. . . birds came along and devoured it . . . it withered away . . . it yielded no grain . . .”
-Mark 4:4, 6, 7.

Parables are usually connected to a scripture text or several of them. They often explain something puzzling about God and his relation to his people, or something unstated or mysterious in a text.

Yeshua understood a startling truth found in Isaiah 6, one that naturally leads any thoughtful reader to ask questions. Modern readers of the Sower parable (Mk 4; Mt 13; Lk 8) tend not to realize that the parable is commenting on a text. The text is Isaiah 6. It is not a randomly chosen or obscure passage. It is the chapter in which Isaiah saw God’s Throne above with his kingly robes coming down and filling the Temple (Isa 6:1). It is the “holy, holy, holy” passage with the Seraphim (the burning ones). It is the commission of the prophet Isaiah.

Yeshua, prophet and Messiah, has a mission which can be compared to Isaiah’s. Yet the puzzling thing about Isaiah’s commission is that he was sent to tell the people about God’s desire for them in that moment in history and yet his words would paradoxically cause greater judgment. God said to Isaiah:

Go, say to that people: ‘Hear, indeed, but do not understand; see, indeed, but do not grasp.’ Dull that people’s mind, stop its ears, and seal its eyes — lest, seeing with its eyes and hearing with its ears, it also grasp with its mind, and repent and save itself.
-Isaiah 6:9-10, JPS.

These words are so surprising, so ironic, many readers need to give them multiple readings to understand what they are saying.

Isaiah was a kingdom prophet. Yeshua was a kingdom prophet. The kingdom is God’s rule over his people and all the cosmos. Isn’t telling people about the kingdom good news? On the contrary, in many cases it is bad news. The simple in understanding think that true instruction will be easily recognized and that great promises will be believed and acted upon.

The easiest criticism of Yeshua is that his message was so little heeded. If he was Messiah, or even a true prophet, why didn’t he bring about the renewal of Israel? Why wasn’t the earth redeemed? Why didn’t the world to come start in his day? Where is the messianic redemption with all the promises of every person under their vine and fig tree?

Parables, according to the early rabbis in the land of Israel, were especially founded in Israel as a way of teaching by Solomon (see Song of Songs Rabbah, first chapter). They interpreted Mishlei (Proverbs) and Kohelet (Ecclesiastes) as illustrations of Torah truths. They saw Shir HaShirim (Song of Songs/Solomon) as figures of God’s dealings with Israel at the Exodus and Sinai. The figure or simile or parable (mashal) explains something about a scripture text.

The Sower parable is about good news that is bad news. It explains first and foremost how a true prophet (Isaiah, Yeshua) can speak what is good and yet he will not be heard. It explains how a generation can be so close to devastation (Isaiah’s in the Assyrian and Babylonian crises and Yeshua’s in the coming war with Rome) even though the kingdom is proclaimed. It explains how disciple circles can form and preserve the teaching for the future.

Isaiah’s words did not prevent Israel and Judah from collapsing, nor did Yeshua’s. But Isaiah’s words and Yeshua’s words did lead to the formation of disciple circles. They were passed down generation to generation.

The Sower parable is rich. To begin to understand it, realize it is a commentary on Isaiah 6. Realize first that it is about our human tendency not to receive the message. It is not our responsibility to bring the messianic era. The king will bring the kingdom. But he who has ears to hear will understand why it is delayed. We bear fruit while we wait.

If you would like to follow this series, here is Part 1.

To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside everything is in parables.
-Mark 4:11

“Kingdom” is not “afterlife” exactly and it is not “people of Israel” or “people of the Church.” The modern reader tends to inject meanings into Yeshua’s words that are not there. Looking in the words of Messiah for a message on how to qualify for a good afterlife, it is natural for many to see in the word “kingdom” a code word for “going to heaven.” This is a problem compounded by the fact that Matthew, the best-known gospel for many Bible readers, uses the phrase “kingdom of heaven” instead of “kingdom of God.” But, as many will rightly point out, “heaven” here stands for “God.” It is a euphemism, like saying “in the eyes of heaven.”

Another temptation is to see “kingdom” as either “the nation of people known as Israel” or “the visible institution of the church.” Christian pastors sometimes ask people to “work for the kingdom” with the understanding that “church is the kingdom.” In Judaism, “kingship of God” is a more common notion than “kingdom.” This is because Judaism, like Yeshua, is immersed in the Hebrew Bible.

What does Messiah mean when he says “to you” (the inner circle, those who come to me after my teaching and ask questions) is given the “secret of the kingdom” but to everyone else (outsiders who sit on the hills and listen from afar, hoping to catch a glimpse of a miracle) there are only “parables”?

Does he mean that the parables are not about the kingdom? Is the idea that the parables are teasers, mere hints, but that somewhere else we should look for Messiah’s real teaching? If so, where do we find this teaching?

No, it is not that there are two sets of teaching exactly, although the inner circle does get more explanation and teaching than the hill-sitters get. But rather, it is the whole package. Those who become part of Messiah’s disciple circle (not just the Twelve, but at least one hundred and twenty by the time of Acts 1) receive the secret. And the secret is not just one thing. It is many things.

Those who were in Messiah’s disciple circle, the ones who were fortunate enough to be there in Galilee and Judea so long ago, saw the actions of Messiah, got private explanations, and went through the experience of disappointment, terror, disbelief, startling realization, overwhelming joy, and sense of empowerment through the trial, death, burial, resurrection, commission, and ascension of Yeshua. The secret was being in the disciple circle. It was asking questions. It was watching Messiah do messianic things. It was seeing the kingdom in action. It was living through the greatest misunderstanding about kingdom (that death and suffering lead to the reign of God).

It is possible to be in Messiah’s disciple circle now. The requirement is a willingness to consider his words and actions. The requirement is to do this with others. The requirement is to believe.

In this series, I will explore a little at a time the details of Messiah’s parables and what they mean about the kingdom, future and present. What is the kingdom exactly? What does a first century Jewish teacher mean when he says “kingdom of God”? How do we apply this?

These are symbolic actions, a kind of prophetic message in and of themselves. Yeshua also engaged in symbolic actions and what I call kingdom enactments.

Symbolic Actions Declaring High Authority

• The Triumphal Entry (Mk 11:1-11; Mt 21:1-11; Lk 19:29-44; Jn 12:12-19) – Riding deliberately into the city as per Zechariah 9 with crowds hailing him, Yeshua is making a claim of messianic identity.
• The Temple Cleansing (Mk 11:15-17; Mt 21:12-13; Lk 19:45-46; Jn 2:13-17) – Perhaps Malachi 3:1 is in the background (after the messenger — Elijah, John the Baptist) the Lord comes suddenly to his Temple. Yeshua quotes Isaiah 56 and Jeremiah 7. This action largely contributed to his arrest and execution.
• Forgiving Sins (Mk 2:5; Mt 9:2; Lk 5:20 and another incident in Lk 7:48) – In even the most skeptical interpretation, Yeshua is claiming to know when God forgives a sinner. Since he says in Mk 2:10; Mt 9:6; Lk 5:24 that the Son of Man has authority to forgive, evidence is strong Yeshua is claiming more. He is claiming to be the divine Son of Man with authority in such matters as per Daniel 7 and the dominion given him by the Ancient of Days.
• Sending the Twelve (Mk 6:7-13; Mt 10:5-42; Lk 9:1-6) and Sending the Seventy (Lk 10:1-16) – Even more so that Yeshua’s own mission of proclaiming the kingdom (Mk 1:15; Mt 4:17), sending disciples to proclaim it suggests starting a renewal movement (a prophetic or even messianic role).

Symbolic Actions as Identity Stories

• The Baptism of Yeshua (Mk 1:9-11; Mt 3:13-17; Lk 3:21-22) – Yeshua’s participation in John’s movement already connects him to the role of prophet. The heavenly voice affirms Yeshua’s identity.
• The Temptation of Yeshua (Mk 1:12-13; Mt 4:1-11; Lk 4:1-13) – Yeshua is tested for worthiness for a role of high authority (prophet, messiah). Satan affirms Yeshua’s identity in an ironic manner.
• The Transfiguration (Mk 9:2-10; Mt 17:1-9; Lk 9:28-36) – Yeshua ascends a mountain with three as witnesses and experiences a prefiguring of coming glory and a visit from Moses and Elijah. A heavenly voice affirms his identity.

