The Palestinian Gospel of Mark

From Mark Buckley: Just for the record, and because it's not particularly helpful to anyone, it can be pointed out that there was in antiquity, in Palestine, an expanded edition of the gospel of Mark, with a name (just not 'secret' or 'mystical').

Here’s a chunk you can drop straight into your post and tweak as you like:

If you put this alongside the Euthalian subscriptions, it stops looking like pious fluff and starts to look like a technical label. In the Euthalian apparatus to Acts and the Catholic Epistles we read the note: ἀντεβλήθη δὲ τῶν Πράξεων καὶ καθολικῶν ἐπιστολῶν τὸ βιβλίον πρὸς τὰ ἀκριβῆ ἀντίγραφα τῆς ἐν Καισαρείᾳ […]. In plain English: “the book of Acts and the Catholic Epistles was collated against the accurate copies belonging to the [church/library] in Caesarea.” That presupposes that “the accurate copies” (τὰ ἀκριβῆ ἀντίγραφα) were a known, fixed reference-set in the Caesarean collection – the Eusebian/Pamphilian master text, not just a vague compliment for any decent manuscript that happened to be lying around.

Now go back to the Mark catena. When the compiler defends including Mk 16.9–20, he says that even though this section is missing from the majority of copies and is “usually regarded as spurious,” nevertheless “we added it … having found it in the most accurate of copies, and in accordance with the Palestinian Gospel of Mark which has the truth” (κατὰ τὸ Παλαιστίναιον εὐαγγέλιον … οὕτως ἔχοντα τὴν ἀλήθειαν Μάρκον). In other words, there is a “Palestinian Gospel of Mark” which not only serves as a textual norm (ὡς ἔχειν ἀλήθεια), but is explicitly coordinated with “the most accurate copies.” Once you know that there was already a Caesarean set of τὰ ἀκριβῆ ἀντίγραφα used to correct Acts and the Catholic Epistles, the Mark catena’s language falls neatly into place. “The most accurate copies” are not an abstract ideal; they are the same Caesarean-Palestinian master text, here in its Markan form. In that light, “the Palestinian Gospel of Mark” is simply the Palestinian/Caesarean edition of Mark – the one that bore, as its implicit title or reputation, exactly the same “accurate” (ἀκριβής) stamp that Acts and the Catholic letters enjoy in the Euthalian note.

The Catena in Marcum is essentially a commentary on the gospel, seeking to reconcile differences with the other canonicals, citing patristic excerpts (about a third deriving from John Chrysostom's Homilies on Matthew). Of those manuscripts that name an author, some have Cyril of Alexandria, some have one 'Victor of Antioch'. While it is likely that its basis was in the C5, the large variations in the manuscript tradition suggest that it was an 'open book', constantly revised.

Eusebius in his Ad Marinum judged the longer ending of Mark to be poorly attested and spurious. But the Catena has this (447.11 ff.) :

"Even if what is after 'when he rose early', which is recounted in the present gospel, is not found in the largest number of copies [αντιγραφοις], as being customarily considered spurious [νοθα], we added it along with that in which the Lord's resurrection is recounted, having found it in the most accurate of copies, and in accordance with the Palestinian Gospel of Mark, which holds the truth [και κατα το Παλαιστηναιον ευαγγελιον ως εχειν αληθεια Μαρκον]."

The Palestinian Gospel of Mark is otherwise unattested