Marginal Christianity

“You will all become Deserters” (Mt.26:31-35) However thrilling, if mind-boggling, it might have been for the disciples to hear and see Jesus proclaim and enact their ancient hopes and display his own joy in the face of the grim prospects ahead of him, as they trudged on the way with him those questions they have had about Jesus all along came back in spades. -How can Jesus’ death fulfill their hopes and longings? -How can a suffering and dying figure ever be considered Messiah? Unlike the unnamed woman who lavishly anointed Jesus for his burial they cannot come to terms with his death. Here at the end, as has apparently been clear to Jesus all along, it is necessary for him to make them face the truth of who they are as those who want to follow him. Truth is the condition of healing and freedom, and Jesus gives the disciples a face full of it! “You will all become deserters because of me this night,” adding Zech.13:7 as a fulfilment text. Even this mass des...

A trumped-up trial matches the over-the-top squad sent to arrest Jesus and testifies to the overall questionability of the whole action against him. False testimony against Jesus was given and received, false testimony that was inconsistent at that. Finally the high priest imperiously demands some answer from Jesus for all this (inconsistent) witness against him. Jesus still refuses to answer. The high priest persists: “Are you the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed One?” (v.61). -“are you the Messiah?” is the very same statement Peter makes in his confession or faith in ch.8 (“you are the Messiah”) cast as a question. We know Peter’s witness is true there. Thus we know that Jesus will answer the high priest’s question in the affirmative. -the high priest’s unwitting testimony to the truth of Jesus’ identity is matched by Peter now languishing in the courtyard waiting to deny Jesus! - “Are you the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed One?” “When he adds ‘The son of the B...

A group of armed men arrive to take Jesus in tow. They are likely authorized by the Sanhedrin to arrest and detain the awaiting trial before it (Boring, Mark : 10935-10937). Jesus protests that he is no brigand requiring armed capture. The betrayer, Judas, appears and scene to do the foul deed. A bystander wields his sword in Jesus’ defense and cuts of the ear of the chief priest’s slave. And all Jesus’ friends desert him. Except one. A mysterious young man wearing a linen cloth remains present. “They,” presumably the crowd arresting Jesus, grab to him to detain him as well as one of Jesus’ cohorts. But who is he? Mark himself? So many have guessed. Opinions run the gamut. N. T. Wright takes this a symbol of the final and total disgrace of the deserting disciples. “Finally, we have the young man who, like Joseph in Genesis 39.12, escapes by  leaving his garment behind. It’s often been suggested that this was Mark himself  (the other gospels don’t mention the ...

Covenant Renewal (Mark 14:22-23) Despite centuries of reading this story as foundational for the church’s doctrine of the Eucharist or the Lord’s Supper, Mark’s version stays focused on Jesus and discipleship rather than the church. In the middle of the Supper Jesus enacts what is best described as an act of Covenant Renewal. Jesus breaks and shares bread with his disciples. Do they understand about the loaves now? And do they catch the allusions in sharing the cup of wine? We’re not told. But what we can safely assume is that  “By eating the bread, the disciples are to know that they somehow become participants in Jesus’ own destiny, but this saying does not specify how this is to be. Receiving and eating bread that Jesus has somehow identified with his very self may be an enactment of what he had said in 8:34–38” ( Boring, Mark :10671-10673) . The bread reminds us of Jesus who used the leftovers of the two feeding stories to dramatize himself as the provider of cove...

Wat do we do with passages like this? Mark tells his story but it’s not what we want to know. Why did Judas betray Jesus? Ark doesn’t tell us. Doesn’t even make him out to be a bad guy. The devil didn’t make him do it. Not according to Mark. Nor are we told that Judas was disappointed by Jesus’ kingdom movement and thus offered to betray him to the chief priests. But maybe what Mark doesn’t tell us points us in the right direction anyway. What might Mark be saying by saying nothing we can claim a “reason” for this event. Eugene Boring claims “that Mark is only interested in the unseen hand of God at work in these events (Boring, Mark :10524-10526). That’s why he offers no “reasons” for it. My hunch is Boring is right on this. The same point holds for the arrangements for Passover. Boring again seems on target: “’The Lord needs it’ . . . This is the key to the Markan understanding of this scene. Historicizing interpretations have attempted to discern in all this some prearr...