The Firstborn of Many Vol. 2, Synoptic Narrative Christology (Marquette Studies in Theology, #20.)

Donald L. Gelpi, S.J. The Firstborn of Many A Christology for Converting Christians Volume 2 SYNOPTIC NARRATIVE CHRIS...

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Donald L. Gelpi, S.J.

The Firstborn of Many A Christology for Converting Christians

Volume 2 SYNOPTIC NARRATIVE CHRISTOLOGY

Marquette Studies in Theology No. 21 Andrew Tallon, Series Editor Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Gelpi, Donald L., 1934The firstborn of many : a christology for converting Christians / Donald L. Gelpi. p. cm. — (Marquette studies in theology ; no. 20, 21, 22) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-87462-644-7 (pbk. : alk. paper), Volume 1: To hope in Jesus Christ; ISBN 0-87462-645-5 (pbk. : alk. paper), Volume 2: Synoptic narrative Christology; ISBN 0-87462-646-3 (pbk. : alk. paper). Volume 3: Doctrinal and practical Christology. 1. Jesus Christ—Person and offices. 2. Conversion—Christianity. 3. Catholic Church—Doctrines. I. Title. II. Marquette studies in theology ; #20, #21, #22. BT205 .G37 2001 232—dc21 00-012328

Cover image compliments of St. Isaac of Syria Skete. We gratefully acknowledge the generous support of The New Orleans Province of the Society of Jesus, also known as The Southern Province, in making possible the publication of these three volumes.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission of the publisher.

For My Mother, Alice, Who Died As She Lived with Great Hope, Faith, Love, Courage, and Dignity

Volume 2 Table of Contents Preface to Volume 2 ............................................................................ 7 Part 1: Mark’s Narrative Christology .................................................. 9 Chapter 1: Understanding Gospel As Narrative .................................. 9 Chapter 2: Positive Dramatic Linkages in Mark ............................... 24 Chapter 3: Negative Dramatic Linkages in Mark .............................. 53 Chapter 4: Ambiguous Dramatic Linkages in Mark ......................... 82 Chapter 5: Thematic and Allusive Linkages in Mark ...................... 125 Part 2: Matthew’s Narrative Christology ......................................... 148 Chapter 6: Matthew’s Infancy Narrative ......................................... 148 Chapter 7: Positive Dramatic Linkages in Matthew ........................ 160 Chapter 8: Negative Dramatic Linkages in Matthew ...................... 194 Chapter 9: Ambivalent Dramatic Linkages In Matthew ................. 237 Chapter 10: Jesus’ Teachings in Matthew ........................................ 276 Chapter 11: Miracles, Fulfillment, and Allusion in Matthew .......... 306 Part 3: Luke’s Narrative Christology ............................................... 327 Chapter 12: Luke’s Prologues and Infancy Narrative ....................... 327 Chapter 13: Positive Dramatic Linkages in Luke ............................ 349 Chapter 14: Negative Dramatic Linkages in Luke .......................... 397 Chapter 15: Ambiguous Dramatic Linkages in Luke ...................... 434 Chapter 16: Thematic and Allusive Linkages in Luke ..................... 498 Chapter 17: Jesus Christ Proclaimed: The Christology of Acts ....... 517 Part 4: The Pragmatic Meaning of Christological Knowing........... 545 Chapter 18: Imagination and the Christian Conscience: The Practice of Christological Knowing ...................................... 545 Glossary .......................................................................................... 581 Indices ............................................................................................ 602

Preface to Volume 2 The second volume of The Firstborn of Many deals with synoptic narrative Christology. The intuitive mind expresses itself in a variety of artistic and literary forms. The synoptic evangelists chose to express their graced, intuitive insight into the person of Jesus through the medium of narrative. This volume compares and contrasts the narrative statement which each of the evangelists chose to make about Jesus. It examines how narrative forms of intuitive thinking grasp reality, and it situates the unique literary form of the gospel within a spectrum of standard narrative techniques. In the course of examining how gospels grasp the reality of Jesus, I shall in what follows clarify the meaning of what in volume one I called “Christological knowing.” I have defined Christological knowing as knowledge of Jesus Christ through practical assimilation to Him in the power of His Breath. That definition, like any abstract definition, remains vague, however, until one invokes pragmatic logic in order to explicitate its operational consequences. This volume invokes such a logic, and it discovers the practical meaning of Christological knowing articulated in the three synoptic accounts of Jesus’ ministry, death, resurection and mission of His divine Breath. The term “Christological knowing” does not designate an arcane or esoteric religious experience. Anyone growing in holiness has it. The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius Loyola inculcate Christological knowing. In a very real sense, this volume of The Firstborn of Many offers an extended dialectical and foundational interpretation of the knowledge of Jesus Christ mediated by the directed Ignatian retreat. This volume divides into four sections. The first three sections analyze one of the synoptic gospels. Section one deals with Mark; section two, with Matthew; section three, with Luke’s gospel and with the Acts of the Apostles. Chapter one of section one explains in greater detail the method of linkage analysis which I employ in analyzing the gospels as narrative wholes. Section four clarifies the meaning of Christological knowing by reflecting on what synoptic narrative theology tells us about the imaginative structure of Christian moral deliberation. I owe a special debt of gratitude to Herman Waetjen for his careful reading of this volume and for his suggestions for improving it. Elizabeth Meier Tetlow also went through the text with a careful editorial eye. In addition, colleagues in the John Courtney Murray Group read and cri-

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Donald L. Gelpi: The Firstborn of Many

tiqued the section of Mark’s gospel in an earlier, more primitive version than the one which here appears. Their suggestions helped reshape the treatment of Mark and indirectly the treatment of the other synoptics as well. Donald L. Gelpi, S.J. The Jesuit School of Theology at Berkeley

Preface

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Part 1 Mark’s Narrative Christology Chapter 1 Understanding Gospel As Narrative Before one can understand the gospels as narrative, one needs to understand how narrative thinking works. This chapter addresses this complex question by reflecting on the nature of narrative in general and of synoptic gospel narrative in particular. This chapter also explains the method of linkage analysis which I shall apply dialectically to each of the synoptic gospels. Dialectic compares and contrasts interpretative frames of reference. This chapter divides into three parts. Part one situates narrative thinking within the method, the construct of experience, and the theology of conversion presented in volume one. Part two analyses how narrative communicates. It distinguishes scholarly history from story telling and then describes the elements of story telling. It compares and contrasts oral and written narrative and explains how different kinds of narrative relate to the world which they disclose. Part three situates gospel narrative within the spectrum of oral and written narrative. Part three argues that the synoptic gospels exemplify a unique narrative genre and that their uniqueness corresponds to the uniqueness of the Christological knowing which they seek to promote. At the end of part three I announce the thesis which I shall argue in this volume. (I) The dialectical analysis of the three synoptic gospels which this volume undertakes exemplifies the understanding of method which I endorsed in volume one. There, with Lonergan, I defined the term “method” to mean a set of recurrent and related operations yielding cumulative and progressive results. In what follows, I shall apply the same analytic operations to all three synoptic narratives; and I shall argue that the resulting analysis yields a cumulative and progressive insight into narrative Christology. Moreover, this reading of the three synoptic gospels presupposes the construct of experience developed in volume one. That construct recognizes that imaginative, intuitive forms of thinking grasp reality in their own right. The intuitive imagination speaks with different voices. The lyric voice seeks primarily to express the rich texture of affective, personal perceptions of reality. The narrative voice grasps reality through story

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Part 1: Mark’s Narrative Christology

and drama. The voice of interpretative, practical, and prudential deliberation weighs imaginatively the concrete suitability of different kinds of decisions. The voice of discernment endows prudential deliberation with charismatic docility to the divine Breath.1 The analysis which follows focuses on the expression of intuitive faith in Jesus Christ enshrined in synoptic narrative. In the first volume of this study I also suggested that human experience, when understood in realistic, social, triadic categories, exhibits a symbolic structure. By a triadic construct of experience I mean one which discovers three relational variables, or feelings, operative within the higher forms of experience: particular values (or qualities), concrete decisions (or facts), and general tendencies (or laws). By philosophical realism I mean an account of experience which recognizes both the operative reality of general tendencies in the world which we experience and the human capacity to know those tendencies and the decisive and evaluative activities which they ground. By a social construct of experience I mean one which can account for two selves communicating with one another about a third reality, together with everything which such communication implies. By a symbol I mean whatever mediates the evaluative grasp of significance. Events exemplify expressive symbols. By that I mean that they have a dynamic relational structure which the human mind can grasp evaluatively. Unexpressed human evaluations exemplify interpretative symbols. Expressed human evaluations exemplify communications. In a triadic, social construct of experience, synoptic narrative counts as a kind of communication. In what follows I shall examine in more detail how the synoptics communicate a Christological statement about Jesus Christ through the creative use of gospel narrative. Because this volume deals with the synoptic gospels, the reader might assume that I have undertaken an exegetical study of New Testament texts. The following analysis of synoptic narrative, however, exemplifies, not exegesis as such, but dialectic. Allow me to explain. All three volumes of this Christology endorse Lonergan’s theory of functional theological specialties. In Lonergan’s account of theological method four functional specialties retrieve a religious tradition: research, interpretation, history, and dialectic. Research provides the basic tools which practitioners of the other specialties need for their work: archeological evidence, critical editions of sacred texts, dictionaries and grammars of sacred languages. Interpretation offers a theory of what religious texts and artifacts meant to those who created them and might mean to those who read and interpret them today. History tells the story of a religious 1. Cf. Donald L. Gelpi, S.J., Inculturating North American Theology: An Experiment in Foundational Method (Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1988), pp. 49-97.

Chapter 1: Understanding Gospel As Narrative

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community. Dialectic compares and contrasts different theological frames of reference in order to determine how they agree or disagree and why. Four functional specialties undertake the critical reformulation of a religious tradition. Foundational theology elaborates a strictly normative account of the conversion which lies at the basis of a religion. Doctrines distinguishes between sound and unsound religious teachings by their ability to foster integral conversion. Systematics explains the connection among sound doctrines. Communications passes on the fruits of technical theological reflection to non-theologians and re-establishes dialogue among the members of a religious community when dialogue breaks down from lack of conversion. Each functional specialty asks a different kind of question and therefore follows different operational procedures. Nevertheless, each functional specialty has to deal with sacred scripture. Accordingly, each functional specialty deals differently with the sacred texts as the operational procedures proper to its method dictate. Research theologians, for example, publish critical editions of the Bible. The new quests for the historical Jesus illustrate how historians deal with sacred texts: they read the Bible in the light of criteria which authenticate the historicity of the events which the Bible narrates. Exegetes, or interpretative theologians use a variety of methods in order to determine what the sacred texts meant to those who created them and continue to mean to those who read them: historical-critical method, reader-response theory, literary analysis, rhetorical analysis. Dialecticians compare and contrast the different theological frames of reference which different sacred writers construct. Reading the Gospels Dialectically This volume undertakes a dialectical analysis of the three synoptic gospels. It compares and contrasts the Christological statement which each synoptic gospel makes. Ordinarily, scholarly summaries of synoptic Christology present some of the major doctrinal positions which each evangelist develops in the course of his narrative. Doctrinal summaries of narrative Christology fail, however, to deal with gospel narratives as narratives. The account of narrative Christology which follows avoids that particular methodological blunder. It does so by proposing a method for reading narrative Christological statements as narratives. I call my dialectical method linkage analysis. Linkage analysis compares and contrasts some of the major narrative strategies which all four evangelists employ in making a Christological statement about Jesus of Nazareth. In volume one I argued that the gospel narratives display traits proper both to oral and to written narratives. Like oral narratives, they tend to begin in medias res, although Matthew’s and Luke’s literary sensibilities led them to modify the abruptness with which Mark’s gospel begins. Both

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evangelists begin the story of Jesus with an infancy narrative. As in oral narratives, one-dimensional characters people the gospel stories. The evangelists offer no detailed psychological portraits of the people whom they describe, including Jesus, their hero. The gospels have no literary plot. Instead, they stitch together remembered anecdotes about Jesus handed down orally in the Christian community. Still, the four evangelists did write down the story of Jesus. Moreover, the four evangelists each display different kinds of narrative sensibility. In the texts of all four gospels, dramatic linkages unify the story much as a plot does in a more sophisticated written narrative. By dramatic linkages I mean the way in which Jesus, the hero of the story, relates to the other persons and constituencies who populate the gospel anecdotes. One-dimensional psychological portraiture causes the characters in gospel narratives to sort out into three basic categories: good guys, bad guys, and wishy-washy people. Jesus, John the Baptizer, the Father, and the divine Breath of God exemplify the good guys. Satan and his demons, the scribes and Pharisees, the chief priests, Herod, Pilate, and the Roman empire qualify as bad guys. The crowds and the disciples vacillate in their response to Jesus and so count as wishy-washy. In all four gospels, the wishy-washy characters must finally choose for or against Jesus in the light of the paschal mystery. In addition, all four evangelists employ the same thematic linkages. By a thematic linkage, I mean the development of a theological motif across the anecdotes which comprise the gospel narratives. All four evangelists, for example, give an account of Jesus’ teachings and of His miracles. Their narratives also develop other theological themes. Mark, for example, develops the theme of Jesus’ “messianic secret.” Both Matthew and Luke mute this Markan theme in their accounts of Jesus’ ministry. Matthew, however, develops extensively the theme of fulfillment, while Luke elaborates both in his gospel and in Acts a three-stage theory of salvation history. Finally, all three evangelists use literary allusion in order to link together theologically different events in their narrative. Moreover, as we shall see, each evangelist uses literary allusion in a distinctive manner. A comparative analysis of the dramatic, thematic, and allusive linkages which structure all the gospels allows one to read each gospel’s narrative Christological statement as a narrative whole; for narrative Christology makes its statement about Jesus by describing how Jesus relates to the good guys, the bad guys, and the wishy-washy people whom He confronts, by developing Christological themes across the events of Jesus’ ministry, and by using literary allusion in order to interpret the deep religious meaning of Jesus’ person and ministry. In other words, comparative linkage analysis of the gospels allows one to compare and to


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contrast dialectically each evangelist’s narrative Christological frame of reference.2 While linkage analysis yields a comparative dialectical reading of gospel narrative Christology, dialectical theologians, like the practitioners of all the other functional theological specialties, need to take into account the fruits of exegesis, or of interpretative theology. Like historical-critical exegetes, dialecticians in dealing with gospel texts must read them in the light of the kind of community for whom the texts were written. Indeed, a dialectical reading of narrative gospel Christology needs to profit from any legitimate method for interpreting gospel texts. In the comparative dialectical reading of synoptic narrative Christology which follows, I have, accordingly, relied on the insights of contemporary exegesis while simultaneously invoking linkage analysis as a legitimate method for comparing and contrasting each evangelist’s narrative Christological statement about Jesus. The following dialectical reading of synoptic narrative Christology discovers broad areas of agreement among the three synoptic evangelists. It also finds convergence and complementarity in their narrative portraits of Jesus. The final chapter examines the agreement, convergence, and complementarity and argues that they yield a clarifying insight into the meaning of Christological knowing. As I indicated in volume one, Christological knowing consists in the kind of understanding of the person of Jesus which results from practical assimilation to Him in the power of His Breath. The final chapter of this volume draws upon a comparative dialectical reading of the three synoptic gospels in order to propose a foundational theory about the practical demands of Christian conversion. That theory offers a foundational interpretation of the intuitive dimensions of Christological faith. 2. The approach to narrative Christology undertaken in this study differs significantly from that proposed by Michael L. Cook, S.J. in Christology as Narrative Quest. Cook seems to reduce all Christology to narrative Christology, whereas I restrict the term “narrative Christology” to those statements about Jesus in which a story as such carries the meaning. Christological creeds, rhetorical proclamations of Christ, and rational reflection on the Christ event do not, then, qualify as narrative Christology. The fact that theses Christologies occur in an historical context does not make them strictly speaking narrative Christologies. All Christology has a history, of course; and creedal, kerygmatic, and doctrinal Christologies all address historical audiences. Unless, however, the Christological statement takes the form of a story, I do not regard it as a narrative Christology. Cf. Michael L. Cook, Christology as Narrative Quest (Collegeville, MI: The Liturgical Press, 1997); see also: Pheme Perkins, “Crisis in Jerusalem? Narrative Criticism in New Testament Theology,” Theological Studies, 50(1989), pp. 296-313; John R. Donahue, S.J., “The Changing Shape of New Testament Theology,” Theological Studies, 50(1989), pp. 314-335; “The Literary Turn and New Testament Theology: Detour or New Direction,” Journal of Religion, 76(1996), pp. 250-275.

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In attempting a dialectical analysis of the three synoptic gospels, I make no claim to having said the “last word” about them or their meaning. In interpreting classic religious texts like the gospels, no one ever says the “last word.” I have more modest hopes. I will rest content if the analysis which follows helps contemporary Christians read and pray the gospels as narrative wholes. Having both taught and preached the material contained in this volume, I have some confidence of success. In this section I have situated the linkage analysis of gospel narratives within the method and construct of experience which I developed in volume one. In the following section, I shall ponder the nature of narrative in general as a context for understanding how gospel narrative works. (II) Narrative exemplifies one way in which human beings try to communicate with one another. When we construct narratives rationally and inferentially, we call them scholarly history.3 When successful, scholarly history performs two interrelated tasks. First, on the basis of the remnants of the past which still survive in the present, it reconstructs an accurate chronology of how the past in fact unfolded. Chronologies specify what happened when and where. They also make it clear which events came first. Second, on the basis of an accurate chronicle, scholarly history then proposes a theory about which events actually decided the course of history and why they did so. Events decide the course of history when they cause it to develop in one way when it might have gone in one or more other possible directions. The Elements of Literary Narrative Not all narratives, however, develop as scholarly history. Instead, they take literary form. Moreover, the literary forms of narrative exhibit a bewildering variety and complexity. Every narrative, however, involves a story-teller, an audience, and a tale. Each of these three elements contributes something to a narrative’s character and meaning.4 In telling a story, a narrator communicates a vision of the world, of reality as he or she perceives it. The more sophisticated forms of narrative 3. For a somewhat more detailed discussion of the epistemological and methodological presuppositions which lie at the basis of this volume, see: Donald L. Gelpi, S.J., Inculturating North American Theology: An Experiment in Foundational Method (Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1988), pp. 49-97. For an illuminating discussion of historical thinking, see: Morton White, Foundations of Historical Knowledge (New York, NY: Harper & Row, 1965). 4. Cf. John Dominic Crossan, Dark Interval: Towards A Theology of Story (Niles, IL: Argus, 1975); Robert Scholes and Robert Kellog, The Nature of Narrative (New York, NY: Oxford, 1966).


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have two narrators: the actual author and a fictional character who tells the story which the author desires to communicate. When authors speak in their own voice, the way they structure the plot dramatically and symbolically conveys the kind of statement they wish to make about reality. The gospels exemplify one such form of written narrative. When a fictional character tells the story, however, one cannot assume that the fictional narrator necessarily speaks for the real author. One can, as a consequence, in more sophisticated narratives interpret the tale’s meaning only by determining first the extent to which the author identifies with the fictional narrator or the extent to which the author uses other characters, events, or symbols to convey his or her vision of the world. The audience to whom one directs a narrative also shapes the way the narrative unfolds. One communicates differently with different individuals and with different groups of people. One writes a children’s story differently from a novel meant for adults. One might satirize a hostile audience or seek to subvert their world through parables. The correct interpretation of a story demands, therefore, some understanding of the kind of audience the story addresses and the way in which the audience’s character and attitudes influence the narrative. Besides having an author and audience, narratives tell a story. The story’s plot organizes the way in which it unfolds. The plot moreover organizes the story’s meaning, the kind of affirmation about reality which the story attempts to make. In oral narrative, the story-teller and the audience confront one another face to face. As a consequence, in oral narrative, the two of necessity share, at least to some extent, the same world. Narrative tends to play a more prominent role in oral cultures than it does in literate ones. Because oral cultures tend to lack elaborate, rationally ordered, scientific explanations of things, they rely more on narrative to store, organize, and communicate shared knowledge. In oral cultures, moreover, the very telling of stories creates and re-enforces social bonding. As a consequence, oral cultures abound in repeatable stories which ritualize the shared lives of communities. Often traditional stories go on at great length, because narrative organizes and bonds thought more massively in oral cultures than in literate. The plots of oral narratives tend to begin in medias res. Moreover, the language of oral narrative tends to employ traditional formulaic and stanzaic patterns of speech. Finally, oral memory adapts traditional stories to specific audiences with a flexibility alien to the spatially fixed printed word.

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Oral narrative abounds in monochromatic rather than in polychromatic characters. The characters in oral narratives tend to act and react in stereotypical or archetypal ways because predictable reactions tend to delight the shared expectations of living audiences. It takes the advent of the written narrative for characters to begin to acquire psychological complexity and subtlety. Similarly, as oral traditions take written and then published shape, the literary forms which they incarnate acquire greater subtlety and complexity.5 Written narrative displays characteristics which contrast with oral narrative. Writing and publication detaches a story from both the author and the audience. We call “classics” written stories which continue to engage generation after generation of readers. The telling of the tale makes a statement about the world in which story-teller and audience both live. Classics address in some depth perennial aspects of the human condition. While oral plots begin in medias res, written narratives have a beginning, a middle, and an end. While oral narrative tends to leave its characters psychologically undeveloped, written narrative nuances characterization with subtle motivation and diversity of temperament. In both written and oral narrative the characters in the story divide roughly into the good, the evil, and the ambivalent. “Good” characters tend to embody ideas and ideals which the real author of the story endorses. “Bad” characters tend to embody ideas and ideals which the real author repudiates. Ambivalent characters often remain torn between the good and the evil people they confront. The way in which ambivalent characters respond often carries the central message or statement which the real story-teller desires to make about human life and reality. Since written narrative cultivates psychological nuance in characterization, any of its characters can exhibit some ambivalent tendencies. In sophisticated literary tales good characters can have minor flaws, just as bad characters can exhibit moments of beneficence. One can classify stories by the way in which they relate to the real world which the author addresses. Myths create a world of meaning, reality, and value in which people, whether real or fictional, live. Narrative parables subvert a world. Parables tend to introduce startling and discombobulating developments into stories about ordinary life as a way of challenging the audience to new and unfamiliar ways of perceiving reality. Apologies defend a world. The David story in the first book of Samuel, for example, endows the Davidic dynasty with divine sanction. Satires, like Gulliver’s Travels, ridicule a world. 5. Cf. Walter Ong, Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word (New York, NY: Methuen, 1982), pp. 138-155; Kenneth E. Bailey, “Middle Eastern Oral Tradition and the Synoptic Gospels,” Expository Times, 106(1995), pp. 663-666.


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Comic narrative engages the negative emotions. Satire, for example, attacks a world bitterly. Light comedy chides it affectionately. Tragedies engage the sympathetic emotions and seek to evoke compassion and sympathy in the face of human suffering. Some narratives merely describe a world. Realistic fiction describes a non-existent world which might exist, and it presents its world as though it actually exists. Unrealistic narrative divides into romance and didactic stories. Romance in the broad sense creates imagined worlds without pretending that they actually exist. Didactic stories tell about a non-existent world in order to make some moral or theoretical point. Fables usually make a moral point. Allegories can make both kinds of points. I have reflected on the nature of narrative and how different kinds of standard narrative work. In the section which follows I shall situate gospel narrative within the spectrum of narrative thinking. (III) Although they have a parabolic intent the synoptic gospels do not fit neatly under any of the preceding literary categories. The synoptic gospels narrate historical events but do so differently from scholarly history. They show minimal concern with an accurate chronology of the events they narrate, although in all three gospels some events clearly precede others. John the Baptizer begins his ministry before Jesus does. Jesus teaches in Galilee before His final tragic confrontation with the high priests in Jerusalem. Jesus’ ministry ends with His crucifixion by Pilate. Most of the anecdotal stories about Jesus which constitute the “plot” of the synoptics, however, follow one another with no scholarly validated temporal priority. While all the synoptics principally blame the high priests for Jesus’ death, the gospels show virtually no concern with proposing a causal, scholarly hypothesis about why most of the events they narrate happened in the order in which the evangelist presents them. In other words, in contrast to contemporary scholarly history, neither chronological accuracy nor causal explanation of the chronological order of events plays a significant role in the way the anecdotal “plot” of the synoptics unfolds. On one point, however, all the gospels agree: the paschal mystery—the death and resurrection of Jesus together with His sending the divine Breath—decisively re-orients and transforms the rest of human history. The synoptics do, of course, tell the story of a man who lived, ministered, and died. In that sense they deal consciously and deliberately with historical events; but they do not tell the story of Jesus as a scholarly historian would. If one defines a myth as a story which creates a world of reality, meaning, and value for people to live in, then the gospels do, in a sense, func-

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tion as the basic Christian myth.6 The story of the life, ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus creates the world of religious meaning and reality in which believing Christians live their lives. The gospels, however, differ from most myths by narrating historical events. Usually myths provide purely imaginative accounts of the ending or beginning of all things. By encompassing in their vision “all things,” myths make an quasi-metaphysical statement about the nature of reality in general. Myths function in intuitive thinking roughly in the way in which world hypotheses function in inferential thinking. Moreover, myths do not usually enjoy parabolic intent. They seek to create a world, not to subvert one. The synoptic gospels paradoxically seek to do both. They tell the story of Jesus as a tale about the divine, messianic reversal of ordinary human perceptions. As a consequence, the gospel stories pose a perennial challenge to any humanly concocted world or culture. In calling with Jesus for the establishment of God’s reign on earth as in heaven, the synoptic gospels also assume a prophetic stance toward sinners and toward natural and sinful human institutions and cultures. The Uniqueness of the Gospels as Narrative The gospels, then, have a unique narrative structure. They tell the story of a real person; but they do not narrate scholarly history. They do not fictionalize the story of Jesus, but they do endow it with an enormous weight of symbolic meaning. Simultaneously myth and parable, the gospels at one and the same time create and subvert the world in which their readers live. The gospels tell about events which really happened; but like some forms of romantic literature, they inculcate moral and religious values. The gospels also blur the distinction between oral and written narrative. Though written, they emerge from an oral tradition and preserve many of the characteristics of oral narrative. Like oral narratives, their main story tends to begin in medias res. Like oral narratives, they eschew subtle psychological portraiture, even of their hero Jesus. As in oral narrative, the good guys tend to be very, very good and the bad guys very, very evil. 6. Cf. Ian Barbour, Myths, Models, and Paradigms (New York, NY: Harper & Row, 1971); James S. Dunne, Time and Myth (New York, NY: Doubleday, 1973); Lee W. Gibbs and W. Taylor Stevenson, Myth and the Crisis of Historical Consciousness (Missoula, MN: Scholars Press, 1975); Morton P. Kelsey, Myth, History, and Faith: The Remythologizing of Christianity (New York, NY: Paulist, 1974); Alan M. Olsen, ed., Myth, Symbol, and Reality (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1980); Tony Stonebrunner, Parable, Myth, and Language (Cambridge, MA: The Society, 1968).


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Despite the fact that they manifest oral patterns of thinking, however, the gospels confront us as written narratives of extraordinary originality and complexity. When Mark wrote the first gospel he created a new and unique literary form. While the first evangelist’s Greek lacks literary polish, Mark tells no simple story. As we shall see, he weaves together his account with both subtlety and complexity. The meaning of a story results from the way a particular story teller tells a tale to a specific kind of audience. History tells us practically nothing about the identity of the evangelists and virtually nothing about their biographies. Almost anything we know about them as story-tellers we must glean from the tales they tell. We must say the same for the historical audiences whom each of the synoptic evangelists addressed. A comparative reading of the gospels in the light of historical-critical method yields some insight into the kind of Christian community each evangelist catechized: but the principal evidence for reconstructing those communities lies in the texts of the gospels themselves. Careful attention to the way in which the synoptic evangelists construct the story of Jesus does, however, yield an insight into a common and central motive which inspired the composition of all three synoptic gospels. Both Matthew and Luke seem to have used and edited Mark’s gospel in writing their own. While both evangelists edited the text of Mark freely in the course of incorporating it into their own narrative, they both adopted several of the literary conventions which Mark created in writing the first gospel. Specifically, both Luke and Matthew reproduce with some variations the same dramatic linkages which tie together Mark’s narrative as well as some of Mark’s thematic linkages. Mark’s gospel uses three kinds of narrative devices to unify its anecdotal story of Jesus. I call these devices dramatic, thematic, and allusive linkages. The term “linkage” designates a literary device which ties the anecdotal material of the gospels into a more or less unified narrative. By a “literary device” I mean a stylistic reather than a grammatical structuring of a text with a view to communicating meaning. As I have already indicated, by dramatic linkages I mean the way in which Mark portrays Jesus’ interaction with the other persons or identifiable constituencies who confront Him in the course of His narrated career. By thematic linkages I mean the way in which Mark clusters interrelated insights around a specific motif: e.g., around the teachings of Jesus, around His healings, around the idea of the messianic secret. By allusive linkages, I mean Mark’s use of descriptive details in order to suggest how the different events in Jesus’ story illumine one another and cast light on the deep religious significance of His person. As we shall see, in Mark most of these allusive references cluster around the two multiplications of the loaves and fishes.

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Each kind of linkage weaves like a thread through Mark’s narrative and creates the gospel’s distinctive narrative texture. The dramatic linkages tie together the “plot” of Mark’s story. The thematic and allusive linkages enrich the plot’s meaning. Sometimes all three linking strands run through the same event. As a consequence, any analysis of the linkages inevitably involves some repetition, as one examines the same event from different perspectives: dramatic, thematic, and allusive. In my judgment, the repetition serves a constructive function; for it calls attention to the complex pattern of meanings which create the remarkable narrative and religious depth which Mark achieves. In the pages which follow, I shall reflect in detail on Mark’s narrative artistry and on the way in which each of these linkages unifies his telling of Jesus’ story. Moreover, I shall in subsequent sections also examine in some detail how Matthew and Luke both adopt and modify Mark’s three basic narrative strategies. In general, Matthew and Luke endorse with some development Mark’s dramatic linkages. Both evangelists develop and expand in considerable detail two of Mark’s thematic linkages: namely, Jesus teachings and miracles. They mute the theme of the messianic secret, however; and they employ literary allusion very differently from Mark.7 In endorsing the way in which Mark uses dramatic linkages in order to structure the plot of his gospel, the other two synoptic evangelists also endorse one of the fundamental purposes for which Mark wrote. No narrative as complex as a synoptic gospel fulfills a single purpose. The complexity of gospel story telling suggests that a variety of religious, doctrinal, and pastoral motives persuaded the evangelist to tell Jesus’ story. Nevertheless, all three synoptic gospels share this central purpose: all three challenge believing Christians to come to terms with any moral or religious ambivalence which might still mar their relationship to the person of Jesus. In other words, the evangelists wrote their gospels in order to challenge converted Christians to deepen in Christological knowing through ongoing converted assimilation to Jesus in the power of His Breath. Let us reflect on the narrative strategies which Mark invokes in issuing this challenge. An analysis of the dramatic linkages of all three synoptic gospels reveals a cast of characters which includes in the manner of oral narrative very good guys, very bad guys, and ambivalent people. In all three gospels, the 7. Ched Myers’s Binding the Strong Man: A Political Reading of Mark’s Story of Jesus (New York, NY: Orbis, 1988) blends both literary and political analysis. In the dialectical reading of Mark which I shall attempt, I shall try to remain sensitive to the political connotations of the text. I shall also approach Mark’s text as a summons to conversion; but I shall attempt a foundational reading of Mark which remains sensitive to all five forms of conversion and to the ways in which they condition one another.


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Father, the divine Breath, and John the Baptizer all function as good guys. Satan and his demons, the scribes and Pharisees, the temple priests, Herod and the Herodians, Pilate, and the Roman empire all function as bad guys. Jesus models for His disciples how to relate to the good guys and to the bad guys. Jesus always relates positively to the crowds and to His disciples, but they both relate to Him ambivalently. The crowds flock to Jesus but fail finally to understand either His identity or the true purpose of His mission. The disciples follow Him with a measure of commitment; but they too fail finally to understand Jesus during His lifetime. Of the three synoptic evangelists, Mark stresses most the ambivalence with which the disciples related to Jesus during His mortal ministry. In all three synoptics, the time of decision for both the crowds and the disciples arrives with the passion. During the passion, the crowds turn on Jesus while the disciples respond in a variety of ways. Most of the disciples abandon Jesus. Judas betrays Him. Peter denies Him. Simon of Cyrene functions as an ironic symbolic type of the disciple who carries the cross to Calvary in Jesus’ footsteps. Joseph of Aramathea buries Jesus. Moreover, in all three synoptic gospels Jesus puts the same fundamental question to His disciples: “Who do you say that I am?” All three synoptic writers expect the disciple, the believing Christian who reads the gospel, to measure his or her response to that question against their insight into Jesus’ relationship to the Father, to the Breath, to the Baptizer, to the crowds, to Jesus’ enemies, and to His disciples as the gospel portrays each of them. The evangelists also expect the disciples to measure their response to Jesus against His teachings and other religiously significant actions during His ministry. Clearly, none of the evangelists wrote the story of Jesus for God the Father, for the Holy Breath, or for the defunct Baptizer. Nor did they write it for Jesus’ enemies. All three assume that the ambivalent and finally unbelieving crowds cannot understand the real truth about Jesus, although in the gospels they sometimes symbolize potential converts. That leaves Jesus’ disciples as the group whom each of the synoptic gospels targets as its principal audience. Moreover, in endorsing the way in which Mark uses dramatic linkages in order to structure the story of Jesus, all three synoptic writers challenge the disciples of Jesus to face any lack of faith, any lack of commitment, any moral deviation which might mar the integrity of their practical response to the challenges of discipleship. I do not know if the evangelists themselves would have used the same words to express this fundamental aim of their gospels as I have; but I would like to think that, having understood what I mean by Christological knowing, they would have endorsed my suggestion that fostering

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it in believing Christians defined one of their major purposes in writing. In the end, of course, we have only the texts of the gospels themselves against which to test such theories.8 Christological Knowing in the Synoptics As we have just seen, both Matthew and Luke endorse in general the way in which Mark uses dramatic linkages in structuring the “plot” of his gospel. By that I mean that the other two synoptic evangelists endorse the general lines of the way in which Mark depicts Jesus’ relationship to the major persons and constituencies whom He confronts in the course of His life. All three synoptic evangelists also preface Jesus’ entire public ministry with His baptism by John and with His desert temptations. In all three synoptic narratives, Jesus’ baptism begins His public revelation as Breath-baptizer. The paschal mystery completes that revelation. All three synoptic evangelists presuppose, then, that the disciples of Jesus for whom they write have experienced Breath-baptism and that they have in some measure committed themselves to Jesus in the light of the paschal mystery. Moreover, as we shall see in greater detail in the chapters which follow, in all three synoptic gospels Jesus functions in His desert temptations as the beginning of the new Israel. In all three gospels, Jesus’ own temptations provide prototypes of the temptations and testing which the members of the new Israel, who follow a crucified messiah, will themselves have to confront. By portraying the baptism and temptations of Jesus as the preface of His entire public ministry, all three synoptic evangelists invite the reader to interpret that ministry in the light of these symbolic and prototypical events. The baptism of Jesus, which begins His revelation as Breath-baptizer, foreshadows Christian baptism. His temptations foreshadow the testing and trials which those who follow Him must face. By telling the story of Jesus in a way which invites Breath-baptized Christians to come to terms which any surviving ambivalence in their relationship to Jesus, the evangelists simultaneously challenge their audience to deepen in their baptismal experience of God’s Breath, to vanquish temptation as Jesus did, and to live in single-hearted commitment to Him and to the gospel. All three synoptic gospels seek, then, to deepen in the Breath-baptized Christian the experience of practical assimilation to Jesus in the power of His Breath. The positive linkages, as we shall see, lay down the basic ontological and moral conditions for advancing in Christological knowing. The negative linkages define its negative parameters: they identify 8. Cf. Adela Yarbro Collins, The Beginnings of the Gospel: Probings of Mark in Context (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1992), pp. 1-38.


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those vicious choices which the believing Christian must avoid. Finally, the thematic and allusive linkages provide more detailed norms for deciding whether or not one’s conduct advances or undermines Christological knowing. In this section I have been attempting to contextualize and to explain the meaning of the fundamental thesis which I shall argue in the course of this volume. At this point I can only state the thesis dogmatically; but I would hope that the dialectical analysis of the synoptic gospels which follows will establish its credibility. The thesis in question affirms: Among the narrative and pastoral purposes of the three synoptic gospels, helping believing Christians advance in the knowledge of Jesus through assimilation to Him in the power of His Breath ranks as fundamental and structures the way in which all three evangelists tell the story of Jesus. I argue this thesis in stages. This chapter has situated narrative thinking within the continuum of human evaluative responses. It has argued the following two theses: 1) The synoptic gospels do not conform to any of the traditional canons of literary narrative. 2) The synoptic evangelists use dramatic, thematic, and allusive linkages in tying together into a unified narrative the largely anecdotal material which comprises their gospels. I shall substantiate the second thesis in the first three sections of this volume. By undertaking a comparative linkage analysis of all three synoptic gospels, in what follows I shall in addition argue the following methodological thesis: 3) A comparative linkage analysis of the synoptic gospels yields an insight into the narrative Christological frame of reference which each synoptic evanglist develops. Finally, in the last chapter of this volume, I shall argue that: 4) A dialectical comparison of synoptic narrative Christology clarifies the practical demands of Christological knowing. In the chapters which follow I shall begin to concretize these abstractions by analyzing Mark’s gospel as a narrative whole. I begin with Mark because Mark created the gospel as a literary genre and set the narrative patterns which Matthew and Luke would embellish.

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Chapter 2 Positive Dramatic Linkages in Mark This chapter begins the linkage analysis of Mark’s gospel. It focuses on how the evangelist develops the positive dramatic linkages which structure the gospel. In other words, this chapter examines how Mark’s Jesus relates to John the Baptizer, to the Father, and to the Breath of God. This chapter divides into five parts. Part one describes the community for whom Mark wrote. Part two analyses the preface to his gospel. Parts three, four and five describe how Jesus relates respectively to John the Baptizer, to the Father, and to the divine Breath. I begin, then, by summarizing what contemporary exegesis tells us about Mark the evangelist, and about the community for whom he probably wrote. (I) We do not know for certain who wrote the first gospel or where the composition occurred. Some locate the creation of the first gospel in the Middle East, possibly in Syria. Others locate its writing in Rome sometime before 70 a.d. I favor the latter position. Patristic tradition calls the author Mark and links his name to that of Peter, who died in Rome during the persecution of Nero in 64 or 67 a.d. Probably, Mark wrote during the 60’s as the Roman community either geared itself for persecution or, more likely, dealt with its aftermath.1 A sizeable community of Jews lived in Rome, the capital of the Roman empire. We find evidence of their presence as early at 139 b.c. We also find evidence of anti-Semitic prejudice in pagan literature written in Rome. Such prejudice suggests a Jewish community sizeable enough and influential enough to threaten the native Gentiles. 1. Cf. John R.Donahue, “Windows and Mirrors: The Setting of Mark’s Gospel,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 57(1995), pp. 1-26; Donald Senior, C.P., “The Gospel of Mark in Context,” The Bible Today, 34(1996), pp. 215-221; C. Clifton Black, “Was Mark A Roman Gospel?” Expository Times, 105 (1993-1994), pp. 36-40. For very different approaches to the redaction of Mark’s gospel, see: Willi Marxsen, Mark the Evangelist: Studies on the Redaction History of the Gospel, translated by James Boyce, et al. (Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 1969); Etienne Trocmé, The Formation of the Gospel According to Mark, translated by Pamela Gaughan (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster, 1975); David Barrett Peabody, Mark as Composer (Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 1987); C. Clifton Black, The Disciples According to Mark: Markan Redaction in Current Debate (Worcester: Billings & Sons Ltd., 1989); J. Duncan M. Derrett, The Making of Mark (2 vols.; Shipston-on-Stour: P. Drinkwater, 1985); Charles Masson, L’évangile de Marc et l’église de Rome (Neuchatel: Delachaux et Niestle, 1968); M.-E. Boismard, L’évangile de Marc et son préhistoire (Paris: Gabalda, 1994); Herman C. Waetjen, A Reordering of Power: A Socio-Political Reading of Mark’s Gospel (Minneapolis, MI: Fortress, 1989).

Chapter 2: Positive Dramatic Linkages in Mark

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Both Jewish support for Caesar and Herodian luck in backing the winning side in the wars which followed upon Julius Caesar’s assassination earned for Jews in Rome special privileges, including the right of assembly. (Josephus, Antiquities, 14.10.1-8; # 185-216) Christians did not gain the right to assemble until the fourth century. An expulsion of Jews from Rome under Tiberius may have resulted from a successful intensification of proselytizing activity which resulted in conversions among the Roman aristocracy.2 The expulsion happened around 19 a.d. During the Jewish wars which culminated in the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 a.d., Roman Jewry seems to have created no political problems in the capitol. Nevertheless, we do have some evidence of close political and religious ties between the Jewish community in Rome and that in Jerusalem. The persecution of Christians in Rome under Nero means that by the late sixties the Christian community had grown large enough in the capitol to bear identification as a distinctive religious group. That suggests that a Christian community had been developing in Rome for some time. Paul’s letter to the Roman church dates about 58 a.d.; but we have other evidence of a fairly sizeable Christian Roman community as early as the 40’s. Some evidence supports the belief that the Roman community originally espoused Petrine Christianity. In other words, it baptized Gentiles without circumcising them; but it did require Gentile converts to observe a certain number of dietary regulations. In writing to Rome, Paul seems to hold out an olive branch to Petrine Christians at the same time that he defends the legitimacy of his own more liberal baptismal practices. Paul’s preaching in Rome, however, probably produced some Roman converts to “his gospel” and more egalitarian view of the Church. Quite possibly, the persecution under Nero, which seems to have provided the context for the writing of Mark’s gospel did not target more conservative Jewish Christians at Rome, who would have lived lives indistinguishable from other Jews. The persecution focused instead on the more visible Pauline and Petrine Christians. During the persecution both Peter and Paul suffered martyrdom.3 2. Cf. E. Mary Smallwood, “Some Notes on the Jews under Tiberius,” Latomus, 15(1956), pp. 314-329. 3. Cf. Raymond E. Brown and John P. Meier, Antioch and Rome: New Testament Cradles of Catholic Christianity (Ramsey, NJ: Paulist Press, 1983), pp. 92-127; Theodore J. Weeden, “The Heresy That Necessitated Mark’s Gospel” in The Interpretation of Mark, edited by W.R. Telford (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark Ltd., 1995), pp. 89-104; Ernst Best, “Mark’s Preservation of the Tradition” in The Interpretation of Mark, pp. 153-168.

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Given such a community and such a context, how, then, did Mark the evangelist choose to tell the story of Jesus to Roman Christians? (II) The gospel of Mark divides roughly into six major parts: 1) the prologue to Jesus’ ministry (Mk 1:1-13); 2) stories of proclamation and conflict during Jesus’ Galilean ministry (Mk 1:14-6:29); 3) the bread section of Mark, which narrates the events surrounding the two miracles of the loaves (Mk 6:30-8:26), 4) the way section of Mark,4 which follows Peter’s profession of faith; 5) the account of Jesus’ final Jerusalem ministry, which concludes with the eschatological discourse (Mk 11:1-37); and 6) the passion and resurrection of Jesus (Mk 14:1-16:8).5 The Preface Mark begins his narrative account of Jesus’ ministry, death, and resurrection with a kind of title. The first verse of the gospel announces: “The beginning of the good news (euaggeliou) of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.”6 (Mk 1:1) The manuscript tradition suggests that a scribe inserted the phrase “the Son of God.” Like virtually every verse in Mark, however, this simple statement contains subtleties within subtleties.7 4. The way section narrates Jesus’ final journey to Jerusalem and to the cross. On the way Jesus instructs the disciples about the demands of discipleship. (Mk 8:27-10:52) 5. Cf. Joanna Dewey, “Mark as Interwoven Tapestry: Forecasts and Echoes for a Listening Audience,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 53(1991), pp. 221-236; F. Neirynck, “The Minor Agreements and Proto-Mark: A Response to H. Koester,” Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis 67(1991), pp. 82-94; Joel Marcus, “The Jewish War and the Sitz im Leben of Mark,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 111(1992), pp. 441-462; Dieter Lührmann, “The Gospel of Mark and the Sayings Collection of Q,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 108(1989), pp. 51-71; E. Trocmé, La formation de l’évangile selon Marc (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1963); Peter J.J. Botha, “The Historical Setting of Mark’s Gospel: Problems and Possibilities,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 51(1993), pp. 27-55; L.W. Hurtado, “The Gospel of Mark: Evolutionary or Revolutionary Document?” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 40(1990), pp. 15-32; Ernest Best, “Mark’s Narrative Technique,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 37(1989), pp. 43-58; T.A. Burkill, New Light on the Earliest Gospel: Seven Markan Studies (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1972), pp. 180-264; W.R. Teleford, “Introduction: The Interpretation of Mark: A History of Developments” in The Interpretation of Mark, pp. 1-62; Claus-Jürgen Thornton, “Justin und das Markusevangelium,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 84(1993), pp. 93-110; Donald H. Juel, A Master of Surprise: Mark Interpreted (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1994); C.S. Rodd, “Reading the Book 1. The Gospel According to Mark,” Expository Times, 108(1996), pp. 4-7. 6. Although absent from some manuscripts, the phrase “Son of God” has solid attestation in the manuscript tradition from the second century on. Moreover, the phrase echoes an important theme in Mark’s gospel, his portrayal of Jesus as “Son of God.” (Cf. Mk 15:39) 7. Trocmé allows the imperfection of Mark’s Greek to lead him to underestimate the evangelist’s literary ability. Cf. Trocmé, op.cit., pp. 72-73.


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Mark dates the “beginning” of the proclamation of the good news about Jesus with the ministry of John the Baptizer and with his prophecy that a mightier one than himself (ho ischyroteros mou) would follow him, one who would baptize with water and a Holy Breath. (Mk 1:7-8) By his prophecy of the “mightier one,” John enters the narrative as the first person to proclaim Jesus and the good news about him. In a sense, the rest of Mark’s gospel offers a detailed commentary on the Baptist’s prophetic words. The phrase “the beginning of the good news” has, however, other connotations as well. Mark views the proclamation of Christ as a new beginning in salvation history, a new creation, a new and decisive act of God, a divine victory over the powers of sin and of evil. The phrase “good news of Jesus Christ” also has a double meaning: while it certainly includes Jesus’ preaching and message, i.e., the good news which He announced, the phrase tacitly equates the good news with the person of Jesus. Mark, moreover, tells the story of Jesus in a way which focuses upon His person and His actions. Indeed, Mark’s gospel challenges the reader to answer the question which Jesus Himself puts to His disciples: “Who do you say I am?” (Mk 8:29) Of the three synoptic gospels Mark shows the least concern to collect and preserve the sayings of Jesus. Mark does indeed frequently portray Jesus preaching, but often he fails to tell the reader what Jesus said. The identification of Jesus Christ with the good news in the first verse of Mark’s gospel offers a plausible explanation of these Markan stylistic idiosyncrasies: for Mark, Jesus embodies the good news in His person. As a consequence, Mark looks primarily to the events of Jesus’ ministry, death, and glorification to disclose to the reader Jesus’ religious identity. Moreover, Mark expects the reader to read deeply into these events and to discern their true religious significance. (Mk 6:52, 8:17-21) The scribal gloss designates Jesus Christ as “Son of God.” (Mk 1:1) Mark himself will, however, designate Jesus by this title more than once in his gospel. (Mk 3:11, 5:7, 15:39); and he will use analogous titles as well: “my Beloved Son” (Mk 1:11, 9:7) and “Son of the Blessed One.” As we shall see, Mark places the latter title on the lips of the high priest in Jesus’ trial before the Sanhedrin. (Mk 14: 61) Moreover, as we shall also see, Mark uses a variety of clear narrative strategies to assert Jesus’ divinity and thus endow this messianic title with divine significance. If, then, a scribe later inserted this phrase into the original text of the gospel, the insertion accords well with Markan narrative Christology.8 (Mk 4:35-41, 6:45-52) 8. Cf. Raymond E. Brown, S.S., Joseph A. Fitzmeyer, S.J., Roland E. Murphy, O. Carm., eds., The New Jerome Biblical Commentary (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1988), 41:6. I shall hereafter refer to this edition as NJBC. See also: C.S. Mann, Mark: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary (Anchor Bible; New York, NY:

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This section has examined the preface to Mark’s gospel. The following section examines how Jesus related to John the Baptizer. (III) Mark, alluding to Mal 3:1 and to Is 40:3, portrays John as divinely sent to proclaim Christ in the desert: “Behold, I send my messenger before your (sou) face, who shall pave your (sou) way. The voice of one crying in the desert: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight His paths.’” (Mk 1:2-3) The first sentence of the citation derives from Malachi, the second from Isaiah. When read in the context of Mark’s text, the pronoun “you (sou)” which appears twice in verse 2, refers to Jesus and tacitly equates Him with the Lord whose way John prepares. John and Jesus The desert sojourn of the Israelites after their escape from Egypt together with the symbolic use in the Old Testament of desert imagery like that which one finds in Is 40:3 had nourished the messianic hope that when salvation would finally dawn for Israel, it would come out of the desert, the traditional place for Israel’s purification, testing, and encounter with God. Mark in citing Is 40:3 portrays the preaching and ministry of the Baptist in the deserts of Judea east of Jerusalem as the fulfillment of that messianic hope. John preaches a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins which prepares Israel for the coming of Jesus, the true messiah. John even prophesies that a greater one than himself will follow him who will baptize, not just with water, but with a sanctifying Breath.9 (Mk 1:4-8) With a touch of hyperbole, Mark states that “all the country of Judea and all the people of Jerusalem” went out to John to receive his baptism in the Jordan. (Mk 1:5) One need not see mere exaggeration in Mark’s Doubleday, 1986), pp. 193-197; Hugh Anderson, The Gospel of Mark (New Century Bible; Greenwood, SC: The Attic Press, Inc., 1976), pp. 62-64; Robert A. Guelich, The Gospel of Mark (World Biblical Commentary; 2 vols.; Dallas, TX: Word Books Publisher, 1989), I, pp. 1-28. Hereafter I shall refer to this last edition as MWBC; Edwin K. Broadside, “Jesus the Nazarene: Narrative Strategy and Christological Imagery in the Gospel of Mark,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 52(1993), pp. 3-18; Peter M. Head, “A Text-Critical Study of Mark 1.1: ‘The Beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ,’” New Testament Studies, 37(1991), pp. 621-629; Norman Perrin, “The Christology of Mark: A Study of Methodology” in The Interpretation of Mark, pp. 125-140; Ulrich B. Müller, “‘Sohn Gottes’—ein messianischer Hoheheitstitel Jesu,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 87(1996), pp. 1-32. 9. Cf. Walter Wink, John the Baptist in the Gospel Tradition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1968), pp. 1-15; J. Lambrecht, S.J., “John the Baptist and Jesus in Mark 1, 1-15,” New Testament Studies, 38(1992), pp. 357-384; Elizabeth Struthers Malbon, Narrative Space and Mythic Meaning in Mark (San Francisco, CA: Harper & Row, 1986).


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hyperbole. Given Israel’s restlessness under Roman domination, a restlessness which eventually culminated in the Jewish wars, no doubt John’s prophetic ministry stirred deeply and widely felt national and religious hopes. John, moreover, baptized in the river Jordan, which in the book of Joshua had parted like the Red Sea to admit the Israelites into the promised land. (Jos 3:14-17) Such memories would have fueled nationalistic hopes for a new exodus, a new liberation from enslavement. Mark’s dramatic portrayal of John’s popularity contrasts, however, with the prophecy of the mightier one which closes Mark’s brief portrait of John. Despite John’s enormous success and popularity, he only prepares the way for Jesus Christ, the Breath-baptizer. (Mk 1:7-8) Moreover, Mark probably cites the Baptizer’s prophecy of the Breath-baptizer with polemic intent. The fact that Jesus had submitted to the baptism of another religious leader in Israel seems to have embarrassed the first Christians. The fact that Jesus submitted to John’s baptism could have suggested the superiority of John’s baptism to Christian baptism. It seems probable that, as Christianity took ecclesial shape, the disciples of John would have put such an interpretation on Jesus’ acceptance of Johannine baptism. In Mark’s gospel, the Baptizer’s prophecy that a mightier one would follow him who would baptize with a sanctifying Breath precludes any such interpretation of Jesus’s own baptism at John’s hands. Even though Jesus submitted to Johannine baptism, John’s baptism of repentance lacked the saving efficacy of Christian baptism to confer the Breath of the risen Christ. Mark underscores this theological point by having the Baptizer confess his unworthiness even to loosen the strap of Jesus’ sandal. (Mk 1:7) Slaves performed the task of untying their masters sandals. John’s attire, a camel’s hair cloak and a leather belt, marks him as a prophetic figure, even as Elijah redivivus. (2 Kings 1:8) Perhaps the greatest of the ecstatic prophets of the Old Testament, Elijah had ascended into heaven in a fiery chariot and a whirlwind (2 Kings 1:11-2); and the book of Malachi had predicted his return as the prelude to the dawning of divine judgment. John’s message of repentance agrees with the message which Malachi foresaw Elijah proclaiming on his return. (Mal 4:5-6) Mark’s Jesus also identifies the Baptizer with Elijah after his account of the transfiguration. (Mk 9:13) As Jesus descends from the mount of transfiguration with the disciples, He orders them not to relate what they saw on the mountain until He rises from the dead. The disciples (bewildered as usual) do not understand how anyone can rise from the dead until Elijah comes. (Mal 3:23-4) Jesus then assures them that Elijah has come and sees in John’s martyrdom by King Herod a repetition in its own way of the first Elijah’s persecution by King Ahab and his wicked wife Jezabel. (Mk 9:9-13; 1 Kings 19:2-10)

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John’s austere diet of locusts and wild honey could have expressed his concern with ritual purity. (Mk 1:7) That concern Jesus would not share.10 In contrast to Matthew and Luke, Mark records only one saying of John: his prophecy of the coming mightier one who would baptize with a sanctifying Breath. (Mk 1:7-8) The prophecy keeps the witness of John narrowly focused on the meaning of Christian baptism. It also sets the stage for Jesus’ appearance. He journeys from Nazareth in Galilee to the Judean desert and the banks of the Jordan in order to submit to John’s baptism. (Mk 1:9) Moreover, in Mark’s narrative Jesus’ baptism follows immediately after the Baptizer’s prophecy and begins Jesus’ revelation as Breath-baptizer and beginning of a new Israel.11 Immediately after His baptism, Jesus experiences His messianic commissioning. The fact that Jesus experiences His commissioning after John’s baptism rather than during it depicts the baptism itself as more the occasion than the cause of Jesus’ commissioning. (Mk 1:9-10) On emerging from the waters of the Jordan, Jesus sees the Breath of God descending upon Him from a rent in the heavens. (Mk 1:10) The symbolic rending of the heavens recalls a prophecy of Isaiah in which the splitting of the skies presages God’s final and decisive act of salvation. (Is 64:1-12) The Breath of God descends upon Jesus in order to transform Him into the divinely chosen instrument for effecting that salvation. More specifically, the Holy Breath of God descends upon Jesus in order to begin His revelation as the mightier Breath-baptizer who fulfills the Baptizer’s prophecy. The Breath descends under the image of a dove. The Hebrew’s kept doves as pets; moreover, both in Ps 74:19 and in rabbinic literature, the image of a dove designated Israel as God’s special pet, as the object of His special delight. The Holy Breath now descends upon Jesus in order to transform Him into the beginning of a new Israel. She also reveals Him as the special object of God’s love, as the Father’s words to Jesus make clear: for, as the dove descends, Jesus hears the Father say to Him: “You are my beloved Son; in You I am well pleased.” (Mk 1:11) Moreover, the fact that the Breath descends upon Jesus before He hears the Father’s voice, suggests that the Breath descends in order to empower Him by Her enlightenment to hear the Father’s words. The descent of the Breath on Jesus probably also alludes to Is 63:11, where the Breath of God comes to Israel in order to effect a new exodus. 10. Cf. Walter Wink, John the Baptist in the Gospel Tradition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1968), pp. 13-17; Justin Taylor, “The Coming of Elijah, Mt 17:10-13 and Mk 9, 11-13: The Development of Texts,” Revue Biblique, 98(1991), pp. 107-119; Joel Marcus, “Mark 9:11-13, ‘As It Has Been Written,’” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 80(1989), pp. 42-63. 11. Cf. James D.G. Dunn, “Spirit-and-Fire Baptism,” Novum Testamentum, 14(1972), pp. 81- 92.


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As Breath-baptizer and beginning of the new Israel, Jesus will effect just such a second liberation and commitment to God. The Breath of God descends after Jesus emerges from the baptismal waters of the Jordan. The image of the Breath hovering over the waters recalls the first chapter of Genesis in which the Breath of God hovers over the waters of chaos, apparently in order to render them docile and obedient to the God’s creative word. (Gen 1:2) The descent of the Breath of God upon Jesus now transforms Him into the beginning of a new creation. The image of Jesus in His desert temptations surrounded by brute beasts like the first Adam who named them re-enforces the theme of the new creation. (Mk 1:13; Gen 2:18-20) The image of the dove over the waters also recalls the story of the flood in Genesis. The dove which returned to Noah’s ark with an olive branch in its mouth, revealed that the flood waters were receding and foreshadowed the covenant between God and Noah. In it God promised never again to destroy the world by flood. (Gen 8:6-9:17) The dove hovering over Jesus’ baptismal waters suggests that through the Breath baptism which He will impart He will seal a new covenant between God and humanity. The descent of the Holy Breath upon Jesus probably designates Him as the one who fulfills Isaiah’s prophecy of a Breath-filled king whom the divine breathing would transform into a compendium of all the great charismatic leaders of Israel. (Is 11:9-11) The Breath’s descent also recalls the prophecy in trito-Isaiah of the coming of an anointed leader to proclaim a season of jubilee.12 (Is 61:1-4) The voice from heaven combines two texts from the Old Testament. The second psalm, a messianic psalm, asserts: “You are my son, this day have I begotten you.” (Ps 2:7), while the first of the servant songs in second Isaiah begins with the verse: “Behold my servant whom I uphold, my chosen one in whom my soul delights.” (Is 42:1) The commissioning voice from heaven thus designates Jesus messiah, but in the image of the suffering servant. Moreover, later in his gospel, Mark will refer to Jesus’ passion and death as the completion of His baptism. (Mk 10:38) That reference suggests that Breath baptism, which draws the disciples into Jesus’ baptismal experience, spans a lifetime and draws one into His passion.13 12. Cf. Leander E. Keck, “The Spirit and the Dove,” New Testament Studies, 17(1970-1971), pp. 41-67; A Feuillet, “Le symbolisme de la colombe dans les recits évangeliques du baptème,” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 46(1958), pp. 524-544; Frank J. Matera, “The Prologue as the Interpretative Key to Mark’s Gospel,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 34(1988), pp. 3-20; Ulrich Mell, “Jesu Taufe durch Johannes (Markus Christologie vom neuen Adam, Biblische Zeitschrift, 40(1996), pp. 161-178. 13. Cf. Kilian McDonnell, O.S.B., “Jesus’ Baptism in the Jordan,” Theological Studies, 56(1995), pp. 209-236.

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Jesus’ temptation in the desert follows immediately upon His baptism. I shall consider His temptations when reflecting on His conflict with Satan. Here it suffices to note that the desert temptations re-enforce the desert imagery which John’s proclamation of Jesus in the desert introduced in verse four. Jesus’ desert sojourn undertaken at the behest of the Breath with which He will baptize designates Him rather than John as the one who actually brings salvation from the desert of testing. Although in Mark Jesus’ messianic commissioning follows immediately on His baptism by John, Mark makes a point of dating the beginning Jesus’ ministry after John’s arrest. Mark writes, “After John had been handed over, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the good news of God . ‘The time (kairos) has been fulfilled .The reign of God is at hand. Repent and believe in the good news.” (Mk 1:14-15) As we shall see, Mark will later describe the actual beginning of Jesus preaching, as the good news spreads first to the disciples, then to Peter’s family and the people of Capernaum, and finally to the whole of Galilee. (Mk 1:16-39) This summary statement of Jesus entire ministry does not, then, describe a specific event but instead summarizes the thrust of Jesus’ ministry as a whole. This summary description of Jesus’ ministry also underscores the centrality which His proclamation of the kingdom occupies in Mark’s gospel.14 The verb “had been handed over,” suggests a parallel between John’s arrest and Jesus’, who was delivered up to His enemies by one of His own disciples. Moreover, in portraying the death of the Baptizer, Mark will make it clear that the Baptizer not only prophesied Jesus’ coming but foreshadowed Jesus’ own death by his prophetic martyrdom. (Mk 5:17-29) The fact, moreover, that Jesus waits until John’s arrest to begin His own ministry of proclamation underscores both the ephemeral nature of the Baptist’s ministry and its continuity with Jesus’ own. Jesus also runs risks similar to those which led to John’s imprisonment and death. As the mightier one who follows the Baptizer, Jesus, the servant messiah, (Mk 10:45) completes and perfects the saving impulse which the Baptizer began with his desert preaching. The words of Jesus underscore this last idea. After John’s ministry and prophecy of the mightier one, Jesus’ proclamation of God’s reign begins “the appointed time (kairos),” the eschatological moment designated by God to effect the salvation He had promised. Salvation stands or falls, not on faith in the Baptizer, but on faith in Jesus and in His proclamation of the kingdom.15 14. Cf. Wink, John the Baptist in the Gospel Tradition, pp. 1-8. 15. Cf. R.A. Guelich, “The Beginning of a Gospel,” Biblical Research, 27(1982), pp. 5-15; MWBC, I, pp. 28-35; NJBC, 41;6; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 65-74.


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Mark records a conflict between John’s disciples and Jesus’ during the lifetime of both men. The two groups of disciples differ in their attitude to fasting. The incident occurs in the course of a series of conflict stories which follow upon the cure of the leper in Mk 1:40-45. These conflict stories play an important dramatic role in Mark’s gospel. At the heart of Mark’s gospel stands the question which Jesus puts to His disciples: “Who do you say I am?” (Mk 8:28) The conflict stories offer important dramatic clues to the correct answer to that question, since through conflict Jesus defines His identity over against other persons, groups, and movements. In the conflict over fasting, the disciples of John join with the Pharisees in questioning Jesus about His disciples’ reluctance to fast. Their link to the Pharisees puts them in an adversarial relationship to Jesus, despite Jesus’ positive relationship to John. In associating the disciples of the Baptizer with the Pharisees, Mark asserts that some of them, perhaps at the suggestion of John himself, had adopted the Pharisaical practice of fasting on Mondays and Thursdays. (Lk 18:12) In recording the conflict over fasting, Mark bears witness to the fact that Jesus, unlike John the Baptizer, eschews extreme ascetical practices and confronts people, as Luke’s gospel insists, as the joyful messenger of the kingdom. (Mk 2:18-22) Mark, however, because of his stress on the centrality of the cross, puts less stress than Luke on this aspect of Jesus’ ministry. Jesus replies to the complaint against his disciples: Can wedding guests [literally: “the sons of the bridal chamber (hoi huioi tou nymphonos)”] fast while the bridegroom (ho nymphios) is among them? As long as they have the bridegroom among them, they cannot fast. But the days are coming when the bridegroom will be taken from them, and then they will fast on that day. (Mk 2:19-20)

The image of the bridegroom has both divine and messianic overtones. It recalls Yahweh’s espousal of Israel. (Hos 2:19, Is 54:4-8, 62:4-5, Ezek 16:7-63) The image also points to Jesus as the messianic bridegroom. (Cf. Jn 3:29; 2 Cor 11:2; Eph 5:32; Rev 19:7, 21:2) The spontaneous joy which His presence among His disciples inspires makes it impossible and inappropriate that they fast and act penitential. Jesus’ application of the image of the divine bridegroom to Himself designates Him as the supreme embodiment of Yahweh’s faithful and forgiving love of Israel. Having justified his disciples’ failure to adopt the penitential attitude of both the disciples of John and of the Pharisees, Jesus predicts that, after He, the bridegroom, has departed from their midst, His disciples will fast. Because this saying justifies the practice of fasting in the early church (Cf. Didache 8:1), many commentators regard it as unauthentic.

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Nevertheless, the prediction has theological significance for Mark, for it alludes to the passion and death of Jesus. Moreover, Mark places this allusion at the center of the five conflict stories of which the conflict over fasting marks the third. At the very moment, therefore, when he is portraying Jesus as the divine and messianic bridegroom whose presence evokes spontaneous joy from His followers, Mark reminds the reader that these conflicts will culminate in Jesus’ final struggle with the powers of evil on the cross. That reminder also implicitly points to the cross as the supreme expression of divine love. Finally, in this passage, Mark gives an eschatological interpretation to Christian fasting: it expresses the bride of Christ’s longing for His return.16 After Jesus’ self-depiction as the divine bridegroom, Mark appends two other sayings of Jesus, which He probably uttered on another occasion: No one sews an unshrunken patch of cloth on an old cloak; otherwise, the added piece tears from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear happens. Similarly, no one stores new wine in old wineskins; otherwise, the wine bursts the skins, and both wine and skins are lost. Rather, new wine in new skins. (Mk 2:21-2)

Both sayings point to the radical newness of Jesus’ message about the kingdom. While they probably originated in another context, Mark inserts them here as a justification of the disciples’ failure to fast. Jesus’ proclamation of God’s reign marks a break with traditional Jewish faith and devotion and therefore justifies the disciples’ reluctance to submit to the traditional religious practices, which John’s disciples embrace. The novelty of what Jesus embodies escapes traditional categories and devotion. It demands confrontation on its own terms, a radical re-interpretation of traditional Jewish piety. Matthew, as we shall see, will present Jesus instead as reforming traditional Jewish piety from within.17 Mark prefaces his account of John the Baptizer’s martyrdom, with King Herod’s fallacious interpretation of Jesus as John risen from the dead. Herod hears that not only Jesus but even His disciples are performing healing and exorcisms. (Mk 6:13-14) Given the disciples’ obtuseness and lack of faith in Mark, their healing ministry could reflect the experience of the post-resurrection Church. Herod has learned of a variety of explanations for Jesus’ unusual powers and for His ability to communicate them to His disciples: 1) that Jesus is John come back from the dead, 2) that Jesus is Elijah, whose return would usher in the messianic age, 3) 16. Cf. J.A. Zeisler, “The Removal of the Bridegroom: A Note on Mark II. 18-22 and Parallels,” New Testament Studies, 19(1972-1973), pp. 190-194; Birkill, New Light on the Earliest Gospel, pp. 39-47. 17. Cf. NJBC, 41:17; Mann, op. cit., pp. 232-236; MWBC, I, pp. 106-117; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 106-108.


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that Jesus has the same prophetic anointing as the prophets of old. (Mk 6:14-5) Later, when Jesus will ask His disciples “Who do people say I am,” they will respond with the same three interpretations of His person and ministry. (Mk 8:28) Herod superstitiously decides that Jesus is John resurrected from the dead. (Mk 6:16) As in Mk 8:26, this erroneous interpretation of Jesus underscores with irony two truths about both Jesus and John. First, Jesus’ ministry prolongs and perfects John’s. Second, Herod’s superstitious assessment of Jesus also foreshadows the fact that Jesus, unlike John, will actually rise from the dead. Even in misinterpreting Jesus, Herod comes ironically close to the truth about Him. This reminder of the resurrection prefaces Mark’s account of the Baptizer’s martyrdom. The account itself gives evidence of legendary embellishment. Mark portrays Herod as a weak, vain, sensuous, and violent man with tattered and superstitious remnants of religious faith. All of these vices illustrate what Mark will mean when later in the gospel he refers to the “leaven of Herod.” (Mk 8:16) Having imprisoned John for having denounced Herod for marrying his brother Philip’s wife, Herodias,18 Mark’s Herod vacillates over his next move. He recognizes John’s holiness, sees to it that the Baptizer goes unharmed while in prison. A troubled Herod even listens privately to the Baptizer’s preaching. As we shall see, Matthew will paint a much darker portrait of Herod.19 The implacable Herodias, however, plays on Herod’s vanity and sensuality by sending her daughter to dance for Herod at a banquet. Herod publicly promises her anything, even half his kingdom. She goes to her mother who orders her to ask for the Baptizer’s head on a platter. Herod, grief-stricken but unwilling to go back on his word in the presence of his guests, orders the Baptizer’s beheading. With black irony, Mark has the head brought before the banquet guests on a serving dish. Later, the disciples come and claim John’s body and bury it. (Mk 6:17-29) The Baptizer’s martyrdom takes place in the presence of Herod’s assembled court: the Herodian nobility, Herod’s military commanders, and rich Galileans. (Mk 6:21) Moreover, Herod’s fear of looking foolish in their eyes motivates his decision to behead John. The delivery of John’s head on a platter to a feasting, self-indulgent assembly of rich, Jewish, client aristocracy makes both a religious and a political statement about the forces which conspired to kill John.20 18. In point of fact, Herod Antipas did not marry his brother Philip’s wife. 19. Cf. Kazimierz Romaniuk, “‘EPOREI’ and ‘EPOIEI’ en Mc 6,20,” Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 69(1993), pp. 140-141; F. Neirynck, “Marc 6, 14-16 et par.,” Ephemerides Theologiae Lovaniensis, 65(1989), pp. 105-109; David Alan Black, “The Text of Mark 6.20,” New Testament Studies, 34(1989), pp. 141-145. 20. Cf. Myers, op.cit., pp. 215-216.

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The Baptizer’s martyrdom clearly foreshadows Jesus’ own death on the cross. It also implicitly foreshadows the fate which can await any of Jesus’ disciples. Mark has already linked the two events by alluding to the paschal mystery before he recounts John’s martyrdom. After John dies, his burial by his disciples foreshadows Jesus’ burial by a handful of his own disciples; but the martyred Baptizer does not rise from the dead as Jesus will, except, of course, in Herod’s guilt-ridden imagination.21 Mark also underscores the continuity between Jesus and John. As Jesus walks in the temple during His final Jerusalem ministry, the high priests, scribes and elders, ask Him by what authority He does what he does. (Cf. Jn 2:18) Jesus replies by agreeing to answer their question, if they will first answer one of His. Jesus asks: “Did John’s baptism come from heaven or from humans?” (Mk 11:29-30) The term “heaven” functions here as a euphemism for “God.” In effect, Jesus is asking, “Did John administer his baptism with divine sanction or not?” The Sanhedrin delegation recognizes at once that Jesus has faced them with a dilemma. If they publicly deny the prophetic character of John’s mission, preaching, and ministry, they will anger the people who regard John as a prophet. If they concede John’s prophetic authority, then Jesus can counter with a second question: “Why then did you not believe in him?” (Mk 11:30-2) The delegates from the Sanhedrin also know that, if they concede John’s right to speak and act prophetically, then they must also concede Jesus’ right to do the same. They therefore reply. “We do not know.” (Mk 11:33) Jesus then refuses to tell them by what authority He Himself acts. Jesus’ reply to the delegation confronts them with their own lack of repentance. It points to that lack of repentance as the chief obstacle which prevents them from recognizing the divinely inspired, prophetic character of Jesus’ own mission. Jesus’ question to the delegation also suggests that to the end of His life Jesus continued to endorse the ministry of John as prophetically inspired at the same time that He claimed prophetic authority of His own.22 Christological Knowing I have defined Christological knowing as practical assimilation to Jesus in the power of His Breath. In Mark, Jesus’ relationship to John casts significant light on its nature. Mark discovers a radical newness in Jesus’ person and message, a newness which contrasts with the more traditional Baptizer. Moreover, Mark hints at the fact that the root of that novelty lies in the paschal mystery 21. Cf. NJBC, 41:41; Mann, op. cit., pp. 293-298; MWBC, pp. 324-334; Anderson, op. cit. , pp. 167-170; Wink, John the Baptist in the Gospel Tradition, pp. 13-17. 22. Cf. NJBC, 41:75; Mann, op. cit., pp. 455-467; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 269-270.


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which discloses the full scope of Jesus’ relationship to God. While Jesus and John resemble one another in the prophetic martyrdom they both suffer, Jesus differs from John by rising from the dead, as Herod’s superstitious identification of Jesus with the risen John suggests. In portraying Jesus’ relationship to John, Mark, then, makes a clear statement about the way in which the converted Christian must relate to Jesus in faith. John for his part stands within salvation history as the promised Elijah, as a prophet like Elijah who prepared Israel for the coming of the true messiah. One must, however, consent in faith to Jesus as Son of God, as the Breath-filled messiah, and as God’s suffering servant. The Breath of God coincides with the reality of God; and only God sends God. Jesus, the Breath-baptizer, therefore, not John, confronts one as the divine Bridegroom. Jesus’ ministry, not John’s, begins the final age of salvation. Jesus rises from the dead; John does not. Jesus, not John, baptizes with a sanctifying Breath. As Breath-baptizer, Jesus begins a new Israel. Those who belong to that Israel acknowledge the saving significance of Jesus’ ministry, death, and resurrection. They also exhibit repentant submission to the conditions for living in God’s kingdom. Finally, the converted Christian recognizes the radical newness of what God accomplishes in Jesus, who begins the new creation in which the believing Christian shares. I have considered the implications of Jesus’ relationship to John. The following section examines the relationship in Mark between Jesus and the Father. That relationship, as we shall see, discloses even more about the dynamics of Christological knowing than Jesus’ relationship to the Baptizer. (IV) Mark names God “Father” in only three texts. (Mk 8:38, 13:32, 14:36) Elsewhere, he designates the Father simply as “God (ho Theos).” In this section I shall consider both sets of texts together. Jesus and the Father As we have seen, in Mark’s gospel Jesus first confronts the Father in His messianic commissioning which follows immediately upon His baptism by John. The Holy Breath descends upon Him to begin His revelation as Breath-baptizer. Immediately after Her descent from an apocalyptic rent in the heavens, the Father speaks to Jesus from the heavens, proclaiming Him His beloved Son and messiah in the image of the suffering servant. (MK 1:10-1) The words of the Father allude to Jesus’ Abba experience, to the fact that He experienced God with special intimacy as Father. The fact that Jesus hears the Father’s voice after the Breath descends suggests that She inspires His Abba awareness.

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The fact that the Father designates Jesus messiah makes the Father the ultimate source of Jesus’ messianic authority and mission. Because, however, Jesus conducts His ministry in the power and enlightenment of the divine Breath, She also endows His ministry with divine, prophetic authority. The Father commissions Jesus messiah in the image of the suffering servant of deutero-Isaiah. That suggests that the Father foresaw the passion of Jesus and incorporated it into His providential arrangement of the messianic age. Later in the transfiguration, the Father will, as we shall see, communicate to Peter, James, and John that Jesus is His beloved Son in the same words which He spoke to Jesus in His messianic commissioning. (Mk 9:8) In Mark’s account of the transfiguration, however, the Father omits any reference to the suffering servant and focuses instead on Jesus’ divine, messianic Sonship. In his account of Jesus’ initial proclamation of the kingdom, Mark underscores the fact that Jesus’ message and authority come to Him from God. Mark portrays Jesus as proclaiming “the good news of God (to euaggeliou tou Theou).” (Mk 1:15) Since Jesus proclaims the reign of God, the phrase “of God” could also function as an objective genitive and mean the good news about God as well as the good news from God.23 In Mk 1:24, the demoniac in the synagogue at Nazareth cries out: “What have we to do with you, Jesus of Nazareth? Did you come to destroy us? I know who You are: the Holy One of God.” (Mk 1:24) Jesus’ confrontation with the Gerasene demoniac elicits a similar cry of terror from the demons who torment the possessed man. At Jesus’ approach, the demoniac cries out: “What have I to do with you, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I adjure you by God, do not torture me!” (Mk 5:7) The title “Son of the Most High God” has messianic connotations and for Mark connotes Jesus’ divinity as well. The fact that the demons recognize Jesus and express terror at His very presence in their midst underscores the divine transcendent origin of His mission. He confronts them with the commissioning authority of the Father and in the power of the sanctifying Breath. Moreover, His very arrival signals the end of the power of the demonic world over creation, as His exorcisms of the terrified demons portend.24 One finds two references to God in Mark’s account of the healing of the paralytic. When Jesus assures the paralyzed man that his sins are forgiven, the scribes who witness the event think to themselves: “Why is this man talking like this? Who can forgive sins but God alone?” (Mk 2:7) 23. Cf. NJBC, 41:6; Mann, op. cit., pp. 204-207; MWBC, I, pp. 40-43; Anderson, op. cit., p. 83. 24. Cf. NJBC, 41-9; Mann, op. cit., pp. 210-216; Guelich, MWBC, I, pp. 54-59; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 88-92.


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When Jesus cures the paralytic in order to prove that “the Son of Man” has power on earth to forgive sins, those who witness the event all praise God in astonishment.25 (Mk 2:12) As Mark narrates the event, Jesus claims an authority to forgive sins on a par with the Father. While Jesus does not say to the paralytic “I forgive your sins,” but “Son, your sins are forgiven” (Mk 2:5), He presents His cure of the paralytic as a sign that “the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins.” (Mk 2:10) Then, by healing the paralytic, Jesus demonstrates by His actions the truth of the judgment which His adversaries have passed on Him. The phrase “Son of Man” could, in fact, translate an Aramaic euphemism for “I,” roughly equivalent in English to “yours truly.” So interpreted, Jesus would merely be saying “that you may know that I have power on earth to forgive sins.” In claiming the power to forgive sins, however, Jesus would be claiming more than human authority. It seems likely, therefore, that Mark’s readers would have read this phrase as Jesus’ claim to exercise the divine, eschatological, judicial authority of the Son of Man. (Cf. Dan 7:13-4; Mk 14:62) As we shall see in greater detail below, Mark expects his readers to see deeply into the revelatory significance of the events He narrates. Mark here invokes the name of God (the Father) as the ultimate sanction of Jesus’ messianic and eschatological power over sin. Jesus speaks not only with divine sanction but with the authority of the Father Himself. The fact that the scribes interpret Jesus’ claim as blasphemy confirms this interpretation. Jesus is in effect doing what only God does. Moreover, when He cures the paralytic in proof of His right to exercise such authority, the astonished onlookers praise God. Their praise implicitly acknowledges the legitimacy of Jesus’ claims.26 Mk 3:35 yields implicit insight into Jesus’ relationship to the Father. Convinced that Jesus has lost His mind (Mk 3:20-1), His relatives, accompanied by His mother, come to take charge of Him while He is teaching in a crowded house. Informed that His relatives stand outside asking for Him, Jesus replies: “Who is my mother and who are my brethren?” He then looks around searchingly (periblepsamenos) at those listening to His preaching and announces: “Behold my mother and brethren! For whoever does the will of God, that person is my brother and sister and 25. Cf. James F. Strange and Hershel Shanks, “Has the Home Where Jesus Stayed Been Found?” Biblical Archeology Review, 8(1982), pp. 26-37; Timothy Dwyer, “The Motif of Wonder in the Gospel of Mark,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 57(1995), pp. 49-59. 26. Cf. NJBC, 41:15; Mann, op. cit., pp. 221-228; MWBC, I, pp. 80-96; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 88-93. In Mk 2:26 Jesus refers to the temple as the house of God. While the verse certainly expresses Jesus’ attitude toward the temple, it throws no new light on His relationship to the Father.