Kingdom Enactments
In these Yeshua demonstrates that he has partially brought the kingdom with him (the rest to come later).

• Healings, for in the world to come there will be no illness, disability, or death.
• Exorcisms, for the forces of spiritual evil are due to be defeated by God.
• Banquets, which foreshadow the banquet to come, a messianic promise.

• The Man in the Capernaum Synagogue, Mark 1:23-27 (Lk 4:33-36).
• The Gerasene Demoniac, Mark 5:1-20 (Mt 8:28-34; Lk 8:26-39).
• The Syro-Phoenician Woman’s Daughter, Mark 7:25-30 (Mt 15:21-28).
• The Deaf and Mute Spirit, Mark 9:14-29 (Mt 17:14-20; Lk 9:37-43).
• The Blind and Mute Man, Matthew 12:22-24.
• The Bent Woman, Luke 13:10-16.

“Love has ever in view,” says George MacDonald, “the absolute loveliness of that which it beholds.” This, I think, is some of what is going on with Yeshua’s kingdom mission. “Where loveliness is incomplete, and love cannot love its fill of loving,” he goes on, “it spends itself to make more lovely, that it may love more.”

The disciples were constantly misunderstanding Yeshua. And even this was part of Yeshua’s method. He was willing to defer much of their learning to the moments after the great crisis of his death and the great revelation of his resurrection. Meanwhile he gave them perplexing lessons, exposed them to contradictions at every turn, and he was ambiguous. He refused to be defined in straightforward categories.

The kingdom of God is at hand, he said. To you, he told the disciples, has been given the secret of the kingdom.

Really? What is that secret? How is it given to the disciples? It seems they, rather, had to read between the lines. Or, better yet, they had to pursue a path which Mark 4 hints at.

For those outside, it’s all parables. What does this mean? What does that mean?

But those inside have come for a private explanation. They dig deeper. They ask questions. They hear the teaching repeatedly and through questioning and repetition begin to understand. They follow and see the teaching in action, so that they come to understand what he means by things like fruit and seed.

Yet Yeshua is a mystery. He often has to be read between the lines. Is he campaigning to be Israel’s king or not? Will he put the critics in their place and oppose power with power? Will he speak plainly and name the times and upcoming events clearly?

Not at all. Instead, he will sleep on the boat during the storm, unconcerned. When the disciples wake him he will ask, “Why are you afraid? Have you no faith?” It is as if he is saying, “Are you not grasping yet who I am? Have you seen beyond the Elijah-figure, the prophet working wonders with fish and bread?”

“Are you without understanding?” Yeshua asks three times in Mark.

Important people from Judea come and say to him, “Show us a sign from heaven.” The same Yeshua who talked to a storm and stilled it says to them, “Your generation is looking for signs.” He refuses to give them one.

In Nazareth, the people said, “Isn’t this Joseph’s son?” And Yeshua, Mark tells us, could do no miracle there.

Peter got a glimpse of the higher truth about who Yeshua was, a far better understanding than the wonder-worker idea. “You are the Messiah,” he said. But moments later he was rebuking Yeshua for talking about dying and being taken prisoner. That will never happen, Peter thought, not to the king of Israel.

James and John said, “Let us sit at your right and left in your glory.” After all, Yeshua said the kingdom was near. He said the disciples were the inner circle, the ones who had the secret. In another place he even said they would sit at his table and judge the tribes of Israel. James and John just wanted to claim the first spot in all this glory.

“Can you drink my cup? Can you be baptized the way I will?” Yeshua asks.

People come to him from all over Galilee, Judea, and even Samaria and Perea. He heals them and demons, who were hidden beforehand, start speaking and revealing their presence.

Yeshua takes people away to private places and heals them. He says, “Tell no one.” The demons call him the Holy One of God and he says, “Shut up.”

He is everything the disciples think he is and more. They barely begin to grasp his exalted identity. King of Israel hardly does it justice. “All things have been given over to me by my Father,” he says in one place. “I thank you, Father . . . that you have hidden these things from the wise and have revealed them to babes.”

He will do nothing the way the disciples think he will. There will be no power showdowns with the Judean leaders. There will be no public signs from heaven. There will be no taking command, leading the nation in a popular movement, making the Sadducees and chief priests bow. Pilate and the Roman garrison in Jerusalem will not see any movement of resistance or power to match power.

This powerlessness confuses disciples even today. The risen Yeshua did not appear to Caesar or even Pilate. The sign of messiahship is still lacking.

If we believe in Yeshua, we must admit the divine plan is not like the methods we are used to. Our distorted understanding of true goodness is bound to interfere with the right unfolding of the messianic age. If people planned the kingdom it would be a sad substitute for the infinitely wise outworking of pure love God has planned.

Our vision of the kingdom is corrupted by our violent nature. Our lack of depth in the understanding of love holds us back. Even those who claim to see the grace and suffering of Yeshua too easily become religious movements seeking personal gratification. He becomes merely “my savior” and “my afterlife” and “my blessing.”

The cross would never be our guess and the idea of it still makes little sense to disciples today. Is it more about God punishing sin or is it something else? Is it God sharing in the suffering of this world?

In the fourth gospel, Yeshua says, “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you.” The way of Yeshua’s messianic mission is hidden in the mystery of something larger, a love that predates creation, that is the essence of our nature but is veiled by corruption. The way Yeshua loves us comes from the Father, from God in his Direct Being, the Infinite One and his ways.

It is no wonder, then, that mere disciples were in danger of misunderstanding and needed to be warned, “Tell no one that I am Messiah.” It is no wonder that we face the danger of misunderstanding the messianic mission.

So, as readers of the gospels, we, like the disciples, need to assume that our understanding is not yet deep enough. Like the disciples, we might be warned not to act too quickly, not to assume we fully understand, not to be dismayed when the thing we expect does not happen, not to dismiss the suffering, and not to desire retribution on God’s enemies and ours.

Yeshua is a mystery, not least, sometimes, to us, his own disciples. The secret to knowing the meaning of Yeshua is in the act of discipleship, of being in the inner circle, of remaining close, hearing the words of Yeshua again and again to allow them to penetrate, of watching him be Messiah in acts of healing and victory over powers of evil, of forgetting about domination and matching power with power, but being servants to all as he was.

“Love has ever in view the loveliness of that which it beholds.” Yeshua spent himself to make us more lovely. Yeshua sees the whole picture, of the world as it will be, of people as they will be. We who follow him should walk in his footsteps.

And the chief priests and the scribes heard it and sought a way to destroy him; for they feared him, because all the multitude was astonished at his teaching.
–Mark 11:18

The gospel did not just happen. The events which marked the onset of a new stage in the world’s redemption happened in a time and place with three main cultural backdrops. Parts 1 and 2 introduced Greek and Roman influences on these events, both in Yeshua’s time and the later time the gospels were written. What about conditions and social structures in Israel itself? What are some basics readers need to know about conditions and groups in Israel? What about Jewish concerns in the times of the evangelists?

First, it cannot be over-emphasized, and it rather has been under-emphasized, that Yeshua was Galilean and his movement was primarily a Galilean one at the beginning. For more about this, see “Yeshua the Galilean” by clicking here. In Galilee itself, Yeshua was safe unless he ran afoul of Herod Antipas. It was primarily in Judea and Jerusalem that there was danger for Yeshua. Galilee was rural and had no aristocracy. Judea had powerful people with statuses to protect so that prophets and upstart messianic brigands were quickly eliminated.

Second, we must locate Yeshua among the common Jews and not see him as part of any of the parties. In an overreaction to centuries of neglecting the Jewish context of Jesus, some studies in recent decades have aligned Yeshua with the Pharisees. This is a misunderstanding of what the Pharisees represented. Yeshua did not belong to any of the parties. Of the parties, the Pharisees may have been closest to Yeshua’s way of thinking, but he himself was not a Pharisee.

As one of the people of the land, Yeshua’s common belief with his countrymen centered on monotheism, covenant, the election of Israel as God’s people, the Temple, and the way of life laid out in the Torah. Readings of Yeshua overturning laws of the Torah are without basis and should be rejected. A more sophisticated reading of Mark 7 and Matthew 15 is called for, a reading based more in Jewish discussions about how to keep the food and purity laws, not whether to keep them.

