Mark 8:27 – 9:1 Discipleship of the Son of Man (1)

Mark 8:27 –30 Who do they say Jesus is?

Mark’s understanding of the significance of Jesus is encapsulated in the “passion predictions.” They are introduced by asking what the word is on the street, so to speak. These other options need to be brought out into the open so that they may be dismissed.

The story is set “on the way” The phrase is used throughout the journey from Caesarea (8:27) to Jerusalem (11:1), more consistently than the English translation would suggest, for both the plot journey and the commitment of those who join Jesus in his march on the Jerusalem power centre. Jesus’ march from Caesarea Philippi in the north will intersect Pontius Pilate’s march from Caesarea Maritima in the west on Palm Sunday; two triumphal processions will clash.

Malina (p. 230) suggests that question is not so much a quiz, the answer to which is known (“tell me, I want to know if they have got it right”), as an attempt to elicit from the larger group, which gives meaning to the members who make it up, the significance of one of its members, Jesus (“how does the group define me?”). The primary circle of meaning in Mark since 3:34f has been Jesus’ new family. Others define who Jesus is, he does not know the answer. (We’ll probably feel better if we use the word ‘dyadic’ at this point!).

Peter has already taken the role of the one who is first to speak. We have seen Jesus acclaimed as a powerful healer and teacher and we have heard him, perhaps understandably, confused with ‘John the Baptist’. ‘Elijah’ and (perhaps) the ‘Prophet like Moses’ (Deut 18:15) are added before Peter adds ‘the Christ’. Perhaps it is this whole series of possibilities that is put under the veil of silence. Anything that is not seen through the lens of the passion is not to be proclaimed; the first passion prediction will make this correction. “The Son of Man” is the description of preference for Mark because, whatever its background (Ezekiel or Daniel), it is defined by the Passion. Norman Perrin believed that “Son of Man” is used to correct the divine man connotations of the title “Son of God”: this title is never used by Jesus and is finally acceptable when it is used by the Roman Centurion of the dead Jesus (15:39).

Mark 8:31 –32a First Passion Prediction

Jesus, mighty in word and deed, begins to teach them. Does Mark say anything else three times (he asks rhetorically)? The three predictions are different: they all involve the Son of Man being killed and then rising again after three days. The third prediction (10:33f) is the most fulsome and the second (9:31) the most succinct. The first uses the adverb of divine necessity (“must,” according to the big plan), and refers to “suffering,” “rejection” and “the elders.” This exhibits some skill on the part of the author.

Mark 8:32b –33 Misunderstanding

Peter attempts to take Jesus aside and correct him; all characters are under the control of a skilful author who wants to use misunderstanding and correction to capture the hearts and minds of his readers. It is usually said (or implied) that Peter cannot accept the idea of a suffering messiah. I think that the misunderstanding would have worked as well if, say, Peter had championed Elijah departing without suffering.

Mark 8:34 – 9:1 Instruction on Discipleship

In each case, the instruction section is where we see most clearly what Mark says about who Jesus is and what it means to follow him on “the way”.

Discipleship of Jesus involves carrying your own cross. Originally not a metaphor but yet one more part of the torture-death reserved for slaves and those who challenged the authority of the Roman State, it becomes a metaphor for following Jesus to death. We note that in Mark’s passion narrative, Jesus did not carry his own cross (beam), Simon of Cyrene is pressed into carrying it (15:21).

All alternatives to such a path are ruled out as the choices offered by the “strong man”, Satan: saving your own life, gaining the whole world, being ashamed of the Son of Man when confronted by “this adulterous and sinful generation”. Loyalty is the fundamental virtue in the surrogate family of Jesus, the one who has already bound the strong man.

Mark 9:2 – 29 Who is this Son of Man?

Mark 9:2 – 13 Transfiguration: God’s Witness

Much of the colour of the setting seems to come from Exodus (24:12-18): the six days, the high mountain, the trusted companion, the cloud, the association of the presence of God with a bright light. The high mountain motif has already been seen in Mk 3:12ff.

