22 Joost Smit Sibinga Chart 8: Mark 14:43-52: The Number of Words in Narrative and Discourse Narrative Discourse Sum-total Jesus Judas Mark 14:43 27 - - 27 44 8 - 10 18 | 45 45ab 6 - 1 7 45c 3 - - 3 46 9 - - 9| 19 47 18 - - 18 48-49 6 28 - 34 50 5 - - 5| 57 51-52 19 - - 19 | 19 | 140 w. Mark 14:43-52 101 28 11 140 w. Twenty-eight, the number of Jesus’ words spoken in v. 48b-49, of course, is the triangular number of seven and a perfect number. The position of the name ὁ Ἰησοῦς in v. 48a is worth our attention: Mark 14:43-47 45+19+18= 82 48a καὶ ἀποκριθείς 2 84 ὁ Ἰησοῦς 2 εἶπεν αὐτοῖς 2 48b-49 < 28 > 50-52 5+19= 24 56 140 words The name Jesus in v. 48a divides the episode in two sections of three viz. two times twenty-eight words: (3 x 28) + (2 x 28) = 5 x 28 = 140 words.42 In v. 43-44, a first paragraph that prepares for and leads up to the arrest, we count 45 words; 45 is the triangular number of nine. As this introductory paragraph readily divides in (v. 43) 10 + 8 + 9 + (v. 44) 8 + « 10 » = 18 + 9 + 18 words, its phrasing is evidently based on an aliquot part of nine words. One notices the formal symmetry between the arrival of Judas and company in v. 43 (10 + 8 words) and Judas’ earlier arrangement with them, v. 44, in 8 + « 10 » words. The nine words about 42 Earlier in this context, Mark 14:17-18, 19-21 use 28 + 56 = 84 words, if in v. 19 one reads μήτι as two words: μή τι - so the Textus Receptus, Lachmann, Tregelles, Souter. Cf. C.R. Gregory (see n. 30), p. 110, who refers to John 21:5.