Why does the Gospel of Mark begin as it does?

The liminality of this stage may be perceived in the ambiguity of Jesus' status and in the new relationships he establishes. Although the voice from heaven declares he is God's Son, his identity will not be totally clear until his testing period ends; therefore, ambiguity is a mark of this entire period. As in other ritual processes, along with this ambiguity, there is a communitas, namely, a new set of relationships based on fundamental common characteristics. Whereas during this period Jesus has no relationships with other human beings, he interacts with beings belonging to another realm of existence. The Spirit comes upon him and becomes his guide (elder), for he is the one who leads Jesus into the desert. The voice that comes from heaven declaring Jesus as God's Son also belongs to this supernatural realm, where both Satan and the angels--with whom Jesus relates in the wilderness--live. Usually, the communitas is intended to create new relationships among the initiands, thus cancelling all differences among them. In Mark's narrative, however, Jesus establishes these relationships with beings belonging to a kind of mesocosmos, showing that this is Jesus' true place, for he is not a human being like others. This is what is meant by the statement, "You are my beloved child," which reveals Jesus' true identity.

Jesus' relation to the Spirit and his confrontation with Satan in this early stage of the Gospel prefigure his later confrontations with evil spirits. Mark gives his readers a key to understand the meaning of the exorcisms, which Jesus himself will explain in the controversy begun by the Pharisees who had come from Jerusalem (Mk 3:22-30). When confronting demons, Jesus acts with the power of God's Spirit, and his exorcisms are therefore a sign of a deeper confrontation (Guijarro 1999: 125-27). As we have previously seen, the account of Jesus' baptism and temptations may have been influenced by the accusations raised against him of casting out demons by the power of Beelzebul. In presenting Jesus as he does, Mark would be answering these accusations and vindicating Jesus' honor as God's Son, endowed with power over the spirits.

The ritual process ends with Jesus' aggregation, that is, with his return with a new status to the society he left (Mark 1:14-15). The one who had left Nazareth to undergo a baptism of repentance now comes back to Galilee as the herald of God's reign. There is a movement from a sacred space and time to a secular space and time, from the wilderness and the Jordan to Galilee, and from a mythical period of time to the precise moment of John's arrest. After the ritual process, Jesus' newly acquired status enables him to preach with authority the imminent arrival of God's reign and to ask for faith and repentance. This new authority of Jesus, flowing from his ascribed honor as God's Son, will appear soon in his actions. Mark summarizes these actions in the next episodes of his narrative: the call to the first disciples (Mk 1:16-20), the day at Capernaum (Mk 1:21-39), his activity in all Galilee (Mk 1:40-45), and his controversies (Mk 2:1-3:6). Jesus' ascribed honor is thus shown in his acts of beneficence, leading the people to awe, and grows in his confrontations with those who question him.