"The Last Supper Of Jesus Christ"



The Portrayal of Jesus in the Gospels: Mark vs. Matthew

Ben Favier

The Gospels of Mark and Matthew both portray Jesus in similar and different ways, on this website I am going to explore these contrasts and try to determine their personal views of Jesus.

The Gospel of Mark communicates to us a Jesus who is very human, a doer of great works(miracles), and a suffering servant. We interperet Marks view of Jesus by looking at the diction Mark uses to describe Jesus and the stories Mark includes in his Gospel. The most apparent evidence of his viewing Jesus as human is the substitution of Jesus's name for "the Son of Man." This title emphasizes Jesus's humanity by relating him to us as born of a human. This is also the title that Jesus uses for refering to himself. For example in line Mark 10:33 Jesus says, "Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be handed over." Suggesting that he is human, but, a different interpretation could also suggest that this implies his divinity. Jesus is also portrayed as human through Mark's stories that include all of Jesus's emotions. Mark mentions Jesus's compassion, distress, his tiredness,and includes when Jesus askes questions he implys that Jesus did not already know the answer. The fact that Jesus did not know the date of his second coming also suggested humanity and uncertainty towards the future, Mark 13:32. This leads to a lower Christology of Jesus but Mark's Gospel still relays the powerful message of Jesus. Marks gospel contains far less of Jesus's teachings than the other gospels, however, he fills his gospel up with the good works of Jesus. He records 17 miracles, and he also summaries and generalizes alluding tomany more good works. The mighty works of this human using God's power is a dominant theme in this gospel. Yet when we think of Mark's gospel we are always brought back to the suffering servant. The idea that God's son, sent to serve us and save us, was tortured and killed by us. Mark portrays Jesus's agony, pain, and hardship during his life on Earth. Enduring the horror of cruxifiction.

The Gospel of Matthew, when compared to Mark, protrays Jesus with a higher Christology, as a teacher, savior, and the fulfillement of the scriptures. In Matthews gospel Jesus is shown to be more divine than human yet there are still examples of his humanity. Matthew makes Jesus seem more divine by leavig out elements of his humanity by obscuring Jesus's emotions and questions. For instance in Mark 24:36 Jesus says he does not know the time of the second coming of man. Matthew leaves this whole part out entirely so that we do not see Jesus without an answer. In Matthew's gospel Jesus is referred to as Lord, Son of God, and Messiah by his disciples. In the Gospel of Matthew Jesus is actually worshipped. Matthew portrays Jesus as a teacher becasue in his gospel there are five large chunks of his teachings. These chunks make up almost one third of Matthew's Gospel, statistically speaking it is 322 verses, the largest around being around 100 verses. They are The Sermon On the Mount and the predicting of Jesus's future. The inner two blocks contain about 35 verses and are about the Chruch's mission. The Fifth block is fifty verses and contains Jesus's parables on the Kingdom of God. Because Jesus is trying to teach the people how they should correctly follow God's teaching he dislikes the Pharisees hypocritical ways. In Matthew's gospel this conflict is developed throughout the story. Mathews gospel portrays Jesus as Savior by usisng the Name Jesus 150 times in his gospel. Also the Idea of God being present with us a key aspect on this. The fullfillment to the scriptures is very important in Matthew's Gospel because it shows to the Jews and others that Jesus's life was planned out by God and revealed through the prophets. The genealogy of Jesus shows how Jesus is related directly to God and the prophets.





I was unable to cite this picture because it has since been removed from the original "site." If You know anything about this pictures origins please email me.



I found the following sources extremely helpful in making this project as they were great sources of ideas and evidence.

Source on Mark's Gospel

Source on Mattew's Gospel

My home Page