Eating, Ecstasy, and Exorcism (Mark 3:21)

Abstract

There have been many attempts to explain Mark 3:20-35 in recent years, though most of these have concentrated on determining how this Markan intercalation functions within the Markan narrative. By contrast, the interest here is in understanding what Jesus had done that would have led to the accusation of madness. This article Assuming the recent social-scientific work on honor/shame and kinship/fictive kinship groups, this article attempts to show what in Jesus' behavior was perceived to be deviant. Mark's off-hand comment that Jesus could not or would not eat provides a clue to the behavior that precipitated the controversy. The symbolism involved in not eating food was used by magicians, thaumaturges, and exorcists to prepare for an encounter with the gods and demons. That symbolism was also a powerful way to ommunicate that one belonged to a certain social group. To abstain from food suggested to some that the non-consumer was a magician. Magicians, however, were regarded with a great deal of ambivalence and uncertainty, sometimes perceived as sorcerers. Jesus abstained from food perhaps for reasons of purgation and purification, perhaps to bring on visions, but the ambivalence evoked by his non-consumption was exploited by the religious elite to impugn his honor. They accused him of sorcery and marked him as a deviant.