(2) Margaret Huffman

The Gospel of Mark is my personal favorite of the four New Testament gospels. Mark presents a very human version of Jesus and therefore one that most people can identify more easily with. Whereas some followers of Christianity have found this humanized presentation of Jesus to be less reliable due to the common Greek used by Mark to write it, it has been discovered more recently that Mark's gospel was used as a reference for both Luke and Matthew's gospels. Another problem that people may have with the Markian Jesus is that the humanized messiah presents a conflict with the all-knowing, all-powerful notion of God that is perpetuated throughout Christianity and used as a goal for humans to constantly aspire to, even if they are human and therefore imperfect. The Markian Jesus, in my opinion, makes a more honest statement about who Jesus was, without lessening his Godliness, for two reasons. The first reason is that the Gospel of Mark has been researched and become understood to be one of the earliest gospels. The second reason is that the Bible says that Jesus was God in human form. God in human form, though still God, would have the conflict of humanity and the problems it presented. Therefore a Jesus, such as the one described in Mark, who feels human emotions such as fear and anger and love, would be no less holy, simply more human. This version of Jesus is one I can personally identify with more easily due to the fact that I was raised in a somewhat strict religious environment, and the idea that Jesus, though human, was beyond any misstep or radical emotion, only lowered my esteem for my own humanity.