refore all the more
interesting and important that his actual words as reported by them do
not necessarily confirm their opinion. On the other hand, there is a
series of passages peculiar to Mark (that is to say, none of them is
found in Q) in which "Son of Man" does not refer to any coming in
judgement, but to the approaching passion, death, and resurrection of
Jesus. If he really uttered these words, beyond doubt he meant himself
by the Son of Man, and was introducing an entirely unparalleled and new
element into the delineation of this supernatural figure. But did he
use these words? In the description of the passion, death, and
resurrection it is generally recognised that the exactness of the
prediction probably owes something to the disciples' later knowledge of
the actual course of events. Their conduct at the arrest of Jesus, and
the entire absence of any sign of expectation of the resurrection,
render it very improbable that Jesus spoke with the definiteness
ascribed to him. In this case, therefore, there is decided reason for
thinking that the phrase "Son of Man" may itself belong to the
embellishment rather than to the body of tradition.

Thus the passages in which Jesus certainly uses "Son of Man" are
ambiguous--they need not {52} necessarily refer to him, and the
passages which unambiguously refer to him were not certainly spoken by
him. For this reason it is somewhat more probable than not that the
identification of Jesus with the Son of Man was not made by Jesus
himself. But it certainly embodies the earliest opinion of the
disciples concerning him, and it is in all probability to this
apocalyptic figure of the Man in heaven, predestined to judge the world
and anointed by God for that purpose, that the Markan tradition (we
cannot speak with certainty of Q) referred when it described Jesus as
"anointed."

A little later the circles represented by Matthew and Luke added to
this the more popular expectation of the restored monarchy of the house
of David; but the original stamp was never lost, and the functions of
the Christian Messiah, as apart from his name, were always those of the
Man of Enoch, much more than those of the Davidic king of the Psalms of
Solomon.

Finally, the concept of the Man who was to judge the world was
extensively modified by the actual course of the passion, death, and
resurrection of Jesus, and the Lukan writings, though probably not
Mark, Q, or even Matthew, facilitated