The parables in St Mark's Gospel

[Father David Moser]

I was visiting out of town relatives over the civil new year and had a conversation with a young man (husband of a friend of a relative) who is working on a doctoral thesis on parables in the Gospel of Mark. He commented that very little had been written on a particular parable on the sowing of the seed - that being the parable in Mark 4:26-29 That got me looking and while I found the commentary of Blessed Theophylact on that passage (quite interesting btw), I found little else. Is there any patristic Orthodox commentary available in English on the Gospel of Mark? Is there anything specifically on this parable that anyone knows (here I would also include homilies or other spiritual writing)? I'd be interested in hearing about any resources.

Fr David Moser

[Ian Leyda]

I would recommend a little book by Bonnie Bowman Thruston called "Preaching Mark." It is not an Orthodox commentary, but she is a very good exegete.

[Peter Farrington]

Dear Father David

It might be worth looking at:

http://www.logos.com/products/details/2439

The Ancient Christian Commentary. Which has a volume on the Gospel of St Mark. If you don't know the series it is a patristic commentary on the books of the Bible. I find some of the references slightly heterodox, too much Theodoret in some volumes for my taste. But a wonderful resource, and I have only just discovered that a CD collection has been released.

The printed volumes are here:

http://www.ivpress.com/accs/

Peter