“Before examining the evidence that pertains to the text itself, it must be emphasized that the question of the
authorship of this passage is not necessarily a question of its
canonicity. In other words, when asking,
(1) did Mark write this passage? and
(2) is this passage inspired Scripture?, it is possible to answer "No" to the first question while still answering "Yes" to the second.” (page 198)
“Some researchers who deny that Mark wrote verses 9-20 believe that an inspired associate of Mark composed them, and on these grounds they propose that these verses, regardless of their authorship, are an inspired text which the Lord has used to instruct His church. A similar view seems to be held by Dr. Bruce Metzger, a member of the United Bible Societies’ Editorial Committee,
which produced the UBS Greek New Testament.” (page 198)
“
The Reader's Digest Bible fully included Mark 16:9-20 as part of the text of the Gospel of Mark with no note whatsoever.” (page 198)
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HOW TO LOSE AN ENDING (from pages 242- 247)[/FONT]
Option One (Least Likely): someone in the second century intentionally removed the Long Ending because of apologetic, practical, and doctrinal motivations.
Option Two (Somewhat Unlikely): Another theory of accidental loss posits that an early copy of Mark contained a symbol to indicate the end of the Byzantine lection-reading for the second Sunday after Easter -- that is, Mark 15:43-16:8. A subsequent copyist then misunderstood this symbol to mean that the text of the entire book came to a close at that point, and therefore he did not include the rest of the text when he made copies.
Option Three (Likely): Sometime in the second century, the Long Ending was accidentally lost. The simplest method of accidental loss is as follows: the contents of the Long Ending happened to occupy the last page of an early copy of the Gospel of Mark.
Option Four (Also Likely): A professional copyist unfamiliar with the contents of Mark (and, perhaps, familiar with the forms of Greek tragedy), coming to the end of the last recto (right-hand page) of a book, might think that the next page was empty, especially if the end of v. 8 was presented as the end of a paragraph (i.e., mid-line).
Option Five (Probability Difficult to Determine): The Gospel of Mark was almost immediately incorporated into the worship-services of the church in Egypt as soon as it arrived there. A reading assigned for Easter-time ended at 16:8. Dissatisfied with the negative tone of the last sentence, an early lector composed the Short Ending and placed it in the margin of his copy. This copy was subsequently used as an exemplar by professional copyists (possibly non-Christians who were not familiar with the text).
by the existence of two endings, and not sure which one ought to be included, some copyists perpetuated neither ending, and some perpetuated only the Short Ending.
Option Six (Most Likely): A second-century copyist who collected Christian material assumed (having received the standard tradition of the church) that the Gospel of Mark consists of the remembrances of Peter as told to Mark. However, when reading the Gospel of Mark, he recognized the Long Ending: it was essentially a source-document which he had previously encountered, and which he did not regard as the work of Peter or Mark. He therefore marked the Long Ending as questionable. A subsequent copyist deleted the marked text. Or, he recognized the convergence of the Gospel of Mark with an earlier source known to him – a Passion Narrative – and recognized that 16:9-20 constituted a departure from the account known to him, and for this reason marked the Long Ending as questionable.