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mother.” (Mk 3:33-5) Mark’s Jesus frequently gives people searching looks. These probing glances designate those whom Jesus is especially addressing on a given occasion. Place plays a symbolic role in the story. Those who surround Jesus inside the house appear as the “insiders,” as His true disciples. Jesus’ natural family, His blood relatives, remain outsiders separated from Him by their contemptuous unbelief. Mark also dramatizes the unbelief of Jesus’ relatives by bracketing the controversy over Beelzebul with the story of their repudiation of Jesus. (Mk 3:20-35) The bracketing suggests that the judgment of Jesus’ relatives that He has lost His mind expresses the same kind of unbelief as the Jerusalem scribes who accuse Jesus of exorcising in the power of the prince of demons. In the confrontation with His relatives, Jesus is in fact warning both His family and those who listen to Him that the kingdom undercuts traditional, clannish kinship ties by broadening them to include anyone who does the Father’s will. In the end the kingdom seeks to transform humans into one and the same family united by its single-hearted, obedient commitment to God. That commitment, rather than mere ties of blood, must define sibling relationships in the family of God. Accordingly, Jesus warns His blood relatives that, if they do not recognize his prior responsibility to proclaim God’s reign in obedience to the Father, then they no longer count as the members of His true family.27 (Cf. Mk 10:28-31) Jesus’ response stands as a rebuke to all unbelief, including that of His own family. Moreover, it makes it clear that Jesus understands His messianic mission as the gathering of God’s family. He gathers the children of God by drawing others into His own Abba experience. At the heart of that experience lies obedience to the will of God. Obedience to the will of God transforms one into a child of God, irrespective of one’s sex. Obedience to God makes one into Jesus’ own brother or sister and therefore, implicitly, into a child of the same Father whom He knows and proclaims. Anyone who obeys the will of God whom Jesus is proclaiming in announcing the kingdom has a claim to membership in God’s own family and a right to treatment as a brother or sister of Jesus. In other words, Jesus’ proclamation of the Fatherhood of God seeks to break down the barriers which separate people from one another, including sexual and social barriers or clan pride. That proclamation seeks to transform Israel and eventually all humanity into a single family reconciled to one another in the one God. This saying of Jesus also shows the kind of reverent intimacy which He expected His disciples to have, not just with God, but also with one another.28 27. Cf. Myers, op.cit., pp.167-168. 28. Cf. NJBC, 41:23; Mann, op. cit., pp. 257-259; MWBC, I, pp. 166-186; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 120-124. See also: Elizabeth Struthers Malbon, Narrative Space and Mythic Meaning in Mark (San Francisco, CA: Harper & Row, 1986).


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Jesus’ confrontation with the Pharisees in the “bread” section of Mark’s gospel underscores the importance of obedience to the Father’s will. When the Pharisees complain that Jesus’ disciples fail to perform the ritual libations before eating, Jesus rebukes them sharply for their hypocrisy and for replacing the commands of God with mere human tradition. In the course of His discourse Jesus repeats the charge three times. (Mk 7:8-13) Jesus’ charge asserts more than a condemnation of superficial legalism, although it does indeed assert that. The incident identifies a fundamental issue between Jesus and the Pharisees: viz., the real meaning of Torah. Jesus identifies the true meaning of Torah with the reign of God. The Pharisees, by contrast, while proclaiming their own fidelity to Torah actually replace God’s own commands with human traditions which excuse them from what God is demanding of them. In effect, therefore, they stand convicted of testing God, of setting the conditions under which they choose to obey the divine will rather than submitting in unquestioning obedience to what the Father asks of them.29 The next reference to the Father in Mark makes clear just how unconditioned an obedience Jesus demands of Himself and of His followers. After Peter’s confession of Jesus as the messiah (Mk 8:30), Jesus rebukes Peter when he tries to dissuade Jesus from walking the path which leads to the cross. In words which suggest an emotionally charged confrontation, Jesus says to Peter: “Get out of my sight, Satan, for you are not committed to the things of God but to the things of humans.” (Mk 8:33) In opposing Jesus’ passion Peter is tempting Him, putting Him to the test as Satan had in the desert. In so acting, Peter therefore stands not on the side of God but on the side of Satan and His minions. In Jesus’ eyes absolute obedience to the Father includes the cross. The passage, then, implicitly harkens back to His messianic commissioning by the Father, who had designated Him messiah, but messiah in the image of the suffering servant. (Mk 1:11) The path to messianic victory leads obediently through Calvary.30 Moreover, having rebuked Peter, Jesus summons His disciples and makes it clear to them that He requires of them the same kind of obedience to God even unto death. Jesus sternly warns: If any one would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it; and whoever loses his life for my sake and for the gospel’s will save it. For what does it profit one, to gain the whole world and forfeit one’s life? For what can one give in return for one’s life? For whoever is ashamed of Me and of My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of that one the Son of man 29. Cf. NJBC, 41:47. 30. Cf. NJBC, 41:55-56; Mann, op. cit., pp. 310-314; MWBC, I, pp. 359-371; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 183-186.

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Part 1: Mark’s Narrative Christology will be ashamed, when He comes in the glory of His Father and with the holy angels. (Mk 8:38)

The way of the cross leads finally to glory; but those who deny Jesus in order to avoid the suffering of the cross must confront Him personally when He returns in the glory of the Father. Once again the phrase “Son of Man” functions as the equivalent of “I”; but it also connotes the eschatological judicial authority of the apocalyptic Son of Man, who participates in the very glory of the Father. The divine glory manifests the reality and excellence of God. Having undergone the humiliation of the cross, Jesus will return as eschatological judge with the manifest right to pass judgment on humans with divine authority and in the very presence of His Father. Those who through fear of death deny Him in this life may expect that He will deny them before the Father when He returns to pronounce divine judgment on humans and on their deeds. The evangelist may allude to unrepented apostasies committed during Nero’s persecution.31 Jesus’ repudiation of Mosaic divorce practices also expresses His obedience to the Father’s will and His insistence on the deep intent of the Torah. Asked to decide between Rabbi Hillel and Rabbi Shamai on the question of divorce, Jesus challenges His Pharisaical questioner in turn to recognize God’s original intent in creating marriage. He concludes: “What God had joined together, let no human put asunder.” (Mk 10:9) As in the case of Jesus’ earlier conflict with the Pharisees over ritual libations, the issue concerns the deliberate substitution of human customs for the divine will. Such substitution only caters to the hardness of the unrepentant heart. Mark’s Jesus insists, moreover, that Moses commanded rather than permitted divorce because of the hardness of the male heart. (Mk 10:3-5) Jesus’ abrogation of one of the laws of the Torah would have deeply scandalized His contemporaries. Jesus’ repudiation of Mosaic divorce practices in Mark makes a statement about the patriarchal oppression of woman in marriage. It replaces the moral compromises which the Mosaic code commanded because of men’s lack of repentance with Jesus’ perception of God’s original intent in marriage: life-long mutual fidelity of the spouses.32 The Father’s testimony to Jesus in the transfiguration summons the disciples to show to Jesus as God’s beloved Son an obedience which supersedes their obedience to the Law and the prophets. Mark describes the event as a theophany. “After six days,” Jesus takes Peter, James, and John up a high mountain where the disciples receive a glimpse of Him in a 31. Cf. NJBC, 41:57; Mann, op. cit., pp. 342-354; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 217-220. 32. Cf. Myers, op.cit., pp. 264-266; Ernst Bammel, “Markus 10. 11 ff. und das jüdische Eherecht,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 61(1970), pp. 95-101; NJBC, 41:62; Mann, op. cit., pp. 385-394; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 239-244.


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glorified state. The temporal reference alludes to Ex 24:16. There God appears to the Israelites in a cloud which rests for six days upon Mount Sinai. On the seventh day, God summons Moses to ascend the mountain. Jesus, on the seventh day, summons His disciples to the mountaintop. Jesus’ clothes become an intense and dazzling white, whiter than any human power could make them. (Mk 9:2) The dazzling garments foreshadow those worn by the “young man” who announces to the terrified women Jesus’ resurrection. (Mk 16:5) The brightness of the young man’s clothes symbolize his transcendent origin. Jesus’ dazzling robes probably enjoy similar symbolism. Clothes also symbolize social relationship. The transformation of Jesus’ clothes, therefore, indicates that He, when revealed in glory, will relate to the disciples in a new and transcendent way. As a foreshadowing of the resurrection, the transformation of Jesus’ clothing also foreshadows the risen glory which will reveal his transcendent origin. Moses and Elijah, who both experienced theophanies atop the mount of the covenant, appear and converse with Jesus. Moses, the special intimate of God and giver of the Torah, and Elijah, the greatest of the ecstatic prophets, also personify the Law and the prophets. (Mk 9:4) Peter speaks to Jesus calling Him “rabbouni,” the Aramaic equivalent of the Hebrew word “rabbi.” Here, however, the word may have the connotations of “Lord.”33 Peter proposes to build three tents atop the mountain: one for Jesus, one for Moses, and one for Elijah. In the process, he foolishly places Jesus on a par with Moses and Elijah and implicitly with both the Law and the prophets. At this point, the cloud of the divine presence which once appeared on Mount Sinai settles upon the mountain, and the voice which spoke to Jesus in His messianic commissioning, speaks to Peter, James, and John. It says: “This is my beloved Son, listen to Him.” As messianic Son of God, Jesus speaks with an authority which surpasses that of the Law and prophets because He participates in heavenly glory. In effect, then, by endorsing Jesus and His teaching, the Father, whose words implicitly allude to the first verse of Mark’s gospel, demands that the disciples obey Jesus and His teaching with the same unswerving obedience which they owe to the Father Himself. The story of the transfiguration follows immediately on Jesus’ injunction to the disciples to take up their crosses and follow Him. (Mk 8:34-9:1) The Father’s command, “Listen to Him” gives divine sanction to that injunction. One who obeys both Jesus and the Father walks the way of the cross, as the Roman martyrs had.34 33. See: Benedict T. Viviano, “Rabbouni and Mark 9:5,” Revue Biblique, 97(1990), pp. 207- 218. 34. Cf. Enrique Nardone, La Transfiguration de Jesús y el Dialogo Sobre Elias (Buenos Aires: Editora Patria Grande, 1975); Johannes M. Neutzel, Die Verklärungserzählung

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Absolute Trust in the Father The encounter between Jesus and the rich man introduces a new dimension of Jesus’ and the disciples’ relationship to the Father: namely, that of trust. The rich man runs up to Jesus and greets Him with extravagant reverence, kneeling on the ground before Jesus. He then asks with equally exaggerated courtesy, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” (Mk 10:17) Jesus rebukes the florid character of the rich man’s address with the dry comment, “Why do you call me ‘good’? No one is good except God.” (Mk 10:17-8) Jesus’ reply expresses His typical humility and self-effacement not only with respect to the Father but with regard to other teachers as well. He refuses to claim any special titles of respect and cites the popular Jewish belief that the term “good” applies to God alone. One can also read His response as Markan irony. In floridly calling Jesus “good,” the rich man implicitly recognizes His divinity. When the rich man cannot accept Jesus’ invitation to sell all his possessions, give them to the poor, and join the inner circle of disciples, Jesus tells the astonished disciples that the rich will enter the kingdom of God only with great difficulty. He counters their astonishment by insisting on the point and astonishing them even further. (Mk 10:23-6) When the disciples then ask in their despondency, “Then who can be saved?” Jesus looks at them (a phrase, as we have seen, which Mark habitually uses to underscore the importance of what Jesus is about to say and to whom it applies) and then replies: “For humans it is impossible, but not for God; for all things are possible for God.” (Mk 10: 27) Jesus does more than deny the disciples’ naive assumption that riches manifest God’s favor and give evidence that the one who has them lives assured of salvation. Jesus insists in addition that no merely human activity has the power to save one, including the amassing of wealth. Only God saves. Hence, the way to salvation lies in absolute trust in the Father’s saving power.35 The theme of trust in God resurfaces during Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry. Mark situates the cleansing of the temple in a tryptic whose first and im Markusevangelium: Eine redactionsgeschitiliche Untersuchung (Bamberg: Ecleterverlag, 1972); A. Feuillet, “Les perspectives propres à chaque évangeliste dans les récits de la transfiguration,” Biblica, 39(1958), pp. 281-301. 35. Cf. NJBC, 41:64; Mann, op. cit., pp 397-406; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 247-252; J.W. Wenham, “Why Do You Ask Me about Good? A Study of the Relation between Text and Source Criticism,” New Testament Studies, 28(1982), pp. 116-125; Ernest Best, “Uncomfortable Words VII. The Camel and the Needle’s Eye (Mk 10:25),” Expository Times, 82(1970-1971), pp. 83- 89; Walther Zimmerli, “Die Frage nach dem ewigen Leben,” Evangelische Theologie, 19(1959), pp. 90-97; Dieter Sönger, “Recht und Gerichtigkeit in der Verkündigung Jesu: Erwägungen zu Mk 10,17-22 und 12, 28-34,” Biblische Zeitschrift, 36(1992), pp. 179-194; Thomas C. Schmidt, “Mark 10.29-30; Matthew 19.29: Leave Houses and Region,” New Testament Studies, 38(1992), pp. 617-620.


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third scenes have to do with Jesus’ cursing a fig tree.36 In cursing the fig tree, Jesus acts out a parable. He goes to the fig tree to pick its fruit and finds it without fruit, since the season for the tree to bear had not arrived. Jesus then curses the tree, predicting that it will never again bear fruit. In between these two interrelated incidents Mark locates the cleansing of the temple. Jesus, after discovering the withered tree with His disciples then instructs them on the importance of an unwavering faith as the basis for prayer. (Mk 11:12-14) When read in context, the tree without fruit symbolizes the sterility of a temple worship vitiated by the greed and oppression of the high priestly caste. Moreover, Jesus’ discourse on faith-filled prayer implicitly contrasts the faithless worship of the temple priesthood with authentic worship of the Father. (Mk 11:20-2) When Peter calls Jesus’ attention to the fact that the fig tree has withered, He replies by instructing the disciples on the need to trust that God will answer prayers of petition. Have faith in God. Amen, I say to you, Whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and cast into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him. Therefore, I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received and it will be yours. (Mk 11:22-4)

Jesus uses deliberate hyperbole in order to underscore the point that, when we turn to the Father in prayer, we should do so with absolute and unconditioned confidence that He will hear us. This teaching of Jesus also recalls His assurance to the disciples that “all things are possible with God.” (Mk 10:27) It looks forward as well to Jesus’ prayer to the Father on the cross. (Mk 15:34) After the cursing of the fig tree, Mark appends another teaching about Christian prayer. We cannot expect God to forgive us, unless we are willing to forgive one another first. In other words, mutual forgiveness authenticates prayer to the Father.37 (Mk 11:25-6) God in the Jerusalem Ministry In the confrontations which occur in Jesus’ final Jerusalem ministry, the figure of the Father enters on three different occasions. The first two 36. See: James R. Edwards, “Markan Sandwiches: The Significance of Interpolations in Markan Narratives,” Novum Testamentum, 31(1989), pp. 193-216. 37. Cf. William R. Telford, The Barren Temple and the Withered Tree (Sheffield: Redwood Burn, Ltd., 1980), pp. 39-68; NJBC, 41:71; Mann, op. cit., pp. 438-454; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 263-269; Christfried Böttrich, “Jesus und der Feigebaum: Mk 11:12-14, 20-25 in der Diskussion,” Novum Testamentum, 39 (1997), pp. 328-359 .

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confrontations rework points which Mark has already made about the Father and our relationship to Him. First, the Pharisees and the Herodians, who earlier in the gospel had joined forces to kill Jesus (Mk 3:6), now come to Him in the hope of trapping Him into forbidding paying taxes to Caesar. With elaborate flattery, they tell Jesus that they recognize in Him a man who disregards the opinions of others, does not respect persons, and teaches the way of God in truth. (Mk 12:13-4) Jesus sees through their hypocrisy and asks them to show him the Roman coin of tribute. When they correctly identify Caesar’s face stamped on the coin, Jesus replies: “Render to Caesar the things due to Caesar and to God the things due to God.” (Mk 12:17) Jesus replies ironically that, if Caesar’s image identifies his coins, then the Herodians and Pharisees should have no difficulty in returning it to him, since it belongs to Caesar in the first place; but He then challenges his adversaries to show even greater zeal in returning to God what they own to God. As far as Jesus is concerned, God expects the Pharisees and Herodians to recognize a universal, divine fatherhood which transforms all who obey God into their brothers and sisters. God desires them to submit to the demands of His divine reign. Jesus’ enemies can recognize Caesar’s image on a coin. They need to learn to recognize God’s image in other people, especially in the poor and the needy.38 (Mk 12:29-31; cf. Gen 1:27) In the second confrontation which alludes to God, the Sadducees, who deny the resurrection of the body, pose a dilemma to Jesus about seven brothers who all married the same woman. The want to know to whom she will belong as wife in the resurrection. (Mk 12:18-23) In his reply Jesus addresses only the resurrection of the righteous. He challenges both the Sadducees’ knowledge of the Pentateuch and the presuppositions on which their dilemma rests. He also challenges their faith in the power of God. (Mk 12:24-5) In rebuking the Saducees’ ignorance of the Pentateuch, Jesus reminds them that it calls God the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. It also calls Him the God of the living. (Mk 12:26-7) Jesus argues that God could not speak of Himself in this way unless Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were now living with Him and destined for resurrection. 38. Cf. NJBC, 41:77; Mann, op. cit., pp. 468-472; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 273-276; Herbert Loewe, “Render Unto Caesar”: Religious and Political Loyalty in Palestine (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1940); Charles Homer Giblin, “‘The Things of God’ in the Question Concerning Tribute to Caesar (Lk 20:25; Mk 12:17; Mt 22:29),” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 33(1971), pp. 510-511; Paul Corby Finney, “The Rabbi and the Coin Portrait (Mark 12:15b, 16): Rigorism Manque,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 112(1993), pp. 629-644; Karl- Gustav Sandelin, “The Jesus Tradition and Idolatry,” New Testament Studies, 42(1996), pp. 412-420.


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Jesus also challenges the presupposition on which the Sadducees have constructed their dilemma: viz., that risen life consists in resuscitation to the same kind of life which humans now live. Instead, resurrection creates a new way of existing which assimilates one to the angels. (Mk 12:25-6) The angels worship God and do His bidding. The Sadducees denied not only bodily resurrection but the existence of angels as well. Jesus’ reply would seem to rebuke them for both doubts.39 The ignorance and error of the Saducees spring, however, from a deeper deficiency. They lack faith and trust in God’s power to raise people from the dead. They doubt God’s ability to transform them in ways which impart to them everlasting life. Implicitly, Jesus is asserting that unconditioned faith and trust in the Father’s power to save includes faith and trust in His power to raise one from the dead.40 In the third Jerusalem confrontation, a scribe asks Jesus which commandment of the Law qualifies as greatest. (Mk 12:28) Jesus replies: The first is: Listen, Oh Israel, the Lord our God is Lord; and you shall love the Lord your God with your whole heart, with your whole soul, and with your whole mind, and with your whole strength. This is the second: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater than this. (Mk 12:29-31)

As we have seen, Jesus has heretofore demanded of His disciples unconditioned obedience to the Father as well as an absolute and unconditioned trust. The latter includes belief in His power to raise the just from the dead. Now Jesus also demands an all-consuming love for the Father. Moreover, when the scribe approves Jesus’ answer, Jesus looks at him— a gesture which, as we have seen, calls attention to the importance of what He is about to say—and says:”You are not far from the reign of God.” (Mk 12:34) The reply has importance because it indicates that, as far as Jesus is concerned, one must interpret the meaning of the two great commandments in the light of His proclamation of God’s reign and of the moral demands of life in the kingdom.41 Mark ends his account of Jesus’ final Jerusalem ministry with Jesus’ apocalyptic discourse. (Mk 13:1-37) Toward the end of the discourse, Jesus warns that no one—not even Jesus Himself— knows when the destruction of Jerusalem and the final judgment will occur. Only the Father 39. The assimilation of the risen to angels accords with Jewish apocalyptic thinking. (Cf. 1 Enoch 104:4; Apoc. Bar. 51:10). Cf. E, Main, “Les Sadducéens et la resurrection des morts: comparaison entre Mc 12,18-27 et Lc20, 27-38,” Revue Biblique, 103(1996), pp. 411-432. 40. Cf. NJBC, 41:78; Mann, op. cit., pp. 472-476; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 276-279. 41. Cf. NJBC, 41:79; Mann, op. cit., pp. 477-482; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 279-283.

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knows when the things which He has just predicted will happen. (Mk 13:32) Moreover, since the disciples live in ignorance of the Father’s timetable, they must live lives of constant vigilance, ready to face judgment, whenever it occurs. Here Mark could conceivably be countering an exaggerated chiliasm which anticipated an immanent second coming.42 The Father in the Passion Two references to the Father occur in Mark’s passion narrative. In Gethsemani Jesus prays: “Abba, Father, all things are possible for you; take this cup from me; but, not what I will, but what you will.” (Mk 14:36) In His prayer, Jesus relates to the Father with the same reverent trust and unconditioned obedience which He demands of His disciples. Although Mark does not record the Our Father among Jesus’ teachings, the evangelist may have patterned Jesus’ prayer in the garden on the petition “Your will be done.” The reference to the Father’s ability to do anything also recalls Jesus’ assurance to the disciples that God can accomplish what humans cannot, since all things are possible with God. (Mk 10:27) Jesus begs the Father urgently not to visit on Him the destiny which threatens Him, the cup of suffering He is about the drink; but Jesus nevertheless submits unconditionally to the Father’s will.43 The prayer has other connotations as well. The cup of which Jesus speaks has eucharistic connotations. Having given the disciples the cup of His covenant blood at the last supper, Jesus now finds Himself loathe to drink of it Himself. In Gethsemane, Mark’s Jesus, like a true son of Israel, wrestles with the Father in the face of a cruel martyrdom. Jesus submits, however, to the divine will. Mark’s Jesus therefore models for Christians how to deal with human weakness when martyrdom threatens.44 On the cross Jesus, shortly before He dies, prays in Aramaic the first verse of Ps 22, “My God, My God why have your forsaken me?” (Mk 15:33-4) The words suggest that Jesus dies feeling utterly abandoned by the Father. Mark, however, is making a theological rather than a psychological point. Throughout his gospel, Mark invites the reader to see deeply into the saving significance of the events which he narrates. One would anticipate, therefore, that, when the evangelist describes the culminating 42. Cf. NJBC, 41:88; Mann, op. cit., pp. 538-550; Anderson, op. cit., p.301; J.K. Elliot, “The Position of the Verb in Mark with Special Reference to Chapter 13,” Novum Testamentum, 38(1996), pp. 136-144. 43. Cf. NJBC, 41: 98; Mann, op. cit., pp. 587-594; The cup also recalls the eucharistic cup of the new covenant and of His blood that Jesus gave to the disciples at the Last Supper. (Mk 14:23) 44. Cf. Raymond E. Brown, S.S., The Death of the Messiah (2 vols.; New York, NY: Doubleday, 1994), I, pp. 161-178.


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events of his entire narrative, he would expect the reader to see beyond the obvious meaning of the text to its deeper soteriological significance. Jesus’ prayer on the cross cites the first verse of psalm 22. Psalm 22 expresses the prayer of the innocent poor who in the midst suffering, oppression, and persecution turn to God as their only and best refuge. The poor find in Him deliverance and vindication. In placing the first verse of the psalm on Jesus’ lips Mark, identifies Him in His passion with the innocent poor man of Psalm 22. In other words, in the face of rejection, betrayal, torture, and death, Jesus clings to the Father in obedience and trust that He will somehow know vindication at the Father’s hand.45 Moreover, the rending of the temple veil and the testimony of the centurion which follow immediately upon Jesus death express the Father’s instant response to Jesus’ dying prayer. The rending of the temple veil de-sacralizes God’s sanctuary under the old Law and foreshadows its destruction. The centurion’s testimony foreshadows the conversion of the Gentiles to Christ. Since, moreover, according to Josephus, the outer veil of the temple depicted the heavens, the rent veil could conceivably recall the apocalyptic rending of the skies at Jesus’ Baptism when the Father first commissioned Him messiah in the image of the suffering servant. The paschal mystery brings that revelation to its culmination.46 (Mk 1:10) Christological Knowing In Mark, Jesus’ relationship to the Father defines one of the fundamental aspects of Christological knowing. Jesus relates to the Father with unconditioned trust, with perfect obedience, and with all-consuming love. He expects His disciples to do the same. They must recognize that through Jesus the Father forgives sins. Their trust in the Father must inform their prayer and confirm their confidence in the Father’s power to raise them from the dead. In introducing the disciples into God’s family, Jesus draws them into His own Abba awareness. He calls them, therefore, to live as children of God in His image. As we shall see in what follows, Jesus’ 45. Jürgen Moltmann has popularized a psychologized and, in my judgment, false and misleading reading of Jesus’ final prayer in the cross in Mark. In Moltmann’s peculiar Hegelian reading of Jesus’s last words, Jesus despairs on the cross and ceases temporarily to be Son, while the Father abandons the Son and ceases temporarily to be Father. The resurrection negates the negation of the cross and restores the interpersonal relationship between Son and Father. We shall have occasion to reflect on Moltmann’s reading of the death of Jesus in the third volume of this study. Here it suffices to note that it combines bad logic with bad exegesis. Cf. Jürgen Moltmann, The Crucified God, translated by R.A. Wilson and John Bowden (New York, NY: Harper & Row, 1974); The Trinity and the Kingdom, translated by Margaret Kohl (San Francisco, CA: Harper & Row, 1981), pp. 75-88. See also: NJBC, 41:106, Mann, op. cit., pp. 646-655; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 344-348. 46. Cf. David Ulansey, “The Heavenly Veil Torn: Mark’s Cosmic Inclusio,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 110(1991), pp. 123-125.

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relationship to the divine Breath also defines a fundamental dimension of Christological knowing. (V) One finds only sparse references to the Holy Breath in Mark’s gospel; but those which occur have considerable significance. Jesus and the Breath John the Baptizer, as we have seen, prophesies that “a mightier one” than himself will follow him and that this “mightier one” will prove his superiority to John by baptizing, not just with water but with a sanctifying Breath. (Mk 1:7-8) Mark writes his gospel, as we have seen, for people who have experienced Breath-baptism and who already know the identity of the mightier one. After Jesus’ baptism by John, the Holy Breath begins Jesus’ revelation as the mightier one by descending upon Jesus from an apocalyptic rent in the heavens. The rent symbolizes the beginning of the end time and the decisive arrival of salvation from God. (Mk 1:10) The Breath, as we have also seen, descends in the form of a dove in order to manifest Jesus publicly as the beloved Son of God, as both messiah and suffering servant. The dove also symbolizes Israel as the object of God’s special delight. (Cf. Ps 74:19) Hence, the Breath also comes to Jesus under the sign of the dove in order to reveal Him publicly as the beloved of God and as the beginning of a new Israel. Indeed, immediately after His messianic commissioning, the Breath drives Jesus out into the desert for His initial confrontation with Satan and the powers of evil. During His forty day sojourn in the desert Jesus relives the first Israel’s period of desert testing. The image of the dove over the waters, as we saw above, also recalls the Noah story and foreshadows the new covenant which Jesus will seal between God and humanity by sheding His blood on the cross and by baptizing with a sanctifying Breath. (Mk 14:24-5) Indeed, for Mark, Jesus’ suffering and death brings His baptismal anointing to its completion by manifesting Him publicly, not only as messiah but as messiah in the image of the suffering servant of deutero-Isaiah. The image of the Breath over the waters also recalls the creation narrative which opens Genesis (Gen 1:2) and indicates that Jesus’ transformation in the power of the Breath begins a new creation. After the Breath descends, Jesus hears the Father proclaim Him messiah in the image of the suffering servant. (Mk 1:10-1; cf. Ps 2:7, Is 42:1) The fact that Jesus hears the voice from heaven proclaim Him Son after the Breath’s descent suggests that His Abba awareness results from Her presence and action within Him.47 47. Cf. James D.G. Dunn, Baptism in the Holy Spirit (London: SCM Press, 1970), pp. 23-36; Kilian McDonnell and George T. Montague, Christian Initiation and Baptism

Chapter 3: Negative Dramatic Linkages in Mark

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After His baptism, the Breath immediately drives Jesus into the desert to begin the final eschatological conflict with Satan. By driving Jesus into this conflict, the Holy Breath of God declares war on the evil spirits. As we shall see, the call of the disciples in Mark parallels Jesus’ messianic commissioning after His baptism, for it draws the disciples into Jesus’ own mission by transforming them into “fishers of people.” (Mk 1:18) In the same way, the confrontation with the demoniac at Capernaum parallels Jesus’ confrontation with Satan in the desert. The exorcism at Capernaum also reveals how the Holy Breath will manifest Jesus’ messianic authority in the course of His ministry: namely, by endowing His teaching with compelling authority and by empowering Him to drive out demons and to heal.48 (Mk 1:21-28) During His Galilean ministry Jesus interprets the slanderous charge that he casts out demons in the power of Beelzebul as blasphemy against the Holy Breath, a sin which blinds one in this life to God’s saving action in this world and exposes one to damnation in the next life. (Mk 3:28-9) The incident dramatizes the struggle between the Breath of God and the breath of evil present in the world and personified by the figure of Satan.49 By alluding to the Holy Breath as the inspiration of the psalms (Mk 12:36), Mark makes it clear that the same divine Breath who had been at work in Israel prior to Jesus’ coming is now working in Him to manifest Him as messiah, suffering servant, and Breath-baptizer. Finally, Mark indicates that Breath-baptism will manifest itself in the willingness of Jesus’ disciples to bear witness to Him even at the risk of their own lives.50 (Mk 13:9-11) Christological Knowing Breath-baptism effects in the disciples personally and corporately the kind of awareness which I have called “Christological knowing.” Christological in the Holy Spirit: The First Eight Centuries (Collegeville, MI: The Liturgical Press, 1991), pp. 3-14; NJBC, 41:6; Mann, op. cit., pp. 198-205; MWBC, I, pp. 29-36; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 74-80; Leander E. Keck, “The Spirit and the Dove,” New Testament Studies, 17(1970-1971), pp. 41- 67; A. Feuillet, “Le symbolisme de la colombe dans les recits évangeliques du baptème,” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 46(1958), pp. 524-544. 48. Cf. C.K. Barrett, The Holy Spirit and the Gospel Tradition (London: SPCK, 1947). 49. Cf. NJBC, 41:23; Mann, op. cit., pp. 251-257; MWBC, I, pp. 166-186; Anderson, op.cit., pp. 121-125.; Owen E. Evans, “The Unforgivable Sin,” Expository Times, 68(1956-1957), pp. 240-244; Gottfried Fitzer, “Die Sünde wider den Heilegen Geist,” Theologische Zeitschrift, 13(1957), pp. 161-182; James G. Williams, “A Note on the ‘Unforgivable Sin’ Logion,” New Testament Studies, 12(1965-1966), pp. 75-76; I. Howard Marshall, “Hard Sayings—VII,” Theology, 67(1964), pp. 65-69. 50. Cf. NJBC, 41:84; Mann, op. cit., pp. 513-520; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 293-295; J. Giblet, “La promesse de l’Esprit et la mission des apôtres dans les évangeiles,” Irenikon, 30(1957), pp. 5-43.

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knowing, therefore, roots itself in commitment in faith to Jesus, the Breath baptizer. The paschal mystery completes Jesus’ own Breath-baptism. Moreover, the Holy Breath strengthens the disciples to bear fearless witness to the risen Lord by inspiring their testimony to Him. In Mark, bearing witness to Jesus at the risk of one’s life gives the clearest evidence of responsiveness to the Breath of Jesus. It functions therefore as the ultimate sign of Breath-baptism. Taken together, the positive dramatic linkages in Mark define in a general way the realistic and moral conditions for Christological knowing. Jesus’ relationship to John designates Him as the Breath baptizer. Breath baptism effects Christological knowing by drawing one into Jesus’ baptismal experience. Jesus’ relationship to the Father and to the Breath describe Breath-baptism’s moral conditions and consequences. Christological knowing presupposes repentance and personal acceptance of the forgiveness of sins which Jesus embodies and proclaims. Christological knowing then draws one into Jesus’ Abba experience. It frees one to recognize that Jesus speaks with the divine authority of God’s only Son. It teaches one to relate to Jesus as a brother and to all those who exhibit the obedience of faith as siblings. Accepting divine forgiveness commits one to forgive others as gratuitously as God forgives us. Such mutual forgiveness authenticates prayer. Christological knowing frees one to trust absolutely God’s power both to save us and to impart transforming risen life. That trust enables one to lay down one’s life for the gospel, if necessary. Finally, Christological knowing teaches one to relate to the Father with an all-consuming love. The divine Breath functions as the enlightening source of Christological knowing. As the Breath teaches one to relate to the Father in Jesus’ image, She incorporates one into the new Israel which Jesus begins. She also imparts a share in the new creation which He embodies. By conforming one to Jesus, the Breath draws one into His mission of proclaiming and embodying God’s reign. The Breath also inspires Jesus’ victorious struggle with Satan. As we shall soon see, the negative dramatic linkages together with the thematic and allusive linkages in Mark further develop the conditions for advancing in Christological knowing. In the chapter which follows I shall begin to examine the negative dramatic linkages which dramatize the sins of which the Breath-baptized must repent. I begin with the most negative relationship of all: Jesus’ relationship to Satan and to everything which Satan symbolizes.


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Chapter 3 Negative Dramatic Linkages in Mark In the preceding chapter I showed how Jesus’ relationship to John the Baptizer, to the Father, and to the divine Breath define the overall parameters of Christological knowing. Jesus’ negative relationships enlarge those parameters by clarifying the kinds of attitudes and commitments which Christological knowing excludes. Mark’s Jesus relates negatively to Satan, to the scribes and Pharisees, to Herod, to the chief priests, and to Pilate. Taken collectively, these enemies of Jesus and of the kingdom symbolize the forces of anti-Christ. Prophetic resistance to them in Jesus’ image further assimilates the disciples to Him in the power of His Breath. This chapter divides into five parts. Part one examines Jesus’ conflict with Satan and his demons. Part two ponders Jesus’ quarrel with the scribes and Pharisees. Part three meditates Jesus’ relationship to Herod. Part four analyses Jesus’ battle with the chief priests. Part five reflects on His trial and execution by Pilate. (I) As we saw in the last chapter, Jesus’ messianic commissioning by the Father in the enlightening empowerment of the Holy Breath plunges Him into immediate conflict with Satan. The Holy Breath expels Him with force into the desert (ekballei eis ten eremon) to confront the prince of darkness. (Mk 1:12-3) Jesus and Satan In his account of Jesus’ desert temptation, Mark, with a dense overlay of images, once again compresses a multiplicity of theological insights into just a few verses. That Jesus confronts Satan in the desert has symbolic meaning. That confrontation points to Him rather than to John as the one who will fulfill the messianic expectation that Israel’s final salvation will dawn in the desert. The violence with which the Holy Breath drives Jesus into the desert (expressed in the verb “ekballei”) foreshadows the violence of God’s final confrontation with the forces of evil which Jesus’ ministry, death, and resurrection will accomplish. Jesus remains in the desert forty days and forty nights. His forty-day desert sojourn recalls Israel’s forty years of desert wandering and testing and portrays Jesus as the Breath-filled beginning and prototype of a new Israel. Mark depicts Jesus in the desert surrounded by wild beasts. The image recalls Adam in the garden of Eden surrounded by the beasts whom God presents to him for naming. (Gen 2:18-20) Jesus’ implicit identification

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with the figure of Adam underscores the newness and universality of the salvation which He brings: namely, that it begins a new creation. While the image of the new creation foreshadows Jesus’ ultimate victory over Satan when He rises from the dead as the Breath-baptizer whom John has just foretold, the beasts also have sinister connotations. Desert animals in the Old Testament symbolized the dangerous and destructive forces which dwell in the desert. Here they symbolize Jesus’ conflict with those same demonic forces. (Cf. Lev 16:10; Is 13:21-2, 14: 23, 30:6, 34:11-6; Zeph 2:14) The figure of Jesus surrounded by wild beasts also conjures up the image of Christians thrown to the beasts in the Roman arena during the persecution of Nero. Ministering angels sustain Jesus in His desert conflict. The members of the new Israel which Jesus begins can, therefore, look forward to analogous divine support in their own confrontation with the powers of darkness.1 (Mk 1:12-13; cf. Mk 13:9-11) Mark parallels Jesus’ messianic commissioning with the call of the disciples. In the same way, the evangelist parallels Jesus’ confrontation with Satan in the desert with His first exorcism in the synagogue in Capernaum. The demoniac at Capernaum responds in terror to Jesus’ Breath-filled, authoritative proclamation of the kingdom. As we have seen, the demon not only recognizes Jesus but perceives His ministry, quite correctly, as a systematic assault the whole demonic realm ruled by Satan. (Mk 3:22-7) Jesus implicitly confirms the truth of what the “unclean spirit” has said by silencing it and casting it out with pneumatic authority. Mark dramatizes the violence of the conflict between the Holy Breath in Jesus and the unclean spirit in the demoniac by the violence of the demon’s departure. It leaves, but only after throwing the demoniac into wrenching convulsions.2 (Mk 1:25-6) Mark, moreover, habitually describes possessing demons as “unclean.” (Mk 1:32-34, 39, 5:1-20, 7:24-30, 9:14-29) Demon possession defiles one, renders one ritually impure. It excludes one from the community of the undefiled. Jesus’ exorcisms in Mark, therefore, not only deliver the possessed from Satanic domination but also, by purifying those defiled by demons, re-incorporate them into the communion of the saints.3 Jesus commands demons with personal authority and they obey Him. (Mk 1:27) The demons recognize Jesus spontaneously as the messiah, though humans do not. Both facts imply the divine, transcendent char1. Cf. NJBC, 41:6; Mann, op. cit., pp. 198-204; MWBC, pp. 36-40; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 81-83; Matthew Black, The Temptation and the Passion: The Markan Soteriology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1965); Herbert Haag, “ Der Teufel im Judentum und Christentum” Saeculum, 34(1983), pp. 248-258. 2. Cf. NJBC, 41:9; Mann, op. cit., pp. 210-214; MWBC, I, pp. 53-60; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 89-93. 3. Cf. Peter Pimentel, “The ‘unclean spirits’ of St. Mark’s Gospel,” Expository Times, 99(1987- 1988), pp. 173-175.


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acter of Jesus’ call and mission. Later Jesus Himself will argue that the realm of the demonic remains subject only to the divine and that His exorcisms in the power of God’s Breath therefore make God’s reign present in His person and mission. (Mk 3:22-27) The demonic conflict begun in the synagogue continues that evening when, after the end of the sabbath rest, the people of Capernaum bring to Jesus the sick for healing and the demoniacally possessed for exorcism. Once again, Jesus silences the demons who, like the unclean spirit in the synagogue, all spontaneously recognize His divine authority and messianic identity. (Mk 1:34) The repeated silencing of the demons at the beginning of Jesus’ ministry introduces dramatically the Markan theme of Jesus’ messianic secret, a notion which I shall consider in more detail when I examine thematic linkages in Mark.4 (Mk 1:34) Mark portrays Jesus’ ministry as God’s final eschatological struggle with the demonic realm of Satan and of evil. More than the other synoptic evangelists, Mark places exorcism at the heart of Jesus’ ministry of proclamation. As Jesus begins His ministry in Galilee He travels about preaching in synagogues and casting out demons. (Mk 1:39) In a dramatic and symbolic manner, he expels the demon named “Legion” from the Gerasene demoniac. (Mk 5:1-13) In response to the faith of the Syro-Phoenician woman, Jesus casts a demon out from Her daughter even at a distance. (Mk 7:26, 29-30) That Jesus can exorcise at a distance without even confronting the demon face-to-face dramatizes the easy authority He wields over the realm of Satan. When Jesus calls the Twelve to begin a new Israel, He empowers them to cast out demons as well. (Mk 3:15) That they do so successfully not only dramatizes Jesus’ authority over the realm of Satan but also draws the new Israel into the same demonic conflict as Jesus Himself. (Mk 6:13) The pseudonymous ending to Mark’s gospel makes this same point explicitly. After noting the tradition that Jesus had cast seven demon from Mary of Magdala, the final redactor of Mark portrays the disciples of Jesus continuing His ministry of exorcism after His resurrection.5 (Mk 16:9, 17) The story of the Gerasene demoniac links Jesus’ power to exorcise implicitly and symbolically to His divinity. Moreover, the narrative strategies which Mark uses in order to make this link illustrate well the way in which the evangelist ties his story together through the use of literary allusion. First of all, Mark uses allusion in order to associate the two cosmological miracles of Jesus. In both miracles, Jesus conquers the sea, 4. Cf. NJBC, 41:11; Mann, op. cit., pp. 214-216; MWBC, I, pp. 63-67; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 93-95; B. Kollman, “Jesu Schweigegebote und die Daemonen,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 82(1991), pp. 267-273. 5. As we shall see, both Matthew and Luke will mute by editing Mark’s theme of demonic conflict.

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the Biblical image of primal chaos. Together, as we shall see, these two miracles disclose the divinity of Jesus. Second, Mark uses the image of the sea in order to link the two cosmological miracles to Jesus’ exorcism of the Gerasene demoniac. As these allusively linked events throw light on one another, they reveal the divine source of Jesus’ authority over the kingdom of Satan. In addition, Jesus’ two cosmological miracles, His calming of the storm (Mk 4:35-41) and His walking on the water (Mk 6:45-52), both allude to the central question which Jesus at Caesarea Philippi will put to His disciples and to the reader: “Who do you say that I am?” (Mk 8:29) These same miracles also give the reader important clues for answering Jesus’ question correctly. Let us try to understand Mark’s clues. After Jesus for the first time calms the storm, in this case by a simple command—an act possible only for God—the disciples ask themselves a slight variation of the very question which Jesus will put to them at Caesarea Philippi. The disciples ask one another: “Who is this that even the wind and the sea obey Him?” (Mk 4:41) Mark would have expected His reader to know the answer to the disciples’ question: namely, God only can tame the forces of chaos by the power of His word. (Cf. Gen 1:1-3) That the disciples in the story seem incapable of coming up with the right answer to their own question only exemplifies their obtuseness and lack of faith. That same faith, however, Mark presupposes his reader to have.6 (Cf. Mk 6:51-2, 8:20-21) Moreover, in case the reader did not get the point in the first story of the calming of the storm, Mark reiterates it more explicitly. He does so in his account of Jesus’ walking on the water, which ends with a second victory over chaos. After the first miracle of the loaves, the disciples re-embark on the Sea of Galilee, this time without Jesus. They suddenly find themselves once again engulfed in a storm which threatens to drown them. Then the terrified disciples see Jesus coming to them walking on the water and mistake Him for some kind of apparition. In the Old Testament God walks on the water, but mere humans cannot. (Job 9:8, 38:16) While walking on the water, Jesus intends to “pass by” the disciples. (Mk 6:48) The phrase “pass by” alludes to other Old Testament theophanies. God “passes by” both Moses and Elijah on the mount of the covenant.7 (Ex 33:18-34:6; I King 19:11) 6. Cf. NJBC, 41:34; Mann, op. cit., pp. 273-276; MWBC, I, pp. 259-271; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 141-146; John Paul Heil, Jesus Walking on the Sea (Rome: Biblical Institute, 1981), pp. 119-144; Albert Fuchs, “La Pericopa de la Tempestad Calmada (Mc 4, 35-42 par.) en el Kerigma de la Iglesia Primitiva,” Estudios Biblicos, 48(1990), pp. 351-373. 7. Cf. John P. Meier, A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus (3 vols.; New York, NY: Doubleday, 1994), II, pp. 905-933; NJBC, 41:52; Mann, op. cit., pp. 328-335;


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The very fact that Jesus walks on the water points, then, to the fact that He is God; but, lest the reader have any doubt, Mark has Jesus apply the divine name to Himself. He reassures the disciples by saying: “Courage! I am! (ego eimi) Fear not!” (Mk 6:50) The phrase “I am” applies the divine name to Jesus (Ex 3:14; Deut 32:39; Is 41:4, 43:10) and transforms His walking on the water into a theophany. Mark ends the incident by noting that had the disciples at that time possessed the kind of faith which would have allowed them to grasp the symbolic meaning of the multiplication of the loaves, they would have also grasped simultaneously the significance of this theophany. Both multiplications of the loaves foreshadow the eucharist. In both miracles, Jesus takes bread, blesses it, breaks it, and gives it, as He does in the eucharist. (Mk 6:41, 8:6, 14:22) In Mark, moreover, the eucharist derives its meaning from the paschal mystery which it introduces and contextualizes. In other words, if the disciples had eucharistic faith in the paschal mystery they would recognize the significance of Jesus’ walking on the water and invoking the divine name, because they would acknowledge His divinity.8 The faithless disciples remain, however, for the time being completely bewildered. One is tempted to say “at sea.” Commentators on Mark who find in his gospel only a “low Christology” put themselves in same boat as the obtuse and unbelieving disciples prior to the resurrection.9 The two cosmological miracles, then, assert the divinity of Jesus in narrative form by attributing to Him divine power over the forces of chaos. The deliverance of the Gerasene demoniac then links Jesus’ divine power over the forces of chaos and of evil to His power to exorcise. Guelich, MWBC, I, pp. 328-335; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 200-205; John Paul Heil, Jesus Walking on the Sea (Rome: Biblical Institute Press, 1981), pp. 119-144. 8. Quentin Quesnell has, I believe, put his finger on an important key to Mark’s entire gospel through his analysis of the deep sacramental significance of the events surrounding the two miracles of the loaves. Mark clearly wants these events to disclose to the reader a much deeper significance than at first appears. The network of allusive linkages which Mark weaves around these two miracles of multiplication further suggests that Mark wants the reader to use the miracles of the loaves as a key to understanding how to interpret the gospel as a whole. By that I mean that Mark writes a gospel of event and intends that the reader ponder the deep religious significance which emerges as different events throw light on one another’s deeper sacramental significance. Cf. Quentin Quesnell, The Mind of Mark, Analecta Biblica No. 38 (Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute, 1969). See also: NJBC, 41:45. See also: Norman A. Beek, “Reclaiming a Biblical Text: The Mark 8:14-21 Discussion about Bread in a Boat,”Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 43(1981), pp. 49-56; Elizabeth Struthers Malbon, “Echoes and Foreshadowings in Mark 4-8: Reading and Rereading,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 112(1993), pp. 211-239; Karl Kertelege, “The Epiphany of Jesus in the Gospel (Mark)” in The Interpretation of Mark, pp. 105-125. 9. See, for example, Javier José Marin, The Christology of Mark (Bern: Lang, 1991).

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The Gerasene demoniac comes to Jesus from his home in the tombs, the place of death and the haunt of demons. The fact that people have tried unsuccessfully to control the demoniac, even with chains and fetters, gives eloquent testimony to the power which the demons exert over him, as does the fact that the demons force the demoniac to do violence to himself. (Mk 5:2-5) Jesus’ deliverance of the demoniac expresses therefore His power over life and death which the raising of the daughter of Jairus will soon dramatize even more graphically. (Mk 5:41-42) Mark uses other allusions in order to link the exorcism of the Gerasene demoniac to Jesus’ first exorcism in the synagogue at Capernaum. In both stories, Mark refers to the demon as an unclean spirit. (Mk 5:2, 1:23) Moreover, the Gerasene demon puts to Jesus virtually the same question as the unclean spirit in Capernaum had: “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God?” (Mk 5:6, 1:23) In both incidents Jesus’ power to exorcise evokes terror in the demon and the realization that he is under attack. In response to Jesus’ exorcism, the Gerasene demon cries out: “In God’s name, do not torment me!” (Mk 5:6) The Gerasene demon names Jesus. Very likely the demon does so as a way of trying to exert power over Him. Jesus turns the tables on the demon by forcing it to confess its own name before He casts it out. The demon gives the name “Legion” because more than one inhabits the demoniac. The name “Legion” also has clear political symbolism. The Roman legions spread the empire through conquest. They also “policed,” often with extreme violence and cruelty, the lands they had conquered. The demon’s name, therefore, identifies him with Roman social, political, military, and economic oppression. The drowning of Legion in the Sea of Galilee also assimilates Rome and its legions to Pharaoh and his charioteers, who perished at God’s hand in the Red Sea. (Ex 14:26-31) Legion asks permission to enter a herd of pigs, animals which the Torah banned as unclean. (Lev 11:7) Jesus gives the requested permission. Legion possesses the pigs and drives them into the waters of chaos which Jesus has just calmed with divine power. As a biblical symbol for chaos the waters provide a place as connatural to the demons as the tombs had been. (Mk 5:10-3) That the pigs perish in the waters which Jesus has just calmed with divine authority manifests that His mastery over the powers of chaos includes His power over Satan and his minions. Jesus’ divine authority over the forces of chaos, therefore, grounds His power to exorcise. That same authority will one day triumph over Rome, its legions, and everything which both symbolize.10 When the former demoniac, now delivered and quieted, begs to accompany Jesus, He sends the man instead to tell his own pagan people 10. Cf. Myers, op.cit., pp. 246-248.


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about what Jesus has done for him. Jesus’ reply and the man’s proclamation of Jesus in the Ten Cities foreshadows Jesus’ proclamation to the Gentiles after His resurrection.11 (Mk 5:18-20) The fact that Jesus’ power to exorcise reveals His divine origin highlights the depths of unbelief which the Jerusalem scribes manifest when they accuse Jesus of exorcising in the power of Beelzebul, or of Satan. (Mk 3:20-3) Jesus replies to the slander first of all by a reduction to the absurd: If Satan is casting out Satan, his kingdom is crumbling and his power at an end. (Mk 3:23-4) The response expresses deep irony: even when the Jerusalem scribes slander Jesus, they find themselves nevertheless forced to admit that His power over the demons spells the end of Satan’s reign. Having shown the absurdity of the charge, Jesus then uses a comparison in order to assert the true significance of His exorcisms: namely, that they manifest the superior power of the divine Breath dwelling in Him. She empowers His exorcisms. Only one stronger than Satan can bind Satan, just as only a stronger man can overpower a weaker one. (Mk 3:27) The fact that Jesus has greater power than Satan discloses, therefore, the divine origin of His power to exorcise.12 One finds only two other references to Satan in Mark. In his allegorical application of the parable of the sower to the apostolic Church, Mark identifies the birds which eat up the seed sown by the path with Satan. (Mk 4:4, 15) Satan seeks to pluck out the seed of faith from the heart of those who believe by putting them to the test. This allegorical interpretation of Satan’s activity identifies him not only as the enemy of Jesus but also as the enemy of faith in Him. The allegory also lends added irony to the controversy over Beelzebul, since it suggests that the unbelief of the scribes who charged Jesus with exorcising in the power of Beelzebul stemmed from their having yielded to the very power of evil which they claimed to discover in Jesus.13 Mark’s final reference to Satan occurs when Jesus rebukes Peter for trying to keep Him from walking the way of the cross. Jesus tells Peter: “Out of my sight, Satan! (hupage opispo mou, satana)! For you are intent not on the things of God but of humans.” (Mk 8:33) 11. Cf. Meier, A Marginal Jew, II, pp. 650-653; NJBC, 41:35; Mann, op. cit., pp. 276-281; MWBC, I, pp. 271-278; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 147-151; Thomas Schmeller, “Jesus im Umland Galiläas: zu den markinsichen Berichten am Aufenhalt Jesu in die Gebieten von Tyros, Caesarea Philippi und der Dekapolis,” Biblische Zeitschrift, 38(1994), pp. 44-66. 12. Cf. Heinz Kruse, S.J., “Das Reich Satans,” Biblica, 58(1977), pp. 29-61; NJBC, 41:23; Mann, op. cit., pp. 251-257; Guelich, MWBC, I, pp.166-186; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 121-124. 13. Cf. NJBC, 41:28; Mann, op. cit., pp. 265-269; MWBC, I, pp. 215-225; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 132-135.

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Peter’s opposition to Jesus’ passion illustrates how Satan tests Jesus’ disciples: namely, by teaching them to resist the cross. In opposing the cross Peter transforms himself into an adversary of Jesus and puts Him to the test as Satan had in the desert. Jesus underscores the point by then demanding that every disciple of His must walk the way of the cross behind Him. Failure to do so causes the loss of one’s very self and will transform the faithless disciple into one of whom the Son of Man will be ashamed on the day of final judgment.14 (Mk 8:34-7) Christological Knowing Clearly, for Mark, conflict with Satan and his kingdom assimilates the believing disciple to Jesus. In other words, that conflict constitutes an important dimension of Christological knowing. The Breath-filled disciple confronts Satan in two ways. First, Satan seeks to undermine faith in Jesus. Mark hints, moreover, at the way in which Satan attempts to destroy faith. The demon named “Legion” identifies the realm of Satan with oppressive institutions like the Roman empire. Organized oppression and persecution by the political powers both put the faith-commitment of the disciples to a severe test. Under persecution, however, the divine Breath inspires the disciples’ witness to Jesus. Second, one also confronts Satan in the power of the Breath by sharing in Jesus’ own power to exorcise. The disciples therefore participate in Jesus’ victorious authority over Satan and his minions. Moreover, Jesus’ relationship to Satan defines the context within which one ought to understand all the other negative dramatic linkages in Mark; for whatever opposes Jesus and the kingdom embodies the realm of Satan. This section has reflected on Jesus’ relationship to Satan. The section which follows begins to examine the human forces which oppose the gospel and put Jesus to the test. It focuses on Jesus’ conflict with the scribes and Pharisees. (II) Mark contrasts Jesus’ teaching style with that of the scribes. Jesus speaks with an authority derived from His messianic anointing by the Holy Breath. (Mk 1:22) The scribes, by contrast, argue by appealing to the authority of famous rabbis. Jesus and the Scribes and Pharisees Repeatedly in Mark’s narrative, Jesus relates negatively to the scribes and Pharisees. The conflict goes beyond teaching style. Mark begins Jesus’ public ministry with a series of conflicts between Jesus, on the one hand, 14. Cf. NJBC, 41:57; Mann, op. cit., pp. 342-354; Anderson, op. cit., p. 217.


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and the scribes and Pharisees, on the other. The conflicts contrast legalistic piety and religious hypocrisy, on the one hand, with the moral demands of life in the kingdom which Jesus, on the other hand, proclaims with pneumatic authority. Mark records four sets of conflict stories. Five conflicts with the scribes and Pharisees open Jesus’ Galilean ministry. Subsequently, scribes from Jerusalem accuse Jesus of exorcising in the power of Beelzebul. Two conflicts occur during the bread section of Mark. Four confrontations happen during the way section. Jesus confronts the scribes and Pharisees three times in His Jerusalem ministry. Finally, scribes, members of the Sanhedrin, join the chief priests in mocking the crucified Jesus.15 In the first conflict story, Jesus scandalizes some scribes when He assures a paralytic lowered through the roof by friends that his sins are forgiven. Jesus first reads the scribes’ censorious thoughts and then, as we have seen, proves that “the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins” by curing the paralytic. The crowds glorify God at the miracle. (Mk 2:1-12) The scribes, however, understand well what Jesus has said and done: namely, He has claimed the right to do something which only God can do.16 In the first conflict story, the scribes pass judgment on Jesus but keep their thoughts to themselves. In the second story, the conflict takes overt form. Scribes of the Pharisee party17 object to Jesus’ table fellowship with sinners. Mark’s text leaves one in the dark concerning the exact location of the dinner. The confrontation follows the call of Levi, the tax collector. Some locate the party in Levi’s house; but grammatically it could have happened in Jesus’ house. For a Jew to have welcomed public sinners into his own home would have posed an even greater scandal than dining in a sinner’s home.18 (Mk 2:16) The scribes in question do not themselves attend the banquet; but they observe Jesus eating with tax collectors and sinners and express their surprise to Jesus’ disciples. Jesus overhears and replies: “The healthy have not need for a physician, but the sick do. I have not come to call the righteous (dikaious) but sinners.” (Mk 2:17)

15. Cf. Elizabeth Struthers Malbon, “The Jewish Leaders in the Gospel of Mark: A literary Study of Markan Characterization,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 108(1989), pp. 259-281; Jack Dean Kingsbury, “The Religious Authorities in the Gospel of Mark,” New Testament Studies, 36(1990), pp. 42-65. 16. Cf. NJBC, 41:15; Mann, op. cit., pp. 221-228; Guelich, MWBC, I, pp. 89-96; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 98-102; Richard T. Mead, “The Healing of the Paralytic—A Unit?” Journal of Biblical Literature, 80(1961), pp. 348-354. 17. A Pharisee belonged to a pious fraternity, while a scribe plied a specific trade. Here we find some people who did both. 18. Cf. David M. May, “Mark 2.15: The House of Jesus or Levi,” New Testament Studies, 39(1993), pp. 147-149.

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Jesus’ reply suggests that His table fellowship with sinners flows from the mission given Him by the Father to proclaim a message of repentance and of the nearness of God’s kingdom. (Mk 1:15) As physicians risk contact with physical contagion to bring healing, so Jesus risks contact with the contagion of sin in order to bring about repentance and conversion. Jesus ironically calls the Pharisees “righteous.” Their righteousness, measured by the standard of the kingdom amounts to self-righteous religious snobbery. Jesus will have none of it.19 A third encounter between Jesus and some Pharisees follows immediately. Some Pharisees and some of John’s disciples join forces to confront Jesus over the issue of fasting. Jesus’ disciples do not observe the same optional fast days which both the Pharisees and John’s disciples do. (Mk 2:18) Jesus, as we have seen, replies that they will fast but that they cannot as long as the bridegroom remains among them. The image of the bridegroom, as we have also seen, has both divine and messianic connotations. It also connotes the spousal relationship between Israel and God. In effect, then, Jesus replies that the disciples cannot fast because they are overwhelmed by the joy of encountering in His person both the coming of the messiah and the presence of God’s faithful love for His faithless people. (Mk 2:19-20) Moreover, as we have also seen, Mark appends two parables to this saying which suggest the reason why both John’s disciples and the Pharisees take scandal at Jesus’ disciples joy and at their lack of asceticism. Their judgmentalism flows from their unwillingness to recognize the utter newness of the reality which confronts them in the person of Jesus.20 (Mk 2:21-2) The fourth conflict story concerns the disciples’ violation of the sabbath by picking and shucking corn to eat. The disciples’ act of gleaning produce left in the fields for the poor to take marks them as belonging to the anawim, the vulnerable poor. (Lev 19:9-10) Jesus defends them by citing the precedent of David, who also violated the law in order to feed himself and his hungry men on the loaves of offering reserved for the priests. (Mk 2:23-26; cf. 1 Sam 2:2-7; Lev 24:5-9) Jesus’ first argument refutes the Pharisees’ attempt to impose arbitrary restrictions on the disciples’ behavior. Jesus then asserts: “The sabbath was made for people, not people for the sabbath. Therefore, the Son of Man is Lord even of the sabbath.” (Mk 2:27-8) This second argument appeals to God’s intention in estab19. Cf. NJBC, 41:16; Mann, op. cit., pp. 228-232; MWBC, I, pp. 96-106; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 102-106; Robert L. Mowery, “Pharisees and Scribes, Galilee and Jerusalem,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 80(1988), pp. 266-268. 20. Cf. NJBC, 41: 17; Mann, op. cit., pp. 232-236; MWBC, I, pp. 106-117; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 106-108.


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lishing a day of rest: the rest seeks to benefit and humanize people. Jesus’ claim, however, to have authority over the sabbath would have deeply shocked Jesus’ adversaries, who regarded God as the Lord of the sabbath. Moreover, Mark probably wants the reader to interpret Jesus’ Lordship in the light of the paschal mystery.21 The conflict with the Pharisees reaches its culmination in the fifth and final healing story. Confronted with a man with a withered hand in a synagogue on the sabbath, Jesus tells the man to stand in front of the assembly. He then challenges those present to acknowledge that traditional Torah piety allows one to do good deeds on the sabbath. They refuse intransigently to respond to the challenge. Like the Pharaoh in the exodus, they harden their hearts. (Ex 7:13-14, 8:15, 19, 32, 9: 7, 12, 35) In anger and frustration at their hardness of heart, Jesus tells the man to hold out the withered hand. When he does, he finds his hand restored. Unmoved by the miracle, the Pharisees immediately join with the Herodians to plot Jesus’ death. (Mk 3:1-6) The Herodians appear here for the first time in Mark. Their instant, murderous enmity toward Jesus makes it clear that Jesus and John have the same political adversaries.22 The five initial encounters with the scribes and Pharisees form a literary unit in Mark. The five incidents also throw light on one another. Jesus incarnates Yahweh’s faithful love for his sinful people. That love manifests itself in Jesus’ concern to call sinners to repentance just as it inspires spontaneous joy in anyone who follows Him. As the embodiment of that divine love Jesus confronts the Pharisees as something utterly new. The full scope of the newness which Jesus embodies appears, when as Son of Man he claims authority over both sin and the sabbath. Mark portrays Jesus’ authority in messianic and eschatological terms. Jesus in effect claims an authority proper only to God, the Lord of the sabbath, who alone can forgive sins. In the end the Pharisees find themselves utterly scandalized by Jesus and His claims. As a result, when He cures a man on the sabbath, they immediately begin to conspire with the Herodians, the client Jewish aristocracy, to have Jesus killed. In Mark, then, Jesus’ early conflict with the 21. Cf. NJBC, 41:18; Mann, op. cit., pp. 236-240; MWBC, I, pp. 117-130; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 108-111; Maurice Casey.”Culture and Historicity: The Plucking of the Grain (Mark 2.23-28),” New Testament Studies, 34(1988), pp. 1-23; Damia Roure, Jesus y la Figura de David en Mc 2,23-26 (Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute, 1990). 22. Cf. W.J. Bennett, Jr., “The Herodians in Mark’s Gospel,” Novum Testamentum, 17(1975), pp. 9-14; NJBC, 41:19; Mann, op. cit., pp. 240-243; MWBC, I, pp. 130-141; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 111-114; Stephen H. Smith, “Mark 3:1-6: Form, Redaction, and Community Function,” Biblica, 75(1994), pp. 153-174.

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Pharisees transforms them at the very beginning of His ministry into His mortal enemies.23 As Mark’s story of Jesus unfolds, conflict between Him and the scribes and Pharisees intensifies. Scribes from Jerusalem malign Jesus by suggesting that He casts out devils by the power of Beelzebul. (Mk 3:22) That they come from Jerusalem suggests that they function as agents of the temple priesthood. In refuting their slander, Jesus unmasks the deep reason for the scribes’ hostility: their own lack of faith and resistance to the Holy Breath. Jesus warns the scribes that they can find forgiveness for merely slandering Him, but when they call the manifest work of the divine Breath a work of the devil, they only betray the fact that they have closed their hearts to Her influence in this life and therefore court damnation in the next.24 (Mk 3:28-30) The Pharisees in the Bread Section of Mark The Pharisees appear in the bread section of Mark’s gospel after each miracle of multiplication. Their presence there underscores the incompatibility of Pharisaical and eucharistic piety. After the first miracle of the loaves, the Pharisees consort with the scribes from Jerusalem, spies for the temple priests. They criticize Jesus’ disciples, “people of the land,” for not observing ritual purity in washing before meals. (Mk 7:1-5) The criticism expresses the Pharisees’ desire to extend to all Jews the laws of ritual purity binding on the levitical priesthood, as a symbol that all Jews belong to a priestly people. Jesus defends the disciples for not performing such libations. Citing Isaiah, Jesus accuses the Jerusalem delegation of offering God only lip service and worthless worship because their hearts remain trapped in a stubborn unrepentance which leads them to substitute human traditions for the demands of the Law. In defending His disciples, Jesus also attacks the Pharisees’ purity code which distinguishes between the religiously clean and unclean. (Mk 7:6-7; Is 29:13) In proof of this charge, Jesus condemns the practice of korban as a violation of the commandment: honor your father and mother. The practice sanctioned dedicating property to God as a way of removing any claim to it which aging parents might have. Such heartless treatment of the aged reveals that Jesus’ adversaries have yet to repent and hear the good news of the kingdom. (Mk 7:8-13)

23. Cf. Joanna Dewey, “The Literary Structure of the Controversy Stories in Mark 2:1-3:6” in The Interpretation of Mark, pp. 141-151. 24. Cf. NJBC, 41:23; Mann, op. cit., pp. 251-257; MWBC, I, pp. 166-186; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 121-124.


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After the second miracle of the loaves, some Pharisees challenge Jesus to perform some striking miracle as a way of validating His right to speak and act as He does. The sign they request probably has apocalyptic and triumphalistic connotations. They doubt His ability to comply with their demand and thus hope to discredit Him publicly. Mark uses the incident to underscore the lack of faith which motivates the Pharisees’ malice. In putting Jesus to the test, the Pharisees commit the sin of testing God, i.e. of themselves setting the conditions for religious faith rather than meeting the conditions set by God. Jesus, deeply troubled by their hostility, refuses to perform any sign. He also sees their unbelief as symptomatic of the unbelief of all His contemporaries.25 (Mk 8:11-2) This last confrontation provides the immediate context for Jesus’ warning to the disciples to avoid the leaven of Herod and of the Pharisees if they expect to understand the miracle of the loaves. (Mk 8:15) The warning alludes to all the preceding confrontations between Jesus and the Pharisees. Hence, by the leaven of the Pharisees Jesus means unbelief, superficial legalism, religious hypocrisy, unrepentance, replacing the deep intent of the Torah with mere human customs, self-righteousness, judgmentalism, hostility of heart, and testing God. In contrasting these attitudes with the meaning of the two miracles of the loaves, Mark stigmatizes them as irreconcilable with authentic eucharistic piety.26 The Pharisees Along “the Way” to Jerusalem Mark punctuates the way section of his gospel with four incidents whhich involve Jesus, on the one hand, and the scribes and Pharisees, on the other. 1) On His final journey to Jerusalem, Jesus foresees that the scribes27 will connive with the temple priesthood to put Him to death. (Mk 8:31; 10:33) 2) Later, Jesus sanctions the belief of the scribes and Pharisees that Elijah must return before the resurrection can take place; but He regards the ministry and death of the Baptist as the fulfillment of that expectation and as a foreshadowing of His own death. (Mk 9:9-13) 3) As Jesus draws closer to Jerusalem and to His own death, the scribes take to harassing the disciples. On descending from the mount of the Transfiguration, Jesus finds the disciples in dispute with some scribes over their failure to exorcise the epileptic demoniac boy. As we shall see below, the hostility of the scribes, the unbelief of the boy’s father, and the disciples 25. Cf. NJBC, 41:47, 52; Mann, op. cit., pp. 310-314; MWBC, I, pp. 359-381, 410-425; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 180-186, 198-202; Jeffrey Gibson, “Jesus’ Refusal to Produce a ‘Sign’ (Mk 8.11-13),” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 38(1990), pp. 37-66; Elian Aivillier, “Tradition et redaction en Marc 7:1-23,” Novum Testamentum, 34(1992), pp. 169-192. 26. Cf. NJBC, 41:52; Terence J. Keegan, “The Parable of the Sower and Mark’s Jewish Leaders,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 56(1994), pp. 501-518. 27. Here “scribes” probably means the same as the Sanhedrin.

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reliance on themselves rather than on God—all these things drive Jesus to utter exasperation. (Mk 9:14) 4) Finally, as Jesus approaches Jerusalem, Pharisees approach Jesus in order to put Him to the test. They ask Jesus to choose between a strict and lenient interpretation of Mosaic divorce practices. They apparently anticipate that He will take the lenient position. To their surprise, Jesus repudiates Mosaic divorce practices altogether and justifies His response to by appealing to God’s original intent in creating marriage.28 (Mk 10:1-11) Scribes and Pharisees in the Jerusalem Ministry During Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry, the scribes and Pharisees again figure prominently as His enemies and adversaries. As Jesus had foretold, the scribes and temple priests plot together to have Him killed; but their fear of the crowds, who hang on Jesus’ teachings, keep them at first from acting. (Mk 11:18) After Jesus cleanses the temple, the chief priests, scribes, and elders challenge His authority to act in the way He does. As we have seen, Jesus plays on their fear of the crowds and refuses to respond unless they tell Him by what authority John acted. In the process, He summons them to acknowledge the prophetic character of both John’s and His own ministry. He also challenges them to acknowledge the lack of repentance which has kept them from hearing both John and Himself.29 (Mk 11:27-8) Shortly thereafter, the cabal of Pharisees and Herodians who has been plotting Jesus’ death try and get Him to forbid paying taxes to Caesar. As we have seen elsewhere, Jesus challenges them to place the kingdom before all else by recognizing the image of God in others.30 (Mk 12:13, cf 3:6) Soon after this encounter, Jesus calls into question scribal teaching that the title “Son of David” offers an adequate description of the messiah. Jesus cites Psalm 110, a messianic psalm. Jesus attributes its composition to David and points out that David composed the psalm under the inspiration of the divine Breath, and therefore with divine sanction. Jesus then notes that in verse one of the psalm David refers to the messiah as “Lord.” Jesus therefore concludes that the messiah must be more than just David’s son. (Mk 13:35-7) Jesus is asserting that scribal endorsement of secular Jewish messianic hopes prevents them from recognizing in Him a messiah superior to David and to any messianic pretender who resembles David. The true messiah will surpass David as his “Lord.” (Mk 13:35-37) Mark almost certainly 28. Cf. NJBC, 41:56-58, 62. 29. Cf. NJBC, 41:75; Mann, op. cit., pp. 455-467; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 267-270. 30. Cf. NJBC, 41:77; Mann, op. cit., pp. 468-472; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 274-276; Paul Corby Finney, “The Rabbi and the Coin Portrait (Mark 12:15b,16): Rigorism Manque,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 112(1993), pp. 629-644.


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intended his readers to hear the title “Lord” with faith and to see in it a reference to the “Lordship” of Jesus. In effect, then, the evangelist is asserting that only someone who combines divinity and humanity in his own person can act as messiah. Jesus’ teaching on Davidic messianism highlights another point of disagreement between Jesus and the Jerusalem scribes: they believe in using force to establish the kingdom of God, while Jesus does not. Because they misconceive the messiah’s character and role, they cannot recognize Jesus as the messiah.31 Toward the end of His Jerusalem ministry, Jesus again warns His disciples against scribal religious hypocrisy. He ridicules scribes who take the first seats in synagogues and who covet public praise and the honor of sitting in the first place at feasts. These hypocrites also pray long prayers to God at the same time that they oppress widows and deprive them of their little means of support. (Mk 12:38-9) Jesus is referring to a practice of lawyers who served as the trustees of widows: they regularly claimed part of the estate as payment for their services. In Jesus eyes, they tended to claim more than they deserved. As we shall see, in Mark as in the other synoptics, for Jesus, the willingness to share one’s bread with the poor expresses the kind of authentic faith which membership in the kingdom requires. Instead of compassionating the poor, the scribal lawyers take from them the little they possess. Jesus immediately contrasts the cupidity of the scribal lawyers with the generosity of the poor widow who gives her last cent to pay the temple tax. (Mk 12:41-3) The story of the widow’s mite implicitly castigates burdening the poor with the temple taxes in order to fill the coffers of the rich priestly aristocracy. While admirable in a way for her foolhardy generosity, the woman functions more as an example of oppression than as someone to emulate. Accordingly, Jesus’ prediction of the destruction of the temple follows immediately.32 (Mk 13-14) In his account of Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry, however, Mark makes it clear that not all the scribes regarded Jesus with hostility. When a scribe approves of Jesus’ teaching on the great commandment, Jesus replies that he is not far from entering the kingdom.33 (Mk 12:28-34) The Scribes in the Passion In his passion narrative, Mark refers to members of the Sanhedrin as “scribes.” Scribes accompany the chief priests when the arrest finally occurs (Mk 14:43), and, scribal members of the Sanhedrin fulfill Jesus proph31. Cf. NJBC, 41:80; Mann, op. cit., pp. 482-487; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 283-286. 32. Cf. J. Duncan M. Derrett, “‘Eating up the Houses of Widows’: Jesus’ Comment on Lawyers,” Novum Testamentum, 14(1972), pp. 1-9; Mann, op. cit., pp. 487-498; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 286-287. 33. Cf. NJBC, 41:105.

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ecy that they would kill Him. (Mk 14:53-65) Scribes join the chief priests and other members of the Sanhedrin in handing Jesus over to Pilate. (Mk 15:1) Finally, they stand in mockery with the chief priests at the foot of Jesus cross.34 (Mk 15:31-2) Christological Knowing Mark clearly expects the disciples of Jesus to stand with Him in repudiating scribal and Pharisaical hypocrisy and violence of heart. (Mk 8:15) Like Jesus the disciples must stand for divine forgiveness, for reaching out mercifully to sinners, and for valuing human compassion and human need more than self-righteous legalism. In other words, opposition to Pharisaical legalism, unbelief, and judgmentalism assimilates one to Jesus and contributes in a significant way to Christological knowing. So too does the recognition of everything to which the scribes and Pharisees remain blind. The disciples must recognize that Jesus’ table fellowship with sinners embodies the divine offer of forgiveness. The disciples must confess the radical newness of the kingdom which Jesus proclaims and begins. Finally, the disciples must acknowledge that in Jesus the Holy Breath of God is routing Satan and overthrowing his kingdom. Such faith advances Christological knowing by challenging the disciples to imitate Jesus’ love and forgiveness and to submit to the moral demands of life in the kingdom. In this section I have considered Jesus’ relationship to the scribes and Pharisees. Other human figures in Mark’s gospel also incarnate the forces of anti-Christ. Among them Mark singles out the figure of Herod for special comment, as we shall see in the section which follows. (III) Mark refers to Herod in only three passages. As we have seen, Herod superstitiously mistakes Jesus for John the Baptist risen from the dead (Mk 6:14-6) We have also seen how Herod, through the connivance of Herodias and of her daughter, orders John the Baptizer beheaded. (Mk 6:17-29) Finally, Jesus warns His disciples against the leaven of Herod as well as against the leaven of the Pharisees. (Mk 8:15) Despite the paucity of references, however, Herod plays an important symbolic role in Mark’s Christology.35 Jesus’ defence of the prophetic character of John the Baptizer’s ministry refers, of course, implicitly to Herod, whom John denounced. (Mk 11:27-33) That endorsement sets Jesus in the same kind of prophetic opposition to Herod as John exhibited. More important still, Jesus’ warn34. Cf. NJBC, 41:105; Mann, op. cit., pp. 643-649; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 342-343. 35. Cf. NJBC, 41:52: Mann, op. cit., pp. 293-298; Guelich, MWBC, I, pp. 324-334; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 166-179.


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ing against the “leaven of Herod” transforms that cruel client king into a symbol of attitudes which contradict eucharistic faith. Jesus’ warning against the “leaven of Herod” makes, then, an important statement about the moral demands of discipleship: namely, anyone who exhibits the same vices as Herod remains blind to the eucharistic meaning of the loaves and therefore blind to the paschal mystery which the eucharist interprets and recalls. In other words, the disciples must have no truck with superstition, vacillation, sensuality, vanity, human respect, covetousness, violence, and the unscrupulous use of power to oppress others. While the Pharisees symbolize self-righteous hypocrisy and unbelief, Herod symbolizes religious superstition, unbridled passion, and violence. Christological Knowing Christological knowing requires, then, that one cultivate the virtues which negate Herod’s vices: deep faith, unswerving commitment, self-control, self-forgetfulness, disregard of human judgments, the renunciation of wealth, and the replacement of violent coercion with faithful and mutual service in the image of a crucified messiah. Mark uses the Pharisees and Herod as prime examples of vices which the disciples of Jesus must avoid if they hope to share in the worship of the Christian community. Jesus’ final conflict with the temple priesthood casts them in an analogous role. (IV) In Mark’s gospel, as we have seen, scribal delegates from Jerusalem travel to Galilee in an attempt to discredit Jesus and His ministry. As in the other synoptic gospels, however, face-to-face confrontation between Jesus and the temple priesthood does not happen until His final Jerusalem ministry. Jesus and the Priests Mark refers explicitly to the temple priesthood for the first time in the way section of the gospel. There Jesus twice predicts His death at the hands of the temple priests. In the first prophecy, Jesus predicts that the chief priests and scribes will reject Him. (Mk 8:31) In the second, Jesus makes the chief priests and the scribes the ones chiefly responsible for His death. They will condemn Him to death and then hand Him over to the pagans who will mock Him, spit at Him, and kill Him.36 (Mk 10:33-4) In Mark, the other references to the chief priests, other than Jesus’ allusion to Abiathar who gave the temple bread to David and his men to eat 36. Cf. NJBC, 41:57, 61, 66.