Second, we can and should accept the picture of the gospels that there was some degree of literacy in Galilee and synagogues with some education. It is not difficult to believe that Yeshua could read the Hebrew text. But we should not imagine him as a scribe with the kind of training found in Judea in the small movement of Pharisees and scribes. Yeshua would have been a literate, but by Judean standards, poorly educated layman.

Third, we should understand the times of Yeshua in Judaism as formative. The last decades before the First Jewish Revolt in 66-70 CE were a time when Israel was looking for an identity, for a way to be Israel. The powerful chief priests and Sadducees held nearly all the power in Jerusalem. Galileans paid tithes to the chief priests out of duty to Torah in spite of corruption and the fact that the Temple-state in Judea was abusive of wealth and power. The Pharisees were seeking to bring their own kind of renewal, but it too was a movement defined by power and status, not righteousness in the mode of the prophets of Israel.

Israel was seeking to be Israel, to recover some sense of what Torah had expressed as the ideal. The common people were powerless. From time to time, groups of the common people would follow an upstart messianic or prophetic leader. None of the small revolts inspired a wide following.

It is in this sense that we should understand Yeshua, who worked wonders in Galilee and attracted crowds. People were ready for change. They wanted to see something from God. Some of the people were ready for a revolution. Otherwise the various brigands who led small revolts would have found no followers. Yeshua seemed to be a person who could make things happen at long last.

Yet nearly all of Yeshua’s teaching and his actions were calculated to overthrowing popular messianic notions. Yeshua found a people so out of touch with the vision of the prophets for the world to come, the kingdom of God, that he set about overturning sacred cows. He dined with sinners. He healed impure people. He praised the faith of non-Jews. He warned that being the Chosen People would not bring inheritance by itself in the kingdom. He denied the idea of power and status as a way for Messiah or Messiah’s followers. He spoke of a long delay in the coming of the kingdom. He established a renewal movement, a group within Israel to be True Israel. He claimed to be of very high and exalted status which people would only understand when he was glorified. He gave many hints and signs of his identity. He left a group of disciples to lead a movement after his death and glorification when these things would become clear. He spoke of coming in the future as the Son of Man.

Yeshua’s vision of Messiahship and kingdom is a Jewish vision, but different in many details from other Jewish ways of imagining the kingdom.

In the days of the evangelists, division with synagogues throughout the empire heightened the distance between the Yeshua-movement and Jewish communities. The evangelists emphasized the origins of their movement as Jewish but with a view to spread to the nations. Yeshua had other sheep. Yeshua called for his name to be proclaimed to the gentiles. The Abrahamic promise was at last being realized.

Yeshua is the Moses-like Prophet-to-Come, the New Moses, whose agency as the Voice of the Father reveals depths of God unknown or ambiguous in previous revelation.

I listed for readers the findings of Paul Anderson regarding the prophet-like-Moses theme in the fourth gospel, which is not a minor motif but a guiding principle of the entire Gospel of John (see my post “Moses-Like-Prophet in John” here).

In searching out examples of how Yeshua revealed greater depths of God than had previously been known, I first went down a path seeking in the teaching of Yeshua new revelation. I think to some degree I was on the wrong path. I came up with a list of nine existential questions about God and us that are addressed in Yeshua’s teaching and wrote a blog post about it (see “The Son Has Spoken” here).

Yet as I taught this material at our synagogue, a perceptive woman and friend said, “But, Derek, none of that is new. That’s all good interpretation of what’s already in the Hebrew Bible.”

I quickly realized she was right. In terms of Yeshua’s teaching about God’s nature, nearly all of it is accessible in the Hebrew Bible if you avoid certain pitfalls. Judaism has, like Christianity, fallen into a number of pitfalls in this area (e.g., the Saadian and Maimonidean ideas about God’s unity and transcendence in utter denial of real Presence).

Not long after realizing that I was searching in the wrong place — looking for Yeshua’s new revelation of the depths of God in his teaching — I came across some good thoughts on the New Moses theme in Matthew in a book by Darrell Bock (Jesus According to Scripture). His comments on Matthew 13:16-17, 52, made me realize that Yeshua’s purpose in teaching was often to clarify what was already in the old. The new wine was mostly new because the shepherds of Israel did not, in Yeshua’s time, understand the message of the prophets.

Those prophets, according to Matthew 13:16-17, desired to look into Yeshua’s time, to see in his identity and teaching the completion of what they envisioned. And the good scribe of the kingdom (the scribe who knows the King, Yeshua, and looks for his kingdom to come) brings forth both new and old. That is, the old (Hebrew Bible) is inextricably connected with the new, and the scribe brings forth the connections (but most writing about “messianic prophecy” has been terrible and has not followed scribal patterns at all).

Where I needed to be looking, to find the new revelation of the Sent-One, was not in Yeshua’s public teaching, per se. I needed to be looking more at his deeds (somewhat in combination with his teaching). It is more in the deeds and hints at the identity of Yeshua that we find the new things coming forth from the old.

I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children.
Matthew 11:25 (and Luke 10:21).

What are some of the things revealed to little children that may be referenced here?

The following list is subject to more evidence that I am planning to give here. I am not pretending that in listing these points I have demonstrated my case for them. This is an initial presentation of some themes and ideas presented in the gospels that cry out for closer scrutiny. Also, it is important to me not to simply draw from the fourth gospel, where the exalted identity of Yeshua is especially emphasized. Any meaningful portrait of what is new in Yeshua ought to draw from the synoptics as well as John.

• The Way of Surrender. I was struck by a phrase in an essay by Marianne Meye Thompson: the path that God designates . . . giving power up in surrender of one’s life and service to others (“Jesus and His God” in The Cambridge Companion to Jesus, 2001). Yeshua not only described his own messianic career as being about surrender of his life and service, but said repeatedly that disciples were to lose their life, that the last was greatest, and that his followers should be servants to all. This is not simply social justice (the message of the Israelite prophets). It is a radical step beyond. It is Messiah killed being the real glory of Messiah. It is kingdom subjects not only working for justice, but selling everything for a pearl of great value. This is not an incidental theme, but is central in all four gospels (the messianic secret, the Sermon on the Mount, the kingdom for the poor, the lifted up Son of Man, and many other themes).
• Ransom theology. This is an outgrowth of the first point. In surrendering all, Yeshua accomplishes a ransom. The famous ransom passage (Mk 10:45; Mt 20:28) is greeted with skepticism by many scholars (a late addition? it sounds too churchy, say some). Ransom theology goes beyond the way of surrender theme. Not only does Yeshua give up power in service to others, but his surrender to death, but this act of sacrifice is a necessary transaction for people to have life. This is cross theology. It grows out of the Exodus-Passover story.
• Faith as inclusion in the kingdom. I do not think Yeshua in any way denies the election of Israel, which is a carnal election (via birth, not faith). I think, rather, he introduces a concept of a second requirement beyond election. The renewal movement of Yeshua suggests it is not enough to be Israel. God has not yet sent the messianic age because Israel has to go beyond being the Elect. Israel must believe and act according to belief. And in making belief the requirement for renewal, Yeshua opens the door for those in the Nations as well. This is where Yeshua’s universalism (that the divine covenant promises cover the whole world and not only Israel) comes through the door. Paul’s “works of the Law” equal presumption of rightness with God via birth as Jews (or conversion). Paul’s “salvation by faith” equals Yeshua’s call to “believe in me.” This is where Matthew 13:16-17 is really explained: the prophets called for faith and action, but the object of that faith and action was waiting to be seen. Yeshua claims to be that object of faith. And the action required is belief in his identity and message. The irrevocable election of Israel remains important, for in the fulness of time, Israel will also come to the renewal of faith, as the prophets had already foretold. And now that Yeshua has come, that faith can only be in the Messiah himself.
• Word made flesh (incarnation). It is not only John, as some think, but all through the gospels, that we see Yeshua as the Exalted One, whose identity is more than a man. It is a mystery, because the nature of God as both transcendent (the Eternal, the Beyond-Knowing) and immanent (the Word-Glory-Presence) is mysterious. Yeshua is more than the Prophet-like-Moses, ultimately, but is the Prophetic-word incarnate. He is Living Torah. All things have been handed over to Yeshua by the Father. Even the wind and waves obey him. He comes in the Glory of his Father. He is greater than the Temple. He is before Abraham. Unless we know that he is, we will die in our sins.

