One of my favorite reading when I was eleven was a series of "Pick-Your-Adventure" books. The bottom of each page presented choices for the characters, and I'd turn to the appropriate page and the adventure would continue accordingly, with attendant consequences for the characters and plot line.  The Gospel According to Mark is a bit like that, too. What's with the three endings?  We don't know. Not really.  Scholars have debated this one since the early church.

Did the women really run away, afraid, and tell no one?

Did they eventually tell the disciples, and did the disciples not believe them? And Jesus appear to others (on the road...) and the disciples not believe them?  And finally did Jesus appear to them and A-ha! they finally believed?

Well, yes... Luke, Matthew and John spell out those latter stories.

But did Mark include them in his version of the Gospel?

We don't know. Not really. 

What we do know is that the earliest and most reliable scrolls of Mark (scrolls, not books...) conclude with the women running off, telling no one, because they were afraid. 

And when we read the two extra endings, found in much later versions of the scroll, indicated helpfully here , and having spent the last few days listening to Mark's voice, it's easy (well, here I'm showing my hand... ) to see... hear? why scholars think they were extra, added.... They just don't sound like Mark. At least, a good deal of it. It's just not Mark's language, syntax... 

You can read more here-- this wikipedia page is a pretty decent summary of the thought around this question. 

One of my go-to theologians and scholars these days is Bishop N.T. Wright, retired bishop of Durham and New Testament professor.  His guide, Mark For Everyone, offers his opinion that the original ending is simply missing. Being at the end of the scroll, it was likely accidentally torn out due to wear, and it just got lost.  He doesn't buy that Mark would have the story end with the women telling no one, when throughout the Gospel Jesus admonished his followers "not to tell anyone until he had risen from the dead,"  and he doesn't buy that the language in either of the two endings is Markan language. 

A part that I love in the longer ending is the language around the ascension, and Jesus' command to the disciples to go and preach the good news to all creation... all creation... good stuff.  The snake handling and poison drinking, well, see above re. it just doesn't sound like Mark...

As an antidote to this puzzling ending...these puzzling endings, this good news: we're here! So thanks be to God, the women told *someone* :)  

And for today's musical gem... unfortunately I couldn't find my favorite setting of Psalm 42, by The Miserable Offenders, on youtube. However, it's available for a quick listen, and download at Church Publishing as part of a Greatest Hits, and on Amazon in the original album entitled, God Help Us.  The Miserable Offenders were a fabulous duo that performed throughout the Anglican Communion during the 90's. If you're looking for some good tunes as you prepare for Lent, I highly recommend  God Help Us.

 

Meanwhile, on with Numbers, numbers and logistics and more numbers!  The portion of Numbers 7 we read today leads me to wonder what it was like to hear this in what may have been its first existence in oral tradition, because it reads a bit like something kids would sing on a bus on a field trip... or something kids would sing while wandering in the wilderness for 40 years...40 long years...

 

"The one who presented his offering on the Nth day was (Name)  son of (Name), of the tribe of (Tribe Name); his offering was one silver plate weighing one hundred and thirty shekels, one silver basin weighing seventy shekels, according to the shekel of the sanctuary, both of them full of choice flour mixed with oil for a grain-offering; one golden dish weighing ten shekels, full of incense; one young bull, one ram, one male lamb a year old, for a burnt-offering; one male goat for a sin-offering; and for the sacrifice of well-being, two oxen, five rams, five male goats, and five male lambs a year old. This was the offering of (Name) son of (Name)."

 

Twelfth verse, same as the first, a little bit louder and....