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(Mk 2:26), all occur during Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry and in the passion narrative.37 After Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, He surveys the Temple and returns to Bethany. (Mk 11:11) What Jesus sees there displeases Him, for He returns the next day to drive the vendors from the Temple precincts. As we have also seen, Mark describes the cleansing of the temple as part of a tryptic. In the first panel of the tryptic, he describes Jesus’ cursing of the fig tree on the second day of His Jerusalem ministry. (Mk 11:12-4) In the second panel, he describes the cleansing of the temple on the same day and the decision of the temple priests to kill Jesus. (Mk 11:15-9) In the third panel, Mark describes the withering of the fig tree on the third day of Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry. The third panel also records Jesus’ discourse on the importance of faith-filled prayer. (Mk 11:20-1) By situating the cleansing of the Temple between the cursing and withering of the fig tree, Mark points to the commercialization of temple worship as an example of the kind of spiritual barrenness which will eventually lead to the Temple’s destruction. Jesus, in driving the merchants from the temple, explains to them the reason for His action. They and the priests have used the temple for personal economic gain. (Mk 11:17-8) They get rich at the poor’s expense. (Mk 12:41-44) In explaining His assault on the vendors, Jesus cites both Is 56:7 and Jer 7:11. The latter citation points to Jesus as a prophet in the tradition of Jeremiah who denounced in his own day the hypocrisy of the temple priests. The citation from Isaiah contrasts the Jerusalem temple with the kind of temple which God desires: namely, “a house of prayer for all the nations.” (Mk 11:17; cf. Is 56:7) The Church, which will incorporate the Gentiles into the New Israel, will eventually embody Isaiah’s words.38 (Mk 8:1-10) The cursing and withering of the tree anticipates Jesus’ prophecy of the destruction of Jerusalem and of its temple in His eschatological discourse. (Mk 13:1-2, 14-20) It also suggests why God will visit this fate upon the city of David and its temple: viz., their failure to produce fruit: i.e, repentance and submission to God’s reign.39 37. Cf. NJBC, 41:18; Edwin K. Broadhead, “Christology and Apologetic: The Priestly Portrait of Jesus in the Gospel of Mark,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 47(1992), pp. 21-34; Stephen H. Smith, “The Literary Structure of Mark 11:1-12:40,” Novum Testamentum, 31(1989), pp. 104-124. 38. Cf. Gam Seng Shae, “The Question on the Authority of Jesus,” Novum Testamentum, 16(1974), pp. 1-29; F.M. Braun, O.P., “L’expulsion des vendeurs du temple,” Revue Biblique, 38(1929), pp. 178-200; David Seeley, “Jesus’ Temple Act,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 55(1993), pp. 263-282; Hans Dieter Betz, “Jesus and the Purity of the Temple (Mark 11:15-18): A Comparative Religion Approach,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 116(1997), pp. 455-472. 39. Cf. NJBC, 41:71; Mann, op. cit., pp. 443-454; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 270-273. Jesus’ action in cursing the tree seems out of character in Mark. Jesus here performs a miracle


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After the cleansing of the temple, Mark describes a series of confrontations between Jesus and the Jerusalem priests. The incidents help clarify why the priests want to kill Jesus. All three confrontations intensify Jesus’ opposition to the temple priests and they to him. In the first, Jesus calls them unrepentant hypocrites. In the second confrontation, which follows, he calls the aristocratic priests God’s tenant farmers and the equivalent of traitors to Israel. In the third, Jesus censures clerical skepticism about the resurrection of the dead. The first incident makes it clear why the priests have refused to believe that Jesus has the authority to say and do the things He says and does: namely, the priests have resisted the message of repentance which both Jesus and John proclaimed. (Mk 11:27-33) This hardness of heart sets Jesus and the priests on a collision course.40 In the second confrontation Jesus castigates the priests by telling the parable of the wicked tenant farmers. The parable subjects the quality of the chief priests’ national leadership to scathing attack. In the parable the owner of a vineyard sends wicked servants to care for it. The Old Testament frequently compares Israel to God’s vineyard; but it takes little imagination to understand how the aristocratic, landed temple priests would have reacted to Jesus’ comparing them to slaves or peasants. The parable also makes it clear that those currently wielding religious power in Israel number ultimately among the expendables. God does not need them and can replace them whenever He chooses. In the parable those who tend the vineyard not only refuse to give the owner His due; but they murder the servants sent to them by the owner in order to collect His rent. Finally, the wicked servants conspire to murder the son and in fact succeed in doing so. Greed motivates the murder. The tenant farmers hope to get the son’s inheritance, the vineyard, for themselves. The action sounds irrational; but the tenants seem to hope that killing the young man will cause the father to back off and leave the vineyard in their hands. Mark’s Jesus then predicts, however, that His death will seal the doom of the temple priests. Moreover, God will confirm this prophecy when, at the very moment of Jesus’ death, the veil of the temple splits from top to bottom. In the end, the true Lord of the vineyard will see the wicked tenants killed and will hand the vineyard over to other servants. The which destroys the property of another person. Elsewhere in Mark Jesus acts miraculously only to heal or to save life. Moreover, Jesus acts quite irrationally in cursing the tree for having no fruit, since, as Mark makes quite clear, Jesus came looking for figs on the tree at a time of year when fig trees do not bear. (Mk 11:12-13) The fact that Jesus acts atypically in the story has led some exegetes to suggest that Mark has transformed a parable told by Jesus into a story about Jesus. 40. Cf. NJBC, 41:75; Mann, op. cit., pp. 255-258; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 269-270.

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scribes, priests, and elders recognize that the parable attacks them; but again they fear the people and for the moment do nothing. (Mk 12:1-12)41 By appending Jesus’ prediction of retribution for the priests, Mark, as he has done elsewhere allegorizes the parable. In the parable, God becomes the owner, Israel the vineyard, the prophets the murdered servants, and Jesus the murdered son.42 In the third confrontation, Jesus, the lay, peasant prophet from Galilee, rebukes some Sadducees, who belonged to the priestly aristocracy, for denying the resurrection. As we have seen, in this incident they try to make the resurrection look ridiculous by posing a dilemma for Jesus to solve: namely, if, in virtue of the levirate law (Dt 25: 5-10), the same woman marries seven successive husbands, to which shall she belong when they all rise from the dead? As we have also seen, Jesus traces the Sadducees’ skepticism about the resurrection to their misunderstanding of the Torah and to their fallacious assumption that resurrection means resuscitation rather than transformation in the power of God. (Mk 12:18-27) The Sadducees’ doubts about the resurrection dramatize the shallowness of their religious commitment.43 Judas plays into the high priests’ hands by freely offering to betray Jesus. (Mk 14:10-1) Judas leads the arresting party to Jesus, men armed with swords and clubs and sent by the high priests. One of the disciples draws a sword and severs the ear (Mark actually says earlobe) of the servant of the high priest. If one takes “servant of the high priest” to mean the high priest’s chief assistant, the second in command in the temple hierarchy, then this minor mutilation renders him unfit for further priestly service, a fit retribution for his attack upon the Son of God.44 (Mk 14:43) The Sanhedrin assembles at the house of the high priest for Jesus’ trial. Mark portrays the trial as a travesty of justice: the Sanhedrin does not seek the truth about Jesus but only evidence which will convict Him. The high court even rounds up false witnesses to testify against Jesus.45 41. Cf. Myers, op.cit., pp. 308-312. 42. Cf. John R. Donahue, The Gospel in Parable (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress, 1988), pp. 52-57; NJBC, 41:76; Mann, op. cit., pp. 458-467; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 270-273. 43. Cf. NJBC, 41:78; Mann, op. cit., pp. 472-476; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 276-279; F. Dreyfus, O.P., “L’argument scripturaire de Jésus en faveur de la resurrection des morts (Marc XII, 26-27),” Revue Biblique, 66(1959), pp. 213-224; Jean Le Moyne, O.S.B., Les Sadducéens (Paris: Librairie Lecoffre), pp. 123-127, 129-135. 44. Cf. Benedict T. Viviano, O.P., “The High Priest’s Servant’s Ear: Mark 14:47,” Revue Biblique, 96(1989), pp. 71-80 45. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, I, p. 433; for an analysis of the literary structure of Mark’s account of the paschal mystery, see: John Paul Heil, “The Progressive Narrative Pattern of Mark 14, 53-16, 8,” Biblica, 73(1992), pp. 331-358; Collins, The Beginning of the Gospel, pp. 92-118.


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Two witnesses testify that Jesus said: “I am going to destroy this temple in three days and in three days build another not made by human hands.” (Mk 14:55-8) Mark mentions no other testimony given against Jesus at His trial. In citing this particular testimony, he asserts that Jesus’ criticism of the temple and His prediction of its destruction played an important role in His trial. Mark portrays the passion as effectively putting an end to temple worship. Jesus’ enemies will repeat the charges of the false witnesses as He hangs on the cross. (Mk 15:29) Their mockery recalls Jesus’ prediction of the temple’s destruction; and, immediately after Jesus dies, the Father responds to His dying prayer by rending the temple’s veil.46 (Mk 15:38) Even with the evidence of the two witnesses, however, the Sanhedrin cannot move legally against Jesus because the witnesses in testifying contradict one another. Jesus, for His part refuses to respond to the accusations or answer questions. (Mk 14:60) Mark probably sees in Jesus’ silence a fulfillment of two Old Testament texts: Is 53:7 describes the servant of Yahweh led to his death in silence, like a lamb to the slaughter; and Ps 38:13-5 describes the innocent poor suffering threats and abuse in silence. The high priest, however, could have interpreted such stubborn silence as contempt of court. In the course of Mark’s gospel narrative, the evangelist has recorded several testimonies to Jesus: the Baptizer’s prophecy of the coming mightier one, the Father’s testimony in Jesus’ messianic commissioning and on the mountain of transfiguration, Peter’s confession of Jesus as messiah. Now, in His trial before the Sanhedrin Jesus gives a culminating testimony to Himself. The high priest, at a legal impasse because the witnesses against Jesus contradict one another, forces Jesus to break His silence with a question: “Are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed One?” (Mk 14:61) Mark has already portrayed the Temple priests as skeptical of Jesus’ claims to have a special experience of intimate sonship with God. Mark has also portrayed Jesus as accepting two public gestures which connoted His messianic authority: His anointing on the head by a woman in Bethany and the accolades of the crowds as He entered Jerusalem. The high priest would certainly have known of the triumphal entry. Later in the Jerusalem ministry, Jesus had also expressed publicly reservations about Davidic messianism. Now, the high priest demands that He state clearly His personal pretensions. The high priest does not, however, ask Jesus, “Are you the messiah, the son of David?” but “Are you the messiah, the Son of the Blessed One (God)?” In the final redaction of Mark, the high priest’s question takes us back to the gospel’s first verse: “The beginning of the good news about Jesus 46. Cf. Nikolaus Walter, “Tempelzerstörung und synoptische Apokalypse,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 57(1966), pp. 38-49.

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Christ, the Son of God.” (Mk 1:1) “Christ” means messiah. From the standpoint of Markan Christology, the high priest has asked the right theological question: Is Jesus the messiah because He stands in a privileged relationship to God as His Son? The high priest’s question echoes the central question which Mark’s gospel poses to the reader: viz., the very question which Jesus asks His disciples at midpoint in His career: “Who do your say I am?” (Mk 8:28) We are about to get Jesus’ own reply to the question which He put to His disciples.47 Jesus finds Himself legally trapped: persistent silence leaves Him open to the charge of contempt of court; at the same time He cannot, given the logic of Mark’s narrative, truly deny His baptismal commissioning by the Father. He replies: “I am (ego eimi); and you shall see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of the Power and coming on the clouds of heaven.” (Mk 14:62) The phrase “the Power” substitutes for the name of God. In this culminating scene of Jesus’ trial, Mark has both Jesus and the high priest use typical Jewish euphemisms for the divine name, probably as a literary device for endowing his account with a tone of genuine facticity. Jesus and the priests talk like real Jews. Jesus in His response assumes two positions with respect to God. First, He sits at the “right hand” of the deity. The attitude of sitting alludes to the first verse of the messianic psalm 110. Jesus had cited the same verse in confounding the priests during His Jerusalem ministry when they questioned His authority to do what He did. Here Jesus implicitly claims that God has endowed Him with both messianic authority and power over His enemies. Besides sitting, however, Jesus also positions Himself in a second way with respect to the deity. He promises the high priests that they will see him “coming on the clouds of heaven” as the apocalyptic Son of Man. Jesus will come from his position of authority at the right hand of God and will enforce His authority over His enemies when He passes divine judgment upon them.48 One could interpret the words “I am” simply as Jesus’ confession to being the messianic Son of God, even though Jesus’ open avowal of messianic pretensions here contrasts with His earlier reservations about Davidic messianism. (Cf. Mk 12:35-40) One could also interpret “Son of God” as just a messianic title. As we shall see in greater detail later, however, Mark makes it clear more than once that he desires the reader to use the eyes of faith in order to see into the deeper revelatory significance of the events which the gospel narrates. 47. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, I, pp. 470-472; J. Duncan M. Derrett, “Jesus as Seducer,” Theology Digest, 42(1945), pp. 26-29; Joel Marcus, “Mark 14:61: ‘Are You the Messiah-Son-of-God?” Novum Testamentum, 31(1989), pp. 125-141. 48. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, I, pp. 496-498.


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The words which Jesus speaks to the high priest—”I am”—have in the course of the gospel already acquired important theological connotations. They recall Jesus’ tacit invocation of the divine name in His second calming of the storm, after the first miracle of the loaves. (Mk 6:51) There the words “I am” transformed Jesus’ walking on the waters and His power over the forces of nature into a theophany. On that occasion, the evangelist also made faith in Jesus’ divinity a condition for authentic eucharistic worship. The high priest calls Jesus’ response blasphemy. Claiming to be messiah did not qualify as blasphemy. The high priest is probably referring to Jesus’ claim to enjoy the divine judicial authority of the Son of Man, an authority greater than that of the high priest himself. The high priest rends his garments, points out the blasphemy to the rest of the Sanhedrin, and demands their judgment. They pronounce Jesus guilty and condemn Him to death, as He had predicted they would.49 (Mk 14:63-4) As we have seen, Jesus’ testimony to Himself marks the culmination of a series of prior testimonies to Him by others. John the Baptizer has identified Jesus as the mightier one to follow Him who would baptize in a sanctifying Breath. (Mk 1:7-8) Peter has testified to Jesus as the messiah. (Mk 8:33) The Father has testified to Jesus as His beloved Son who speaks with greater authority than the Law and the prophets. (Mk 9:8) Now Jesus testifies to Himself, to His messianic authority and divine Sonship; and the reader knows that He speaks with a divine authority sanctioned by the Father. Moreover, in confessing His true identity, Jesus warns His enemies that those who judge Him now will one day stand before Him when He returns to pronounce eschatological judgment on the powers of this earth. All of these testimonies, as we have seen, provide in Mark a cumulative answer to the probing question Jesus puts to His disciples: “Who do you say that I am?” (Mk 8:29) The members of the Sanhedrin, however, ignore Jesus’ warning. After condemning Jesus to death, they spit at Him in contempt. They blindfold and beat Him. While abusing Him they challenge Him to prophesy who hit Him. The guards beat Jesus unmercifully. (Mk 14:65) This violent scene makes clear the utter contempt and hatred in which the temple priesthood and the scribes hold Jesus and His response to the high priest’s question. In the light of His response, it seals their malice, unbelief, and guilt in condemning Him. Mark also describes Jesus’ maltreatment with intentional irony. Jesus’ enemies blindfold Him and mock Him as a false prophet. They strike Him and then challenge Him to identify prophetically His assailant. Mark, however, follows this scene with an account of Peter’s denial of Jesus which fulfills in every detail Jesus’ prophecy at the last supper. At the very mo49. Cf. Burkill, New Light on the Earliest Gospel, pp.1-38.

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ment, then, when Jesus’ enemies are rejecting Him as a false prophet, events are proving Him a true one. Ironically, the blindfolded Jesus sees all too clearly, while those who mock Him act out of their own sinful blindness.50 Mark’s account of Jesus’ trial before the Sanhedrin offers the reader a theologized account of that event. Mark is here remembering an historical event: Jesus’ trial and condemnation by the temple priests. As we saw in volume one, that trial may not have taken place before the entire Sanhedrin; but at least some members of the Sanhedrin certainly tried and condemned Him. Mark, however, is remembering Jesus’ trial from the other side of the paschal mystery. Moreover, he is proclaiming in the light of that mystery the deep religious significance of what happened: viz., that humans dared to pass judgment on the Son of God, who would one day return as Son of Man in order to pass judgment upon them. In Mark’s gospel, therefore, the trial of Jesus—especially Jesus’ testimony to Himself— functions dramatically as a culminating revelatory moment. Jesus avows His own divinity and promises His judges that one day the tables will be turned and that He will stand in judgment over the priests.51 After a night of plotting, the high priests decide to hand Jesus over to Pilate. The priests decide what to do with Jesus at a second meeting of the Sanhedrin the following morning. Mark gives no indication why they decided to hand Jesus over to Pilate instead of stoning Him according to Mosaic law. From what Mark has said about the trial, one could infer that they wanted Jesus’ messianic claims completely discredited by having Him crucified. The chief priests make many accusations against Jesus in Pilate’s presence; but He, the suffering servant and innocent poor man, remains silent, to Pilate’s amazement.52 (Mk 15:1-5) The chief priests make their last appearance in Mark’s gospel at the foot of Jesus’ cross where they mock His inability to save Himself. They speak derisively of His messianic claims. They tell Him that they will believe in Him if He will come down from the cross. (Mk 15:34-5) The heartless mockery of a dying man dramatizes the extent of the priests’ hatred for Jesus. In setting conditions for believing in Jesus, the chief priests also “test God” and commit the sin of unbelief. The reader, of course, knows that Jesus will in fact foil His enemies when He rises from the dead (Mk 14:51-2); but one senses instinctively that even so the chief priests will never believe in Him.53 50. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, I, pp. 595-597. 51. Cf. Werner H. Kelber, ed., The Passion in Mark (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress, 1976), pp. 61-94. 52. Cf. NJBC, 41: 101-102; Dunn, op. cit., pp. 606-620; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 324-333. 53. Cf. NJBC, 41:104; Mann, op. cit., pp. 643-655; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 342-344.


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Christological Knowing Clearly, in Mark the temple priests incarnate everything which a religious leader in God’s kingdom needs to avoid. Rich, politically ambitious, ruthless, spiritually barren, religiously skeptical, unrepentant, persistently blind to the divine reality which Jesus incarnates, murderous, covetous, hypocritical, manipulative. Those who advance in Christological knowing must cultivate all those virtues which negate the chief priests’ vices: active compassion for the poor, humility in serving others, justice, resurrection faith, repentance, religious sensitivity to God’s revelatory activity, and fruitful religious practice. The evangelist makes it clear that Christian leaders especially must by contrast incarnate the humble service which Jesus embodies. (Mk 10:41-45) I have considered Jesus’ negative relationship to Satan, to the scribes and Pharisees, to Herod and to the chief priests. Only one negative, dramatic relationship remains. The next section ponders Jesus’ relationship to Pilate and to the Roman empire which he represents. (V) In Mark, Pilate makes his first personal appearance at Jesus’ trial; but we find an indirect reference to the Roman governor in Jesus’ warning to the Twelve that they must never model their leadership of the new Israel on that of pagan rulers, who lord it over others and make their authority felt. Jesus regards such rulers as merely putative wielders of authority (hoi dokountes archein ton ethnon). (Mk 10:41-2) Those, then, who need to exercise brute force in order to rule lack any real authority. One could conceivably hear in this remark an implicit reference to Legion, the demon who tormented the Gerasene demoniac and who symbolizes Roman oppression.54 True authority in the new Israel rests on following Jesus in His way to the cross. True authority derives from self-abasement and from free subjection to all as their slave (doulos). True authority derives from the imitation of Jesus who lays down His own life as His act of ultimate service to God and to His disciples. (Mk 10:43-5) That Jesus’ death expresses obedience to God flows from the fact that Jesus “did not come to be served but to serve and to lay down His life.” (Mk 10: 45) Jesus’ words refer tacitly to His messianic commissioning by the Father as suffering servant. At the same time, He lays down His life for the sake of others, trusting the Father to make it a source of life and salvation for His disciples. (Mk 10:45) 54. Cf. NJBC, 41:67; Dunn, op. cit., pp. 411-420; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 253-258; Gerald Sloyan, Jesus on Trial (Philadelphia, PA: 1973), pp. 36-73.

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Jesus and Pilate Pilate enters Mark’s narrative in person when he tries Jesus. The chief priests, after condemning Jesus to death for blasphemy, plot during the night how best to handle Him. They decide to hand Him over to Pilate and to accuse Him of messianic pretensions, as Pilate’s question to Jesus “Are you the King of the Jews?” indicates. (Mk 15:1-2) In other words, Mark asserts that, having condemned Jesus on religious grounds for blasphemy, the high priests sought to have him executed on political grounds. Jesus responds to Pilate’s question differently from the way in which He responded to the question put Him by the chief priests. To Pilate Jesus answers noncommittally: “You are saying it (su legeis).” Jesus neither affirms nor denies the charge. Instead, He leaves Pilate to decide for himself its truth or falsity. Nor does His answer contain any of the allusive religious symbolism of His answer to the high priest. Jesus also refuses to respond to the allegations pressed by the high priests. His refusal to defend Himself astonishes the governor. Once again Jesus’ silence in Mark portrays Him as the innocent poor man and as the suffering servant who bears silently the slanders and sufferings inflicted by His enemies. Instead of making a clear-cut decision about Jesus, Pilate compromises. He appeals to the crowds to decide between Jesus and Barabbas, an insurrectionist and a murderer.55 (Mk 15:6-10) Did Mark recognize or intend the irony in Barabbas’s name? It means “son of the father.” Given the evangelist’s propensity to find deeper symbolic meaning in the events of Jesus’ life, I suspect that the irony did not escape him. The chief priests incite the crowds to choose Barabbas. When the frustrated Pilate asks them what he should do with Jesus, the crowds cry out “Crucify Him!” (Mk 15:11-3) When Pilate asks for evidence that Jesus has done something deserving of crucifixion, the crowds only cry the louder for His blood. Pilate, to placate the crowds, releases Barabbas and orders Jesus scourged and crucified. (Mk 15:14-15) As Mark tells the narrative, once Pilate realizes that the crowds want Jesus crucified and will not cause a disturbance because of His death, he acquiesces and condemns Jesus to death. Mark’s Pilate acts, then, not out of concern for justice, but for reasons of political expediency. A poten55. Mark, like the other synoptic evangelists, portrays Pilate’s granting of amnesty to a prisoner at the time of Passover as an established custom. (Mk 15:6-8) We find no extra-biblical evidence of such a custom, although an argument from silence does not prove its non-existence. Cf. Mariano Herranz Marco, “Un problema de critica historica en el relato de la Pasion: la liberation de Barrabas,” Estudios Biblicos, 30(1971), pp. 137-160; Alois Bajsic, “Pilatus, Jesus, und Barabbas,” Biblica, 48(1967), pp. 7-28.


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tially violent situation over which he exercises dubious control forces his decision.56 Pilate hands Jesus over to flogging and crucifixion. After soldiers scourge Him, in the presence of the whole company of soldiers, they array him in a purple cloak which derides His messianic pretensions. They crown Him with a sadistically satirical crown of thorns and bow before Him in contemptuous mockery, first calling Him “King of the Jews,” then striking the crown of thorns with a staff and spitting on Him.57 (Mk 15:16-20) When Jesus reaches Golgotha, the soldiers offer Him sweet wine drugged with myrrh in order to diminish the pain of crucifixion; but He refuses and chooses to suffer the full agony of the execution. (Mk 15:22-3) The gesture suggests the totality of Jesus’ self-immolation. Mark indicates that Jesus “rode the cross” for six hours. The soldiers divide His garments among them by casting lots and wait to see what will occur. They affix the charge for which Jesus suffers execution: His messianic claim to be “King of the Jews.” (Mk 15:24-6) Mark portrays Jesus’ death as one of total humiliation and repudiation. Not only do Jesus’ enemies revile Him as He dies, but even the two rebels crucified with Him join in the mockery. (Mk 15:22-32) Halfway through Jesus’ death agony, darkness blankets the whole earth (eph’ holên tên gên) until Jesus finally dies. These darkening clouds have received a variety of interpretations. The darkness could recall Amos 8:9. If so, it symbolizes God’s judgment upon the world and upon Jesus’ murderers for what they have done. The darkness could also call attention to the darkness of the deed.58 (Mk 15:33) At the ninth hour, Jesus cries out in Aramaic, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken Me?” The bystanders mistake the Aramaic word for God (Eloi) for the name of Elijah. They ridicule Jesus for expecting Elijah to come and save Him and in mockery of His messianic pretensions offer Him sour wine to drink. (Mk 15:33-37) As we have seen above, while Jesus’ cry seems to express abandonment by God, Mark’s allusion to Psalm 22 depicts Him clinging to God even in death in the hope of ultimate divine vindication. The citation therefore implicitly foreshadows the resurrection; for in Psalm 22, God hears the poor man’s cry and vindicates Him.59 (Ps 22:22-31) 56. Cf. NJBC, 41:102; Mann, op. cit., pp. 633-643; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 333-339. 57. Cf. NJBC, 41: 104; Mann, op. cit., pp. 641-643; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 338-339. 58. Cf. Rufino Maria Grandez, “Las Tinieblas en la Muerte de Jesús: Historia de la Exegesis de Lc 23, 44-45a (Mt 27, 45; Mc 15,33),” Estudios Biblicos, 47(1989), pp. 117-223. 59. Cf. Miguel Perez Fernandez, “Lectura del Antique Testamento desde el Nuevo Testamento: Estudios sobre las Citas Biblicas Atribudas a Jesús en el Evangelio de Marcos,” Estudios Biblicos, 47(1989), pp. 450-474.

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Jesus dies with a loud outcry which dramatizes the violence of His final confrontation with the forces of evil. (Mk 15:34-7) Instantly, the temple veil splits from top to bottom. (Mk 15:38) Jesus’ prediction of the temple’s destruction had figured prominently in His trial and condemnation by the Sanhedrin. Now, as we have seen, God acts immediately upon Jesus’ death in order to vindicate the truth of Jesus’ prophecy. The rending of the veil abolishes the temple’s privileged sanctity and prepares it for destruction. Moreover, because the outer temple veil depicted the heavens, its rending may recall the apocalyptic rending of the heavens at Jesus’ Baptism when the Father proclaimed Him messianic Son of God in the image of the suffering servant.60 (Mk 1:10) The soldiers have sat waiting for the crucified men to die. The centurion, having observed the manner of Jesus’ death, now confesses Him “God’s Son.” (Mk 15:39) The centurion’s testimony points to the deep meaning of Jesus’ final words on the cross. God will in fact vindicate Jesus when the Gentiles accept the universal salvation which He brings. The centurion’s confession alludes to the Father’s testimony to Jesus in His baptism and transfiguration. It also implicitly recalls Jesus’ victory over “Legion.”61 Pilate makes a final appearance in Mark’s gospel when he consents to the bold request of Joseph of Aramathea for permission to bury Jesus’ body. Pilate consents after he has a centurion verify that Jesus has in fact died. Mark identifies Joseph as a member of the Sanhedrin. He does not describe Joseph as a disciple of Jesus but as a man who hoped for the coming of the kingdom of God. (Mk 15:42-5) Joseph’s hope for the coming of God’s kingdom could in Mark connote only the re-establishment of Jewish political hegemony and the end of Roman rule. Mark gives no reason for Pilate’s acquiescence.62 Christological Knowing In the course of Mark’s narrative, Jesus has referred to His impending death as His second baptism. Clearly, for Mark the Breath-baptized Christian must stand prophetically opposed, as Jesus did not only to the client priesthood and everything which they symbolize but also to Pilate, the 60. Cf. Kenneth E. Bailey, “The Fall of Jerusalem and Mark’s Account of the Cross, “ Expository Times, 102(1990-1991), pp. 102-105; David Ulansey, “The Heavenly Veil Torn: Mark’s Cosmic Inclusio,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 110(1991), pp. 123-125. 61. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, II, pp. 1098-1102; Kelber, ed., op. cit., pp. 115134; NJBC, 41:105-106; Mann, op. cit., pp. 648-650; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 339-349; Juergen Roloff, “Anfange der soteriolgischen Deutung des Todes Jesu (Mk X. 45 und Lk XXII.27),” New Testament Studies, 19(1972-1973), pp. 38-64; Bernadette Escaffe, “La mort de Jésus et la venue du royaume dans l’Évangile de Marc,” Estudios Biblicos, 52(1994), pp. 329-339. 62. Cf. NJBC, 41:106; Mann, op. cit., pp. 655-658; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 349-351.


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type of the oppressive Gentile ruler. Jesus’ death at the hands of Rome therefore reveals the Roman empire and similar oppressive human institutions as anti-Christ. Mark’s Jesus in His crucifixion also models for Christians the faith and trust in God with which they too must approach death. Mark does not minimize the cruelty of Jesus’ executioners or the suffering which Jesus endured. Jesus’ final cry dramatizes the bitterness of His final conflict with the powers of Satan. Like Jesus’ prayer in the garden, Jesus’ final prayer exemplifies the prayer of the innocent poor and provides the paradigm for all those who die with faith in the Father’s power to raise from the dead. Finally, Pilate, like the chief priests, incarnates vices which Christian leaders especially must avoid: moral vacillation, moral compromise, the violent and oppressive use of power, injustice. I have considered both the positive and negative dramatic linkages which tie together Mark’s story of Jesus. I have also pondered the light which they throw on the person of Jesus and on the practical demands of Christological knowing. The chapter which follows reflects on the all important ambiguous dramatic linkages in Mark.

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Chapter 4 Ambiguous Dramatic Linkages in Mark As the story of Jesus unfolds, two constituencies stand in a morally ambivalent relationship toward Him during His ministry: the crowds and His own disciples. Jesus always relates positively to both groups; but they respond ambiguously to Him. The evangelist endows the second relationship with the greatest dramatic importance. Indeed, insuring the correct resolution of the disciples’ ambivalence toward Jesus provides his gospel with its fundamental challenge. This chapter divides into two parts. Part one examines the crowds’ relationship to Jesus. Part two analyses how Jesus’ disciples relate to Him. (I) Mark describes crowds of people flocking to Jesus. He always welcomes them, teaches them, heals them, and exorcises them. They respond to Him initially with enthusiasm but ultimately with misunderstanding, unbelief, and finally rejection. For that reason their relationship to Him qualifies as ambiguous. In this section I shall first consider Jesus’ relationship to the crowds in Galilee. Then I shall examine His relationship to the Judean crowds. The Crowds in Galilee The cure of the leper in the first chapter of Mark begins Jesus’ popularity with the Galilean crowds. Mark tells the story of the cure of the leper in a way which makes it a prognosis of Jesus’ entire ministry. Leprosy in first century Israel applied to a variety of contagious skin diseases. Lepers lived lives of total ostracism. The Law banned them from social contact with other persons until they found a cure for the disease. To identify themselves they had to wear rags and leave their hair disheveled. They also had to warn anyone approaching them to stay clear lest they catch the dread disease. (Lev 13: 1-14:57) In other words, leprosy in first century Palestine excommunicated one from the rest of the human community and made one socially expendable. Jesus’ cure of the leper counts, therefore, in Mark not just as a miracle of healing but also and especially as a miracle of inclusion. In healing the man Jesus restores to him his humanity and transforms him once again into a functioning member of society. Mark’s leper leaves the deserted places in which He has lived, breaks the ban imposed by the Law, and actually approaches Jesus, throwing himself to his knees in front of Him. The leper comes in faith and says:

Chapter 4: Ambiguous Dramatic Linkages in Mark

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“If You will, You can make me clean.” (Mk 1:40) Jesus deeply moved by the man stretches out His hand and Himself breaks the taboo against lepers by touching the man and saying, “I do will [it]; be cleansed.” (Mk 1:41) The touch should have defiled Jesus. Instead, it heals the leper. That compassionate act of healing simultaneously restores the man to health and to social communion with others.1 The actual cure of the leper does not, however, bring Mark’s story to its narrative climax. Rather the story climaxes when Jesus and the leper trade places. At the beginning of the story Jesus, an insider in the sense that He does not lie under the leper’s ban, confronts the leper, a total outsider. With the cure Jesus and the leper begin to change places. Jesus orders the leper to have a priest verify the cure and make the offering prescribed by the Law; but He warns the cured man sternly not to tell anyone how he came to experience a cure. The warning develops the theme of Jesus’ “messianic secret,” whose significance I shall consider in the next chapter. Here, however, it suffices to note that the leper disobeys Jesus and spreads the story of his cure everywhere. As a result, Jesus, in order to avoid the throngs who flock to Him, finds Himself forced to live where the leper formerly lived, in desert places outside the city. (Mk 1:41-3) In other words, Jesus’ act of healing and compassionate concern to break down the barriers which separated the leper from the rest of humanity transform Jesus Himself from an insider into an outsider.2 In Mark, then, the cure of the leper foreshadows Jesus’ entire ministry, which the evangelist describes as His growing marginalization, as His inexorable transformation into a complete outsider. Jesus’ conflicts with the scribes and Pharisees, which follow immediately on the cure of the leper, begin His marginalization and motivate the first plots against His life. (Mk 2:1-3:6) Very quickly, Jesus’ relatives repudiate Him as madman. (Mk 3:20-1) The crowds hear Jesus proclaim the kingdom in parables but fail to receive the message in faith. (Mk 4:10-12;33-4) Jesus’ rejection by the citizens of Nazareth foreshadows His ultimate rejection in Jerusalem. (Mk 6:1-6) The disciples show greater and greater obtuseness until finally they scarcely differ from the unbelieving crowds. (Mk 8:17) Finally, Jesus begins His final journey to Jerusalem, where He experiences ultimate margenalization and crucifixion outside the city walls on Golgotha. (Mk 15:21-2) 1. Cf. Michael Wojciechowski, “The Touching of the Leper (Mark 1, 40-45) as an Historical and Symbolic Act of Jesus,” Biblische Zeitschrift, 33(1989), pp.114-119; Carl R. Kazmierski, “Evangelist and Leper: A Socio-Cultural Study of Mark 1.40-45,” New Testament Studies, 38(1992), pp. 37-50. 2. Cf. Edwin K. Broadhead, “Mk 1.44: The Witness of the Leper,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 83(1992), pp. 257-265.

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Mark, however, gives the story of the cure of the leper a final ironic twist. Despite Jesus’ margenalization, the crowds still keep coming to Him. In other words, Jesus the outsider will, despite His margenalization, continue to draw crowds to Himself as the gospel spreads. Jesus, the outsider, actually re-defines what both “outside” and “inside” mean. The crowds who flock to Jesus in the desert foreshadow, then, the multitudes who will one day believe in Jesus, the crucified “outsider” whom resurrection will transform into the only real “insider.” This interpretation of Mark’s account of the cure of the leper gains plausibility in the light of the concern with boundaries which characterizes the first gospel. Jesus’ unbelieving relatives, for example, confront Him as “outsiders,” while Jesus embraces as His true family the disciples “inside” the house where He teaches. (Mk 3:31-35) Similarly, Jesus regards the unbelieving crowds as “outsiders,” but He reveals the secrets of the kingdom to the disciples who gather “around Him” as “insiders.” (Mk 4:10-11) As we have seen, Jesus’ repeated deliverance of the possessed from “unclean” demons transforms them from tainted “outsiders” into “insiders,” re-welcomed to the bosom of society and of their religious community. In the cure of the paralytic, the sick man’s friends must contrive to get him from the outside to the inside of the house where Jesus teaches before Jesus can forgive and heal him. The disciples err when they regard the man exorcising in Jesus name as an “outsider” and therefore forbid him such activity in the future. (Mk 9:38-41) The disciples own lack of faith transforms them temporarily into “outsiders,” scarcely distinguishable from the unbelieving crowds. (Mk 8:17-21, 4:10-13) Exegetes find other less obvious allusions to insiders and outsiders scattered throughout Mark’s gospel, allusions also foreshadowed by the cure of the leper. Suffice it here to say that Mark’s concern with boundaries reflects the margenalization of the Roman community through persecution. The evangelist summons that community to identify with Jesus, the ultimate outsider, in both His martyrdom and margenalization. At the same time, Mark challenges the persecuted Roman church to recognize that Jesus redefines the meaning of both “inside” and “outside.” Only those who identify with the ultimate “outsider” count in the end as “insiders.”3 Mark states that the crowds who followed Jesus in His Galilean ministry came not only from Galilee but from Judea and from the city of Jerusalem itself, from across the Jordan, and even from Tyre and Sidon. Presumably the people who came from these pagan cities were primarily Jews; but, given Mark’s propensity to seek deeper meaning in the events he narrates, one could 3. Cf. W. Ernest Moore, “‘Outside’ and ‘Inside’: A Markan Motif,” Expository Times, 98(1986- 1987), pp. 39-43; ‘Inside’ and ‘Outside’: Paul and Mark,” Expository Times, 103(1991-1992), pp. 331-336; S.H. Smith, “‘Inside’ and ‘Outside’ in Mark’s Gospel: A Response,” Expository Times, 102(1990-1991), pp. 363-367; NJBC, 41:73; Mann, op. cit., pp. 218-220; MWBC, I, pp. 71-79; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 96-98.


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see here another possible foreshadowing of the flocking of the Gentiles to the gospel after Jesus rises and baptizes with a sanctifying Breath. Mark dramatizes the size of the crowds who swarm to Jesus by noting that He must teach them from a boat in order to avoid being crushed by them.4 (Mk 3:10) The crowds all but overwhelm Jesus because they want Him to heal their diseases and deliver them from demon possession (Mk 3:10-2); but they fail finally to understand His teaching. Indeed, Mark portrays Jesus as deliberately hiding the meaning of His message from the crowds by concealing it in parables whose true meaning He explains only to His disciples.5 (Mk 4:10-2, 33-4) Initially, then, Mark draws a sharp contrast between the crowds in Galilee and the disciples. In describing the crowds’ relationship to Jesus, Mark portrays the crowds as the outsiders, the disciples as the insiders, as people with a special, intimate, enlightening relation to Jesus. As Jesus becomes more and more margenalized from His own disciples, however, Mark makes it clear that this intimate, enlightening relationship will apply to the disciples fully only after Jesus rises and baptizes them with a sanctifying Breath. Jesus Himself, of course, did not seek to hide His message from those to whom He preached. The notion that He did boils down, then, to a Markan theological interpretation of Jesus’ use of parables. As we have seen, parables seek to subvert the ordinary world in which people live and open them to new possibilities. Jesus’ parables sought to open people to the novel possibilities inherent in the reign of God. One may, however, discern a kernel of historical fact in Mark’s allegation that the parables concealed the message of the kingdom from the crowds: Jesus may have preferred the indirect and allusive form of parabolic discourse to direct statement as a way of concealing from His enemies the revolutionary chracter of the claims He was making.6 4. In point of fact sound carries extremely well on the Sea of Galilee, which abounds in small inlets where Jesus could have effectively taught while sitting on the water in a boat. In the course of his narrative, Mark uses the crowds for a variety of narrative purposes. The crowds, for example, who flock to Jesus cause His alienation from His relatives. When Jesus’ relatives see the size of the crowd and that the pressure they put on Jesus gives Him scarcely time to eat, the relatives decide that He has lost His mind. (Mk 3:20-1) Jesus, however, uses the crowd to rebuke His relatives, calling them His true brothers and sisters, since their desire to listen to Him manifests a deeper desire to do the Father’s will. (Mk 4:31-5) The crowds pressing around Jesus in the cure of the woman with a flux of blood function as a narrative prop within the story. The crowd makes the disciples misunderstand Jesus’ question, “Who touched me?” The disciples fail to realize that Jesus felt power go from Him and knew that He had healed someone in the great press of people. (Mk 5:21, 30-2) 5. Cf. NJBC, 41:21; Edward F. Siegman, C.PP.S., “Teaching in Parables (Mk 4, 10-12; Lk 8, 9-10; Mt 13, 10-15),” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 23(1961), pp. 161-181. 6. Cf. NJBC, 41:27; Mann, op. cit., pp. 262-265; MWBC, I, pp. 198-215; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 130-132; Edward F. Siegman, C.PP.S., “Teaching in Parables (Mk 4, 10-12; Lk 8, 9-10; Mt 13, 10-15,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 23(1961), pp. 161-181.

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The crowds function symbolically in the two miracles of the loaves. In Mark’s account of the first miracle, which takes place on Jewish soil, despite the fact that both Jesus and the disciples need a break from their pastoral work, when the crowds frustrate their attempt and beat them to the place they were headed for a rest, Jesus reacts not in frustration and anger, but with the compassion of a good shepherd. He teaches them at great length. (Mk 6:30-5) The confusion of the leaderless Jewish crowds and their apparent willingness to have Him lead them both motivate Jesus’ compassion. Moreover, as recipients of the multiplied loaves and fishes which symbolize the eucharist, the crowds foreshadow those Jewish Christians who will one day believe in Jesus and share His body and blood in faith. The second multiplication of the loaves in Gentile territory foreshadows the fact that the multitudes who will eventually come to believe in Jesus will include Gentiles as well as Jews. (Mk 8:1-10) In the same way, the faith of the Syro-Phoenician woman and that of the centurion beneath the cross also foreshadow the faith which Gentiles will one day place in Jesus. (Mk 8:31-7, 15:39) Moreover, while Jesus compassionates the Jewish crowds because their leaders have betrayed them, He compassionates the Gentile crowds because their desire to hear His teaching exceeds even their desire for food. (Mk 8:1-3) After the first miracle of the loaves and after Jesus has walked on the water, invoked the divine name, and calmed the storm, the people once more flock to Him, and He cures anyone who touches Him. The incident, composed by Mark as a literary transition in his narrative, calls the reader to faith in Jesus’ universal healing power.7 (Mk 6:53-6) The Galilean crowds also function dramatically in the cure of the epileptic demoniac. They have been watching the disciples’ futile attempts to exorcise the possessed boy. After Jesus descends from the mount of transfiguration, the crowds run to Him filled with amazement, apparently at His unexpected appearance. Mark suggests that they press upon Jesus more out of curiosity than out of faith, because Jesus’ takes the lack of faith He finds in both the father of the boy and in His disciples as symptomatic of the lack of faith of the entire “generation” in which He lives. Moreover, the crowd expresses neither wonder nor admiration when Jesus heals the boy. Indeed, Jesus cuts short His dialogue with the father of the boy and cures the lad apparently as a way of dispersing the crowd of curiosity seekers.8 (Mk 9:14, 19, 25)

7. Cf. NJBC, 41:44-51. 8. Cf. NJBC, 41: 59; Mann, op. cit., pp. 368-371; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 229-232.


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The Crowds in Judea On Jesus’ final journey to Jerusalem, the people of Judea crowd around Him to hear His teaching. (Mk 11:1) The Judean crowds welcome Jesus joyfully as the messiah, as the one who comes in the name of the Lord and who is about to re-establish the kingdom of David. (Mk 11:8-10) The fact, however, that Jesus will later in His Jerusalem ministry distance Himself from Davidic messianism suggests that the welcoming crowds in Jerusalem misunderstood the true meaning of Jesus’ messianic commissioning. (Mk 12:35-7) Nevertheless, the crowds in Jerusalem hang on Jesus’ words; and His popularity with them shields Him temporarily from the malice of the temple priests and scribes. (Mk 11:18-9, 32, 14:1-2) After Jesus’ arrest, however, the crowds in Jerusalem turn against Him. Incited by the plotting temple priests, they call for Pilate to release Barabbas instead of Jesus and demand Jesus’ crucifixion. Mark portrays Pilate as reluctantly yielding to pressure from the blood-thirsty crowds as he orders Jesus scourged and crucified. (Mk 15:11-15) Given, finally, a chance to choose between God’s real Son and a false “son of the father (Barabbas),” the crowds choose the false son. Instead of choosing Jesus’ non-violent way; they choose the way of Barabbas, the way of violence.9 Christological Knowing Jesus always responds with compassion to the crowds in Galilee despite their obtuseness and unbelief. He heals all who come to Him for healing. He labors tirelessly and selflessly for them, both teaching and healing them, even to the point of neglecting His own need for food and for rest. He pities their confusion and seeks to pastor them like a good shepherd. He will one day relate to the crowds as their eucharistic Lord. Clearly, the disciples who relate to “the crowds” as Jesus did will look upon the masses of humanity with compassion and with a desire to incorporate them through faith into the family of God. Their confusion and hunger for the gospel should motivate active pastoral concern to draw others into a eucharistic community of faith by revealing to them the full truth about Jesus. As we shall see in the next section, however, far from standing in judgment on the unbelief of the masses, disciples of Jesus need to face their own religious obtuseness and lack of faith. (II) Mark, as we have seen, begins his account of Jesus’ public ministry with the summary statement that He went about Galilee preaching, “The time is fulfilled. The kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good 9. Cf. Myers, op.cit., pp. 380-382.

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news.” (Mk 1:14-5) Jesus, however, does not begin His preaching tour of Galilee until Mk 1:39. Instead, He begins His ministry by calling four disciples: Peter, Andrew, James, and John. (Mk 1:16-20) Of the four Peter, James, and John will enjoy a privileged relationship to Jesus. Mark indicates that He gave them (probably ironic) nicknames. (Mk 3:17) Moreover, their presence at the cure of Peter’s mother-in-law (Mk 1:26-31), at the raising of the daughter of Jairus (Mk 5:37), on the mount of the transfiguration (Mk 9:2), at the beginning of the eschatological discourse (Mk 13:3-4), and in Gethsemane (Mk 14:33) tie all these events allusively to one another. As we shall see, in Mark such allusive links indicate that the events in question all throw light on one another. Jesus and His Disciples It seems unlikely that the first disciples would have followed Jesus without any prior knowledge of Him; but Mark tells the story of their call in a way which suggests that it happened in just that way. Jesus walks up to Peter and Andrew as they are fishing and says to them: “Follow me and I will make you fishers of men.” (Mk 1:16-18) Jesus confronts James and John with the same abruptness, and they follow immediately leaving behind not only their possessions but their father Zebedee. (Mk 1:19-20) The story lacks verisimilitude; but Mark is making several theological points. Jesus, unlike other rabbis, called at least some of His disciples to follow Him; and we can, as we saw in the first volume, almost certainly ascribe this trait to the historical Jesus. The call has a prophetic character to it (Cf. Mk 2:13-4), because it flows from Jesus’ own sense of mission. Jesus’ mission, moreover, derives from His baptismal commissioning. The call, then, draws the disciples into Jesus’ baptismal sense of mission: if they follow Him, they will fish for people, not for fish. In other words, Mark parallels the call of the disciples with Jesus’ messianic commissioning just as he parallels the exorcism at Capernaum with Jesus’ desert confrontation with Satan. Mark also tells the story of the disciples’ call in a way which makes clear the peremptory character of a Christian vocation. Those who hear Jesus’ call must respond instantly (euthus) and with a finality which demands the abandonment of both possessions and family, if necessary. The disciples respond with initial generosity. The story narrates their finest hour in Mark’s gospel.10 10. Cf. NJBC, 41:8; Mann, op. cit., pp. 208-214; MWBC, I, pp. 48-53; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 86-88; Juan J. Bartolomé, “El Discipulado de Jesús en Markos: Motivo y Methodologia de un Modelo Evangelico de Vida Cristiana,” Estudios Biblicos, 51(1993), pp. 510-530; Robert Tannehill, “The Disciples in Mark: The Function of a Narrative Role” in The Interpretation of Mark, pp. 169-195.


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The disciples would seem to accompany Jesus as He exorcises the demoniac in the synagogue at Capernaum; for, after the synagogue service, Jesus accompanies Peter to the disciple’s house. The presence of the disciples at this first exorcism has symbolic meaning; for, as we have seen, Jesus will also draw them into His combat against Satan and against his demonic minions. (Mk 3:14) Initially, however, they learn about discipleship by watching Jesus exorcise. Peter welcomes Jesus to his home, where his mother-in-law lies ill. Jesus heals her [literally: “raises her up (egeiren autên)”]; and she begins to wait upon them. (Mk 1:29-32) Mark intends the healing to have symbolic meaning; for the raising up of the woman connotes her participation in Jesus’ own experience of being raised up, or resurrected. Moreover, her subsequent service of Jesus and His disciples foreshadows the transforming effects of participation in Jesus’ risen life: viz., the freedom to serve both Jesus and other persons in His image. As we shall see, Mark frequently uses miracle stories in order to foreshadow the transformation which the paschal mystery will effect in the otherwise obtuse disciples. Mark portrays this first day of Jesus’ ministry as the gradual spread of the gospel. It begins with the disciples, then extends itself to the people in the synagogue. That evening the authority of Jesus’ teaching and especially His power to exorcise and to heal draw the townsfolk to Peter’s house, where Jesus accedes to their needs. The next morning, Jesus rises early to pray. When the disciples find Him praying alone, He announces that they must carry the good news beyond Capernaum to all the synagogues of Galilee. Jesus sets off on His first tour of preaching and exorcism. (Mk 1:16-39) Initially, the disciples accompany Jesus; later He will also send them to preach as He does.11 (Mk 3:14) As we have seen, Jesus’ preaching immediately involves Him in conflict; and three of the conflict stories involve the disciples. Jesus calls Levi, the tax collector to follow Him like the other disciples. The call has the same prophetic character as the call of the first four disciples, and Levi responds with the same totality and selflessness as the other disciples had. (Mk 2:13-4) Jesus and the other disciples share a dinner with Levi and with other tax collectors and sinners either at Levi’s or Jesus’ house. The event immediately involves both Him and the disciples in a controversy with the 11. Cf. NJBC, 41:9-10; Mann, op. cit., MWBC, I, pp. 53-60; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 88-93; Thomas Schmeller, “Jesus im Umland Galiläas: Zu den markinischen Berichten vom Aufenthalt Jesu in den Gebieten von Tyros, Caesares Philippi, und der Dekapolis,” Biblische Zeitschrift, 38(1994), pp. 44-66; Jozef Verheyden, “Mark 1, 23-25 and 6, 53-56,” Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 64(1988), pp. 413-428; John Granger Cook, “In Defense of Ambiguity: Is There a Hidden Demon in Mark 1.29-31?” New Testament Studies, 43(1997), pp. 184-208.

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Pharisees, who complain to the disciples that Jesus should not eat with tax-collectors and sinners. (Mk 2:15-7) Jesus certainly practiced table fellowship with sinners. Here, as we have seen, He justifies His action by appealing to His mission and to the message He has been sent to proclaim, one of repentance and conversion. (Mk 2:15-7) The two conflict stories which follow the call and banquet of Levi also focus on the disciples. Jesus defends His disciples for not observing the same optional fasts as do both the disciples of John and the Pharisees. Jesus responds that people at a wedding do not fast in the presence of the bridegroom. (Mk 2:18-9) As we have seen, the image of the bridegroom has both divine and messianic connotations. (Cf. Jn 3:29; 2 Cor 11:2; Eph 5:32; Rev 19:7, 21:2; Hos 2:19, Is 54:4-8, 62: 4-5; Ezek 16:7-63) Jesus adds, however, that His disciples will fast when the bridegroom is taken away from them. (Mk 2:20) The prediction, as we have also seen, alludes to Jesus’ passion. The following of Jesus not only draws the disciples into the same conflicts as He faced, but it also sets their feet on the path which leads to Calvary. And, indeed, these five conflict stories end with the Pharisees beginning to plot Jesus’ death with the Herodians. (Mk 3:6) The fourth conflict story also involves the disciples, who scandalize the Pharisees by gleaning corn on the sabbath. Jesus justifies them by appealing to the example of David, who, with the consent of the priest Abiathar, assuaged his own hunger and that of his men by eating the altar breads which only the priests where allowed to eat. (Mk 3:23-8) As we have seen, Jesus concludes by enunciating the principle: “The sabbath was made for humans, not humans for the sabbath.” (Mk 3:27) This radical saying subordinates even the sacred sabbath rest to human needs and would surely have scandalized Jesus’ contemporaries. Jesus concludes: “Therefore, the Son of Man is Lord (kyrios) even of the sabbath.” (Mk 3:28) The phrase “Son of Man” at one level functions as the equivalent of “I.” Its linkage, however, to the suggestive term “Lord (kyrios)” gives it deeper eschatological and theological connotations. The title points to Jesus’ identity as the eschatological Son of Man who possesses divine authority over Jewish religious practices.12 A summary description of Jesus’ early popularity and success in Galilee follows. The crowds press upon Him in such numbers that He has the disciples keep a boat ready in which He can escape the crush if need be. (Mk 3:7-9) This incident sets the stage for the call of the Twelve, an event which fulfills Jesus’ promise to Peter and Andrew that He would transform them into fishers of men. The size of the crowds dramatizes Jesus’ need for help in His ministry. (Mk 3:33-9) It also foreshadows the first 12. Cf. NJBC, 41:17; Mann, op. cit., pp. 228-240; MWBC, I, pp. 96-130; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 102-111.


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formal discourse which Jesus gives in Mark’s gospel: His sermon on the lake. (Mk 4:1 ff.) The call of the Twelve begins to clarify what the phrase “fishers of men” means. The Twelve will share Jesus’ intimate companionship and His ministry. Mark suggests the intimacy of their relationship by noting that Jesus had, as we have seen, probably given ironic nicknames to some of the Twelve: He called the unpredictable Peter “the Rock” and James and John “sons of thunder.” The Twelve as a group will later participate in Jesus’ own proclamation of the kingdom and in His power over demons. (Mk 6:7-13) The number Twelve has clear symbolic significance: Jesus has been anointed in His baptism to begin a new Israel. He now summons the Twelve to function as the pillars on which He will construct that Israel. The inclusion of Judas’s name in the list of the Twelve as well as the Christian community’s concern to replace Judas after his betrayal of Jesus and after his own death, an incident narrated only by Luke, indicates that the disciples grasped well the meaning of the symbolism. (Mk 13:13-19; Acts 1:13) By calling the Twelve, Jesus, moreover, gave rudimentary institutional structure to the movement He headed.13 Teaching about Discipleship In Mark, Jesus’ inaugural sermon occurs, not on a mountain, but on a lake. The sermon on the lake gathers together several parables of the kingdom. In the middle of the discourse, Jesus explains the meaning of the first parable privately to the disciples. The switch from the lake to a private tête-a-tête between Jesus and the disciples lacks any realistic verisimilitude; but Mark makes the switch anyway so that he can apply the first parable (the story of the astonishing harvest) allegorically to the apostolic Church. Mark also makes it clear that all the parables of the kingdom should disclose to the disciples its secret meaning. The disciples, therefore, here number among the insiders who hear Jesus in faith, not among the outsiders (ekenois de tois exo), who hear Jesus’ parables without grasping them.14 (Mk 4:21-5; 10-2) The first parable tells of the astonishing harvest which the kingdom will bring about. The parable begins by describing a familiar experience of peasant farmers: namely, some of the seeds they scatter produce no fruit. The birds eat some. Other seeds land on barren soil. Other get stifled by weeds. Then comes the astonishing end of the parable. Despite the loss of some seed, Jesus’ proclamation of the kingdom will reap a 13. Cf. NJBC, 41:22; Mann, op. cit., pp. 246-251; MWBC, I, pp. 155-166; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 115-119. 14. Cf. Michael D. Goulder, “Those Outside (Mk 4:10-12),” Novum Testamentum, 33(1991), pp. 289-302.

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harvest of thirty, sixty, and even a hundred fold. (Mk 4:3-9) In drought-ridden Palestine, one did well even to double the yield of a crop. A yield as enormous as Jesus describes would have boggled the minds of His peasant audience. On Jesus’ lips, then, this parable originally had an apologetic meaning; Jesus was defending the final triumph of the kingdom, despite its humble and apparently ineffectual beginnings. Mark, however, in Jesus’ private explanation of the parable to the disciples transforms it into an allegory about discipleship.15 Mark’s allegorical elaboration of the first parable expresses, then, the evangelist’s own vision of discipleship rather than the parable’s original meaning. Mark’s allegory instructs the disciples about how to relate to the word of God, which the seeds sown by the sower symbolize. First, the disciples should remain on guard against Satan, who seeks, if possible, to destroy their allegiance to the words of Jesus and to His proclamation of the kingdom. If they hope to persevere in faith, they must allow the word to take deep root in their lives. If they rest content with superficial first fervor, they shall not survive times of persecution and Satanic testing. Similarly, they must guard against worldliness, the lure of riches, and other disordered passions which have the capacity to stifle the word and keep it from bearing fruit. Those, however, who negotiate successfully these trials and temptations, will bear the astonishing harvest which Jesus promised.16 (Mk 4:13-20) Mark indicates that the two proverbs which follow apply particularly to the disciples by prefacing each parable with the phrase: “He also said to them.” (Mk 4:21, 24) Mark introduces the last two seed parables more simply with the phrase “He also said” (Mk 4:26-30) Moreover, on examination, the last two parables do not deal directly with the meaning of discipleship. Instead, they call attention rather to two aspects of the mystery of the kingdom: its spontaneous growth under God’s providence and its eventual expansion to an enormous size, despite its humble beginnings. (Mk 4: 26-32) The first proverb addressed to the disciples notes that, when one lights a light, one puts it on a lamp stand, not under a tub. On Jesus’ lips the 15. Cf. J. Jeremias, “Palesetinakunliches zum Gleichnis vom Sämann,” New Testament Studies, 13(1966), pp. 48-53; P.B. Payne, “The Order of Sowing and Ploughing in the Parable of the Sower,” New Testament Studies, 25(1978), pp. 123-129; Donahue, The Gospel in Parable, pp. 29-34; Terrence Keegan, “The Parable of the Sower and Mark’s Jewish Leaders,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 56(1994), pp. 501-518; John Paul Heil, “Reader Response and the Narrative Context of the Parables about Growing Seed in Mark 4:1-34,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 54(1992), pp. 271-286; Michael Stahl, “Vom Verstehen des Neuen Testaments in der einen Welt: Anfragen einer befreiungstheologie Bibelauslegung an die europäische Exegesis am Beispiel von Mk 4,” Zeitschrift für Mission, 16(1990), pp.224-235. 16. Cf. NJBC, pp. 41:28.


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proverb justifies the bold proclamation of God’s reign. Mark, however, interprets the proverb of the lamp to mean that the hiddenness of the kingdom which characterized Jesus’ enigmatic proclamation of it in parable will not last forever. Eventually, the good news will become completely manifest. (Mk 4:21-3) Mark does not say exactly when this manifestation will occur. The statement, “For there is nothing hidden which will not be brought to light, nor is their anything kept secret which will not come into the open” has, however, a certain absoluteness about it. Absolutely nothing hidden can escape eventual scrutiny. That absoluteness plus the warning: “If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear” suggests that for Mark the day when all things will come to light coincides with the last day, with the final judgment. (Cf. Mk 13:26-7) If one interprets the final disclosure of the kingdom as coinciding with final judgment, then one mutes the contrast between the meaning of this second parable and Mark’s previous insistence on the secret character of the kingdom. If the full revelation of the kingdom must await the second coming, then the kingdom will remain a kind of secret wisdom even during the age of the Church, a wisdom hidden from those who refuse to believe. Anticipation of the final revelation of the kingdom also implies living in readiness for final judgment, a readiness which accords well with the demands of discipleship which Mark has just sketched in his allegorization of the parable of the astonishing harvest. (Cf. Mk 13:33-7) Mark will further elaborate the demands of living in an eschatological age in Jesus’ eschatological discourse during His Jerusalem ministry.17 The second proverbial teaching states: Attend to what you are hearing. The amount you measure out is the amount you will be given, and more besides. For the one who has will be given more, and the one who has not will forfeit even what he has. (Mk 4:24-25)

This proverb calls the disciples to generosity in responding to the word. Each will receive a reward proportioned to the generosity of his or her personal response. (Mk 4:25)In oral cultures, wisdom manifests itself in the ability to cite traditional proverbs in situations which endow them with surprising meaning. Here Jesus takes a cynical peasant proverb about economic injustice and greed and transforms it into a teaching about generosity. The original proverb asserts a common experience of first-century Palestinian peasants: the greedy rich get richer and the poor 17. Cf. Gerhard Schneider, “Das Bildword von der Lampe: Zur Traditionsgeschichte einer Jesus-Wortes,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 60(1970), pp. 183-209; Robert M. Fowley, “The Rhetoric of Direction and Indirection in the Gospel of Mark” in The Interpretation of Mark, pp. 207-227.

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get poorer. Jesus transforms the proverb into a teaching about the kind of generosity the kingdom demands: the more generously one responds, the greater the reward one will receive. Moreover, no one outdoes God in generosity. The reward will go beyond what one actually merits. By juxtaposing these two proverbs Mark also endows the second with an eschatological flavor. For Mark the kingdom brings present blessings; but one looks for one’s reward in the life to come. (Cf. Mk 10:28-31) The clause “the one who has not will forfeit even what he has” may allude to Israel’s failure to respond to the word; but the warning applies to the disciples as well. (Mk 4:24) In the sermon on the lake, Jesus rebukes the disciples for their unbelief. (Mk 4:40) Those who respond with little faith risk losing what little they have.18 Despite their lack of faith and understanding, the disciples continue to accompany Jesus in his ministry and witness His rejection at Nazareth, an event which foreshadows His ultimate rejection on Calvary. (Mk 6:1-6) Moreover, immediately after this rejection, Jesus joins the Twelve even more intimately to His own ministry by sending them out by twos to proclaim repentance, to cast out demons, and to heal. (Mk 6:7, 13) The effectiveness of their mission, which Mark underscores, (Mk 6:13) foreshadows their eventual proclamation of the risen Christ. As a consequence, Jesus’ brief instruction to the Twelve on the way to conduct themselves while on mission provides a thumbnail sketch of the proper way to conduct a ministry of Christian proclamation, even in the face of hostility and unbelief. The Twelve must travel light: they can carry a staff and wear sandals but must carry no food, no supplies, no haversack, no extra tunic. (Mk 6:7-9) The sparseness of their luggage dramatizes the urgency of their message: those who travel light travel fast. The lack of provisions also demands that they conduct their ministry in trust that they will be cared for providentially. They must also expect those to whom they preach to supply their physical needs through hospitality, just as the Christian community would one day welcome traveling apostles and teachers. (Mk 6:10) As in the case of Jesus, a response of unbelief to the disciples’ proclamation of the gospel will endow their ministry with a judgmental character. They must shake the dust from their feet in any place which refuses to welcome them. The gesture signifies that the place has no relationship to the new Israel. (Mk 6:11) The Disciples’ Unbelief The return of the apostles after their successful experience of ministry introduces the first miracle of the loaves. Jesus suggests a break for all of 18. Cf. NJBC, 41:29-34; Mann, op. cit., pp. 260-276; Guelich, MWBC, I, pp. 186-257; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 124-140.


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them, since the pressures of ministry do not leave them even time to eat. (Mk 6:30-1) The crowds anticipate what Jesus and the disciples are doing and reach the isolated place of rest before Jesus and the apostles arrive. The first miracle of the loaves takes place, not in a desert, but in a lonely grassland. Like many other descriptive details in Mark the setting has symbolic meaning. In the first miracle of the loaves, Mark portrays Jesus as the good shepherd who cares with compassion for the sheep He pastures. Moreover, like a good shepherd, Jesus feeds them with the bread of wisdom, which foreshadows the eucharist. (Mk 6:34, 39-40) The eucharist in turn derives its meaning from the paschal mystery and foreshadows the messianic banquet. (Mk 14:25) Jesus out of pastoral compassion for the multitude teaches them at some length. As evening draws on the disciples ask Jesus to dismiss the crowds so that they can go find something to eat. When Jesus tells the disciples themselves to feed the crowd, they foolishly think He wants them to go and buy food. (Mk 6:35-8) Jesus then sends the disciples to scour the crowds for bread. They find five loaves and two fish. The disciples distribute the loaves and the fish which Jesus then miraculously multiplies; but they do so without understanding that the miracle foreshadows the eucharist and manifests the divinity of Jesus.19 (Mk 6:41-4, 51-2) As we have seen, after each of the miracles of the loaves, Mark has Jesus once again confront the Pharisees in controversy. Mark does so because he wants to contrast the unbelief of the Pharisees with the demands of eucharistic faith. (Mk 7:1-13) The disciples, however, quickly manifest that they have as little faith and understanding as the Pharisees. Jesus teaches publicly that nothing entering a person from the outside can make that person unclean. (Mk 7:14-6) The disciples ask Him in private the meaning of this “parable.” The reference to Jesus’ parables alludes to the sermon on the lake, which distinguished between the unbelieving crowds, on the one hand, and the disciples, with their privileged access to Jesus’ message, on the other. Now, the disciples’ lack of understanding places them for the time being with the unbelieving crowds who cannot understand Jesus’ teaching. (Mk 4:10-12) Jesus first rebuffs the disciples for their lack of faith and understanding (Mk 7:18); then He abrogates Mosaic legislation about clean and unclean food. As we shall see, Matthew, the Petrine Christian, finds this 19. For a detailed analysis of the miracles of the loaves, see: Quesnell, op.cit. Cf. NJBC, 41:43, 51; Mann, op. cit., pp. 298-308, 324-337; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 170-179, 194-205; Frank J. Matera, “The Incomprehension of the Disciples and Peter’s Confession (Mark 6, 14-8, 30)” Biblica, 70(1989), pp. 153-172.

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particular theological gloss of Mark unacceptable. Mark’s Jesus, however, denies that anything physical can make a person unclean. Real uncleanness must proceed from the human mind and heart: evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, avarice, malice, deceit, fornication, envy, slander, arrogance, and folly.20 (Mk 7:17-23) This confrontation between Jesus and the disciples allows Mark to draw out in more detail the contrast between the legalistic Pharisees’ attitude to Torah and Jesus’ own more flexible view of the Law. It also foreshadows Jesus’ warning after the second miracle of the loaves that the disciples must avoid the “leaven of the Pharisees.”21 (Mk 8:16) The confrontation with the Pharisees which follows the second multiplication of loaves betrays the true reason for their opposition to Jesus: their lack of faith. This second confrontation sets the stage for what happens next. As Jesus crosses the lake with His disciples, He warns them against the leaven of the Pharisees and of Herod. (Mk 8:14-5) As we have seen, the stories of Jesus’ controversies with the Pharisees have revealed what Jesus means by the leaven of the Pharisees: religious hypocrisy, superficial legalism, judgmentalism, subverting the true intent of the law by replacing it with human traditions, and, finally, unbelief. The Pharisees manifest their unbelief by testing God, by trying to set the conditions under which they will believe in Jesus. By placing this sin immediately before Jesus’ warning about the leaven of the Pharisees, Mark seems to point to it as their culminating sin, the sin which explains and finds embodiment in all their other faults, the sin which the disciples must especially avoid. As we have also seen, Herod’s conduct reveals what Jesus means by the leaven of Herod: sensuality, weakness, vainglory, murder, and oppression. Once again the disciples misunderstand Jesus’ warning against the leaven of the Pharisees and of Herod. They foolishly think that Jesus is complaining because they forgot to bring enough bread to eat. In rebuking them, Jesus puts them in the same category as the unbelieving multitudes, who have eyes but cannot recognize the significance of Jesus’ ministry and who have ears but refuse to grasp His message. (Mk 8:16-8) Moreover, Jesus links their lack of faith to their inability to understand the meaning of the two miracles of the loaves. (Mk 8:19-21) Understanding the meaning of the loaves, requires eucharistic faith. In effect, Jesus is saying that one cannot eat the eucharistic bread of wisdom without renouncing the malice and unbelief which Herod and the Pharisees symbolize. 20. Cf. Camille Focant, “La rapport à la loi dans l’évangile de Marc,” Revue Théologique de Louvain, 27(1996), pp. 281-308; Enrique Nardoni, “Lo Puro y lo Impuro en Marcos 7:1-23: La Respuesta del Lector,” Revista Biblica, 59(1007), pp. 135-154. Mark’s abrogation of dietary laws forms a piece with his abrogation of temple worship. 21. Cf. NJBC, 41:52.


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The incident puts the disciples in an adversarial relationship with Jesus. Mark, however, immediately portrays Jesus healing a blind man. (Mk 8:22-6) The story parallels the healing of the deaf and dumb man which preceded the second multiplication of the loaves. (Mk 7:31-7) Both stories point to the eventual healing of the disciples. When Jesus baptizes them with the Holy Breath, He will eventually heal the blindness of unbelief and will empower them to hear with understanding and to bear witness to Him. Both miracles of multiplication culminate, then, in a crisis of faith among the disciples. The first miracle takes place on Jewish soil. On Jewish ground, the disciples fail to recognize the divinity of Jesus. (Mk 6:45-52) Accepting Jesus’ divinity constituted, of course, a major obstacle to potential Jewish converts. In foreshadowing the eucharist on Jewish soil, therefore, the evangelist insists on belief in the divinity of Jesus as a fundamental condition for authentic eucharistic faith. The crisis of faith which follows the second miracle of the loaves has, however, a different character. It takes place on Gentile ground and implicitly engages the moral issues likely to confront a mixed community of Jewish and Gentile Christians. One suspects that, in the eyes of the evangelist, Jewish Christians need especially to guard against the leaven of the Pharisees: they must not let their status as members of God’s chosen people degenerate into elitism, legalism, judgmentalism, and condescension toward Gentile sisters and brothers. The leaven of Herod, on the other hand, probably applies more to baptized Gentiles. It reminds them that if they expect to worship eucharistically, they need to purge from their hearts the sensuality and unbridled passions of their former lives.22 Peter’s confession of Jesus as messiah follows the healing of a blind man. Like the blind man whom Jesus healed in two stages, Peter is only beginning to see and understand Jesus’ true identity. At the first stage of his healing, the blind man sees men who look like walking tress. Mark could conceivably be alluding to the book of Judges 9:7-15, which narrates a fable about a gathering of trees to choose themselves a king. The fable in Judges satirizes the kingship of Abimalech over Scheche. In Mark, the blind man is probably looking at the disciples who surround Jesus. By assimilating the disciples to walking trees, the evangelist could be mocking their espousal of secular messianism and their attempt to cast Jesus in the role of a Davidic messiah. (Mk 8:27-30) Peter, like the partially healed blind man, has not yet grasped the full truth about Jesus, because, when Jesus predicts His coming death and resurrection, Peter tries to talk Jesus out of it. Jesus eyes the disciples before giving Peter a stinging rebuke: “Get out of my sight, Satan, for you do not savor the 22. Cf. Stephen H. Smith, “Bethsaida via Gennesaret: The Enigma of the Sea Crossing in Mark 6,45-53,” Biblica, 77(1996), pp. 347-374.

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things of God but the things of humans.” (Mk 8:33) Jesus eyes the disciples when saying this in order to make it clear that His rebuke includes them all, not just the brash Peter. Discipleship demands of them the willingness to follow Jesus all the way to Calvary. In a sense, the partially healed blind man foreshadows the imperfect faith of all the disciples as they follow Jesus on “the way.”23 The Disciples on the Way Mark underscores this point by having Jesus teach this immediately and explicitly to both the crowds and the disciples. Any follower of Jesus must stand ready to deny his or her very self and carry the cross after Him. On Jesus’ lips this teaching need not have functioned as a prediction of His own crucifixion. Jesus uses the image of the condemned criminal carrying the patibulum on which he would hang. The condemned person stumbles pelted with rocks and reviled by the crowd as he goes to his death. On the lips of Jesus this teaching painted a startling image of discipleship. Those who follow a servant messiah must stand as willing as He to face hostility, rejection, and a shameful death. Jesus also clarifies the cause for which the disciples must willingly sacrifice their lives: namely, for Jesus’ person and for the gospel which He proclaims and embodies. Anyone who does so will save his or her life, not lose it. (Mk 8:34-5) Here life means one’s true self, what is deepest and most precious about oneself, so precious, in fact, that gaining the whole world could not replace it or begin to have the same value. (Mk 8:36-7) This stern teaching opens the way section of Mark’s gospel. For Mark, then, willingness to walk the way of the cross stands at the head of the lessons which the disciples must learn along “the way.” Willingness to die for the gospel presupposes, of course, willingness to live it as well. Indeed, during the way section of Mark, the disciples, as they reluctantly follow Jesus on the way to Jerusalem and to martyrdom, reach, like Peter, an imperfect insight into Jesus whose imperfections only the paschal mystery will dispel.24 23. Cf. B. Willärt, “La connexion entre la première prédiction de la passion et la confession de Pierre chez les synoptiques,” Ephemerides Theologiae Lovaniensis, 32(1958), pp. 24-45; Johannes M. Nützel, Die Verklärungserzälung im Markusevangelium: Eine redaktionsgeschichtliche Untersuchung (Wurzburg: Echter Verlag, 1973); R.S. Sugirtharajah, “Men, Trees and Walking: A Conjectural Solution to Mk 8:24,” Expository Times, 103(1991- 1992), pp. 172-174; Jean-Francois Baudoz, “Mc 7, 31-37 et Mc 8, 22-26: géographie et théologie,” Revue Biblique, 102(1995), pp. 560-569. 24. Cf. Walter Rebell, “‘Sein Leben Verloren’ (Mark 8.35 Parr.) als Strukturmoment vorand nachösterlichen Glaubens,” New Testament Studies, 35(1989), pp. 202-218; Elizabeth Struther Malbon, “Galilee and Jerusalem: History and Literature in Markan Interpretation” in The Interpretation of Mark, pp. 253-268.


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After summoning the disciples to take up their crosses, Jesus warns that anyone who feels ashamed of Him will discover that the Son of Man will in turn feel ashamed of that person when He returns in the glory of the Father and surrounded by His angels. (Mk 8:38) This saying seems to suggest how Jesus saw Himself functioning in the judgmental role of Son of Man. On the last day He would testify to the Father about how people responded to Him and to His mission. This second teaching puts both the one which precedes it and the one which it follows in an eschatological context.25 Jesus next promises that some of His hearers will see the arrival of the kingdom of God in power even during their lifetime. (Mk 9:1) The promise serves as a transition to Mark’s account of the transfiguration, which follows immediately; and Mark may have intended this promise of Jesus to refer to the transfiguration itself. If, however, one can trace this saying back to Jesus, it suggests that He Himself at some point in His ministry hoped for the rapid, final arrival of the kingdom. The evangelist probably saw this prophecy sufficiently fulfilled in Jesus’ own resurrection, which the transfiguration foreshadows. (cf. Mk 8:31) If, however, the account of the transfiguration itself foreshadows Jesus’ glorification, the conversation of Jesus and His disciples after the transfiguration alludes once again to the way of the cross. That allusion links it to the teaching on the cross which opens the way section. The juxtaposition of cross and transfigured glory indicates that one achieves the latter by passing through the former. In testifying to Jesus in the transfiguration, the Father, as we have seen, sanctions Jesus’ teachings and demands that the disciples obey Him with the same absoluteness and trust as they owe to the Father Himself. The disciples must regard Jesus’ teachings as more authoritative than the Law and the prophets, viz., as the word of God itself. The Father’s words also begin to draw the disciples into Jesus’ baptismal experience: they hear the very words which the Father spoke to Jesus during His messianic commissioning after His baptism in the Jordan. (Mk 1:11) In recalling Jesus’ messianic commissioning, the account of the transfiguration also alludes to John’s prophecy of the “mightier one” whose revelation Jesus’ messianic commissioning begins. The transfiguration, therefore, also contains an implicit promise of the disciples’ Breath-baptism, which will draw them finally and fully into Jesus mission. Jesus converses with Peter, James, and John as they descend the mountain. He forbids them to tell anyone about the transfiguration until He rises from the dead. With typical obtuseness, the three disciples find it hard to believe that Jesus could rise from the dead before the general resurrection. In the process they mistakenly imagine that Jesus will rise 25. Cf. NJBC, 41:56-57; Mann, op. cit., pp. 342-354; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 213-222.

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like anyone else. They fail to grasp that His resurrection will reveal Him as the source of risen life. (Mk 9:9-10) The disciples also find it hard to understand how Jesus could rise from the dead before the return of Elijah. Jesus puts the latter doubt to rest by assuring them that Elijah has come again and has been treated badly. Jesus is identifying John the Baptist as Elijah, slain by Herod and especially by Herodias, just as Jezabel incited the wicked king Ahab to take the life of the original Elijah. (1 King 19:2, 10) Moreover, Jesus assures them that just as John’s death fulfills the Scriptures, so too will Jesus’ own death. (Mk 9:12-3) Mark does not develop the theme of fulfillment as extensively as Matthew or even Luke, but Jesus’ assurance provides the Markan community with an important hermeneutical principle for interpreting the paschal mystery. One must interpret the paschal mystery as a fulfillment of the Hebrew scriptures.26 The cure of the possessed boy happens as Jesus together with Peter, James, and John join the rest of the disciples at the foot of the mount of transfiguration. There the disciples have been trying unsuccessfully to exorcise the boy; moreover, their failure stems from their self-reliance and from their failure to look to God to effect the exorcism. (Mk 9:29) It also stems from the boy’s father’s own lack of faith. (Mk 9:22-3) This lack of faith helps explain Jesus’ exasperation when he learns of the disciples’ failure to exorcise the boy: “O faithless generation, how much longer will I be with you? How long must I put up with you?” (Mk 9:19) Jesus sees the faithlessness of His disciples and of the boy’s father as an expression of the faithless response which He in His passion will receive from His contemporaries. Again, however, Mark makes it clear that the cross leads ultimately to risen life for those who follow Jesus. After Jesus exorcises the demon, the disciples mistakenly believe that the demon has killed the child. Jesus, however, takes him by the hand and “raises him up” (egeire), as He had the daughter of Jairus and Peter’s mother-in-law. (Mk 5:41) Here too, His raising of the boy reveals His power to raise from the dead. That Jesus grasps by the hand those whom He raises up dramatizes the intimacy of the relationship between the risen Lord and those whom He raises. Moreover, the demon Jesus casts out causes deafness and dumbness. The boy’s father has already described the boy as dumb (Mk 9:17); but in characterizing the boy as both deaf and dumb, Mark alludes to Jesus’ earlier healing of a deaf and dumb man. (Mk 8:31-37) That healing, as we have seen, foreshadows the transformation which the paschal mystery will work in the disciples. It will enable them to hear the gospel truly and to proclaim it. The boy’s cure therefore foreshadows the fact that those 26. Cf. NJBC, 41:58; Mann, op. cit., pp. 354-368; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 222-229.


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who share in Jesus’ risen life will not only hear Him in faith but will bear witness to the gospel.27 During the rest of way section of Mark, Jesus patiently instructs the disciples in the demands of discipleship, despite their persistent obtuseness and failure to get the point. In the first part of the way section of Mark’s gospel, Jesus, as we have seen, has one basic lesson to teach His disciples: viz., that they must stand ready to follow Him even to death and crucifixion; but they must do so in the knowledge that death for Him and the gospel leads not only to life but to true self-discovery and to the salvation of what is most precious, viz., their very selves. The second prediction of the passion introduces the second part of the way section. Once again, the disciples respond to Jesus’ prediction of His impending death and resurrection with complete incomprehension; but they fear to ask Jesus for an explanation and remain in their ignorance. (Mk 9:30-1) Mark follows the second prediction with a series of teachings on a variety of topics: self-effacement in the leadership of service, avoiding cliquishness and intolerance, mutual charity, avoiding scandals, the repudiation of Mosaic divorce practices, welcoming children, the danger of riches, and the rewards of renunciation. All these teachings deal with relationships among the members of the kingdom, in other words, with the kingdom viewed as community. In the first teaching, Jesus embarrasses the disciples by forcing them to admit that they were arguing along the way about which of them ranked greatest. As Jesus goes humbly and obediently to His death, the disciples remain full of self-importance and pride. Jesus rebukes their ambition and arrogance in two ways. First, Jesus instructs the Twelve that those who ambition leadership in the new Israel must make themselves the least of all, the servant of all. (Mk 9:33-4) Second, setting a small child in Their midst, He tells them that both He and the Father so identify with the smallest and most vulnerable that anyone who welcomes the least member of the new Israel welcomes both Jesus Himself and the Father. (Mk 9:35-7) The fact that Jesus directs this teaching to the Twelve makes it clear that His words apply especially to all leaders in the new Israel, including those with the greatest responsibility. Having dealt with the supposedly “greatest” members of the community, Jesus then deals with the smallest and neediest. He demands that they receive the same welcome one would accord to Jesus Himself or to the Father: “Whoever welcomes one such child in My name welcome Me, and whoever welcomes Me welcomes the one who sent Me.” (Mk 27. Cf. Meier, A Marginal Jew, II, pp. 653-656; NJBC, 41: 59; Mann, op. cit., pp. 368-371; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 229-232.

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9:37) In effect, Jesus is standing the social order of first century Palestine on its head. The weakest find the warmest welcome; the leaders must learn humility and vulnerability.28 Jesus next rebukes cliquishness among His disciples. John informs Jesus that the disciples came across someone doing what they could not do for the possessed boy: namely, the person in question was invoking Jesus’ name in casting out demons. The disciples forbade the stranger to continue exorcising, simply because he did not belong to their own inner circle. Jesus tells John that the disciples have acted wrongly, because no one can drive out demons in Jesus’ name while opposing Jesus and His cause. Jesus concludes: “Anyone who is not against us is for us.” (Mk 9:38-40) Mark is using the story to undercut any tendencies to narrow elitism on the part of Christians. They must stand ready to credit the fruits of faith and signs of God’s Breath wherever they find them, even in those who do not belong formally to the Christian community. 29 Jesus next counsels mutual charity. Jesus promises that the smallest act of benevolence toward another member of the kingdom will have its reward. This teaching re-enforces the universalism asserted in the preceding story, since the one who performs the act of kindness contrasts with the believing Christian who receives the charity. Even unbelievers who act benevolently toward believers will have their eschatological reward. (Mk 9:41) Jesus also requires that His disciples prefer death by drowning to giving scandal to another. The sin of scandal means causing another member of the community to sin, however small or insignificant the person might be. (Mk 9:42) These two pronouncements illumine one another. Those actively concerned for one another’s welfare will of necessity show concern to keep one another from sinning. Having rebuked scandalizing others, Jesus next warns against scandalizing oneself. The disciples must avoid absolutely anything which leads them into personal sin. Jesus underscores the absoluteness of this prohibition by the violence of His metaphors: better to amputate one’s limbs or to pluck out one’s eye than sin. The violence of the metaphors also make it clear that the kind of sin against which Jesus’ warns has a serious character: it excludes both from the kingdom and from eternal life. It consigns one to burn forever like the rubbish of Gehenna, the garbage heap of ancient Jerusalem. (Mk 9:48) Here fire symbolizes the holiness of God as it consumes the unrepentant, whose vary lack of repentance sets them against God. 28. Cf. NJBC, 41:60-61; Mann, op. cit., pp. 375-379; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 233-235; Harry Fleddermann, “The Discipleship Discourse, Mk 9:33-50,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 43(1981), pp. 57-75. 29. Cf. NJBC, 41:61; Mann, op. cit., pp. 377-385; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 235-236; Alfonso de la Fuente, “A Favor or en Contra de Jesús: El Logion de Mc 9,40 y sus Paralelos,” Estudios Biblicos, 51(1993), pp. 449-459.