Yeshua heals and those with faith are made well. Yeshua defeats evil powers and demons are drawn to oppose him, but they can only obey his greater authority. Yeshua criticizes the shepherds of Israel who have followed the pattern of domination and not surrender. Yeshua gathers disciples for his way of surrender. And Yeshua surrenders to the difficult will of the Father (“he will speak to them all that I command him,” “the word which you hear is not mine but the Father’s who sent me”). And all these things are revealed not to the wise, the shepherds of Israel who deal in power, but to little children.

Cliches like splitting hairs, chopping logic, quibbling over details, or making fine distinctions come to mind as the probable result of insisting on a good interpretation of a few words from an ancient saying. After all, do the differences really amount to much?

Well, I think they do. Take the phrase “poor in spirit” for example.

I was explaining the Beatitudes at a “Yeshua in Context” seminar this past weekend. It was the third lecture in a few hours and the whole experience for me was like an intensive meditation on the meaning of being a disciple, of being a follower, of thinking about what it meant to be near to Messiah and learn from him. I was learning at least as much as those I was speaking to. Sometimes inspired texts do that.

Of course, following the example of Yeshua, I started the talk with something unexpected. Predictability is often not the best tactic in teaching. So we started by thinking about the Beatitudes in Luke 6 instead of the more familiar ones in Matthew 5.

Matthew’s version is easier to take, especially Matthew’s version of the very first Beatitude about the “poor in spirit.” As you probably know, in Luke’s version, Yeshua makes a very similar point, but not about the “poor in spirit,” but rather “the poor.” Blessed are the poor.

Why is “poor in spirit” easier to take?

It’s because there is no alternate way to understand “blessed are the poor.” “Blessed are the poor” is an antithesis, pure and simple. It’s truth standing on its head, logic upside down. It’s crazy to say “blessed are the poor.”

But “poor in spirit” is capable of a few comfortable interpretations. The common one goes like this: “Blessed are people who exhibit humility, who think more of others than themselves. They are poor in spirit but rich in rewards from God.”

It’s a nice interpretation and the main point of it is certainly true. So if we just read Matthew’s version of the saying that way, we can’t go wrong. Right?

Why not just read all of Matthew’s Beatitudes in a parallel manner? Meek people are humble. Those who hunger and thirst in Matthew do so for righteousness (of course, in Luke, they just hunger and thirst). Being merciful is good. Peacemakers and people will to be persecuted are good.

Maybe all the Beatitudes are about something we do to earn a blessing. God gives the kingdom to humble people, the poor in spirit, and the meek and merciful. Maybe that’s what Yeshua meant.

But I don’t think so.

I think there is plenty of evidence that the “poor in spirit” are the broken and devastated. And the meek are not the “saints of humility” but rather the stepped on and oppressed, the ones always overlooked and never assumed to be important.

I think there is a long tradition of this in the Psalms and Prophets (and also the Wisdom) before Yeshua ever comes to teach God’s way to a band of disciples.

Job exhibits repeatedly a Wisdom tradition concerning care for the poor as a sign of righteousness, such as in 30:25, “Did not I weep for him whose day was hard? Was not my soul grieved for the poor?”

In Psalms the poor or needy one is the special subject of God’s care, as in 34:7(6), “This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him, and saved him out of all his troubles.”

The Prophets rail against the injustice done to the poor, as in Isaiah 3:14, “What do you mean by crushing my people, by grinding the face of the poor?”

So, a good interpretation of the Beatitudes does matter and it gives a different message. It is not, “Blessed are the righteous for they will earn a reward.” It is, rather:

Blessed are the crushed people, devastated, for theirs is the kingdom.
Blessed are those suffering grief, for they will be comforted by God.
Blessed are the overlooked and oppressed, for these will own the world to come.
Blessed are those who cannot find justice and true goodness in this broken world, for they will see goodness in the kingdom.
Blessed are those who have mercy now, for all will see how mercy is needed then.
Blessed are those who work for the One Thing, for they will see the One.
Blessed are those who heal fights and bitterness, for this is what God does.
Blessed are those who suffer for the mission of healing and serving, for their reward will redeem the persecution.

And the underlying message is also clear: My disciples will work to make this world as much like the world to come as they can.

Kingdom at Hand?
What did Yeshua mean about the kingdom of God being at hand (soon to appear) in Mark 1:15? He followed this proclamation up by calling disciples, defeating evil spirits, and making people well. In the world to come there will be no evil, people will be well, and all will be as a family in union with each other and God. Yeshua was bringing future realities into the present. Note that many of Yeshua’s kingdom parables (Sower, Mustard Seed) represent present realities and not just future.

Sinners and Mustard Plants
Yeshua came to call sinners (Mark 2:17). The parable of the Mustard Seed is more about the plant than the seed (Mark 4:30-32). The mustard weeds are a gardener’s nightmare. They grow up all over and become nesting places for birds. One reading is that the birds that nest are undesirables, like sinners and gentiles. So the present kingdom grows up unstoppably and attracts those who might not seem like kingdom people.

Binding the Strongman
Yeshua announced his intention to enter the house of evil and plunder its goods, by first binding the strongman (Satan, see Mark 3:27). Some might read the “plunder his goods” in purely conversionary terms (converting lost people and saving them from Satan’s control), but everything in the gospels suggests Yeshua freed people from evil in more holistic ways (wellness, provision, and redemption).

Beatitudes
As I discuss in chapter 10 of Yeshua in Context, the Beatitudes (Matt 5:1-12; Luke 6:20-23) have both a present and future aspect. For example, Matthew 5:2 has a future part (“theirs is the kingdom of heaven”) and a present (“blessed are the poor in spirit”). It is more than implied that disciples hearing Yeshua’s sermon will bless the poor in spirit, comfort mourners, fill the hungry, and so on. Yeshua is calling us to live now in light of what will come in God’s kingdom.

As You Measure, Alms, Do Not Worry
It is the Father’s pleasure to give us the kingdom, says Yeshua (Luke 12:32). So we do not need the treasures of this world. But instead we should sell things and give alms (12:33). This principle is stated without balance, causing many to disregard it completely. It is not an absolute principle. Possessing things is clearly not wrong (a case I can easily demonstrate if challenged). But the balance of owning versus sharing is way off in the lives of nearly all people who have the opportunity to own many things. Treasure in heaven (not in the sky or in the future, but treasure in the heavenly court–as in reward from the one who sits on the heavenly throne) is stored up for the righteous. And Messiah tells us: “Give, and it will be given to you; good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap. For the measure you give will be the measure you get back” (Luke 6:38). So we are not to worry about our life, our food, our clothing (Luke 12:22). The Father knows we need these things. And Matthew records it this way, “When you give alms…” (6:2).

When You Fed These
There are sheep and there are goats, the blessed and the judged. Those blessed fed the least and in so doing fed Yeshua. Those judged, as Keith Green says in his famous song on the Sheep and Goats, were too busy running religious organizations to help (not that I am innocent of this myself). See Matthew 25:31-46.

The Temple State
Yeshua’s protest against the Temple (Mark 11:15-19) was about commerce in the holy precincts, about the violation of the sacred by carrying things through God’s courts, about hypocrisy in the leadership, and a protest against a Temple state that demanded obedience from the masses but which did not obey in turn. Had the Temple state followed Torah as it demanded of the people, the tithes would have been redistributed and the people blessed with abundance. See “Yeshua and the Mishnah on Carrying in the Temple” and “Yeshua and Idolatrous Coins.” Mark 11 contrasts the Yeshua-community with its faith and prayer with the Temple state (see below, “The Disciple Communities as Alternative”).

The Disciple Communities as Insiders
To you (plural, disciples) has been given the secret of the kingdom of God (Mark 4:11). To those outside, all looks like a riddle. But they will know you are my disciples by your love (John 13:35).

