While there were surely Jewish Christians in Mark's audience for this Gospel, he emphasized the elements of the narrative which Romans would understand. As the life of Jesus climaxes, we see the themes of spiritual blindness, treachery and injustice contrasted with a single example of someone with spiritual insight, bravery not of faith but flesh, and Jesus' complete composure during the whole mess.
The initial plan of the conspiring Sanhedrin was to manufacture an excuse to arrest Jesus after the Passover. Without a strong accusation, or barring Jesus implicating Himself publicly, it would be very difficult to arrest Him at what should have been His greatest exposure, on the Temple grounds ruled by the Sanhedrin. They knew their case was weak, and it was important to wait for the holiday traffic to leave the city. The jaded residents of Jerusalem were far less likely to react to something so purely political.
Meanwhile, mentioning figures surely known to his Roman readers, Mark tells of the one person -- a woman -- who understand what Jesus had said about His impending death. While dining in some supporter's home, this unnamed woman comes to Jesus with a delicate jar. It was long, tapered to a thin neck with a seal stronger than the material of the jar. It was meant to be an extravagance, because the only way to open it was to break it. Normally this meant snapping its thin neck. The entire contents were poured on Jesus' head, a very expensive perfume. The whole thing typically represented a year's wages for the average peasant. When His disciples complained of the waste, that it was better to have given that amount to the poor, Jesus shut them up by pointing out she, at least, paid attention to His warnings about dying very soon. To the last moment, the Twelve never seemed to understand or believe this warning.
Mark seems to connect Jesus' rebuke with the timing of Judas deciding this was over. Using the nickname which marked him as the complete political radical, a member of the assassins who chose Romans and their collaborators as targets, Mark tells us Judas went to the Sanhedrin to arrange a quiet and easy arrest of Jesus. If they would keep an arresting party on hand, he would come to them the first moment Jesus could be taken into custody without a crowd watching. This, in exchange for a mere pittance.
Mark then explains the origin of the Christian Communion celebration. It was based on Jewish Passover, of which most Romans had some vague ideas about sacrificial sheep. It was to be a private celebration of Jesus and His disciples. Obviously, Jesus had prearranged this, and told His men to look for, of all things, a man carrying a water jug, typically a task only for women. The pair found things as He told them, and set about obtaining and cooking the meal. They gathered that evening, which most people knew the whole Near East regarded as the beginning of the next day. During this ritual celebration, Jesus identified two elements as marking a new covenant, symbolic of His life and teaching, and His coming sacrifice. It's unlikely anyone in Mark's audience would have missed Jesus associating His sacrifice with that of the Passover lambs. He told them bluntly this was the last wine He would taste until the Kingdom was brought literally to the earth, meaning He was about to leave earth.
He had warned them earlier there was a traitor in their group, one of those who had been with Him from the start. It seemed impossible. Apparently the immediacy of all this was lost on them. They sang a hymn and left. He warned them as they walked in the evening between houses of solemn celebration that the Scripture prophesied they would desert Him that very night. However, all would be well, and He would rise and wait for them in Galilee, where they had spent so much time together. They all insisted this was not so. Were they not about to take over the city and revive David's monarchy? Peter the more so, as he had prepared himself for duty as Jesus' bodyguard, carrying an illegal weapon. Jesus asserted Peter would disavow Him completely, three times, before dawn. Peter insisted he was ready to die with Jesus.
The cool night air and hike would have kept them awake. Once they settled into the warmer valley garden, with the heavy meal and wine settling in their stomachs, only some trauma could keep them awake at that hour. Apparently Jesus was the only one aware of the awful doom approaching. He left the nine and took His closest trio with Him farther into the garden. His instructions were they should pray as He was praying, that they might rise to a more spiritual level, because human flesh was untrustworthy in the difficulty to come. Three times Jesus went off privately, falling face down on the ground, praying He not have to be executed, yet willing to face it if there was no other way. Each time, He returned to find them sleeping. They just did not sense the spiritual turmoil, but existed entirely in the flesh. All His teaching about His death as the Passover Lamb had passed over their heads. They didn't even have sense enough to be excited about what they thought was coming next: victory over the Jewish leadership.
Instead, Jesus announced His traitor had arrived. Keeping his bargain with the Sanhedrin, Judas led a large and heavily armed arrest party to Jesus. Greeting his rabbi in the typical expressive Eastern fashion, Judas identified Jesus in the darkness. As the mixed group of Temple Guards and Roman soldiers took Him into custody, Jesus loudly noted how silly it was they cowardly arrested Him this way at night, when it would have been pretty easy to do so during His daily teaching sessions right in front of them on the Temple grounds. He never once threatened them, and the elderly priests could have taken Him themselves. Jesus knew it was to fulfill the Scriptures implicating His nation as deep in sin to the very end. The token resistance of Peter amounted to nothing, and the Twelve ran away.
Mark betrays his presence at the event by a brief mention of something about a young man following Jesus and His disciples that night. We envision a young fellow, possibly a member of the family which hosted their Passover celebration that night, who slipped out of the house behind them. Having heard some of the talk that night, it was obvious something exciting was ahead, and perhaps he could catch some of it. When the arrest party began marching Jesus back toward the city, this young man was following a little too closely, and was nearly taken himself by zealous members of the Sanhedrin's group. This young man escaped, as the Greeks say it, in his gymnasium suit -- not necessarily nude, but embarrassingly close to it, at least.
Without bogging down in the details of the Jewish justice system, Mark makes it plain to anyone this whole thing was unjust from the start. The trial was at night to avoid public participation or observation, the Sanhedrin couldn't even buy consistent testimony against Jesus, and the best they could do was some wild story about threatening to destroy the Temple building. In exasperation, the Chief Judge demanded the accused condemn Himself. Jesus willingly complied, frankly stating He was the Messiah. Further, He warned they would someday see Him in His full power judging them. This gave them at least a charge of blasphemy, for which their laws required a death penalty. Then the Jews themselves -- since Romans weren't allowed inside the High Priest's courtyard -- began abusing Him. Every detail was a complete failure of justice by any civilized standard.
Perhaps he hoped yet to redeem himself in some way, for Peter had followed somewhat behind all this, entering the High Priest's courtyard and hanging out with the milling crowd of guards and servants. Three different times he was identified as one of the Twelve, and each time Peter denied it. Nothing here should be taken as Peter using foul language, but as calling curses upon himself as an oath to back his denial. This was typical of Eastern men arguing with someone else. In the end, Peter was already standing in the ornate gateway, trying to avoid any further discussion of his identity, and was hit with it one last time. Obviously this was fear rising in the place of dying bravado of the flesh. When Peter realized the rooster had crowed twice, and he had denied Jesus three times, both as he was warned, his living death was complete. Whatever Peter had been before, there was nothing left but tears.
The Roman audience would have felt a mixture of contempt and pity for Peter. This was Jesus at His hour of greatest need, the last chance when even a futile gesture might be made. The Messianic dreams of kicking out the oppressive Jewish rulers, perhaps the Romans too, and reviving the purity and glory of ancient Israel, all gone. Peter could not so much as acknowledge Jesus was His best friend, much less his Master. Nor could Peter witness to these servants what great things Jesus had done for him, nor all the mighty miracles he had seen, or done himself. Failure of the flesh could not have been more complete. The ultimate failure of virtue, justice and truth were still ahead.
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By Ed Hurst
10 May 2008
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