The meeting of Jesus with Elijah and Moses is sometimes associated with them representing the Prophets and the Torah. Perhaps a more helpful suggestion is that Moses and Elijah were both thought to have been taken up directly to heaven and hence able to come back. This is made more explicit in Luke 9:31 where they are “speaking about his departure, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem”. The Fourth Gospel will make it clear that no-one other than the Son of Man has ascended to heaven and he first descended from heaven (Jn. 3:13).

The attestation of Jesus by the divine voice was seen at the baptism (1:11). Here we are told to “listen to him” – in general, as the powerful teacher, or specifically when he speaks in 9:12-13 about John the Baptist being Elijah or in 9:9 when he speaks about the Son of Man rising from the dead?

Mark 9:14 – 29 The Healing of the Possessed Boy: The Absence of the Son of Man

This exorcism-healing-pronouncement story is almost as long as the healing of the Gerasene demoniac (5:1-20). There seems to be repetition of the description of the problem and of the assembling together of the crowd.

Some elements stand out to us. The twelve have been commissioned to heal (3:14f) and they had previously had some success (6:13). While we were with the narrator watching the transfiguration, they had met with failure. Honour has been lost and must be restored in the presence of a crowd, perhaps explaining the repeated assembling of the crowd (9:14, 25). On the model of Roman patronage, the effort of the brokers has failed and now the clients appeal directly to the patron (Jesus – God).

Further, the story reads a lot like the raising of Jairus daughter (chapter 5) with the father, child, appearance of death, lifting up.

“How much longer must I be with you?” reminds us that Jesus is on the way to his death-departure and the community of Mark is now living in this period of the absence of Jesus. Faith, prayer and unbelief characterize this period.

“If you are able” may well be a polite introduction to the request, like our “If it’s not too much trouble would you please …”. As readers, we know that Jesus’ ability is not in question but, rather, will soon be demonstrated. We have seen the transfigured Son of Man and we have witnessed his prayer and his healing power before; he can and he will act on behalf of the father and his child.

We will now see this pattern of prediction, misunderstanding and teaching on discipleship repeated.

Mark 9:30 – 49 Discipleship of the Son of Man (2)

The pattern established in the first prediction cycle – passion prediction, misunderstanding by the disciples and teaching on discipleship – is continued with some stylistic variations: the shortest prediction and a second block of misunderstanding and teaching. As the middle of three cycles of this pattern, we would expect it would be the most important of the three, but that may be a matter of taste.

Mark 9:30 –31 Second Passion Prediction

Jesus will be “handed over” into human hands. The Baptist was “handed over” (1:14) and increasing reference to this quasi-technical term (actually, “theological terms”) will be noted, especially in chapters 14 & 15. We anticipate a fate comparable to that of the Baptist.

Mark 9:32 –34 Misunderstanding

They “did not understand” because they still saw “men as trees, walking” or because they understood enough to know they did not want to understand it any more (Malbon, 63), or because Mark wants us to see that they were actually regressing and ask why they could be so dense (Donahue, 284). They had been arguing over who was the greatest in their group, like boys in the playground!

Mark 9:35 – 37 Instruction on Discipleship

Jesus responds by picturing the new nature of greatness within his followers. The one who is the greatest is the servant of all. We remember that Jesus will say that “the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve”(10:45) Here he presents the “poster child” of the kingdom. The child does no represent a romantic ideal of innocence: the child is the one who is completely powerless, with less status that a slave. In exemplifying God being for the powerless, Jesus uses the language of agency: “the agent is as the one who sent him”. Jesus is the agent/apostle of God.

Mark 9:38 More Misunderstanding

Why John by himself? Who is the strange exorcist? Is the “following us” referring to Jesus and his disciples or just to the disciples? Was this exorcist doing what the disciples could not do (9:28-29)? Did they forbid him or prevent him, as they will prevent children from coming to Jesus (10:14)? Oh, the questions that come up here!