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Jesus, however, adds immediately: “For everyone will be salted with fire.” (Mk 9:50) In other words, the fire of God’s holiness will also purify those whom it does not consume. As we shall see, both Matthew and Luke will link the fire of divine holiness closely to Breath-baptism. The Breath of Christ will purify those to whom Jesus sends Her, but She will consume in the fires of judgment those who resist Her sanctification. Mark then adds two other proverbs about salt. The evangelist is stringing together diverse sayings of Jesus which contain similar images, even though they deal with very diverse themes. The two salt sayings do, however, develop the general theme of this part of the way section: namely, life in community. The first proverb about salt teaches: “Salt is a good thing; but, if salt loses its taste, with what will you season it?” (Mk 9:49) This saying reminds the disciples that they are being sent to season the world as purveyors of religious wisdom and must embody the wisdom they disseminate. If they abandon the salt of wisdom for folly, the world will not correct them. The second salt saying states: “Have salt in yourselves and be at peace with one another.” (Mk 9:50) Here the salt of wisdom symbolizes hospitality, mutual friendship, and reconciliation in community.30 A confrontation with some Pharisees contextualizes Jesus’ next teaching about the way of discipleship. The Pharisees ask Jesus to choose between a lax and a stringent interpretation of mosaic divorce practices. Mark’s Jesus sets aside Moses’s “command” sanctioning divorce. (Mk 10:1-5) In revising the Law, Jesus invokes an authority superior to that of Moses, the very authority with which the Father had endowed Him during the Transfiguration. (Mk 9:8) Jesus refuses to choose between rabbinic interpretations of the divorce legislation in Dt 24:1. Instead, He appeals to God’s original intention in establishing marriage and holds up to His disciples the ideal of mutual, life-long fidelity between husband and wife. When the disciples question Jesus about His answer in private, He replies that it applies to both men and women. If either divorce and remarry, they commit adultery. Since Jewish women could not initiate a divorce, although Roman matrons could, Mark in this private conversation about marriage extends Jesus’ original prohibition of divorce to include female, Gentile Christians. In private Jesus addresses the disciples as “insiders.”31 30. Cf. NJBC, 41: 61; Mann, op. cit., pp. 379-385; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 236-239; Harry Fledermann, “The Discipleship Discourse, Mk 9:33-50,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 43(1981), pp. 57-75. 31. Cf. NJBC, 41:62; Mann, op. cit., pp. 385-394; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 239-244; John Noland, “The Gospel Prohibition of Divorce: Tradition, History, and Meaning,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 58(1995), pp. 19-35; Barbara Green, O.P., “Jesus’ Teaching on Divorce in the Gospel of Mark,” Journal for the Study of the New

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In His final teaching on relationships among members of the new Israel, Jesus indignantly rebukes the disciples for keeping mothers from bringing their children to Him for Him to touch and heal. He tells the disciples that the kingdom belongs to children in a special way and that those who enter the kingdom must accept it with the simplicity of a child. Then He embraces the children, blesses them, and lays His hands on them in healing. (Mk 10:13-6) The story insists that children, in virtue of their need and vulnerability, enjoy a privileged place among the members of the new Israel. The kingdom belongs to children in a special way. Moreover, the simplicity with which they accept the kingdom makes them a model to all the other disciples. Since Mark includes this pronouncement story among Jesus’ teachings concerning communal living, the evangelist is probably also alluding to the apostolic practice of baptizing children who were members of households who converted to the faith.32 In the first part of the way section, Jesus summons the disciples to follow the way of the cross in eschatological hope. In the second part of the way section, He teaches them how to relate to one another in community. The message in the third part of the way section targets Christian leaders. It binds them particularly to follow the way of the cross; and it challenges them to humble leadership in service in the image of a crucified messiah. After the third prophecy of the passion, James and John, in an act of overt ambition, ask Jesus if He will let them sit on His right and left hands when He comes into His kingdom. Jesus replies darkly, “You do not know what you are asking. Can you drink the cup which I must drink, or be baptized with the baptism with which I must be baptized?” (Mk 10:35-8) The cup, of course, symbolizes both the eucharistic cup and the destiny of crucifixion which awaits Jesus. (Mk 14:23-5, 36) Moreover, in Markan theology, Jesus’ passion and resurrection bring His baptismal anointing to its culmination by completing His revelation as messiah, suffering servant, and Breath-baptizer.33 (Mk 1:9-11) Mark’s Jesus is, then, warning James and John that, in asking to sit on His right and left hands, they are in fact asking for their own crucifixion. Testament, 38(1990), pp. 67-75; Will Deming, “Mark 9.42-10.12, Matthew 5.27-32, and BNID.13b: A First-Century Discussion of Male Sexuality,” New Testament Studies, 36(1990), pp. 130-141. 32. Cf. NJBC, 41:63; Mann, op. cit., pp. 395-406; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 244-247; S. Legasse, Jésus et l’enfant: “enfants,” “petits,” et “simples” dans la tradition synoptique (Paris: Librairie Lecoffre, 1969).; John W. Pryor, “John 3.3,5: A Study in the Relation of John’s Gospel and the Synoptic Tradition,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 41(1991), pp. 71- 95. 33. Cf. J. Duncan M. Derrett, “Christ’s Second Baptism,” Expository Times, 100(1988-1989), pp. 294-295.


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They naively say that they are ready to drink the same cup as Jesus and to receive His baptism. (Mk 10:39) They will, of course, along with the rest of the disciples abandon Jesus when the chief priests arrest Him. (Mk 14:49) Jesus, however, looks beyond that moment and predicts that one day James and John will suffer and die for Him; but He tells them that only the Father has the authority to let them sit on His right and left hands. (Mk 10: 40) The ambition of James and John incenses the rest of the Twelve. Their envious ambition contextualizes Jesus’ final teaching on the way. When the other ten learn of the ambition of James and of John, they angrily resent what the two brothers have done. Jesus in response calls the Twelve together and instructs them on the true meaning of leadership in the kingdom. Leaders in the kingdom must not lord it over others in the manner of earthly kings and rulers, like Herod and Pilate. Instead, they must act as the servants and slaves of all. They must model their leadership on Jesus who has come to serve others and to give His life as “a ransom for many.” It would appear, then, that Mark included clericalism in his understanding of “the leaven of the Phariseees and of Herod.”(Mk 10:41-5) The term “ransom (lystron)” means the deliverance by purchase of a slave or captive. Here it connotes God’s liberating acquisition of humanity which Jesus’ death will effect. The term “the many (pollon)” alludes to the third servant song of second Isaiah and points to Jesus’ death as an atoning sacrifice for sins.34 The way section of Mark ends on a note of hope for the obtuse disciples. Despite their blindness and lack of understanding on the way, the day will come when they will finally understand Jesus and His teachings. On that day they will also find courage to walk the way of the cross. Mark makes this prediction symbolically by closing the way section with the healing of blind Bartimaeus. As the story unfolds, Bartimaeus’s physical blindness becomes a symbol of the disciples’ blindness to the truth which Jesus embodies; for Bartimaeus’s healing transforms him into a prototype of what the disciples will become after Jesus rises and baptizes them with a sanctifying Breath. When Bartimaeus, using the messianic title “Son of David,” begs Jesus to have pity on him, the disciples in their spiritual blindness try to silence Him. Bartimaeus, however, has more faith and more persistence than they do: he continues to call upon Jesus. When Jesus calls Bartimaeus, he casts off his garment, probably the beggar’s cloak he had spread for alms. 34. Cf. NJBC, 41:66-67; Mann, op. cit., pp. 410-420; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 253-258; W.J. Noulder, “The Old Testament Background and the Interpretation of Mark X.45,” New Testament Studies, 24(1977-1978), pp. 120-127; David Seeley, “Rulership and Service in Mark 10:41-45,” Novum Testamentum, 35(1993), pp. 234-250; Benedetto Prete, “Il Logion di Gesù: ‘Dare la Propria Vita in Riscatto por Molti” (Mc 10,45),” Rivista Biblica, 34(1996), pp. 309- 335.

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Since clothes symbolizes social relationships archetypally, the gesture symbolizes the blind man’s passage from one mode of social existence to another. Hence, after Jesus heals him and leaves Jericho for the road that leads to Jerusalem and the cross, Bartimaeus follows Him “on the way (en tê hodô).” (Mk 10:52) As we have seen, the first Christians called their movement “the way.” (Acts 9:2, 18:25-6, 19:9, 23, 22:4, 24:14, 22) Bartimaeus, once healed of his blindness, follows Jesus on the Christian way to Jerusalem and to the cross. After Breath baptism transforms them, the disciples too will see with the eyes of faith and follow Jesus along with the cured Bartimaeus.35 The Disciples in the Jerusalem Ministry The disciples figure significantly in four incidents in Jesus’ final Jerusalem ministry. They prepare and participate in the triumphal entry into Jerusalem. They witness the cleansing of the temple and the prophetic cursing of the fig tree. They hear Jesus’ teaching about the widow’s mite. Finally, they provoke and hear Jesus’ eschatological discourse, the culmination of Jesus’ teaching in Mark. The disciples prepare Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem. They follow His detailed instructions, which Mark portrays as Jesus’ preternatural foreknowledge of events before they happen. Jesus tells the disciples where to find the donkey He intends to ride and what to say when the owners of the donkey find them untying it. They should reply that “the Lord (Kyrios)” has need of it and should promise to return the beast when Jesus no longer needs it. The term “Lord” has, of course, a double meaning. In context, it means master; but it would have connoted for Mark and for his readers the Lordship of the risen Christ. Jesus, then, orchestrates His entry into Jerusalem in a manner which fulfills the prophecy of Zech 9:9. He enters the holy city as a peaceful messiah, humbly seated on a beast of burden instead of on a war horse. As He enters, however, the crowds misunderstand the gesture and greet Jesus as the Davidic messiah.36 (Mk 11:1-11) The disciples subsequently witness Jesus’ cursing the fig tree and its consequences. (Mk 11:12-14, 20-25) And they accompany Jesus when He cleanses the temple and on the following day. (Mk 11:15-9, 27) As 35. Cf. NJBC, 41:46-52; Mann, op. cit., pp. 420-430; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 258-259; Stephen H. Smith, “The Function of the Son of David Tradition in Mark’s Gospel,” New Testament Studies, 42(1996), pp. 523-539; Hans Joachim Eckstein, “Markus 10,46-52 als Schlüssetext des Markusevangelisums,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 87(1996), pp. 333-50. 36. Cf. NJBC, 41:69-70; Mann, op. cit., pp. 431-438; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 260-263; Walter Bauer, “The ‘Colt’ of Palm Sunday (der Palmesel),” Journal of Biblical Literature, 43(1953), pp. 220-229; Paul Brooks Duff, “The March of the Divine Warrior and the Advent of the Graeco-Roman King: Mark’s Account of Jesus’ Entry into Jerusalem,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 111(1992), pp. 55-71.


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we have already seen, after the cleansing they learn that they must replace the simoniacal worship of the priests with a faith-filled prayer authenticated by mutual forgiveness. (Mk 11:20-25) The disciples also hear Jesus praise the generosity of the widow who gave her mite, all she had, to the temple. Mark, then, directs this teaching especially to them. Jesus’ remark has a triple thrust. He praises the faith and generosity of the impoverished widow, one of God’s “little ones” and a marginal member of Jewish society. Jesus then mocks the ostentatious donations of the rich who pay their taxes from the surplus of their possessions. Finally and especially, Jesus implicitly criticizes the temple taxes for the burden they place upon the poor. Clearly, the disciples can admire the widow’s faith and generosity; but they should eschew the example of the religious hypocrites who oppress her. (Mk 12:41-4) Having witnessed the cleansing of the temple, the withering of the fig tree, which symbolizes the barren piety of the avaricious temple priests, and having listened to Jesus’ denunciation of the priestly aristocracy, the disciples occasion Jesus’ prediction of the destruction of the Jerusalem temple. Moreover, Jesus’ prediction prefaces His second, final, and culminating discourse in Mark: the eschatological discourse. The discourse counsels the disciples about living in the end time. Longer than the sermon on the lake the eschatological discourse ranks as the longest and most important continuous discourse in Mark’s gospel. That and its position at the culmination of Jesus’ ministry further marks its importance. Its prominence also accords well with the eschatological flavor of Mark’s narrative. The disciples admire the enormous stones in the temple walls. Cyclopean stone work typifies Herodian architecture. Jesus, however, unimpressed by this architectural achievement, predicts that despite their size, these very stones will one day be razed flat. (Mk 13:2) Peter, Andrew, James, and John, the first disciples whom Jesus called, ask Him in private when His prophecy will reach fulfillment. Their names link the eschatological discourse which follows to their call and thus underscores the eschatological character of discipleship. Jesus delivers the discourse on the Mount of Olives, whose riving in Zech 14:4 announces the beginning of the final judgment. (Mk 13:3-4) The privacy of Jesus’ remarks designates them as part of the secret wisdom of the post-resurrection Church. The disciples function prominently in the eschatological discourse, because it instructs them on how to conduct themselves in the eschatological age. Jesus does not answer directly their request for a timetable of future events but instead encourages them to patient endurance in the face of cosmic upheavals and persecution.37 37. Cf. NJBC, 41:84; Mann, op. cit., pp. 498-511; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 290-291.

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Jesus first warns the disciples against false messiahs who will pretend to be Jesus returned to earth. They will even claim the same divine name as Jesus has: “I am.” (polloi eleusontai epi to nomati mou legontes hoti ego eimi). They will also deceive many. The disciples, however, should put no faith in them. (Mk 13:5-6) This first saying of Jesus seeks to dampen any excess of eschatological fervor on the disciples’ part which would leave them vulnerable to false prophets. Moreover, Jesus here once again implicitly claims the divine name which He used while walking on the water after the first miracle of the loaves. (Mk 6:50) As we have also seen, He will claim it a third time (also implicitly) in His trial before the Sanhedrin. Jesus warns the disciples that cataclysmic events like wars, earthquakes, and famines provide no evidence that the final judgment is near. Such tribulations only begin the violent birth pangs of the messianic age. (Mk 13:7-8) In the meantime, the disciples must expect persecution. They can expect growing hostility from Jews and Gentiles alike. They will face trial in both Jewish and Gentile courts. They will suffer flogging in synagogues. (Mk 13:9-10) The proclamation of the gospel will divide families in mutual hatred and cause its members to hand siblings and parents over to death. (Mk 13:12-3) This last saying may describe tragic betrayals during the persecution under Nero. Nevertheless, the gospel will spread not only despite persecution but because of it; for through persecution itself disciples will bear witness to Jesus. Moreover, the disciples can expect these tribulations to continue until all the nations of the world have heard the good news. (Mk 13:10) The fact that the gospel must find proclamation in every part of the earth and to every nation before the final judgment can occur puts the date of the second coming in the vague and far distant future. In the midst of the tribulations which they face, the disciples will experience a divine enlightenment which will teach them how to bear witness to Christ in the face of persecution and death. When they are hauled into court, they should not think ahead how to answer their tormenters; for the Holy Breath with whom Jesus will baptize them will teach them what to say in their moment of trial. (Mk 13:11) Just as She inspired and empowered Jesus’ own ministry of proclamation, so too She will inspire and empower the disciples’ witness to Jesus and transform them into instruments for the spread of the gospel.38 The words of Jesus have so far described events within the experience of the Markan community. Jesus, however, finally addresses the question which Peter, Andrew, James, and John originally asked: namely, when will Jerusalem and its temple undergo destruction? In the process He 38. Cf. NJBC, 41:85; Mann, op. cit., pp. 512-520; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 291-295.


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begins to talk about things which have yet to occur. Jesus does not give a date for the destruction of Jerusalem, but He foretells that it will happen when the “abomination of desolation (to bdelugma tes eremoseos)” stands where it ought not: i.e., in the sanctuary of the Jerusalem temple. (Mk 13:14) The phrase “abomination of desolation” refers to the pagan altar erected by Antiochus Epiphanes on the Jewish altar of holocausts in 168 b.c. Jesus, however, speaks of the “abomination of desolation” as “standing where it ought not (hestekota hopou ouk dei).” (Mk 13:14) The present participle “standing” seems to connote a contemporary action. Moreover, Mark adds cryptically and parenthetically: “let the reader understand.” Mark is probably referring to the abortive attempt of Caligula to erect his own statue in the Holy of Holies of the Jerusalem temple in the year 49 a.d. If so, the evangelist would seem to be interpreting this blasphemous attempt as a repetition of the desecration under Antiochus and as an omen of the prompt fulfillment of Jesus’ prophecy. In fact, Jerusalem would fall in 70 a.d.39 Mark’s Jesus then instructs His disciples in Jerusalem about how to conduct themselves when the city’s doom approaches. They should flee Judea once the abomination of desolation has appeared and they should do so at once, if they hope to avoid the unparalleled destruction and suffering which will descend on the doomed city. (Mk 13:15-6) Jesus foresees greatest suffering for pregnant and nursing mothers and their children. Jesus also exhorts the disciples to pray that they not have to flee during the winter. During the winter, rains make the wadis of Palestine impassible. Moreover, in winter food would be scarcer. The instruction also makes it clear that Jesus claims no detailed knowledge when the flight of the disciples will occur. (Mk 13:16-7) Jesus does, however, predict that the eschatological tribulation (thlipsis) which will visit Jerusalem will, whenever it comes, have no parallel in the entire history of the world. Only those whom God chooses will survive. Indeed, God will shorten the period of suffering for their sake. Jesus also warns that prior to the fall of Jerusalem false prophets and false messiahs will arise and will try to deceive God’s chosen ones. Hence, the disciples should remain on their guard. (Mk 13:18-22) Josephus’s account of the Jewish wars indicates that this prophecy too found ample fulfillment. 39. Cf. N.H. Taylor, “Palestinian Christianity and the Caligula Crisis. Part I. Social and Historical Reconstruction,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 61(1996), pp. 101- 124; “Palestinian Christianity and the Caligula Crisis. Part II: The Markan Eschtological Discourse,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 62(1996), pp. 13-41.

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Jesus closes His prophecy about the destruction of Jerusalem with the words, “Look to yourselves. See, I have forewarned you of everything.” (Mk 13:23) The phrase recalls attention to Peter, Andrew, James, and John and to the fact that Jesus’ vague prediction gives them all the answer from Him which they will get concerning its precise date. Since the disciples lack any knowledge of when the Father has ordained that the tribulation of Jerusalem occur, they should stand ready to flee at the sign of its approach. The command to remain alert and on guard marks the transition to the final part of the eschatological discourse, which describes Jesus’ return as Son of Man. Jesus will close this final prediction with a long exhortation to the disciples to live in ready watchfulness for the final judgment, since only the Father knows when it will occur.40 (Mk 13:24-37) In describing the second coming, Mark’s Jesus introduces two significant interpolations into the account of the coming of Son of Man in Dan 7:13-4. First, in contrast to Daniel Jesus warns that apocalyptic signs of destruction will precede the coming of the Son of Man. The darkening of the sun and moon, the falling of the stars will manifest that the elemental powers (dynameis) which dwell in the heavens and which take concrete embodiment in oppressive human institutions like the Roman empire are suffering their final overthrow. (Mk 13:24-6) Jesus draws His apocalyptic imagery from a number of Old Testament texts. (Is 13:10, 34:4; Ezek 32:7; Amos 8:9; Joel 2:10, 31, 3: 15; Hag 2:6, 21) Jesus is predicting that, when He returns as the Son of Man described in the book of Daniel, He will personally overwhelm the powers which persecute His disciples as Nero had. (Mk 13:26) As in Dan 7:13-14, the Son of Man in Jesus’ prophecy arrives riding like Yahweh upon the clouds of heaven. (Mk 13:26) Jesus, however, modifies Daniel’s vision in a second way: He foretells that the Son of Man at His arrival will dispatch His angels to gather His elect from the four corners of the wind. (Mk 13:27) At no point does Daniel attribute such an action to the Son of Man. The Old Testament does speak of God gathering together His elect. (Deut 30:4; Is 11: 11, 16, 27:12; Ezek 39:27); but nowhere do the texts in question attribute this act to the Son of Man. Jesus, however, does precisely that. He ascribes to Himself in His role as Son of Man the divine act of gathering. Both the assault of the Son of Man upon the powers and His gathering of the dispersed elect put an end to the present sufferings and tribulations of His disciples.41 The eschatological discourse ends, as we have seen, with an extended exhortation to the disciples to live in constant readiness for Jesus’ return 40. Cf. Donahue, The Gospel in Parable, pp. 57-62; NJBC, 41:86; Mann, op. cit., pp. 520526; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 295-297. 41. Cf. NJBC, 41:87; Mann, op. cit., pp. 526-528; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 297-299.


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because they know not when it will happen. Jesus begins this part of the discourse by urging the disciples to live in expectation of the cosmic signs which will mark His assault upon the powers. When the signs occur, the disciples should recognize that the Son of Man is very near, “even at the gates.” (Mk 13:28-9) Jesus then predicts that “all these things (tauta panta)” He has just described will take place within the lifetime of His contemporaries and that His words will outlast both heaven and earth. (Mk 13:30) Mark leaves the antecedent of “all these things” vague, although the evangelist probably refers particularly to the destruction of Jerusalem. Jesus, however, ends the discourse by warning the disciples once again that only the Father—not even Jesus Himself—knows the precise time when these cataclysmic events will transpire. (Mk 13:32) As a consequence, as the disciples await the second coming, they should conduct themselves like servants whose master has gone away on a journey. They should keep the master’s house in perfect readiness for His return. The discourse ends with Jesus’ admonition that this command to live in readiness applies to everyone, and not just to the three disciples to whom He is speaking. (Mk 13:33-7) As we shall see, Matthew will expand this warning in considerable detail. Jesus predicted the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem. Moreover, it seems at least probable that His teachings included an apocalyptic strain. Nevertheless, most of the eschatological discourse in Mark appears to address pastoral needs in the Markan community. Viewed as a component in Mark’s narrative, the eschatological discourse in a sense completes Jesus’ instructions to the disciples in the way section of the gospel. Certainly, it gives the disciples extensive practical advice on how to conduct themselves in the end time. The discourse exhorts the disciples to constant readiness for whatever the future brings, including the second coming. At the same time, the discourse puts a damper on the excesses of chiliastic enthusiasm. The disciples should guard against gullibility in dealing with false prophets. Mark could be countering an upsurge of prophetic chiliasm occasioned by Nero’s persecution. Instead of fussing about the precise timing of future events, the disciples should reconcile themselves to the fact that the second coming will probably not happen soon. Better, then, to live in readiness for the judgment of God, whenever and however it occurs and to leave the future in the Father’s hands. Christians living in the end time should, however, expect to encounter suffering and persecution; but they should remain completely confident of the final and total victory of Christ. Mark’s gospel contains only two discourses: the enigmatic sermon on the lake and the eschatological discourse. The positioning of the eschatological discourse at the climax of Jesus’ ministry gives it greater

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dramatic prominence than the sermon on the lake. This extended explanation about life in the end time accords well with Mark’s portrayal of Jesus’ ministry as God’s final, eschatological struggle against the forces of evil. Moreover, the obscurity of both discourses also reflects Mark’s sense of Christianity as a secret wisdom.42 The Disciples in the Passion Mark begins his passion narrative with the plotting of the chief priests and scribes against Jesus (Mk 14:1-2) and with the story of the Jesus’ anointing at Bethany. In fact, the evangelist sandwiches the story of the devout woman between two stories about wicked men: the chief priests and Judas. Mark situates the anointing at Bethany in the house of Simon the leper. (Mk 14:3) Since such precision about details does not normally characterize Mark’s narrative style, they probably derive from the story as he received it. We do not know who Simon the leper was, but the fact that the story names him specifically without explanation suggests that the Markan community may have known the man first hand. Since lepers could not associate socially with others, Simon had presumably recovered from his leprosy. Jesus could conceivably have healed him. The evangelist may also have included these details in part for symbolic reasons. Mark’s servant messiah receives his messianic anointing, not in the holy city, where one would expect such an anointing to occur, but “outside” Bethany, not in the temple, the normal site of the ritual, but in the house of the unclean, the house of a leper. The reverse imagery recalls Jesus’ own symbolic margenalization at the start of His ministry when he cured a leper. (Mk 1:40-45) A woman enters with an alabaster jar of ointment and precious spices and anoints Jesus’ head. The gesture seems to signify her acknowledgement of Jesus’ messianic dignity. Some of those present complain indignantly about the waste of the oil and suggest that it should have been sold and the money given the poor. They turn angrily upon the woman. (Mk 14:3-4) We do not know whether Mark had the disciples in mind as the origin of this complaint. Matthew’s account does attribute the complaint to them (Mt 26:8), while John ascribes it to Judas only. (Jn 12:4) Mark, as we have seen, tends to paint a fairly dim portrait of the disciples. The fact, then, that he fails to name the disciples as the source of this com42. Cf. Jan Lembrecht, S.J., Die Redaktion der Markusapokalypse: Literarische Analyse und Strukturuntersuchung (Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute, 1967); Lars Hartman, Prophecy Interpreted: The Formation of Some Jewish Apocalyptic Texts and of the Eschatological Discourse, Mark 13 par. (Upsala: Almqvist & Wiksells, 1966); NJBC, 41:87-88; Mann, op. cit., pp. 538-542; A Feuillet, “Le discours de Jésus sur la ruine du temple,” Revue Biblique, 55(1948), pp. 481-482; 52(1949), pp. 61-92; Nikolaus Walter, “Tempelzerstörung und synoptische Apokalypse,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 57(1966), pp. 38-49.


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plaint suggests that he intended the reader to assume that it came from some other source. Moreover, it would seem from the way Mark tells the story that the woman’s acknowledgement of Jesus’ messianic dignity really motivates the bystander’s violent attack on her rather than any real concern for the poor. Markan Christians would, of courase, have approved of the woman’s action. The attack on the woman assimilates her to Jesus, whom Judas and the chief priests are plotting to destroy. Jesus immediately comes to the woman’s defence. He changes her act of homage into a corporal work of mercy, explaining that she has really anointed Him for His burial. He also predicts that wherever people proclaim His message they will tell the story of this woman and her kindness to Him. In defending the woman Jesus says: “She did what she was able to do.” (Mk 14:8) Some see in the phrase an assimilation of the woman to the widow who gave all her possessions to the temple. That could suggest that the woman had in fact spent all her possessions on purchasing the oil. In defending the woman Jesus also remarks: “You always have the poor in your midst and you can do good to them whenever you wish; but you do not always have me.” (Mk 14:6-7) The remark alludes to Deut 15, which teaches that, if Israel acts justly, it will find no poor person in its midst. Nevertheless, if poverty does persist, then openhanded generosity toward the poor provides the only proper course of action. Jesus’ saying also has Christological meaning. In effect, Jesus is sanctioning the messianic significance of the woman’s act at the same time that He predicts that He Himself will soon die. Not just the woman’s faith and dedication but the fact that she has proclaimed Jesus’ messianic dignity makes her action an integral part of the good news. The paschal mystery, which will soon take place, will, moreover, justify her action by revealing Jesus as both the suffering servant and the messianic Breath-baptizer.43 After Judas arranges with the chief priests to hand Jesus over to them (Mk 14:10), Jesus sends the disciples into Jerusalem to prepare the passover supper. As when He sent the disciples to procure the donkey on which He rode in triumph to Jerusalem, Jesus exhibits a clairvoyant foreknowledge of events, a foreknowledge which reveals His mastery of them. He predicts that the disciples will meet a man carrying a pitcher who will lead them to the place where they will celebrate the supper. (Mk 14:12-6) Men, of course, did not normally carry pitchers. At the last supper, the evangelist makes it even clearer that Jesus retains the mastery, even in His passion. Jesus foresees His own death clearly and 43. Cf. NJBC, 41:90; Mann, op. cit., pp. 554-559; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 305-307; Stephen C. Barton, “Mark as Narrative: The Story of the Anointing Woman,” Expository Times, 102(1990- 1991), pp. 230-234.

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even knows that one of the Twelve will betray Him. Jesus does not name Judas; but He insists that the traitor comes from among the Twelve. (Mk 14:12-4) Jesus then proclaims that His death does indeed fulfill the Scriptures but that the traitor would have been better off if he had never been born. (Mk 14:21) Jesus’ says in effect that His death fits into the Father’s providential plan of salvation; but He also confronts the traitor with the fact that no appeal to providence justifies what He is about to do.44 Mark’s institution narrative follows. As He had done in the two multiplications of the loaves, Jesus takes bread, blesses it, breaks it, and gives it to the disciples. This time, however, He says: “Take, this is my Body.” (Mk 14:22) Jesus is performing a prophetic act, similar to His cursing the fig tree, to His triumphal entry, and to His cleansing of the temple. He is portraying His coming death and, indeed, the whole paschal mystery as His ultimate gift of Himself to His disciples. Moreover, the fact that He gives His body as bread means that He goes to His death in the expectation that it will bring life to the disciples. The image of bread also recalls the bread of wisdom with which Jesus fed the crowds in the miracles of multiplication. That wisdom, as we have seen, includes both faith in Jesus’ divinity and repentant renunciation of the leaven of Herod and of the Pharisees. Jesus then takes a cup of wine, says a prayer of blessing and gives it to the disciples, saying: “This is my blood of the covenant which will be poured out for the many. Truly I tell you that I shall not again drink the fruit of the vine until I drink it new in the kingdom of God.” (Mk 14:23-5) In Jewish worship, sprinkled blood symbolized the bond of life which the covenant established between God and His chosen people. (Ex 24:8) Jesus is predicting that His death will establish a covenant, a bond of life between the disciples and God. In saying that He dies for “the many,” Jesus is once more alluding to Is 53:12 and is assimilating His death to the atoning death of the suffering servant. In effect, then, Jesus is portraying His death as both a covenant sacrifice and a sacrifice of atonement, of reconciliation. Despite the disciples’ obtuseness and lack of faith, despite betrayal, denial, and abandonment, His death will reconcile them to God. Moreover, the phrase “the many” in Hebrew means the same as “all.” Hence, Jesus’ death has universal atoning significance. Jesus then promises that He will not drink wine again until He drinks it new in the kingdom. Jesus’ words link the last supper to all the other meals He has shared with the disciples, including His table fellowship 44. Cf. NJBC, 41:92; Mann, op. cit., pp. 561-569; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 308-310; John Paul Heil, “Mark 14:1-52: Narrative Structure and Reader Response,” Biblica, 71(1990), pp. 303-331; Jean-Marie van Cangh, O.P., “Le déroulement primitif du Cène (Mc 14, 18-26 et par.),” Revue Biblique, 102(1995), pp. 193-225.


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with sinners. The newness of the eucharistic wine, however, looks forward to the future. It connotes the new eschatological order of salvation which the paschal mystery inaugurates. That salvation looks forward to the final messianic banquet, which will reunite Jesus to His own.45 The passion of Jesus functions as a time of decision for the disciples. The paschal mystery allows no ambivalence toward Jesus. The disciples must choose for Jesus or against Him. Moreover, two disciples function prominently in the passion narrative: Judas, the traitor, and Peter, who denies Jesus, but subsequently repents. As we have seen, the chief priests begin to plot Jesus’ death after His triumphal entry into Jerusalem and cleansing of the temple. (Mk 11:18) They reach a firm decision to arrest Jesus by trickery and put Him to death; but they fear to do so during the Passover festival because they recognize Jesus’ popularity and fear the reaction of the crowds gathered for the festival. (Mk 14:1-2) Judas, then, plays directly into their hands when he approaches the chief priests with an offer to hand Jesus over to them. They promise money as a reward for Judas’s treachery. Mark does not specify the amount. Judas begins looking for the right moment to betray Jesus. Mark, then, presents Judas’s action as one of unadorned treachery. Judas does not even ask for a reward for betraying Jesus. The offer of money comes from the chief priests. (Mk 14:10-11) Mark portrays Jesus as fully aware that one of the Twelve has betrayed Him. (Mk 14:17-8) Moreover, Mark seems to include Judas among the ones who come to Jesus after His prediction of the treachery to ask Him: “Surely, not I?” (Mk 14:19) Mark gives no indication of Judas’s ultimate fate other than Jesus’ dire prediction: “Better for him, if he had never been born.” (Mk 14:21) Jesus holds Judas fully responsible for his treachery, even though it will cause Jesus Himself to fulfill the Scriptures by His suffering and death.46 After the last supper, when the others head for Gethsemane, Judas goes to the chief priests to collect an armed band which he leads to the garden where Jesus has been praying. As he had prearranged with the armed guard, Judas goes up to Jesus, calls Him “Teacher,” and kisses Him, as a dutiful disciple would do. The kiss identifies Jesus for arrest. (Mk 14:43-6) The kiss brings Jesus’ public ministry to an end and sets in motion the events which will fulfill Jesus’ three predictions of His own passion and death. Judas’s pretended affection for Jesus underscores the traitor’s base hypocrisy and the horror of the act he is performing. One hears no more of Judas in Mark. Matthew, however, tells us that Judas regretted his treachery, returned the blood money to the chief priests, and then hanged himself. He adds that the chief priests used the money 45. Cf. Kelber, ed., The Passion of Jesus, pp. 21-40. 46. Cf. NJBC, 41:94; Mann, op. cit., pp. 583-586; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 315-317.

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to buy a graveyard, called the Field of Blood. (Mt 27:3-10) Luke tells us that Judas died violently and speaks of his body bursting open and his bowels gushing out; but Luke gives the impression that Judas himself purchased the Field of Blood. (Acts 1:18-9) Mark contents himself with Jesus’ statement that Judas would have been better off it he had never seen the light of day. During the last supper, Jesus predicts that the disciples are about to be “scandalized” because of Him. Freely citing Zech 13:17, Jesus warns that the disciples will in fact abandon Him. (Mk 14:26-27) The citation clarifies the nature of the scandal. Jesus’ arrest will cause the scandal. After it, the terrified disciples will abandon Him. Jesus, however, follows this dark prediction with a promise that He will nevertheless be reunited to the disciples in Galilee after he rises from the dead. (Mk 14:28) Jesus’ promise to appear to the disciples in risen glory contains the implicit promise that after the resurrection He will empower them to do what, prior to the paschal mystery, they could not do. In response to Jesus’ warning, Peter protests that, even though the others abandon Jesus, he will never do so. Jesus then predicts that Peter will deny Him three times before the cock crows twice. (Mk 14:26-30) Peter responds by insisting that he will die rather than disown Jesus. (Mk 14:31) At the last supper, Mark’s Peter contradicts Jesus just as he had after Jesus’ first prediction of His passion. On that earlier occasion, Peter tried to dissuade Jesus from embracing the cross. Now the volatile Peter contradicts Jesus by asserting his own personal readiness for martyrdom. In both cases, events would belie Peter’s inflated presumption.47 On arriving at Gethsemane, Jesus first distances Himself from most of the disciples by withdrawing from them in the company of Peter, James, and John. Jesus desires to pray. (Mk 13:32) Suddenly Jesus finds Himself seized with horror and distress (erxato ekthambeisthai kai adeomein) at the prospect of His coming ordeal. Jesus tells the three disciples, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death. Stay here and watch.” (Mk 14:32-5) Jesus urges Peter, James, and John to imitate Him by seeking strength through prayer to face the coming ordeal. The watchfulness of which Jesus speaks has clear eschatological overtones. It recalls the parable of the master who leaves His affairs in the hands of His servants with an admonition to watch because he can return unexpectedly and at any time. (Cf. Mk 13:37)48 Jesus then withdraws from the three disciples in order to pray in solitude. Jesus’ physical separation from the disciples foreshadows His separation from them at the moment of His passion. Jesus must face His ordeal utterly isolated from any human support. His return three times 47. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, I, pp. 116-138; NJBC, 41:96. 48. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, I, pp. 156-162.


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to the disciples only to discover them asleep and not watching underscores dramatically both Jesus’ isolation and loneliness and the disciples’ unpreparedness. On His first return, Jesus speaks to all the disciples but chides Peter especially: “Simon, do you sleep? Didn’t you have strength to watch one hour? Watch and pray that you not enter into the testing (peirasmon).” (Mk 14:37) Peter, despite his protestations of readiness for martyrdom is failing the eschatological test. Jesus’ triple return to the disciples foreshadows, moreover, Peter’s triple denial. The fact, however, that in reproaching Peter Jesus implicitly addresses all the disciples suggests that they, by abandoning Jesus, will in their own way participate in his triple renunciation of discipleship. (Mk 14:35-40) In all three synoptics, Jesus exhorts the weak disciples to “keep on praying” lest they succumb to the final eschatological struggle (peirasmos). (Mk 14:37-38; Mt 26:40-41; Lk 22:45-46) The exhortation implies the disciples’ weakness in the face of the coming ordeal. As Jesus Himself is entering the eschatological struggle which will separate Him temporarily from His disciples, He warns them that only persevering prayer will enable them to triumph over Satan in the final testing. Jesus concludes His admonition of the disciples with the rueful observation: “The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.” (Mk 14:38) One does not find in Mark the same theological contrast between “Breath” and “flesh” as one does in Paul. In Mark, “flesh” does, however, designate humanity in its weak, fragile, death-bound state. Moreover, Mark’s Jesus, who is wrestling with His own human weakness, probably alludes to His own experience of human limitation as well as to His disciples’ weakness. On His third visit to the disciples, Jesus announces abruptly that the time is up and that His betrayer is at hand. (Mk 14:41-42) The ordeal has begun; and Jesus must face it alone.49 When the soldiers seize Jesus after Judas’s kiss, one of the bystanders strikes with a sword and cuts off the ear of the servant of the high priest. (Mk 14:47) Mark leaves the bystander unnamed; but Luke and John identify the assailant as one of the disciples. John’s gospel names the swordsman as Peter. (Jn 18:10; Lk 22:51) Some exegetes, as we have seen, argue that the term “servant of the high priest” designates a high temple functionary, the prefect of priests, the second in command of temple affairs. If so, his mutilation renders him subsequently unfit to offer sacrifice. (Lev 21:17-21) Not all scholars, however, accept this interpretation of the phrase “servant of the high priest.”50 49. Cf. Kelber, ed. op. cit., pp. 41-60. 50. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, I, pp. 272-278; NJBC, 41:98-99; Mann, op. cit.,, pp. 587-606; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 317-321; Simon Legasse, “L’arrestation de Jesus d’apres Marc 14/43-52,” Études Théologiques et Religieuses, 68(1993), pp. 241-247.

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In Mark’s passion narrative, Peter follows the arresting party to the house of the high priest. Peter apparently wants to make good his boast that he is willing to die with Jesus. In fact, while Jesus is suffering condemnation, mockery, and beating, Peter denies Him three times, just as Jesus had foretold. Peter, despite his protestations of his personal willingness to face death for Jesus’ sake, finds himself terrified and intimidated by two serving women and by the other bystanders. He even confirms his third denial with oaths and curses. After the third denial Peter hears a cock crow for the second time.51 Peter suddenly remembers Jesus’ prediction, goes out, and weeps in repentance.52 (Mk 15:66- 72) We see no more of Peter personally in the gospel. We hear Peter speak for the last time when as he curses and swears to the bystanders, “I do not know the man of whom you speak.” (Mk 14:72) If, as seems likely, Mark wrote his gospel in the very community in which the great apostle had just suffered martyrdom, then Peter’s denial makes his personal exit from the gospel story a striking, even shocking event. It would, however, have served to console those in the Roman community who out of weakness had also denied Jesus in the face of suffering and persecution. We do, however, find one final reference to Peter’s name in Mark. When Mary of Magdala, Mary the Mother of James, and Salome encounter the young man in a white robe in Jesus’ empty tomb, the young man tells them that Jesus has risen and instructs them to tell the disciples and Peter, specifically, to go to Galilee where they will encounter the risen Christ as He foretold them. (Mk 16:7) Throughout his story of Jesus, Mark has underscored Jesus’ special relationship to Peter. Jesus calls Peter first together with his brother Andrew. The latter, however, does not enjoy the same dramatic prominence in Mark as Peter does. (Mk 1:16) After calling Peter, Jesus stays at Peter’s house and cures his mother-in-law. (Mk 1:30) When Jesus rises early the next morning to pray, Simon leads the search to find Him. (Mk 1:36) Mark names Peter first among the Twelve and notes that Jesus had a pet name for him. (Mk 3:16) Peter along with James and John witnesses the raising of Jairus’s daughter (Mk 5:37), the transfiguration (Mk 9:2). and the agony in the garden (Mk 14:33) Moreover in the transfiguration Peter speaks for the other two disciples. (Mk 9:5) Peter confesses Jesus as messiah and then earns Jesus’ ire for trying to dissuade Him from His passion and death. (Mk 8:29, 32) Peter, again as spokesman for the Twelve, presses Jesus to tell them what reward they will get for following Him. (Mk 10:28) Peter calls Jesus’ attention to the withered fig tree. (Mk 11:21) 51. Mark never mentions the first cockcrow. 52. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, I, pp. 589-626; NJBC, 41:100; Mann, op. cit., pp. 269-232; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 332-333; Eta Linemann, “Die Verleugnung des Petrus,” Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche, 63(1966), pp. 1-32.


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Peter, together with James, John, and Andrew, presses Jesus in private to tell them when the Jerusalem temple will meet destruction. With the other disciples, Peter then hears Jesus’ eschatological discourse. (Mk 13:3) Finally, as we have seen, Peter plays an important dramatic role in the passion and is named as the special recipient of the news of Jesus’ resurrection. All this attention to Peter underscores his special relationship to Jesus, his importance in the apostolic church, and his symbolic importance in Mark’s narrative.53 Judas and Peter both function, then, in Mark’s passion narrative as types of the sinful disciple. In both cases, Jesus foresees their sin and continues offering them both His friendship and forgiveness. That Jesus’ love pursues both disciples even in the act of sinning underscores its gratuity. By contrasting the two disciples, Mark makes it clear, however, that the ultimate fate of the fallen disciple results from the way in which each disciple chooses to respond to personal guilt. Judas’s despair ends His relationship with Jesus, while Peter’s repentance prepares him for his eventual encounter with the risen Christ and for his rehabilitation among the disciples.54 What of the other disciples in Mark’s passion narrative? As we have seen, they prepare the passover. They ask Jesus to assure them one by one whether he is not the one to betray Jesus, and receive the eucharist from Him. (Mk 14:12-25) After the eucharist, Jesus predicts that, when He dies, all of them will cease to believe in Him after having abandoned Him. (Mk 14:27; cf. Zech 13:7) Nevertheless, Jesus promises to remain faithful to them and to appear to them in Galilee after He rises from the dead. (Mk 14:28) As Jesus had predicted, the disciples do abandon Him in fear after His arrest. Mark, however, describes their abandonment of Jesus in a way which points to the resurrection and to their eventual rehabilitation. As the disciples flee, the soldiers seize one of Jesus’ followers, an anonymous young man (neaniskos) wearing a linen garment (syndona). The soldiers seize him; but he eludes them by slipping out of the cloth and running away naked. (Mk 14:51-2) In Mark’s passion narrative, the incident at first seems to underscore the soldiers’ violence and brutality; but in fact it foreshadows the encounter between the women who come to anoint Jesus and the young man (neaniskon) wearing a long, white robe (stolen leuken) which recalls Jesus’ garments in the transfiguration. The young man announces Jesus’ 53. Cf. Raymond E. Brown, Karl P. Donfried, and John Reumann, Peter in the New Testament (New York, NY: Paulist, 1973), pp. 57-73; Marcus Ohler, “Der Zweimalige Hahnschrei der Markuspassion: Zur Textüberlieferung von Mk 14, 30. 62. 72,”Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 85(1994), pp. 145-150. 54. Cf. Kelber, ed., op. cit., pp. 96-114.

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resurrection and His immanent appearances to the disciples in Galilee. (Mk 16:5-7) The figure of the young man links the two passages. In the garden the young man escapes Jesus’ enemies leaving behind a linen garment (syndona). Later Joseph of Aramathea will wrap Jesus in the same kind of garment before burying Him. (Mk 15:46) In the encounter with the young man in the tomb, garments recalling Jesus’ transfiguration have replaced the burial cloth. The first young man’s escape in the garden foreshadows the resurrection which the second young man announces.55 After the resurrection, the frustrated enemies of Jesus find themselves left with an empty heap of burial cloth. The women who come to the empty tomb will, moreover, see the young man sitting “on the right side” (Mk 16:5), a position which suggests the position of the glorified Son of Man “sitting at the right hand of power.” One cannot, however, simply identify Mark’s neaniskos with the risen Christ, since the young man announces to the woman that Jesus is not in the tomb. One with the risen Christ but distinct from Him, some interpreters find in the figure of the enigmatic young man a type of the Christian neophyte, stripped and plunged ritually through baptism into the death of Jesus in such a way as to share in Jesus’ glorified, risen life. The fact that Mark names both Simon of Cyrene, who carries Jesus’ cross behind Him to Calvary, and Simon’s two sons, Alexander and Rufus suggests that the Markan community knew all three men. If so, then Simon and his sons probably converted to Christianity. As a consequence, even though Simon performs this service for Jesus under duress, he functions in Mark’s narrative as an ironic type of the true disciple, carrying his cross after Jesus. (Mk 15:21-2, 8:34-8) Simon functions as an ironic symbol of the true disciple because prior to the paschal mystery soldiers had to coerce Him to do something Simon would have presumably chosen freely to do once Jesus had risen and sent the divine Breath. Soldiers, however, also forced the Roman martyrs to their death; and that fact may have caused the Roman community to view Simon’s coercion by the soldiers as simply factual rather than as ironic.56 55. Raymond Brown, in my judgment, misreads this passage with a regrettable literalism. He misses the fact that in Markan symbolism the long white robe (stolên leukên) worn by the young man in the tomb replaces the burial cloth (syndona) which the first young man leaves behind. Garments of glory, reminiscent of the transfiguration, replace the burial cloth. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, I, pp. 300-301; Barbara Saunderson, “Gethsemane: The Missing Witness,” Biblica, 70(1989), pp. 224-233 Howard M Jackson, “Why the youth Shed His cloak and Fled Naked: The Meaning and Purpose of Mark 14:51-52,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 116(1997), pp. 273-289. 56. Brown, in my judgment, misses the irony. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, II, pp.913-917.


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The three women who will discover Jesus’ empty tomb—Mary of Magdala, Mary the mother of James, and Salome—observe Jesus’ death from a distance. (Mk 15:40) Mark, as we have seen, identifies them as disciples (êkolouthoun autô) who took care of Jesus when He was in Galilee. Moreover, together with the three women many other women (allai pollai) witness Jesus’ death from a distance. (Mk 15:41) In all the passion narratives, the women who see Jesus die and watch him buried function primarily as witnesses to the paschal mystery. In Mark, Joseph of Aramathea’s audacious rescue of Jesus’ body marks him as a devout Jew but not necessarily as a disciple. Matthew does call Joseph a disciple (Mt 27:57); and John portrays him as a secret disciple of Jesus. (Jn 19:38) Mark describes Joseph as a man “awaiting the kingdom of God” (Mk 15:43); and Mark’s phrase could suggest that Joseph had in fact endorsed Jesus’ proclamation of the kingdom but without committing himself to open discipleship. Mark, on the other hand, also describes Joseph as a member of the Sanhedrin which had unanimously condemned Jesus. In Mark’s passion narrative, then, Joseph would appear in retrospect to have had second thoughts about his vote. After making sure that Jesus has in fact died, Pilate grants Joseph’s request. Joseph alone buries Jesus’ body and does so in haste because of the close proximity of the sabbath.57 (Mk 15:42-7) The Disciples and the Resurrection Mary of Magdala, Mary the mother of James, and Salome come three days after the crucifixion in order to anoint the body of Jesus. Jesus had died on Friday, the sabbath had followed, and now early Sunday morning the three women come to do for Jesus’ body what they could not do on Friday because of the sabbath’s immanence. (Mk 16:1-2) They find the round stone door to the tomb rolled back and the corpse gone. Within the tomb, however, they encounter the apparition of a young man in a white robe, the young man foreshadowed by the youth who escaped naked from Jesus’ captors. (Mk 14:51-2) His white robe, as we have seen, recalls the dazzling white garments Jesus wore in His transfiguration and thus suggests the young man’s transcendent, quasi-angelic origin. (Mk 9:3) The empty tomb needs an explanation. The young man explains to the women that the body has disappeared because Jesus, the crucified, has risen. He predicts that the risen one will appear to His disciples in Galilee and instructs the woman to carry the message to Peter and the other 57. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, II, p. 1213; “The Burial of Jesus (Mark 15:42-47),” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 50(1988), pp. 233-245; J. Spencer Kennard, Jr, “The Burial of Jesus,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 74(1955), pp. 227-238.

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disciples, “He is going before you to Galilee. There you will see Him, just as He foretold.” (Mk 16:7) Instead of carrying the young man’s message to Simon and the disciples, the women remain silent “because they felt terrified (ephobounto gar).” (Mk 16:1-8) Very likely, Mark expected to startle his readers by the women’s failure to bear witness to the resurrection. In ending his gospel on this ironic note, Mark implicitly called upon the reader to recognize that the resurrection demands open and courageous proclamation, not fearful hiding. Since, moreover, the reader knows that the apostles did indeed proclaim the resurrection, the women’s failure to obey the young man in the tomb could have offered assurance to Mark’s readers that the truth of the gospel will out despite human fear and weakness.58 The young man in the tomb alludes to the resurrection apparitions soon to occur. He reminds the women of Jesus’ triple prediction during the way section of Mark both of His passion and of His resurrection. (Mk 8:31-3, 9:30-1, 10:32-4) The disciples’ reception of the news of Jesus resurrection will begin their rehabilitation in faith which the cure of Bartimaeus and other symbolic healings have foreshadowed. Indeed, throughout Mark’s gospel, people seek Jesus without really understanding His true identity and mission. Only in Galilee will the disciples finally understand, when they encounter the risen Christ.59 (Mk 10:46-52) The redactor who added an ending to Mark’s gospel felt no doubt dissatisfied with the abruptness with which the original gospel closed. The author notes Jesus’ apparition to Mary Magdalene narrated in John 20:11-18 and adds that the disciples did not believe her testimony. (Mk 16:9-10) The author also alludes to the apparition to the two disciples journeying to Emmaeus which Luke describes. (Mk 16:12-3; cf. Lk 24:13-35) Finally, Jesus appears to the Eleven and rebukes their unbelief. Then, in terms reminiscent of Matthew’s gospel (Mt 28:11), the risen Christ sends the disciples to proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. 58. Cf. Gerald O’Collins, “The Fearful Silence of Three Woman (Mark 16:8c), Gregorianum, 69(1988), pp. 489-503; Andrew T. Lincoln, “The Promise and the Failure: Mark 16: 7,8,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 108(1989), pp. 283-300; Claudia Setzer, “Excellent Women: Female Witness to the Resurrection,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 116(1997), pp. 259-272; Paul Danove, “The Women at the Tomb (Mark 15, 40-41. 47; 16, 1-8),” Biblica, 77(1996), pp. 375-397. 59. Cf. NJBC, 41:108; Mann, op. cit., pp. 659-672; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 351-358; L. Legrand, “La finale de Marc comme récit d’annoce?” Estudios Biblicos, 50(1992), pp. 457-468; Collins, The Beginning of the Gospel, pp. 119-148; Andrew T. Lincoln, “The Promise and the Failure: Mark 16:7,8” in The Interpretation of Mark, pp. 229-251; Robert Schlarb, “Die Suche nach dem Messias: zêteo als terminus technicus der markinischen Messianolgie,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 81(1990), pp. 155-170; J. David Hester, “Dramatic Inconclusion: Irony and the Narrative Rhetoric of the Ending of Mark,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 57(1995), pp. 61-86.


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(Mk 16:16) Salvation flows from accepting the message, perdition from rejecting it. (Mk 16:17) Jesus also predicts that signs and wonders will accompany the disciples’ proclamation of the good news. (Mk 16:17-8) Jesus then ascends to the right hand of the Father in heaven, while the disciples do what the women who met the young man in the tomb feared to do: namely, they proclaim the resurrection with the miraculous confirmation which Jesus had foretold.60 (Mk 16:19-20) Christological Knowing Mark describes the relationship of Jesus to His disciples in a manner which challenges the reader to come to terms with any ambivalence he or she may experience in relating to Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Like the disciples, the reader must answer Jesus’ probing question: “Who do you say that I am?” Moreover, Mark in predicting the eventual transformation of the disciples looks to their baptism in the Holy Breath to reveal to them the answer to that question. In Mark the kingdom lies at the heart of Jesus’ message. Life in the kingdom in imitation of Jesus demands practical charity, humility, and mutual service. It precludes any attempt to test God with Pharisaical hypocrisy. It precludes enslavement to disordered passion in the image of Herod. The practical demands of discipleship and of life in the eschatological age describe the way in which Breath baptism assimilates the disciples to Jesus. Jesus begins to instruct the disciples about the demands of discipleship in the sermon on the lake. They must guard against temptations against faith, cultivate a deep and lasting commitment which will sustain them in the face of adversity, avoid worldliness and disordered passions. They must bear fearless witness to the faith, despite the hiddenness of the kingdom, a hiddenness which will in part perdure until the second coming. The disciples must let the message of Jesus take root in generous hearts. The way of discipleship demands total self-effacement and humility. It requires one to walk the way of the cross in eschatological hope The disciples should accept the gospel with the simplicity of small children. In their relationships to one another, the disciples must eschew the pride and power of earthly rulers and treat the least important and most vulnerable like the greatest. They must avoid cliquish pride and remain open to signs of genuine faith even outside their inner circle. They can expect their least act of charity to find a reward from God. They must scrupulously avoid giving scandal to one another. They can expect to experience growth in holiness as purification. In the last age of salvation, husbands and wives must both live in lifelong mutual fidelity. Leaders 60. Cf. NJBC, 41:109; Mann, op. cit., pp. 672-679; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 358-362.

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especially must take Jesus’ own service as their model. Jesus, of course, lays down His life in service for those He has called. Despite their sinfulness, the disciples must exhibit absolute faith in the Father’s power to save them and raise them from the dead. As they wait for Jesus’ return, the disciples should guard against the deceptions of false prophets and false messiahs. They need to avoid setting time tables for the second coming, which lies in the indeterminate future. They can expect catastrophes and persecutions before Jesus comes again; but they can also expect the Holy Breath to inspire their courageous testimony to Him. For Mark Christological knowing has a eucharistic, ecclesial character. It teaches one to confess the divinity of Jesus; but even more it conforms one practically to Him in a converting community of eucharistic faith. The life of discipleship demands a deep and solid faith commitment which Satan and human weakness can erode. Practical, moral conformity to Jesus demands absolute obedience to His teachings in submission to the Father. Practical, moral conformity to Jesus also draws one inevitably into conflict with the same forces of evil as sought to destroy Him. In Mark faith in the paschal mystery demands a radical commitment: the willingness to follow Jesus on the way which leads to the cross. Those, like Peter, who deny Jesus under threat of torture and of death will, however, find forgiveness, if, also like Peter, they repent. I have reflected in this chapter and in the two preceding ones on the three kinds of dramatic linkages which endow Mark’s gospel with its basic narrative structure. The evangelist, however, embellishes these dramatic linkages with thematic and allusive ones. The following chapter examines how Mark does this.

Chapter 5: Thematic and Allusive Linkages in Mark

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Chapter 5 Thematic and Allusive Linkages in Mark This chapter examines three kinds of thematic linkages: Jesus’ teachings, His miracles, and His messianic secret. Each serves a different narrative purpose. The teachings of Jesus provide norms against which ambivalent disciples may measure their personal and corporate response to Jesus. The miracles serve primarily a revelatory function in Mark: they disclose different aspects of the mystery of the kingdom which Jesus embodies. Among its narrative purposes, the messianic secret keeps Mark’s narrative focused on the paschal mystery as the event which ultimately discloses Jesus’ true identity. After developing these thematic linkages I shall examine how Mark uses literary allusion in order to develop the Christological message of His gospel. This chapter divides, then, into four parts. Part one meditates on Jesus’ teachings. Part two examines His miracles and exorcisms. Part three meditates on the messianic secret. Part four traces Mark’s allusive linkages. (I) Mark stresses the distinctive way in which Jesus taught. Instead of playing off the opinions of famous rabbis against one another, Jesus, in contrast to the scribal teachers of His day, spoke with an authority which flowed from His messianic anointing by the divine Breath.1 (Mk 1:9-11, 20) In this section I shall first examine Mark’s summary of Jesus’ message. Then I shall analyze the two discourses in Mark’s gospel. After that I shall summarize Jesus’ teachings in the bread and way sections of Mark and in pronouncement stories scattered throughout the gospel. Although Mark prefers to allow the symbolic significance of the events of Jesus’ life to disclose His identity to the reader, the evangelist also shows a care to preserve Jesus’ basic teachings. As we have seen, Mark puts four key ideas at the heart of Jesus’ message: 1) the approach of the end time, 2) the need for repentance, 3) the arrival of God’s reign in Jesus’ person and ministry, and 4) the need to accept the kingdom in faith. (Mk 1:15) These four themes, moreover, all imply one another. The arrival of the kingdom marks the beginning of the end time and calls for a faith which springs from repentance. It characterizes Mark’s narrative style to portray Jesus preaching without telling you what He said. (Mk 1:22, 39, 2:13, 3:9, 33-4, 6:2, 34) 1. Cf. Richard J. Dillon, “’As One Having Authority’ (Mark 1:22): The Controversial Distinction of Jesus’ Teaching,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 57(1995), pp. 92-113.

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Mark, however, does collect sayings of Jesus into two formal discourses: the sermon in parables on the lake (Mk 4:1-34) and the eschatological discourse.2 (Mk 13:5-37). The Sermon on the Lake The parabolic discourse on the lake performs in Mark an analogous function to that which the sermon on the mount does in Matthew: viz., it announces the mystery of the kingdom in an initial formal discourse. As we have seen, it fits Mark’s sense of the gospel as a secret wisdom accessible to faith-filled insiders. Jesus announces that wisdom in cryptic parables.3 The sermon on the lake begins the fourth chapter of Mark. Verses one and two describe the setting of the sermon. Verses three through nine recount the parable of the astonishing harvest. In verses ten through twelve, Jesus instructs the disciples privately about why He speaks in parables. In verses thirteen through twenty Mark applies the parable of the astonishing harvest allegorically to the disciples. Verses twenty-one through twenty-five contain proverbs directed to the disciples. Verses twenty-six through thirty two contain two seed parables. Verses thirty-three and thirty-four conclude the discourse with the evangelist’s explanation of why Jesus spoke in parables. Both the sermon on the lake and the eschatological discourse in Mark exhibit a chiastic structure. In the sermon on the lake, the introduction (vv.1-2) corresponds to the evangelist’s concluding reflections on the parables (vv.33-34). The parable of the astonishing harvest (vv.3-9), which describes the scattering of seed, corresponds to the two seed parables at the end of the discourse (vv. 26-32). Jesus’ private explanation to the disciples of why He speaks in parables (vv. 10-12) corresponds to the two proverbs which He directs especially to the disciples (vv. 21-25). That puts the Markan allegory on discipleship at the heart of the discourse.4 (vv. 13-20). For Mark, then, obedience to the demands of discipleship lies at the heart of the mystery of the kingdom. As we have seen, Mark’s allegory on the astonishing harvest summons the disciples to hold fast to the faith despite any tests to which Satan might put them. As we have also seen, in Mark Satan finds incarnation in Rome and in its legions. The disciples must let the kingdom strike deep roots in their hearts lest they fall away during times of persecution. They must renounce riches and all disordered passions. Finally, they must respond to the kingdom with generous hearts.5 2. Cf. NJBC, 41:6; Dunn, op. cit., pp. 204-207; MWBC, I, pp. 40-46; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 83-86. 3. Cf. C.H. Dodd, The Parables of the Kingdom (London: Nisbet & Co. Ltd., 1936). 4. Cf. Donahue, The Gospel in Parable, pp. 28-32. 5. Cf. C.M. Tuckett, “Mark’s Concerns in the Parables Chapter (Mark 4, 1-34), Biblica, 69(1988), pp. 1-26; Gerhard Dautzenberg, “Mk 4,1-34 als Belehrung über das Reich


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The parable of the astonishing harvest, which we have considered elsewhere, predicts that the kingdom which Jesus proclaims and embodies will one day bear astonishingly abundant fruit. (Mk 4:1-9) It corresponds to the two seed parables at the end of the sermon on the lake. The parable of the mustard seed, the first of the two seed parables, makes an analogous point. Like the tiny mustard seed which grows into the greatest of the trees, the kingdom will grow from its humble origins in Jesus’ ministry into a great and welcoming reality. Since, however, the mustard seed encroached on other plants, the image of the full-grown mustard tree attracting seed-eating birds into the garden has subversive connotations. Though unwelcome to some, the kingdom will eventually take over the whole garden. As we have seen, the proverb about the lamp, which Mark addresses especially to the disciples, portrays the reign of God as an illumination which demands public proclamation, even though its full disclosure must await the final judgment when all hidden things will finally come to light. (Mk 4:21-3) The kingdom, therefore, has an inherently eschatological character: manifest, yet hidden, present, yet still to come. The second seed parable makes an analogous point. The kingdom spreads secretly, mysteriously, spontaneously, the way crops grow and invisibly ripen night and day whether the farmer who sowed them sleeps or wakes. The spontaneous growth of the seed also portrays the kingdom as ultimately God’s work. The farmer sows but cannot make the seeds or plants grow. Moreover, only when the kingdom has finished growing will the time of reaping arrive. (Mk 4:26-9) The evangelist probably wants the reader to see in the harvest an image of the final judgment. If so, then one could conceivably see in the end of the parable a reminder to believers to bring forth fruit. In insisting that one must wait for the harvest, Mark would also probably be warning against any prophesies of an immanent parousia.6 Gottes: Beobachtungen zum Gelichniskapitel,” Biblische Zeitschrift, 34(1990), pp. 38-62; Greg Fay, “Introduction to Incomprehension: The Literary Structure of Mark 4: 1-34,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 51(1989), pp. 65-80; Philip Sellew, “Composition of Didactic Scene in Mark’s Gospel,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 108(1984), pp, 613-634; “Oral and Written Sources in Mark 4.1-34,” New Testament Studies, 36(1990), pp. 234-267; Marie Sabin, “Reading Mark 4 as Midrash,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 45(1992), pp. 3-26; Derrett, The Making of Mark, pp. 9-75. 6. Cf. Donahue, The Gospel in Parable, pp. 34-39; NJBC, 41:24-32; Mann, op. cit., pp. 260- 276; MWBC, I, pp. 189-259; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 125-141; Waetjen, op. cit., pp. 108; J. Duncan M. Derrett, “Ambivalence: Sowing and Reaping in Mark 4,26-29,” Estudios Biblicos, 48(1990), pp. 489-510; Gerd Thiessen, “Der Bauer und die von selbst Frucht bringende Erd: Naiver Synergismus in Mk 4, 26-29,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 85(1994), pp. 167-182.

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The Eschatological Discourse The eschatological discourse begins chapter thirteen in Mark. Like the sermon on the lake, it has a chiastic structure. In verses one through three, Peter, James, John, and Andrew ask about the date of the destruction of the Jerusalem temple and about the signs which will accompany it. In verses twenty-eight through thirty-seven, Jesus answers the question about the date: no one knows when Jerusalem will fall or when the second coming will happen. Verses five through thirteen describe the tribulations of the end time, the “birth pangs of the messiah.” Verses twenty-one through twenty-seven describe the second coming which terminates the “birth pangs.” At the heart of the eschatological discourse, in verses fourteen through twenty-three, Mark situates Jesus’ prophecy of the destruction of Jerusalem. Since I have already analyzed the eschatological discourse in some detail in the preceding chapter, here it suffices to summarize its chief lessons about life in the end time. 1) Before the second coming happens, all nations must have the opportunity to hear the gospel and to respond to it. (Mk 24:14) 2) In the meantime, false prophets and false messiahs will appear who even lay claim to the divine name. (Mk 24:5) 3) During the birth pangs of the messiah, the disciples will experience war, famine, and cataclysm. They will know persecution, hatred, and martyrdom. They will witness the increase of lawlessness and the waning of love. (Mk 24:6-13) 4) Caligula’s attempt to erect his statue in the Jerusalem temple means that its destruction and that of the city is approaching. Christians should, then, flee the city at the first sign of approaching calamity. 5) The disciples should give no credence to false prophets who claim to know when the messiah shall return. (Mk 24:23-28) 6) Accompanied by cataclysmic, apocalyptic signs of God’s approach, the second coming will, when it happens, terminate the birth pangs of the messiah. Jesus will return as Lord of the angels in order to vanquish the powers and reveal His glory. Then He will gather the disciples to Himself from the four corners of the earth.7 (Mk 24:29-31) I have summarized the two discourses in Mark. The bread section of Mark enunciates the conditions for sharing in eucharistic worship. The way section summarizes major conditions for a life of discipleship. In addition one finds other teachings of Jesus scattered throughout Mark’s gospel. Let us reflect on each set of teachings in turn. 7. Cf. NJBC, 41:83-88; A. Feuillet, “Le discours de Jésus sur la ruine du temple,” Revue Biblique, 55(1948), pp. 481-482; 52(1949), pp. 61-92; Collins, The Beginning of the Gospel, pp. 73-91.


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The Bread of Wisdom and the Way of Jesus In the bread section of his gospel, as we have seen, Mark demands faith in Jesus’ divinity as a precondition for eucharistic worship. In addition, Mark’s Jesus requires that those who share in the eucharist renounce “the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod.” (Mk 8:15) In so speaking, Mark’s Jesus exacts the rejection of self-righteous legalism, judgmentalism, and unbelief. He also calls for the willingness to live by the deep intent of the Law instead of substituting mere human customs for the commands of God. He repudiates any inclination to test God. Finally, He demands the rejection of religious superstition, violence of heart, sensuality, greed, oppression, and disordered passion. Moreover, as we have also seen, only those who believe in Jesus’ divinity and who renounce the leaven of the Pharisees and of Herod understand about the multiplication of the loaves. Only they, in other words, have the quality of faith which eucharistic worship demands. Clearly, for Mark, eucharistic faith has an inherently practical character. The way section of Mark begins with Jesus’ first prophecy of the passion. (Mk 8:31-33) The other two prophecies of the passion divide the way section into three parts. (Mk 9:30-32, 10:32-34) Since I have already commented in some detail on Jesus’ teachings in the way section, once again it suffices to summarize the lessons which the disciples must learn. In the first part of the way section, the disciples learn the following lessons: 1) Those who follow Jesus must live in readiness to walk the way to the cross. Far from feeling ashamed of the cross, the disciples of Jesus must see in it the ultimate path to self-preservation and salvation. (Mk 8:34-8) 2) The disciples must recognize that Jesus, as God’s beloved Son, speaks with a divine authority which exceeds that of the Law and the prophets. His glorification reveals His transcendent origin and foreshadows the glorification of those who suffer with Him. (Mk 9:1-13) 3) The disciples must recognize Jesus’ victory over Satan, that He imparts risen life which empowers one to hear and proclaim the gospel. In order to share in His victory over the evil one, however, the disciples must renounce self-reliance and root themselves solidly in prayer. (Mk 9:14-29) The second part of the way section paints for the disciples a portrait of an ideal community of faith. That portrait contains the following lessons: 4) The disciples must renounce all ambition and competitiveness. Instead, they must learn to embrace smallness and vulnerability and to welcome the weakest and most vulnerable as they would welcome Jesus Himself. (Mk 9:33-37) 5) The community of Jesus must eschew all cliquishness and must honor signs of genuine faith even in those who do not belong to it. (Mk 9:38-40) 6) In Jesus’ community, the smallest act of kindness will find its reward. (Mk 12:38-40)

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7) Each disciple must scrupulously avoid sin and its occasions. Moreover, mutual charity requires that the disciples never cause another disciple to sin. (Mk 9:42-50) 8) Membership in the kingdom subjects one to the purifying fire of divine holiness. (Mk 9:49) 9) The community of the kingdom seeks to impregnate others with the salt of divine wisdom. The community can do that only if it embodies that wisdom. (Mk 9:50) 10) The community of the kingdom lives in peace and hospitable fellowship. (Mk 9:50) 11) Membership in the eschatological community which the kingdom creates requires life-long fidelity of spouses, in obedience to God’s original intent in creating marriage. (Mk 10:1-12) 12) The community of disciples must welcome even small children. (Mk 10:13-16) 13) Discipleship requires that one renounce one’s possessions, give them to the poor, and follow Jesus as members of God’s persecuted family, confident of the rewards of membership both in this life and in the next. The disciples must, moreover, also trust God’s power to save anyone, even the rich. (Mk 10:17-31) In the third part of the way section, Jesus teaches two major lessons to the leaders in the new Israel. 14) The Father alone decides one’s ultimate status in the kingdom, even in the case of those who give their lives for it. (Mk 10:35-40) 15) The leaders of the community must renounce the coercive power and violence of secular rulers and serve all others in the image of Jesus the servant messiah.8 (Mk 10:41-45) Scattered Teachings Other sayings of Jesus scattered throughout the gospel call attention to other aspects of life in the kingdom: 1) Jesus in announcing the kingdom simultaneously proclaims the forgiveness of sins and demands faith that He has divine power to forgive them. (Mk 2:1-12) He also claims authority over the sabbath. (Mk 2:23-8) 2) Like Jesus, the disciples rightly imitate His table fellowship with sinners, which provides a prototype of the eucharist. (Mk 2:15-7) 3) The disciples must share the blessings of this life with the poor, the outcast, and the marginal. Moreover, the breaking down of social barriers which the kingdom requires expresses its eschatological novelty. (Mk 2:21-2) 4) The disciples of Jesus must recognize the superficiality of ritual uncleanness and that only the evil intentions of the human heart render one unclean. (Mk 7:17-23) 8. Cf. NJBC, 41:56-58; Mann, op. cit., pp. 342-420; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 215-259.


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5) Life in the kingdom demands that its members live united as God’s family and that they relate to one another as God’s children living in Jesus’ image. Jesus’ obedience to the Father, therefore, provides the pattern according to which those who enter the kingdom must live. (Mk 3:33-5, 10:45) 6) Membership in the kingdom also sets one in opposition to any form of hypocritical piety which would teach one to pray long prayers while oppressing the poor. (Mk 13:38-44) 7) Jesus recognizes the legitimate claims which secular authority makes on its subjects at the same time that He deplores the coercive use of secular power. Jesus demands that obedience to God and therefore to the reign of God comes first. That obedience demands that one reverence the image of God in other persons. (Mk 10:41-5, 12:13-7) 8) Finally, while the two great commandments stand at the head of the Law—total, all-consuming love of God and love of neighbor—the disciples of Jesus must interpret the meaning of those commandments in the light of His proclamation of the kingdom. (Mk 12:26-34) In other words, the moral demands of discipleship define the meaning of Christian love.9 Christological Knowing In Mark, as we have seen, discipleship assimilates the baptized Christian to Jesus in the power of His Breath. The teachings of Mark’s Jesus explain the practical meaning of discipleship. In other words, they provide a practical program for growing in what I have called Christological knowing. The disciples will come to know Jesus by allowing His sanctifying Breath to teach them to embody the same religious vision which He lived and proclaimed. This section has examined the first set of thematic linkages which embellish Mark’s narrative: Jesus’ teachings. The section which follows ponders the second set of thematic linkages: namely, Jesus’ miracles. (II) The miracles and exorcisms of Jesus all play a revelatory function in Mark’s gospel. They disclose different aspects of Jesus’ person and of the kingdom which He proclaims.10 9. Cf. Rolf Busemann, Die Jüngergeneinde nach Markus 10 (Bonn: Verlag Peter Vanstein, 1983); Willem S. Vorster, “Literary Reflections on Mark 13:5-37: A Narrated Speech of Jesus” in The Interpretation of Mark, pp. 269-288. 10. Cf. L. Shenke, Die Wunderzälungen des Markusevangelium (Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1974); George Aichele, Jr. “Biblical Miracle Narratives as Fantasy,” Anglican Theological Review, 73(1991), pp. 51-58; Reinhold Schmücker, “Zur Function der Wundergeschichten im Markusevangelium,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 84(1993), pp. 1-26.

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Wonders and Exorcisms As we have already seen, the exorcism in the synagogue at Capernaum parallels Jesus’ confrontation with Satan in the desert. (Mk 1:12, 21-28) It inaugurates a series of such confrontations between Jesus and demons. Those confrontations highlight the final, eschatological struggle between God and evil which Jesus’ ministry inaugurates. Moreover, the disciples by sharing in Jesus’ mission find themselves drawn into the same eschatological conflict. (Mk 1:32, 34, 39, 3:15, 5:1-20, 6:13, 7:26-9, 9:38, 16:9) Mark links Jesus’ exorcisms symbolically and dramatically by often making the demons behave in ways which recall Jesus’ first exorcism. Like the demon in the synagogue, they recognize Jesus, who silences them and forbids them to reveal His identity as messiah. (Mk 1:24-5, 34, 3:11-2, 5:7-9) Jesus’ power to exorcise also reveals dramatically the divine, Breath-inspired character of the authority with which He preaches.11 (Mk 1:22; cf. Mk 2:22-30) Jesus’ miracles also point symbolically to the full scope of His divine authority (exousia): in virtue of that authority Jesus even has divine power to impart risen life. Jesus raises three people in Mark’s gospel: Peter’s mother-in-law, the daughter of Jairus, and the epileptic demoniac boy. Each raising discloses a different facet of the risen life which Jesus imparts. Like the epileptic demoniac boy, those whom Jesus raises He delivers from the power of Satan and empowers to hear and to proclaim the gospel. (Mk 9:25-27) Like Peter’s mother-in-law, those whom Jesus raises from the dead He empowers to serve both Himself and others. (Mk 1:30-31) The raising of the daughter of Jairus demands more detailed commentary.12 The cure of the woman defiled by a flux of blood parallels the raising of the daughter of Jairus. The woman had suffered from the flux of blood for twelve years (Mk 5:25), Jairus’s daughter died at the age of twelve. (Mk 5:42). The number twelve recalls both the number of the tribes of Israel and the Twelve who symbolize the new Israel which Jesus founds. The number provides, therefore, an important symbolic key to the story’s meaning. The two women symbolize Israel: the older woman symbolizes the first Israel and life under the Law, while the younger woman, whom Jesus raises from the dead, symbolizes the new Israel which Jesus is bringing into existence. Jesus heals the older woman from a disease which makes her legally impure. Jesus raises Jairus’s daughter from death to life. As symbolic embodiments of the old and new Israel, the two women symbolize Jesus’ 11. Cf. Meier, A Marginal Jew, II, pp. 648-650; NJBC, 41:9; Mann, op. cit., pp. 210-214; MWBC, I, pp. 53-60; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 88-92. 12. Cf. NJBC, 41:10; Mann, op. cit., pp.214-220; MWBC, I, pp. 60-70; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 92-95.


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relationship to the two covenants: He frees people from the bondage of the Law by establishing the new covenant. He establishes the new covenant by communicating His own risen life to others. The kind of liberation which Jesus effects in healing the older woman also makes a statement about the social status of women in the new Israel. Lev 15:25-27 proscribed all menstruating women as unclean. The “flux of blood” which the elderly woman experienced involved, then, more than just a physical disorder. It also left the woman socially ostracized. She defiled any person or thing she touched. Moreover, her very femininity caused her defilement. It made her ashamed of herself as a woman, ashamed even to touch another person publicly, as Mark’s story makes clear. (Mk 5:27) Her shame and social disgrace also explain her reluctance to confess publicly that she has violated a legal taboo and touched Jesus. (Mk 5:33) In healing the older woman, Jesus frees her from the social ostracism and from the defilement which the Law prescribed for menstruating women. Jesus also heals the woman in her wounded femininity and in the shame which she feels. That healing happens when she testifies publicly to her healing. In narrating the story of the older woman’s healing, therefore, Mark seems to suggest not only that Jesus has come to free people from the burden of the Law but also that He has come especially to free women from the kinds of social ostracism which the Law imposed upon them. If the healing of the older woman symbolizes the way in which Jesus relates to the old covenant, the raising of the daughter of Jairus symbolizes the way in which He establishes the new covenant. Mark links the raising of Jairus’s daughter to the paschal mystery in two ways. 1) He makes Peter, James, and John its privileged witness. They will accompany Jesus in His agony at Gethsemane and will receive a privileged revelation of His glory in the transfiguration. (Mk 9:2, 14:33) The transfiguration, of course, foreshadows the resurrection. (Mk 13:3-5) With Andrew, Peter, James, and John occasion the eschatological discourse and, as disciples, learn about life in the end time which the paschal mystery begins and the second coming ends. (Mk 13:3) 2) After raising the young girl to life, Jesus tells those present to give her something to eat. (Mk 5:43) Jesus will give the same command to His disciples in Mark’s account of the first miracle of the loaves. (Mk 6:37) As we have seen, that miracle of multiplication, like the second miracle of the loaves, foreshadows the eucharist. The eucharist, which introduces Mark’s passion narrative, interprets the meaning of the paschal mystery. In other words, the feeding of the young girl links her rising from the dead to both the eucharist and the paschal mystery. The miracle

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therefore transforms her into a personal symbol of those who through their share in the eucharist possess risen life.13 Jesus’ miracles reveal His eschatological authority as Son of Man to forgive sins, and they vindicate His right as Lord of the sabbath to heal on that day. (Mk 2:1-12. 3:1-6) Jesus’ cosmological miracles disclose the ultimate source of His divine authority: viz., that He bears the divine name and speaks as God. (Mk 4:35-41, 6:45-52) Some of Jesus’ miracles and exorcisms forecast the narrative future in Mark. As we have seen, Jesus’ cure of the leper at the beginning of His ministry causes Him and the leper to change places, a transformation which foreshadows His growing marginalization and His ultimate rejection by His people. (Mk 1:40-5) Jesus’ persistence in healing on the sabbath consolidates the enmity of the Pharisees and Herodians against Him and begins the plots against His life. (Mk 3:1-6) Taken together, the first calming of the storm, the deliverance of the Gerasene demoniac, and the self-destruction of the demons in the waters of chaos over which Jesus has just exercised divine authority all foreshadow His ultimate and decisive victory over the powers of Satan and of evil. (Mk 4:35-5:20) As we have also seen, in naming the Gerasene demon “Legion,” Mark also predicts Jesus’ victory over the Roman empire and the oppressive secular institutions which it symbolizes. Similarly, the faith of the Syro-Phoenician woman which mollifies Jesus and leads Him to exorcise her daughter at a distance foreshadows the faith of Gentile Christians. In a competitive exchange of proverbs between two peasants, the woman bests Jesus and by her persistent faith in Him persuades Him to do the exorcism. In a sense, then, the exorcism also foreshadows the second miracle of the loaves, which symbolically extends the eucharist to include the Gentiles as well as Jews.14 (Mk 6:24-30, 8:1-10) The cursing of the fig tree during Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry dramatizes the barrenness and faithlessness of the temple priesthood and implicitly of all those who refuse to put their faith in Jesus. It therefore foreshadows Jesus final and decisive rejection by His people. (Mk 11:12-4, 20-22) As Mark structures his gospel narrative, the two miracles of the loaves function as the culminating miracles of Jesus’ Galilean ministry. We shall examine this point more closely when we explore Mark’s use of allusive linkages. Here it suffices to note that these miracles and the events in the 13. Cf. NJBC, 41:36; Mann, op. cit., pp. 281-286; MWBC, I, pp. 289-305. 14. Cf. Francis Dufton, “The Syrophonoecian Woman and her Dogs,” Expository Times, 100(1988-1989), p. 417; David Rhoads, “Jesus and the Syrophonoecian Woman in Mark,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 62(1994), pp. 343-375; Burkill, New Light on the Earliest Gospel, pp. 48-120; William Loader, “Challenged at the Boundaries: A Conservative Jesus in Mark’s Tradition,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 63(1966), pp. 45-61.


