Mark 11:20-13:37
The author of the Gospel of Mark has assembled some of Jesus’ most meaningful and memorable encounters together into a single day – Tuesday of Holy Week. It covers 115 verses, the longest day in Mark by far. Scholars believe Mark, author of the earliest Gospel, began with a collection of stories, teachings, debates, healings, parables, and then wove them together with his own narrative details that were less concerned with historical accuracy but focused on spiritual truth.
There are fourteen separate episodes on Tuesday of Holy Week, as you can see in the headings in your pew Bible:
The first lesson from the fig tree
Questioning of Jesus’ authority
Parable of the wicked tenants
Questioning about taxes to Caesar
Questioning about resurrection
First commandment
Questioning about David’s son
Jesus denouncing the scribes
The widow’s offering (mite)
Destruction of the temple foretold
Persecution foretold
Desolating sacrilege
The second lesson of the fig tree
A reminder of the necessity for watchfulness
I’m sure you recognize some of your favorite teachings – all gathered together on Tuesday. Mark also gave us verbal markers of where Jesus was at each point and we could actually lay it out with Google Earth.
I’d like to touch on three of the incidents. Tuesday began in Bethany at the home of Mary, Martha and Lazarus. Jesus went into the city and walked to the temple – not inside the sanctuary itself but an outer courtyard, or porch, where he’d confronted the money changers, and the buyers and sellers of sacrificial animals the day before.
He soon is entangled in debates with the chief priest, the scribes and the elders – all wise men who carried forward the traditions and customs of the temple. He spoke to them in parables and metaphors. They verbally dueled and parried about scripture and tradition. The tensions rose and the anger was barely beneath the surface.
The point, of course, was the temple authorities were allied with the Romans and benefiting from the status quo, while the common folks were backing Jesus and hoping for liberation. The Romans intended to silence Jesus, but without creating a mob riot among the people.
So the tension between the realm of God and the realm of Caesar is most clearly captured in verses 13-17, the question about paying taxes: “They (the temple authorities) sent to him some Pharisees and some Herodians to trap him in what he said.”
Following a few other verses we come to one of the most familiar lines in the New Testament: “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s.” Borg and Crossan, in their book The Last Week, (pg. 61) catch us mid-leap as we assume this means what we’ve always been told it means. I quote them:
As often happens in the interpretation of the Bible, there is a habituated way of seeing this passage that gets in the way of seeing its meaning in the context of Mark’s story of Jesus’ last week…
Once this has happened… the phrase has been understood as:
A solemn statement about the relationship between civil and religious authority, between religion and politics, or, in Christian terms, between “church and state.” It has been most commonly understood to mean that there are two separate realms of human life, one religious and one political. In the first we are to “render to God,” and in the second we are to “render to Caesar.”
This text has been used in countless ways to suggest that we are citizens of two realms – Caesar’s and God’s – and that each has its right to demand allegiance. That was not what Jesus was saying. To the original question “Is it right to pay taxes to Caesar,” he could have said “yes” or “no.” Either way he would have been trapped – to say “yes” was to assent to Roman imperialism as they extracted a tribute from the Jewish citizens who had been overwhelmed by the Empire in 63 BCE. To say “no” would have been treason, leading to charges in the Roman court. He really didn’t answer the question.
Instead, Jesus asked the Pharisees and Herodians to give him a coin. And with that he set a counter-trap. How? He tricked his questioners into disclosing that they carried coins with the image of Caesar on one side, and an inscription heralding him as the Son of God (pg. 63-4) Jewish law prohibited graven images of any kind.
In this moment the Pharisees and Herodians, who claimed purity and faithfulness, betrayed themselves. Jesus quickly said “that coin that belongs to Caesar should be given back to him. And all that belongs to God should be given to God.”
For Jesus it was self-evident that everything belongs to God. And he calls us today to live that conviction as well. Your life, your love, your spiritual gifts… they belong to God. Your wealth, your convictions, your compassion… they belong to God. Modern-day Caesars will stake their claim because empires always make such demands. Some of them are good and some are evil. You need to figure out which is which, and whether and how to pay the tribute they demand.
But don’t be confused. The world cannot be neatly divided between God and Caesar, sacred and secular, holy and profane. All things, all lives, all love come from God.
Let’s turn to Mark 12:28-34, “which commandment is the first of all?” This encounter is unique because it’s the only time during the day when conflict is absent. A scribe, apparently impressed that Jesus has answered his challengers with skill and wisdom, now asks a heart-felt question about what matters most. What gives life a center and a focus? In a world of competing voices and multiple demands, what should we focus on?
The two-fold response is so familiar that it’s become a Christian cliché. (pg. 70) But look deeper: Mark has placed this after the question about God and Caesar and our allegiances, and here says our heart, soul, mind and strength belong to God, not to Caesar. And loving my neighbor as myself means I reject all the labels that suggest some should be winners and some losers, some should be powerful and some marginalized; some Jews and some Gentiles.
The scribe affirms what Jesus has said and then adds “this is more important than burnt offerings and sacrifices.” And in this we remember that some scribes and others associated with the Temple were moved by Jesus, the country rabbi who had come into the city of Jerusalem for Passover and who was acting out a living parable, street theater, that his true followers would see and hear and believe.
The remaining encounters on Tuesday of the Last Week are all grouped under a single theme called “the little apocalypse.” The big apocalypse, of course, is the entire Book of Revelation (pg. 78). Here, in chapter 13: 5-37 we read Jesus’ longest speech detailing events that will signal the shift from the old world order to what comes next – earthquakes, wars and rumors of war, false prophets, persecutions, great suffering, and cosmic disorder. Then there will be the “desolating sacrilege,” a curious turn of phrase.
The key to understanding is this: Most scholars say Mark wrote his Gospel about 70 AD (70 Christian Era or CE) maybe 35 years after Jesus’ death, yes, but just about the time of the destruction of the great Jerusalem Temple by the Romans. Jews took to the streets in 66 AD in an uprising and revolt against Roman oppression. The freedom fighters were successful for a while but the Empire struck back with brutality (pg. 80), culminating in the absolute destruction of the one greatest symbol of Jew life, the temple atop Mount Zion. “Not one stone left upon another” as scripture says. This was the “desolating sacrilege” to be sure.
So Mark addressed that first century community of disciples and told them to flee the violence, and turn their backs on the carnage, reminding them that the rabbi they followed would not lift a sword against an enemy, or even lift his voice against his persecutors.
After this, after the destruction, after the wars and violence, then comes the Son of Man on a cloud with great power and glory, surrounded by angels.
To be sure, Mark expected this to happen soon – the Second Coming, the return of Messiah at the end of the age. And we’re still waiting.
We’re still waiting, too, to figure out how we can live at the intersection of the realm of God and the realm of Caesar. And we’re still waiting for wars to cease, and for justice to roll down like waters, and for lion and lamb to lie down together.
Our world is weary and broken in so many ways. But this is the world God loves so much. And into this world come the amazing signs of love and grace that keep us strong, keep us faithful, keep us going.
As Borg and Crossan say (pg. 83):
…beneath Mark’s timetable, one may perceive a deeper meaning in his apocalyptic conviction. Namely, what was begun in Jesus will triumph, despite the tumult and resistance of this world… Tuesday has been a long day. By now, it is evening on the Mount of Olives. Darkness is coming on, a darkness that will deepen as the week continues to unfold. And as darkness falls, Mark commends us, “Be alert! Stay awake! Watch!”