Mark 9:39 – 49 More Instruction on Discipleship

Jesus puts forward a minimalist entry requirement: if you are not against us (Jesus identifying himself with the exorcist who is working in his name), you are for us (so too, Lk 9:50). We are probably more familiar with the opposite form of this saying: he who is not for me is against me (e.g. Matt. 12:30, Lk. 11:23) (I remember reading a small, but significant, piece written by Bishop JAT Robinson in the early 60s where he develops a case for the minimalist approach, based on the use of Greek prepositions in the Gospels. I have never since been able to lay my hands on this article. Oh, the frustration)

Strangely, we then have a number of sayings (vv. 42-48) that seem to argue in the opposite direction – how difficult it is to be a follower of Jesus and what extreme measures are justified to overcome the obstacles that come in our way. Why does mark put them here?

And then there are the two sayings about salt!

Mark 10:1 – 31 He turns the world upside down

Mark 10:2 – 12 Teaching about Divorce

As with the model of the child, so too with the practice of marriage and divorce, we need to rid ourselves of 21st Century assumptions. Marriage was not the romantic joining together of two individuals but more the economic and political joining together of two families. The marriage “symbolized the fusion of the honor of both families involved’ (Malina, 240). Marriage was a contact arranged between two groups of men and concluded with the bringing of the wife into the husband’s household. The wife was effectively a stranger in this household until she had delivered a son. The wife appears to be little more than a chattel that is moved from one household to another, the payment that seals the contract.

“Adultery means to dishonor a male by having sexual relations with his wife.” (Malina, 241) Since women cannot embody gender honor, a woman cannot dishonor another woman by have sexual relations with her wife. “Nor can a married man dishonor his wife by having sexual relations with some other female.”(Malina, 241)

Divorce was not forbidden. Initially, it was initiated solely by the husband. (Within early Judaism, women come to be able to initiate a Git, a bill of divorce.) Issues involved are the loss of honor in one or other household and the leaving of the wife out in the cold; she had been disembedded from her paternal household by her marriage and now cannot go back.

Mark’s Jesus sees the fusion of the two families as so fundamental that it is supported by the second creation story (Gen. 2:24). The effect of splitting up this family union is a sin against God’s creation: they are one flesh. However, divorce is allowed as a concession to human hardness of heart. Mark’s Jesus stops short of remarriage.

Mark’s Jesus is ahead of his time in seeing remarriage as an affront to the honor of the first wife: “commits adultery against her”. In addition, it reflects the movement towards allowing women the right to initiate divorce and initiate dishonor; “if she divorces her husband ..” In appealing to the heart of marriage in the creation story, Mark’s Jesus is able to turn reality on its head by saying that in marriage it is the husband that leaves his mother and father and cleaves to his wife, whereas in reality it is the other way around – the wife is disembodied from her family and is re-embodied within her husband’s family. At every point, Jesus is turning everything about marriage around and tipping it upside down. Elizabeth Malbon sees the restricting of divorce by Jesus as an attempt to protect the partner most hurt by divorce in that society – women (Malbon, 67)

Mark 10:13 – 16 Teaching about Children

As we have already noted when commenting on 9:36-37, placing the powerless child at the centre of the kingdom of God (“to such as these … the Kingdom of God belongs”), Jesus challenges the social status quo.

Mark 10:17 – 31 Teaching about Wealth

“Good teacher” is seen by us as a compliment but in a limited good society, it is a sign of aggression (“you are rising above your station in life”). Such a challenge must be warded off (“Why do you call me good …God alone.”).

In addition, in a limited good society, like this one was, for one person to be rich others had to be poor. The good things in life were in limited supply and so to be rich was to be a thief or the son of a thief and to take advantage of others. “To be rich is, by definition, to be greedy.”(Malina, 244) [The modern counter claim seems to be: “I got rich through my own hard work, no one else contributed to this.”]