The Disciple Communities as Alternative
These are my mother and brothers, said Yeshua (Mark 4:34), those who do the will of God (4:35). The powers of death (some say “gates of hell”) will not be able to stand before this community (Matt 16:18). In Mark 11, Yeshua curses a fig tree right before he protests the Temple state. Afterward, he uses the fig tree as a lesson. His disciple movement will be about prayer that moves mountains and forgiving one another as their Father in heaven forgives their sins. What the Temple state cannot accomplish (bringing the world to come through righteousness), Yeshua’s disciples community will do. For more on this, see “Discipleship and the Fig Tree.”

Mark’s account is the best of all four gospels to help us reconstruct what happened. This incident is of great importance, probably being what sealed Yeshua’s doom in the eyes of the Temple state and Rome. We should read Yeshua’s actions in the giant Temple complex as a commotion, not bringing the whole Temple activity to a standstill. Yeshua acted alone and did not ask his disciples to participate.

In the comments that follow, I will point to some resources for further study, consider the sequence as narrated in Mark, and put this crucial incident in Yeshua’s life in its context.

RESOURCES FOR FURTHER STUDY
Maurice Casey, Jesus of Nazareth is a monumental summary of historical scholarship by an expert in the Aramaic of Yeshua’s time. Casey has written on the Aramaic sources of Mark’s gospel and his work has interested me so much I am working with a rabbi friend and mentor this year to start learning Galilean Aramaic and will work through Casey’s research and read DSS texts and Midrashic texts in Galilean Aramaic over the next few years. Casey covers the Temple protest on pgs 408-415.

Adela Yarbro Collins, Mark: A Commentary, in the Hermeneia series. Collins is excellent at providing examples from the Greco-Roman and Jewish sources to provide historical context. I first learned from her some of the issues surrounding Herod’s expansion of the Temple complex and how it informs Yeshua’s action of protest.

Daniel J. Harrington, The Gospel of Mark, in the Sacra Pagina series. Harrington is a well-informed and balanced commentator who values both tradition and context. I think his comments are a sane balance between mere historical inquiry (like Casey) and traditional understandings of the gospel. I do not think what we can know about Yeshua is limited to what historians can give evidence for. I think a storied epistemology (see my Yeshua in Context and an appreciation for the living presence of Yeshua in the tradition should also inform our knowledge.

COMMENTARY ON MARK 11:15-19
The following sequence from Mark is helpful to restate:
(1) Yeshua enters the Temple, likely the outer courts.
(2) Yeshua begins driving out traders and overturning some tables.
(3) Yeshua preaches against and takes action to prevent people carrying vessels (baskets, bowls, money bags) through the outer courts.
(4) Yeshua preaches from Isaiah 56:7 and Jeremiah 7:11.
(5) Yeshua’s protest becomes known to the chief priests and also the scribes.
(6) Yeshua’s action draws a crowd which prevents his immediate arrest.

What should be obvious is that Yeshua reveres the Temple and protests the Temple state. Any interpretation which assumes Yeshua wanted the Temple to be destroyed is incorrect. The proper running of the Temple would involve redistributing tithes to the poor and make it a place of God’s Presence, of shared resources, and of joy. The Temple state has made it a place of taxation without redistribution and a source of power and position for the elite.

What does Yeshua specifically oppose here? He opposes trading in the Temple courts, carrying vessels through, and filling the place of prayer in such a way as to prevent the main activity which should be here: prayer.

Collins explains that the idea of commerce in the Temple courts began with Herod enlarging the Temple area and including a Portico, like the Greco-Roman markets on their temples. Prior to this, tradition says the necessary trade (selling animals, changing money) happened on the Mount of Olives.

Maurice Casey (Jesus of Nazareth) explains Yeshua’s very plausible prohibition of carrying vessels through holy space, which is similar to the later rabbinic law, “one should not enter the Temple mount with . . . his moneybag” (m. Berakhot 9:5, see also Harrington).

Isaiah 56 is about foreigners and eunuchs in the Temple, but also describes its courts as a place for prayer. Yeshua’s main objection seems to have nothing to do with gentiles (the outer courts were used by Jews and non-Jews for prayer, as numerous New Testament texts and other sources confirm). The commerce here at Passover crowded the courts and prevented prayer. Instead of worship, the Temple was a market. This is also the point of the Jeremiah 7 text, where the prophet complains that the leadership have made of the Temple a source of personal power and enrichment instead of a place of prayer and worship.

An additional issue in the money-changing is that the Temple state required the Tyrian shekel, which was more pure in its metal content, but which had an image of Baal Melkart on it (the Syrian Hercules) and was therefore idolatrous (Collins, Casey).

The Temple state’s priority was not holiness, but commerce, power, and wealth. Yeshua’s protest action did not stop Temple commerce and was symbolic. But it drew the attention of the Temple state and also a large crowd. By the time Yeshua completed it, his arrest was certain and the chief priests had what they would need to convince Rome to execute him.

After the commentary, I will suggest a few points of application for discipleship in our time.

MARK 11:12-14, 20-25
Yeshua curses a fig tree (vss. 12-14).
In between is Yeshua’s Temple protest action (vss. 15-19).
The next morning’s lesson from the fig tree (vss. 20-25).

This whole section in vss. 14-25 is a classic example of what some have called the Markan sandwich technique. He begins to tell a story, follows with another scene which may not seem to be related, and then returns to the story. So, here, Yeshua curses a fig tree and then the story of his Temple protest action is related. But the next morning, the story comes back to the fig tree.

The episode raises a number of questions. Is Yeshua’s cursing a fig tree rational or irrational? Does the fig tree symbolize something specific and should we try to find the exact reference? Which mountain does Yeshua have in mind for being moved by prayer? How does the fig tree lesson relate to the Temple protest action?

To begin, we need to understand the seasons for figs in Israel. By Passover (April) there would usually be leaves, but no figs. By Shavuot (June), the same time as the wheat harvest, would be the early crop of figs (there are two fig crops a year in Israel’s climate). Therefore, and as Mark is careful to point out, it is irrational for Yeshua to expect figs at Passover. This means his action with the fig tree is purely symbolic. His curious action, a prophetic enactment, is meant to make the disciples curious.

The next morning, after the Temple protest action, Peter remembers the fig tree as they pass it, now brown and withered. Does Yeshua now launch into a lesson about Israel being fruitless and unworthy, as we might expect? Not at all. He launches into a lesson about the power of prayer. What could it all mean?

First, it is helpful to know that the fig comes up as a symbol in the prophets several times for Israel’s faith and fruitfulness. Micah speaks of God’s disappointment at finding no fig to eat in Israel (7:1). Hosea describes Israel as a withered fig tree without fruit (9:10). Yet the promise of a great age of peace is that every man will sit under his vine and fig tree (Isa 36:16; Mic 4:4).

Second, we should forget about some specific symbolic meaning, since Yeshua gives no such clues. Neither should we read the mountain of vs. 23 with some specific reference (as if this is about the Mount of Olives and the Zechariah 14 imagery, as some interpreters do). Yeshua does not take the lesson in this direction. Note that Yeshua’s words about faith moving a mountain come up again in Paul in 1 Cor 13:2 (“faith so as to move mountains”).

What we have here is a potent contrast between the powerful Temple state and the humble disciple group. The Temple, though holy, has become corrupt through its leadership. It is a religious institution of vast wealth and power. But it is not effective at making Israel holy and fruitful. So, Yeshua, powerless and alone, makes an ineffective protest action, an irrational act which cannot succeed (like his irrational expectation of a fig tree to have early fruit). But while Yeshua’s protest does not bring the Temple to its knees, his curse does wither a fig tree.

This leads to a lesson about prayer. The humble disciple group has more power than all the Temple state. If they do God’s will and pray, nothing is beyond their ability. God will move mountains, shake empires, and change the world through them. Their power is not in wealth or position, but in prayer, forgiveness, and faith.

DISCIPLESHIP LESSONS:
… The power of the Yeshua community is never going to be in money, position, and power over people to govern or coerce.
… The power of the Yeshua community comes from God and is based on faith and prayer.
… We should not read that we have the power to move mountains, but that God does. Thus we have no “blank check” from God here, but rather the promise that as we serve him he will move mountains and use us along the way.
… The Temple state and its leaders made the error of setting goals based on personal power and trying to make them come to pass.
… Yeshua, who has real power, does not use it to coerce. He could have smitten the Temple completely, but instead made a protest action which changed nothing. He stands for right even if his actions do not overthrow evil. So the Yeshua community stands for right even though we cannot change evil.
… Unlike the Temple state Yeshua protested, our calling as a disciple community is to understand and discern God’s purposes in healing people and the world and to stand praying for mountains to move as God wills. Our power is in togetherness, faith, and prayer centered on our wise understanding of God’s purposes, not agendas created to manipulate the process or establish power structures.
… The Jewish tradition of prayer with additional prayers and teachings by Yeshua is a good tradition which accomplishes these purposes for the disciple community as Yeshua taught us (note that Mark 11:25 is the closest Mark comes to echoing Yeshua’s prayer recorded in Matthew and Luke).

