Mark 16:9-20
Tom
Hanks in the movie Cast Away portrays
a man stranded on a desert island by himself after his plane crashed. A soccer
ball became his new best friend. He had to learn to adapt in order to survive.
And this drive to survive has spawned a whole series of TV shows. They are
about how people make it through, although it is really about holding our
attentions to the next commercial and next week’s episode.
If
you notice our text today, you will notice that most modern translations put
this text as a separate section of the text. Often the put a footnote telling
us that the oldest and most reliable manuscripts and most ancient sources don’t
have this section. What does that mean?
The
Bible was written as men were moved by the LORD to write, and they wrote on the
paper of their day or on animal skin. They didn’t have a printing press, or a
scanner to make copies, so every copy that was passed along had to be copied by
hand. They knew they were copying the most important document in the world, so
they would have carried on the Jewish traditions around safeguarding the
accuracy of the text. Thousands of these handwritten copies survive. They are
remarkably similar. Only a few places have differences, and none of these
differences change the meaning of the text or our understanding of theology.
They are mainly spelling differences around places and people. Some have to do
with the sound of words and regional variations.
And
since it was God’s Word, other people quoted these texts and commented on what
they meant to everyday life, just like I try to do with this BLOG. They would
often quote large sections in their writings. It is said that you could destroy
all the copies of the Scriptures and reconstruct the entire Bible just from
these ancient quotes. When the content of a book changes so many lives, it is
bound to be copied and cherished.
So
when our footnote tells us that verses nine through twenty aren’t in these old
copies or quoting sources we are led to doubt whether these verses were in the
original. By the way, this is the largest section of the Bible that is in
doubt. Most are a word or two, some a verse or two. So we can trust the accuracy
of our Bibles.
I
think that the ending of Mark’s Gospel was lost very early, perhaps before even
one copy was made. That would account for the lack of copies and ancient
witnesses. Then I think someone down through history realized that the book
ended abruptly without telling about the post-resurrection appearances, so they
added them. Another possibility is that this part of Mark was broken off, only
to be reunited with the rest of the Gospel at a later date. Or maybe a dog ate
the last page and the owner of the manuscript wrote down what he remembered it
said.
We
know from the other Gospels that Jesus did appear to His followers as out text
today states. He is alive. He did send out His followers to reach the world
with the news that sins are forgiven and relationship with God restored in
Jesus. And the power that Jesus had while He was here on earth will be present
with His followers, validating their message of hope.
So
while these verse may not be part of Scripture, part of God’s Word, the content
is certainly validated through other texts that we do know are part of the
Bible.