What more can you give a rich man? Reaching the end of a conventional check list, Jesus whirls like Lt Colombo at the door and says “One thing more!” He offers him two possibilities that are impossibilities for this young man – to sell the family home and land and to turn away from his first family and join the new family of Jesus, putting himself under the patronage of God (Malina, 244)

To be rich is to be blessed by God, or so it is said. If the rich can’t enter the kingdom, then who can? If the pastor can’t get rich at the expense of his flock, then …?

The section ends with a reaffirmation of the client status of the new family of Jesus that has God as its Patron and the paradox of the topsy-turvy world of the kingdom: “the first will be last, and the last will be first.”

Mark 10:32 – 45 Discipleship of the Son of Man (3)

The journey began in Bethsaida, in the Gentile north, and ends on the doorstep of Jerusalem. It has been bracketed by the two giving of sight stories: the two-step Gentile healing at the beginning and the immediate Jewish healing at its end. The story of the journey and its steep learning curve has been framed by the metaphor of regaining sight, As readers, we have got the point.

Luke will make the journey to Jerusalem the substantial part of the centre of his Gospel, 9:51 – 19:27, where Jesus is the teacher on the way. There, it is as though Jesus’ persona is changed as “his face .was set towards Jerusalem”. Here, in Mark, the awe of Jesus as the divine healer and Lord of the elemental spirits, is now the awe of the one who is going ahead of them. “… they were amazed, and those who followed were afraid”(10:32).


Mark 10:32 –34 Third Passion Prediction

This third prediction has more detail than the other two, e.g. spitting and flogging. Jesus will be “handed over” to the chief priests and the scribes who will judge him as deserving death (14:64) and in turn “hand him over” to the Gentiles (= Pilate 15:1) who will have him put to death. We know that this means crucifixion, but it is not made explicit here.

Mark 10:35 –40 Misunderstanding

The characters James and John now carry the baton of misunderstanding. Jesus asks substantially the same question he will put to Bartimaeus: “what do you want me to do for you?” As second readers we remember this and contrast their answer with Bartimaeus’ “let me see again!” They want something akin to a blank cheque (so Donahue 311) and when pushed ask for the seats of honour. They are asking the wrong question (wanting to ape their oppressors) and they are asking the wrong person (“Jesus is not in charge of such arrangements” (Malbon, 69))

Mark 10:41 – 45 Instruction on Discipleship

Jesus responds by picturing the new nature of greatness within his kingdom: the lord is the one who serves; the great one is the slave and servant of all. They are not to ape their oppressors; they are to model themselves on the Son of Man.

Mark 10:46 - 52 Final Giving of Sight Story: Following in the Way

This story is the right hand bookend; together with the first giving of sight story it frames the central Christology-discipleship section of Mark, its metaphor of sight regained informing the stumbling towards the life of discipleship.

We note similarities and contrasts between the two stories, some coming from the contrasting Gentiles and Jewish styles of healing (spitting, touching a word), some from the tentative, two-part gaining of sight that characterized discipleship back then and some from the more immediate nature of discipleship now. This is reinforced by the identical “what do you want me to do for you?” spoken to James and John (10:36) and to Bartimaeus (10:51).

We rise with Bartimaeus and follow Jesus on the way.

E. Mark 11:1 – 16:8 Jesus in Jerusalem

Mark 11:1 – 12:44 Clash of Kingdoms

Mark 11:1 – 11 A challenge to those who occupy Jerusalem

Jesus arrives in Jerusalem at about the same time that the Roman Procurator, Pilate, arrives from Caesarea on the Mediterranean coast. He must be in Jerusalem at the time of the Passover. It is not too good to remind a subject people of their delivery from slavery.

Jesus’ entry into the city is a mocking of Pilate’s entry. Not on a war horse, accompanied by trained troops carrying their standards but on a colt, accompanied by a rag tag lot, carrying palm branches and evoking ancient warrior hopes associated with David. Jesus has some popular appeal; Pilate is hated for his killing of Jews and his sacrilegious behavior around the temple. When his patron in Rome eventually dies, Pilate will be removed from Judea as an embarrassment to Rome.