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bread section of Mark all foreshadow the last supper, the paschal mystery, and the Christian eucharist. (Mk 6:30-8:21) As we also saw in considering Jesus’ relationship to His disciples, many miracles of healing in Mark portend the transformation which Breath-baptism will effect in the disciples. The healing of the deaf and dumb man foreshadows Jesus’ ability to empower the disciples to hear the gospel and to loose their tongues so that they may proclaim the gospel. (Mk 8:31-7) Mark underscores the symbolic character of this miracle by calling the demon who inhabits the epileptic demoniac boy deaf and dumb. (Mk 9:14-26) In the boy’s case, as we have seen, his deliverance from deafness and dumbness results from relaease from bondage to Satan and from his being symbolically raised up by Jesus and given a share in risen life. (Mk 9:26-9) The progressive healing of the blind man at Bethsaida precedes Peter’s profession of faith and foreshadows the progressive healing of his blindness and that of the other disciples. (Mk 8:22-30) Finally, the healing of blind Bartimaeus at Jericho foreshadows that those to whom the risen Christ will impart the light of faith will have the courage to follow Him “on the way,” all the way to Jerusalem and to Calvary.15 (Mk 10:46-52) Christological Knowing The miracle and exorcism stories advance Christological knowing in two ways. 1) The exorcisms and cosmological miracles which reveal Jesus’ divinity clarify the reality to which Christological knowing assimilates one. 2) The miracle stories which foreshadow the state of the disciples after Jesus baptizes them with a sanctifying Breath throw light on the transforming power of Christological knowing. I have considered the first two sets of thematic linkages in Mark. We have yet to consider the third: Jesus’ messianic secret. Among other narrative purposes, it keeps Mark’s narrative focused on the paschal mystery. To this third and final thematic link I turn in the section which follows. (III) Mark introduces the theme of the messianic secret implicitly in his account of Jesus’ baptism. After receiving John’s baptism, Jesus experiences His messianic commissioning; but He and He alone witnesses the rending of the heavens and the descent of the Breath under the sign of the dove. He and He alone hears the Father commission Him as Son of God, as messiah in the image of the suffering servant, and as the beginning of a new Israel. (Mk 1:9-11) After His baptism, then, among humans, Jesus alone knows the messianic secret. 15. Cf. NJBC, 41:68; Mann, op. cit., pp. 420-430; Anderson, op. cit., pp. 258-259; L. Shenke, op. cit.

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The theme of the messianic secret serves three narrative purposes in Mark. First, it makes a statement about the gradual, sacramental character of Jesus’ revelation as messiah and Breath-baptizer. Second, it keeps Mark’s narrative focused on the paschal mystery. At the same time, the messianic secret makes the reality which Easter will disclose already but obscurely present and active in Jesus during His ministry. In this sense, the messianic secret asserts a realized eschatology. Third, the messianic secret keeps reminding the reader that, like the demons and Jesus, those who have faith already know the secret. Moreover, in contrast to the obtuse disciples prior to their baptism in Jesus’ Breath, the reader grasps the deeper religious implications of the secret. The theme of the messianic secret also accords well with Mark’s sense of the gospel as a secret wisdom reserved for believers.16 With the exorcism at Capernaum which follows the call of the first disciples, the secret begins to slip out. The demon recognizes Jesus and gives Him the messianic title “Holy one of God.” (Mk 1:24) Jesus, however, on this occasion as on others, muzzles the demon and forbids the dark powers to reveal His messianic identity. (Mk 1:34, 5:7-13) After healing the leper, Jesus also forbids him to disclose the identity of the one who healed him. The healed leper disobeys, however, and the secret spreads. (Mk 1:43-5) Jesus tries to keep other cures secret. He orders the cure of the deaf and dumb man kept hidden. (Mk 8:36-7) Jesus orders the witnesses of the raising of the daughter of Jairus to tell no one about the event. (Mk 5:42) Jesus also forbids the blind man whom He heals at Bethsaida to return to the village, apparently in order to keep the healing a secret. (Mk 8:26) After Peter confesses Jesus’ messianic dignity, Jesus forbids the disciples to disclose it to anyone. (Mk 8:30) Moreover, after the Father testifies to Jesus on the mount of the transfiguration, Jesus warns Peter, James, and John to say nothing of what they have witnessed until He rises from the dead. (Mk 9:2-9) Mark intertwines with the theme of the messianic secret two other theological themes: 1) Jesus’ gradual revelation as suffering servant through His progressive marginalization, His final rejection, and His crucifixion and 2) Jesus’ gradual revelation as true messiah and Breath-baptizer, obscurely at first during His ministry but clearly and decisively in His resurrection. Together, these other two themes clarify the meaning of the messianic secret. 16. For a survey of scholarly debate about the messianic secret, see: James L. Blevins, The Messianic Secret in Markan Research (Washington, D.C.: University Press of America, 1981), See also: John G. Cook, The Structure and Persuasive Power of Mark (Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1995); Philip G. Davis, “Mark’s Christological Paradox,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 35(1989), pp. 3-18; T.A. Burkill, Mysterious Revelation: An Examination of the Philosophy of Mark’s Gospel (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1963).


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As we have seen, the healing of the leper introduces the theme of Jesus’ margenalization: Jesus’ healing of the leper causes them to trade places and symbolically transforms Jesus into a leper, an outcast. (Mk 1:40-5) Margenalization begins immediately in a series of conflict stories between Jesus, on the one hand, and the scribes and Pharisees on the other. The stories culminate in an alliance between the Pharisees and the Herodians to destroy Jesus. (Mk 2:1-3:6; Mk 2:21) Jesus’ own relatives soon join the scribes and Pharisees in rejecting Him. They regard Him as a lunatic; and Mark underscores the fact that they have joined the adversaries of Jesus by inserting the controversy over Beelzebul between the relatives’ initial decision to restrain Jesus and their actual confrontation with Him. In the controversy over Beelzebul, of course, scribes from Jerusalem commit the sin against the Holy Breath by accusing Jesus of casting out demons in the power of Beelzebul. This narrative triptych places Jesus’ relatives on the side of the enemy in virtue of their unbelief. The controversy over Beelzebul also makes it clear that enmity toward Jesus not only exists in Galilee but also emanates from Jerusalem. (Mk 3:20-35) In the bread section of Mark, the conflict with the Pharisees intensifies. (Mk 7:1-13, 11-13) The bread section also begins the conflict between Jesus and His own disciples, whose unbelief now parallels the obtuseness of His enemies. (Mk 8:18-21) The conflict with the disciples worsens when Jesus calls Peter Satan. (Mk 8:31-3) The confrontation continues when the disciples drive Jesus to exasperation by their self-reliant efforts to exorcise the epileptic demoniac boy (Mk 9:17-9), when they squabble among themselves about which of them is the greatest (Mk 9:34-5), and when the ambitious James and John try to outmaneuver the rest of the Twelve by securing for themselves the places of highest honor in the kingdom. (Mk 10:35-40) Jesus’ three predictions of His own passion set the stage for His ultimate rejection by the temple priests and Jerusalem scribes. (Mk 8:31-3, 9:30-1, 10:32-4) The conflict with the temple priests culminates, of course, in the tragic events of the passion: in Jesus’ trial before the Sanhedrin and condemnation for blasphemy (Mk 14:53-65), in His condemnation by Pilate (Mk 15:15), in His scourging and mockery by the Roman soldiers (Mk 15:16-20), and in His crucifixion. (Mk 15:29-32) Jesus becomes the suffering servant of God by dying the death of the innocent poor man, in utter solitude, abandoned by all but God. That fact goes lost on the bystanders, who with apparent malice mock His praying of Ps 22 in Aramaic as a futile call to Elijah to come deliver Him. (Mk 15:35-7) Jesus dies with a loud cry which gives voice to the violence of His eschatological struggle with evil. (Mk 15:37) Mark immediately reminds

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the reader, however, that His very death marks the end of the old covenant and the beginning of the new. The darkness which lies over the land of Israel symbolizes God’s judgment upon the rejection of His messiah. (Amos 8:9) As Jesus dies, the temple veil which shields the Holy of Holies from profane eyes splits from top to bottom. The rent symbolizes God’s voiding of the covenant with the first Israel and the temple’s immanent destruction. (Mk 15:38) Moreover, the centurion’s testimony, “Surely, this was the Son of God,” echoes the first verse of Mark’s gospel and foreshadows the faith which the apostolic Church’s Gentile mission will evoke. (Mk 15:39) One grasps only half the messianic secret, however, in learning of Jesus’ transformation into the suffering servant through marginalization and rejection; for Mark interweaves with the story of Jesus’ tragedy the story of His gradual but steady manifestation as messiah, Son of God, Breath-baptizer, and beginning of a new Israel. Jesus’ manifestation begins with the prophecy of John the Baptizer who proclaims Him the mightier one who will one day baptize with a sanctifying Breath. (Mk 1:7-8) Jesus’ baptism and initial conflict with Satan in the desert apparently discloses His identity to Satan and His minions. (Mk 1:12-3, 23-5, 34, 39) Moreover, through His ministry of proclamation, His exorcisms, and miracles, Jesus gradually discloses Himself to more and more people: first to the disciples, then to the people of Capernaum, then to people throughout Galilee. (Mk 1:16-39) Finally, after the leper refuses to remain silent about who cured him, Jesus finds Himself mobbed. (Mk 1:16) People stream to Jesus from further and further distances (Jerusalem, Idumaea, Transjordania, Tyre, and Sidon) and in such numbers that He must teach them from a boat in order to escape mobbing by them. (Mk 3:7-12, 4:1) Such crowds follow Him that He and the disciples have no time even to eat. (Mk 3:20) As Jesus’ attracts more and more notice, He involves the disciples in His mission. First, He calls the Twelve as the foundation of the new Israel He is bringing into being. (Mk 3:13-19) Later in His ministry He sends them to preach repentance and to exorcise. (Mk 6:7-13) The return of the Twelve from a successful ministry inaugurates the bread section of Mark which foreshadows the Christian eucharistic community. (Mk 6:30-1) The testimonies to Jesus which punctuate Mark’s gospel also reveal progressively His true identity. The testimony of John the Baptizer had begun Jesus’ public manifestation as Messiah, Breath-baptizer, and beginning of a new Israel. Peter’s confession of Jesus as messiah reveals to His intimate disciples the true scope of Jesus’ mission, although the disciples do not yet understand that as messiah Jesus must suffer and die. (Mk 8:27-33) The Father at the beginning of the way section testifies to Peter,


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James, and John that Jesus is indeed His beloved Son who speaks with a greater authority than the Law and the prophets. Moreover, the Father orders the three disciples (and implicitly anyone who seeks to walk the path of discipleship) to obey Jesus and what He teaches. (Mk 9:1-8) Finally, Jesus testifies to Himself during His trial before the Sanhedrin. He implicitly invokes to divine name and portrays Himself as the Son of Man, the One who blends both divinity and humanity in His person and as the one whom God has appointed to pass final judgment upon the world. (Mk 14:62-3) Even during Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry and passion, the messianic secret manifests itself with greater and greater clarity. Jesus’ anointing at Bethany foreshadows His death but it also discloses His messianic dignity, since the woman anoints His head in a gesture which proclaims His royal dignity. (Mk 14:3-9) Jesus’ preternatural grasp of the future in the triumphal entry into Jerusalem and in the preparation of the last supper reveals that, despite all He will suffer, He remains the master of events. As Jesus rides into the Holy City in the image of the messianic prince of peace, the crowds publicly proclaim Him messiah. (Mk 11:1-4, 14:13-6) Moreover, during His Jerusalem ministry, Jesus, in expressing reservations about the Davidic character of the messiah, makes it clear that the messiah relates to David as Lord, rather than primarily as His heir. (Mk 13:35-7) In other words, because Jesus’ messianic dignity rests on His Lordship, on His possession of the divine name, His true messianic office utterly transcends the Davidic messiah for whom most of Israel hoped. The paschal mystery marks the culmination of Jesus’ revelation as messiah by manifesting Him simultaneously as suffering servant and Lord. Jesus’ institution of the eucharist at the last supper reveals His coming death as His free gift of Himself to His disciples, a gift which transforms Him into the source of their life. The eucharist also points to the sheding of Jesus’ blood both as a covenant sacrifice and as a sacrifice of atonement. (Mk 14:22-4) Finally, as we have seen above, at the very moment when Jesus dies, the new order He has established immediately begins to come into existence with the rending of the temple veil and the centurion’s confession of faith. (Mk 15:38-9) Moreover, Mark narrates Jesus’ burial in a way which foreshadows the resurrection which will soon occur. (Mk 15:40-47) The evangelist in his own redaction of the gospel apparently ended it with the apparition of the young man to the women in the empty tomb and with a prediction of the manifestation of the risen Christ to the disciples in Galilee. (Mk 16:1-8) Mark wrote, however, for a worshipping eucharistic community of people who had experienced Breath-baptism by the risen Christ and who confessed His divinity in their eucharistic worship. He expected therefore that his readers would read the entire

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gospel as a foreshadowing of the graces which they were in fact experiencing. I shall explore this point in greater detail in examining the allusive linkages in Mark.17 Christological Knowing The theme of the messianic secret advances Christological knowing by disclosing the full scope of Jesus’ person and of the eschatological age which the paschal mystery inaugurates. In other words, this theme clarifies the true nature of the human and divine reality to which the Breath of God conforms the believing Christian. In following Jesus, the disciples will experience margenalization just as He did; but they will do so in the knowledge that Jesus redefines the meaning of what constitutes inside and outside. (Mk 1:40-45) In this section, I have so far considered both the dramatic and thematic linkages which structure Mark’s gospel. Only one other set of linkages needs analysis: namely, Mark’s extensive use of allusion. As we shall see, Mark uses this literary device quite systematically. In fact, it endows his gospel with much of its distinctive narrative flavor. The following section analyses Mark’s allusive linkages. (IV) By allusive linkages in Mark I mean the way the evangelist relates anecdotal events to one another by including in one event a descriptive detail which reminds the reader of some other event in Jesus’ story. Because Mark relies more on narrative events than on Jesus’ teachings in order to disclose to the reader Jesus’ true identity and the significance of His life and ministry, the evangelist’s use of allusive linkages plays an extremely important role in conveying the evangelist’s central Christological message; for the allusive linkages indicate which events especially illumine one another. Moreover, as Mark structures his narrative, virtually all of the allusive linkages focus finally on the two miracles of the loaves. I therefore begin this exploration of allusive linkages in Mark with the first miracle of the loaves. The First Miracle of the Loaves As we have seen, immediately after the first miracle of the loaves, Jesus walks upon the water, invokes the divine name, and stills the storm. At the end of this incident Mark remarks that the disciples did not understand the significance of what had just happened because they had not understood the meaning of the miracle of the loaves. (Mk 6:45-52) The evangelist’s remark ties together a complex cluster of allusive linkages. 17. Cf. James L Blevins, The Messianic Secret in Markan Research: 1901-1976 (Washington, DC: University Press of America, 1981).


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First of all, the miracle of the loaves alludes to the eucharist, since in multiplying the bread and fish Jesus performs the four ritual eucharistic acts of taking, blessing, breaking, and giving. (Mk 6:41, 14:22) One can therefore comprehend the meaning of the miracle of the loaves only if one comprehends the meaning of the eucharist. In Mark, however, the eucharist interprets the meaning of the paschal mystery, of Jesus’ death, resurrection, and mission of the divine Breath. In the first instance, the eucharist reveals the paschal mystery as Jesus’ gratuitous sharing of His life, ultimately of His risen life, with His disciples. Jesus will share risen life with the disciples when He baptizes them with His Breath. (Mk 1:8) The eucharist, however, also reveals Jesus’ death as both a covenant sacrifice and a sacrifice of atonement which takes away sins. (Mk 2:10-11) Moreover, as we have seen at perhaps the most dramatic moment in Mark’s account of Jesus passion, viz. in Jesus’ confrontation with the high priest during His trial, Jesus will once again implicitly uses the divine name, as He had done when He walked on the water. Jesus in His trial invokes the divine name in response to a question by the high priest. That question recalls the first verse of Mark’s gospel. The first verse functions as the equivalent of a title; and in its own way summarizes Mark’s message. (Mk 1:1, 14:61) In reply Jesus claims the divine judicial authority of the Son of Man. (Mk 14:61-2, 6:50) Jesus’ testimony to Himself in His trial also comes as the culmination of a series of testimonies to Him in the course of Mark’s narrative. The Baptizer calls Jesus the mightier one who baptizes in a sanctifying Breath. (Mk 1:7-8) The Father calls Jesus His beloved Son, the messiah in the image of the suffering servant. (Mk 1:11) The Father repeats His testimony to the disciples on the mount of transfiguration. There he requires of the disciples absolute obedience to Jesus’ teachings, since as Son of God Jesus speaks with greater authority than either the Law or the prophets. (Mk 9:2-8) Peter testifies to Jesus as the messiah. (Mk 8:29) Finally, Jesus testifies to Himself as eschatological Son of Man and bearer of the divine name. (Mk 14:62) Clearly, Mark intends all of these different testimonies to Jesus to throw light on one another. Each of them reveals a different facet of His person. When, therefore, Mark states that the disciples did not understand the significance of the fact that Jesus walked on water, invoked the divine name, and calmed the storm because they had also failed to understand about the multiplication of the loaves, the evangelist is making faith in the divinity of Jesus a condition for eucharistic faith. Only one who confesses the divinity of Jesus has understood the meaning of the loaves; for the two miracles of multiplication foreshadow both the eucharist and the paschal mystery which gives the eucharist its meaning.

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Second, Jesus’ walking on the water contains an allusive reference to His first calming of the storm. As we have seen, after that incident the disciples, as usual bewildered, had asked, “Who is this that even the wind and sea obey Him?” (Mk 4:41) Their question contains in turn yet another allusive reference to the central question which Jesus poses to His disciples in Mark’s gospel: namely, “Who do you say that I am?” (Mk 8:29) When, moreover, one understands the miracle of the loaves in the light of the two miracles of the calming of the storm, one grasps immediately the inadequacy of Peter’s response to that question. Peter has understood Jesus’ messianic identity, but he has yet to recognize the messiah as the suffering servant and as divine. (Mk 8:31-3) Like the blind man Jesus cures in stages prior to Peter’s confession, Peter has begun to see but has yet to reach the full vision of eucharistic faith. (Mk 8:22-26) The first miracle of the calming of the storm has, however, other important allusive connections in Mark’s narrative; for Jesus’ exercise of divine power over the forces of chaos which the storm waves symbolize sets the context for His exorcism of the Gerasene demoniac. After that exorcism, the demon-possessed pigs perish in the very waters of chaos which He has just dominated by a word. (Mk 4:39, 5:13) In other words, Jesus’ creative, divine power over the wind and waves also manifests His victorious power over all the forces of evil. Those forces include Satan and His minions; they also include the Roman empire and its legions, as the Gerasene demon’s name symbolizes. By linking the meaning of Jesus’ power over the waters of chaos to eucharistic faith (Mk 6:52), Mark also places at the heart of such faith confidence in Jesus’ eschatological victory. Third, when one reads the first miracle of the loaves in the light of the cosmological miracles in which Jesus calms the storm, then descriptive details in the miracle of the loaves take on new meaning. Jesus stands revealed as the divine shepherd of the new Israel who nourishes those who relate to Him with eucharistic faith by giving them the eucharistic bread of wisdom. The content of that wisdom derives from Jesus’ ministry and from the paschal mystery itself. (Mk 6:34-43) Similarly, Jesus’ command to the disciples in the story of the multiplication, “Give them something to eat yourselves” (Mk 6:37) contains an allusive reference to Jesus’ command after raising the daughter of Jairus to give her something to eat. (Mk 5:43) In other words, Mark wants one to read the account of the multiplication of the loaves not only in the light of the two miraculous calmings of the storm but also in the light of raising of the daughter of Jairus. The raising of the twelve-year-old daughter of Jairus, however, forms a tryptic with the healing of the woman with a twelve-year flux of blood. (Mk 5:21-43) Moreover, in these healings the two women symbolize the old and new covenants and Jesus’ relation to them. In healing the older


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woman, Jesus reveals His power to free Jews who believe in Him, especially women, from the curse of the Law. In raising the young girl from death to life, Jesus reveals how He establishes the new covenant: namely, by sharing with those who believe in Him His own risen life. In addition, the raising of the daughter of Jairus contains further allusive references to the other healings which Mark describes as “resurrections”: viz., to the healing of Peter’s mother-in-law (Mk 1:31) and to the cure of the epileptic demoniac boy (Mk 9:26-7). In both cases, Jesus “raises up” the sick person in a way which foreshadows His “raising up” of all those who believe in Him. Such “raisings” prefigure the transforming, empowering consequences of sharing in the risen life of Christ. In the case of Peter’s mother-in-law

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her “raising” empowers her to serve Jesus as well as others. In the case of the demoniac boy, his “raising” not only frees him from the power of Satan but it also assimilates him to the deaf and dumb person Jesus had healed in Gentile territory just before the second miracle of the loaves. (Mk 8:31-7) That miracle, as we have already seen, belongs to a series of miracles which symbolize the transformation which resurrection faith and Breath-baptism will effect in the disciples. In the case of the demoniac boy, sharing in risen life enables one not only to hear the gospel to but speak it, to bear witness to others. Jesus’ healing also empowers one to “see” with the eyes of faith and to follow Him “on the way,” on the path of discipleship which leads to Calvary and to risen glory. (Mk 8:22-6, 10:46-52) In other words, by linking the raising of the daughter of Jairus to the first miracle of the loaves, Mark intends all these allusively connected healings and what they symbolize to throw light on the meaning of Christian eucharistic faith. The presence of Peter, James, and John at the raising of the daughter of Jairus links this incident, moreover, to three others: to the transfiguration, to the eschatological discourse, and to the agony in the garden. (Mk 5:37, 9:2, 13:3, 14:33) In the transfiguration, the three disciples find themselves drawn into Jesus’ own baptismal experience. They hear the Father speak the same words He had spoken to Jesus in His messianic commissioning after His baptism by John. Then the Father had said to Jesus: You are my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased” and had designated Him messiah, suffering servant, and the beginning of a new Israel. (Mk 1:9-11) In the Transfiguration the Father says to Peter, James, and John, “This is my Beloved Son, listen to Him.” (Mk 9:33) In other words, in designating Jesus as His Son, the Father commands the disciples to recognize by their obedience to Him that Jesus speaks with a greater authority than Moses and Elijah, than the Law and the prophets. The Father’s words also echo what He said to Jesus in His baptismal commissioning. Hence, obedience to Jesus draws one into His original baptismal experience. Mark also places the transfiguration at the beginning of the way section of his gospel. The evangelist thus underscores how seriously the disciples must take the demands of discipleship which Jesus is expounding to them. The transfiguration also foreshadows the resurrection. The presence of Peter, James, and John in Gethsemane makes it clear that those who witness the resurrection and know the risen glory of Christ must also accompany Him in His humanity and vulnerability. (Mk 14:33) By connecting all these events allusively to the first miracle of the loaves, Mark makes them all relevant to the meaning of Christian eucharistic faith.


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The eschatological discourse instructs the disciples on the way they should conduct themselves during the end time. Mark also uses the figures of Peter, James, and John in order to link the eschatological discourse to raising of the daughter of Jairus and through her to the miracle of the loaves. Mark thus implicitly portrays the eucharist as the expression of eschatological longing and readiness. The presence of Andrew also links the eschatological discourse to the call of the first disciples and thus underscores the eschatological character of all discipleship. (Mk 1:9-11, 16-20, 13:3) I began by examining a single allusive reference in Mark’s gospel: viz., the evangelist’s allusion to the first miracle of the loaves after Jesus walks on the water and calms the storm. (Mk 6:32) This allusion lies at the heart of a whole cluster of other allusive references in Mark’s narrative. Through these references the evangelist attempts to call attention to the deeper, sacramental significance of the events he is narrating. He also links them in a way which throws light on the meaning of eucharistic faith. The Second Miracle of the Loaves After the second miracle of the loaves, Mark makes another such allusive reference. It pulls together another allusive rete, a network of references which illumine the meaning of the second miracle of the loaves and through it the meaning of Christian eucharistic worship. After the second miracle of the loaves, Jesus warns the disciples against the leaven of Herod and of the Pharisees. Moreover, a frustrated Jesus ascribes their failure to understand what He is talking about to yet another failure: the unbelieving disciples also fail to comprehend the meaning of both miracles of the loaves. (Mk 8:14-21) In effect, Mark is saying that those who desire to share through faith in the Christian eucharist must purge out of their hearts the “leaven,” or corrupting example, of Herod and of the Pharisees. Jesus’ reference to the “leaven of Herod” invites the reader to ponder all the attitudes which this tyrant has embodied in Mark’s narrative. Purging out the leaven of Herod means personal repentance of any similar attitudes in one’s own heart: unbridled passion, superstition, vanity, violence, venality, sensuality, greed, oppression. (Mk 6:14-29; cf. 1 Cor 5:6; Gal 5:9) Similarly, Jesus’ reference to the “leaven” of the Pharisees invites the reader to ponder all of Jesus confrontations with the Pharisees recorded in Mark’s gospel and to repent of all those attitudes which Jesus censures in them. Specifically, the disciples must refuse to test God through unbelief, legalism, hypocrisy, judgmentalism, preferring human traditions to God’s will, testing God.

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Moreover, after warning against the two leavens and after reminding the disciples of the two miracles of the loaves, Jesus asks them: “Do you not yet understand?” (Mk 8:21) The question contains an allusion to the way section which follows almost immediately in Mark’s gospel. In the way section, Jesus will with apparent lack of success try to communicate to the disciples the demands of discipleship. (Mk 8:27-10:45) Jesus’ question, therefore, points allusively to the flip side of purging out the leaven of Herod and of the Pharisees: namely, obedient walking in the way of discipleship. One can find other allusive references in Mark: 1) between the young man stripped of his clothes in the garden and the young man who confronts the women in the empty tomb (Mk 14:51-2, 16:5); 2) the symbolic links among the miracles of healing which I examined above; 3) the three prophecies of the passion (Mk 8:31-3, 9:30-32, 10:32-34); 4) Jesus’ mysterious foreknowledge in the preparation of the triumphal entry and in the last supper (Mk 11:1-6, 14:12-6); 5) the rending of the heavens at Jesus’ baptism and the rending of the temple veil depicting the heavens (Mk 1:10, 15:38). The allusive references which cluster around the two miracles of the loaves, however, strike me as the most fraught with Christological significance since they illumine the meaning which Mark discovers in eucharistic faith in the risen Christ. Christological Knowing The allusive linkages in Mark make it clear that Christological knowing—practical assimilation to Jesus in the power of His baptismal Breath— has both an ecclesial and a eucharistic character. Indeed the allusive linkages point to the eucharist as the sacramentalization of the Christian community’s corporate assimilation to Jesus in the power of His Breath. Clearly, Mark’s narrative Christology has as its purpose to teach the disciples of Jesus to read the deep saving significance sacramentally manifest in the ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus. Only conformity to the risen Christ through Breath baptism and through participation in the eucharistic community into which Breath-baptism introduces one can disclose to the human mind and heart the secret wisdom of faith which grasps that sacramental significance. The very narrative structure of Mark gives, therefore, practical meaning to Christological knowing. It defines its conditions, its revelatory context, its moral demands, it sacramental scope. As we shall see in the other two sections of this volume, Matthew and Luke both use and modify Mark’s basic narrative strategies. They employ dramatic, thematic, and allusive linkages, as Mark does. Like Mark, they seek by these means to draw the disciples of Jesus more deeply into an experience of Christological knowing.


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Matthew and Luke, however, tell Jesus’ story somewhat differently from Mark. They address different communities with different faith needs. A comparative dialectical analysis of their retelling of Jesus’ story will, then, in the chapters which follow call attention to another facet of Christological knowing: namely, its analogical character. All those who know Jesus through conformity to Him in the power of His Breath converge on the same divine reality and aspire to the same kind of community of faith. Different individuals and different communities, however, converge on those realities out of different histories. Those historical differences, as we shall see in the following two sections, endow Christological knowing with its analogous character.18

18. Cf. Masson, L’évangile de Marc et l’église de Rome, pp. 51-125; Eduard Schweizer, “Mark’s Theological Achievement” in The Interpretation of Mark, pp. 63-87.

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Part 2: Matthew’s Narrative Christology

Part 2 Matthew’s Narrative Christology Chapter 6 Matthew’s Infancy Narrative Foundational Christology studies the ways in which justifying faith in Jesus Christ as savior and Lord transforms the four secular forms of conversion. This volume ponders the way in which such a commitment transvalues imaginative perceptions and intuitive beliefs about reality. This section divides into six chapters. This chapter summarizes what historical-critical method tells us about Matthew and his community. Then it ponders the message of Matthew’s infancy narrative. Chapter seven analyzes Matthew’s positive dramatic linkages. Chapter eight examines the negative dramatic linkages. Chapter nine reflects on the ambiguous dramatic linkages. Chapter ten focuses on one of the most important thematic linkages in Matthew: Jesus’ five discourses and the message they inculcate. Chapter eleven ponders two other thematic linkages: Jesus’ miracles and the theme of fulfillment. This final chapter of section two also examines how Matthew edits Mark’s allusive linkages and creates a different rete of allusions which cluster around the Great Commission. The present chapter divides into two parts. Part one summarizes what historical critical method has to say about the evangelist we call Matthew and about the community whom he addresses. Part two analyzes the message of Matthew’s infancy narrative. (I) Matthew wrote his gospel in the sub-apostolic era, which followed the death of the apostles. Scripture scholars have suggested many different ancient cities as the source of Matthew’s gospel: Jerusalem, Alexandria, Caesarea Maritima, Edessa, Phoenicia, and Antioch. In the present state of scholarly research, however, Antioch would seem to qualify as the most likely candidate. The church in Antioch came into existence in the late thirties. Matthew probably wrote his gospel in the eighties. Between the community’s founding and the composition of Matthew’s narrative, the church at Antioch experienced a relatively untroubled life. It therefore had the opportunity to develop the kinds of resources on which Matthew drew in writing his gospel.

Chapter 6: Matthew’s Infancy Narrative

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Matthew, for example, almost certainly relied on the gospel of Mark as a resource. Nevertheless, both the infancy gospel and the many sayings of Jesus found in Matthew but absent from Mark indicate that Matthew had access to other historical sources, both oral and written about Jesus. That fact plus hints in Matthew’s text (cf. Mt 13:52) together suggest that Matthew’s gospel emerged from a Christian community with an active scribal tradition. Matthew’s gospel addresses a Church which practiced Petrine Christianity. In other words, in ecclesiological matters, the church at Antioch stood to the right of center. With Peter it baptized Gentiles without requiring their circumcision. Petrine Christianity, however, dealt with such Gentile converts as more or less the Christian equivalent of “God-fearers” in Judaism. Among the Jews of the time, the term “God-fearers” designated Gentiles who had converted to Judaism, but frequently without submitting to circumcision. In the Petrine churches, then, those functioned as a kind of inner circle of believers who submitted both to circumcision and baptism. These Jewish Christians obeyed the Torah while interpreting it in the light of Jesus’ teachings. Baptized Gentiles participated in eucharistic communion with them; but these Gentile Christians were not expected to shoulder the full burden of Mosaic law. Instead, they observed certain dietary practices. In Matthew’s mind, Gentile Christians practiced a real but religiously diluted form of Christianity. (Cf. Mt 5:17-19) In Gal 2:11-14, Paul describes how he confronted Peter at Antioch when the latter, under pressure from right-wing Jewish Christians in Jerusalem, ceased eating with Gentile Christians. We have reason to believe, however, that Peter, not Paul, won out at Antioch and that Petrine Christianity provided the Antiochene church with its founding tradition. The fact that Ignatius of Antioch in his letters alludes three times to Matthew’s gospel also tends to support its Antiochene origin. Moreover, if Mark’s gospel originated in Rome, then its presence and influence in the church at Antioch could suggest communication between the Roman and Antiochene communities.1 As in the case of Mark, we know little of the evangelist we call Matthew beyond what we can glean from the text of his gospel. Most scholars doubt that he numbered among the disciples who knew Jesus personally. 1. Cf. Raymond E. Brown and John P. Meier, Antioch and Rome: New Testament Cradles of Catholic Christianity (Ramsey, NJ: Paulist, 1982), pp. 15-27; R.M. Grant, “Jewish Christianity in Antioch in the Second Century” in Judaeo-Christianisme (Paris: Editions Beauchesne, 1972), pp. 97-108; Rafael Aguirre, “La Communidad de Mateo y el Judaismo,” Estudios Biblicos, 51(1993), pp. 233-249; D.C. Parker, “Was Matthew Written Before 50 C.E.? The Magdalen Papyrus of Matthew,” Expository Times, 107(1995), pp. 40-43; Anthony J. Saldarini, Matthew’s Jewish-Christian Community (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1994).

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Even if, as seems possible, the author of the present gospel did draw on sources one could trace back to the apostle Matthew, the evangelist himself almost certainly numbered among a later generation of Christians.2 Many believe that the portrait of the “good scribe” which the evangelist puts on the lips of Jesus describes Matthew himself. (Mt 13:52) If the gospel originated from Antioch and if the community at Antioch had developed a scribal tradition, then Matthew exemplified that tradition and may have enjoyed a certain prominence in the Antiochene church. Themes in Matthew’s gospel also tell us something about its author. He espoused a form of Petrine Christianity. (Mk 5:17-20) His strong polemic against Pharisaism suggests that he wrote his gospel in part as a response to the growing influence of Pharisaism in the Jewish community. Matthew sought to discourage Pharisaical influence among Petrine Christians. Some historians have suggested that the Jewish scholars at Jamnia finally settled the Jewish canon of inspired Biblical books between the years 90 and 100 a.d. In fact, we find no general acceptance of the present canonical books in the Jewish community until the end of the second century. The rise of Jamnian Pharisaism did, however, foster a movement toward the standardization of Jewish faith and worship; and that movement also helped motivate the expulsion of Christians from the synagogue. Matthew certainly shows concern over growing tensions between Jewish Christians and Pharisaism. His Jewish Christian community has, moreover, achieved a separate identity within the Jewish community at Antioch. Matthew seems concerned to recognize the de facto leadership of the Pharisees in the Judaism of his day as long as it does not compromise Christian faith and practice. His strong polemic against Pharisaism suggests, moreover, that he recognized that radical differences of faith and practice divided the two groups. These differences motivated the debate in Matthew’s gospel with the so-called “synagogue across the street.” Matthew seems, then, to have written his gospel in response to a crisis of identity among Jewish Christians at Antioch occasioned by the initial emergence of the Christian community as a distinct institutional entity within Judaism. While Mark portrays Christianity primarily as a eucharistic community, Matthew calls it a “church (ekkelsia).” Matthew also shows concern that the institutionalization of Christian leadership structures happening at Antioch not yield to what he perceives as a nascent clericalism. The evangelist fears that those clericalizing tendencies will undermine authentic gospel living. 2. The tradition that the Greek version of Matthew has roots in an Aramaic version of the gospel derives from Eusebius, who quotes Papias of Hierapolis to that effect. (Eusebius, HE, 3.39.16)


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Matthew responds to this communal crisis by a systematic retrieval of the traditions about Jesus. In that retrieval he shows a concern to preserve the bond of union among Gentile and Jewish Christians. At the same time he shows an equally strong concern to preserve the Petrine identity of the Antiochene church. Against Mark’s stress on the utter newness of the revelation made in Jesus, Matthew opts for qualified newness. In Matthew’s gospel, the incarnation does mark a startling new beginning in salvation history; but Matthew sees no reason therefore to jettison the Jewish traditions revered in the Antiochene community. Instead, Matthew interprets traditional Judaism in the light of Jesus and of the paschal mystery. Matthew views Jesus as an unparalleled religious teacher, as one who proclaimed the new Christian covenant with divine authority. For Matthew, however, the new covenant illumines and makes sense out of the old; it does not simply replace it.3 The Structure of Matthew’s Gospel Matthew adapts Mark’s narrative freely to fit his own narrative and theological needs. Matthew departs most significantly from Mark by the enhanced importance he gives to Jesus’ teachings. Matthew expands the two short discourses in Mark—the sermon on the lake and Jesus’ apocalyptic discourse— with other sayings of Jesus. In addition, Matthew adds three other major discourses to Mark’s text: the sermon on the mount, the missionary discourse, and the ecclesial discourse. That makes five major discourses of Jesus in all, corresponding to the five books of the Torah. The Pentateuch embedded the Mosaic covenant in the contextualizing story of Hebrew origins. Matthew retells Jesus’ story as the promulgation of the Christian Torah and presents Jesus’ moral and religious vision as distilling the true meaning of Torah piety. Besides insisting on the importance of Jesus’ teachings, Matthew also edits, re-arranges, and rewrites Mark’s text when it suits him theologically. Moreover, Matthew orders the discourses chiastically. The first discourse, the sermon on the mount, announces the arrival of kingdom and proclaims the moral demands for entry into it, while the last discourse, the eschatological discourse, describes its final consummation. The missionary and the ecclesial discourses also enjoy a certain parallelism, since both describe different aspects of Church life: its missionary activity and life in community. The parabolic discourse has no parallel among the other discourses. It provides the central discourse of Matthew’s gospel. In Matthew, the parabolic discourse discloses the mysterious character of the kingdom. Its central location among the discourses suggests that the evan3. Cf. Brown and Meier, op.cit., pp. 73-86; Eduard Schweizer, Matthäus und seine Gemeinde (Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1974).

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gelist looked upon the Church primarily as a saving mystery providentially planned by God from all eternity. The narrative sections of Matthew’s gospel which alternate with the discourses serve different purposes in the overall structure of Jesus’ story. The infancy narrative tells the story of Jesus’ birth in a way which anticipates His passion and resurrection. The infancy narrative and the account of Jesus’ burial display an analogous narrative structure. Accounts of the actions of those favorable to Jesus alternate with descriptions of the doings of His enemies.4 The first narrative section of the gospel proper—chapters three and four—inaugurates Jesus’ public ministry. The preaching of John proclaims Jesus Breath-baptizer and warns that His ministry will come as a judgment upon the unrepentant Pharisees and chief priests. Jesus’ baptism by John begins His revelation as Breath-baptizer, a revelation which culminates in the Great Commission to baptize in the triune name which will close Matthew’s gospel. Jesus’ temptations, as we shall see, indicate those aspects of the Torah which His life, ministry and teaching especially fulfill. The second narrative section which follows the sermon on the mount confirms Jesus’ inaugural proclamation of the kingdom with an outpouring of miracles. They reveal the healing power of Jesus and of His message as well as His divine authority. This section also introduces for the first time the theme of conflict which the missionary discourse, which follows it, will develop in considerable detail. The third narrative section follows the missionary discourse. It intensifies the theme of conflict and dramatizes Jesus’ rejection by the Pharisees and by His contemporaries. The parabolic discourse which follows Matthew’s third narrative section culminates in the disciples profession that they, at least, understand the meaning of Jesus’ teachings. The fourth narrative section, which follows the parabolic discourse, shows how the disciples, in contrast to Jesus’ own townspeople, do have faith in Him. They, however, as yet have only weak and sometimes wavering faith. The two miracles of the loaves occur in the fourth narrative section. They foreshadow the universally salvific, eucharistic Church which Jesus, the Breath baptizer, will create. So does Peter’s profession of faith and Jesus’ response to Him. As we shall see, Matthew, in contrast to Mark, transforms Peter’s confession into a promise of the Church’s founding. This fourth narrative section also looks forward to the paschal mystery: the death of the Baptizer anticipates Jesus’ passion, while Jesus’ transfiguration foreshadows His resurrection. 4. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, II, pp. 1302-1304.


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The fifth narrative section clarifies the strenuous demands which both discipleship and leadership in service make on those who follow Jesus. The account of Jesus’ final Jerusalem ministry follows. It describes the final confrontation between Jesus and His enemies and culminates in the woes against the scribes and Pharisees. The woes express the curses which rest upon those who reject the new covenant. The sixth and final narrative section follows the eschatological discourse. It describes the paschal mystery: the eucharist, Jesus’ betrayal and trial, His crucifixion, His death, His resurrection, and His reconstitution of the new Israel in the Great Commission. In the following portion of this chapter, I shall reflect on Matthew’s infancy narrative. As we shall see, it has a tight literary unity and provides a thematic introduction to the gospel as a whole.5 5. One finds no scholarly consensus about the narrative structure of Matthew. Cf. Raymond E. Brown, The Birth of the Messiah (New York, NY: Doubleday, 1977), pp. 25-56, 96-121. For different approaches to Matthew’s gospel see: Graham N. Stanton, A Gospel for a New People: Studies in Matthew (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1992); David B. Howell, Matthew’s Inclusive Story: A Study in the Narrative Rhetoric of the First Gospel (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1990); Jack Dean Kingsbury, Matthew As Story (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress, 1988). See also: Harold Riley, The First Gospel (Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 1992); R.E.O. White, The Mind of Matthew: Unique Insights for Living Today (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster Press, 1979); Daniel Patte, The Gospel According to Matthew: A Structural Commentary on Matthew’s Faith (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress, 1987); Amy Jill Levine, The Social and Ethnic Dimensions of Matthean Social History (Lewiston, NY: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1988); W.F.Albright and C.S. Mann, Matthew: Introduction, Translation, and Notes (New York, NY: Doubleday, 1971); David Hill, The Gospel of Matthew (London: Oliphants, 1972); Warren Carter, “Kernels and Narrative Blocks: The Structure of Matthew’s Gospel,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 54(1992), pp. 463-481; Franz Neirynck, “Apo Tole Eriato and the Structure of Matthew,” Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 64(1988), pp. 21-59; George Howard, “The Textual Nature of Shem-Tob’s Hebrew Matthew,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 108(1989), pp. 239-257; Akio Ito, “Matthew and the Community of the Dead Sea Scrolls,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 48(1992), pp. 23-42; Donald Verseput, “The Faith of the Reader and the Narrative of Matthew 13.53-16.20,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 46(1992), pp. 3-24; Jack Dean Kingsbury, “Reflections on ‘the Reader’ of Matthew’s Gospel,” New Testament Studies, 34(1988), pp. 442-460; Mark Allan Powell, “The Plot and Subplots of Matthew’s Gospel,” New Testament Studies, 38(1992), pp. 187-204; Ronald V. Huggins, “Matthean Posterity: A Preliminary Proposal,” Novum Testamentum, 34(1992), pp. 1-22; Ulrich Luz, “Fiktivität und Tradtionstreue im Matthäusevangelium im Lichte griechischer Literatur,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 84(1993), pp. 153-177; Paul S. Minear, Matthew: A Teacher’s Gospel (New York, NY: Pilgrim Press, 1982); John P. Meier, The Vision of Matthew: Christ, Church, and Morality in the First Gospel (New York, NY: Paulist, 1978); Christopher R. Smith, “Literary Evidence of a fivefold Structure in the Gospel of Matthew,” New Testament Studies, 43(1997), pp. 540-551; Augustine Stock, O.S.B., The Method and Message of Matthew (Collegeville, MI: The Liturgical Press, 1994).

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(II) Matthew’s infancy gospel begins with a genealogy of Jesus “A book of origin of Jesus Christ, Son of David, Son of Abraham (Biblos geneseos Iesou Christou huiou Dauid huiou Abraam)” (Mt 1:1-17). Many commentators regard the genealogy as a repellant way to begin Jesus’ story; but the genealogy serves several important Christological purposes within the infancy narrative.6 The Genealogy 1) The genealogy recapitulates rapidly the story of Jewish salvation history from Abraham to Jesus. In the process, it inserts Jesus solidly in that history. It portrays Jesus as a Jew, a son of Abraham, born of Mary, in solidarity with other Jews. 2) The genealogy insists on the humanity of Jesus. Jesus has a genealogical history like any other human, has a family and family roots. 3) The genealogy calls attention to some of the important figures in salvation history which the infancy gospel will endow with typological significance: Abraham, David, and Israel as a whole. 4) The genealogy also implicitly introduces the theme of “fulfillment” which plays such an important role in Matthew’s gospel. It does so by using the rabbinic numerology, or gametria, which endows numbers with symbolic significance. Matthew orders the genealogy artificially into three sets of fourteen generations. In rabbinic gametria David’s name has the numerical value of fourteen. In other words, Matthew presents the number of generations in Jesus’ genealogy as fulfilling a providential plan by foreshadowing Jesus’ Davidic sonship and messianic dignity. (Mt 1:17) 5) The genealogy mentions four women: Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, and Bathsheba. They seem to foreshadow the figure of Mary in that all four had an unusual relationship with their husbands and played a significant role in salvation history. Tamar’s improper union with her father-in-law Judah reminds the reader that sin tainted the Davidic throne even in its primary ancestor. Rahab and especially Ruth, David’s ancestress, both Gentile women of genuine faith allude to the universal salvation which Jesus, the new David, brings. Bathsheba’s adultery with King David dramatizes David’s own sinfulness. The link of all four women to the Davidic dynasty points, of course, to Jesus, the new David, who, as Immanuel, utterly transcends His royal ancestor.7 6. Cf. Benedict T. Viviano, O.P., The Genres of Matthew 1-2: Light from Timothy 1:4,” Revue Biblique, 97(1990), pp. 31-53. 7. Cf. John Paul Heil, “The Narrative Role of the Women in Matthew’s Genealogy,” Biblica, 72(1991), pp. 538-545; Brown, The Birth of the Messiah, pp. 57-95; NJBC, 42"9-10; Jean Radermakers, S.J., Au fil de l’évangile selon Saint Matthieu (2 vols.; Louvain: Institute d’Etudes Theologique, 1972), II, pp. 30-34; Daniel Harrington, The Gospel of Matthew (Collegeville, MI: The Liturgical Press, 1991), pp. 27-33; W.F.


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The Infancy Narrative In the infancy narrative which follows, the figures of Joseph and of Herod the Great predominate. Joseph has three dreams which ensure Jesus’ providential birth and survival despite the machinations of Herod. In the first, an angel appears to Joseph in a dream and tells him not to divorce Mary, but to take her as his wife, since she has conceived Jesus by the power of the Holy Breath. (Mt 1:18-25) In the second, the angel instructs Joseph to flee to Egypt in order to escape Herod’s plot against the infant Jesus’ life. (Mt 2:13-15) In the third, the angel orders Joseph to return to the land of Israel, but to settle in Nazareth. (Mt 2:19-23) After Joseph’s first dream, Matthew inserts the story of the Magi, of their arrival in Jerusalem, of their encounter with Herod, and their discovery of the Christ child. (Mt 2:1-12) A dream also enables them to outwit Herod and to return home without disclosing Jesus’ whereabouts. After Joseph’s second dream, Matthew inserts the story of the slaughter of the innocents. (Mt 2:16-18) The motif of the dream will resurface in Matthew’s passion narrative. Because of a dream, Pilate’s wife warns him to have nothing to do with the “just man” named Jesus. Dreams in Matthew serve an oracular function which discloses to their recipients God’s will. Unlike Joseph and the magi, Pilate will disobey the message he receives.8 Matthew’s genealogy proceeds by patrilinear generation. The genealogy reiterates monotonously the Greek verb “egennesen (begot)” as sons turn into fathers in Jesus’ family tree. When the evangelist comes to tell the story of Jesus’ birth, however, he makes it clear that Jesus breaks the pattern of natural patrilinear generation. Matthew so orchestrates the story of Jesus’ birth as to underscore the fact that Joseph did not in fact beget Jesus. Matthew even insists that Joseph, after his crisis of conscience over how to deal with Mary’s conception of Jesus out of wedlock, had no relations with Mary until she gave birth to Jesus. In other words, Jesus’ birth totally disrupts the line of patrilinear generation which it simultaneously terminates and fulfills. It marks a new and miraculous beginning in salvation history. (Mt 1:18-9) As Joseph wrestles with his conscience about the best way to deal with his pregnant fiancee, an angel appears to him in a dream in order to resolve his dilemma. The angel tells him that Mary has conceived Jesus in Albright and C.S. Mann, Matthew (New York, NY: Doubleday, 1971), pp. 1-6; John Mark Jones, “Subverting the Textuality of Davidic Messianism: Matthew’s Presentation of the Genealogy and the David Title,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 56(1994), pp. 256-272; Brian M. Nolan, “Rooting the Davidic Son of God of Matthew 1-2 in the Experience of the Evangelist’s Audience,” Estudios Biblicos, 50(1992), pp. 149-156; John Nolland, “The Four (Five) Women and Other Annotations in Matthew’s Genealogy,” New Testament Studies, 43(1997), pp. 527-539. 8. Cf. Richard A. Horsley, The Liberation of Christians: Infancy Narratives in Social Context (New York, NY: Crossroad, 1989).

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the power of a Holy Breath and that Joseph should not therefore divorce her but take her as his wife. The angel calls Joseph “son of David” and thus testifies to the fact that legally Jesus belonged to the house of David, as the messiah should.9 (Mt 1:20-1) Jesus’ conception by a Holy Breath makes two theological points simultaneously: 1) Jesus did not first enter into relationship with God’s Breath at His baptism, as one might incorrectly surmise from the gospel of Mark, which, as we have seen, formed one of the sources of Matthew’s gospel. Mark does not explicitly defend adoptionism.10 Since, however, Mark makes no reference to Jesus’ relationship to God’s Breath prior to His baptism by John, Matthew probably wanted to clarify Mark on this point. 2) More important still, Jesus’ conception by God’s Breath manifests His transcendent origin and divine sonship. It does so by foreshadowing His full revelation as Immanuel, as God-with-us, in the Great Commission which ends Matthew’s gospel. When the risen Christ reconstitutes the new Israel in the Great Commission, He promises to “be with” His disciples till the end of the final age of salvation. (Mt 28:20) The angel who appears to Joseph in a dream gives Jesus His name. In doing so, the angel explains the name’s etymological significance. “Jesus” means “God saves.” As the divinely conceived Immanuel, as God-with-us, Jesus will save His people (ton laon autou) from their sins. (Mt 1:21) This promise of salvation foreshadows the moment in Jesus’ trial when “the entire people (pas ho laos)” call down Jesus’ blood upon themselves. As we shall see, Matthew regards Jesus’ innocent blood not simply as the cause of divine retribution but also as the atoning blood of divine forgiveness. (Mt 27:25) Matthew reverences Jesus as the Davidic messiah, but the evangelist subordinates this title to Jesus’ divine Sonship. Jesus’ miraculous generation foreshadows His resurrection, reveals His divine origin, and makes a new beginning in salvation history. Jesus comes as much more than a Davidic messiah; He comes as God’s Son, as God-with-us, and as the savior who will atone for Israel’s sins. Joseph obediently follows the angel’s command and marries Mary, who gives birth to a son. Joseph, again in obedience to the angel’s instruction, names Him Jesus. If Jesus’ conception in the power of the Breath discloses His transcendent divine origin, His adoption by Joseph insures that in His humanity He confronts the 9. Cf. Brian M. Nolan, The Royal Son of God (Göttingen: Vanderhoeck and Ruprecht, 1979), pp. 24-28, 116-119, 145-170; Vincent Cernuda, “El Domicilio de José y la Fama de Maria,” Estudios Biblicos, 46(1988), pp. 5-25; Robert Gnuse, “Dreams in the Night—Scholarly Mirage or Theophonic Formula? The Dream Report as a So-called Elohist Tradition,” Biblische Zeitschrift, 39(1995), pp. 28-53. 10. Adoptionism teaches that Jesus was an ordinary human being whom God adopted as Son at some point in His life. 11. Cf. Brown, The Birth of the Messiah, pp. 122-164; Nolan, op. cit., pp. 29-34, 120-131; NJBC, 42:11; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 34-38; Harrington, op. cit., PP. 34-40;


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world (as the messiah should) as a member of the house of David.11 (Mt 1:25) The story of the magi follows. Magoi, or men schooled in occult wisdom and in astrology, suddenly appear in Jerusalem asking where to find the newborn king of the Jews. Their appearance throws Herod and the whole city of Jerusalem into confusion. Herod assembles the chief priests and scribes, the same generic group who will one day conspire to put Jesus to death, and asks them where the messiah is supposed to be born. Citing Micah 5:1, they tell him in Bethlehem, the city of David. Herod then plots to use the magi to bring about the death of the newborn messiah. The magi must find Jesus and then report to Herod where the child lies. Herod says he wants to worship the newborn king; but subsequent events show that he really wants the newborn messiah dead. (Mt 2:2-12) Several narrative details in the appearance of the magi need comment. First, the magi follow a star which leads them, as the pillar of cloud and of fire led the Israelites in the desert, first to Jerusalem and then to the house in Bethlehem where the holy family is staying. The star probably alludes to the messianic prophecy in Num 24:17, which predicts the rising of a star from Jacob. If so, the appearance of the star symbolizes the birth of the messiah.12 Second, Matthew contrasts the joy and reverence with which the magi welcome the messiah, on the one hand, and Herod’s desire to destroy Him, on the other. Presumably, the secret wisdom of the magi has enabled them to interpret the appearance of the star correctly. If so, that secret wisdom foreshadows the faith which Gentiles will place in Jesus. When the magi find the Christ child with Mary, His mother, they do Him homage and offer Him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. They thus fulfill the prophecy of Is 60:6 and of Ps 72:10. Ps 72:10 predicts that pagan kings will pay homage to the messiah. Is 60:6 predicts the conversion of the nations to faith in Yahweh.13 (Mt 2:11) Herod in his unbelief relates to the newborn Jesus in the same way as the Pharaoh related to Moses. (Compare: Mt 2: 13-4 and Ex 2:15; Mt. 2:16 and Ex 1:22; Mt 2:19 and Ex 2:23; Mt 2:19-20 and Ex 4:19; Mt 2:21 and Ex 2:21 and Ex 4:20). One finds an even closer parallel between Herod’s actions and those of the Pharaoh in Josephus’s life of Moses. Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 7-10; Robert Gnuse, “Dream Genre in Matthean Infancy Narratives,” Novum Testamentum, 32(1990), pp. 97-120; J. Nolland, “No Son of God Christology in Matthew 1.18- 25,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 62(1996), pp. 3-12. 12. Cf. Kim Paffenroth, “Science or Story? The Star of Bethlehem,” Expository Times, 106(1994), pp. 78-79; Benedict T. Viviano, “The Movement of the Star: Matthew 2:9 and Num 9:17,” Revue Biblique, 103(1996), pp. 58-64. 13. Cf. Nolan, op. cit., pp. 41-46.

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There the Pharaoh, forewarned by sacred scribes of Moses’ birth, seeks to destroy the child by ordering the massacre of all male Hebrew babies. The Egyptian people also share in the Pharaoh’s apprehension. (Josephus, Ant., II, ix, 2,3 ##205-31) Matthew assimilates the unbelieving Herod, a client king of the Jews but a Jewish king nevertheless, to Pharaoh, to a Gentile tyrant and archenemy of Moses, the liberator. The comparison introduces a deeply ironic twist into the evangelist’s account of Herod’s reception of the news of the messiah’s birth. In assimilating a Jewish king to Pharaoh, Matthew also implicitly portrays Jesus as a new Moses, as the one who will lead Israel to a new exodus, to new freedom, despite the tyrannical opposition of the pharaohs of this world, whether Jew or Gentile. When Herod, with pharaonic malice orders the slaughter of all Hebrew boys in Bethlehem two years old and under, Matthew depicts the grief of their mothers poignantly as fulfilling Jer 31:15. Jeremiah describes Rachel bewailing the exile of her sons. Matthew probably alludes to Jesus’ exile in Egypt. The God who presided over Israel’s exile and return will also insure Jesus’ return to the promised land. In citing Jeremiah, Matthew could conceivably also intend to assimilate Jesus to Jeremiah, the suffering prophet, as he will later do in his gospel. When read in context, the words of Jeremiah suggest that God will comfort the grieving mothers.14 (Mt 2:13) Third, the magi receive a warning in a dream not to report to Herod but instead to return secretly to their own country. (Mt 2:12) The warning in the dream recalls the angelic message Joseph received and foreshadows the angelic warning he will receive, again in a dream, ordering him to flee to Egypt. (Mt 2:12-14) The messiah’s divine deliverance from Herod’s pharaonic plot, foreshadows the messiah’s ultimate victory over those who will crucify Him. Moreover, Herod’s plot causes Jesus to relive the Exodus experience of the first Israel. (Mt 2:15) God orchestrates the holy family’s flight into Egypt and return to the Holy Land after Herod’s death. The flight and return recalls that God providentially prepared a place for Israel in Egypt and providentially intervened in order to deliver them from Egyptian oppression. In a sense, as the embodiment and beginning of a new Israel, 14. Cf. Bob Becking, “‘A Voice was heard in Ramah’: Some Remarks on Structure and Meaning of Jeremiah 31,15-17,” Biblische Zeitschrift, 38(1994), pp. 229-242; Julio Trevollen Barrera, “El Relato de la Huida y Regresso de Egypto (Mt 2, 13-15a, 19-21),” Estudios Biblicos, 50(1992), pp. 251-260; Michel Quesnel, “Les citations de Jeremie dan l’evangile selon Saint Matthieu,” Estudios Biblicos, 47(1989), pp. 513-527; Michael Knowles, Jeremiah in Matthew’s Gospel: The Rejected Prophet Motif in Matthean Redaction (Sheffield, JSOT Press, 1993); Richard J. Erickson, “Divine Injustice? Matthew’s Narrative Strategy and the Slaughter of the Innocents (Matthew 2.13-23),” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 64(1996), pp. 5-27.


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Jesus also confronts the reader symbolically as a new Abraham who will “father” the new Israel in a transcendent manner. Later, in his account of Jesus’ baptism Matthew will again portray Him as both Son of God and the beginning of a new Israel.15 (Cf. Mt 3:16-17) Fourth, in telling the story of the magi, Matthew underscores the fact, that even though, Jesus as God-with-us embodies something greater than the Davidic messiah of Jewish expectation, He nevertheless fulfills punctiliously the prophecies concerning the Davidic messiah. Jesus of Nazareth is born in Bethlehem, David’s city. Divine providence insures that He would grow up in Nazareth and thus “be called a Nazarene.” (Mt 2:1, 4-6, 22-3) The name “Nazareth” does not occur in the Old Testament. In saying that the prophets foretold that the messiah would come from Nazareth (Mt 2:23), Matthew is probably punning on Isaiah’s prophecy that a branch would spring from Jesse and would bring about a universal salvation. (Is 11:1-10) The Hebrew word for “branch (nesher)” has the same root as Nazareth. If Matthew does allude to the Isaian prophecy, the fact that the “branch” will effect universal salvation fulfills the story of the Gentile magi who worship the Christ child. The portrayal of Jesus as a Nazarene may also pun on the word “Nazarite,” one specially consecrated to God. (Num 6:1-21) If so, Matthew is assimilating Jesus to Samson, the Nazarite judge of Israel. (Judg 13-6) In his gospel, Matthew will stress even more than Mark the judgmental character of Jesus’ ministry. Jesus’ lack of Nazarite asceticism, however, argues against this interpretation.16 This chapter has examined Matthew’s infancy narrative. The narrative articulates many of the themes which the evangelist will develop in greater narrative detail in his gospel. The time has come, then, to examine how Matthew develops the positive dramatic linkages which he finds in Mark. To this problem I turn in the next chapter.17

15. Cf. Brown, The Birth of the Messiah, pp. 219-223; Nolan, op. cit., p. 133; NJBC, 42:12; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 39-41; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 11-19. 16. Cf. Steve Willis, “Matthew’s Birth Stories: Prophecy and the Magi,” Expository Times, 105(1993), pp. 43-45; Gabriel Perez Rodriguez, “Division Existential de Mt 1-2; Lc 1-2,” Estudios Biblicos, 50(1992), pp. 161-175; Brown, The Birth of the Messiah, pp. 165-232; Nolan, op. cit., pp. 131-144; NJBC, 42:15; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 41-44; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 40-50; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 20-22. 17. Cf. Patte, op.cit., pp.16-42; Albright and Mann, op.cit., pp. 1-24; Hill, op.cit., pp. 74-88; Levine, op.cit., pp. 59-106.

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Chapter 7 Positive Dramatic Linkages in Matthew Matthew patterns the dramatic linkages in his gospel on Mark’s. In both gospels, Jesus stands in a positive relationship to John the Baptizer as His precursor and as a fellow prophet. As in Mark’s gospel, Matthew’s Jesus relates more ambivalently to John’s disciples; but Jesus relates only positively to the Father and to the Holy Breath. Jesus, however, relates negatively to Satan and his demons, to the scribes and Pharisees, to the chief priests, to Herod, to Pilate, and to the Roman empire. Finally, Jesus, as in Mark, relates positively to the crowds and to His disciples, but they relate ambivalently to Him. This chapter examines the positive dramatic linkages in Matthew. It divides into three parts. Part one describes Jesus’ relationship to John the Baptizer. Part two examines His relationship to the Father. Part three analyzes His relation to the divine Breath. (I) After the infancy narrative, Matthew takes up the story of Jesus where Mark began it: with the preaching and ministry of John the Baptizer. As in Mark, Matthew’s John fulfills the prophecy of Is 40:3. Matthew, however, omits most of Mark’s editorial embellishments of Isaiah. Mark had written: “Behold, I send my messenger before your face who shall prepare your way, the voice of one crying in the wilderness: Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.” (Mk 1:2-3) As we saw, one does not find Mark’s verse 2 in the text of Isaiah. Mark has, in fact, conflated two Old Testament texts: Mal 3:1 and Is 40:3. Matthew, with scribal care, takes fewer liberties with the text of Isaiah, although he too does modify it slightly. Isaiah wrote: “A voice cries: In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.” (Is 40:3) Matthew writes: “The voice of one crying in the wilderness: Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.” (Mt 3:3) Later, Matthew will place the prophecy of Malachi on the lips of Jesus and will develop its theological implications in more detail than Mark.1 (Mt 11:9-17) John the Baptizer and Jesus Moreover, whereas Mark had portrayed John preaching a baptism “of repentance for the forgiveness of sins” (Mk 1:4), Matthew, who has already described Jesus in his infancy narrative as the one who takes away the sins of Israel, omits the phrase “for the forgiveness of sins.” Instead, 1. Cf. Gerd Höfner, “‘Jene Tage’ (Mt3,1) und der Umfang des Matthäschien Prologs,” Biblische Zeitschrift, 37(1993), pp. 43-59.

Chapter 7: Positive Dramatic Linkages in Matthew

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Matthew’s John preaches only a baptism of repentance. In Matthew’s theology, only the paschal mystery forgives sins. (Mt 26:26-28) In other respects, however, Matthew describes John’s ministry as Mark does. He situates it in the desert where popular expectation located the dawning of Israel’s final salvation. Moreover, like Mark, Matthew describes the Baptist as Elijah redivivus. Again echoing Mark, Matthew portrays John as a desert ascetic and insists on the enormous excitement and popularity of his ministry. (Mt 3:4-6) In contrast to Mark, however, Matthew gives more of a sampling of the Baptizer’s teachings. Mark had contented himself with reproducing John’s prophecy of a “mightier one” to come after him who would baptize in a sanctifying Breath. (Mk 1:7) Matthew precedes this prophecy with John’s rebuke to the Pharisees and Sadducees: You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit which benefits repentance, and do not presume to say to yourselves, We have Abraham as our father; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees; every tree therefore which does not bear good fruit is cut down and throw into the fire. (Mt 3:7-9)

John’s denunciation of the Pharisees and Saducees puts them immediately in an adversarial relationship to the new salvation foreshadowed by the ministry of John and soon to dawn in the ministry of Jesus. John denounces the Pharisees and Sadducees as a poisonous influence in Israel: as a brood of vipers. They oppose John because they substitute racial pride for the kind of genuine repentance which bears fruit in good works. Later, Matthew’s Jesus will warn against the “leaven,” or false teaching, of the Pharisees and Sadducees. Moreover, throughout his gospel Matthew will denounce Pharisaism as a shallow form of religious legalism. In these denunciations, the evangelist probably envisages not only the Pharisaism of his day but Pharisaical tendencies within his Jewish Christian community. John’s excoriation of the Pharisees and Sadducees also has a strongly eschatological tone. John warns of the immanence of divine judgment and of the divine wrath which will overtake the unrepentant sinner. Sinners will experience the holiness of God, symbolized by fire, not as a purification but as divine retribution. This judgmental rhetoric probably offers an accurate feel for the tone of John’s preaching. In reproducing it, moreover, Matthew implicitly contrasts John’s stern language with Jesus’ joyful and healing proclamation of the kingdom in the sermon on the mount. In the prophecy of the mightier one, Matthew also contrasts the consuming fire of divine retribution which will overtake the unrepentant

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Pharisees and Sadducees with the purifying fire of judgment which will sanctify those whom Jesus will baptize with the divine Breath. To Mark’s prophecy of the mightier one, Matthew adds the phrase “and with fire.” Matthew’s John prophesies: “I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry (Mark had said “to stoop down and untie”); He will baptize you with a sanctifying Breath and with fire.” (Mt 3:11) Whether John carries Jesus’ sandals (as in Matthew) or unties them (as in Mark), the Baptizer relates to Jesus as a slave, as one who serves one greater than himself. The addition of the phrase “and with fire” to the Baptizer’s prophecy may derive from a more primitive tradition about the prophecy of the “mightier one” than Mark knew. The addition makes it clear that Jesus’ ministry too brings judgment. Those who confront Jesus will, one way or the other, experience the immanent judgment which John foretells. That judgment will reveal the holiness of God. Those who believe and submit to Jesus’ Breath baptism will know that holiness as a forgiving, purifying, sanctifying force. Those who refuse faith in Jesus and harden their hearts against Breath-baptism will burn in the unquenchable fire of divine retribution: “His winnowing fork is in his hand, and He will clear His threshing floor and gather His wheat into the granary, but the chaff He will burn with unquenchable fire.” (Mt 3:12) The image of the fire of divine holiness which either purifies the repentant or consumes the unrepentant runs like a thread through the sayings of the Baptizer as Matthew reports them. In contrast to Mark, then, Matthew uses the preaching of John to foretell that Jesus by His ministry will sift Israel in eschatological judgment. True Israelites will hear His message and accept His Breath-baptism. Those who confuse Jewishness with racial origins instead of identifying it with obedient submission to the demands of a Torah fulfilled by Jesus’ preaching will know only divine rejection and retribution.2 Matthew also modifies Mark’s account of Jesus’ baptism in another way. He inserts a little tête-a-tête between Jesus and the Baptizer prior to the baptism itself. In that exchange John tries to dissuade Jesus from baptism. (Mt 3:13-7) Matthew’s John tells Jesus: “I should be baptized by you and do you come to me?” (Mt 3:13) To this objection Jesus replies:

2. Cf. Robert L.Webb, “The Activity of John the Baptist’s Expected Figure at the Threshing Floor (Matthew 3.12=Luke 3.17),” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 43(1991), pp. 103-111; NJBC, 42:17; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 50-60; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 50-61; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 24-29; J. Giblet, “La promesse de l’Esprit et la mission des apôtres dans les évangiles,” Irenikon, 30(1957), pp. 5-43.


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“Let it be so for now for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness (plerômai pasan dikaiosynen).” (Mt 3:15) The conversation between Jesus and John lacks a certain historical verisimilitude; but the exchange bears theological witness to the fact that Jesus’ baptism by John scandalized some of the first Christians. Indeed, as we saw in the reflecting on Mark’s gospel, Jesus’ baptism by John probably served as a bone of contention between the first Christians and the disciples of the Baptizer. The phrase “fulfill all righteousness” alludes to the theme of fulfillment which Matthew has already introduced in his infancy narrative. As we have seen, the evangelist has punctuated the infancy narrative with four citations of the prophets which the story of Jesus’ birth fulfills. (Mt 1:23, 2: 6, 15, 18) Now Jesus tells John that He intends to fulfill the meaning of John’s own baptism just as He will fulfill the meaning of the Law and the prophets. (Mt 5:17-19) Jesus will, moreover, fulfill the meaning of John’s baptism by fulfilling the Baptizer’s own prophecy about Him: namely, by baptizing with a sanctifying Breath and with fire. This Jesus will do when, as risen Lord, He sends the disciples forth and with the authority of Immanuel in order to baptize in the triune name. (Mt 28:19-20) In other words, Matthew justifies Jesus’ submission to John’s baptism as the means providentially chosen by God to fulfill its true meaning. Jesus transforms John’s water baptism from a baptism of mere repentance into a sanctifying baptism for the forgiveness of sins. Matthew’s John, convinced by Jesus’ argument, proceeds with the baptism.3 (Mt 3:15-6, 26:26-28) Like Mark, Matthew also records the confrontation between Jesus and the disciples of the Baptizer over the issue of fasting. Matthew, however, does not introduce this Markan material into his narrative until after the Sermon on the Mount. Instead of plunging Jesus into immediate conflict, as Mark does, Matthew portrays the opening of Jesus’ ministry as the joyful and healing proclamation of the kingdom. In postponing Mark’s conflict stories until later, Matthew incorporates the theme of conflict into his story of Jesus but, initially at least, gives it less narrative prominence. Matthew, as he habitually does, also edits Mark’s version of Jesus’ confrontation with John’s disciples, as he habitually does. Mark describes a confrontation between the disciples of John and a group of Pharisees. Matthew omits the Pharisees from the delegation who comes to Jesus, although with Mark he alludes to the fact that the Pharisees, like John’s disciples, observed non-obligatory fast days on Mondays and Thursdays. Matthew also edits Mark’s version of Jesus’ response, deleting unnecessary words. 3. Cf. NJBC, 42:18; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 60-64; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 61-65; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 30-32.

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Matthew’s terser version of the encounter preserves important elements of Mark’s account. Neither Jesus nor His disciples observed optional fasts. In this they contrasted with the more ascetical John, with John’s disciples, and with the Pharisees. Matthew’s Jesus responds like Mark’s: As long as the bridegroom is with them, His disciples cannot fast for joy. (Mt 9:15; Mk 2:19) In Matthew as in Mark, the image of the bridegroom has both divine and messianic overtones. Jesus identifies Himself as Israel’s faithful, divine spouse (Hos 2:19, Is 54:4-8, 62:4-5, Ezek 16:7-63) and as the messianic bridegroom. (Cf. Jn 3:29, 2 Cor 11:2, Eph 5:32, Rev 19:7, 21:2) Jesus also predicts that, when the bridegroom will be taken from them, the disciples will fast. For Mark, fasting expresses eschatological longing for the second coming. Matthew, however, sees fasting in more penitential terms. Matthew’s Jesus asks: “Can the sons of the bridegroom [a Semitic term for wedding guests] mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them?” (Mt 9:15) By equating fasting with mourning, Matthew presents it as an expression of sorrow, probably for sin. In addition, Matthew modifies the two sayings of Jesus which follow. The first proverb warns against mending old clothes with a patch of “unshrunken” cloth. (Mt 6:16-17) Mark calls the cloth “new” in order to contrast the difference between the new order and the old. Matthew, who sees the old order fulfilled in the new, mutes that contrast.4 Moreover, Matthew’s Jesus predicts that the unshrunken patch will tear the old garment. The prediction contains two puns. The term “patch (pleroma)” also means fullness, while the term “tear (schisma)” also means a schism, a division within a community. Since Matthew regards Christian faith as the fulfillment of the old Law, the patch symbolizes Jewish Christianity; the tear, the widening division between the church at Antioch and the synagogue. The latter’s refusal to recognize that the new Law fulfills the old has, Matthew warns, caused the rift between the Christian community in Antioch and the “synagogue across the street.” Matthew, pursues his polemic in the second proverb as well, which asserts that if one puts new wine into new skins “both are preserved.” The fulfillment of the old Law in the new preserves the old. The new does not supplant the old because it demands more, not less, than the old. Elsewhere in his gospel, Matthew edits Mark in such a way as to focus issues exclusively on the Pharisees, who symbolize the Pharisaical leaders of the “synagogue across the street.” Matthew could have done the same in editing this confrontation between Jesus and John’s disciples. Instead, Matthew has John’s disciples pose the question about fasting to Jesus. The inclusion of John’s disciples suggests that Matthew wants Jesus’ pro4. Cf. J.A. Zeisler, “The Removal of the Bridegroom: A Note on Mark II. 18-22 and Parallels,” New Testament Studies, 19(1972-1973), pp. 190-194.


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nouncements to apply to the Johannine movement as well. Jesus fulfills John’s prophetic ministry, just as He fulfills the other prophets. Any split between John’s disciples and Jesus’ results from the former’s failure to recognize that Christian baptism fulfills Johannine.5 In addition, Matthew introduces new material into His account of the relation between Jesus, on the one hand, and John and John’s disciples, on the other. While in prison, John, hears of Jesus and His ministry. The imprisoned prophet sends a delegation of disciples to ask Jesus if He is indeed “the one who is to come.” (Mt 11:2-6) The title has messianic connotations, although it could also allude to John’s prophecy of the coming “mightier one” who would baptize with a sanctifying Breath and with fire. In the evangelist’s mind the question would very probably have had both connotations. Interpreted from the Baptizer’s viewpoint, the question suggests that John in his own mind identified the “mightier one” whom he foretold with the messiah. Jesus interprets the question in a messianic sense and answers it as directly as He could without getting arrested. He does not say outright “I am the messiah,” but He points to His ministry as containing the signs which would accompany the arrival of the messianic era: Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the poor have the good news preached to them. And blessed is he who takes no offense at me. (Mt 11:2-6; cf. Is 29:18-9, 35:5-6; 61:1)

In pointing to His ministry of healing and proclamation as a sign that the messianic era has arrived, Jesus revises popular messianic hopes. Not the prophet of eschatological wrath and judgment envisaged in John’ prophecy of the “mightier one,” Jesus also eschews a Davidic messianism, which would forcibly establish Israel’s political dominion over all the nations of the earth. Jesus instead focuses His ministry on the poor and disenfranchised, on the broken and suffering. Nevertheless, He responds to John by saying in effect: “Anyone with eyes to see will recognize in me and in my ministry the arrival of the messianic era.” At the same time, Jesus recognizes that His repudiation of Davidic messianism will prove a stumbling block to many. He also acknowledges that His message of forgiveness and of hope rather than of judgment and of divine retribution has even raised doubts in John’s mind as to Jesus’ messianic identity. For that reason, Jesus adds: “Blessed is he who takes no offense at me.” 5. Cf. NJBC, 42: 62; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 128-130; Albright and Mann, op. cit., 107-109.

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Matthew also follows this incident with Jesus’ encomium of John and of John’s ministry. Mark’s Jesus pronounces no such encomium. Matthew’s Jesus addresses His words to the crowds who had gone to listen to John’s preaching. Jesus asks six rhetorical questions about John. Three questions repeat the same query: When you went to listen to John, what did you go out to see? Each time the question recurs, a second question follows which suggests an answer to the first. The second question proposes the wrong answer in the case of the first two doublets of questions, the right answer in the case of the last: What did you go out into the wilderness to behold? A reed shaken by the wind? Why then did you go out? To see a man clothed in soft raiment? Behold. Those who wear soft raiment are in kings’ houses. Why then did you go out? To see a prophet? Yes, I tell you and more than a prophet. This is he of whom it is written, Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who shall prepare the way before you. (Mt 11:7-15)

Jesus portrays John as a person of enormous strength and unshakable resolve. The Baptizer’s fidelity to His prophetic mission has led him to denounce Herod and to put his very life on the line. John’s ascetical garments underscore his difference from the Herodians, and especially from the sensual, self-indulgent Herod. (Mt 11:2, 14:5-6) In testifying to the prophetic character of John’s mission, therefore, Jesus endorses the substance of John’s message. Jesus also, implicitly, sanctions John’s denunciation of Herod by His satirical reference to self-indulgent royalty.6 Jesus, however, goes further. He regards John as more than an ordinary prophet. Jesus sees in John the eschatological prophet foretold by Malachi who would prepare the way for the coming of the “angel (messenger) of the covenant.” In the text of Malachi the “angel of the covenant” probably designates Jahweh Himself, who will come to purify the levitical priesthood and the worship it offers to God by bringing to judgment sorcerers, adulterers, and those who oppress the poor. In Matthew, “the angel” designates Jesus. As for John, Jesus is about to inform his disciples, He regards the Baptizer as Elijah redivivus. (Mt 17:13) As a final encomium Jesus asserts, “Truly I say to you, among those born of women, there has risen no one greater than John the Baptizer.” (Mt 11:11) Jesus offers no immediate explanation for singling out John as unsurpassed in the whole history of the human race. One may, however, read this hyperbolic praise as a summary of what preceded and as a foreshadowing what Jesus is about to say about John. John stands unsurpassed among humans because the Law and the prophets all culminate in 6. Cf. Stephen Llewelyn, “The Traditionsgeschichte of Matt 11:12-13, Par. Luke 16:16,” New Testament Studies, 36(1994), pp. 330-349.


