We arrive therefore at the conclusion: _Until the confession before the council Jesus was publicly regarded as the Forerunner, as he had been already in Galilee._ [pg 164] CHAPTER VII AFTER THE MISSION OF THE TWELVE. LITERARY AND HISTORICAL PROBLEMS 1. The Voyage on the Lake after the Return of the Twelve. It is exceedingly difficult to gather from the Synoptic accounts a clear picture of the events which happened after the mission of the Twelve. When did the Disciples return? Where did Jesus betake himself during their absence? What sort of success did the Disciples have? What events happened between their return and the departure for the north? Were these events of a sort to account for Jesus’ determination to withdraw with them into solitude? The accounts supply no answer to these questions. Moreover they confront us with another, a purely literary problem. The connection between the several scenes is here extraordinarily broken. It seems almost as if the thread of the narration were here completely lost. Only at the moment of departure for the journey to Jerusalem do the [pg 165] scenes begin to stand again in a clear and natural relationship. First of all we have to do with two obvious doublettes: the feeding of the multitude and the subsequent journey on the lake (Mk 6:31, 56 = Mk 8:1, 21). In both instances Jesus is overtaken by the multitude as he lands on a lonely shore after a journey across the lake. Then he returns again to the Galilean village on the west shore. Here in his accustomed field of activity he encounters the Pharisaic emissaries from Jerusalem. They call him to account. In the series which contains the first account of the feeding of the multitude the question at issue is about hand-washing (Mk 7:1-23), in the second case it is the requirement of a sign (Mk 8:11-13). The first series concludes with the departure for the north, where in the neighbourhood of Tyre and Sidon he meets the Canaanitish woman (Mk 7:24-30). In the second series the journey to Cæsarea Philippi (Mk 8:27) follows upon his encounter with the Pharisees.