Jesus entry is a challenge to Pilate and Pilate is not big on challenges to his authority. Yes, Pilate is also coming to town and he is not coming alone. Is Jesus’ fate sealed? You bet!

Mark 11:12 – 25 A challenge to those who run Jerusalem

Jesus, “the tourist”, arrives in Jerusalem, looks around and then sets up his base in Bethany. He needs to distance himself from the city and its temple industry because he is going to signal its demise. He leaves so that he can come back and leave again.

We note the Markan sandwich: fig tree – temple – fig tree. Each part interprets the other: the “cursing” of the fig tree interprets the “cleansing” of the temple. The petulant behavior of Jesus – cursing the tree because he could not find any fruit – alerts us to the mistake we make if we interpret this story literally. Rather we must find its truth wrapped in a metaphor
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“It was not the season for figs”. This is not to do with clock time – Jesus had arrived too early. Rather, it is to do with significant time – it was no longer the time for figs, the tree’s time for producing figs had passed, Jesus had arrive too late. Israel is the fig tree (Jeremiah. 8:13) and it is no longer the time for figs.

The time for what, had been and gone? What is inside the Markan “sandwich” – the whole business of the emptying out of the temple? Notice that Jesus drives everyone out, those who buy and sell animals and birds for sacrifice and those who exchange the regular, profane coins with images on them, for the image-less temple coinage. There is nothing wrong, or illegal or underhand or corrupt in this activity: without it the activity of the temple would simply close down.

Bringing the whole sandwich together, Mark’s Jesus sees the sacrificial activity of the Temple has had its day. It’s a fig tree that has withered away to its roots, Its kairos, its appropriate time, has been and gone. It was (no longer) the season for figs. Now, says Mark’s Jesus, it’s the time for a house of prayer for all nations. The Son of Man, formerly the one who teaches and heals with power, tells his followers who are living in the time after the destruction of the Temple, that there prayers will have the power to remove mountains and throw them into the sea.

Mark’s Jesus scares the daylights out of Mark’s chief priests and scribes. The challenge to them has been thrown down to all the powers that be. Is Jesus’ fate sealed? You bet! He has not quietly slipped into Jerusalem and then slipped out again. His challenges could not have been more conspicuous It is not a case of ‘if’ but ‘when’,

Mark 11:27 – 12:44 Controversies in Jerusalem

We remember the controversy stories that are at the beginning of Jesus’ ministry in Galilee (2:1 – 3:6). Here, at the beginning of Jesus’ time in Jerusalem, we have a stylized set of controversy stories. ‘Stylized’ because they are ordered against every Jerusalem-based group known to Mark - Chief Priests and their Scribes, Pharisees, Herodians, Sadducees and the Scribes - they each have their moment in the sun. There, towards the beginning of Jesus’ Galilee ministry the issues are his authority to teach, to forgive and to heal on the Sabbath. Here, in Jerusalem, he will not re-visit the issue of his authority, Here, the controversies are over the future of the Temple, their rejection of God’s envoys, their favoring the image of Caesar over the image of God, their arrogant attitude towards widows.

Mark 11: 27 – 12:12 Controversy with the Chief Priests and Scribes

The silencing of the Chief Priests and their scribes: (i) we already know Jesus’ source of authority. We have been told the words of the prophets, heard the divine voice, we have seen him teaching and healing with authority, we have heard the crowds acclaim. It is more than enough! (ii) Jesus counter-question is seen to appeal to the popularity of the Baptist among “the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem who were going out to him” (1:5). (iii) What we can’t understand is why they don’t resort to a version of the defensive counter-response: “we asked first so you answer first”. The rules of the game are unclear to us but they seem to dictate a stalemate and both sides withdraw … . (iv) .or do they?

The parable of the tenants: As followers of Mark’s Jesus we note that the context of the parable is given as a resolution of the standoff. “They perceived that he told this story against them and they wanted to arrest him…”(12:12) Mark’s Jesus is scoring against the Chief Priests and their scribes. Clearly, making sense of how "he told this parable against them” is going to be key to our understanding of this controversy.

