Jesus' eating transgressions and social impropriety in the gospel of Mark: a social scientific approach

Biblical Theology Bulletin, Spring, 2000 by Dietmar Neufeld

G. Feeley-Harnik observes that Jesus' many culinary disasters along with his gluttony probably paved the way for his condemnation and eventual crucifixion. She asks, "why should it have been such a powerful means of exalting Jesus as well as condemning him?" (72). As noted earlier, food and feasting are one of the most significant languages used by Judeans to express a variety of social relationships (Feeley-Harnik: 19, 72). These social relationships are partially dictated and defined by Israel's attitude and stance toward ethical, practical, and ethnic purity matters. These matters, in turn, are replicated in the dietary and commensality practices. Feeley-Harnik writes, "food, articulated in terms of who eats what with whom under which circumstances, had long been one of the most important languages in which Israelites conceived and conducted social relations among human beings and between human beings and God. Food was a way of talking about law and lawlessness. Food was identified with God's word as the foundation of the covenant relationship in scripture ... eventually when God's word became identified with the law; food law came to represent the whole law. The violation of dietary rules became equivalent to apostasy" (19). Thus, to flout deliberately the conventions of appropriate eating conduct at meals by disregarding the reputation of table companions, altering the contours of group identity, and challenging the customs concerning purity, would swiftly arouse the ire of the religious elite, family members, strangers, and friends.

Food events within the Markan community, therefore, constitute a powerfully concentrated language that communicates meaning. The language embedded in food habits and eating rituals is one of the idioms through which Jesus is portrayed as expressing himself--a peformative that demonstrated his message.

Household, Kinship Family and the Honor of Jesus

The house or the household is the centre for a group of people (Osiek & Balch: 45). The family is an integral part of the household: a group of people bound in relationships of mutual reciprocity through kinship, both living and working together. It is also the dominant social institution in the lives of ancients, providing a source of identity, religion, education and nurture. The household is a component of the larger social structure in which members produce and consume collectively in the context of socio-economic conditions that are often negative (Moxnes 1997). People come into the picture of the household as immediate family, relatives, neighbors and friends, each participating in the other's lives. Furthermore, the household serves as the primary group of identification for individual members. Kinship plays a significant role, both culturally and socially, in defining a collective identity. This collective group with a common history helps forge a link between the individual members of a household, the larger community, and the country and its people. In Mark 6:4, Jesus is explicitly associated with three distinct groups: "A prophet is not without honor except in his own country, and among his own kin, and in his own house." A person is understood to belong to all three of these groups permanently (Malina 1993: 117-48).