But it is impossible to exaggerate the importance of the idea that Yeshua was a prophet of the kingdom from within the story, from within the experience the disciples and crowds had of Yeshua. For them Yeshua was a potential prophet, a healer, an exorcist. How does Yeshua come across as a prophet in Mark? What sorts of things do we learn from this?

Rather than go through a boring list of passages in which Yeshua plays a prophet role, I thought I’d look more deeply into one story and reflect on the others from within it.

The classical story is, of course, Mark 8:27-38. The disciples’ answer to Yeshua’s question is, “John the Baptist; and others say, Elijah; and others one of the prophets.” Only one disciple goes further, Peter, and we wonder if all of the Twelve would have gotten this or if Peter had better insight than the others. (Yes, I know that in another gospel, John, we have Andrew telling Peter, “We have found the Messiah” (1:41)).

The popular notions of Yeshua’s identity all had to do with the role of prophet. John the Baptist and Elijah, of course, were prophets. If Yeshua wasn’t one of them returned to life, then who was he? He must be one of the other prophets (Malachi? Isaiah? It’s hard to know who else people might have imagined).

It’s curious that in Mark’s wording, it did not occur to anyone that he was simply “Yeshua the prophet,” but that he was “Yeshua with the spirit of one of the prophets upon him.” That is, we might wonder if people resisted the idea of a new prophet and thought that God might bring back one of the hallowed prophets in a kind of spiritual endowment on a contemporary person.

And what sort of prophet was Yeshua. What “prophetic” topics did he address? Leaving aside for the moment his healings and feedings, which put him in an Elijah-Elisha category, we would have to say that Yeshua was a prophet of the kingdom.

The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe in the gospel (Mark 1:15).

I will make you fishers of men (1:17) said Yeshua, meaning either “catching people in kingdom faith” or “catching and judging those who prevent the kingdom” (Jeremiah 16 uses the image of fishing for people as judgment).

I came not to call the righteous, but sinners (2:17), said Yeshua. He was calling them to a realization of the kingdom.

The days will come, when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in that day (2:20), which is a futuristic pronouncement of coming sorrow (a very prophet-like thing to say).

In 3:13; 6:46; and 9:2 he goes up on “the mountain” or “a high mountain” and gives revelation. It is a very Moses-like thing to do. In one of these instances, he said he would show those standing with him the kingdom (9:1).

To you has been given the secret of the kingdom, but to those outside everything is in parables (4:11), says Yeshua and then cites Isaiah as a precedent of a prophet, like himself, called to preach in a way that will bring judgment to the many but reward to disciples who hear and follow.

The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed upon the ground (4:26). Yeshua’s parables, even when not put into a form of “the kingdom is like” were generally understood to be about the kingdom.

The Pharisees and scribes sought a sign (8:11-13) from the prophet, perhaps not satisfied for some reason with the signs they already saw.

Yeshua made many other prophet-like pronouncements, including enactments with a fig tree and a long discourse on signs and coming events in Mark 13.

No wonder Schweitzer long ago depicted Yeshua historically in the category of a apocalyptic prophet. Likewise, Maurice Casey in his new and monumental historical Jesus book, Jesus of Nazareth, sees apocalyptic prophet as the main category for Yeshua.

In an upcoming series (“Messianism and Yeshua in Mark”) we will consider the further claim that Yeshua is Messiah. But from within the story, few could see that. Such a realization came mainly after the resurrection.

Even stories in which it seems people either hoped or actively pushed for Yeshua to take on some revolutionary role (deliverer from Rome), they may still have had prophet in mind more so that “king” or “one like David” or “Messiah.”

Ched Myers in Binding the Strongman summarizes well the ideas of resistance to Rome with the involvement of a prophet as the leader. Theudas (see Acts 5:36) promised to lead a group to the Jordan and part the waters, like Moses, Joshua, and Elijah. An action like this had military overtones, with Rome being like Egypt. In Acts 21:38 we have a reference to the Egyptian, a prophet coming from Egypt (but Jewish) who called followers to gather in the desert and come with an unarmed attack on Jerusalem. He said they would stand on the Mount of Olives and the walls of Jerusalem would crumble. This calls to mind not only Joshua, but also Zechariah’s words (chapter 14) about the Mount of Olives and the last battle. John the Baptist repeatedly denied he would lead any resistance movement, but he drew many followers out into the desert. His movement was packed with revolutionary potential.

The idea that many people regarded Yeshua as a prophet who might lead a popular resistance movement against Rome is not far-fetched. But Yeshua kept putting down such expectations. And as a prophet he gave off mixed signals, saying things about suffering, a cross, and being raised after three days.

What are we, as Yeshua’s followers now, to make of Yeshua as the prophet and even apocalyptic prophet?

It is in forgetting Yeshua’s role as a prophet that much modern religion has missed the mark. Prophets brought change in the present as well as cryptic foretastes of the future. Yeshua’s kingdom talk mysteriously is about future and present. Is the kingdom here now or coming? Many of Yeshua’s sayings can be read either way.

But when we combine Yeshua’s sayings and his actions, we find a pattern. He based present actions on the future realities of the kingdom. So, the kingdom now of Yeshua the prophet looks like the things he did and taught (healing, defeating evil, teaching love and service). The kingdom future will look like a world where everyone is healed, evil defeated, and love and service will be the norm.

So, if we take Yeshua as Messiah-for-the-future-only, as does so much modern religion, we miss the prophetic movement of Yeshua. It is about literal things, not spiritual realities to be realized in the future. Yeshua the prophet has a lot to say about how you relate to people now, to possessions, and to life itself.

Yeshua said in Mark 7:15, “there is nothing outside a man which by going into him can defile him; but the things which come out of a man are what defile him.”

I have always thought that this passage was one of the most penetrating, well-phrased, to-the-heart-of-the-matter statements of what Yeshua stood for. It’s actually only part of what Yeshua had to say on the matter. It’s what he said to the crowds, the outsiders, the ones who did not get private instruction as part of the inner circle. Mark 7:15 is rather vague and can be taken in some different directions all by itself.

Yeshua gives further clarification in vss. 17-23. I won’t go into detail about some of the controversial matters here. Many people wonder if Yeshua is nullifying the dietary law. You can find my take on that question in chapter 8 of Yeshua in Context.

What I am interested in in this podcast is the meaning of Yeshua’s ethical teaching here. We’re too quick to make blanket statements and simplistic arguments. I hear all the time, “God hates religion and loves relationship.” You can’t possibly read the Bible with intelligence and believe this. What God hates is not religion, but the kind of things some people make of religion and the kinds of religion the masses tend to settle for. These weak and sometimes evil forms leave people empty, unfulfilled.

Likewise, it’s simplistic to say, “Yeshua is against ritual purity laws.” That’s not the point.

I’m saying Mark 7 cuts through our shoddy notions of religion. It is not simply a rebuke against those scribes back then.

Neither is Mark 7 unique in Yeshua’s teaching. It is a thread that runs throughout it.

In one parable, Yeshua calls his movement a mustard bush. That is, Yeshua’s movement is an annoying weed that pops up in the religious scene which the official gardeners can’t get rid of. It results in sinners and gentiles and the great unwashed coming into the kingdom.

In a famous scene, Yeshua protests the Temple. It is his Father’s house. He has zeal for it, as his disciples testify. Why does he protest it?

The simplistic say, he was against the Temple. Those who look deeper say, he was against what the leaders made the Temple to be. It has become an unjust system, a burden on the people and a source of enrichment for the power-brokers.

His Father made the Temple a place not only of worship but also of feeding the hungry and filling the people with abundance. But the leaders demand the tithes of the people without fulfilling the purpose. They keep as much of the proceeds as they can and use the Temple as much as they can to perpetuate their power. They demand without giving.

