Mark 13 is often called the Synoptic Apocalypse. It is synoptic not only because it appears in the "synoptic" gospels, but because it can itself be read synoptically alongside Matthew 24 and Luke 21. It is apocalyptic because it reveals the End of Days. One of these passages is Mark 13:26 (with its dependent Mark 14:62), "and then they will see the Son of Man coming on clouds with great power and splendour", a citation of Daniel 7:13-14. It is firmly Markan, appearing in Matt 24:30 (and 28:18) and Luke 21:27 (and 1:33). Assuming the integrity of both Mark and Daniel during and since the first century CE, Mark is a witness to a Book of Daniel close to the one we know today.
But my projects have thrown doubt on both books during that century. I have shown here that Mark once existed in an earlier edition, known to Luke, which lacked Mark 6:26-8:21. Then I showed here that Daniel 7:13-14 is a quote from an earlier prophecy whose "son of man" could mean anything. The author of Daniel 7 wanted this figure to be symbolic of the true believers; Ezekiel the Tragedian instead took it literally, and made its Moses in the image of said figure. So which editor of Mark quoted Daniel 7:13-14, and was he alluding to this passage as part of Daniel or of Daniel's source?
Mark has few references to Daniel. Besides Mark 13:26 and 14:62, the Greek New Testament lists Mark 4:32, 13:16, and 13:19.
Mark 4:32 (== Matt 13:32, Luke 13:19, Thom 20) is Mark's take on the Mustard Seed, which also appears to be a part of Q, based on Matt & Luke's shared divergences and follow-up pericope. All three versions parallel Nebuchadnezzar's tree vision in "Daniel 4:12,21". Luke used Mark here; if Mark has in turn used Daniel there would be no reason to suggest that Mark was not using Daniel elsewhere.
Mark (with Thomas 20) does not turn the plant into a tree; his plant's branches provide shade, not a perch; and the plant provides a service the birds can take advantage of, an advantage that Matthew and Luke's birds (probably from Q) seize. Mark and Thomas therefore depict a more positive scene than does Matthew, much more than does Luke, and far more than "Daniel 4:12,21". Q probably intended an irony here: the tree in Daniel 4 will one day fall!
But it cannot be proven that it is really Daniel that Mark is using here. Kloppenborg (and Robert Funk, in New Gospel Parallels) noted that Dan LXX shared with Mark the kai... ta peteina tou ouranou, and Dan Th the en toiV kladoiV autou and kataskhnoun (the latter before the birds, there called ornea). Both versions of Daniel had independently borrowed from Ezekiel 31:5c-6a LXX, of which the translator of Dan LXX perhaps most closely followed the template: see here. Either Mark chose verses in two translations of Daniel, or else Mark was using Ezekiel and ignored both Daniels.
One objection to this, is that the kataskhnoun is unique to Dan Th in the Daniel tradition. Here, though, Kloppenborg additionally showed that ta peteina tou ouranou kataskhnwsei exists outside this tradition in Psalm 103:10-12 LXX, and in an order closer to Mark and Q (especially as seen by Matthew).
Mark's skiai should end the debate; it is a word found in LXX Ezekiel 31:6 that appears altered in LXX Daniel and not at all in Th.
I think it likely that the source common to Mark and Q intended to cite LXX Ezekiel 31:6 but subconsciously slipped into LXX Psalm 103:10-12's language. Therefore we have to look elsewhere to find an example of Mark citing Daniel.
For the rest, to find out whether a Markan reference to Daniel proper is authentically Markan, one should preferably identify whether that reference is still visible in Luke, perhaps moved elsewhere. Failing that, one can look at other lost parts of Mark similar to the reference whose traces have survived in Luke, and extrapolate how Luke was likely to treat such a part of Mark if it did exist.
Where the three synoptics overlap, Matthew's version is usually closer to canonical Mark's than is Luke's. This is partly because, as I have shown earlier, Luke used an early copy of Mark lacking some sections (Mark 6:26-8:21). This is also because Luke was free with this source: Luke corrected Mark's errors and diction, and even went so far as to omit sections like Mark 8:22-27a.