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His preaching and because, through his courageous and unswerving fidelity to his eschatological mission as Elijah, John announces the arrival of the end time and the divine judgment accomplished in Jesus and in His ministry. What follows re-enforces this interpretation, since Jesus immediately contrasts John’s mission with His own. Truly, I say to you, among those born of women there has risen no one greater than John the Baptizer; yet he who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. From the days of John the Baptizer until now the kingdom of Heaven has suffered violence (biazetai) and people of violence take it by force (kai biastai harpazousin auten). For all the prophets and the Law prophesied until John; and, if you are willing to accept it, he is Elijah who is to come. He who has ears to hear let him hear. (Mt 11:11-3)

We find here the recurrence of themes Matthew has already introduced into his account of Jesus’ ministry: namely, for all of John’s dignity as eschatological prophet, Jesus’ ministry surpasses the Baptizer’s because Jesus’ ministry fulfills not only John’s own ministry but also the entire Law and the prophets. (Mt 2:14-5, 5:14) Moreover, Jesus does this by being Immanuel, God-with-us. (Mt 1:23) Jesus thus fulfills the prophecy of Malachi that the angel of the covenant, God himself, would one day come to purify His people, his priests, and the worship they offer Him. Presumably, Jesus will do this when He baptizes His disciples with “a sanctifying Breath and with fire,” as John had prophesied. (Mt 3:11, 28:19-20) The fact that the least in the kingdom outrank John suggests that the latter never did put faith in Jesus and in His mission. The verb “biazetai” in verse 12 can mean either suffers violence or does violence. If one takes it in the latter sense, then this obscure saying would seem to refer to the radical demands made by the kingdom, demands which require an equally radical response on the part of those accept the kingdom (and in this sense “take it by force.”) If, however, one takes “biazetai” to mean “suffers violence,” then Jesus refers to the opposition which John’s ministry and His own have provoked among the strong and powerful. In that case, the kingdom suffering violence alludes to John’s forcible imprisonment by Herod, the client king of the occupying Romans. The latter interpretation has a bit more verisimilitude and pits the work of the kingdom against the principalities and powers of this world, symbolized now by Herod Antipas. Antipas’s father had, of course, symbolized the same dark powers in Matthew’s infancy narrative. Moreover, Jesus’ close linkage of His own mission to John’s suggests that He Himself regarded His ministry as prolonging and extending the work of John. Jesus therefore provokes hostility from the same enemies:

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namely, from the Herodians. The allusion to Malachi’s prophecy, moreover, implicitly includes the temple priesthood among the adversaries whom Jesus confronts. Finally, Jesus warns the crowds: “Whoever has ears to hear, let him hear!” The warning underscores the urgency of John’s message of repentance and of judgment. Even more, Jesus’ warning voices the crucial urgency of taking Jesus Himself even more seriously than John.7 (Mt 11:15) In challenging the crowds to hear His message, Jesus also calls upon them to listen deeply to the wisdom which He proclaims. Matthew’s tacit allusion to the deep wisdom present in Jesus and in His ministry also forms a transition to the parable which follows. It contrasts works of the children in the market place with the works of wisdom. But to what shall I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the market place and calling to their playmates: “We piped to you and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn.” For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, “He has a demon”; the Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, “Behold, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.” And wisdom is justified by her works. (Mt 11:16-9)

The parable underscores both the contrast and the continuity between Jesus’ mission and John’s. Both announce the coming of the end time; but Jesus proclaims a kingdom which fulfills the Law and the prophets. John comes as a fire-breathing ascetic, Jesus as the joyful messenger of the kingdom who gathers the sinners and the marginal back into the fold of the new Israel which He begins. Both Jesus and John find among “this generation,” not acceptance, but unbelief, ridicule, and slander. “This generation” will hear neither John’s stern summons to repentance nor Jesus’ joyful proclamation of good news.8 Luke in his version of this parable refers to the “children” of wisdom rather than to the “works” of wisdom. Luke probably records the original version of the parable, which sets up a contrast between the foolish, mocking children in the market place, who stand for “this generation,” and “the children of wisdom” who stand for those who hear the messages and John and of Jesus and respond appropriately. 7. Cf. Gerd Häfner, “Gewalt gegen die Basileia? Zum Problem der Auslegung des ‘Stürmerspruchs,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 83(1992), pp. 21-51. 8. Cf. O. Linton, “The Parable of the Children’s Game,” New Testament Studies, 22(1975- 1976), pp. 158-179; Harold Clark Lee, “Jesus a Glutton and a Drunkard,” New testament Studies, 42(1996), pp. 374-393; NJBC, 42:73; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 153-160; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 154-162; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 135-141.


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Matthew, however, changes the phrase “children of wisdom” to read “works of wisdom.” The term “works” serves as a biblical inclusion by referring back to “the works of Jesus (ta erga tou Jesou)” which had originally prompted John to ask Jesus if He is the one who is to come. For Matthew, these works serve as a rebuttal to the mockery and slander of “this generation.” Matthew’s Jesus has, moreover, proclaimed those works as signs of the arrival of the messianic age, even though Jesus embodies something very different from Davidic messianic expectations. By proclaiming the kingdom to the poor and the marginal, Jesus radically revises Jewish messianic hope. As a consequence, Jesus meets mocking unbelief among the unrepentant. Clearly, those do the works of wisdom who heed the message of John and of Jesus.9 Matthew abbreviates Mark’s account of John’s martyrdom. Moreover, he underscores the parallel between Jesus’ rejection at Nazareth and John’s execution by juxtaposing the two events temporally. (Mt 14:1) Despite, the terseness of his account of the Baptizer’s demise, however, Matthew preserves the fundamental elements of Mark’s narrative: 1) Herod superstitiously believes that Jesus is John the Baptizer come back from the dead. 2) Herod imprisons John because the Baptizer publicly rebuked the king for marrying his brother’s wife, Herodias. 3) Herod promises publicly to give Herodias’ daughter whatever she asks as a reward for her dance at Herod’s birthday party. 4) The girl requests the head of John which is grotesquely delivered to her on a serving platter. As in Mark, she gives it to her mother, who presumably was attending the feast. (Mt 14:1-12, Mk 6:14-29) Matthew, however, modifies Mark’s account in two details. Mark contrasts the hatred Herodias feels for John to Herod’s own ambivalent attitude toward the Baptizer. (Mk 6:19-20) Matthew portrays Herod as a murderous villain, who from the beginning lusts from John’s blood. Only fear of the crowds, who idolize John, restrains Herod’s hand in Matthew. (Mt 14:5) Matthew’s account accords better than Mark’s with Josephus’s portrait of Herod. (Josephus, History of the Jewish Wars, 75:165) Matthew, moreover, in portraying Herod as pure villain also implicitly assimilates him to his villainous father, Herod the Great, who had sought Jesus’ life in the infancy narrative. Mark ends his account of John’s death with the burial of the Baptizer’s corpse by his disciples. Matthew, however, subtly stresses both the similarity and contrast between John’s and Jesus’ death. The evangelist does so by having the disciples of John also inform Jesus of the Baptizer’s mar9. Cf. W. Wilkins, “Die Täuferüberlieferung des Matthœus und Ihre Verarbeitung durch Lukas,” New Testament Studies, 40(1994), pp. 542-557; Volker Schoenle, Johannes, Jesus, und die Juden: Die theologische Position des Matthœus und des Verfassens der Redenquelle in Lichte von Mt 11 (Frankfurt am Mein: Verlag Peter Lang, 1982).

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tyrdom. Jesus responds to the news by retiring into the desert, where He works the first miracle of the loaves. That miracle, as in Mark, foreshadows the eucharist, which, of course, derives its full meaning from the paschal mystery. By thus implicitly linking the paschal mystery to his account of the Baptizer’s death, Matthew tacitly contrasts Jesus’ death with John’s. John dies a martyr’s death; but John does not rise again, as Jesus will in the paschal mystery.10 We find three other references to John the Baptizer which echo the gospel of Mark. First, when Jesus at Caesarea Philippi asks His disciples who people say He is, the disciples reply, among other things, John the Baptizer. (Mt 16:13-20; Mk 8:27-30) The response indicates that others shared Herod’s superstitious belief that Jesus was John risen from the dead. It also suggests that the Palestinian populace acknowledged the continuity between Jesus’ ministry and John’s. Second, as Jesus and His disciples descend the mount of the transfiguration, Jesus informs them that John the Baptizer is Elijah. As in Mark, Jesus says this after predicting that He will rise from the dead. As in Mark’s account, the disciples do no understand how anyone can rise until Elijah returns; and in this context Jesus tells them that Elijah has returned in the person of John. (Mt 17:1-8; Mk 9:9-13) Matthew edits Mark’s text slightly and eliminates repetition; but apart from greater terseness, Matthew reduplicates Mark. In Matthew, of course, Jesus’ statement echoes His encomium of John. (Mt 11:13-15) Third, during Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry the chief priests challenge Jesus to name the authority which justifies His actions. As in Mark Jesus replies by saying that he will do so if the chief priests tell him by what authority John baptized. The priests know that if they acknowledge the divine authority of John’s prophetic ministry, Jesus will respond: “Why then did you not believe in him?” If they deny divine authority to John’s prophetic ministry, they fear the anger of the crowds. (Mt 21:23-7; Mk 11:27-33) Once again, Matthew edits superfluous verbiage from Mark’s version of the incident; but he preserves the essence of Mark’s account. Both versions of the story underscore the continuity between John’s prophetic ministry and Jesus’ proclamation of the kingdom. Jesus implicitly claims to speak and act with the same authority as John, namely, with the Breath-inspired authority of a prophet. In both gospels, the chief priests refuse to credit either prophet.11 10. Cf. J.D.M. Derrett, Law in the New Testament (London: Darlon, Longmans, and Todd, Ltd., 1970), pp. 339-358; NJBC, 42:95; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 201-202; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 214-218; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 175-176. 11. Cf. Walter Wink, The Baptist in the Gospel Tradition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1968), pp. 27-41; John P. Meier, “John the Baptist in Matthew’s Gospel,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 99(1980), pp. 383-405; NJBC, 42:107, 127;


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The Analogy of Christological Knowing Like Mark, Matthew uses the figure of John inorder to insist on the saving importance of the Breath-baptism which conforms the believing Christian to Jesus. Matthew, however, stresses even more than Mark the unique efficacy of Jesus’ baptism. Johannine baptism seals repentance, but it does not forgive sins. Only Jesus’ baptism, which communicates the sanctifying Breath of God, does that. Moreover, Matthew’s inistence on the judgmental character of Jesus’ ministry focuses the attention of the disciples on the purifying character of the baptismal Breath’s activity. Matthew concedes that in John one encounters the greatest of the prophets; but in Jesus, Immanuel, God Himself visits His people. In all these ways Matthew develops and underscores the uniqueness of Christian baptism and of the knowledge which the Breath of Jesus imparts to the baptized. This section has considered the first of Matthew’s positive dramatic linkages. It highlights the unique character of Christian baptism and the sovereign, saving efficacy of the Breath it communicates. Let us begin to examine how Matthew develops Mark’s account of Jesus’ relationship to the Father and to the Breath; for in both gospels that relationship yields a normative insight into the practical demands of Christological knowing. (II) In Matthew as in Mark the term “God (ho Theos)” refers to the Father. I shall therefore consider together the passages in which both “God” and “Father” appear.12 The Father in the Infancy Narrative One finds only one reference to God in Matthew’s infancy narrative and no explicit reference to the Father. In his account of the birth of the messiah, Matthew explains in Greek the meaning of the Hebrew name Immanuel: namely, “God with us (meth’ hemôn ho Theos).” (Mt 1:24) As we have seen, Jesus’ virginal conception manifests His divine origin and anticipates His resurrection, which will bring his revelation as Immanuel to its culmination. Jesus, as we have also seen, will stand fully revealed as God-with-us when He fulfills John the Baptizer’s prophecy of

Radermakers, op. cit., II, p. 225; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 253-256, 298-301; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 202-207, 258- 261; Justin Taylor, “The Coming of Elijah,” Revue Biblique, 98(1991), pp. 107-119; Hubert Frankemoelle, “Johannes der Täufer und Jesus im Matthäusevangelium: Jesus als Nachfolger des Tœufers,” New Testament Studies, 42(1996), pp. 196-218. 12. In Matthew’s gospel, the term “God” occurs in contexts which add little fresh insight into His relationship with the Father. For example, when Jesus cures the paralytic in order to prove His authority to forgive sins, the bystanders all glorify God. (Mt 9:1-8) After He cures the multitudes, they praise “the God of Israel.” (Mt 15:31)

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the coming Breath-baptizer by sending the disciples to baptize all creatures in the triune name. (Mt 23:20) At one level, therefore, “God with us” designates Jesus’ divinity and connotes His equality with the Father. Since, however, the term “God” designates the Father, one may also interpret “God-with-us” in the more dispensational sense that Jesus, as the Son of God, reveals the Father and makes Him present in a unique, saving way.13 The Father in the Baptizer’s Preaching One also finds a single use of the term “God” in the teachings of Matthew’s Baptizer. In rebuking the high priests and the Pharisees for their shallow legalism and racial pride, John warns them “I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham.” (Mt 3:9) John is calling the priests and Pharisees to abjure their self-righteous trust in their Jewishness and to recognize that salvation has nothing to do with racial descent. Salvation results instead from works which flow from repentance. (Mt 3:8) John warns that God alone saves and can create members of the true Israel in miraculous and unexpected ways. Matthew would probably have seen John’s words fulfilled in the repentance and baptism of Christian Gentiles, who thereafter belong to the new Israel founded by Jesus. The evangelist therefore implicitly prefers the repentance and righteous living of Gentile Christians to the self-righteous legalism of the Pharisees and Sadducees.14 Jesus and the Father In Mark’s account of Jesus’ baptism, the evangelist speaks of the Breath descending on Jesus like a dove. Matthew, however, explicitly designates the Breath as “a Breath of God.” The genitive designates God as the source of the Breath who descends on Jesus in order to begin His manifestation as Son of God and beginning of a new Israel. (Mt 3:16-17; cf. Mk 1:10-11) In addition, Matthew also insists more explicitly than Mark that the Father sends Her to Jesus. In Mark, Jesus sees “the Breath descending like a dove.” (Mk 1:10) Matthew writes: “He saw the Breath of God descending like a dove, and alighting on Him.”15 13. Cf. NJBC, 42:11; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 34-38; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 34-40; 13and Mann, op. cit., pp. 7-10. 14. Cf. NJBC, 42:17; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 51-55; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 55-59; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 24-29. 15. In Mt 12:28, Jesus claims to exorcise in the power of the Breath of God. The phrase reasserts something Matthew has already made clear: the Father functions as the ultimate source of the Breath. See also: Leander E. Keck, “The Spirit and the Dove,” New Testament Studies, 17(1970-1971), pp. 41-67; A. Feuillet, “Le symbolisme de la colombe dans les recits évangelique du baptème,” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 46(1958), pp. 524-544.


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As we have seen, Matthew’s John predicts that Jesus will baptize with a sanctifying Breath and with fire. The fact, therefore, that the same Holy Breath descends on Jesus under the sign of a dove suggests that He relates differently to Her from the way the disciples do. Since the Breath comes to Jesus from the Father, a difference in His relationship to Her also implies a difference in His relationship to the Father. The sign of fire indicates that the Father sends the Breath to the disciples in purification and in judgment. Matthew’s dove, like Mark’s, symbolizes Israel as the “pet,” the beloved of God. The Father sends Her to Jesus in order to manifest Him as the beloved Son of God and as the beginning of a new Israel, as the Father’s commissioning words make clear. (Mt 3:17; cf. Ps 74:19) In both Matthew and Mark, the Father commissions Jesus messiah in the image of the suffering servant of Deutero-Isaiah. Matthew, however, changes slightly the Father’s commissioning words. Mark’s Jesus hears the Father say: “You are My beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.” In Matthew, the voice proclaims, “This is My beloved Son; with You I am well pleased.” (Mt 3:17) In Matthew, therefore, the voice from heaven does not only address Jesus but also the reader and through the reader the entire world. In other words, Matthew revises Mark’s account of Jesus’ baptism and transforms the personal hierophany which Jesus experiences secretely in Mark into the Father’s universal proclamation to the world of Jesus’ divine Sonship. Matthew, therefore, assimilates Jesus’ baptism to His transfiguration more closely than Mark. On both occasions, the Father speaks the same words: “This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.” In the transfiguration, the Father speaks to Peter, James, and John and adds: “Listen to Him.” (Mt 17:1-5) In other respects Matthew reproduces Mark’s account of the baptism and endorses Mark’s theological reading of that event.16 Matthew, however, significantly revises Mark’s temptation narrative. First, Matthew downplays the force with which the Breath causes Jesus to confront Satan. In Mark, the baptismal Breath drives (ekballei) Jesus into the desert; in Matthew She leads (anechthe) Him. As we shall see, Matthew mutes the theme of demonic conflict so prominent in Mark. Matthew also omits all reference to desert beasts. This editorial omission also downplays the note of conflict; for, as we have seen, in Mark the desert beasts symbolize both demonic forces and (probably) the beasts of the Roman arena. The omission of the desert beasts eliminates as well Mark’s 16. Cf. Moran D. Hooker, Jesus and the Servant (London: SPCK, 1959); NJBC, 42:18; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 60-64; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 60-65; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 30-32; Robert L. Mowery, “Subtle Differences in Matthean ‘Son of God’ References,” Novum Testamentum, 32(1990), pp. 193-200.

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Adamic symbolism, since Jesus in the midst of the beasts recalls Adam surrounded by the beasts in Eden and giving them names. Matthew, however, modifies Mark’s temptation narrative most significantly by turning Mark’s cryptic reference to Satan into an extended dialogue between Jesus and Satan. Satan tempts Jesus three times; and three times Jesus responds by citing the Torah. I shall return to this point in other contexts. Here it suffices to note that in each citation of the Torah, Jesus invokes the name of God. His replies, therefore, make a statement about His relationship to the Father. As in Mark, Matthew’s Jesus stays in the desert forty days. The forty-day sojourn reasserts an idea which Matthew has introduced in His infancy gospel: namely, that, as messiah and God-with-us, Jesus confronts the reader as the personal embodiment of the new Israel which He begins. (Mt 2:15) His temptations, as we shall see, foreshadow the temptations of the corporate Israel He will found. His responses, therefore, typify the way the members of that Israel should respond to temptation. Jesus responds to each temptation by citing a precept of the Law which His person and teaching fulfill. (Mt 5:17-19) Matthew’s Jesus will demand that His disciples imitate the attitudes expressed in each of His responses to Satan. Jesus’ responses, as a consequence, provide an important key to the moral demands of new covenant living. The fact that in each response Jesus cites a verse of the Torah which contains the name of God also transforms His relationship to the Father under temptation into the prototypical way in which the members of the new Israel sould relate to the Father in similar circumstances. Satan first tempts Jesus to sinful self-reliance. (Mt 4:3-4) He does so by urging Jesus to break His fast by turning stones into bread and eating them. Devout Jews fasted, not in order to get control of their appetites, but as a way of recalling the desert wanderings of God’s people during which they depended on the Lord God from day to day to provide the food they needed in order to survive. Jesus, through His baptismal commissioning by the Father as messiah in the image of the suffering servant, begins the new Israel by reliving the desert experience of the first Israel. His fast symbolizes that He undertakes His mssion from the Father trusting in the Father’s provident care over Him. Jesus’ response to Satan makes His motives for fasting clear. When Satan tempts Him to break His fast by using His miraculous powers in order to change stones into bread, Jesus replies: “One shall not live by bread alone, but by every word which proceeds from the mouth of God.” (Mt 4:3; Dt 8:3) Jesus looks to the Father, not to bread or to the other physical supports of life as the ultimate source of His life. Jesus makes this response as the beginning of a new Israel and under the inspiration of the Breath with whom He will baptize its members. Hence, they too


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must look to the Father and not to physical possessions as the ultimate source of their lives. Satan next takes Jesus to the pinnacle of the temple and urges Him to throw Himself off in order to see if the Father will come to His rescue. The second temptation builds on the first. In effect, Satan tempts Jesus to “test God.” “Testing God” means setting the conditions under which one is willing to trust Him. In effect, Satan says, “Very well, if you intend to trust the Father, then at least set the conditions under which you will trust Him. Test Him and make sure He is really on your side.” Jesus’ answer goes once again to the heart of the temptation. Jesus replies, “Again, it is written, ‘You shall not tempt the Lord your God.’” (Mt 4:5-7; Dt 6:13) In refusing to test God, Jesus responds that He will relate to the Father in an attitude of unconditioned trust. Once again, Jesus models for the members of the new Israel how they ought to relate to God in times of testing. Finally, Satan tempts Jesu to found the kingdom of God on secular messianism. Satan shows Jesus the kingdoms of the world and tells Him, “All these I will give you if you will fall down and worship me.” Jesus replies, “Begone, Satan! For it is written: ‘The Lord your God shall you adore and Him only shall you serve.’” (Mt 4:8-10; Dt 6:13) Clearly, in the eyes of Matthew’s Jesus, to found the kingdom on coercive violence and on the laws of the nations amounts not only to idolatry but to devil worship. Jesus rejects this option categorically and replies that He will found the reign of God only on authentic worship of the Father. Once again, when similarly tempted, the disciples of Jesus must respond in similar ways. As we shall see below, these three responses provide an important key to the moral demands of life in the kingdom. Here, however, it suffices to note that Jesus in His temptations relates to the Father in an attitude of absolute and unconditioned trust and in fidelity to His commission as messiah in the form of the suffering servant. He rejects the principalities and powers of this world and insists on founding the kingdom on authentic worship of the Father. The members of the new Israel must relate to the Father in a similar manner.17 Jesus Teaches About the Father Matthew, as we have seen, desires to portray Jesus as the one who brings a new covenant. He, therefore, stresses much more than Mark the teach17. Cf. J. Dupont, Les tentations de Jésus au desert (Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 1968), pp. 11-42; Birger Gerhardson, The Testing of God’s Son (Matt 4:1-11 & Par.) (Lund: Berlingska Bortrickereit, 1966); NJBC, 42:19; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 64-68; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 65-70; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 33-37; Mark McVann, “Uno de los Profetas: Interpretacion del Relato de las Tentaciones in Mateo como Rito de Iniciacion,” Estudios Biblicos, 49(1991), pp. 191-208.

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ings of Jesus. As a result, in Matthew, God the Father figures more prominently in Jesus’ teaching. The sixth and seventh beatitudes discuss a believer’s relationship to God. The sixth beatitude reads: “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.” (Mt 5:8) In the Old Testament, purity of heart implies both legal and moral cleansing. The sixth beatitude, therefore, promises that those who live righteous lives in accord with the legal and moral demands of the Law as fulfilled by Jesus, will one day enjoy the vision of God. The seventh beatitude reads: “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.” (Mt 5: 9) Peace in the Old Testament signifies total well-being. In Matthew, then, the peacemaking which the seventh beatitude urges implies the love of one’s neighbor and therefore stands close to the fifth beatitude: “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.” (Mt 5:7) Peacemaking, caring for the total well-being of others, transforms one into a child of God: i.e., it conforms one to Jesus. Except in the first and eighth beatitude the verb promising the reward stands in the future tense. The beatitudes in Matthew, therefore, have a strong eschatological flavor. The rewards they promise will come in their fullness with the final establishment of the kingdom. The fact, however, that poverty of spirit and persecution make one into a present possessor of the kingdom, suggests a realized eschatology. In Jesus and in the Church, the kingdom has already arrived in some measure but will arrive in its fullness at some future date.18 In prohibiting oaths, Jesus in the sermon on the mount refers to heaven as “the throne of God,” the place where God sits in majesty and from which God reigns. (Mt 5:34) The image recurs in the woes against the scribes and Pharisees. There Jesus says, “One who swears by heaven, swears by the throne of God and by Him who sits upon it.” (Mt 23:22) In Matthew, therefore, the term “heaven,” when it designates the place where God dwells rather than functioning as a euphemism for the divine name, has a double connotation. As the dwelling place of God, it designates the ultimate goal of the pure of heart, the place where they will “see God.” As the throne of God, however, heaven designates the ultimate source of God’s reign, whose influence reaches down into the earth, the dwelling place of humans.19

18. Cf. I. Brör, Die Seligpreisungen der Bergpredigt (Bonn: Peter Hanstein, 1986); NJBC, 42:24; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 83-85; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 77-81; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 45-53. 19. CF.Jo-Ann A. Brant, “Infelicitous Oaths in the Gospel of Matthew,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 63(1996), pp. 3-20.


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In the sermon on the mount, moreover, the perfection of the Father’s love provides the measure and pattern of Christian love. Love of one’s enemies and the willingness to pray for one’s persecutors transform one into a child of the Father. In other words, they conform one to Jesus. Since the Father sends blessings on both good people and evil people, His children must do the same. Even sinners and tax collectors love their own; but the child of God, living in Jesus’ image, loves even sinners with the universal perfection of the Father.20 (Mt 5:43-8) In the course of correcting abuses in traditional Jewish piety during His inaugural sermon, Jesus warns that the Father will not reward hypocritical, egocentric religious behavior which seeks only to impress others with one’s religiosity. (Mt 6:1) Indeed, the Father will ignore both alms and prayer performed for that reason, because both have already received the reward they seek: self-adulation. One should, then, perform all such acts of piety in secret, as a proof that one is doing them sincerely for God’s sake and not for the sake of oneself. Only then will they merit a reward from God. (Mt 6:1-6) By contrasting the present reward of religious hypocrites with the prayers which the Father will hear and the almsgiving which He will reward, Matthew once again endows both acts with a eschatological character. The Father will reward sincere prayer and almsgiving offered in secret, but whether in this life or in the next remains vague. (Mt 6:5-6) Jesus also discourages the superstitious multiplication of words in prayer in the hope of controlling or manipulating God. Such superstition characterizes pagan prayer. The true child of God approaches the Father in an attitude of trust, confident that the Father knows the needs of His children even before they ask Him. The expression of personal and communal needs in prayer does not, therefore, tell God anything new; rather it disposes the one praying to receive the boon for which one prays.21 (Mt 6:7-8) The Our Father provides the child of God with a model of Christian prayer. Luke begins the Our Father more simply than Matthew. Luke writes: “Father, hallowed be Your name.” (Lk 11:2) Matthew writes “Our Father in heaven (Pater hemon ho en tois ouranois).” In calling the Father “Our Father,” Matthew makes it clear that one addresses the Father, not as an isolated individual, but in solidarity with all of God’s children. The Father in heaven contrasts with one’s earthly father. Moreover, since Matthew, as we have seen, regards heaven as the throne of God the image endows the Father with an awesome majesty which attenuates the easier familiarity of the “Abba” which opens Luke’s prayer. In fact, Luke 20. Cf. NJBC, 42: 35; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 94-95; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 85-90; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 71-72. 21. Cf. NJBC, 42:38; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 97-98; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 93-99; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 73-78.

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reproduces not only a terser but probably a more accurate version of the Father prayer.22 In both Matthew and Luke, the petitions of the Our Father express the way a child of God ought typically to relate to the Father in prayer. The petition “Your kingdom come (eltheto he basileia sou)” expresses longing for the final and full arrival of the reign of God. The second petition, “Your will be done on earth as in heaven” describes what the final and full coming of the kingdom demands: namely, perfect obedience of faith on the part of all people. Like the first petition, the second expresses eschatological longing. It contrasts the unchanging order in the stars with the chaotic disobedience to God’s will on earth. The second petition longs for the day when human conduct will imitate the obedient movement of the heavenly bodies. “Give us today our daily bread (ton arton hemon ton epiousion dos hemin semeron)” Like Jesus’ fasting in the desert, the child of God must look to God for food and for the other necessities of life. This petition, like all the petitions of the Our Father, expresses corporate longing and implicitly commits the child of God to the sharing of bread with others, especially with those in need. The Greek term “epiousion” can mean “tomorrow’s,” “daily,” “needful,” or “future.” Given the strong eschatological tone of the Our Father, Matthew may have intended all of these meanings. Christians long for earthly bread, the daily bread of the poor and of the needy. At the same time, eschatological longing transforms the bread we eat today into a symbol of the bread of “tomorrow,” the bread we shall one day share at the messianic banquet. The eschatological character of the bread which the Father gives led the first Christians to endow this petition with eucharistic connotations, although it seems unlikely that Jesus would have had the eucharist in mind when He composed this petition. Two teachings in the sermon on the mount—the proverb about God and mammon and the parable about the birds of the air—implicitly comment on the fourth petition of the Our Father by making clear what attitudes the petition ought to express. (Mt 6:24-34) No one can serve God and mammon (the Semitic word for riches) at the same time. (Mt 6:24) In other words, life in the kingdom demands a radical choice between God and wealth.23 22. Cf. Kari Syreeni, “Between Heaven and Earth: On the Structure of Matthew’s Symbolic Universe,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 40(1990), pp. 3-13; Warren Carter, “Recalling the Lord’s Prayer: The Authorial Audience and Matthew’s Prayer as Familiar Liturgical Experience,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 57(1995), pp. 514-530. 23. Cf. Hans Christol Brennecke, “‘Niemand kann zwei Herren dienen’ Bemerkungen zur Auslegung von Mt 6,24/Lk 16,13m” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 88(1997), pp. 157-169.


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The parable of the birds of the air ponders the consequences of abjuring riches. The renunciation of wealth implicitly demands that one look to God as the source of one’s bread and of all the other physical needs. (Mt 6:25-34) Trust that the Father will fulfill all one’s needs requires in turn an attitude of heart which excludes any anxiety about physical possessions. One must seek first the reign of God and its righteousness, confident that God, who knows well the physical needs of His children, will provide for them. Absence of anxiety about possessions frees one to share them with others. (Mt 6:2-4) God’s concern to clothe the lilies of the field more sumptuously than Solomon implicitly censures that monarch’s excessive wealth and asserts God’s special concern for the anawim. (Mt 6:29) Trust in God does not, however, require one to ignore either one’s needs or the difficulty of survival in this world: “Let the day’s trouble suffice for the day.”24 (Mt 6:34) “Forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors.” The two verses which follow the Our Father in the sermon on the mount comment on this petition: For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father also will forgive you; but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive you. (Mt 6:14-5)

Since God forgives repentant sinners, sinners who refuse to forgive others set themselves in opposition to the divine will and by their own lack of repentance close their hearts to God’s gift of forgiveness. After the parable of the unjust steward, Matthew’s Jesus makes the same point. In the parable, a stern lord forgives one of his servants an enormous sum of money. Subsequently, however, the same lord delivers the same steward to the jailers for his failure to forgive the much smaller debt owed him by one of his fellow servants. (Mt 18:23-34) Jesus then re24. Cf. Juan José Bartolome, “Los Pájaros y los Lirios: Una Aproximacion a la Cuestion Ecologica desde Mt 6,24-34,” Estudios Biblicos, 49(1991), pp. 165-190; José O’Callaghan, “Dos Variantes en la Parabola des Sembrador,” Estudios Biblicos, 48(1990), pp. 267-270; Richard J. Dillon, “Ravens, Lilies, and the Kingdom of God (Matthew 6:25-33/Luke 12:22-31),” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 53(1991), pp. 605-627; Joop van Banning, S.J., “Il Padre Nostro nell’ Opus Imperfectum in Mattheum,” Gregorianum, 71(1990), pp. 293-313; J.F. Healy, “Models of Behavior: Matt 6:26 (//Luke 12:24) and Prov 6:6-8,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 108(1989), pp. 497-498; Robert K. McIver, “One Hundred-Fold Yield—Miraculous or Mundane? Matthew 13.8, 23; Mark 4.8,20, Luke 8.8,” New Testament Studies, 40(1994), pp. 606-608; Warren Carter, “‘Solomon in All His Glory: Intertextuality and Matthew 6.29,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 65(1997), pp. 3-25; J. Duncan M. Derrett, “Light on Sparrows and Hairs (Mt 10, 29-31,” Estudios Biblicos, 55(1997), pp. 341-353.

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marks: “So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from the heart.”25 (Mt 18:35) “And do not lead us to the test” has two possible meanings, both probably intended. It can mean “do not let us succumb to the trials of the end time” or “do not let us sin when we are tempted.” If one takes this phrase in the first sense, then the petition may include an implicit desire to avoid divine judgment. In that case, one is asking God not to judge one according to one’s deserts but according to divine mercy and condescension.26 The final petition—”but deliver us from the Evil One”—develops the one which precedes it. Satan, the demonic personification of evil and eschatological opponent of Jesus will test His disciples just as he tested Jesus. In other words, the final two petitions of the Our Father place the disciples of Jesus in solidarity with Him in His desert temptations and in His final ordeal on Calvary. In the midst of such trials, the disciples must, as Jesus did, look to the Father as the source of their strength, courage, and obedient fidelity to life in the kingdom.27 (Mt 6:13) The disciples should, moreover, also trust the Father to strengthen them in times of persecution. In His ecclesial discourse, Jesus warns the disciples not to worry about what to say when they are haled before either Jewish or Gentile courts of law, because “it is not you who speak but the Breath of your Father (to pneuma tou Patrou hymon) speaking through you.” (Mt 10:20) The Father functions here as elsewhere as the Breath’s ultimate source. As She inspired Jesus’ witness, so too will She inspire the disciples’. In addition, Jesus promises, “So everyone who acknowledges me before humans, I also will acknowledge before my Father who is in heaven; but whoever denies me before humans, I also will deny before my Father in heaven.” (Mt 10:32) Fearless testimony to Jesus, even in times of persecution, will save one when one stands before the throne of judgment. On that day Jesus will claim as His own those who testified to Him under threat. Indeed, reverence (literally, fear [phobeisthe]) of the Father should take away fear of mere humans who can only kill the body, while the Father can “destroy (apolesai)” soul and body in Gehenna. (Mt

25. Cf. Beat Weber, “Alltagswelt und Gottesreich: Überlegungen zum Verstehehintergrund des Gleichnisses vom Schalksknecht,” Biblische Zeitschrift, 37(1993), pp. 161-182. 26. Cf. P.S. Cameron, “‘Lead us not into Temptation,” Expository Times, 101(1990), pp. 299- 301; Stanley E. Porter, “‘Lead us not into Temptation,” Expository Times, 101(1990), pp. 359- 362. 27. Cf. Joachim Jeremias, The Lord’s Prayer, translated by John Reumann (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1964); Ernst Lohmeyer, “Our Father”: An Introduction to the Lord’s Prayer (New York, NY: Harper & Row, 1965); NJBC, 42: 39; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 99-101; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 93-99; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 74-77.


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10:28) One should probably interpret “destroy” hyperbolically to mean “punish.”28 Jesus even assures His disciples that the Father takes into account every hair on their balding heads. This ironic pronouncement suggests that the Father’s providence includes things which humans cannot even count, much less comprehend. The all-encompassing character of God’s providence calls, then, for utter trust.29 The same kind of trust must inform prayer of petition. Jesus, invoking a “spirituality of the off day,”30 argues that, if human parents, despite their sinfulness love their children enough to give them only good things, how much more will the heavenly Father give the disciples only good things when they come to Him in petition. (Mt 7:7-11) By a “spirituality of the off day,” I mean one which builds, not on some spiritual or religious high, but on the day-to-day experience of human sinfulness. Jesus does not in this saying specify what the Father will give, nor does He say that the Father will give exactly what a person requests. Jesus does, however, promise that the Father will give only good things. Later in the gospel, however, He promises the disciples: “Again I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by My Father in heaven.” (Mt 18:19) The agreed-upon petition expresses presumably shared commitment to the way of discipleship as its precondition.31 Jesus also demands obedience to the Father’s will as a condition for entry into the kingdom. (Mt 7:21) Moreover, Matthew’s Jesus discourages charismania. The charisms without the obedience of faith count for nothing.32 (Mt 7:22-3)

28. Cf. Rudolf Pesch, “Über die Autorität Jesu: Eine Rückfrage anhand des Bekennenund Verleugnerspruchs Lk 12, 8f par.” in Die Kirche des Anfangs, edited by R. Schnackenburg et al. (Leipzig: St. Benno Verlag, 1977), pp. 25-55; I.H. Marshall, “Uncomfortable Words VI: ‘Fear Him who Can Destroy Soul and Body in Hell’ (Mt 10:28 RSV),” Expository Times, 81(1969- 1970), pp. 276-280; NJBC, 42:70; Radermakers, op. cit., II, p. 143; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 149-154; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 127-128; John G. Cook, “The Sparrow’s Fall in Mt 10:29b,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 79(1988), pp. 138-144. 29. Cf. Dale C. Allison, “The hairs of your head are all numbered,” Expository Times, 101(1990), pp. 334-336. 30. I derive the term “spirituality of the off-day” from a dear friend and colleague, John Boyle, S.J., who to the best of my knowledge has never used it in print. 31. Cf. NJBC, 42: 47; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 101-104, 237-244; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 100-106, 268-272; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 83-85, 220-221. 32. Cf. NJBC, 42: 49-50; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 104-106; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 107- 111; Albright, op. cit., pp. 86-89.

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Jesus Reveals the Father Matthew’s Jesus claims a privileged knowledge of the Father and a privileged ability to reveal the Father to others. After excoriating the lake towns who greeted His ministry with unbelief (Mt 11:20-4), Jesus exclaims: I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to babes; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. All things have been delivered to me by my Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and any one to whom the Son chooses to reveal Him. Come to Me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and my burden light.” (Mt 11:25-7)

Here several points need noting. First, this saying of Jesus divides into three parts. In verses 25 and 26, Jesus praises the Father for the revelation He has made in sending His Son. In verse 27, Jesus indicates the content of that revelation: the unique and intimate relationship which Jesus as Son of God has with the Father and the Father with Him. In verses 28 and 29, Jesus invites others in the name of divine wisdom to acknowledge that revelation by entering into the same obediential relationship to the Father which He enjoys. Second, in Matthew, the Father typically appears as the ultimate source of religious enlightenment. Later in the gospel when Peter proclaims Jesus “the Christ, the Son of the living God,” Jesus will also attribute this insight to the Father’s enlightenment. (Mt 16:17) The Breath of God functions as an immanent source of enlightenment; but the Father, who empowers Jesus’ Breath-baptism (Mt 3:16-17), functions as Her ultimate transcendent source. Third, the claim to a privileged relationship with the Father which Jesus here makes finds an echo in the way He speaks about the Father. In Matthew’s gospel, Jesus will say “My Father” and “your Father”; but He never joins the disciples in saying “Our Father.” The fourth gospel reproduces the same pattern of discourse. (Cf. Jn 20:17) Fourth, in claiming unique access to the Father and in promising rest to those who bare the yoke of the new covenant, Jesus speaks in this passage as divine Wisdom made visible, and therefore as the spoken “word” of God who communicates that Wisdom. (Cf. Wis 2:13, 9:17; Sir 6:28, 24;19; Prov 3:17; Jer 2:20, 5:5) Since the Breath of God inspires wisdom, by incarnating a liberating divine wisdom Jesus reveals Her to His disciples.33 (Cf. Wis 7:22-24, 9:17) 33. Cf. B. Charette, “‘To Proclaim Liberty to Captives’: Matthew 11.28-30 in the Light of Old Testament Prophetic Expectations,” New Testament Studies, 8(1992),


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Fifth, Jesus rejoices that the “little ones” of this earth—the poor, the underprivileged—show a willingness to live as the Father’s children by acknowledging the wisdom which Jesus incarnates even though others reject Him in disobedience and unbelief. Sixth, in the Old Testament, the yoke symbolized submission to the covenant, the Torah. (Cf. Jer 2:20, 5:5) Hence, Matthew depicts Jesus’ teachings as Christian Torah which unlocks the true meaning of the Law and prophets. (Cf. Mt 5:17-19) Jesus’ divine sonship enables Him to speak for the Father and with divine authority: “All things have been delivered to Me by My Father.” (Mt 11:27; cf. 17:5) Seventh, if, as seems possible, Jesus had in mind the double yoke which linked two oxen together in the work of plowing, then He is portraying Himself in the humble image of the other ox who is pulling the plough along with the disciple. The lowliness of the image would re-enforce Jesus’ claim to humility of heart.34 Following Mark, Matthew recounts how Jesus’ relatives sought Him out. In Mark, the family does so because they believe that Jesus has gone mad. (Mk 3:20-1) Matthew omits this humiliating detail and thus writes out of his gospel the conflict between Jesus and His relatives on which Mark insists. Instead Matthew portrays Jesus’ relatives as merely desirous of speaking with Him. (Mt 12:48) Matthew, however, reproduces the substance of Jesus’ response. In Matthew, Jesus stretches out His arms to His disciples in a gesture of both pointing and embrace. (In Mark, He gives them a hard look.) Jesus then proclaims that anyone who does the will of His Father is “my brother, and sister, and mother.” (Mt 12:48-50) In Matthew as in Mark, therefore, the obedience to the Father’s will which Jesus proclaims incorporates one into the family of God and draws one into an intimate sibling relationship with Jesus and (implicitly) with all the other members of God’s family.35 Jesus, who requires perfect obedience to the Father, reproaches the scribes and Pharisees for their disobedience to God. They hypocritically invoke the authority of human customs in order to nullify the clear demands of the Law. Here again, Matthew follows Mark. (Mt 15:1-9) In Matthew, however, when the disciples reproach Jesus for having offended the Pharipp.290-297; Celia Deutsch, “Wisdom in Matthew: Transformation of a Symbol,” Novum Testamentum, 32(1990), pp. 13-47. 34. Cf. M. Jack Suggs, Wisdom, Christology, and Law in Matthew’s Gospels (Cambridge, MA: Harvard 1970), pp. 71-97; Benedict Thomas Viviano, O.P., Study as Worship: Aoth and the New Testament (Leiden: Brill, 1978), pp. 183-192; NJBC, 42:75; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 158-160; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 166-170; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 144-146. 35. Cf. W. Trilling, Das Wahre Israel: Studien zur Theologie des Matthäus Evangeliums (Munich: Kösel, 1964), pp. 29-32.

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sees by His remarks, Jesus dismisses them as blind guides who lead others to fall in the same pit as themselves. Jesus warns: “Every plant which My heavenly Father has not planted will be rooted up.” (Mt 15:10-12) The hypocritical legalism of the Pharisees manifests the fact that their teaching has no root in true knowledge of the Father or in obedience to His will. The final judgment will unmask and discredit all such religious hypocrisy.36 In warning His disciples against scandal, Jesus tells His disciples: See that you do not despise one of these little ones; for I tell you that in heaven their angels always behold the face of my Father who is in heaven. (Mt 18:10)

The phrase “behold the face” derives from courtly etiquette. It portrays the angels standing like courtiers in the presence of God the Father. When the Hebrews conquered the Holy Land, they found other nations who worshiped national deities which also symbolized natural forces. The Hebrews felt unwilling to reduce these gods to nothing; for natural forces have reality and the nations sometimes triumphed over Israel. At the same time, they did not want to make pagan gods equal to Jahweh. They therefore transformed the gods of the nations into courtiers of Jahweh, creatures subservient to Him. The angels, especially in intertestamental Judaism and afterward, also functioned as Jahweh’s messengers and thus symbolized His presence to the world despite His divine transcendence.37 Here Jesus alludes to the popular Jewish belief that every individual has an angelic look-alike standing before the throne of God. (Cf. Acts 12:15) These “guardian angels” symbolized the particular providence which God has over every individual in the world.38 (Mt 6:25-34) In Matthew as in Mark, Jesus repudiates Mosaic divorce practices by appealing to God’s original intent in creating the institution of marriage. Jesus asserts that God originally intended marriage to remain monogamous and that only because of the hardness of the male Jewish heart did Moses permit them the luxury of divorce. (Mt 19:6-9) In contrast to Mark, however, Matthew, the conscientious, scribal interpreter of Torah, portrays Moses as merely permitting rather than commanding divorce.39 (Cf. Mk 10:1-12) 36. Cf. NJBC, 42: 99; Radermakers, op. cit., pp. 209-210; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 228-234. 37. Cf. G.B. Caird, Principalities and Powers (Oxford: Oxford at Clarendon, 1956). 38. Cf. NJBC, 42: 114; Radermakers, op. cit., II, p. 240; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 263-267; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 213-219. 39. Cf. Quentin Quesnell, “Made Themselves Eunuchs for the Kingdom of Heaven (Mt 19, 12),” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 30(1968), pp. 335-358; Alexander Sand, Reich Gottes und Eheverzicht im Evangelium nach Matthäus (Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1983), pp. 45- 60.


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In his account of the rich man who could not bring himself to renounce his riches in order to follow Jesus, Matthew edits Mark’s text for reasons of style. Mark’s Jesus replies to the man in a way which could be interpreted as a denial of His own divinity. Matthew revises Jesus’ response so as to preclude such a reading. Mark’s Jesus says, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good but God.” (Mk 10:18) Matthew’s Jesus responds: “Why do you ask me about what is good. One there is who is good.” (Mt 19:17) As in Mark, the disciples express dismay over Jesus’ statement that the rich will find it virtually impossible to enter the kingdom. They protest: “Who then can be saved?” Jesus replies in Matthew as in Mark: “With humans this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” (Mt 19:25-6) In both gospels, therefore, Jesus calls upon the disciples to have a radical trust in the Father’s ability to overcome human sinfulness and to save even rich people in spite of themselves.40 In Matthew, as in Mark, Jesus tells the ambitious James and John that only the Father can tell them to sit at His side when the kingdom arrives. (Mt 20:23) The saying reflects Jesus’ sense of standing in an obediential relationship to the Father in whatever concerns His mission. During His Jerusalem ministry, Jesus will insist that only the Father knows the day and hour of the final judgment. It remains hidden from Jesus and even from the angels in heaven. Persumably, only the Father knows the date of the final judgment, because, as the ultimate source of all, He sets the date. (Mt 24:36) The Father in the Jerusalem Ministry During Jesus’ final Jerusalem ministry, when the Pharisees and Herodians try to trap Him into forbidding the payment of Roman taxes, in Matthew’s account, they hypocritically flatter Jesus as one who “teaches the way of God.” (Mt 22:16) Jesus, however, confounds them in the same way as He does in Mark’s account. He makes them show Him a Roman coin with Caesar’s image on it and then replies: “Render therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” (Mt 22:15-22) As in Mark, Jesus equivalently says, if you are willing to use Roman money to your profit, then you should be willing to pay Roman taxes. At the same time, He calls the Pharisees beyond their hypocritical resistance to His message to acknowledge the claims which God makes upon them through faith in Jesus and in His proclamation of the kingdom. Jesus’ response also implicitly challenges those who recognize the 40. Cf. José O’Callaghan, “Examen critico de Mt 19,24,” Biblica, 69(1988), pp. 401-405; NJBC, 42: 119; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 259-261; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 277-281; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 230-235.

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image of Caesar without difficulty to honor the image of God in others.41 (Gen 1:26) In Matthew as in Mark, Jesus rebukes the Saducees for their lack of faith in the resurrection. Jesus tells them that in denying the resurrection they understand neither the Scriptures nor the power of God to raise from the dead. The Sadducees misunderstand the power of God because they confuse resurrection with resuscitation. In fact God will endow the risen body with an angelic character. In calling the risen body angelic, Matthew’s Jesus, like Mark’s, adopts the position on the resurrection defended by the Pharisees, namely, that the risen body would have a different character and exist in a different order from physical bodies. Jesus here also endorses belief in angels, which the Sadducees also denied.42 Matthew offers a terser account than Mark of Jesus’ enunciation of the great commandment. In both accounts, however, Jesus demands of His followers an all-consuming love of the Father: “with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.” (Mt 22:37; cf. Mk 12:29-31) Like Mark, Matthew also makes it clear that one must interpret love of God and of neighbor in the light of Jesus’ proclamation of the kingdom; but Matthew does so differently from Mark. Mark has Jesus tell the scribe who approves of His reply, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” (Mk 12:34) In other words, Jesus’ proclamation of the kingdom provides the ultimate context for understanding the two great commandments. Matthew omits this exchange between Jesus and His interlocutor and has Jesus say after enunciating the two great commandments. “On these two commandments depend all the Law and the prophets.” (Mt 22:40) In the sermon on the mount, Matthew has already made it clear that Jesus fulfills both the Law and the prophets. His person and message, therefore, provide the ultimate context for understanding the two great commandments.43 (Mt 5:17) 41. Cf. Oscar Cullmann, The State in the New Testament (New York, NY: Scribner’s 1956), pp.3-49; F.F. Bruce, “Render to Caesar,” in Jesus and the Politics of His Day, edited by Ernst Bammel and C.F.D. Moule (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984), pp. 249-263; Sean P. Kealy, C.S.Sp., Jesus and Politics (Collegeville, MI: Liturgical Press, 1990); NJBC, 42: 131; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 281; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 309-311; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 271-275. 42. As in Mark, the Sadducees misunderstand the Scriptures, because in proclaiming Himself to Moses as the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Ex 3:6), the living God revealed that they continue to live with Him in His presence. In arguing that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob now live with God, Jesus in both gospels asserts personal survival after death prior to the final resurrection. Cf. NJBC, 42: 131; Radermakers, op. cit. , II, p. 281; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 309-311; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. lxxxvi-xcix, 271-275. 43. Cf. William F. Moran, S.J., “The Ancient Near Eastern Background of the Love of God in Deuteronomy,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 25(1963), pp. 77-87; NJBC, 42: 133; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 283-284; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 314-317; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 271-275.


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Only Matthew records the parable of the sheep and the goats. The parable describes Jesus’ judgment of all the nations, the outcome of the Great Commission which closes the gospel. At the final judgment Jesus will tell Gentiles who showed compassion to His “brethren,” i.e., to the Christian members of God’s family: “Come, O blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” Jesus will count any compassionate act performed toward a Christian as done to Himself. (Mt 25:31-40) The same Jesus, acting as divine, eschatological judge, will consign to eternal hellfire with the devil and his angels those who failed to show compassion. (Mt 25:41-4) Jesus’ reply to the damned suggests, however, that the failure to act compassionately toward anyone at all, Christian or not, has brought about their damnation. In explaining His judgment Jesus omits the term “brethren” and says simply: “Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did it not to Me.” (Mt 25:45) In this parable the Son of Man, Jesus, acts with divine authority. In judging the human exercise of compassion, the eschatological judge seems finally not to care whether or not the needy person belongs to the Christian community.44 The Father in the Passion In Matthew as in Mark, the Father requires the death of Jesus as an integral part of His messianic mission. (Mt 16:21-3) As in Mark, when Matthew’s Jesus institutes the eucharist, He tells the disciples that He will not drink wine again until He drinks it new “in My Father’s kingdom.” (Mt 26:29) The new wine refers to the wine drunk at the final, messianic banquet. Jesus, therefore, goes to His death obediently; but He dies in the eschatological hope of divine vindication. As in Mark, Jesus’ prayer in Gethsemane expresses both His horror at His coming ordeal as well as His complete submission to the Father’s will: “My Father if it be possible, let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will.” (Mt 26:39, 42; cf. Mk 14:35-6) In Matthew, however, one hears in this petition an explicit echo of the Our Father, which Mark fails to record. (Mt 6:10) 44. Cf. John Donahue, S.J., “The Parable of the Sheep and Goats,” Theological Studies, 47(1986), pp. 3-31; Victor Kossi Agbanou, Le discours eschatologique de Matthieu 24-25: Tradition et rédaction (Paris: Librairie Lecoffre, 1983), pp. 173-198; Egon Brandenburger, Das Recht des Weltenrichters: Untersuchung zu Matthäus 25:31-46 (Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1980), pp. 98-138;Daniel Marguerat, Le jugement dans l’Evangile de Matthieu (Paris: Librairie Protestante, 1981), pp. 495-520; Edmond Farahian, S.J., “Relire Matthieu 25:31-46,” Gregorianum, 72(1991), pp. 437-457; NJBC, 42:145; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 315- 317; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 355-360; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 305-310.

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Matthew reproduces Mark’s account of Jesus’ arrest. One of the disciples draws a sword and cuts off the ear of the High Priest’s servant. In Matthew as in Mark, the severed ear could have symbolic meaning, if the servant in question functioned as Vice-President in the Temple administration. In such a reading of the phrase “servant of the high priest,” the mutilated man represents the high priest and temple priesthood generally; and the mutilation disqualifies him from performing any further priestly functions. Any priest who would lay violent hands on the Son of God does not deserve the honor of presiding over divine worship. (Cf. Lev 21:18 LXX) Both Matthew and Mark record the assault on the servant of the high priest, but Matthew’s Jesus also rebukes the violent disciple with the words: “Put your sword back into its place; for all who take the sword will perish by the sword. Do you not think that I cannot appeal to my Father, and He will at once send Me more than twelve legions of angels?” (Mt 26:5253) The reply expresses Jesus’ endorsement of non-violent resistance to evil. (Mt 5:39) Jesus’ response also reasserts His submission to the Father’s will. It expresses too His confidence that the Father would in fact save Him if Jesus chose to ask it. Jesus claims more powerful assistance than anything the disciples can offer: namely, twelve legions of angels; but He eschews even angelic help. He submits freely to arrest while asserting His own ultimate control over the events of His passion.45 As in Mark, during Matthew’s account of Jesus’ trial, false witnesses accuse him of saying, “I am able to destroy the temple of God, and to build it up in three days.” (Mt 26:61)46 When the High Priest invokes the name of the living God to force Jesus to say whether or not He is the Messiah, the Son of God. (Mt 26:63) Mark’s Jesus implicitly invokes the divine name and responds clearly, “I am.” (Mk 14:62) Matthew’s Jesus answers somewhat more ambiguously, “You have said so.” The response expresses Jesus’ hesitations about Davidic messianism. Matthew’, then, edits out Mark’s allusion to Jesus’ invocation of the divine name while walking on the water. In both Matthew and Mark, however, Jesus then predicts His coming glorification and is condemned for blasphemy.47 (Mt 26:64-6; Mk 14:62-4) As Jesus hangs on the cross, His enemies taunt Him, saying: “You who would destroy the temple and build it in three days, save yourself! If you 45. Cf. B. Gerhardsson, “Jesus livré et abandonné d’après la passion de Saint Mattieu,” Revue Biblique, 76(1969), pp. 206-207; NJBC, 42:153; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 335-337; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 372-378; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 325-327. 46. Jesus refers to the temple as “house of God.” (Mt 12:4) The phrase suggests the reverence He felt for the temple that motivated His purification of the house of God. (Mt 21:12-6) 47. Cf. NJBC, 42:155; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 337-340; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 378-384; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 331-336.


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are Son of God, come down from the cross....He saved others; He cannot save Himself. He is the king of Israel; let Him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in Him. He trusts in God; let God deliver Him now, if He desires Him; for He said, ‘I am the Son of God.’” (Mt 27:40, 42-3) The taunts mock basic Christian beliefs: Jesus’ divine Sonship, His power to save, His messianic dignity, His trust in God. The mockery underscores the unbelief of Jesus’ enemies. As in Mark, Jesus dies with the prayer of the innocent poor man on His lips: “My God, My God, why have you forsaken Me?” (Mt 27:46; Mk 15:34) As in the case of Mark, Matthew probably expects the reader to remember the rest of the psalm which begins with these words and ends with an expression of confidence in God’s saving power.48 (Ps 22) The Father and the Risen Christ Matthew’s final reference to the Father in his gospel occurs in the command given by the risen Christ to go and baptize every creature in the triune name. (Mt 28:19) As we have seen, this event in Matthew functions as the culminating revelation of Jesus as both Immanuel and Breath-baptizer. The Analogy of Christological Knowing In Matthew as in Mark, then, Christological knowing draws the Christian community into the same kind of relationship to the Father as in Mark. Matthew, the Jewish Christian scribe, insists, however, much more than Mark does, on the moral consequences of entering into the same kind of filial relationship with the Father as Jesus exemplified. That insistence proceeds in no small part from Matthew’s concern to interpret Jesus’ teachings as Christian Torah. In both gospels the Breath teaches the Christian community to relate to the Father in an attitude of trust. Matthew, however, in the Our Father insists more explicitly on the kinds of commitment which must ground that trust. Both evangelists believe that trust in God commits one to sharing one’s bread with the poor; but Matthew, in his the temptation narrative, makes that connection more explicit than Mark does. The beatitudes also spell out in greater detail the ways in which the Christian community must relate to the Father: as reconciling peace-makers, with purity of heart, and with a longing to see the Father face to face.

48. Cf. Donald Senior, “The Death of Jesus and the Resurrection of the Holy Ones,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 38(1976), pp. 312-329;NJBC, 42:155; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 345- 348; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 393-398; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 349-353.

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Mark writes for a community confronted with persecution and its disturbing aftermath. In telling the story of Jesus, therefore, Mark stresses eschatological conflict and makes commitment to follow Jesus even to Calvary central to His Christological message. Matthew, by contrast, writes for a community of Petrine Christians in a polemic relationship with the Pharisaism of its day. He acknowledges Mark’s themes of eschatological conflict and of witness unto death. Matthew, however, in explaining the meaning of assimilation to Jesus in the power of His Breath stresses with greater centrality than Mark the moral demands of day-to-day gospel living. I have considered the second positive dramatic linkage in Matthew’s gospel: Jesus’ relationship to the Father. The following section reflects on the third: namely, Jesus’ relationship to God’s Breath. As in Mark these three relationships articulate the realistic conditions and fundamental moral consequences of Christological knowing. (III) As we have seen, Matthew, in contrast to Mark, insists on Jesus’ virginal conception in the power of the Holy Breath. (Mt 1:18-20) As we also saw, that miraculous event breaks sharply the patrilinear descent catalogued in Jesus’ genealogy and marks Jesus as a startling, new beginning in salvation history. In addition, Jesus’ conception by the Breath points to His divine origins: that He is the divine Immanuel, God-with-us, the one who makes the Father present in a special way. Jesus’ miraculous conception also foreshadows the miracle of the resurrection, which reveals Jesus as Immanuel finally and fully. Jesus and the Breath As we also saw, Matthew in His baptismal narrative insists more than Mark that the Holy Breath who descends on Jesus in His baptism comes from the Father and is sent by the Father specifically to Jesus. (Mt 3:16) Matthew distinguishes in a way in which Mark does not between Jesus’ relation to the Breath and His disciples’ relation to Her. She comes to Him under the sign of a dove to reveal Him as the beloved of God and beginning of a new Israel; but She comes to the disciples under the sign of fire, i.e., in purification and in judgment. (Mt 3:10-2, 16) In other respects, however, Matthew endorses the rest of Mark’s portrayal of the baptismal Breath. She descends from an apocalyptic rent in the heavens which signifies the end time, although Matthew, as we have just seen, excludes an adoptionist reading of Mark by making it clear that Jesus stood in relationship to the Breath from the first moment of His conception. The dove over the waters recalls the first flood and the covenant with Noah. The image foreshadows the new covenant which Jesus


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will seal and which will take away sin. The Breath over the water recalls the first creation and reveals Jesus as the beginning of a new creation.49 As we have also seen, Matthew attenuates the violence with which the Breath conducts Jesus into the wilderness. In Mark, She drives Him; in Matthew, She leads Him. The mitigation of violence reflects Matthew’s general tendency to downplay Mark’s theme of demonic conflict. (Mt 4:1; Mk 1:12-13) Moreover, by having the Breath of God preside over Jesus’ desert temptations and strengthen Him to overcome them, Matthew implicitly portrays Her as the immediate source of inspiration for Jesus’ replies to Satan’s wiles. (Mt 4:1-2) Although, as we have seen, in Matthew the Father functions as the ultimate transcendent source of enlightenment, Jesus and the Breath also enlighten. She enlightens both Jesus and His disciples, especially in moments of trial and testing. (Mt 3:16-7, 10:20) Jesus enlightens by embodying the divine wisdom which She inspires. (Mt 11:25-7) Since Jesus’ replies to Satan provide, as we have seen, a foreshadowing of His whole complex relationship to the Father, the Breath in inspiring those replies also inspires that relationship and the morality of discipleship which it grounds.50 (Cf. Mt 3:16-7) In promising that the Holy Breath will inspire and strengthen the disciples in times of persecution by teaching them what to say, Matthew stresses in a way in which Mark does not that the Breath comes to them from the Father. This insistence parallels Matthew’s revision of Mark’s baptismal account. That account also stresses that the Breath comes to Jesus from the Father; and it underscores the analogous way in which the Breath acts in the disciples and in Jesus. She comes to Him as Son of God and beginning of a new Israel; She comes to the disciples in purification and judgment.51 (Mt 10:20) Matthew handles the controversy over Beelzebul somewhat differently from Mark by invoking the theme of fulfillment. (Mt 12:15-21) Prior to the controversy, Matthew describes an outpouring of miracles which fulfills the first of the servant songs of second Isaiah (Is 42:1-4) The allusion to second Isaiah links Jesus’ miracles of healing to the cross and portrays both as aspects of His ministry of atonement. The allusion also depicts 49. Cf. NJBC, 42:18; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 60-64; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 61-65; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 31-33; A. Feuillet, “Le symbolisme de la colombe dans les récits évangeliques du baptème,” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 46(1958), pp. 524-544; Lender E. Keck, “The Spirit and the Dove,” New Testament Studies, 17(1970-1971), pp. 41-67. 50. Cf. NJBC, 42:19; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 64-68; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 65-70; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 31-37. 51. Cf. NJBC, 42:69; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 141-145; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 144-149; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 123-129.

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atonement, the re-establishment of a relationship with God ruptured by sin, as an act of divine healing. Matthew also uses the prophecy to underscore the fact that Jesus performs His miracles in the power of God’s Holy Breath. (Mt 12:18; Is 42:1) This insistence throws the Pharisees’ sin against the Holy Breath into even sharper dramatic relief than in Mark. By linking Breath-blasphemy to the theme of fulfillment, Matthew also implicitly suggests that the Pharisees’ unbelief results from their inability to recognize in Jesus the one who fulfills the Law and the prophets. In Matthew, as in Mark, Jesus replies to the charge that He exorcises by the power of Beelzebul by insisting that the Breath of God inspires His exorcisms. Jesus warns the Pharisees that if they continue blaspheming God’s Breath by calling Her the devil, they commit an unforgivable sin. They stand convicted of unbelief in this life and court damnation in the next. (Mt 12:22-32) Matthew underscores the heinousness of Breath-blasphemy in yet another way. After Matthew’s Jesus issues the same warning about the unforgivable sin as He gives in Mark (Mt 12:32), He calls the Pharisees a “brood of vipers,” a dangerous source of poisonous beliefs and attitudes. (Mt 12:34) Matthew’s Baptizer had used the same epithet in His confrontation with the Pharisees and Saducees. Now in the controversy over Beelzebul Jesus confronts the same self-righteous unbelief as John had. Moreover, in His final denunciation of the Pharisees, Jesus will again invoke John’ epithet. In thundering woes against the Pharisaical “brood of vipers,” Matthew’s Jesus will warn both the Pharisees and Christian leaders that both clericalism and hypocritical lack of repentance subject one to the curses of the new covenant. Matthew’s Jesus also declares that the malice in the Pharisees’ hearts, their stubborn rejection of the sanctifying Breath who dwells in Him, motivates their commission of the unforgivable sin. They speak poison from the poisoned sinfulness of their own hearts, and they will answer for every sinful word they utter.52 (Mt 12:33-7) Like Mark, Matthew recognizes that the Breath of God inspired the psalms of David, and implicitly all of the Hebrew scriptures (Mt 22:43; Mk 12:36) which Jesus fulfills. (Mt 5:17-19)

52. Cf. Owen E. Evans, “The Unforgivable Sin,” Expository Times, 68(1956-1957), pp. 240- 244; Gottfried Fitzer, “Die Sünde wider den Heilegen Geist,” Theologische Zeitschrift, 13(1957), pp. 161-182; James G. Williams, “A Note on the ‘Unforgivable Sin’ Logion,” New Testament Studies, 12(1965-1966), pp. 75-76; I. Howard Marshall, “Hard Sayings—VII,” Theology, 67(1964), pp. 65-69; NJBC, 42:79; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 164-167; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 182-187; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 152-157.


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Finally, Matthew goes beyond Mark when he discovers in the Great Commission to baptism in the triune name Jesus’ revelation as Immanuel and as the Breath-baptizer promised by John.53 (Mt 28: 19-20, 1:23, 3:11) The Analogy of Christological Knowing Matthew’s narrative portrait of the Breath’s role in Christological knowing develops Mark’s in important ways. Matthew makes it much clearer than Mark does that the Breath of God relates differently to the disciples from the way in which She relates to Jesus. She reveals Him as the beloved of God, as the suffering servant, as the beginning of a new Israel, and as Immanuel—as God with us. She comes to the disciples, however, under the sign of purifying fire, of the holiness of God burning away the dross of human sinfulness. For that reason Matthew stresses more than Mark does the moral demands of standing in a life-giving relationship to God’s Breath: one must endorse the same values and realities as Jesus did in His temptations. Moreover, one must respond to the tempter exactly as He did. Matthew makes it clearer than Mark does that Breath-baptism and Christian sacramental baptism coincide. More emphatically than Mark, Matthew attributes the unforgivable sin against God’s Breath to the kind of poisonous religious hypocrisy which the Pharisees embody. This last point brings us to the negative dramatic linkages in Matthew, which the following chapter examines. As in Mark they dramatize the negative limits of discipleship, the kinds of realities and values of which the Breath-baptized must repent and to which they must stand prophetically and unalterably opposed.54 This chapter has pondered Matthew’s adaptation of Mark’s positive linkages. The chapter which follows considers Matthew’s modified rendering of Mark’s negative dramatic linkages.

53. Cf. J. Giblet, “La Promesse de l’Esprit et la mission des apôtres dans les évangiles,” Irenikon, 30(1957), pp. 5-43. 54. Cf. Kingsbury, op.cit., pp. 115-127.

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Chapter 8 Negative Dramatic Linkages in Matthew Matthew both adopts and adapts the negative dramatic linkages which he finds in Mark. In both gospels, Jesus confronts the same forces of evil: Satan, his demons, and his human and institutional instruments: The latter include the scribes and Pharisees, Herod and the Herodians, the chief priests, Pilate, and the Roman empire. Matthew, however, develops these negative relationships in His own distinctive way. This chapter divides into five parts. Part one treats Jesus’ confrontation with Satan. Part two examines Jesus’ conflicts with the scribes and Pharisees. Part three describes how Jesus and Herod relate. Part four analyzes Jesus’ conflict with the chief priests. Part five details His relationship to Pilate. (I) As we have seen, Mark portrays Jesus’ entire ministry as an eschatological conflict with the powers of evil, with Satan and His minions. Matthew recognizes the conflict but gives it much less prominence in His gospel. Jesus and Satan Matthew, as we saw above, downplays the violence of Jesus’ desert confrontation with Satan by having the Breath lead rather than drive Him to the confrontation. (Mt 4:1; Mk 1:12) Moreover, in his account of Jesus’ temptations, Matthew identifies Satan as “the devil (tou diabolou),” i.e., as the chief of the demonic powers, as “the Evil One.” (Mt 4:1, 5, 8, 11, 6:13, 13:39, 25:41) Mark sees Satan in the same way, but does not make that clear until his account of the controversy over Beelzebul. (Mk 3:26) Matthew, therefore, by identifying Satan from the first as the chief of all the devils stresses more than Mark the cosmic significance of Jesus’ desert confrontation with Satan. Moreover, in the course of the three temptations, Matthew lays bare Satan’s strategy for destroying Jesus and His work. Mark portrays Satan as the enemy of faith. (Mk 3:4, 15) Matthew makes the refusal to trust God Satan’s first and most fundamental temptation. Matthew’s temptation narrative also clarifies what that refusal involves. Satan tempts Jesus to renounce the fast He has undertaken and with it the trust in the Father which His fasting signifies. Were Jesus to use His miraculous powers to change stones into bread, He would, then, yield to a sinful self-reliance which would cause Him to value bread (the physical supports of life) more than the obedience of faith and trust in the Father’s providential

Chapter 8: Negative Dramatic Linkages in Matthew

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care. (Mt 4:1-4, 6:25-34) In other words, a sinful self-reliance which expresses itself in self-serving attachment to the physical supports of life constitutes Satan’s first and most basic strategy for undermining practical faith in the kingdom. Satan’s second temptation builds on the first. He tempts Jesus to test God. (Mt 4:5-6) The second temptation and Jesus’ response to it go beyond the first in that they make clear the absolutely unconditioned character of the trust in the Father which Jesus demands and embodies. Moreover, since in the first temptation lack of trust takes concrete form in selfish attachment to the physical supports of life, unconditioned trust in God demands the corresponding willingness to set no limits, even as the Father sets no limits, on one’s willingness to share one’s “bread” with others, even with one’s enemies and with sinners. (Mt 4:7, 5:43-8) Unconditioned trust in the Father seeks, therefore, to bring into existence a community of universal compassion which shares unrestrictedly with others the good things of this world. Satan’s second strategy, testing God, sets him in opposition to such a community. In the first two temptations, Satan quotes Scripture to Jesus. Matthew thus dramatizes the hypocrisy of the Evil One. He masks sin as piety and seeks to subvert the true intent of the word of God. Jesus, by contrast, in rejecting Satan’s wiles, enunciates and embodies the true meaning of the Torah. The first two temptations present Satan’s fundamental strategy: namely, his intention to subvert faith and trust in God. In the final temptation, Satan throws aside Scripture and speaks in his own name. The last temptation reveals Satan’s ultimate purpose in opposing Jesus: He desires to dominate this world through the coercive violence of its principalities and powers, and he schemes in order to supplant God idolatrously as the object of human adoration. The third temptation, therefore, confronts Jesus and implicitly all the members of the new Israel which He begins with a stark and fundamental option: either God or Satan, either the lust for power or authentic worship of God, either the kingdom of God or the kingdoms and principalities of this world. Moreover, since mutual forgiveness provides the final test of authentic worship of the Father (Cf. Mt 2:5, 6:13-5), the final temptation confronts Jesus and His disciples with a fundamental choice between mutual hostile domination, on the one hand, and mutual forgiveness and peacemaking on the other. Clearly, Matthew’s temptation narrative shifts attention from the fact of conflict between Jesus and Satan to the moral and religious issues which make the kingdom of God and the kingdom of Satan irreconcilably opposed.

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Matthew ends his temptation narrative as Mark does with the image of angels ministering to Jesus. In Mark, the angels apparently come to support Jesus in His battle with Satan. In Matthew’s temptation narrative, however, the angels do not come to Jesus until He has thoroughly routed Satan. (Mt 4:10-1) Their appearance confirms the victory which Jesus has just single-handedly won. Moreover, as we shall see, throughout his gospel Matthew depicts Jesus triumphing over Satan with easy authority. The final petition of the Our Father begs, as we have seen, for deliverance from the Evil One, from Satan. This final petition follows a prayer that God spare the disciples both the final eschatological battle against evil as well as the other temptations of this life. (Mt 6:13) In that struggle, the disciples can expect to confront Satan and his temptations in the same way in which Jesus did. Moreover, as they join in God’s final conquest of evil, they, like Jesus, must look to the Father to strengthen and protect them.1 In Matthew, the Pharisees twice accuse Jesus of exorcising in the power of Beelzebul. (Mt 9:32-34, 12:22-37) On another occasion, Matthew’s Jesus alludes to the Pharisees’ slander. Mark, as we have seen, puts the same slander on the lips of scribal spies from Jerusalem. (Mk 3:22) Matthew’s handling of the controversy over Beelzebul illustrates his tendency throughout his gospel to heighten the opposition between Jesus and the Pharisees. Matthew precedes his account of the first accusation with the story of an exorcism. After Jesus casts out a demon which has rendered a man mute, the man begins to speak. (Mt 9:32-3) The story has symbolic intent. Jesus’ victory over Satan and his minions empowers people to speak, i.e., to proclaim the good news. The healing implicitly contrasts the proclamation of the gospel which the miracle symbolizes with the vicious slander of the Pharisees. Moreover, the crowds bear verbal witness after Jesus performs the miracle: “Never was anything like this seen in Israel.” (Mt 9:33) The faith response of the crowds to the exorcism also contrasts starkly with the slanderous unbelief of the Pharisees, who attribute Jesus’ power to exorcise to Satan himself. (Mt 9:34) Later in Matthew’s narrative, but before the controversy over Beelzebul actually occurs, Jesus warns His disciples that they can expect even worse treatment from the Pharisees than He has received: “If they have called the master of the house Beelzebul, how much more will they malign those of His household.” (Mt 10:24-5) 1. Cf. Jacques Dupont, Les tentations de Jésus au desert (Paris: Descleé de Brouwer, 1968); Birger Gerhardsson, The Testing of God’s Son (Mt 4, 1-11 par) (Lund: CWK Gleerup, 1966); NJBC, 42:19; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 64-68; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 65-70.


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This saying of Jesus implicitly recalls that, earlier in the same chapter of Matthew, He sends the disciples out to proclaim the good news and to exorcise. The commissioning occurs in Matthew’s missionary discourse. That discourse develops theologically the theme of conflict which the preceding narrative section introduces. (Mt 10:8, 34-9) Jesus here warns the disciples to expect in their ministry of proclamation to encounter from the Pharisees the same kind of slanderous unbelief with which they greeted Jesus’ own ministry and exorcisms. The Pharisaical leaders of “the synagogue across the street” prolong in Matthew’s day their slanderous opposition to Jesus during His ministry. Matthew even extends the Pharisees’ slanderous accusation of demon possession to John the Baptizer. In Matthew’s version of the parable of the children in the market place, the children of folly say of John: “He is possessed.” The accusation recalls the confrontation in Matthew between John and the unbelieving Pharisees and Saducees. (Mt 11:18; cf. 3:7-12) Matthew, then, implicitly parallels the slander against John (“He is possessed.”) with the slander against Jesus (“He is Beelzebul”). As we have just seen, Matthew prefaces the Pharisees’ first slanderous attack on Jesus with a symbolic exorcism. (Mt 9:32-3) He also prefaces his account of the controversy over Beelzebul itself with a similar exorcism. This time Jesus exorcises a blind and dumb demoniac to the amazement of the crowds, who begin to suspect that Jesus is the messiah. (Mt 12:22-3) Again, the exorcism has symbolic intent. By freeing from the power of Satan, Jesus enables those He delivers to see (to believe, to recognize the revelation He brings) and to speak (to bear witness to it). The case of the delivered demoniac contrasts sharply, then, with the state of the Pharisees, who remain blind and who only utter slanders against Jesus. They again repeat the accusation to which Matthew has already alluded twice: “It is only by Beelzebul the prince of demons, that this man casts out demons.” (Mt 12:24) After this second slanderous attack, Jesus points out the absurdity of the accusation: it makes Satan act at cross purposes. (Mt 12:26) Here Matthew echoes Mark. (Mk 3:22) Jesus’ then asserts the irreconcilable opposition between the kingdom of God which He proclaims and the kingdom of Satan, to which the slanderous “brood of vipers” belong. In Matthew’s gospel, of course, Jesus’ teaching about the two kingdoms also echoes His third temptation in the desert. In addition, Matthew’s account of the controversy over Beelzebul expands Mark’s account of Jesus’ response. After pointing out that the Pharisees’ accusation presupposes implausibly that Satan is acting to defeat himself, Mark’s Jesus says, “But no one can enter a strong man’s house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man; then indeed he may plunder the house.” (Mk 3:27) Matthew’s Jesus says the same and

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then adds: “One who is not with me is against me, and one who does not gather with Me scatters.” (Mt 12:30) If the Pharisees aline themselves with Satan and against Jesus, like Satan they will find themselves routed by the divine authority with which Jesus triumphs over the demons. Both evangelists therefore recognize that Jesus has conquered Satan, that He has in fact “bound the strong man.” In “binding the strong man,” Jesus demonstrates the superiority of His power over the devil. Matthew, however, insists even more than Mark on the radical character of the choice between Jesus and Satan. Jesus warns the Pharisees that in resisting the kingdom they, not He, have allied themselves with Beelzebul. He then warns them that they are committing the unforgivable sin of Breath-blasphemy and court damnation in the next life.2 Later in Matthew, Jesus adds a further warning to His adversaries: one delivered from demonic possession needs to replace the evil spirit with something else if the former demoniac hopes to prevent repossession by more numerous and more powerful devils. (Mt 12:43-5) Matthew appends this saying to a series of incidents in which the Pharisees demonstrate their malice and unbelief. Presumably, only the presence of the good Spirit, the Holy Breath of God whom the Pharisees are blaspheming, provides adequate protection against demonic invasion and possession. I shall consider this passage in greater detail in the next section.3 In interpreting allegorically the parable of the wheat and the weeds, Matthew alludes to the devil, Satan, as an enemy of the faith. The allegory therefore implicitly alludes to Jesus’ first two desert temptation. In its original formulation, the parable of the wheat and the weeds calls attention to the patience of an ultimately victorious God in suffering sinners to live without destroying them. In the parable, a farmer sows good seed in his field; but, while he sleeps, an enemy sows weeds among the sown wheat. When the weeds and wheat appear simultaneously, the farmer’s servants want to pull the weeds up; but surprisingly the farmer forbids the weeding. He allows the good seed and the bad seed to flourish side by side until the harvest time. (Mt 13:31-2)

2. Cf. Scroggs, loc. cit.; NJBC, 42:79; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 164-167; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 182-187; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 152-157; James G. Williams, “A Note on the ‘Unforgivable Sin’ Logion,” New Testament Studies, 12(1965-1966), pp. 75-76; I. Howard Marshall, “Hard Sayings—VII,” Theology, 67(1964), pp. 65-69; Owen E. Evans, “The Unforgivable Sin,” Expository Times, 68(1956-1957), pp. 240-244; Gottfried Fitzer, “Die Sünde wider den heiligen Geist,” Theologische Zeitschrift, 13(1957), pp. 161-182; Robert Schurock, “Whose Exorcists Are They: The Referents of hoi huioi hymon at Matthew 12.27/Luke 11.19,”Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 46(1992), pp. 41-51. 3. Cf. Barbara Reid, “Puzzling Passages (Matthew 12:43-45),” The Bible Today, 33(1995), p. 49.


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The parable of the wheat and the weeds has some resemblance to another parable which Mark records. In both parables a farmer sows seed and something happens without the farmer’s acting. In Mark, however, the seed grows without any help from the farmer. Mark’s parable, therefore, makes a very different point from Matthew’s. Mark stresses in his parable that the kingdom spreads, not through the human efforts of those who sow the seed, but only because God makes the seed grow. Matthew’s parable by contrast, takes a more polemic tone. It teaches that, despite opposition, God will eventually reap the harvest He has sown. In the meantime God suffers with astonishing patience the unbelief and opposition of those who, like the Pharisees, refuse to enter the kingdom. Matthew, in addition, allegorizes the original parable of the wheat and the weeds. Matthew’s Jesus teaches the allegory in private to His disciples to whom it especially applies. In the allegorization, the sower turns into “the Son of man,” i.e. into Jesus viewed as final eschatological judge of the nations. The enemy turns into the devil and the weeds he sows, into “his sons.” Satan’s children oppose the sowing of the good seed, which Matthew equates with “the sons of the kingdom.” The servants of the sower turn into apocalyptic angels who carry out the Son of Man’s final judgment upon the world. (Mt 13:36-43) The allegory, then, envisages conflict between Jesus’ disciples and the Satanic enemies of the kingdom. Those enemies include the Pharisaical leaders of the “synagogue across the street.” Matthew’s allegory, therefore, downplays the theme of God’s patience in favor of the militant opposition between the kingdom of God and its children, on the one hand, and Satan and his children, on the other.4 The same prophetic call for a radical choice between Jesus and the powers of evil surfaces in the parable of the sheep and the goats with which Matthew closes Jesus’ eschatological discourse. In the parable, the goats, those who refused to show mercy and who ignored the basic human needs of others suffer banishment into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. (Mt 25:31-46) Once again fire symbolizes the holiness of God which consumes His enemies in judgment. The fact that God has prepared this fire for the devil and his angels suggests that from the beginning God foresaw His final victory over the forces of evil. As we have seen, Mark at the beginning of his account of Jesus’ public ministry describes His confrontation with a demoniac in Capernaum.(Mk 4. Cf. John Dominic Crossan, “The Seed Parables of Jesus,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 92(1973), pp. 244-266; Nils Alstrop Dahl, Jesus in the Memory of the Early Church (Minneapolis, MI: Augusburg Publishing House, 1976), pp. 141-166;NJBC, 42:88-89; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 184-187; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 203-210; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 163-171.

