miracles of Jesus draw increasingly large crowds (1:32, 37, 45; 2:2; 3:7–8; 4:1; 5:21; 6:33–34, 54–56; 8:1; 9:15, 25). Moreover, Jesus uses his healing of the paralytic to validate his claim to be able to forgive sins (2:1–12); so Jesus does on occasion use a miracle to convince doubters concerning the truth of his claims.10 However, the presentation of Jesus’ miracles in Mark’s Gospel is more complex than a straightforward apologetic purpose would imply. Mark did not portray Jesus as seeking to