Form and Function in the Passion Story: the Issue of Genre Reconsidered

Abstract

While literary-critical approaches have become an accepted part of biblical criticism, skeptics continue to ask about the ultimate value of such procedures. Thus far the 'payoff has been limited largely to alternate readings and to different perspectives on redactional intent, and traditionsgeschichtliche questions of origin and development are rarely addressed through literary-critical tools.

This investigation demonstrates how formalistic analysis of the passion story not only raises issues of interpretation and intentionality, but also requires careful recon sideration of the form and genre of this tradition. This study identifies in Mark 14-16 a formal pattern which controls ten of the twelve scenes and influences the other two. Sayings material is shown to exert a surprising influence upon the narration of Jesus' final days. This literary pattern requires a restatement of the defining traits of the passion story: its genre, its function, its origin. Each of these issues will be reformu lated in light of the literary characteristics of the scenes in Mark 14-16. As a conse quence this study demonstrates that literary-critical tools may be used to illuminate enduring foundational questions such as the origin and identity of the passion story.