Yeshua opposes the Pharisees again and again and modern religion completely misses why. So many modern religious people act just like the Pharisees Yeshua opposed.

They shut people out of the kingdom. All the while they congratulate themselves, “We believe in grace; we are not legalistic Pharisees.” Mark 7 doesn’t allow any of us the luxury of self-congratulation.

In spite of much rhetoric, much modern religion is no more than “come to our meeting so you can have the mark of being one of the saved.” And in order to accommodate the idea of grace, many have made the meeting more like a concert, so that the threshold is lowered and it is not so hard for large numbers of people to attend the meeting and have the mark of the saved. Come as you are. You can wear a T-shirt. But by God, get here. If you don’t, you’re missing God’s healing power and heading to a dangerous place.

No wonder Dietrich Bonhoeffer spoke of religionless Christianity as being so needed.

When people reduce the message of Yeshua to something as powerless as having the marks of the saved on you, outward signs like mere attendance, they have missed Yeshua completely.

Belonging to a community of believers is not and never has been, for Yeshua, about having the mark. Yeshua designed his community to be the place that IS and DOES his will.

How about we translate Yeshua’s saying in Mark 7: “Failure to attend meetings and bear the outward marks of faith is not what defiles, but righteousness comes from within, goes out from my followers, and comforts the suffering”?

What are the false notions of impiety in modern religion. They are many. Wrong music. Disinterest in shallow or boring worship services. Failure to apply the right bumper sticker or proclaim Jesus in a T-shirt logo.

Think about what Yeshua is actually saying in Mark 7: “Don’t worry that in the jostling crowds at Walmart you might contact uncleanness. It’s not contact from the outside that defiles. It’s what comes out of you, the wickedness in your heart. Your sense of superiority, I’m better than that woman. Your deceit. Your lust. Your grasping for self-enthronement is what defiles.

But you can get these words wrong too.

It’s not that Yeshua is saying, “Measure up.” Nor is he calling you to be a righteous individual.

First, a focus on measuring up will lead you astray. Don’t look at your shortcomings and feel unshakable shame. Look at all the good you can do and do it. Be a force for love, justice, kindness, goodness, service, help for those hurting.

Second, a focus on being a righteous individual will lead you astray. You were not created to be a solitary paragon of virtue. You made for others, to be with others, to be completed by others. You were made for God’s family.

But, you say, the congregation near me has it all wrong. Well, start somewhere. Yeshua’s generation had it all wrong too.

And no matter where you go, you’ll find people who want love, friendship, encouragement, help, and even to lend a helping hand.

But you will find that evil always pops up, in you and in others. Why be surprised? The power of sin is in perpetuating evil. The power of good is in reclaiming lost ground and advancing the kingdom of God.

While we are waiting for it to fully arrive, the kingdom of God is what we do together. It is what Yeshua taught us to do. Comfort mourners. Fill the hungry. See God. Supply needs. Right wrongs. Promote life.

Hopefully most readers (and movie viewers) understand that the way you tell a story shapes the message. That is, the same events can be told by different storytellers and different morals and themes can be emphasized. Everyone reporting an event or telling a story must choose things like what to include and exclude, what order to tell it in, what parts to emphasize, and how to comment on the story beyond simple reporting.

The call of the first disciples is a perfect example of the difference the storytelling can make. You’d almost think Mark and the Fourth Gospel are telling of completely different events.

Mark and John have very different versions of the calling of the initial disciples. It is not that the two ways of telling the story cannot be harmonized (they can, in basic outline). It is, rather, that they give different backgrounds and make different points. In John, the initial call story is about evidence for the exalted identity of Yeshua. In Mark, the initial call story is about Yeshua’s dramatic authority and the model of disciples leaving all kinships and vocations to follow.

Most readers are more familiar with the story as told in Mark and followed in Matthew and Luke. It is about Yeshua coming to the Lake in Galilee and saying to Andrew and Simon, “Come with me and I will make you catchers of men.” He then goes to another place on the lake and says to James and John, sons of Zebedee, and calls them away from their boat.

Mark has just narrated the message of Yeshua that the kingdom of God is drawing near and people should repent and believe. Mark is just about to show Yeshua on a mission to heal and defeat demonic powers. The call of the disciples comes in between.

People in a synagogue are about to be astounded in Mark’s account by the strange authority with which Yeshua speaks. His authority forces demonic powers to listen. It drives out illness and disability. It declares the kingdom with certainty. This Yeshua knows and has miraculous authority to back up his knowledge.

So, when Yeshua says to a person, “Follow me,” it has an authority than cannot be denied. You can bet that Mark wants his contemporaries, the people in his time a generation after Yeshua, to know that authority.

I have argued elsewhere that Mark’s gospel presents Yeshua in a way that speaks both to the Jewish and Greco-Roman world. Mark’s thesis is in the first verse of his gospel: the beginning of the gospel of Messiah Yeshua, the Son of God. Roman emperors were referred to as sons of deity. To Jewish ears, Son of God suggested Davidic kingship quite possibly.

Mark is saying to his generation, “The actual Son of God calls you to expand your idea of vocation and kinship. Do not cling to your family and job. Serve the real king.”

The story in the Fourth Gospel is quite different. It starts during the career of John the Baptist. The Baptist bears witness to the identity of the True Light, that all might believe in him. The Baptist proclaims the Coming One who is much greater. The Baptist points to Yeshua and cries out that he is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

Then, in 1:35 and following, the Baptist points Yeshua out specifically to two disciples. One of them is Andrew. The other is not named. Some speculate that the other is John, son of Zebedee.

Andrew then goes to his brother, Simon also called Peter, and tells him about Yeshua. Andrew and Peter have a powerful encounter with Yeshua.

Next, Yeshua goes into Galilee and finds Philip. Philip is from the same small town as Andrew and Peter. All the personal relationships are connected. Then Philip finds Nathanael and the circle grows.

We find in the Fourth Gospel that the Baptist’s work was still going on in the early days of Yeshua’s work. The Baptist’s disciples worry that all the disciples are now going over to Yeshua. The Baptist explains that this is fitting, that he must decrease and the Coming One increase.

So, in the Fourth Gospel, the formation of Yeshua’s disciple group is an outgrowth of the work of John the Baptist. The prophetic movement of the Baptist is passing to a new and greater teacher. And the disciples who come to Yeshua have already learned from the Baptist who Yeshua is.

The Fourth Gospel emphasizes the exalted identity of Yeshua. Mark emphasizes the authority of Yeshua. The Fourth Gospel waxes long about the mysterious transcendence of the Son. The gospel of Mark shows rather than tells and shows Yeshua commanding illness and evil to flee.

So, in the Fourth Gospel, the disciples are drawn to Yeshua by what? They are drawn by their knowledge of who he is.

And in Mark, the disciples are drawn by what? They are drawn by his irresistible authority.

Now the two version can be basically reconciled. There are some difficulties to work out. When did Yeshua’s group start baptizing and how long did they continue? Did Yeshua’s movement start in Judea or Galilee? Reconciling the two accounts is not without problems.

But we can suggest that when Yeshua came to the Lake of Galilee, Andrew and Peter already knew Yeshua. They responded as they did because of who Yeshua was. But Mark did not wish to emphasize this aspect. He emphasized the equally valid perspective that Yeshua’s authoritative call persuaded them. The one who speaks and demons listen also calls people to lay aside their interests and join in the work.

Those of us who are predisposed, unlike historians and secular biblical scholars, to take the reporting in all four gospels as true stories, can see how they may be reconciled.

Yet even so, we can see how the same events can be made to serve different messages. And for those of us who accept both messages, we can see more than one reason to be disciples. We follow because we are persuaded Yeshua is the True Light who will conquer the darkness. And we follow because Yeshua is the One with all authority, who will dispel the forces of evil and suffering. Following him in the Fourth Gospel means knowing who he is and through him having union with God. Following him in Mark means joining in the work of defeating evil and suffering.

Zechariah’s prophecy of the king coming on a donkey is a critical view of kingship looking ahead to the messianic age when the ideas of dominion change into peace. In the early part of Zechariah 9, the warring peoples of the Mediterranean coast will become peaceful and submit to God’s authority in the messianic era. Then, in 9:9, Daughter Zion’s king (Jerusalem in the age when promises are fulfilled) comes not as a war-maker, but bringing peace, not on a warhorse, but a donkey like the Davidic kings of old.