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1:21-8) The incident follows the call of the disciples. (Mk 1:16-20) As we have also seen, in Mark the call of the disciples parallels Jesus’ baptism in the Jordan, just as Jesus’ exorcism of the demoniac in Capernaum parallels His desert temptation. Empowered by the Holy Breath who descended on Him in His baptism, Mark’s Jesus through His first exorcism advances the eschatological struggle against the powers of evil which His confrontation with Satan in the desert began. Matthew, however, omits entirely the exorcism in Capernaum and thus destroys Mark’s parallelism. Indeed, Matthew edits out of Mark’s text many of the latter’s repeated references to exorcism. These omissions provide another instance of Matthew’s downplaying the theme of demonic conflict so dramatically prominent in Mark. Matthew replaces the story of the exorcism at Capernaum with a summary description of an outpouring of miracles and of exorcisms. Jesus cures every variety of disease and casts out demons whenever he confronts them. Matthew includes demoniacs in the list of those whom Jesus helped: “So His fame spread throughout all Syria, and they brought him all the sick, those afflicted with various diseases and pains, demoniacs, epileptics, and paralytics, and He healed them.” (Mk 4:24) This great outpouring of divine healing serves as an introduction to the sermon on the mount, Jesus’ inaugural proclamation of the kingdom. Moreover, as we shall see in another chapter. Matthew clusters most of Jesus’ miracles in the narrative section which follows the sermon on the mount. In other words, in contrast to Mark, who views Jesus ministry as God’s final eschatological conflict with Satan and the forces of evil, Matthew initially presents Jesus’ ministry as a joyful message of healing and of hope. Matthew ultimately acknowledges with qualifications the role which demonic conflict played in Jesus’ ministry, but initially he does not give it as much dramatic prominence as Mark. Mark begins his gospel with the gradual spread of the gospel from Jesus to his disciples, then to Peter’s family, then to the people of Capernaum, and finally to the rest of Israel. Matthew, however, locates these incidents after the sermon on the mount. Jesus has already proclaimed the kingdom publicly. As a consequence, Matthew transforms Mark’s story into something like part of a day in the life of the messiah. (Mt 8:14-7) In both accounts Jesus exorcises; but Matthew’s Jesus does so, as He always does, with an effortless command. (Mt 8:16) Matthew’s Jesus never wrangles with demons, as Mark’s does. Moreover, Matthew further transforms Mark’s text with the theme of fulfillment. Jesus’ miracles and exorcisms at Capernaum on the evening after He cures Peter’s mother-in-law fulfill one of the servant songs of Deutero-Isaiah: “He took our infirmities and bore our diseases.” (Mt 8:17) Deutero-Isaiah had written: “Surely he has borne our griefs and


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carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted.” (Is 53:4) As we have already seen, Matthew sees a continuity between Jesus’ ministry of healing and exorcism, on the one hand, and the cross, on the other. Healing and exorcism both belong to Jesus’ ministry of atonement for two reasons: 1) Through them, Jesus enters deeply into the pain of the human condition and suffers the consequences of sin without sinning; and 2) His atoning death brings both deliverance from Satan and healing.5 Matthew records a slightly modified and highly edited version of Mark’s account of Jesus’ exorcism in the country of the Gentile Gerasenes. Matthew, who restricts Jesus’ ministry to the ‘lost sheep of the house of Israel,’ (Mt 10:6) transforms the Gerasenes into the inhabitants of the town of Gadara, six miles east of the Sea of Galilee. (Mt 5: 1-14) In Matthew, Jesus confronts two demoniacs, not one. Matthew also omits many of Mark’s colorful descriptive details. Matthew mentions nothing about the demoniacs’ power to break the chains with which people bound them. (Mk 5:3) He makes no mention of the demoniacs screaming day and night and bruising themselves with stones. (Mk 5:5) Finally, Matthew edits out Jesus’ battle of wits with the demoniac. As a result of the last omission, Matthew fails to give the demon the symbolic name of “Legion.” (Mk 5:7-8) In the process, Matthew mutes the subversive political implications of Mark’s narrative. For Mark, Rome the persecutor embodies the Satanic forces of evil. Matthew, however, tends to find Satanic opposition to the gospel in the Pharisaical leaders of the “synagogue across the street.” In Mark the exorcism takes a while, a detail which heightens the sense of conflict and struggle. (Mk 5:6-10) In Matthew all the images of conflict typically drop out. Matthew’s Jesus again exhibits effortless power over the demons. He speaks only one word in the narrative. When the demons ask to enter the herd of swine, Jesus says the single word. “Go.” (Mt 8:32) Matthew does mention, however, that the demoniacs lived in the tombs, the place of death. (Mt 8:28) While the exorcised man functions in Mark as a forerunner of the evangelization of the Gentiles, Matthew omits this detail entirely; but like Mark’s Gerasenes, Matthew’s Gadarenes beg Jesus to leave them after He works the miracle. (Mt 8:34; Mk 5:14-20) Apart from these omissions and modifications, Matthew reproduces the other features of Mark’s account of the exorcism. It follows the calming of the storm. (Mt 8:23-7; Mk 4:35-41) Matthew, like Mark, portrays the calming as a theophany, as a revelation of the fact that Jesus shares in 5. Cf. Claude Tassin, “Matthieu ‘Targumiste’?: L’exemple de Mt 12.18(=Is 42.1),” Estudios Biblicos, 48(1990), pp. 119-214; NJBC, 42:55-56; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 111-132; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 112-117; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 90-94.

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God’s creative domination of the forces of chaos. (Gen 1:1-3) As in Mark, the calming of the storm sets the stage for the exorcism of the demoniacs, since the possessed swine rush headlong to their destruction in the waters of chaos over which Jesus has just exercised divine sovereign authority.6 (Mk 5:14-20) Matthew narrates two other exorcisms: 1) the exorcism of the daughter of the Canaanite woman, whose faith foreshadows the faith of the Gentiles7 (Mt 15:21-8) and 2) the cure of the “moonstruck” (epileptic demoniac) boy. Mark calls the woman a Syro-Phoenician; Matthew calls her a Canaanite, even though the Canaanites had long since ceased to inhabit Palestine. As the prototype of the believing Gentile, the woman foreshadows not only their inclusion in the new Israel but the end of the enmity which separated Israel from their Gentile, Canaanite enemies, who here symbolize all Gentiles.8 The second exorcism exhibits typical Matthean editing. In it, Matthew omits any detail suggesting conflict. The demon does not convulse the boy and leave him looking dead, as in Mark. (Mk 9:20-7) Matthew’s Jesus, does not struggle with the demon but dismisses it instead with sovereign authority. Unlike Mark, Matthew does not assimilate the boy’s deliverance implicitly to resurrection. In Matthew, Jesus simply rebukes the demon and the boy experiences an instant cure. (Mt 17:14-8) As in Mark, however, the story makes it clear that the disciples can lose the power of exorcism which Jesus has given them through a self-reliant lack of faith. Matthew makes an analogous point in the sermon on the mount. There Jesus cautions against charismania. Toward the end of the sermon, He warns that those who value their charismatic prowess more than the obedience of faith will face rejection by Jesus in the final judgment. Among the charismatic gifts one might covet, Matthew mentions the power to exorcise. (Mt 7:22) Implicitly, Jesus is teaching that the true victory over Satan happens when people respond to God’s word with expectant faith.9

6. Cf. NJBC, 42:59; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 118-125; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 100- 101. 7. Cf. Alice Dermience, “La pericope de la cananéenne (Mt 15:21-28),” Ephemerides Theologie Lovaniensis, 58(1982), pp. 25-49; NJBC, 42:100; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 210- 212; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 234-238; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 186-188. 8. Cf. Waetjen, op. cit., pp. 167-169; J. Martin C. Scott, “Matthew 15.21-28: A Test Case for Jesus’ Manners,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 63(1996), pp. 21-44; Alice Dermience, “La pericope de la Cananeenne,”Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 58(1982), pp. 25-49. 9. Cf. NJBC, 42:108; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 225-227; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 257-261; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 208-209.


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The Analogy of Christological Knowing Mark wrote his gospel to shore up Christian commitment in the face of persecution. The theme of demonic conflict therefore looms large in his account of Jesus’ relationship to Satan. Matthew, the Jewish Christian scribe, prefers to warn the church at Antioch of the wiles which Satan employs in undermining their day-to-day living of Christian Torah. Moreover, Matthew stresses more than Mark that effective opposition to Satan demands moral fidelity to Jesus’ teaching more than charismatic prowess. Matthew also uses Jesus’ desert temptations in order to alert his community to Satan’s typical strategies in tempting both Jesus and the members of the new Israel which Jesus begins and symbolizes. Matthew, moreover, repeatedly assures his community that Jesus has indeed already won a decisive victory over Satan, a victory in which they can confide. Matthew’s polemic relationship toward Pharisaism causes him to stress even more than Mark that the unbelief which the Pharisees symbolize closes one’s heart to the divine Breath and causes one to commit the unforgivable sin of Breath-blasphemy. Matthew also lays more narrative stress than Mark on the fact that Pharisaical unbelief places one on Satan’s side. I have considered the most fundamental negative linkages which both Matthew and Mark discuss: namely, Jesus’ relationship to Satan and his demons. In both gospels, Jesus’ adversaries each embody in a somewhat different way the Satanic forces of anti-Christ. In Matthew’s gospel, however, Pharisees play a more prominent role among Jesus’ adversaries than in Mark’s. The following section considers Jesus’ bitter conflict with the Pharisees and scribes. (II) In both Mark and Matthew, Jesus enters into conflict with the Pharisees and the scribes, but Matthew portrays that confrontation in even more embittered terms than Mark. In Matthew the conflict culminates in Jesus calling down the woes of the new covenant on the hypocritical scribes and Pharisees.10

10. Urban C. von Hahlde argues that Josephus paints a plausible account of the relationship of the Pharisees and chief priests and that the gospels reproduce the same pattern of relationship. He seems to believe that this argues against the evangelists retrojecting onto the Pharisees traits derived from concerns in the communities they address. I find his argument unconvincing since it ignores the different theological handling of the Pharisees and chief priests which occur in the gospels. See: Urban C. von Wahlde, “The Relationship between Pharisees and Chief Priests: Some Observations on the Texts in Matthew, John and Josephus,” New Testament Studies, 42(1996), pp. 506-522.

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Jesus and the Pharisees As we have seen, the Pharisees make their first appearance in Matthew’s gospel when they join the unbelieving Saducees and come to hear John preach. On that occasion, John calls them a “brood of vipers,” a dangerous and poisonous presence in Israel. (Mt 3:1-12) Jesus will again use the same epithet when He rebukes the Pharisees for Breath-blasphemy (Mt 12:34; cf. Mt 23:33); and it surfaces a third time in the woes against the scribes and Pharisees which precede Jesus’ eschatological discourse. (Mt 23:33) As we have also seen, when Matthew invokes this epithet in the controversy over Beelzebul, he clarifies what it means: namely, that the sinful poison in the unbelieving hearts of the Pharisees leads them to sow poisonous doubts about Jesus in the minds of others and to blaspheme God’s Holy Breath. Moreover, in the confrontation between John and the Pharisees and Sadducees, the Baptizer rebukes the Pharisees for looking to racial pride to save them rather than to repentance of heart and to the obedience of faith. Only repentance and obedient faith can deliver them from the act of judgment which God is about to perform in sending Jesus to baptize with a Holy Breath and fire. (Mt 3:8-12) The conflict between John and the unrepentant Pharisees foreshadows, Jesus’ own confrontation with them. In the sermon on the mount, Jesus warns His disciples: “For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” (Mt 5:17-20) The warning comes in the context of Jesus’ claim to have come, not to abolish (katalysai) the Law and the prophets but to fulfill (plerôsai) them. (Mt 5:17) True righteousness for Matthew’s Jesus consists in interpreting the Law in the light of His person, His mission, His teachings. Gentile Christian “God-fearers” rank behind Jewish Christians in the kingdom but far in advance of the unbelieving Pharisees. (Mt 5:18-9) The scribes and Pharisees by cultivating a false righteousness refuse even to enter the kingdom.11 Not every scribe responds negatively to Matthew’s Jesus. After the sermon on the mount and the cures at Nazareth, a scribe, apparently a disciple, tells Jesus that he will follow wherever Jesus goes. Matthew locates the incident on the shores of the Sea of Galilee. The magnitude of the crowds forces Jesus to escape by crossing the sea. Before He can embark, however, two people approach Him with requests: the scribe and a young man recently bereaved by his father’s death. I shall consider the case of the young man in pondering Jesus’ relationship to His disciples. Here I focus on the scribe. 11. Cf. NJBC, 42:26-28; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 88-89; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 77-81; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 57-59.


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Jesus does not immediately sanction the scribe’s request. Instead He warns the man of the demands of discipleship. If the scribe follows Jesus, he must lead the same kind of vagabond life as Jesus Himself, who has nowhere to lay His head. Even birds and animals have better homes. (Mt 8:18-22) In Matthew’s gospel, moreover, Jesus takes to the road when confronted with hostility and opposition. (Mt 2:13-14, 12:14-15, 14:12-13, 15:12-14, 21) If the scribe wants to follow Jesus, he must accept in advance a share in the animosity which Jesus Himself endures. Matthew does not tell us whether the scribe followed Jesus or not.12 (cf. Lk 9:57-8) As we have seen, Matthew postpones the conflict stories which open Mark’s gospel. He locates some of them in the narrative section which precedes the missionary discourse. While Mark tells five conflict stores, Matthew further mutes the theme of conflict by telling initially only the first three. Matthew, as he habitually does, also edits Mark’s text and writes a leaner version of these confrontations at the same time that he preserves the substance of Mark’s narrative. As in Mark, in the first conflict narrative, scribes take scandal at Jesus’ words to the paralytic, “Take heart, my son, your sins are forgiven.” (Mt 9:1-3; cf. Mk 2:1-5) Matthew omits several colorful details which Mark records: that friends of the paralytic lowered him through the roof, that their faith moved Jesus to heal the paralytic, and that Jesus reads the hearts of His adversaries. As we have seen, however, Matthew makes an important point which Mark does not make: namely, not only does Jesus as Son of Man have the divine authority to forgive sins, but He also communicates it to His Church.13 (Mt 9:1-8; Mk 2:1-12) The second conflict story in Matthew concerns Jesus’ table fellowship with sinners. In Mark, scribes belonging to the Pharisee party express shock to Jesus’ disciples when they see Jesus eating with sinners and tax collectors. (Mk 2:16) Matthew focuses the conflict on the “Pharisees” only. (Mt 9:11) As in Mark, Matthew’s Jesus turns upon the Pharisees and rebukes them. In Matthew, however, Jesus also names the reason for the Pharisees’ judgmentalism: namely, they have no mercy or compassion in their hearts 12. Cf. Jack Dean Kingsbury, “On following Jesus: the ‘Eager’ Scribe and the ‘Reluctant’ Disciple (Matthew 8:18-22), New Testament Studies, 34(1988), pp. 45-59; Jarmo Duelunen, “Der Nachfolgewillige Schriftgelehrte: Matthaeus 8.19-20 im Verständinis der Evangelisten,” New Testament Studies, 37(1991), pp. 268-279; Robert H. Gundry, “On True and False Disciples in Matthew,” New Testament Studies, 40(1994), pp. 433-441;NJBC, 42:57; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 118-125; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 95-96. 13. Cf. José O’Callaghan, “Tres Casos de Armonizacion en Mt 9,” Estudios Biblicos, 47(1989), pp. 131-134; U. Luz, “The Son of Man in Matthew: Heavenly Judge or Human Christ,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 48(1992), pp. 3-21.

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for those who have sinned. As a consequence, they transform the worship of God into hypocrisy and their “righteousness” into self-righteousness. As for Jesus, His mission from the Father to call sinners to repentance takes precedence over concern with ritual purity. (Mt 9:10-3; cf. Mk 2:15-7) Matthew then narrates the confrontation between Jesus and some of John’s disciples over fasting. (Mt 9:14) In Mark the confrontation did not involve John’s disciples directly but people scandalized that Jesus’ disciples did not observe the same optional fast days as John’s disciples and as the Pharisees did. (Mk 2:18) As in Mark, however, Matthew’s Jesus responds by identifying Himself with the divine messianic bridegroom whose presence brings only infectious joy to His disciples. As in Mark, He rebukes His interlocutors for failing to recognize the radical newness of what He embodies and proclaims. As we have seen above, Matthew attributes the rift between his community and the local synagogue to the latter’s failure to recognize that Jesus fulfills the Law and the prophets.14 (Mt 9:14-7; cf. Mk 2:18-22) Three chapters later, Matthew tells the fourth of Mark’s inaugural conflict stories, the story about Jesus’ disciples eating corn on the sabbath. Here Matthew both edits and expands Mark’s text. He omits non-essential details, like the fact that Abiathar functioned as high priest when David and his men at the bread of the Presence in violation of the law. (Mt 12:4; cf. Mk 2:26) Matthew also edits out what he seems to consider useless verbiage in Mark. In addition, Matthew lengthens Jesus’ response to the Pharisees. Matthew’s Jesus adds a second argument to justify His disciples’ “violation” of the sabbath. Even the Torah allows the temple priests to reap the offering of the first sheaf on the sabbath. (Lev 23:10-4) Matthew, the Christian student of Torah, seems to have realized that Mark’s allusion to David does not involve a sabbath violation as such. Hence, Matthew cites a legally sanctioned sabbath violation in an attempt to buttress Jesus’ original argument. In the process, Matthew portrays Jesus, not as abrogating Torah, but as instructing the Pharisees on its true interpretation.15 Moreover, Matthew’s Jesus follows this second argument with the claim that the Pharisees confront something “greater than the temple.” (Mt 12:6) Matthew, moreover, clearly parallels Jesus’ claim to embody some14. Cf. J.A. Zeisler, “The Removal of the Bridegroom: A Note on Mark II, 18-22 and Parallels,” New Testament Studies, 19(1972-1973), pp. 19-194; NJBC, 42:60-62; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 124-127; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 118-130; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 102-109. 15. Cf. Ethan Levine, “The Sabbath Controversy According to Matthew,” New Testament Studies, 22(1975-1976), pp. 480-483; David Daube, The New Testament and Rabbinic Judaism (London: Athlone Press), 1956, pp. 67-71.


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thing “greater than the temple” with His original reply in Mark that the Son of Man functions as “Lord of the sabbath.” (Mt 12:8) What does the “something greater” mean? The proclamation of the kingdom? Possibly. That Jesus speaks as the messiah? The messiah, while important, would never have ranked even on a par with the temple, the very house of God. Matthew, moreover, we have already seen, derives Jesus’ messianic authority from the fact that He is Immanuel, God-with-us. Matthew also parallels the “something greater” with Jesus’ Lordship over the sabbath. As a believing Christian, Matthew would almost certainly have recognized in the term “Lord” a Jewish euphemism for the divine name. Jesus, then, as Son of Man, embodies something greater than the temple because as God-with-us His divine authority exalts Him above the temple at the same time that it gives Him jurisdiction over the sabbath. The preceding interpretation finds confirmation in Matthew’s account of the triumphal entry into Jerusalem and the cleansing of the temple. The Old Testament allusions which Matthew weaves into that account portray Jesus as God entering and reclaiming His temple. (Mt 21:1-17) The phrase “the Son of Man” could, as we have already seen, mean the same as “I,” or “yours truly.” In context, however, Matthew, like Mark, almost certainly intends it to connote much more and would almost certainly have expected his Christian readers to have heard the phrase “the Son of Man” as a reference to the eschatological Son of Man of Dan 7:13 whose person blends heavenly and human characteristics. Matthew, then, uses this conflict story both in order to develop his theology of Jesus as Immanuel and in order to contrast that theology with the sinful unbelief of the Pharisees. Their sin goes beyond carping over the breaking of the Sabbath. It results from their failure to recognize that Jesus speaks with the eschatological authority of the Son of Man. That failure stems from a deeper one. They refuse to recognize in Jesus the very presence of God. As a consequence, the Pharisees also fail to recognize His authority over the sabbath and His superiority to the temple itself. Although Matthew has separated this conflict story from the conflict over table fellowship with sinners, he alludes to the earlier conflict by having Jesus repeat to the Pharisees the rebuke He spoke to them on that occasion: “And if you had known what this means, ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice,” you would not have condemned the guiltless.” (Mt 12:7, cf. 9:13) The reiteration of Jesus’ rebuke not only ties the conflict over picking grain on the sabbath to the earlier conflict story, but it also underscores the reason for Pharisaical opposition to Jesus: namely, the Pharisees’

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self-righteous formalism, judgmentalism, legalism, and their unrepented lack of mercy and compassion. The citation also sharpens the social issues at stake in the dispute. The Pharisees despise the laxer piety of the “people of the land.” Excessive Pharisaical legalism, however, transforms the consolation which religion offers to the oppressed peasantry into a needless burden. In God’s merciful eyes, the “little ones” whom the Pharisees censure for gleaning food on the sabbath have not in fact sinned.16 Matthew follows the conflict over breaking the sabbath with the last of Mark’s inaugural conflict stories. Again Matthew edits and simplifies Mark’s text but preserves its substance. Jesus scandalizes the Pharisees by healing a man on the sabbath. Moreover, as in Mark, Jesus justifies his action by appealing to Torah piety. The Law forbids physical work on the sabbath, but it never forbids doing good deeds. (Mt 12:9-14; Mk 3:1-6) In Mark, the Pharisees respond to Jesus by going out and beginning to plot with the Herodians how to have Jesus killed. (Mk 3:6) Matthew omits any mention of the Herodians and attributes the conspiracy exclusively to the Pharisees, thus underscoring their malice and opposition.17 (Mt 12:14) Matthew further dramatizes the unbelief of the Pharisees by following the account of their Breath-blasphemy with another expression of hostility and lack of faith. Some scribes and Pharisees come to Jesus as ask Him to perform some striking miracle, apparently in the expectation of embarrassing Him when He fails. (Mt 12:38-42) Mark, as we saw in the preceding section, locates this incident right after the second miracle of the loaves. Mark has Jesus rebuke the scribes’ and Pharisees’ unbelief and tell them that “this generation” will receive no sign. (Mk 8:11-13) Matthew places this incident at the end of a series of stories about Pharisaical unbelief. Moreover, Matthew expands Jesus’ reply in order to put their lack of faith in its ultimate context. While Mark’s Jesus denies His enemies a sign, Matthew’s tells the Pharisees that they shall receive only one sign: viz., the sign of Jonah: An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign; but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the whale, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh will arise at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and, behold, a greater than Jonah is here. The queen of the South will arise at the judgment with this generation and condemn 16. Cf. NJBC, 42:76; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 161-163; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 171-179; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 148-151. 17. Cf. NJBC, 42:77; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 171-179.


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it; for she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and, behold, a greater than Solomon is here. (Mt 12:39-42)

This remarkable passage makes several points simultaneously: 1) The passage transforms Jonah’s three day ordeal in the belly of the fish and subsequent deliverance into a foreshadowing of Jesus’ three days in the tomb and subsequent resurrection. The comparison contextualizes further the Breath-blasphemy of the Pharisees. Their unbelief has blinded them to the fact that Jesus heals and exorcises in the power of the divine Breath. The same unbelief will blind them to the ultimate miracle of the resurrection, which, as we have see, reveals Jesus as Breath-baptizer. 2) Indeed, as in the case of the queen of Sheba and the Gentile city of Nineveh, the Gentiles generally will respond in faith to the good news of Jesus’ resurrection more readily than the unbelieving Pharisees. 3) The resurrection, as we have seen more than once, will reveal Jesus as Immanuel, God-with-us. (Mt 23:20) It will thus demonstrate why Jesus can claim more than prophetic authority and more authority than the wisdom of Solomon. As God-with-us, Jesus reveals the Father in a special way and embodies Breath-inspired wisdom. (Mt 11:27) 4) Even Gentile women will respond to the ultimate revelation of God in the risen Christ and will seek His wisdom. This last point could implicitly rebuke Pharisaical sexism.18 Matthew then repeats a point he made in his account of the controversy over Beelzebul: namely, that by not gathering to Jesus the scribes and Pharisees stand instead with Satan and with his doomed minions. (Mt 12:30) Jesus warns: When the unclean spirit has gone out of a man, he passes through waterless places seeking rest, but he finds none. Then he says, “I will return to my house from which I came.” And when he comes he finds it empty, swept, and put in order. Then he goes and brings with him seven other spirits more evil than himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last state of that man becomes worse than the first. So shall it be also with this evil generation. (Mt 12:43-5)

Luke also records this saying of Jesus but fails to add the warning. “So shall it also be with this evil generation.” In its original form, this teaching of Jesus warns that after an exorcism another reality must replace the expelled demon, otherwise the one exorcised remains vulnerable to repossession by many more demons even more powerful than the one expelled. To what reality does Jesus refer? 18. Cf. Santiago Guijarro Oporto, “‘El Signo de Jonas,’” Estudio Agustiniano, 18(1983), pp. 39-50; NJBC, 42:81; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 167-169; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 187-190; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 158-160.

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By adding the phrase “So shall it be also with this evil generation,” Matthew links this teaching of Jesus to the Pharisees’ cynical and faithless demand for a sign. There Jesus had called them “an evil and adulterous generation.” (Mt 12:39) The scribes and Pharisees need to side with Jesus against Satan by repenting, believing, and producing the works of righteousness. Since the malice of their unbelief has caused them to blaspheme the Holy Breath, they need to acknowledge the meaning of the sign of Jonah and open their hearts to the Breath-baptism of the risen savior. (Mt 28:19-20) Unless they do, they shall find themselves more and more dominated by the Evil One.19 Like Mark, Jesus inserts a confrontation with the faithless Pharisees between the two miracles of the loaves. As in Mark, Pharisees from Jerusalem censure Jesus for not requiring His disciples to obey unwritten traditions surrounding the Law. (Mt 15:1-3, Mk 7:1-13) Once again, Matthew prefers a much leaner version of the incident than Mark, who has to explain to his Gentile Christians the context of the dispute. Nevertheless, Matthew once again preserves the basic kernel of Mark’s narrative. In both gospels, Jesus rebukes the hypocrisy of the Pharisees for using unwritten traditions to subvert the manifest intent of Torah. As a consequence, they commit the very sin which Isaiah warned them against: namely, giving lip service to God while not only disobeying the Law but teaching others to rationalize their disobedience as well.20 (Mt 15:7-9, Mk 7:6-8, Is 29:13) After rebuking the Pharisees, Jesus summons the crowds to Him and warns them that nothing which goes into the mouth defiles one but only what comes out the mouth. (Mt 15:10) Matthew, as a circumcised Jew, obeyed Mosaic dietary laws and required dietary restraint of Gentile Christians. Hence, in contrast to Mark, Matthew does not interpret this saying of Jesus as declaring all foods clean. (Mk 7:19) Instead, Matthew uses the incident primarily to intensify the conflict between Jesus and the Pharisees. Jesus’ disciples come to Him and warn Him that what he has just said offends the Pharisees. Jesus dismisses their warning: “Let them alone, they are blind guides. And if a blind man leads a blind man, both will fall into the pit.” (Mt 15:12-4) Peter then asks Jesus to explain the parable. Jesus replies: Are you also without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into the mouth passes into the stomach, and so passes on? But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person. For 19. Cf. Richard Allen Edwards, The Sign of Jonah in the Theology of the Evangelists and Q (Napierville, IL: Alec R. Allenson, Inc., 1971), pp. 67-71; NJBC, 42:82; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 190-191; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 158-160. 20. Cf. Joseph Fitzmyer, Essays on the Semitic Background of the New Testament (London: Chapman, 1971), pp. 93-104.


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out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, fornication, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a person: but to eat with unwashed hands does not defile a person. (Mt 15:15-20)

Once again Matthew edits Mark’s text but reproduces its substance. In Matthew’s gospel, however, Jesus’ reply takes on connotations which it does not have in Mark. In Matthew, Jesus’ warning recalls His stern rebuke to the Pharisees: “You brood of vipers! How can you speak good when you are evil? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.” (Mt 12:34) In Matthew, Jesus’ reply to Peter also echoes His call for interiorized religion in the sermon on the mount.21 This confrontation with the Pharisees before the second multiplication of the loaves sets the stage in Matthew for Jesus’ warning against the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees. Mark’s Jesus, as we have seen, warns against the leaven on the Pharisees and of Herod. In Mark, the leaven of the Pharisees means the religious attitudes they symbolize: their superficial legalism, religious hypocrisy, unrepentance, their subversion of the true intent of the Law by invoking human customs, their self-righteousness, their judgmentalism, their hostility and violence of heart, ultimately, their unbelief. In Mark, as we have seen, Herod symbolizes sensuality, violence, self-indulgence, vacillation, vanity, and unscrupulocity. (Mk 8:15) Matthew, however, explicitly identifies the “leaven” of the Pharisees and Saducees with their teachings. Mark, moreover, endows Jesus’ warning against bad leaven with explicit eucharistic connotations. The evangelist insists that anyone who understands the meaning of the two multiplications of the loaves will also understand about the need to avoid the leaven of the Pharisees and of Herod. As we have seen, the miracles of the loaves in Mark foreshadow the eucharist. Matthew in handling the image of “leaven” departs from Mark on all of the above points and does so in significant ways. First of all, Matthew’s Jesus warns: “Take heed and beware the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees.” (Mt 16:6) As in Mark, the disciples misunderstand at first what Jesus means and think Him upset because they forgot to bring bread with them. (Mt 16:7) While Mark’s Jesus rebukes the disciples at this point for failing to comprehend the significance of the miracle of the loaves, Matthew’s Jesus rebukes them for their lack of faith: “O men of little faith, why do you discuss among yourselves the fact that you have no bread? Do you not yet perceive? Do you not remember the five loaves of the five thousand, and how many baskets you gathered? Or the seven loaves of the four thousand, and how many baskets you gathered? How is it that you fail to perceive that I did not speak about bread? 21. Cf. NJBC, 42:99; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 209-210; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 228-234; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 183-185.

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Beware the leaven of the Pharisees and Saducees.” Then they understood that He did not tell them to beware the leaven of bread, but of the teaching of the Pharisees and Saducees. (Mt 16:8-12)

In effect, Matthew’s Jesus says: “I have twice fed miraculously thousands of people with more food than they needed. If you are now worrying about bread, you show a lack of faith in Me and in My ability to feed you if need be. I am not talking about physical bread, so get the point.” Instead of pointing to the deep eucharistic symbolism in the multiplication of the loaves, as Mark does, Matthew here treats the two miracles as exercises of divine power which should put to rest the disciples’ concern about lack of food. (Cf. Mt 6:25-34) Moreover, unlike the obtuse disciples in Mark, who at this point stand in something like an adversarial relationship with Jesus because of their lack of understanding, Matthew’s disciples actually get Jesus’ original point. They understand that, when Jesus warns them about the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees, He means their false teaching. Matthew’s concern with erroneous Jewish teaching seems to have led him to substitute the Sadducees for Herod in Jesus’ warning to the disciples. Herod did not teach; but the Sadducees, who here stand for the temple priesthood, did have a teaching function. For Matthew, then, the true disciple holds fast to the teachings of Jesus and resists the false instruction of Pharisaism, which Matthew may well equate with the emerging rabbinate. The disciples must also avoid the Sadducees’ skeptical denial of the resurrection and of angelic ministers at the divine throne.The Pharisees endorsed bodily resurrection and Old Testament angelology; but in other ways they, in leading “the synagogue across the street,” function as the heirs of priestly unbelief.22 (Mt 22:23- 33) In Matthew as in Mark, Pharisees raise the issue of divorce. In Mark, Jesus’ questioners ask Him in effect to side between Rabbi Hillel and Rabbi Shammai. In Matthew, the Pharisees want to know whether or not Jesus endorses the laxist interpretation of Leviticus concerning divorce. They pose their question in the following terms: “Is it lawful to divorce one’s wife for any cause?” (Mt 19:3; cf. Mk 10:2) In Mark’s account of the incident, Jesus questions the Pharisees for their own reading of the Law. Moreover, in the course of their exchange Mark’s Jesus and the Pharisees disagree about whether Moses permitted or commanded divorce, with Jesus taking the latter position. (Mk 10:3-5) Mark’s Jesus then gives His own magisterial rendering of the Mosaic code, by saying that Moses commanded divorce because of the hardness of the male Jew’s heart. (Mk 10:6) 22. Cf. NJBC, 42:104; Radermakers, op. cit., II, p. 215; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 243-246; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 191-192.


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In Matthew, however, Jesus answers the Pharisees’ question directly. He appeals, as He does in Mark, to God’s original intent to create marriage monogamous: in blending their lives husband and wife become the equivalent of one moral person, “one flesh.” Jesus issues same the prohibition which He enunciates in Mark: “What therefore God has joined together let not man put asunder.” (Mt 19:3-9) In other words, the directness of Jesus’ response not only precludes any laxist interpretation of the Mosaic divorce code but it also enjoins the ideal of monogamy. Matthew then has Jesus explain why Moses permitted (not commanded) divorce: For your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for unchastity (mê epi porneia) and marries another commits adultery. (Mt 19:8-9)

This response echoes a saying of Jesus in the sermon on the mount: It was also said, “Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.” But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of unchastity (parektos logou porneias), makes her an adulteress; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery. (Mt 5:31-2)

The fact that Matthew repeats twice Jesus’ prohibition of divorce suggests that he regarded it as a fundamental moral ideal of the new covenant, one which fulfills the old covenant by its more stringent demands. Exegetes generally agree that Matthew has inserted the exceptive clause, “except for unchastity,” into Jesus prohibition against divorce; but they have yet to agree about its meaning. Theodore Makin notes five different interpretations of the term “porneia”: 1) an invalidating impediment, 2) premarital intercourse, 3) incest, 4) adultery, 5) an infertile marriage.23 Of the five suggestions incest has the most plausibility. If Jesus meant the first—an invalidating impediment, the disciples would have found nothing to shock them in the legal reality of invalidating impediments. (Mt 19:10-2) The idea that the second explanation—namely, premarital intercourse—justifies divorce would sanction Joseph’s decision in the infancy gospel to divorce Mary because He believes that she has lost her virginity. Through an angel, however, God forbids the divorce. In addition, using such a lapse as a pretext for divorce ill accords with Jesus’ teaching on the unlimited forgiveness of the repentant. Finally, the term “porneia” signifies neither the third explanation, adultery, nor the fifth, 23. Cf. Theodore Makin, Marriage in the Catholic Church: Divorce and Remarriage (Ramsey, NJ: Paulist, 1984), pp. 60-6.

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infertility. A process of elimination, therefore, disposes of every suggestion except the fourth: incest. It seems extremely unlikely that Matthew would deliberately set out to contradict Jesus’ teaching on the indissolubility of marriage. By their reaction, Matthew’s disciples certainly see in the exceptive clause no hint that Jesus has mitigated His stance on the unacceptability of divorce. It seems probable, then, that Matthew, the Christian scribe, is making a fine legal point. He allows divorce only in the case of a sinful, incestuous union, whose immorality would preclude its counting as a true marriage. This passage focuses on Jesus’ prohibition of mosaic divorce practices, but it also suggests less than good will on the part of the Pharisees who approach Jesus. Matthew says that they asked about the laxist position “in order to test Him (peirazontes auton).” (Mt 19:3) Legal rigorists themselves, the Pharisees assume that Jesus, who interprets the Law with much more latitude than themselves, will also endorse the laxist position when it comes to divorce. They discover to their surprise that He does not. In Matthew, the stringency dramatizes how He fulfills the Law: namely, by holding up more demanding ideals that the Jewish Torah.24 The Pharisees in the Jerusalem Ministry Only in Matthew does the conflict between Jesus and the Pharisees reach its high point during Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry. At that point, moreover, the conflict takes on a more explicitly eschatological character. Jesus addresses two parables—the parable of the two sons and the parable of the wicked tenants—to both the chief priests and the Pharisees. Mark records only the parable of the wicked tenants and aims it exclusively at the chief priests and Sanhedrin. (Mk 11:28) Matthew’s parable of the two sons associates the Pharisees with the chief priests in their unrepentant failure to recognize John the Baptizer’s prophetic authority as willingly as the tax collectors and harlots had. In the parable, one son promises to work for his father and does not. The second son refuses at first to work, then changes his mind and does so. On Jesus’ lips, the parable inculcated the importance of actually living the good news. 24. Cf. A. Sand, Reich Gottes und Eheverzicht im Evangelium nach Matthaus (Stuttgart: Katolisches Bibelwerk, 1983); Michael W. Holmes, “The Text of the Matthean Divorce Passages: A Comment on the Appeal to Harmonization in Textual Decision,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 109(1990), pp. 651-664; Dale C. Allison, “Divorce, Celibacy and Joseph (Matthew 1.18-25 and 19.1-12),” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 49(1993), pp. 3-10; Markus Bochmühl, “Matthew in the Light of Pre-rabbinic Halakah,” New Testament Studies, 35(1989), pp. 291-295; NJBC, 42:117; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 255-259; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 272-277; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 224-228.


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Matthew applies the parable to both the chief priests and the Pharisees as a way of suggesting that the Pharisees now wear the mantle of religious leadership which the chief priests once wore. (Cf. Mt 23:1-3) Moreover, the Pharisees of Matthew’s day, like the chief priests in Jesus’ day, find themselves in the position of promising to obey God and then reneging on their promise.25 (Mt 21:28-32) Matthew next reproduces Mark’s parable of the wicked tenants. In it, a householder plants a vineyard and leases it to tenants to cultivate. They however beat, murder, and stone the householder’s servants who come to collect the rent. Finally, thinking that the tenants will respect his son, the extraordinarily patient householder sends the young man to collect the rent. The wicked tenants, however, delude themselves into believing that if they murder the householder’s son, they will get his inheritance. When the young man arrives, they kill him. (Mt 21:33-46) Matthew handles this parable somewhat differently from Mark. In Mark, Jesus’ response to the chief priests ends with a citation of Psalm 118. The citation warns the chief priests that despite their rejection of Jesus, God will choose to exalt Him. Matthew, however, allegorizes the parable into a more extended reflection on salvation history. Matthew notes that the householder began sending servants to the wicked tenants “when the season of fruits drew near.” (Mt 21:34) The addition assimilates the time of the parable to the eschatological approach of the kingdom. The addition also alludes to the priests and Pharisees’ failure to produce the fruit of conversion and of good works. (Cf. Mt 7:15-20) Matthew identifies the owner of the vineyard as a householder; and the evangelist describes the householder’s son as “beloved.” Matthew thus identifies the son of the parable with Jesus whom the Father has twice proclaimed His beloved Son. (Mt 3:17, 17:5) Matthew also has the wicked tenants cast the son out of the vineyard before they kill him. The evangelist thus alludes to Jesus’ death outside the walls of Jerusalem. In addition, Matthew interprets the fall of Jerusalem as the fulfillment of Ps 118:22-23. Finally, by directing the parable against the Pharisees as well as against the high priests, Matthew explicitly excludes both from the kingdom, which the Gentiles are entering. In Matthew’s revision of the parable, then, the eschatological approach of God’s reign in Jesus requires a response of conversion and good works. Instead, the Pharisees join the chief priests in casting out Jesus, God’s beloved Son, and killing Him. The destruction of Jerusalem has brought divine judgment to the temple priests; yet the Pharisaical leaders of the “synagogue across the street” continue to reproduce the temple priests’ unbelief. What the chief priests did in Jesus’ time, the Pharisees continue 25. Cf. Donahue, op.cit., pp. 87-89; NJBC, 42:128; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 274-275; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 298-301.

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to do in Matthew’s day. Both therefore deserve the same fate: exclusion from the kingdom. In targeting the Pharisees for rebuke along with the priests, Matthew is, however, as we shall soon see in greater detail, also rebuking Pharisaical tendencies in his own community, especially among its leaders.26 In Matthew as in Mark, the chief priests, infuriated, want to arrest Jesus but fear the reaction of the crowds who regard Jesus as a prophet. Matthew has the Pharisees sharing the chief priests’ frustration and fear of the multitudes. Matthew reproduces Mark’s single reference to the Pharisees during Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry. As in Mark, the Pharisees conspire with the Herodians to trap Jesus into forbidding the payment of Roman taxes. (Mt 22:15-22; Mk 12:13) Matthew, however, adds other confrontations as well. Matthew identifies the lawyer who asks Jesus about the great commandment as a Pharisee. Matthew’s Pharisee, moreover, puts the question to Jesus “as a test.” (Mt 22:34-40) Matthew also has Jesus question some Pharisees concerning David’s son. Mark’s Jesus addresses this query to the crowds. (Mt 22:41-6) In both Matthew and Mark, Jesus distances himself from Davidic messianism by implicitly claiming divine Lordship. Matthew’s Jesus, however, specifically challenge the Pharisees on this point. All these additions almost certainly elaborate Matthew’s argument with Pharisees of his own day. The Pharisaical leaders of Judaism seek to pit the gospel against Roman authority. They fail to grasp the true meaning of the great commandment. They need to recognize Jesus as both messiah and Lord. The fact that Jesus’ final silencing of the Pharisees during His Jerusalem ministry introduces the litany of woes against the hypocritical scribes and Pharisees tends to re-enforce such an interpretation.27 Matthew also prefaces this Markan incident with a parable not found in Mark, the story of the king who gave a marriage feast for his son. Some of the invited guests, however, refuse to take the royal invitation seriously and prefer to go about their ordinary business of farming and bartering. 26. Cf. Donahue, op.cit., pp. 89-92; Michel Hubaut, La parabole des vignerons homicides (Paris: J. Gabalda, 1976); Richard J. Dillon, “Towards a Tradition History of the Parables of the True Israel (Matthew 21,33-22,14),” Biblica, 47(1966), pp. 1-42; Akira Ogawa, “Parabole de l’Israel veritable? Reconsideration critique de Mt XXI,28-XXI,14,” Novum Testamentum, 21(1979), pp. 121; NJBC, 42:129; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 275-277; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 301-305; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 262-267. 27. Cf. Herbert Loewe, “Render Unto Caesar”: Religious and Political Loyalty in Palestine (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,1940); Mark Matt, “‘The Things of God’ in the Question Concerning Tribute to Caesar (Lk 20:25; Mk 12:17; Mt 22:29),” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 33(1971), pp. 510-511; NJBC, 42:131; Radermakers, op. cit., II, p. 281; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 309-311; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 271-275.


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Other invited guests turn vicious. They mug and lynch the royal servants who carry the invitation. Surprisingly, however, the king does not retaliate. Instead, he sends out more servants into the streets and fills the feast with ordinary, lowly folk, both the bad and the good. (Mt 22:1-11) The parable dramatizes the inclusiveness of Jesus’ kingdom of nuisances and nobodies, which even invites sinners to share in the celebration. At the same time, the parable rebukes Jesus’ enemies who refuse God’s invitation either from preoccupation with mundane concerns or from violence of heart. As Matthew narrates Jesus’ final Jerusalem ministry, this parable apparently so exasperates the Pharisees that they conspire with the Herodians to trick Jesus into opposing Roman taxation and lay Himself open to the charge of sedition; but to their astonishment, Jesus turns the tables on them. (Mt 22:15-22) In Mark, one finds a brief diatribe against the scribes during Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry. (Mk 12:38-40) Matthew, however, expands the invective into a major discourse possibly by drawing on Q and possibly on other sources. In an opening salvo, Matthew’s Jesus warns: The scribes and the Pharisees sat (ekathisan) on Moses’ seat; so practice and observe whatever they tell you, but not what they do. They bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on people’s shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with their finger. They do all their deeds to be seen by others; for they make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long, and they love the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues, and salutations in the market places, and being called rabbi by others. But you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher and you are all brethren. And call no man your father on earth, for you have one Father, who is in heaven. Neither be called masters, for you have one master, the Christ. He who is greatest among you shall be your servant; whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted. (Mt 23:1-12)

Here several points need noticing. Matthew describes the scribes and Pharisees as having sat on the seat of Moses. Sitting on Moses’s seat means succeeding to Moses in leadership authority. In Jesus’ own time, the chief priests and Sanhedrin sat on the seat of Moses in Palestine, not the Pharisees, even though the latter may have tried on occasion to influence the course of political events. Matthew’s Jesus, however, here portrays the scribes and Pharisees as succeeding the chief priests within the Jewish community in the authoritative interpretation of the Law. Jesus’ words, therefore, envisage not so much the Palestine of His own day as the situation of Matthew’s community in its relationship to the Jewish community in Antioch and its Pharisaical leaders.

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Matthew’s Jesus distinguishes between the realm of external discipline and the deeper demands of Christian living. He is warning Jewish Christians at Antioch that, in what concerns the formal governance of the Jewish community, the scribes and Pharisees have in fact taken over juridical leadership and within the legitimate limits of their authority deserve obedience. Having made this disciplinary point, however, Matthew’s Jesus then goes on to insist that Christians, especially Christian leaders, must never take the scribes and Pharisees as role models. Matthew, who was watching the Jesus movement turn itself into an institutional Church, here voices genuine concern about signs of an incipient clericalism among the Christian leaders in Antioch. The evangelist censures ostentatious public piety, coveting public honors and attention, and assuming honorific titles. Jesus condemns all such pious actions as hypocrisy. (Mt 23:8-12) It seems unlikely that Matthew’s Jesus really expected children to stop calling their male parents “father.” Instead, the evangelist employs hyperbole in order to underscore the fact that no Christian leader should use any title in order to condescend hypocritically to others. Egalitarianism and self-abasement in mutual service must characterize the new Israel.28 The ambivalence toward Pharisaical authority which Matthew expresses in this passage finds confirmation and further qualification in an earlier incident in his gospel which he alone of all the evangelists records. The incident concerns Peter and the tax. Pharisees ask Peter whether Jesus is going to pay the tax. Peter replies that Jesus will do so. (Mt 17:24-7) Many authors assume that the Pharisees refer to the Temple tax. If this story roots itself in an incident in Jesus’ life, the Pharisees could indeed refer to the tax for the upkeep of the temple. The story, however, does not call the tax in question a temple tax. Other commentators believe that this story does not derive from Jesus but relates to the situation of the Matthean church. They suggest that the Pharisees are inquiring whether Jewish Christians pay a civil tax, possibly for the upkeep of pagan temples. Since the Pharisees themselves would have found such a tax unacceptable, the enquiry could exemplify an attempt on their part to get conscientious Christians who resisted such taxes in dutch with the Roman authorities. Still other exegetes question the plausibility of the preceding explanation. They suggest instead that Matthew is really referring to an

28. Cf. David E. Garland, The Intention of Matthew 23 (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1979), pp. 1-64; Steve Mason, “Pharisee Dominance before 70 CE and the Gospel’s Hypocrisy Charge (Matt 23:2-3),” Harvard Theological Review, 83(1990), pp. 363-381; Benedict T. Viviano, O.P., “Social World and Community Leadership: The Case of Matthew 23.1-12, 34,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 39(1990), pp. 3-21; NJBC, 42:135; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 286-288; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 319-325.


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tax leveled in the Jewish community by its Pharisaical leaders. In my judgment, this last suggestion enjoys the greatest probability.29 In the second half of the story about the tax, Jesus rebukes Peter for committing Him to pay the levy. Jesus asks Peter whether kings tax their own sons or whether they tax other people. When Peter replies that they tax other people, Jesus replies, “Then the sons are free.” In other words, in virtue of His position as Son of God, Jesus claims exemption from the tax. The fact, moreover, that Jesus uses the plural form “sons” extends the same exemption to all of God’s children, including the Christian community at Antioch. Moreover, having made the point that He stands under no obligation to pay the tax, Jesus nevertheless helps Peter save face. He instructs him to go fishing and that the first fish he catches will have a coin, a stater, in its mouth. Peter should pay the tax with that coin for both himself and for Jesus lest they scandalize the Pharisees. (Mt 17:24-7) Why then did Matthew spin this strange and somewhat legendary story about fish swimming around the Sea of Galilee with Roman coins in their mouths? If one takes the story as a gloss on the situation of the Matthean church vis a vis the “synagogue across the street,” then Peter probably functions here, as elsewhere in Matthew’s gospel, as a symbol of the Petrine leadership of the Antiochene church. If so, then the story could be admonishing Christian leaders in Antioch for having agreed to pay a synagogue levy which in Matthew’s eyes they had no obligation to pay. The evangelist concedes, however, that, for the sake of maintaining a good relationship with the Jewish community, Christians can, if they choose, contribute freely to the support of the local Jewish synagogue, but only on the condition that they realize that the payment in no way binds them in conscience. Under such an acknowledgedly speculative interpretation, the story of the tax could illustrate tensions between the church at Antioch and local synagogue authorities. If, moreover, one reads this fish story in the light of Jesus’ rebuke to clericalism during His Jerusalem ministry, then the tale of the tax could re-enforce Jesus’ insistence that Christian leaders should eschew the Pharisaical practice of imposing needless burdens on their community. The alleged synagogue tax would exemplify a needless 29. Cf. Thomas Brodie, O.P., “Fish, Temple Tithe, and Remission: The God-Based Generosity of Deuteronomy as one Component of Matt 17:22-18:23,” Revue Biblique, 99(1992), pp. 679- 718; G. Schwarz, “Anoithas to stoma autou? (Mattheaus 17.27),” New Testament Studies, 38(1992), pp. 138-141; Richard J. Cassidy, “Matthew 17:24-27—A Word On Civil Taxes,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 41(1979), pp. 571-580; NJBC, 42:110; W. Horbury, “The Temple Tax,” in Jesus and the Politics of His Day, edited by Ernst Bammel and C.F.D. Moule (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984), pp. 265-286; NJBC, 42:110; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 227-228; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 260-263; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 211-214.

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burden which Church leaders had unjustifiably laid upon the Antiochene church. In Matthew’s account of Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry, the seven woes follow His indictment of both clericalism and Pharisaism. As we have seen, the woes parallel the beatitudes which begin the sermon on the mount. (Mt 5: 3-10) The beatitudes summarize the blessings of living the new covenant; the woes denounce the evils of rejecting it. The term “woe (ouai)” has judgmental connotations, but not necessarily vindictive ones.30 Jesus first indicts the scribes and Pharisees for giving scandal by not entering the kingdom themselves. Not content with that, however, they also hinder others from entering and seek to convert others zealously to their own hypocrisy and unbelief. Matthew calls the proselytes converted by the Pharisees “twice as much a child of hell” as the Pharisees themselves. This harsh phrase suggests that the converts to the “synagogue across the street,” possibly former Christians, may with the zeal of neophytes have shown even greater hostility to Jewish Christians than synagogue leaders. (Mt 23:13-5) This first woe makes it clear, however, that in Matthew’s day the scribes and Pharisees had begun to regard the Antiochene church with hostility and suspicion. Matthew’s Jesus has already warned His followers against the leaven, or false teaching of the Pharisees. The next woe accuses the scribes and Pharisees of disseminating false teaching which undermines the binding power of oaths. Jesus gives two examples of the kind of false teaching He means. He accuses the Pharisees of placing more value on oaths which swear by the gold of the temple than on oaths which swear by the temple. He also blames them for placing more value on oaths which swear by the gift on the altar than by the altar itself. In point of fact, one finds no teachings parallel to these in the Talmud. Matthew’s Jesus, however, is doing more than condemning the use of casuistry to invalidate binding oaths. Valuing gold more than the temple and the gift on the altar more than the altar suggests that cupidity motivates such legalistic slight of hand. The cupidity in question blinds the legalistic scribes and Pharisees to what is truly sacred: You blind men! For which is greater, the gift on the altar or the altar which makes the gift sacred? So one who swears by the altar swears by it and by everything on it; and one who swears by the temple, swears by it and by Him who dwells in it; and one who swears by heaven, swears by the throne of God and by Him who sits upon it. (Mt 23:16-22)

In this second woe, Matthew is warning the community at Antioch and especially its leaders against the hypocrisy of imagining that they can reconcile greed and authentic religious faith. 30. Cf. Garland, op. cit., pp. 64-90.


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The third woe excoriates the scribes and Pharisees for showing more concern with the tithing of produce than with “the weightier matters of the Law: justice and mercy and faith.” (Mt 23:23-4) Here Jesus does not condemn the practice of tithing. Rather, He takes issue with the legalistic value system which causes the scribes and Pharisees to find such externals more important than the cultivation of the virtues which the Law inculcates. The blindness of the Pharisees manifests itself in the fact that they “strain out a gnat and swallow a camel.” They focus on superficial trivialities and ignore the truly important and morally binding aspects of the Law. Pharisaical blindness also results from a lack of faith. Here the third woe echoes the first. Matthew is implicitly asserting that shallow legalism results from a failure to interpret Torah in the light of Jesus’ teachings, which demand both an interiorization of the Law and a recognition of its true intent. (Mt 23:24; cf. Mt 5:17 ff.) The fourth woe chides the scribes and Pharisees for substituting a concern with external ritual purity for lack of repentance. He cites two sins especially: plunder (haparges) and intemperance (akrasias). One should probably see the two as related; for the fourth woe denounces concrete expressions of the greed which the second woe condemned. Greed expresses itself in the covetous and illegitimate appropriation of the goods of others. (Mt 23:25-6) The final woes make it clear that Pharisaical lack of repentance springs from more than greed. By pretending to possess a righteousness they lack, the scribes and Pharisees remain filled with moral and religious iniquity. (Mt 23:27-8) They posture hypocritically, pretending that they, unlike their fathers would have listened to the prophets, when in fact they are plotting Jesus’ death and persecute His followers. In fact, therefore, the scribes and Pharisees show themselves as violent and hardhearted as their fathers. Their murderous intentions will plunge them into the fires of hell. Thus you are witnesses against yourselves that you are the sons of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers. You serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell? Therefore I send you prophets and wise men and scribes, some of whom you will kill and crucify, and some you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from town to town, that upon you may come all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of the innocent Abel to the blood of Zechariah the son of Berachiah, whom you murdered between the sanctuary and the altar. Truly, I say to you, all this will come upon this generation. (Mt 23:31-6)

In this final and longest woe, Jesus parallels His own death with the persecution and murder of the ancient prophets, which it “fills up.” He also assimilates His impending execution to the persecution of Chris-

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tians by the synagogue. In other words, synagogue leaders who persecute Christians imitate both those who hounded Jesus to His death and all the violent, hard-hearted hypocrites in the history of Israel who rejected and persecuted the prophets. Matthew’s Jesus warns that by filling up “the measure of their fathers” in murdering Him and in persecuting His followers, the scribes and Pharisees must answer for every murder in the history of the human race from Abel to Zechariah. The retribution which Jesus promises probably alludes to the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple in 70 a.d. If so, Matthew is implicitly using the tragic fate of the temple priests in order to warn the Pharisees who have succeeded to their leadership that they court a similar retribution through their unrepented violence of heart. One finds parallel inditements of the scribes and Pharisees scattered throughout the gospels of Mark and of Luke. (Mk 7:1-13, 12:38-40, 9:33-7, 10:41-5; Lk 11: 37-40, 45-54, 20:45-7) Nothing in the other two synoptics, however, matches the sustained condemnation which one encounters in Matthew’s woes. Matthew’s dramatic piling on of woe upon woe, all of them directed at the Pharisaical “brood of vipers” suggests a truly embittered confrontation between Matthew and his community, on the one hand, and the scribal and Pharisaical leaders of the “synagogue across the street,” on the other. By rejecting the kingdom and by obstructing its spread, by false zeal, by legalism, by cupidity, by skewed and superficial religious values, by lack of repentance, by an intemperate exploitation of others, by religious hypocrisy, and by violent opposition to the word of God, the Pharisaical leaders of the old Israel are calling down upon themselves the curses of the new covenant. In effect, Matthew accuses the leaders of the “synagogue across the street” of a perverse and malicious misreading of Torah. At the same time, the evangelist sternly warns Christian leaders to have none of it.31 Jesus’ lament over Jerusalem follows: O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, killing the prophets and stoning those who are sent to you! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not! Behold, your house is forsaken and desolate. For I tell you, you will not see me again, until you say, “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.” (Mt 23:37-9)

31. Cf. Anthony J. Salderini, “Deligitimation of Leaders in Matthew 23,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 54(1992), pp. 659-680; Ulrich Luz, “L’Antiguidaismo nel Vangelo di Matteao come Problema storico e teologico: imo schizzo,” Gregorianum, 74(1993), pp. 425-445; NJBC, 42:135; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 288-290; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 324-330; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 276-278.


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One finds a parallel lament in Luke’s journey discourse; but it precedes Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem and foreshadows it. (Lk 14:34-5, 19:38) Matthew places the same lament after Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, at the end of the woes, and just before Jesus’ eschatological discourse. (Mt 24:3 ff.) He thus transforms Jesus’ prophecy, “For I tell you, you will not see me again, until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord,” into a prediction of the second coming. Now that Jesus’ prophecy of the destruction of the temple has come to pass, the hope of the true Israel lies in repentant longing for Jesus’ second coming and for the parousia. The fact that Matthew uses this saying of Jesus differently from Luke does not in and of itself prove its inauthenticity. Matthew’s theological reading of Jesus’ lament makes a smooth rhetorical transition, however, from the woes to the eschatological discourse itself. It also puts the woes in a clear eschatological context. The scribes and Pharisees in their persistent resistance to the kingdom, in their unbelief and persecution of Jesus’ disciples will face the consequences of their conduct when Jesus returns as the eschatological judge to whom they must one day answer.32 Matthew does not assign any special role to the Pharisees in the trial and death of Jesus. After Jesus’ death, however, when Pilate grants permission to Joseph of Aramathea to bury Jesus’ body, Matthew has Pharisees join the chief priests in requesting Roman soldiers to guard the tomb of Jesus lest His disciples steal the body and claim that He has risen from the dead. (Mt 27:62-6) By joining the chief priests in their petition, the Pharisees manifest that their enmity against Jesus goes beyond the grave. They stand with the temple priests in their stubborn refusal to believe in Jesus’ resurrection. The surprising presence of Pharisees as co-petitioners with Pilate implicitly portrays them as the heirs to the religious leadership which the high priests exercised in Jesus’ time. Matthew also regards the leaders of the “synagogue across the street” as the historical heirs of the chief priests’ malice and unbelief.33 The Analogy of Christological Knowing Matthew seems to have written his gospel for a Petrine community trying to preserve its Christian identity while adhering to the faithful practice of Torah. Much of its identity crisis seems to have resulted for conflicts and tensions with the Pharisaical leaders of the local Jewish community. As a Jewish Christian, Matthew regards Jesus as the fulfillment 32. Cf. Garland, op. cit., pp. 90-215; NJBC, 42:136; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 291-292; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 228-230; Albright and Mann, op. cit., p. 284. 33. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, II, pp. 1284-1313; NJBC, 42:166; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 349-350; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 404-408; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. cvi- cxxiii, 354-356.

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of the Mosaic Law. Jesus fulfills the Law by demanding more, not less, than traditional Torah piety. Jesus’ compassionate reading of the Law grasps its original intent. Matthew finds himself of a double mind when he confronts both the Pharisaical leaders of the “synagogue across the street,” on the one hand, and the official leaders of his own community, on the other. The evangelist vindicates the right of Christians to claim their Jewish identity without harassment and persecution by local synagogue leaders. At the same time, he recognizes that the scribal and Pharisaical leaders refuse to believe fundamental Christian doctrines, like the resurrection and Lordship of Jesus. Matthew therefore portrays them as standing in historical continuity with the chief priests and elders who occupied the “seat of Moses” in Jesus’ day. The Pharisaical leaders of the local synagogue manifest the same hostility and unbelief as killed Jesus, only now they vent their wrath on His followers. As far as Matthew is concerned therefore, the Pharisees of his day share in the guilt and unbelief of the chief priests which led to the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple. Matthew reiterates the Pharisees’ stubborn refusal to confess both Jesus’ resurrection and His divinity. The evangelist condemns their blasphemy of the divine Breath who enlightens Christians and inspires their faith in Jesus. With prophetic courage, the evangelist denounces the scribes and Pharisees as a brood of vipers who seek to undermine Christian faith in Jesus by their poisonous attacks upon Him. They resist Jesus’ teaching about divorce and about the two Great Commandments. Cupidity and unrepentant violence of heart ultimately motivate their unbelief. Matthew therefore challenges the Pharisees of his generation to repentance and to a faith which carries them beyond a superficial legalism and a self-righteous judgmentalism. That challenge echoes the challenge to Pharisaism which Jesus had voiced in His own day. Two things caused Matthew to recast and intensify the opposition between Jesus and the Pharisees: 1) the Petrine character of the community at Antioch and 2) its conscious, institutional self-definition over against an increasingly hostile synagogue. Matthew’s diatribes against Pharisaism, however, also target the leaders of his own Christian community. As the Christian community at Antioch began to define itself institutionally over against the Jewish community, Matthew feared that uncritical aping of Jewish leadership structures would betray Christian leaders into abandoning Jesus’ egalitarian vision of a community in which the greatest function as slaves to the least. Matthew denounces nascent Christian clericalism because he perceives it as a Christian version of Pharisaical hypocrisy. In Matthew as in Mark, the Pharisees function as negative role models both for Christians and especially for their leaders. The specific pastoral


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and ecclesial situation of the Petrine community at Antioch, however, caused Matthew to handle that confrontation differently from Mark. Matthew not only enhances the Pharisees’ dramatic role in Jesus’ story but portrays the conflict between the two as even more embittered than Mark had. Polemic concerns lead Matthew to specify in greater detail than Mark the faith differences between Jesus’ disciples and the Pharisees. The same polemic concerns lead him to transform Jesus’ attacks on the Pharisees into a rebuke to Christian clericalism. In all these ways, Matthew’s telling of Jesus’ tale illustrates the analogy of Christological knowing. Assimilation to Jesus in the power of His Breath raises different issues in different ecclesial, pastoral, and doctrinal contexts. In consciously transforming and intensifying Mark’s account of Jesus’ confrontation with the Pharisees, Matthew gives evidence of having grasped quite clearly this basic Christological insight. This section has considered how Matthew’s handling of Jesus’ relationship to the scribes and Pharisees differs from Mark’s. The following brief section describes Jesus’ relationship to Herod and the Herodians. (III) Matthew mentions Herod Antipas in only three passages of his gospel. Like Mark, he notes that Herod superstitiously regarded Jesus as the murdered John the Baptizer returned to life. Like Mark he records that John’s denunciation of Herod for incestuous adultery led Herod to arrest the Baptizer. Unlike Mark, however, who portrays Herod as having mixed feelings toward John, Matthew, as we have seen, states that Herod lusted for John’s blood. Only fear of the crowds, who regarded John as a prophet held the king’s hand temporarily from killing him. (Mt 14:1-5) The same fear would for a time stay the chief priests’ hands in their plot against Jesus. (Mt 26:5) Matthew, as we have seen, edits Mark’s account of the dance of Herodias’s daughter and of her connivance with her mother to have the Baptizer killed; but Matthew preserves the main lines of Mark’s account. Paradoxically, having portrayed Herod as wanting John dead, Matthew follows Mark and describes Herod, quite inconsistently, as sorry to order John’s beheading.34 (Mt 14:6-12) Matthew differs from Mark, however, chiefly by depriving Herod of explicit ethical and eucharistic symbolism. Both evangelists link Herod’s murder of John symbolically to the miracle of the loaves. Matthew, however, does so in order to make a doctrinal point. The miracle of the loaves follows upon John’s martyrdom. By foreshadowing the paschal mystery, the miracle contrasts the Baptizer’s death with Jesus’ own. The disciples 34. Cf. NJBC, 42:95; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 201-202; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 214-218; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 175-176.

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of both men will bury their master. Jesus will rise, but the Baptizer will not. Mark links Herod to eucharistic faith by insisting that those who would share in the Lord’s supper must first purge themselves of Herod’s “leaven.” For Mark, the leaven of Herod alludes metaphorically to the vices which the tyrant king incarnated. Matthew speaks of the leaven of Saducees instead of the leaven of Herod. Matthew apparently makes the substitution because he deems the Saducees’ denial of the resurrection as pernicious as the objectionable doctrines of the Pharisees. Moreover, the unbelief of the Sadducees finds an echo in the Pharisees’ denial of Jesus’ resurrection. I have in this brief section pondered how Matthew treats the figure of Herod. The following section reflects on Jesus’ confrontation with the chief priests. (IV) Apart from Matthew’s infancy gospel, members of the high priesthood make their first appearance in his gospel when Sadducees join some Pharisees in seeking the Baptizer’s baptism. The Sadducees in question probably belonged to the high priestly caste. They find themselves, however, rejected by the Baptizer for approaching his baptism without the needed repentance. (Mt 3:7) Matthew, therefore, makes it clear from the very start of his gospel that the unrepentant high priests, like the Pharisees, stand in an adversarial relationship to John. Jesus and the Priests In Matthew, Sadducees join with the Pharisees in asking Jesus to perform some miraculous sign. Both groups act in bad faith and apparently seek to embarrass Jesus when He fails. Jesus replies that they know how to read the signs of changing weather but cannot read the signs of the times. Matthew means by the signs of the times the manifest signs of the in-breaking of God’s reign in Jesus’ person and ministry. Matthew’s Jesus tells them again that they will receive only one sign: the sign of Jonah, which Matthew, as we have seen, interprets as Jesus’ resurrection. (Mt 16:1-4; cf. 12:38-42) This story points to the paschal mystery as the sign from heaven which the Pharisees and the Sadducees both need to acknowledge but will reject. The confrontation in Matthew recalls the confrontation between John the Baptizer and the same two groups of hypocrites. (Mt 3:7-12) It also anticipates Jesus’ warning against the leaven (teaching) of the Pharisees and Sadducees. (Mt 16:6-12; 22:23-34) When read in context, therefore, Matthew’s association of the Sadducees with the Pharisees in testing Jesus gives yet another indication that in the evangelist’s eyes, the Sadducees’ denial of the resurrection made them particularly reprehensible. It also suggests that, in Matthew’s judgment, Pharisaical denial of


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Jesus’ resurrection linked them doctrinally to the Sadducees even though they defended belief in bodily resurrection.35 As in Mark, Jesus predicts three times that He will suffer crucifixion at the hands of the chief priests and the scribes in Jerusalem but that He will rise from the dead on the third day. In his first prediction, Jesus includes the whole Sanhedrin in the list of His executioners. In His second prediction of the paschal mystery Jesus does not mention the chief priests and scribes by name. He says that “men” will crucify Him; but Matthew clearly has the chief priests and scribes in mind, although the more generic term probably includes Pilate and his soldiers as well. (Mt 16:21-3, 17:22-3, 20:17-9) As in Mark’s gospel, the most important confrontations between Jesus and the temple priesthood occur during His final Jerusalem ministry. In both gospels, those confrontations dramatize the issues which divided Jesus and the chief priests, issues for which Jesus died. Matthew, however, modifies Mark’s account of the cleansing of the temple in three ways. Mark, as we have seen, inserts the temple cleansing between Jesus’ cursing of the fig tree and the disciples’ discovery later that same day that the tree has withered. Mark, therefore, makes the barrenness of the fig tree a symbol of the barrenness of the temple priests who use the house of God as a means of fattening their own pocketbooks. Mark then contrasts the hypocritical worship of the priests with authentic, faith-filled Christian prayer. (Mk 11:12-25) Matthew, as we have seen, mutes Mark’s symbolism. In Matthew, Jesus curses the tree the day after he cleanses the temple. By destroying Mark’s triptych, Matthew transforms the cursing of the tree into a story about the efficacy of prayer and blurs Mark’s reference to the sinfulness and cupidity of the temple priests. Mark’s Jesus says as he overturns the money-changing tables and the seats of the pigeon sellers, “It is written, ‘ My house is a house of prayer for all nations,’ but you have made it a den of thieves.” Matthew’s Jesus omits the words “for all nations.” (Mk 11:15-19; Mt 21:13) The text from Isaiah which Jesus cites actually says “for all peoples.” (Is 56:7) The fact that the temple no longer existed may have motivated Matthew’s editorial omission. Finally, Mark portrays the cleansing of the temple as the event which turned the temple priests decisively against Jesus; for he adds that from then on the chief priests wanted to destroy Jesus and refrained only our 35. Cf. NJBC, 42:103; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 214-215; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 243- 246; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 191-192; Jean Le Moyne, O.S.B. Le sadducéens (Paris: Librairie Le Coffre, 1972), pp. 123-127, 129-135; F. Dreyfus, O.P, “L’argument scripturaire de Jésus in faveur de la resurrection des morts (Marc XII, 26-27),” Revue Biblique, 66(1959), pp. 213-224; Xavier Quinza Lleo, “La Reflexion biblica sobre los Signos de los Tiempos,” Estudios Biblicos, 48(1990), pp. 317-334.

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of fear, because of Jesus’ popularity with the crowds. (Mk 11:15-9) Matthew, by contrast, postpones the priests’ decision to do away with Jesus until after a series of subsequent confrontations. (Mt 21:45-6) Matthew, therefore, seems to have desired to make it clearer than Mark that other motives besides the cleansing of the temple motivated the high priests’ animosity toward Jesus. By postponing his assertion that the chief priests’ had decided to kill Jesus, Matthew implicitly points to those other motives: 1) Jesus’ messianic pretensions, however He qualified them; 2) Jesus’ claim to speak with divine authority; 3) Jesus’ denunciation of the temple priesthood for failing to repent at His own and the Baptizer’s preaching; and 4) Jesus’ prophecy that the priests’ intransigence would lead to the transfer of God’s kingdom to other people and to other leaders. All these things together, Matthew seems to say, caused the chief priests to seek Jesus’ life.36 After the cleansing of the temple, Matthew inserts an incident completely absent from Mark’s account. After cleansing the temple, Jesus remains there and heals the blind and the lame. As he does so children shout, “Hosanna to the Son of David,” event though the Davidic messiah was not supposed to heal as Jesus does. The chief priests react with indignation and ask Jesus if He hears what the children are saying. The question indicates that they desire Jesus to deny the messianic title with which the children are greeting Him. In His reply, Jesus alludes to two Scripture texts: Ps 8:2 LXX and Wis 10:21. Jesus answers that He does hear what the children are saying and then asks the chief priests and scribes: “Have you never read, ‘Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings you have brought perfect praise’?” (Mt 21:12-7) This text from the Septuagint translation of Psalm 8 contrasts the exalted majesty of God with the weak ones on earth who proclaim it. The psalm calls God’s little ones mere babes. That Jesus would have cited the Septuagint version of Psalm 8 has little historical probability. Matthew, however, in this text alludes to Jesus’ divinity, since Jesus Himself receives the praise of the babes just as God does in the psalm. The citation also contrasts the spontaneous, childlike faith of God’s “little ones” with priestly unbelief. Finally, Jesus’ reply to the priests alludes to His response to the Baptizer’s disciples that He represents a different kind of messiah from the Davidic messiah of popular apocalyptic. (Mt 11:2-6) The text from Wisdom says: “Wisdom opened the mouth of the dumb and gave speech to the tongues of babes.” The text from which this verse comes alludes to Exodus. The Wisdom text points, then, to Jesus’ person 36. Cf. F.M. Braun, O.P., “L’expulsion des vendeurs du temple,” Revue Biblique, 38(1929), pp. 178-200; Donald J. Verseput, “Jesus’ Pilgrimage to Jerusalem and Encounter in the Temple: A Geographical Motif in Matthew’s Gospel,” Novum Testamentum, 36(1994), pp. 105-121.


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and ministry as effecting a new exodus, a new liberation of Israel. Having rebuked the priests and scribes, Jesus withdraws to Bethany.37 The next day the chief priests and members of the Sanhedrin return to the attack and confront Jesus a second time. This time, as in Mark, Jesus first challenges the chief priests to acknowledge the prophetic Breath present in both Him and John. (Mt 21:23-27) Jesus then tells the parable of the two sons and the parable of the wicked servants who slay the servants and the son of the owner of a vineyard. As we saw, in examining Jesus’ relationship to the Pharisees, Matthew’s Jesus applies both parables simultaneously to the chief priests and to the Pharisees.38 (Mt 21:33-46) Matthew includes a slightly edited version of Mark’s account of Jesus’ exchange with the Saducees over the resurrection of the body. (Mt 22:23-33) As in Mark, the Sadducees confuse resurrection with resuscitation. At the heart of their mockery lies their lack of faith in God’s power to raise the dead. (Mt 22:29-33) In Matthew, though not in Mark, however, the crowds greet Jesus’ teaching with astonishment. (Mt 22:33-4) The astonishment calls attention to the importance of the confrontation. Erroneous teaching about the resurrection exemplifies the “leaven” of the Sadducees.39 (Mt 16:1-4) Mark’s Judas betrays Jesus out of pure malice (Mk 14:10-11); Matthew’s Judas does it for money, for thirty pieces of silver. As we shall see, the evangelist endows the sum with prophetic meaning. (Mt 26:14-16, 27:3-10) The mob takes the arrested Jesus to the palace of Caiphas, where the whole Sanhedrin has assembled. (Mt 26:47-51) Matthew reproduces the substance of Mark’s account of Jesus’ trial by the Sanhedrin. 40 (Mt 26:59-68; Mk 14:53-65) Matthew, as we have seen, mutes the implicit theological significance of Jesus’ response to the high priest by editing out Mark’s allusion to the calming of the storm. Matthew’s high priest finds, however, sufficient motive for pronouncing a judgment of blasphemy in Jesus’ reference to the Son of Man. As we have seen, the refer37. Cf. NJBC, 42:125-126; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 269-272; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 292-298; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 254-261. 38. Cf. Jean Le Moyne, O.S.B., Les sadducéens (Paris: Librairie Le Coffre, 1972), pp. 123127; 129-135;Daube, op. cit., pp. 151-157, 217-223; NJBC, 42:127; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 272-273; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 298-301; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 259-261. 39. Cf. NJBC, 42:132; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 282-283; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 312- 314; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 217-275. 40. Jo-Ann A. Brant argues that in Matthew Herod’s oath to the daughter of Herodias and the high priest’s adjuration of Jesus under oath during the trial before the sanhedrin both dramatize why Jesus forbids His disciples the use of oaths. See: Jo-Ann A. Brant “Infelicitous Oaths in the Gospel of Matthew,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 63(1996), pp. 3-20.

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ence conflates the coming of the Son of man in Dan 7:13 and Ps 110:1, a royal psalm of enthronement. Matthew also adds the term “hereafter (ap’ arti)” to Jesus’ response to the high priest as Mark reproduces it. The term marks Jesus’ very trial by the Sanhedrin as already beginning the final divine judgment which He will one day pronounce when He returns as the apocalyptic Son of Man. Jesus, then, in claiming the judicial authority of the Son of Man implicitly asserts that He has the power to reverse the judgment which the Sanhedrin is about the pass upon Him. The high priest responds to this claim to divine prerogative with a charge of blasphemy. As in Mark, the Sanhedrin condemns Jesus to death, after which they spit upon Him, strike Him, and slap Him.41 (Mt 26:63-8) As in Mark, the chief priests and elders assemble the following morning and decide to hand Jesus over to Pilate, the Roman governor, for execution. At this point, Matthew abandons Mark’s version of the passion and inserts the story of Judas’s remorse and despair. Judas again confronts the high priests and declares that he has sinned in betraying innocent blood. The high priests reply contemptuously: “What is that to us? See to it yourself.” Judas then throws at their feet the thirty pieces of silver which his treachery has earned, departs, and hangs himself. The chief priests betray the same kind of shallow legalism which Jesus denounced in the Pharisees. They debate how they should dispose legally of the blood money. They procure a potter’s field as a burial ground for strangers. Matthew notes that the field still bears the name, “The Field of Blood.” (Mt 27:3-10) Matthew then links the thirty pieces of silver and its use by the high priests to his theme of fulfillment. In buying the field, the chief priests “fulfill” an incident described in Zech 11:12-13.42 There the prophet receives a wage of thirty shekels for tending sheep. Zecharaiah is performing a prophetic gesture. God deems the paltry wage a sign that His people 41. Cf. J. Duncan M. Derrett, “Jesus as Seducer,” Theology Digest, 42(1995), pp. 26-29; Donald Senior, C.P., “Matthew’s Special Material in the Passion Story: Implications for the Evangelist’s Redactional Techinque and Theological Perspective,”Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 63(1987), pp. 272-294; “Revisiting Matthew’s Special Material in the Passion Narrative: A Dialogue with Raymond Brown,” Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 70(1994), pp. 417-424; NJBC, 42:154-155; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 335-340; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 372-384; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 328-336. 42. The fulfillment prophecy which Matthew cites does not occur in the Old Testament as such. Although Matthew derives some of its content from Zech 11:12-13, the evangelist attributes the prophecy to Jeremiah. It would appear that in formulating the fulfillment prophecy, Matthew conflated elements from both Jeremiah and Zechariah but possibly chose to cite Jeremiah as his source because Jeremiah occupies a place of greater eminence among the Old Testament prophets. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, I, pp.637-652.


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fail to value both God and His word properly. Zechariah breaks two shepherds crooks, one symbolizing good will and the other symbolizing union. The first act predicts the ending of the covenant with Israel; the second, the separation of Israel and Judah. The citation implicitly points to the chief priests as worthless shepherds and as the cause of Jerusalem’s eventual downfall.43 (Zech 11:15-7) As in Mark, Pilate senses that the chief priests are asking him to execute Jesus for legally dubious motives. He tries to release Jesus by asking the crowds whether to release either Him or Barabbas; but the chief priests outfox the Roman.44 (Mt 27:15, 20) As Jesus hangs on the cross dying, the chief priests, scribes, and elders, all of those responsible for His death, mock Him blasphemously. (Mt 27:42-43) The priests deride the salvation which Jesus has offered to Israel, they contemn His messianic pretensions, and they mock Him as someone beyond saving. Finally, the priests ridicule Jesus’ claims to be Son of God and take pleasure in the fact that God has abandoned Him. Their conduct recalls that of the godless men in Wis 1:16-2:20, who murder the virtuous because their innocent lives reproach the wickedness of the godless. The priests’ mockery also derides cherished Christian beliefs.45 The Chief Priests and the Resurrection After Jesus dies, Matthew records another incident not found in either Mark or Luke. The chief priests, joined by Pharisees, recall Jesus’ predictions of His own resurrection and ask Pilate to post guards at the tomb, lest Jesus’ disciples steal the body and then claim that He has risen “and the last fraud will be worse than the first.” Pilate grants them a detachment of soldiers to guard the tomb. (Mt 27:62-4) When the requested guards actually witness the descent of an angel and see the empty tomb, they report all they have seen to the chief priests who bribe them to spread the lie that the disciples stole the body. The priests promise to protect the guards from punishment by Pilate should he hear of what they have done. The chief priests remain intransigent and maliciously unrepentant to the bitter end. (Mt 28:11-5) It would also appear at least plausible that Matthew tells this story of priestly and Pharisaical perfidy in refutation of one of the arguments 43. Cf. Pierre Benoit, Jesus and the Gospel, translated by Benet Weatherhead (New York, NY: Seabury, 1973), I, pp. 189-207; Donald Senior, The Passion Narrative According to Matthew: A Redactional Study (Louvain: Leuven University Press, 1975), pp. 343-397; NJBC, 42:158; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 340-342; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 384-387; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 340-341. 44. Cf. NJBC, 42:163; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 344-345; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 393- 398; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 347-348. 45. Cf. Terence L. Donaldson, “The Mockers and the Son of God (Matthew 27.37-44),” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 41(1995), pp. 3-18.