In addition Luke used little of Daniel. Matthew by contrast made extensive use of the Theodotionic (i.e. "classical, late LXX") translation of Daniel: Daniel 2:28-9 in Matthew 24:6; Dan 2:34-5,44-5 in 21:44; Dan 2:45 in 24:6; Dan 3:5 in 4:9 and so on down the index, The Greek New Testament p. 899.
Luke 22:69 borrowed Mark 14:62 much as Luke 21:27 borrowed Mark 13:26, but omitted the clouds. This shows that Luke was trying to shake off Mark's messianism in Mark 14.
Luke cuts and runs around Mark's imagery in Mark 13 too. Mark 13:15-16a's roof/house/field triad, most of which Matthew reproduced in 24:17-18, is instead "inside the city flee, and in the countryside do not reenter" in Luke 21:21. But Luke knew Mark 13:15-16a, because Luke has cited it in Luke 17:31.
Likewise Mark 13:24-25a's (and Matt 24:29's) sun/moon/stars triad is merely "portents in the sun, moon, and stars" for Luke 21:25a, to which Luke added events on the ground (dismay, seas, fainting). The three share a conclusion of a heavenly shake-up which is irrelevant to Luke's extra land-based events. Mark had the original and Matthew transmitted it faithfully; Luke's version is secondary.
Mark 13:32-37's parable on staying alert is likewise recast, not only by Luke but also Matthew.
Mark and Matthew also agree that the Apocalypse was a word for the disciples at the Mount of Olives, the full version in private (Mark 13:3 = Matt 24:3); Luke 21:7 follows 21:5-6 directed to a crowd of onlookers, presumably by the Temple. Luke's narrative has Jesus's speech segue right into the coming plots against Jesus's life. Our version of Mark, by focusing on the disciples and secrecy, breaks up the link between the original prediction that the Temple would fall (Mark 13:1-2) and the plots in Mark 14:1.
Likewise it is hard to know whether Luke's conclusion in 21:28 is the original, or Mark 13:27 = Matt 24:31. Luke ends with a general admonition to "stand tall"; Mark with a message for the b'nai yishrael, that angels shall gathered it together from the four winds (their post-exile metaphor for exile: MT Jeremiah 49:36; Ezekiel 37:9; Zechariah 2:6,6:5).
Within Mark 13, Mark 13:14's mention of the bdelugma thV erhmwseuV, Abomination that Desolates, first appears in the Greek translations of Daniel 9:27, 11:31, 12:11 (with the second word in plural). The Abomination's source is something a reader "should understand" and Matthew's quote in 24:15 bluntly names it "Daniel". Likewise when Mark 13:19 (== Matt 24:21) talks of distress "the likes of which has not occurred since the God created the world until now, nor will it ever happen again", it is following Daniel 12:1's template, but substituting world history for the Jewish nation's and extending it to the eternal future.
Instead of Mark 13:14's abomination, Luke 21:10 instead has Jerusalem surrounded by armies. Same with Mark 13:19; Luke 21:23 concentrates on the land, not the time, and does not call it the worst period in Jewish or world history.
I cannot answer the question for Mark 13:14, but I can for 13:19: Luke knew it. Luke 21:23 starts with the vague mention of "in these days", continues with "misery across the land", and ends with "until the period allotted to the pagans has run its course". This division of history into tangible chunks is even more in line with Mark 13:20 - "those days will be cut short" - than it is with Daniel 12:1.
There is therefore a merest hint that Luke read in her copy of the Gospel of Mark the full text of Mark 13:19, which cites Daniel 12:1. Daniel 12 is of a piece with Daniel 8 onward. I therefore follow the majoritarian / conservative opinion that Mark followed a Greek translation of something we'd recognise as the Book of Daniel, not a source which happened to share the same wording. Mark didn't use it often; and Luke tried not to refer to it at all; but it was in use in Mark's early Christian community.
Any thoughts? e-mail me :^)
zimriel@sbcglobal.netStarted this 8 Sept 2001. 14 Sept, reorganised it. 24 Sept, clarified Ezekiel v. Daniel here and in the Nabunai-Nebuchad"n"ezzar project. 20 Oct, fixed the earlier part. 7 April 2002, link-fix, ease-of-reading for Dan-v-Zeke.