Yeshua deliberately evokes this scene, so those who say this is about a prophecy fulfilled miss the point. Yeshua acts out the scene, proclaiming by his action that he is this different kind of king.

The scene creates excitement and tension in Jerusalem. Yeshua is not a Judean, so the people in Jerusalem thinking about the triumphal entry limit their understanding to the idea of a prophet from Galilee. They do not entertain the idea of a messiah from Galilee. But the crowds who are in the know, those who have followed Yeshua around, they proclaim him in clear messianic terms as Son of David. Yet the fact remains that not one in the crowd truly understood. Yeshua is not to be the vanquisher of Rome, but Rome’s redeemer. The theme of Zechariah 9 stands as a witness against revolutionary notions. Yeshua is the one who makes Philistines as if they are part of the people of Israel (Zech 9:7). Yeshua declares here exactly the sort of kingship he is bringing and until the resurrection, none comprehend it.

YESHUA COMMENTS ON FAITH DURING THE ENCOUNTER
John 4:46-54. The royal official in Cana. Inexplicably, when asked to heal, Yeshua rebukes the official (and people in general) for requiring signs in order to believe.

Matthew 8:5-13; Luke 7:1-10. The centurion in Capernaum. Yeshua comments that he has not seen such faith in Israel (the centurion is a Roman, not a Jew).

Mark 2:1-12; Matthew 9:1-8; Luke 5:17-26. Yeshua doesn’t say it, but Mark (and Matthew and Luke follow him in this) says that the faith of those who brought the paralytic was the reason he forgave the man’s sins and then healed him.

Mark 5:25-34; Matthew 9:20-22; Luke 8:43-48. The woman with the bleeding. The word for save is the same as heal, leading to further connection between faith and healing in this story (“your faith has saved/healed you”).

Mark 6:5-6. Yeshua does not heal in his hometown. While Yeshua does not say anything about faith, Mark records that he could not heal here due to lack of faith and that Yeshua was amazed by their unbelief.

Mark 9:23-24 (also in Matthew 17:14-20; Luke 9:37-43, but without the dialogue between Yeshua and the father). The boy with a demon who causes seizures. Yeshua says all things are possible to the one who believes. The man says, “help my unbelief.”

Mark 10:46-52 (also in Matthew 20:29-34, but without the comment about faith). Blind Bartimaeus, near Jericho.

YESHUA COMMANDS SECRECY
Mark 1:25; Luke 4:35. The demon in the synagogue.

Mark 1:40-45; Matthew 8:2-4; Luke 5:12-16. The leper in Galilee.

Matthew 9:30. The mute demoniac.

Mark 7:36. The deaf man in the Decapolis.

YESHUA GOES OUT OF HIS WAY TO HEAL ON THE SABBATH
Mark 3:1-6; Matthew 12:9-14; Luke 6:6-11. The man with the withered hand.

Luke 13:10-17. The disabled woman in the synagogue.

Luke 14:1-6. The man with swelling (dropsy).

John 5:2-24. The lame man at the Bethesda pool.

YESHUA USES SALIVA IN HIS HEALING
Mark 7:31-37. The deaf man in the Decapolis. Yeshua spits on his tongue and puts his fingers in his ears.

Mark 8:22-26. The blind man at Bethsaida. Yeshua makes mud with saliva and applies it to his eyes.

John 9. The man blind from birth.

YESHUA WEEPS RIGHT BEFORE RAISING THE DEAD
John 11:1-44. Lazarus. Why weep when he knows Lazarus will be alive again momentarily?

Aside from the many connections to Moses’ and Israel’s story, the temptation account definitely has a message about Yeshua’s identity. Is it what people think? R.T. France in the New International Commentary on the New Testament series is most helpful.

Some have argued that the temptation centers around Yeshua’s messianic mission:
…(1) if Yeshua could make bread he could get followers
…(2) if he survived a fall from the Temple, this sign would get followers
…(3) if he accepted Satan’s offer of transfer of kingship now, Yeshua could reign as Messiah early.

France says no, that is not it.

It is about Yeshua’s relationship to the Father and the tempter trying to drive a wedge between them:
…(1) Will Yeshua exploit his role as the Son of God? Will he put an early end to the time of testing by making bread from stones?
…(2) Will he require the Father to save him from a fall, pridefully asserting his right as the Son?
…(3) Will he skip the hard road to kingdom decreed by the Father and take a transfer of kingship directly from Satan?

As France observes, Yeshua will face similar temptations as the time of the cross draws near and while he is on the cross.

O the gladness of the poor in ruach, theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Yeshua makes desirable what is commonly regarded as unpleasant or pathetic. Our emotions are stirred by such talk. The imaginations and hopes of peasants sitting on the Galilean grass were stirred. It is something greatly to be desired, a reversal so needed by those of us who deeply feel our poverty of spirit.

What makes these Beatitudes pleasantly sweet is a combination of our trust in the one who speaks them and the attractiveness of their message. There is nothing in all Jewish literature after the Bible to compare with them.

The king, if we believe that about Yeshua, offers his kingdom to the unlikely. It is not because we are poor in spirit that the time of God’s rule on earth is extended to us. Rather, we can know our destiny is gladness and draw on that blissfulness now because the kingdom is ours.

In other words, poverty of spirit is not a condition of the kingdom, though some have read it that way. Rather, poverty of spirit is a condition in which many of us find ourselves without any say in the matter, just as mourning happens to us rather than being a virtue we cultivate.

The Beatitudes are further attractive to us because they are not spoken by just another religious teacher. Yeshua had two things that proved his words worthy of devoting one’s life. He lived what he professed and he gave evidence of having authority to back up his assurances. He comforted mourners and lifted up unimportant people. He showed that the kingdom of heaven can be partially here amongst those who will bring its qualities into life now. His kingdom aims were not simply to draw a following of desperate poor with a false assurance of future hope. Rather, he taught the movement that followed him how to become communities of healing while waiting for the full arrival of God’s reign.

And who could deliver such a counter-intuitive message with authority like Yeshua? He spoke of granting the right for his disciples to sit at his table in his kingdom (Luke 22:29-30) and demonstrated in life, death, and resurrection that he can keep his word.

Yeshua indicated that in some ways the kingdom of God arrived with him and in others that there would be a delay. Luke 10:9 is one of the “now” aspects of the kingdom of God in the “now and not yet” duality. How does Luke 10:9 inform us of one of the senses in which the kingdom had already reached Yeshua’s generation? What does it tell us about the kingdom in our day and in the future?

The story in Luke 10 is about Yeshua sending out seventy to proclaim and heal and exorcise demons. Luke Johnson comments, “The preaching of the kingdom of God is signaled by the power to heal.” In other words, an aspect of the kingdom of God was with Yeshua wherever he went (healing and liberating the possessed). And Yeshua sent that same kingdom power with the seventy.

The kingdom of God (God’s rule on earth) partially exists now, but will be fully realized in the future when human kingdoms are gone and God’s rule is unopposed. Many times “kingdom of God” simply stands for “the age to come.” And in the age to come, sickness and disability and demonic possession will all be done away with.

It was in the healing work of Yeshua and his followers that the kingdom reached his generation. The beatitudes clue us in to other aspects of the kingdom which can be brought into the here and now: comfort, peace, righteousness, lifting up the poor in spirit, etc.

Whether we can, in our modern context, go out with the same power as the seventy or not (some think we can, others do not), we can cause the kingdom to reach our generation much as they did, by bringing aspects of the age to come into the present wherever we are.

An interesting but isolated parallel to the a activity of Jesus may be found in 2 Chr 17:7-9 LXX:
And in the third year of his [Jehoshaphat's] reign he sent his leading men and the sons of prominent people . . . to teach in the cities of Judah; and with them the Levites . . . and with them (was) the book of the Law of the Lord, and they passed through the cities of Judah and taught the people.

Here, according to the Chronicler, the old ideal, according to which the people are to be instructed in the Law by the priests and Levites, is fulfilled at the initiative of the king. Jesus’ activity reflects a new ideal: the instruction of all the people about the good news of God, the eschatological plan about to be fulfilled.