The conventional option for interpretation is to see the parable as a theological allegory built on Isaiah 5 (“My beloved had a vineyard…”): The code is: the Holy One Blessed be He is the owner, the tenants are the Jerusalem authorities, the servants are the prophets, the beloved son is Jesus, the destruction of the vineyard is the destruction of the temple by the Romans in 70CE and the ‘others’ refers to the emerging church. It is thought that the details of the actions of the owner and the tenants would not fit in with a realistic narrative – “what owner would do that, what tenant would think like that”.

An alternative is to read the parable against the background of land confiscation and absentee landlords, rampant in the world of Jesus. Germane to this are:

1. Isaiah 5 embodies the failure of expectations – God planted grapes and they produced thorns. Mark’s story heads off in another direction – a man planted a vineyard, appointed tenants and departed out of the area. There is nothing to suggest that the man represents God; the appointing of tenants and the departure, point to an absentee landlord.
2. Where did the man get the large quantity of land to support a vineyard? Land was held by small families as a gift from God and was not available for sale. It must have been acquired by some variation of theft or foreclosing on a loan following a bad harvest.
3. Grapes were a luxury crop, here planted in the midst of a subsistence economy.
4. There was a 4-5 year wait before a crop was produced so the owner would need other wealth (=land) to tide him over. (v) Tenants would often receive a (small) share of vegetables grown between the vines during this pre-crop period.
5. The man was quite probably Jewish and resident in Jerusalem: the verb ‘depart’ does not necessarily require going offshore. We know that the first action of the revolutionaries on taking over Jerusalem in 65CE was the seizure and burning of the land records that were kept in Jerusalem, records that attempted to legitimate the blasphemous theft of ancestral, God-given land.
   

What we are seeing is the emergence of a story that operates in the world of the redistribution of land away from the small, family, peasant land-holdings into the large estates. (Herzog, 103). The tenants are attempting to regain their land by refusing to pay the so-called owners their so-called entitlement; the elite create the law and have the weapons to resist the peasants.

We could call this The Parable of The Wicked Jerusalem-based Absentee Landlord. Such a parable fits both the world of Jesus and the narrative of Mark thus far. Confronted by the Chief Priests and their scribes in Jerusalem, following his challenge to the temple industry in chapter 11, Jesus tells a parable about their despoiling of the land of Israel and the constant threat of a peasant revolt. Quite correctly, they see themselves shown up by this parable. Is Jesus’ fate settled? You bet!

You may want to revisit the comments made on 4:1-9 about parables

Mark 12:13 – 17 Controversy with the Pharisees and Herodians

They seek to entrap him in speech, to have him self-incriminate. We are alerted to the insincerity of their flattery: it is so much “flannel”

Is it lawful to pay the tax to Caesar? The leading question operates against the background of the Jewish law. We have seen it before: “Is it lawful to pluck grain on the Sabbath?”(2:24); “Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the Sabbath?” (3:4) The issue is not so much the tax itself but the coinage used to pay it. The coin bears the imprinted image of the pagan god, the Roman Caesar, and hence it is an idol.

Bring me a denarius, and they did! This is extraordinary: Jesus was not carrying one of these coins but his entrappers were able to produce one. (Someone has said that this is like asking them to produce a slab of bacon, and then finding that they had one with them.)

Whose image and inscription is on the coin? In the time of Jesus the image is of the Roman god, Tiberius Caesar (14 – 37 CE), and the inscription would have read: “Tiberius Caesar Augustus, son of the Divine Augustus.” His stepfather Augustus Caesar was the first emperor to be named a god

Implied question: whose image is on you? The subtext comes from Genesis 1:26-27 “Then God said, ‘Let us make humankind in our image; according to our likeness; … So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.’” This idea is called in Hebrew “bitzelem elohim” and in Latin “Imago Dei” The nature of the divine image is not the object of discussion here.

The things of Caesar give back to Caesar and the things of God give back to God. The answer of Mark’s Jesus not only avoids the trap of a leading question; it allows that Caesar has a small part to play in the big scheme of things and points to the major object of our allegiance, the Lord God.

There is a Rabbinic tradition that reflects on the superficial similarities, but profound differences, between the two images. It surfaces in the Babylonian Talmud (Sanhedrin 38a), but which is undoubtedly much older: “When the kings of the earth stamp their image on coins, they all come out the same. When the Holy One, Blessed be He, puts his image on humans, they are all different.”
Caesar only has a relatively minor call on us; the Holy One, Blessed be he, has the first and major call on our allegiance. Caesar’s power is limited to stamping out replicas of his own image; the Holy One, Blessed Be He, has the power to express the infinite variety of his own image.

There is no justification to be gained from this story for thinking that God (maybe) has a claim on our spare change. Unfortunately, this is the counter-assumption that interpretation has to struggle against in our western cultures.

Mark 12:18 – 27 Controversy with the Sadducees

The Sadducees who say there is no resurrection: The Sadducees are one of the 1st century Jewish groups mentioned by Josephus. They are neither a popularist group like the Pharisees nor are they as progressive. They are a small, elitist group with a conservative outlook based on the five books of Moses (c.f. the Samaritans). As a consequence, the new fangled suggestion that the soul does not perish at death (“resurrection”), based on suggestions in later biblical and post-biblical, books and championed by the Pharisees is rejected.

The “reduction ad absurdum”: The rejection of an idea, by showing that it can lead to absurdities is clearly exemplified here. Given the requirement of levirate (“brother-in-law”) law laid out in Torah (Deut. 25:5-6), we can easily imagine the situation where one woman has (successively) been married to several brothers. Resurrection, they conclude, makes a nonsense of this: “Whose wife will she be in the ‘resurrection’?”

Jesus responds that they are wrong on two counts:
You don’t understand God’s power. You must not assume that human relationships then (after the resurrection) will be the same as we know them now, with marriage continuing on as we know it now. God has the power to make all things new.

You don’t understand scripture. If you looked you would see that Torah itself presupposes life beyond death. In Exodus 3, God says he is the God of the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob who have all died. If existence ceased with death then God would have to have said “I was the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob”. (This is a win on the technicalities of grammar, made on the assumption that every letter of Tanak was there for a purpose. You can understand it without having to agree with it!)

No wonder then that they were utterly amazed at him!

Mark 12:28 – 44 Controversy with the Scribes

Are these three scribe stories brought together here to illustrate three dimensions of these community officials, record keepers, bureaucrats, middle-level government officials? One story praises them, one confuses them and one condemns them. Together they represent Mark’s understanding of them? Maybe

As to theology, not far from the kingdom. A standard question put to a teacher to clarify the most important of the commandments. It’s the “thirty second elevator pitch”. Jesus’ response leads in turn to the scribe’s resume and agreement: “Teacher, you have truly said that …” On theology, Jesus gives him a passing grade.

As to interpreting scripture, confused. In Ps 110:1, God (Lord) invites the king (my Lord) to ascend the throne. It is assumed that later Jewish tradition sees this psalm to be narrated by David in praise of the Messiah and therefore rules out the Messiah being the Son of David – David cannot call his son ‘Lord’. Let’s move on!

As to behavior, not a good word to be said. I agree with the suggestion that the story of the Widow’s mites is a lament. The introduction to the story (12:38-40) characterizes the scribes as “devouring widows’ houses” and the conclusion (13:1-2) points out the irony of making any donation to the Temple. The widow is not held up to us as an example of the correct spirit of giving (she may be no less hypocritical that the rich people) nor does it form a basis for believing that “every little bit counts”. Jesus observes a particular widow whose “house has been devoured.” She has been encouraged to bleed herself dry and we see her last two coins dropping into the box – and it is all so pointless! The woman should be the object of our pity and support.