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against Jesus’ resurrection bruited about in the “synagogue across the street.” (Cf. Mt 28:15) If so, the allegation that Jesus’ disciples had actually stolen His body and then lied about the resurrection would exemplify the leaven of false teaching which Matthew has repeatedly deplored.46 The Analogy of Christological Knowing Matthew reproduces Mark’s account of the relationship between Jesus and the chief priests with only minor variations. If anything, he stresses even more their perfidy and the Sadducees’ lack of religious faith in the resurrection. Still, Matthew’s handling of this linkage in Mark’s gospel acquires slightly different connotations in that, for reasons already considered, Matthew associates more closely than Mark does the unbelief and hypocrisy of the chief priests and that of the Pharisaical leaders of the Jewish community in Antioch. Moreover, Matthew’s insistence on the need for Christians to reject the leaven of the Sadducees transforms them into a special type of religious unbelief. Matthew’s concern with incipient clericalism in Antioch also gives his portrait of the priests more explicit ecclesial connotations. Besides avoiding Pharisaical greed and hypocrisy, Christian leaders must eschew all the vices which the chief priests incarnate: religious compromise and unbelief, the simoniacal exploitation of the poor, the intransigent refusal to repent, corrupt and irresponsible religious leadership. In this chapter, I have analyzed all but one of the negative dramatic linkages in Matthew. The final section meditates Jesus’ relationship to Pilate and to the empire he represented. (V) Although Pilate makes no personal appearance in Matthew’s gospel until Jesus’ trial, as in Mark, one finds a tacit allusion to him in Jesus’ repudiation of the mode of governance of the kings of the Gentiles. As in Mark, Jesus makes this point in correcting the ambition of the apostles after the ten become indignant at the attempt of James and John to secure a special place of honor for themselves in the kingdom. Matthew reproduces Mark’s text with inconsequential editorial adjustments. In both gospels Jesus insists that those in a position of leadership in the new Israel must not lord it over others as the kings of the Gentiles do. Instead they must rest content to serve one another, to act as the slaves of the community, and to follow a servant messiah even to the cross. (Mt 20:24-8; Mk 10:41-5) 46. Cf. NJBC, 42:167; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 408-413; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 357- 360.


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Jesus and Pilate When Mark first names Pilate, he assumes that the reader will recognize him as the Roman governor; but Matthew makes no such assumption and supplies Pilate’s title. (Mt 27:1-2; Mk 15:1) In Matthew, when Pilate asks Jesus whether or not He claims the title “King of the Jews,” Jesus replies with the same diffident response He gave to the high priest in His trial before the Sanhedrin. Jesus says: “You have said so.” (Mt 27:11) One could, however, interpret Jesus’ answer to mean either “You have said it, not I” or “You have answered your own question.” As in Mark, Pilate wonders at Jesus’ silent refusal (as suffering servant) to defend Himself against the high priests’ accusations against Him. As in Mark, Pilate tries to outwit the high priests by asking the crowds to choose between Jesus and Barabbas, only to find that the high priests have persuaded the crowds to choose Barabbas. (Mt 27:15-7, 21-3; Mk 15:6-15) Matthew, however, includes an incident in Jesus’ trial which Mark omits. The wife of Pilate sends him a message as he sits on the throne of judgment awaiting the crowds’ choice between Jesus and Barabbas. Pilate’s wife urges him to “have nothing to do with that righteous man, for I have suffered much over him today in a dream.” (Mt 27:19) Her dream recalls the dreams in Matthew’s infancy narrative which there, and probably here, communicate a divine message. Matthew thus underscores Pilate’s malice more than Mark. Pilate will accede to the crowds and order Jesus crucified, despite the fact that God has warned Him not to do so. The incident, however, also gives Pilate a clearer motive than Mark does for resisting initially the crowd’s call for Jesus’ blood. The dream highlights as well the hypocrisy with which Matthew’s Pilate seeks to exonerate himself of any guilt for Jesus’ death. In Matthew, though not in Mark, Pilate, before condemning Jesus, calls for a bowl of water and washes his hands in it, saying, “I am innocent of this man’s blood; see to it yourselves.” (Mt 27:24) Still, when the crowds persist in calling for Jesus’ blood, as in Mark, Pilate accedes to their demands and orders Jesus’ scourging and crucifixion. (Mt 27:25-6) Pilate’s reference to Jesus’ innocent blood recalls Judas’s protest to the high priests that he has betrayed innocent blood. (Mt 27:3-10) Pilate’s words also foreshadow the cry of the crowd that Jesus’ blood be upon them and their children. By insisting on the innocence of the blood which the “whole people” call down upon themselves, Matthew underscores both their guilt in calling for Jesus’ execution as well as the atoning character of Jesus’ sacrifice. Repentance and faith can, then, turn the blood of judgment into the reconciling blood of atonement.47 47. Cf. NJBC, 42:159-160; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 342-343; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 387-393; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 342-345; Barbara Reid, “Puzzling Passages (Matthew 27:24),” The Bible Today, 34(1996), pp. 94, 120.

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The Roman soldiers execute Pilate’s order. They strip Jesus, scourge Him, crown Him with thorns, cover Him with a scarlet cloak, and mock Him as king of the Jews. Matthew takes Jesus’ blindfolding by the soldiers for granted. I shall consider the symbolism of the scarlet cloak in reflecting on Jesus’ relationship to the crowds. After mocking Jesus, the soldiers lead Him to Golgotha, the hill of execution. Mark describes the soldiers offering Jesus wine mixed with myrrh, a pain-killing drug. Jesus refuses it. In other words, Mark’s Jesus embraces His sufferings. Matthew replaces the drug with gall. This bitter drink dramatizes in Matthew the bitterness of Jesus’ death and symbolizes the cup which the Father requires Jesus to drink. (Mt 27:27-34; cf. Mk 15:16-23) As in Mark, the soldiers crucify Jesus and then divide His garments among them by casting lots. They post above His head His crime: “Jesus of Nazareth the King of the Jews.” As in Mark, both the crowds and the two robbers crucified with Jesus mock and revile Him. Executed by Pilate as an insurrectionist, Jesus dies a death of abandonment, degradation, and ultimate rejection. (Mt 27:33-44; Mk 15:22-32) In Matthew as in Mark, a darkness portending God’s judgment on Israel enshrouds the land from the six to the ninth hour, while Jesus hangs on the cross. Mark mentions that Jesus was crucified at the third hour and so suffered for six hours in all. Matthew, however, omits this detail.48 (Mt 27:45; Mk 15:25, 33-9) As in Mark, at the ninth hour Jesus prays the first line of Psalm 22, the prayer of the innocent poor who trusts in God’s power to vindicate Him. As in Mark, the mocking bystanders say He is calling on Elijah. One of the bystanders, seemingly out of sympathy, then offers Jesus sour wine on a sponge. After drinking Jesus dies. (Mt 27:45-50; Mk 15:33-7) Matthew, however, uses a different verb from Mark in order to describe Jesus’ death. In Mark, Jesus cries out with a loud voice and expires (exepneusen). Matthew says that after Jesus cried out, He “handed over His breath (apheken to pneuma).” (Mt 27:50; Mk 15:37) In Mark, then, Jesus suffers death; in Matthew He actively hands over His breath, or life principle, to God.49 As we have seen, in Mark only a single sign follows Jesus’ death: namely, the rending of the temple veil. Matthew adds other apocalyptic signs, both positive and negative, to Mark’s single sign. Three negative signs— the rending of the veil, the earthquakes, and the splitting of rocks—sym48. Cf. Rufino Maria Grandez, “Las Tinieblas en las Meurte de Jesus: Historia de la Exegesis de Lc 23:44-45a (Mt 27:25, Mc 15,33),” Estudios Biblicos, 47(1989), pp. 177-223. 49. Cf. Gerard S. Sloyan, Jesus on Trial (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress, 1973), pp. 74-88; NJBC, 42:161-163; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 344-345; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 393-398; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 346-353.


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bolize divine judgment and anticipate the earthquake which will accompany the discovery of Jesus’ empty tomb. They designate both the death and resurrection, therefore, as judgmental, apocalyptic acts of God. The positive signs—the opening of the tombs and the resurrection of devout Jews—also foreshadow Jesus’ resurrection. The fact that those who rise fail to appear to the residents of Jerusalem until Jesus rises from the dead dramatizes the fact that His resurrection effects resurrection in others. The rending of the temple veil has slightly different connotations in Mark and in Matthew. In Mark it signifies more the replacement of the Mosaic order with the new Christian covenant. Matthew sees the old covenant fulfilled in the new. Hence, in his passion narrative, the rending of the temple veil probably foreshadows more the destruction of the temple. Overawed at these apocalyptic signs, one of the Roman soldiers testifies, “Truly this was the Son of God.” (Mt 27:51-54; Mk 15:39) In both Mark and Matthew the soldier’s testimony foreshadows the conversion of the Gentiles.50 (Mt 14:33) While Matthew recognizes with Mark that Jesus died a cruel death of rejection and abandonment, his interpolations of Mark’s account of Jesus’ death transform it into something more than the grim and violent eschatological struggle with the forces of evil which Mark’s narrative depicts. Matthew in no way denies either the eschatological character of the struggle or its grimness. In fact, he underscores the eschatological significance of Jesus’ death with the apocalyptic signs which follow upon Jesus’ death. Matthew also insists on its bitterness. The rock splitting earthquake and resurrections which follow Jesus’ death dramatize its cosmic, eschatological, and apocalyptic significance. In Matthew, Jesus inaugurates the end time by choosing to die for sins in utter abandonment by humans. In choosing to die, however, Jesus acquires the power to raise others from the dead, as the immediate resurrection of many “saints” symbolizes. His saving death, therefore, begins the final resurrection. It has revelatory significance for the whole cosmos and makes the earth shudder at its disclosure.51 As in Mark, Joseph of Aramathea secures Pilate’s permission to bury Jesus. (Mk 15:42-47, 27:57-61) Matthew, however, adds that Pilate also acceded to the request of the chief priests to post a guard at Jesus’ tomb lest His disciples steal His body and claim He has risen. (Mt 27:62-6) 50. Cf. Jacques Winandy, O.S.B., “A Psychology of Faith: Matt 27:54 in the Light of Exod 14:30-31,” Revue Biblique, 104(1997), pp. 368-372. 51. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, II, pp. 1118-1140; Donald Senior, “The Death of Jesus and the Resurrection of the Holy Ones,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 38(1976), pp. 312- 329; NJBC, 42:166; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 350-352; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 408-413; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 357-360.

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When, moreover, the terrified soldiers tell the chief priests of the descent of the angel and the opening of Jesus’ empty tomb, the chief priests, in paying the soldiers to spread the lie that the disciples stole the body also promise to patch things up with Pilate, if what the soldiers are saying comes to his attention. The remark suggests that Pilate would willingly connive with the chief priests to undermine faith in the resurrection. (Mt 28:11-5) Mark makes no mention of these last two events. Matthew, therefore, suggests that Pilate believes as little in Jesus’ resurrection as the chief priests.52 The Analogy of Christological Knowing Matthew like Mark has Jesus insist that leaders in the kingdom of God cannot function in the oppressive, autocratic way of Gentile kings. Instead they must serve the community as its slave in imitation of a servant messiah who lays down His life for the ransom of others. As in Mark, then, Pilate serves as a negative role model for all Christians but especially for all Christian leaders. Besides vacillation, moral compromise, cruelty, and authoritarian, oppressive behavior, Matthew names other vices which Pilate exemplifies: disobedience to God and hypocrisy. In this section I have considered so far the positive and negative linkages which structure Matthew’s story of Jesus. The next chapter meditates the crucial ambivalent linkages for what they tell us about Matthew’s narrative purpose in retelling Jesus’ story.

52. Cf. NJBC, 42:165; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 348-350; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 404- 408; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 354-356. For a study of Matthew’s redaction of Mark’s passion narrative, see: Donald P. Senior, The Passion Narrative According to Matthew: A Redactional Study (Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1975).


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Chapter 9 Ambivalent Dramatic Linkages in Matthew This chapter analyzes Jesus’ ambivalent relationship to the crowds and to His own disciples. As in Mark, Jesus relates only positively to both groups; but they relate ambivalently to Him. As in Mark, the time of decision comes for both groups with the paschal mystery. This chapter divides into two parts. Part one ponders Jesus’ relationship to the crowds. Part two examines His relationship to His disciples. (I) In Matthew as in Mark the crowds relate ambivalently to Jesus. Sometimes they react with astonishment and enthusiasm; but they fail finally to grasp the full significance of either His person or His mission. In the end, the Judean crowds turn on Him. Jesus for His part never wavers in His relationship to the crowds and regards them with zeal and with compassion.1 The Crowds in Jesus’ Galilean Ministry In Matthew as in Mark, crowds from Jerusalem and Judea flock to John the Baptizer in order to submit to his baptism of repentance. (Mt 3:5-6; Mk 1:4) They also flock to Jesus. Jews come to Him from Galilee and the Decapolis and from other places beyond the Jordan. (Mt 4:23-5) In Mark the cure of the leper first draws the crowds to Jesus. (Mk 1:40-45) Matthew postpones the cure until after the sermon on the mount. (Mt 8:1-4) Moreover, as we shall see, Matthew’s story of the leper’s cure serves different narrative ends from Mark’s. In Matthew, Jesus’ many acts of power— His teaching, healing, and exorcisms—symbolize the arrival of the kingdom and initially attract the crowds to Him. In Mark, the leper’s cure foreshadows Jesus’ impending marginalization and the paschal mystery. Sight of the crowds motivates Jesus to ascend the mountain where He makes His inaugural proclamation of the kingdom. (Mt 5:1-2) Jesus proclaims the new covenant from the mountaintop, the same place from which God proclaimed the Mosaic covenant. Now, however, from this exalted and symbolically privileged place, Jesus Immanuel dictates to the crowds the terms of the new covenant with personal divine authority. After Jesus cures Peter’s mother-in-law, crowds gather at Peter’s house in the evening to hear Jesus teach and to experience His healing. (Mt 8:16-7; cf. Mk 1:32-4, Is 53:4) The sight of the crowds the following day 1. Cf. Warren Carter, “The Crowds in Matthew’s Gospel,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 55(1993), pp. 54-67.

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motivates Jesus to cross the Sea of Galilee in order to escape them. The incident suggests that the crowds had grown to unmanageable size. The escape also serves as a narrative transition to the story of the calming of the storm. (Mt 8:18, 23-7) As Jesus tours Galilee proclaiming the kingdom and healing every kind of infirmity, He looks with compassion on the crowds who swarm to Him, because they seem to Him like sheep without a shepherd. (Mt 9:35-8) As in Mark, the pastoral imagery indites the leaders of Israel for failing to care for the masses of the people. The same imagery depicts Jesus as the good shepherd who faithfully tends His sheep. (Cf. Num 27:16-7, 1 Kgs 22:17, Zech 10:2) Matthew’s Jesus’ pastoral compassion for the crowds finds vocal expression in His instruction to the disciples: “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; pray therefore the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into the harvest.” (Mt 9:35-8) One finds no parallel saying in Mark. Jesus’ pronouncement underscores the divine origin of any pastoral vocation and encourages prayer for such vocations. Jesus’ instruction also implicitly characterizes the call of the Twelve, which prefaces the missionary discourse. (Mt 10:1-4) In Matthew, moreover, Jesus’ mission of the Twelve to the crowds foreshadows the Great Commission to evangelize the nations which ends Matthew’s gospel. After calling the Twelve and instructing them, Jesus continues His tour of evangelization in which they as “fishers of men” now share. (Mt 11:1) After telling the disciples of John that the messianic age has arrived in His ministry, even though He does not play the part of a Davidic messiah, Matthew’s Jesus, as we have seen, turns to the crowds and testifies to John’s asceticism, courage, and prophetic greatness.2 (Mt 11:7-19) Jesus also reproaches His contemporaries for their lack of faith in both Himself and John. Matthew’s Jesus singles out for special condemnation the places where He has worked the most miracles: namely, Chorazin and Capernaum. The woes which Jesus calls down upon the lake towns foreshadow His final woes against the scribes and Pharisees.3 Jesus admonishes the lake towns that sinful Gentiles, the people of Tyre, Sidon, and Sodom, would have responded more readily than they to the signs which He has worked in their midst. Hence, on the day of judgment the unbelieving lake towns will find themselves cast down into Hades for their unbelief. (Mt 11:20-4) Jesus’ discourse to the crowds after his testimony to John ends with thanks to the Father for hiding the truth of His message from the wise 2. Cf. NJBC, 42:67-68; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 133-143; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 135- 144; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 116-122. 3. Cf. Joseph A. Comber, C.F.X., “The Composition and Literary Characteristics of Matt 11:20-24,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 39(1977), pp. 497-504.

Chapter 9: Ambivalent Dramatic Linkages in Matthew

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and understanding and for revealing it to “mere babes,” to the weak and small of the earth. The faith of the disciples contrasts with the unbelief of the unrepentant lake towns. Finally, as we have seen, speaking with the voice of divine wisdom, Jesus invites the crowds to bear the yoke of the new covenant He proclaims.4 (Mt 11:25-30) These discourses to the crowds find no parallel in Mark. Large numbers of people follow Jesus after He heals the man with a withered hand on the sabbath. Here as elsewhere, Matthew portrays the healings which flow from Jesus as part of His mission of atonement. (Mt 12:15-37) The crowds prevent Jesus’ relatives from seeing him. Matthew, as we have already seen, omits the humiliating detail from Mark that Jesus’ relatives regarded Him as mad and came to take Him in hand. In Matthew, Jesus’ relatives merely desire to converse with Him. Matthew, however, uses the incident as Mark does in order to have Jesus proclaim to the crowds that whoever does the will of the Father in heaven is His sibling and relative. Jesus comes, therefore, to transform the crowds into the family of God. (Mt 12:46-50) Jesus directs the first part of His parabolic discourse principally to the crowds and teaches them, as in Mark, from a boat on the Sea of Galilee. (Mt 13:1-2) Matthew, however, in contrast to Mark, introduces the theme of fulfillment in order to explain why Jesus addresses the crowds in parables. Matthew interpolates Ps 78:2-3, which states, “I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter dark saying from of old, things that we have heard and known, which our fathers have told us.” Matthew rewrites the Psalm to have it say: “I will open my mouth in parables, I will utter what has been hidden since the foundation of the world.” (Mt 13:35) For Matthew, then, the obscurity of Jesus’ parables makes them a fitting way for Him to discourse about the saving secrets of the divine mind, to which He has privileged and conscious access. (Mt 13:51-52) The citation transforms the parabolic discourse from Mark’s inaugural proclamation of the kingdom into a meditation on the deep, providential, and mysterious wisdom which the kingdom embodies.5 Jesus explains this secret divine wisdom to His disciples in private. (Mt 13:36-52) In Matthew as in Mark, their understanding of His message contrasts with the unbelief and skepticism which Jesus encounters in the crowds. Matthew stresses this point even more than Mark. (Mt 13:10-7; Mk 4:10-2) 4. Cf. M. Jack Suggs, Wisdom, Christology, and Law in Matthew’s Gospel (Cambridge, MA: Harvard, 1970), pp. 33-61; NJBC, 42:74; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 163-166; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 142-143. 5. Cf. Edwards F. Siegman, C.PP.S., “Teaching in Parables (Mk 4, 10-12; Lk 8, 9-10; Mt 13, 10-15,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 23(1961), pp. 161-181.

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First, Matthew inserts a saying of Jesus which explains why He responds to the unbelief of the crowds with obscure stories: “For to the one who has will more be given, and such a one will have abundance; but from the one who has not even what such a one has will be taken away.” (Mt 13:12) Mark directs this saying to the disciples and treats it as a teaching on the need for generosity. Matthew, however, aims the same saying at the crowds and uses it in order to warn that unbelief breeds unbelief, since the rejection of divine favor leads to its withdrawal. Second, Matthew immediately invokes the theme of fulfillment twice in order explain why Jesus hides His message from the crowds with parables. Matthew sees in Jesus’ parabolic discourse a fulfillment of Is 6:9-10. Moreover, the proverb in verse twelve, considered in the preceding paragraph, colors the citation from Isaiah. The Isaian text deplores Israel’s dullness of heart and resistance to God’s word. Matthew therefore uses the obscurity of the parables in order to warn the “synagogue across the street” that in resisting the gospel they risk a withdrawal of divine, gracious enlightenment which will leave them mired in unbelief. In a second invocation of the theme of fulfillment, Matthew stresses the blessedness of the disciples who possess the enlightenment of faith. They see what prophets and righteous Jews have for centuries been longing to see. (Mt 13:16-7; cf. Lk 10:23-4) The second citation heightens the contrast between the unbelieving crowds and the believing, insightful disciples at the same time that it implicitly develops the theme of fulfillment. Matthew dramatizes the popular unbelief which Jesus encounters in other incidents. As in Mark, the people of Nazareth reject Jesus. Their skepticism foreshadows Jesus’ ultimate rejection by His own people. (Mt 13:53-8) At Caesarea Philippi, Matthew’s Peter, like Mark’s, makes it clear that Jesus is evoking a variety of responses from the crowds. People commonly look on Him as John the Baptizer returned from the dead, as Elijah, or as a major prophet. (Mt 16:13-14) After the transfiguration, Jesus, Peter, James, and John find crowds of people witnessing the disciples’ failure to exorcise an epileptic demoniac boy. In Matthew as in Mark, Jesus rebukes the unbelief of the crowds, who seem to have gathered out of simple curiosity.6 (Mt 17:14-20) The crowds follow Jesus when He withdraws into the desert on hearing news of the Baptizer’s death. Despite their obtuseness, Jesus looks on them with compassion and heals their sick. He then feeds them by working the first miracle of the loaves. As in Mark, the miracle foreshadows 6. Cf. NJBC, 42:84-89; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 186-187; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 193- 210; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 163-171; David S. New, “The Occurrence of Auton in Matthew 13.15 and the Process of Text Assimilation,” New Testament Studies, 37(1991), pp. 478-480.


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the eucharist, and the crowds who partake of this first miraculous meal foreshadow Jewish Christian communities like Matthew’s who will one day break eucharistic bread together. After the crowds eat, Jesus dismisses them and retires to a mountain to pray by Himself. (Mt 14:15-23) Another outpouring of healings precedes the second miracle of the loaves, this time in Gentile territory. Jesus again climbs a mountain, where crowds of people seek Him out. Moreover, the abundance of the healings He works evokes wonder from the crowds who glorify God for what they see. (Mt 15:29-31) This outpouring of miracles and ascent of a mountain recall the outpouring of healings and exorcisms which introduced the sermon on the mount. The miracles and the ascent therefore link the second miracle of the loaves, which foreshadows the eucharist of the Gentiles, to Jesus’ inaugural proclamation of the kingdom. (Mt 15:32-39) In Matthew, of course, the Gentile crowds prefigure especially Gentile, “God-fearing” Christians.7 After a story of conflict between Jesus and the Pharisees over ritual purity, Jesus calls the crowds to Himself and warns them against the hypocrisy of the Pharisees by telling them that an unrepentant heart defiles them, not the failure to observe ritual purity. (Mt 15:10-1) This warning will find an echo in Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry. Just before His eschatological discourse, Jesus will again warn the crowds against the hypocrisy and bad example of the scribes and Pharisees. Then, in the presence of the crowds, He will call down upon the Pharisees the woes of the new covenant. (Mt 23:13-36) The double warning envisages the pernicious teachings of the Pharisees which keeps “the crowds” from converting. The Judean Crowds After Jesus’ ecclesial discourse, He retires to the Judean deserts beyond the Jordan. Large crowds follow Him there, and He heals them. (Mt 19:1-2) A great crowd follows Jesus and witnesses His healing of two blind men. Matthew reproduces the substance of Mark’s account of the triumphal entry into Jerusalem. The Judean crowds spread their garments on the road in front of Jesus and pave His way with cut branches as He enters the Holy City with both humility and messianic authority. (Mt 21:4; Zech 9:9) As in Mark, the crowds acknowledge Jesus publicly as messiah. Matthew’s crowds cry: “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!” The crowds’ words have enhanced liturgical connotations in Matthew. Mark, in his account of the triumphal entry, uses the liturgical term “Hosanna.” It functioned as a word of acclamation in Jewish liturgy. It means “Save, I 7. Cf. NJBC, 42:96, 102; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 202-204, 212-213; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 218-223, 240-242.

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pray.” Matthew, however, adds two other liturgical acclamations. The phrase “the highest” probably refers to God. The phrase “blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord” alludes to Ps. 118:26, which pilgrims to Jerusalem sang during a gate, or entrance, liturgy. In Matthew, Jesus’ triumphal entry throws the whole of Jerusalem into turmoil. The turmoil recalls the general consternation with which the holy city greeted the magi in Matthew’s infancy narrative. (Mt 21:10-1) After the cleansing of the temple, as Jesus heals the blind and the lame within the temple precincts, small children echo the cry of the crowds. (Mt 21:14-17) Neither Mark nor Luke mention this incident. As we have seen, in justifying the children’s behavior to the chief priests, Jesus cites Psalm 8, which addresses God. (Ps 8:1-2) The citation puts into a theological context the liturgical allusions implicit in the crowd’s acclamations during the triumphant entry. God has entered His holy city and has reclaimed His temple. The children, “the little ones” see and acknowledge that fact; the priests refuse. In Matthew as in Mark, the chief priests recognize the threat which Jesus poses to the status quo. They wish to do away with Him; but they fear to act because of His popularity with the crowds, who persist in interpreting Jesus’ actions and authority (inadequately) as prophetic.8 (Mt 21:45-6, 26:1-2) As in Mark, when Judas betrays Jesus in the garden, a large group of people armed with swords and clubs come to arrest Jesus. They come from the chief priests and elders and accompany the betrayer. (Mt 26:47) The crowds, however, begin to function as more than a backdrop to the passion in Jesus’ trial before Pilate. When Pilate during the trial of Jesus offers to release either Jesus or Barabbas, the crowds, incited by the chief priests and elders call for the release of Barabbas and for the crucifixion of Jesus. Matthew, however, gives the incident his own theological twist. Mark calls Barabbas a rioter and an assassin. (Mk 15:7) Matthew calls him a notorious criminal. (Mt 27:16) In Mark, Pilate ironically asks the crowds to choose between Barabbas and “the king of the Jews.” (Mk 15:7) Matthew’s Pilate asks the crowds to choose between Barabbas the criminal and Jesus the Messiah. (Mt 27:17) By calling attention to Jesus’ messianic mission, Matthew underscores the religious implications of the crowds’ choice. They prefer a criminal to God’s anointed. When Pilate protests to the blood-thirsty crowds that Jesus has done nothing worthy of death, the people begin rioting. Pilate then calls for a bowl of water and washes his hands in a hypocritical gesture of self-absolution for guilt of Jesus’ blood. The crowds, whom Matthew here 8. Cf. NJBC, 42:125; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 267-271; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 292-296; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 250-258.


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designates as “the whole people (pas ho laos),” then call down Jesus’ blood upon themselves and their children. (Mt 25:15-26) Only Matthew records this incident and fills it with both prophetic meaning and theological irony. The crowd’s prayer will find fulfillment in the destruction of Jerusalem. Nevertheless, while the crowds make themselves and their children accountable for Jesus’ death, they do not realize, though Matthew wants the reader to know it, that they are really calling down upon themselves the blood of atonement. The phrase “the whole people” recalls the angel’s prophecy that Jesus will “save His people from their sins.” (Mt 1:21) Moreover, Matthew’s repeated insistence in the course of Jesus’ trial that in dying He sheds “innocent blood” calls attention to both dimensions of “the whole people’s” action. In murdering Jesus they do something heinous; but the very innocence of Jesus’ blood transforms Him into the suffering servant who has the power to reconcile a sinful people to God: i.e., to save His people from their sins. If, therefore, the people repent and believe, they will experience the blood of Christ, not as the blood of judgment, but as the blood of atonement. Moreover, in the scourging and mocking of Jesus which immediately follows. Matthew changes the color of the robe which the soldiers put around Jesus when they mock Him. Mark speaks of a purple cloak, which derides Jesus’ royal, messianic claims. Matthew, however, has the soldiers robe Jesus in a scarlet cloak. (Mt 27:28; Mk 15:17) Roman soldiers wore scarlet cloaks; but Matthew is probably doing more than correcting historically Mark’s account of the color of the cloak with which the mocking soldiers robe Jesus. The scarlet cloak probably alludes to a moment in the Jewish rite of atonement, when the priests girded a pillar of the temple with a scarlet cloth. As the year passed, the sun would bleach it white. Its bleaching symbolized Jahweh’s cleansing of the sins of Israel, which, though scarlet, became through the forgiveness of God, white as snow. (Is 1:18) In other words, the crowds, in sinfully calling for Jesus’ death, have in fact unwittingly called down upon themselves the atoning, forgiving blood of Christ, who by His dying and rising will “save His people from their sins.” (Mt 1:21) Only the people’s unrepentant rejection of Jesus transforms them into the objects of divine retribution. In calling for Jesus’ death, the crowds are unwittingly advancing God’s secret plan of salvation. To experience that salvation, they need only repent and believe.9 9. Cf. Vincent Mora, Le Refus d’Israel (Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1986). For a scholarly study of patristic exegesis of this passage, see: Rainer Kampling, Das Blut Christi und die Jüden (Münster: Aschendorff, 1984); NJBC, 42:159; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 340-345; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 387-393; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 343-345; Timothy B. Cargal, “‘His Blood be upon Us and upon our Children’: A Matthean Double Entendre?” New Testament Studies, 37(1991), pp. 101-112.

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As Jesus hangs on the cross, passersby join in the mockery of the chief priests. The passersby taunt: “You who would destroy the temple and build it in three days, save yourself! If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross.” (Mt 27:39-40) The passersby function as the instrument of Satan. Their words echo the tempter’s words when he confronted Jesus in the desert: “If you are the Son of God....” (Cf. Mt 4:3, 6) Matthew thus portrays Jesus’ crucifixion both as His moment of supreme testing and as His ultimate confrontation with Satan. In Jesus’ crucifixion, moreover, the unbelief of the crowds takes on a Satanic character.10 The Great Commission Finally, one may find a cryptic allusion to crowds of people in the Great Commission which ends Matthew’s gospel. The risen Christ once again speaks from the mountain top with divine authority. He joins Himself to the Eleven as the twelfth apostle and sends forth the reconstituted new Israel with the command: “All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Breath, teaching them to observe everything which I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you all days even to the close of the age.” (Mt 28:18-20) The Great Commission weaves together a remarkable number of themes in Matthew’s narrative; and I shall return to it yet again in discussing Jesus’ relationship to His disciples. Here it suffices to note that the nations have replaced the all-Jewish crowds as the multitude which the disciples must now evangelize through the rite of Breath-baptism and through instruction in the obedience of faith.11 The Analogy of Christological Knowing One finds important nuances in Matthew’s handling of Jesus’ relationship to the crowds, nuances which mirror the situation which the evangelist addressed. Matthew uses the crowds both to rebuke the unbelief of “the synagogue across the street” and to invite them to acknowledge Jesus as more than a prophet, as more than a secular messiah, as Immanuel, God-with-us. The evangelist employs a variety of narrative strategies in order to accomplish this end. He contrasts the unbelief of the Jewish crowds whom Jesus and the disciples evangelize with the belief of the disciples themselves. He draws a sharper contrast between the unbelief of many Jews and the readiness of Gentiles to hear the gospel. Moreover, the evangelist invites his Jewish adversaries to recognize that in crucifying Jesus, the 10. Cf. NJBC, 42:163; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 393-398; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 349- 353; 11. Cf. NJBC, 42:168; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 357-381; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 414- 417; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 361-363,


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crowds in Jerusalem unwittingly called down upon Israel His saving, atoning blood which has the capacity to free God’s people from their sins. In a word, in his handling of the crowds, Matthew, like Mark, rebukes the general failure of the Jewish community to respond in faith to the gospel. At the same time, however, Matthew makes a greater effort that Mark to urge his Jewish contemporaries to repent and recognize Jesus’ power to save them. The Great Commission expands the disciples’ initial restricted mission to “the lost sheep of the house of Israel” to a world-wide mission of evangelization. I have considered the first of the ambiguous dramatic linkages in Matthew: namely, Jesus’ relationship to the crowds. The following section turns to Jesus’ relationship to His wavering disciples. (II) Matthew, as we have already seen, paints a more positive portrait of the disciples than Mark; but in both gospels the disciples respond ambivalently to Jesus during His mortal ministry. While the disciples on more than one occasion profess faith in Jesus, their faith remains weak; and they often misunderstand what Jesus says. Jesus and His Disciples In both Mark and Matthew, Jesus as His first public act calls to Himself first Simon and Andrew, then James and John as disciples. Although Matthew pares down Mark’s prose with minor editing, both accounts of the call of the first disciples make the same basic points. In both, Jesus makes the same promise: “Follow me and I will make you fishers of men.”12 (Mt 4:19; Mk 1:17) As in Mark, the call has a prophetic quality to it. In draws the disciples authoritatively into the mission He has just received from the Father in His baptismal commissioning. It requires instant and unhesitating obedience as well as the sacrifice of possessions and of family. Despite the stringent demands of discipleship the four men leave everything and follow Jesus. (Mt 4:18-20; Mk 1:16-20) In Mark, as we have seen, the call of the disciples parallels Jesus’ own baptismal commissioning, and the exorcism at Capernaum which follows parallels His confrontation with Satan in the desert. Matthew omits the exorcism and shatters Mark’s parallelism. Matthew also omits Mark’s reference to Peter, Andrew, James, and John at the beginning of the eschatological discourse. In Mark, the explicit naming of the first disciples at the beginning of that discourse underscores the close connection between the call of discipleship and eschatological readiness. Matthew’s omission of the names mutes this Markan theme, although Matthew makes up in 12. Cf. Wilhelm Wuellner, The Meaning of Fishers of Men (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster, 1967).

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part for Mark’s allusion by expanding Mark’s original eschatological discourse. As we shall see, Matthew gives even more prominence to Peter in his gospel than Mark does. In describing Peter’s call, for example Matthew names Simon “Peter.” (Mt 4:18) The name alludes to Jesus’ response to Simon’s testimony to Jesus as the messiah. On that occasion, Jesus gives Simon his nickname “Peter (Rock)” with the promise that He, Jesus, will build His Church upon that Rock. (Mt 16:17-8) As we shall see in greater detail below, Matthew alone among the evangelists transforms Peter’s confession into a promise of Church founding.13 After the sermon on the mount, Matthew returns to the theme of the demands of discipleship. When the overeager scribe asks permission to follow Jesus wherever He goes, Jesus admonishes the man that he will be following a homeless vagabond: “Foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man has nowhere to lay His head.” As we have seen, the reply warns of poverty, of hardship, and of the persecution which discipleship demands. It also implicitly portrays Jesus living by the same radical trust in the Father’s providential care as He had demanded of the disciples in the sermon on the mount. He will require the same trust of His missionaries. (Mt 8:18-20; cf. 6:25-34, 10:5-15) When another disciple next asks permission to go home and bury his father, Jesus replies sternly: “Follow me, and leave the dead to bury their own dead.” (Mt 8:21-2) Jesus summons the grieving disciple with a peremptory charismatic authority which recalls His call of the first disciples. If, moreover, Jesus’ harsh reply refers to the first burial of a parent, it would have deeply shocked Jesus’ contemporaries; but it leaves no doubt that the kingdom takes precedence over even the most solemn and traditional family obligations. Jesus’ reply also asserts the life-giving power of the kingdom: only those within it qualify as truly alive. Those outside it might as well be dead.14 13. Cf. NJBC, 42:21; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 69-70; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 70-75; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 40-41. 14. Is the young man really asking for time to rebury his father’s bones, as recent scholarship has suggested? Apparently, after the body had decayed, Palestinian Jews did rebury the bones in a funeral urn. If the young man desires to rebury his father’s remains, he could be asking for as much as a year, the time it would take for the body to decay. The text, however, says “bury” not “rebury” or “bury again.” Did, then, Jesus really say to the young man, “Let the corpses with whom your father lies buried take care of the second funeral?” I, for one, do not find a great deal of plausibility in the suggestion. Cf. Byron R. McCane, “‘Let the Dead Bury Their Own Dead’: Second Burial and Matthew 8:21-22,” Harvard Theological Review, 83(1990), pp. 31-43; Jack Dean Kingsbury, “On Following Jesus: The ‘Eager’ Scribe and the ‘Reluctant’ Disciple (Matthew 8.18-22),” New Testament Studies, 34(1988), pp. 45-59; Jarmo Külunen, “Der Nachfolgewillige Schriftgelehrten: Matthäus 8.19-20 im Verständnis des Evangelistin,” New Testament Studies, 37(1991), pp. 268-279; Robert H. Undry, “On


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The disciples ascend a mountain with Jesus and gather around Him in order to hear His inaugural discourse on the kingdom: the sermon on the mount. (Mt 4:23-5:2) Matthew, then, directs the sermon on the mount especially to the disciples, although, as we have seen, Jesus’ inaugural proclamation of the kingdom envisages the crowds as well. I shall consider the structure and content of the sermon in reflecting on Jesus’ teachings in Matthew. In Matthew’s second narrative section, Jesus cures Peter’s mother-in-law. Then He heals and exorcises the people of Capernaum. Peter, James, and John witness the raising of the daughter of a ruler. Mark names him Jairus and describes him as the ruler of a synagogue. (Mt 9:18-19; Mk 5:22) As in Mark, Peter, James, and John will also witness both the transfiguration and Jesus’ ordeal in Gethsemane. (Mt 17:1, 26:37; Mk 9:2; 14:33) The first calming of the sea occurs when Jesus, finding that the crowds who follow Him have grown to an unwieldy size, decides to cross the sea of Galilee. A storm arises. Mark calls the storm a wind squall (lailaps anemou). Matthew describes it as a great agitation in the sea (seismos megas in tê thalassê), either a violent surface agitation of the sea or, perhaps, an earthquake at the bottom of the sea which stirs up giant waves. As in Mark, waves nearly swamp the boat. The noun “seismos” can mean an earthquake; and in Matthew apocalyptic quakes accompany both Jesus’ death and the angel’s rolling back the stone from the empty tomb to reveal the resurrection. (Mt 27:51, 28:2) Finally, after Jesus’ triumphal entry Matthew describes the Jerusalem crowds as agitated and depicts that agitation with a verb possessing the same root as seismos. I find it plausible that Matthew is here using literary allusion in order to link these four events. The quakes which accompany both Jesus’ death and the rolling back of the stone at the tomb endow both events with apocalyptic, revelatory significance. For Matthew, the paschal mystery reveals the full mystery of Jesus person, reveals Him as Immanuel, God-with-us, and as Breath baptizer. (Mt 28:19-20) By assimilating Jesus’ calming of the storm and the consequences of His reclaiming of the temple to earthquakes, Matthew indicates that the apocalyptic, revelatory significance of both events must await the paschal mystery. Jesus sleeps calmly through the storm which threatens to swamp the boat and drown both Him and the disciples. When the disciples finally wake Him, they use a different formula from the one they use in Mark’s True and False Disciples in Matthew 8.18-22,” New Testament Studies, 40(1994), pp. 433-441; Martin Hengel, The Charismatic Leader and His Followers, translated by James Grieg (New York, NY: Crossroad, 1981); Herman Waetjen, The Origin and Destiny of Humanness (San Rafael, CA: Crystal Press, 1976), p. 120; NJBC, 42:57; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 118-125; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 93-97.

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version of the story. In Mark they rebuke Jesus with the self-preoccupied complaint: “Teacher, do you not care if we perish?” (Mk 8:38) Matthew again paints a somewhat more favorable portrait of the disciples than Mark. Matthew’s disciples approach the sleeping figure of Jesus with a fear-filled faith. They call Him “Lord (Kyrie)” not teacher; and they plead with Him: “Save [us], we are perishing!” (Mt 8:25) Their faith in the Lord’s power to save them finds instant response. Matthew’s Jesus, however, first rebukes them for their fear and for the lack of sure confidence which their fear expresses. Then He also rebukes the wind and sea, which immediately subside. (Mt 8:26-7) As in Mark, the story points to the divinity of Jesus. Matthew’s awestruck disciples ask, “What sort of man is this that even the winds and sea obey Him.” (Mt 8:27) In the Bible, the wind and sea obey only God. Like Mark, Matthew expects the reader to know the correct answer to the disciples’ question.15 Moreover, as in Mark, the first calming of the storm foreshadows the calming of the storm which follows the first multiplication of the loaves. In Matthew as in Mark, this second cosmic miracle answers the question the disciples had put after the first calming: “What sort of man is this, that even the wind and sea obey Him?” As in Mark, after the miracle of the loaves, Matthew’s disciples set sail and leave Jesus alone praying on a mountain. When a sudden storm threatens to swamp them, Jesus comes walking to them over the water. The terrified disciples mistake Jesus for a ghost. As in Mark, Jesus corrects them by invoking the divine name. He says, “Take heart, I am; have no fear (Tharseite, ego eimi; me phobeithe).” (Mt 14:26-7) Mark, as we have seen, ties the significance of this event intimately to the deeper significance of the miracle of the loaves and therefore to eucharistic faith. In other words, Mark insists that eucharistic faith requires the ability to recognize the divinity as well as the humanity of Jesus. Matthew clearly regards Jesus’ walking on the water, calming of the storm, and invocation of the divine name as a theophany which reveals His divinity. Matthew’s Jesus walks on the water right after the first multiplication miracle. His miraculous action therefore implicitly throws light on the multiplication. Matthew, however, does not explicitly connect the two miracles as Mark does. Moreover, in Matthew’s version of the second calming, Peter plays a prominent role. Matthew’s Peter tests Jesus’ claim to divinity. Peter cries out: “Lord, if you are (Kyrie, ei su ei), bid me come to you on the water.” (Mt 14:28) Peter’s challenge has two levels of meaning. At one level, one could read it as Peter’s attempt to make Jesus prove His identity. In that 15. Cf. NJBC, 42:58; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 118-125; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 98-99.


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case one would translate the Greek to mean: “Lord, if it is you....” In context, however, Matthew almost certainly wants the reader to find a deeper meaning in Peter’s words. Peter uses the divine title “Lord” and is asking Jesus to work a miracle which only God could do. Moreover, he desires Jesus to prove thereby that He can indeed use the divine name: “If You are....” In Mark, the obtuse disciples fail to recognize the meaning of Jesus’ miraculous power to walk on water and calm the waves of chaos. Matthew’s disciples, however, acknowledge the theophany openly and candidly. When Jesus joins them in the boat and the winds subside, they kneel to Him (proskynesen) and confess, “Truly, you are the Son of God (alethos, Theou hyios ei).” (Mt 14:33) The words have messianic significance and foreshadow the confession of Peter; but once again Matthew would have expected the reader to grasp another deeper meaning: namely, that Jesus’ divine Sonship exceeds mere messianic dignity. In other words, Matthew rewrites the story of the second calming of the storm in a way which underscores that Jesus truly is Immanuel, God-with-us. The disciples’ adoration recalls that of the magi and foreshadows the women’s adoration of the risen Christ. (Mt 2:11, 28:9-10) Matthew also uses the story to call attention to Peter’s brashness and his weakness of faith—two traits which will lead to his betrayal of Jesus in the passion. (Mt 26:58, 69-75) Peter’s question has overtones of Satan’s temptations in the desert. (Mt 4:3, 5) In putting Jesus to the test, Peter already betrays his weakness of faith. When, moreover, Jesus summons Peter to step out of the boat and walk on the waves, Peter begins to come to Jesus, then fears the high winds, and begins to sink. (Mt 14:29-31) Peter’s near drowning, however, also foreshadows Peter’s salvation by Jesus, despite his weakness of faith. As Peter begins to sink beneath the waves of chaos, He cries out, “Lord, save me (Kyrie, soson me).” Jesus immediately clasps his hand and keeps him from sinking with the same gentle rebuke He made to the disciples after the first calming of the storm, “Man of little faith, why did you doubt?” (Mt 14:31-2) Clearly, for Matthew Jesus’ power to calm storms and walk on water while invoking the divine name not only reveals His divinity but also manifests that, as Immanuel, He also has the power to save Peter and others who waver in their faith. The story probably has ecclesial significance as well. Peter figures even more prominently in Matthew’s gospel than in Mark’s because Matthew is telling Jesus’ story for a community of Petrine Christians. Matthew’s Peter often symbolizes a certain way of being Church. He also symbolizes Church leadership in the Petrine community. As we have already seen, Matthew wrote his gospel partly out of a concern to counter a nascent clericalism in the Antiochene church. Read in that context, the story of Peter’s weakness of faith contains a cautionary

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lesson for Antioch Church leaders. It says in effect: Do not attempt to do on your own power what God alone can do in you. Sustain your faith in Jesus and in His power to save you in spite of your human weakness and lack of faith. Take care, however; for, if you test God and if you take your eyes away from Jesus, you will find yourselves overwhelmed by the forces of chaos. Even if you waver, however, you need only call on the Lord to save you; and He will draw you out of the waters of chaos.16 Matthew, as we have seen, postpones the Markan theme of the conflict between Jesus and His enemies until after the sermon on the mount. He foreshadows it with the hostility of the Gadarenes and begins overt conflict with the call of Matthew. As we shall see later and in greater detail, the missionary discourse, which follows the second narrative section, makes a decisive turn to the cross and Calvary. Here I focus on the way in which Matthew’s disciples relate to conflict. As in Mark, Jesus calls Matthew the tax collector to follow Him in discipleship. (Mt 9:9; Mk 2:14) Moreover, as in Mark, Matthew celebrates the event with a dinner to which he invites other tax collectors.17 On that occasion, the disciples find themselves drawn into the conflict which begins to surround Jesus. Pharisees complain to the disciples that Jesus should not be dining with tax collectors and sinners. (Mt 9:10-13; Mk 2:15-7) Matthew differs from Mark chiefly in postponing this conflict story until chapter nine of his gospel. Mark, as we have seen, plunges both Jesus and the disciples into instant conflict. Shortly thereafter, Jesus, the true shepherd of Israel, moved by the harassed and helpless crowds, who resemble shepherdless sheep, feels compassion for them. He tells the disciples to pray that “the Lord of the harvest” (i.e., the Father) send more laborers into the plentiful eschatological harvest which Jesus’ ministry has inaugurated. (Mt 9:35-8) As we have already seen, Matthew insists more than Mark on the heavenly origin of the call to apostolic ministry and Church leadership. Having made this point, Jesus immediately summons the Twelve to him, gives them authority to heal and exorcise, and then sends them out to proclaim the kingdom. (Mt 10:1-4; Mk 3:13-9) Matthew expands Mark’s commission to the Twelve. Jesus sends them to proclaim the kingdom exclusively to “the lost sheep of the house of Israel,” not to the Gentiles, not to the Samaritans. This command so contrasts with the Great Commission at the end of Matthew’s gospel that 16. Cf. John Paul Heil, Jesus Walking On the Sea (Rome: Biblical Institute Press, 1981), pp. 84-117; J. Duncan M. Derrett, “Der Wasserwandel in christlicher und buddistischen Perspektive,” Zeitschrift für Religions- und Geistgeschichte, 41(1989), pp. 193-214; NJBC, 42:97; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 204-206; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 223-228; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 180-181. 17. Cf. John R. Donahue, “Tax Collectors and Sinners: An Attempt at Identification,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 33 (1971), pp. 39-61.


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one must suppose that it originally came from Jesus Himself. (Mt 10:5-6) By the “lost sheep,” Jesus means primarily “the people of the land,” the marginal Jews whose poverty, disreputable occupation, and lack of education excluded them from the Jewish power elites. The universality of the great commission dramatizes the fact that the paschal mystery expands the scope of Jesus’ and of the disciples’ mission so that it includes all people.18 Jesus sends the disciples out into a violent and hostile world: “Behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves; so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.” (Mt 10:16) Jesus distinguishes here innocence from naive gullibility. The disciples must face a hostile world realistically but must not respond to sin by sinning themselves. Jew and Gentile will accuse them, hail them to court, scourge them, put them to death. The disciples, however, can expect that “the Breath of your Father” will empower them to bear witness to Jesus under persecution, even in the face of death. (Mt 10:16-23) A disciple is not above his teacher, Jesus warns, nor a servant above his master; it is enough for the disciple to be like his teacher and the servant like his master. If they have called the master of the house Beelzebul, how much more will they malign those of his household. (Mt 10:24-5) Jesus’ warning about hostility implicitly points to the Pharisees (read the Pharisaical leaders of “the synagogue across the street”) as the disciples’ chief enemies. In Matthew, as we have seen, the Pharisees especially stand convicted of the unforgivable sin against the Holy Breath. (Cf. Mt 9:34, 12:24-37) The secret wisdom which Jesus imparts to the disciples they must proclaim from the rooftops. They should have no fear of their enemies. Those who oppose the kingdom can only kill the body; but God can consign soul and body to hell. As we have seen, the disciples under persecution must trust the Father’s providential care for each of His children. Indeed, nothing can happen to them which lies beyond the Father’s care and control. Finally, Jesus promises that, if they confess Him boldly before others, He will testify on their behalf to the Father.19 (Mt 10:26- 33) 18. Cf. F.W. Beare, “The Mission of the Disciple and the Mission Charge: Matthew 10 and Parallels,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 89(1970), pp.1-13; Paul D.Meyer, “The Gentile Mission in Q,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 89(1970), pp. 405-417; Schyler Brown, “The Matthean Community and the Gentile Mission,” Novum Testamentum, 22(1980), pp. 193-221; “The Two-Fold Representation of Mission in Matthew’s Gospel,” Studia Theologica, 31(1977), pp. 21-32; Martin Hengel, Between Jesus and Paul, translated by John Bowden (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress, 1983), pp. 48-64; Joachim Jeremias, Jesu Verheissung für die Völker (Stuttgart: W. Kohlhammer, 1956); Blaine Charette, “A Harvest for the People: An Interpretation of Matthew 9:37f,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 38(1990), pp. 29-35. 19. Cf. NJBC, 42:69; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 149-154; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 116- 122.

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The public confession of Jesus will draw enmity from others besides the Pharisees. The disciples’ public witness to Jesus will set them into conflict even with members of their own family. Do not think that I have come to bring peace on earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and a man’s foes will be those of his own household. He who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and he who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and he who does not take up his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for my sake will find it. (Mt 10:34-9)

Jesus does not bring the sword of violence but of division. Christians can anticipate that unbelieving relatives will turn on them because of their faith in Jesus. Matthew is probably alluding to the social ostracism which some Jewish converts encountered among their families In the end, however, the disciples must value their relationship to Jesus more than their own flesh and blood, more than their very lives. They must regard even opprobrium and death for the sake of the gospel as the true pathway to life.20 While discipleship draws one into conflict with the enemies of Jesus, it also brings its privileges. Discipleship, when founded on the obedience of faith, introduces one, as we have seen, into the family of God and transforms one into a brother or sister of Jesus. (Mt 12:46-50) The disciples also have access to the “secrets of the kingdom of heaven,” which Jesus hides from the unbelieving crowds in parables.21 Jesus discloses that wisdom to the disciples because their response of faith opens them to receive more and more insight; while the unbelief of the crowds causes them to lose what little insight they may have had into Jesus’ message. (Mt 13:10-13) Jesus so identifies with His disciples that He takes any hospitality shown them as done to Himself. He will reward the least kindness shown to one of his followers. Jesus especially commends hospitality among the dis20. Cf. NJBC, 42:71; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 149-154; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 116- 122. 21. Matthew, the urban scribe, like Mark, apparently fails to recognize the true purpose of parabolic discourse: namely, that it tells a story in order to subvert one’s familiar world and open one to the world of the kingdom. Instead, Both evangelists see in the parables only enigmas and conundrums which conceal the secret wisdom of the kingdom from the unbelieving crowds. Once abstracted from their original context, Jesus’ parables seem to have puzzled both evangelists. That does not mean, of course, that Jesus did not use parables in part in order to conceal the subversive character of His teaching from the secular and religious authorities and from hostile unbelievers.


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ciples, promising that one who welcomes a prophet will enjoy the reward of a prophet and that one who welcomes a righteous person will share the reward of the righteous. (Mt 10:40-2) Like Mark, Matthew transforms the parable of the astonishing harvest into an allegory about temptations against faith. As in Mark, those temptations result for Satan’s animosity, from personal shallowness, from worldly cares, and from covetousness. The one, however, who receives the word with understanding and lives it bears a harvest of astonishing fruitfulness. (Mt 13:18-23) As we have seen in considering Jesus’ relationship to Satan, Matthew also allegorizes the parable about the wheat and the weeds. The second allegory exhorts disciples to expect conflict with those who side with Satan; but the disciples will experience vindication when Jesus returns in glory and in judgment. (Mt 13:36-43) Matthew applies three other parables explicitly to the disciples. The first two call for unstinting generosity. They compare the kingdom to a priceless reality worth sacrificing all to acquire. The first parable compares the kingdom to a field containing buried treasure. The one who finds the treasure sells everything and buys the field in which the treasure lies. The second parable compares the kingdom to a pearl merchant who sells all he has in order to obtain a single pearl of great value. (Mt 13:44-46) In both parables, the two protagonists joyfully perform the foolhardy act of alienating their entire fortunes in order to possess a single valuable reality. The parables dramatize the importance of the kingdom, the total sacrifice it demands, and the joy which its possession brings. Moreover, while the first parable compares the kingdom to the priceless reality, the second parable compares it to the quest for that reality. The treasure and the quest, therefore, designate different aspects of the kingdom.22 Matthew allegorizes the third parable. It describes the familiar Galilean scene of fishermen sorting out the catch which their nets have taken. On Jesus’ lips the parable warns that not everyone qualifies as a member of the kingdom. Membership demands repentance and the obedience of faith. In Matthew’s allegory, the fishermen become angels of judgment, who will separate the just from the unjust at the last judgment. After the sorting, the good go to their reward, while evildoers burn in the retributive fire of divine holiness, wail, and gnash their teeth. (Mt 13:44-50) Unlike the obtuse disciples in Mark’s gospel, however, Matthew’s disciples actually grasp the meaning of these three parables and even merit Jesus’ praise for their insight. Good scribes trained not only in Torah but in the wisdom of the kingdom, they, like good Petrine Christians, know how to blend ancient wisdom with the new vision of faith which the 22. Cf. Jacques Dupont, “Les parabole du trésor et de la perle,” New Testament Studies, 14(1967-1968), pp. 408-418.

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kingdom discloses. (Mt 13:51-2; cf. 5:19-20) In Mark, the disciples never display any such precocity.23 As in Mark, the disciples twice minister the multiplied loaves and fishes to the crowds, a symbol and foreshadowing of their future eucharistic ministry. (Mt 14:15-19, 15:32-59; cf. Mk 6:35-44, 8:1-10) As in Mark, Jesus defends His disciples from Pharisees who take scandal that the former eat without performing rituals of purification. As we have seen, Jesus charges the Pharisees with a formalistic legalism which invokes mere human traditions in order to subvert the compassionate intent of the Law. He also finds their legalism a rationalization of cupidity. (Mt 15:1-9) After this encounter, Jesus warns the crowds that nothing which goes into the mouth defiles a person but what comes out of the mouth. Matthew’s disciples then warn Jesus that this saying has offended the Pharisees. (In Mark, they do not.) Jesus in reply warns the disciples to ignore the Pharisees as blind guides. Since they put no faith in the Father, like useless weeds they will eventually be uprooted and discarded. Then, at Peter’s request Jesus explains privately to the disciples His warning to the crowds: malice of intent, not external ritual impurity, defiles one. (Mt 15:10-20; cf. Mk 7:14-23) Matthew’s allusion to Pharisaical blindness focuses the story on the unreliability of the Pharisaical leadership of the “synagogue across the street.”24 (Mt 16:5-12) The Confession of Peter Matthew introduces major modifications into Mark’s account of the confession of Peter. Like Mark, Matthew locates the event at Caesarea Philippi. As in Mark, Jesus asks the disciples what opinion the crowds have formed of Him. As in Mark, Peter responds that they look on Him as John the Baptist risen from the dead, as Elijah, Jeremiah, or one of the classical prophets returned. When Jesus asks who the disciples take Him to be, Mark’s Peter replies simply: “You are the Christ.” (Mk 8:29) Matthew’s Peter answers: “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” (Mt 16:16) The title “Son of the living God” connotes Jesus unique knowledge of and relationship to the Father which transforms Him into Immanuel. (Cf. Mt 11:27, 1:23, 28:20) In his account of this event, Mark has Jesus then warn the disciples not to reveal His messianic identity to others. Matthew’s Jesus, by contrast, replies with an extended encomium of Peter’s faith: 23. Cf. Dieter Zeller, “Zu eine Jüdische Vorlage von Mt 13, 52,” Biblische Zeitschrift, 20(1976), pp. 223-226; Jacques Dupont, Études sur les évangiles synoptiques (2 vols.; Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1985), II, pp. 920-928; NJBC, 42:92; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 198-190; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 203-210; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 163-171. 24. Cf. NJBC, 42:104; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 215; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 243-246; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 191-192.


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Blessed are you, Simon Bar Jonah! For flesh and blood have not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven. And I tell you, you are Peter and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. (Mt 16:13-20)

Neither Mark nor Luke record any such words of Jesus to Peter. Most questers for the historical Jesus would hold that during His mortal ministry Jesus historically headed a movement rather than founded a Church, although in calling the Twelve to labor at His side and in (perhaps) promising them judicial authority when the kingdom arrived, Jesus did give rudimentary institutional shape to the movement He headed. The Jesus movement apparently sought to effect a religious transformation of Israel which would enable it to serve as God’s instrument for effecting a universal salvation. That Jesus actually saw Himself as the founder of a Church seems historically improbable. Matthew, however, wrote his gospel as Church institutions were crystallizing in the sub-apostolic era. He therefore shows concern to ground those institutions in the person and event of Jesus. The reflections which follow clarify the purpose of this theological gambit. Some assimilate these Church-founding words of Matthew’s Jesus to the risen Christ’s commissioning of Peter to feed His lambs and sheep in the gospel of John. But the two events have little similarity to one another apart from the commissioning of Peter. In John, Jesus rehabilitates Peter after his triple denial, while in Matthew Jesus rewards Peter for his profession of faith. The Petrine trajectory in the New Testament suggests that Peter did it fact play a significant leadership role among the disciples. Jesus’ words in Matthew, however, appear nowhere else in the New Testament; and they almost certainly express the evangelist’s own interpretation of Peter’s significance for the sub-apostolic Church. By placing these words on Jesus’ lips, Matthew is pointing to Petrine Christianity as the solid rock on which the emerging Christian Church must rise. (Cf. Mt 5:19) The Johannine tradition has more affinity with Hellenistic Christianity, which saw Jesus as replacing the Torah and the forms of Jewish worship. Jesus attributes to the Father Peter’s recognition that in Jesus he confronts not only the messiah but the Son of God who reveals the Father in a privileged way. As we have seen, in Matthew, the Father, as the ultimate source of Son and Breath, functions as the ultimate source of all religious enlightenment. By insisting on the transcendent origin of Peter’s insight and that it exceeds anything possible to mere human nature, Matthew underscores the profound significance of what Peter has just said. He has

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glimpsed and recognized Jesus’ unique relationship to the Father, a truth which only the Father could reveal to him. Jesus then changes Simon’s name to Peter (Rock) and endows the name with ecclesial symbolism. Jesus promises that He will build His Church on the rock of Peter and that the powers of death—the gates of Hades— will not conquer it. Jesus’ Church triumphs over death itself. Jesus further promises that He will give Peter “the keys of the kingdom of heaven.” Jesus does not here confer the power of the keys on Peter; instead He promises to do so at some future date. The keys symbolize rabbinic authority to decide community issues. When, in the ecclesial discourse which follows this narrative section in Matthew, Jesus actually confers the power of the keys, He confers it collegially on all of Twelve. Jesus thus transforms the Twelve into the rabbis who will lead the Petrine church. (Mt 18:18) Moreover, as we shall see, Matthew also makes it clear that the exercise of the power of the keys engages the entire Christian community. Here Jesus promises Peter that, when He founds His Church, Peter will function within it as its chief rabbi. The promise also expresses Matthew’s predilection for Petrine Christianity. Since the papacy did not take imperial shape until the eleventh century, any attempt to read this text as divine endorsement of papal imperialism within the Church counts as eisegesis, as shallow and indefensible proof-texting, not exegesis. When Matthew wrote, Rome did not even have a monepiskopos.25 As in Mark, the first prediction of the passion and resurrection follows the confession of Peter. Jesus predicts that the elders, chief priests, and scribes will murder Him but that after three days He will rise again. (Mt 25. Cf. B. Willaert, “La connexion entre la première prédiction de la passion et la confession de Pierre chez les synoptiques,” Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 32(1958), pp. 24-45; Richard H. Heirs, “‘Binding’ and ‘Loosing’: The Matthean Authorization,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 104(1985), pp. 233-250; Jacques Dupont, “La révélation du fils de Dieu en faveur de Pierre (Mt 16,7) et de Paul (Ga 1,16),” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 52(1964), pp. 411- 420; Joseph Fitzmyer, S.J., To Advance the Gospel (New York, NY: Crossroad, 1981), pp. 112-124; Raymond E. Brown, et al., Peter in the New Testament (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1973), pp. 86-101; William J. Tobin, “The Petrine Primacy: Evidence of the Gospels,” Lumen Vitae, 23(1968), pp. 27-70; Andre Mehat, “‘Quand Kephas vint a Antioch....’ que s’est-il passé entre Pierre et Paul,” Lumière et Vie, 192(1989), pp. 29-43; Joel Marcus, “The Gates of Hades and the Keys of the Kingdom (Matt 16:18-19),” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 50(1988), pp. 443- 445; Herbert W. Basser, “Marcus’s ‘Gates’: A Response,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 50(1988), pp. 307-308; Rafael Aguirre, “Pedro en el Evangelio de Mateo,” Estudios Biblicos, 47(1989), pp. 343-361; U. Luz, “Das Primatwort Matthäus 16.17-19 als Wirkungsgeschtlicher Sicht,” New Testament Studies, 37(1991), pp. 415-433; Klaus Pantle-Schieber, “Anmerkungen zur Auseinanderstezung von ekklesia und Judentum im Matthäusevangelium,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 80(1989), pp. 145-162.


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16:21-3; Mk 8:31) Peter, shocked, takes Jesus aside and rebukes Him for suggesting that anything of the sort will happen to Him. Mark has Jesus include the disciples in his rebuke to Peter; Matthew’s Jesus addresses Peter alone. In other words, Mark uses the incident to stress that discipleship means walking with Jesus on the path to Calvary, if necessary. Matthew, however, treats the incident as a personal confrontation between Peter and Jesus, possibly as a way of admonishing in a special way the leaders of the Petrine church at Antioch. Matthew also embellishes Jesus’ rebuke to Peter. Mark’s Jesus says: “Get behind me Satan! For you are not on the side of God, but of humans.” (Mk 8:33) Matthew’s Jesus adds after the command, “Get behind me Satan!” the phrase: “You are a stumbling block (skandalon) to me.” (Mt 16:23) In other words, in Matthew’s version of the confrontation, Jesus explains why He has applied the harsh name of Satan to the apostle. Peter, like Satan, is putting Jesus to the test. He gives scandal to Jesus by urging Him to avoid a fate to which His mission from the Father is impelling Him. Moreover, Peter tempts Jesus because he fails to recognize God’s saving purpose. Instead, Peter thinks only in a human way of sparing Jesus suffering and death. Having portrayed the incident as a personal confrontation between Jesus and Peter, Matthew then immediately applies its lesson to the disciples as a group. Jesus assures them that discipleship includes following a servant messiah, to Calvary, if necessary. Discipleship demands, then, the willingness to walk the way of the cross. (Mt 16:24-26) Moreover, as he has done on other occasions, Matthew underscores the importance of embracing the cross by repeating this same teaching elsewhere. It recurs in Jesus’ missionary discourse. (Mt 10:16-23) Moreover, Matthew’s Jesus, like Mark’s, puts readiness for martyrdom in an eschatological context. He warns: For the Son of Man is to come with His angels in the glory of His Father, and then He will repay every person for what he has done. Truly, I say to you there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in His kingdom.” (Mt 16:24-8)

Mark’s Jesus promises in addition that, when He returns as Son of Man, He will be ashamed of anyone “in this adulterous and sinful generation” who is ashamed of Him and of His teaching. Matthew edits out this Markan allusion to apostasy. Some scholars find in Jesus’ promise that some people standing before Him would see the Son of Man coming into His kingdom a reference to the transfiguration which follows this saying.

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Others see it as a reference to the resurrection. Matthew could have intended both allusions.26 As in Mark, the transfiguration foreshadows the resurrection and provides counterpoint to the suffering which discipleship entails. It gives a glimpse of the glory to which the cross leads. Matthew edits slightly Mark’s account of the transfiguration, but reproduces its fundamental assertions. (Mt 17:1-2; Mk 9:2-3) In both gospels, the transfiguration represents a theophany, a revelation of Jesus’ share in the Father’s glory in virtue of His divine Sonship. Moreover, in both accounts the revelation begins to draw the disciples into Jesus’ baptismal experience. The Father speaks to them as He spoke to Jesus in His messianic, baptismal commissioning. By obediently listening to Jesus, as the Father commands, the disciples begin to share in His baptismal mission. When, however, in Matthew, the Father commands Peter, James, and John to listen to Jesus as a greater authority than the Law or prophets, the command takes on different theological connotations from Mark. In Matthew, the Father’s command binds the disciples to interpret the Torah in the light of Jesus’ teachings, which fulfill both the Law and the prophets. (Mt 17:3-8; Mk 9:4-8) As the four descend the mountain Matthew records the same conversation between Jesus and the three disciples as Mark. Jesus warns them to tell the vision to no one until He rises from the dead. Jesus also assures the three disciples that Elijah has come. In Mark, Peter, James, and John have no reaction to this announcement; but Matthew, once again more sympathetic to the disciples than Mark, has the three recognize immediately that Jesus is speaking about John the Baptizer.27 (Mt 17:9-13; Mk 9:9-13) I have already reflected on Matthew’s account of the epileptic demoniac boy when I examined Jesus’ relationship to Satan. Here it suffices to note that, as in Mark, the other disciples have tried unsuccessfully to exorcise the boy. Mark attributes their failure to their self-reliant omission of prayer. Matthew attributes it to their insufficient faith. The two responses differ in nuance, but both point to the disciples’ self-reliance rather than to their trust in God. Moreover, Matthew’s Jesus assures the disciples hyperbolically: “For truly, I say to you, if you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you will say to 26. Cf. Heinz Schürmann, Jesu ureigene Tod (Freiburg: Herder, 1975), pp. 16-65; NJBC, 42:106; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 220-222; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 346-353; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 199-201. 27. Cf. J.W.C. Ward, Transfiguration (London: The Faith Press, 1967); Daniel Völter, Das Bekenntnis des Petrus und die Verklärung Jesu auf dem Berg (Strassburg: Heitz and Mündel, 1911); Johannes M. Neutzel, Die Verklärungserzälung in Markusevangelium (Wurtzburg: Echter Verlag, 1973), pp. 275-288.


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this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible to you.” (Mt 17:14-20; Mk 9:14-27) In both accounts, therefore, the disciples failure to exorcise the boy successfully flows from their self-reliance; but Matthew contrasts their impotent unbelief with the power with which true faith in God endows prayer.28 The second prophecy of the passion follows the cure of the epileptic boy. Jesus foretells His own betrayal, murder, and resurrection. This time no one contradicts Him; but the second prediction leaves the disciples greatly distressed. They still look on the passion with human eyes and have yet to see it from God’s standpoint. (Mt 17:22-3) Matthew’s disciples, however, in contrast to Mark’s, seem to understand well what Jesus is saying. In Mark they greet the second prediction with incomprehension. (Mk 9:30-2) The disciples then occasion the discourse on the Church by asking Jesus who ranks greatest in the kingdom of heaven. I shall consider that discourse in reflecting on Jesus’ teachings in Matthew. Here it suffices to note that the discourse targets the disciples in a special way. After Jesus repudiates Mosaic divorce practices in an exchange with the Pharisees (Mt 19:3-9), Matthew, in contrast to Mark, has the disciples voice their dismay. They protest to Jesus: “If such is the case of a man with his wife, it is not expedient to marry.” (Mt 19:10-2) Typically, Matthew uses the objections which the disciples raise to Jesus’ teachings as a literary device which allows Jesus to clarify what He is saying. In this case Jesus replies: Not all men can receive this saying, but only those to whom it is given. For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven. He who is able to receive this, let him receive it. (Mt 19:11-2)

Jesus speaks of three kinds of eunuchs: the physically malformed, those castrated, and those who become eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom. As we saw in volume one, becoming “eunuchs for the kingdom” could refer historically to Jesus’ option for celibacy. Matthew’s Jesus, however, makes it clear that “becoming a eunuch for the sake of the kingdom” refers not to celibacy but to “this saying,” i.e., what He has just said about the indissolubility of marriage. Moreover, after His statement about eunuchs, Jesus again refers back to what he has just said about marriage. In Matthew’s text, then, “becoming a eunuch for the sake of the kingdom” asserts hyperbolically that recognizing the indissolubility of marriage con28. Cf. NJBC, 42:108; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 225-227; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 257- 260; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 208-209.

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stitutes a condition for entry into the kingdom. Celibacy provides a hyperbolic image for the constraints on male sexuality which the abolition of divorce entails. The disciples, however, must not try to live such marital continence with Stoic self-reliance. They must expect continence as a gift, presumably from God.29 When parents bring their children to Jesus for Him to bless them, the disciples rebuke them and seek to prevent the blessing. Jesus, however, ignores the disciples and accedes to the parents’ wish, saying: “Let the children come to Me and do not hinder them; for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven.” (Mt 19:13-5) In Mark the parents want Jesus to “touch” their children. (Mk 10:13) In Mark, then, it would appear that the parents offer Jesus their children for healing. Matthew transforms this therapeutic touch into a solemn blessing. In both versions of this incident, however, allowing the children to come to Jesus probably envisages the baptism of infants in the apostolic church, which seems to have occurred initially in the baptism of entire households. Jesus’ pronouncement on this occasion also holds a lesson for adults: they must learn to accept the kingdom which Jesus proclaims with the simplicity of children, like the children who greet Jesus joyfully after his triumphal entry. (Mt 21:14-17) Here again, the disciples function as a foil to Jesus. Their blunder forces Jesus to correct them and to clarify His own attitudes.30 Matthew, in contrast to Mark, describes the rich man who asks Jesus what he must do to attain eternal life as “young,” apparently a young idealist looking for something more in his life.31 (Mt 19:20) Matthew’s Jesus replies to the youth’s question by telling him to keep the commandments. When the young man asks which commandments, Jesus first cites several of the commandments—the prohibition of murder, theft, false witness, and the practice of filial piety—and then adds the second Great Commandment: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Mark makes no mention of the second Great Commandment. Matthew includes it here as a way of reminding the reader that the two Great Commandments sum up the whole of the Law and prophets which Jesus’ teaching in turn fulfills. (Mt 19:17-19, 23:34-40, 5:17-9; cf. Mk 10:19) 29. Cf. Sand, loc. cit.; NJBC, 42:117; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 255-259; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 272-276; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 224-228. 30. Cf. S. Legasse, Jésus et l’enfant: “enfants,” “petits,” et “simples” dans la tradition synoptique (Paris: Librairie Lecoffre, 1969); NJBC, 42:118; Radermakers, op. cit., II, p. 259; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 272-277; Albright and Mann, op. cit., p. 229; Walther Zimmerli, “Die Frage nach dem ewigen Leben,” Evangelische Theologie, 19(1959), pp. 90-97. 31. Cf. Walther Zimmerli, “Die Frage nach dem ewigen Leben,” Evangelische Theologie, 19(1959), pp. 90-97.


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The young man protests that he already does all these things and wants to know what he still lacks. In Mark, Jesus responds to this act of generosity with love. Matthew omits this touching detail and has Jesus reply more austerely: “If you would be perfect (teleios), go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.” (Mt 19:16-22; Mk 10:17-22) As in Mark, the young man hears these words with sorrow and departs, unable to follow Jesus because of his attachment to his wealth. Jesus presents the renunciation of one’s possessions and their sharing with the poor as the condition for close discipleship. The perfection, or completeness, to which He invites the rich young man in Matthew’s account recalls the perfection, or completeness of the Father’s love to which Jesus has already alluded in the sermon on the mount. The perfection of the Father’s love consists in the fact that He sends the blessings of this life impartially to all, whether saint or sinner. (Mt 5:43-8) Jesus, in other words invites the rich youth to imitate the universality of the Father’s love by sharing his possessions impartially on the basis of need and not of merit only. After the young man’s departure, Matthew presents a slightly edited version of Mark’s account of Jesus’ exchange with the disciples. In it, Jesus, as we have seen, assures them that God can even save the rich despite themselves. Moreover, Matthew’s Jesus promises the Twelve that, for having abandoned all to follow Him, they will one day sit on twelve thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel. (Mt 19:28) The twelve thrones parallel the throne of judgment which the “Son of Man” will mount when He judges the nations. (Mt 25:31) In conferring on the Twelve a share in Jesus’ own eschatological authority as judge, Matthew implicitly endows their proclamation of the risen Christ with a judgmental character. That proclamation will, then, prolong the judgment which Jesus’ own person and mission begins. (Cf. Mt 3:11-12) Moreover, since the apostles died before they could complete Jesus’ great commission to evangelize the whole world (Mt 28:16-20), their share in Jesus’ judicial authority will extend even beyond their deaths. At the parousia, they will pass judgment on all of Israel in Jesus’ name.32 After promising the Twelve eschatological, judicial authority over Israel, Matthew’s Jesus promises:

32. Cf. Jacques Dupont, “Le logion des douze trônes (Mt 19,28; Lc 22,28-30),” Biblica, 45(1964), pp. 355-392; David C. Sim, “The meaning of paliggenêsia in Matthew 19.28,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 50(1992), pp. 3-12; Thomas C. Schmidt, “Mark 10.29-30; Matthew 19.29: ‘Leave Houses....and Region,’” New Testament Studies, 38(1992), pp. 617-620.

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And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my sake, will receive a hundredfold, and inherit eternal life. But many that are first will be last, and the last first. (Mt 19:29)

In discussing the reward which all those receive who imitate the Twelve and sacrifice all for the gospel, Mark’s Jesus promises abundant rewards in this world as well as eternal life in the next. (Mk 10:29-31) Mark, then, looks on the Christian community and its mutual sharing and mutual concern as a replacement in this life for any family and possessions which one gives up in order to follow Christ. Mark’s Jesus also promises, typically, persecutions along with these temporal blessings. Matthew’s Jesus, in contrast to Mark’s, omits any mention of persecutions and looks to the next life, more than to this one, as the place where present renunciation will find its reward. In other words, Matthew apparently expects the eschatological reversal of fortunes which Jesus promises to occur, not so much in this life, as in the next.33 Moreover, Matthew elaborates on the meaning of this reversal of fortune by inserting the parable of the laborers in the vineyard. A householder, rather than his steward, goes personally into the marketplace to hire workers for occasional work in his vineyard at the third, sixth, ninth, and eleventh hour. The householder agrees to pay the first group the usual day’s wage of a denarius. He promises those hired at the third, sixth, and ninth hours to pay them whatever is right. He promises those hired at the eleventh hour nothing. The householder surprisingly pays the laborers in reverse order from the way he hired them. When those who labored all day get the same wage as those who only worked an hour, they complain to the householder that he is doing them an injustice. (Mt 20:1-12) He replies: Friend, I am doing you no wrong; did you not agree with me for a denarius? Take what belongs to you, and go; I choose to give this last as I give to you. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or do you begrudge my generosity? (Mt 20:13-15)

The parable concludes by repeating the aphorism in Mt 19:30 which it seeks to illustrate: “So the last will be first, and the first last.” (Mt 20:16) The evangelist has probably appended this proverb to the original parable. Some commentators on this parable read it as pointing to the admission of the Gentiles into the Church with the consequence that they receive the same salvation as Jews. It seems unlikely, of course, that Jesus 33. Cf. NJBC, 42:119; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 277-281; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 230- 235; José O’Callaghan, “Nota Critica sobre Mt 19,30,” Estudios Biblicos, 48(1990), pp. 271- 273.


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would have envisaged the baptism of Gentiles when He told this parable. On the lips of Jesus, the parable points to the fact that one cannot earn the rewards of the kingdom, which come from the gratuitous generosity of God. Matthew, however, uses the parable to illustrate the messianic reversal of values within the Church. In Matthew, the parable continues Jesus’ response to Peter’s question: “What about us?” In other words, Matthew uses the parable in order to reflect on the kind of reward which the Twelve will receive for following Jesus. Matthew’s Jesus warns that, even though the Twelve have accompanied Jesus from the beginning and have received the promise of sharing in His apocalyptic judicial authority, given the gratuity and generosity of God’s love, they should expect no preferential treatment when it comes to reward. Those who enter the kingdom later will have the same reward from God as those who entered earlier. In other words, the messianic reversal of values demands an egalitarian Church order, where all share impartially in its benefits. The parable of the laborers in the vineyard, as Matthew tells it, punctures the bubble of clerical privilege and rebukes the ambition of the sons of Zebedee which the evangelist will next describe.34 (Mt 20:20- 3) As in Mark, the story of the ambitious attempt of James and John to secure a privileged place for themselves in the kingdom follows the third prediction of the passion. This time Matthew fails to note any reaction on the part of the disciples to the prediction; but, like Mark, he intends the ambition of James and John and the resentment of the other ten disciples to illustrate that they have yet to grasp the meaning of the paschal mystery which Jesus is foretelling. (Mt 20:20-8;cf. Mk 10:35-45) Matthew, however, as usual paints a slightly more flattering picture of the disciples than Mark. Mark attributes to raw personal ambition the request of James and John to sit at Jesus’ left and right when the kingdom arrives. Matthew places the request instead on the lips of their mother, who, like most mothers, wants her sons to “get ahead.” James and John, however, go along with her request. As in Mark’s account, Matthew’s Jesus replies: “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup which I am to drink?” They answer that they can; and Jesus replies: “You will drink my cup, but to sit at my right hand and at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared by my Father.” (Mt 20:22-3; Mk 10:38-40) Matthew once again pares down Mark’s original text. Matthew eliminates Mark’s assimilation of Jesus’ passion to a baptism. Mark’s allusion to baptism recalls Jesus’ own baptismal anointing in which the Father commissions Him messiah but in the image of the suffering servant. 34. Cf. NJBC, 42:120; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 261-263; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 282- 285; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 236-237.

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Matthew does not mention baptism. In Matthew, the cup to which Jesus refers symbolizes suffering. It alludes both to the eucharistic cup and to the cup which Jesus will drink in His passion. (Mt 26:27, 39. Cf. Is 51:7, 22; Jer 25:15, 17, 28; 49:12; Lam 4:21; Ps 75:8; Mt 26:39) In Matthew, one can, then, see in Jesus’ reply to James and John a slightly more explicit allusion to Christian martyrdom.35 As in Mark, the other ten disciples respond with just as much ambition as James and John. They react indignantly. Jesus responds by insisting that the leaders in the new Israel take Jesus Himself and Jesus alone as their model for how to exercise leadership. Again Matthew edits Mark but preserves the substance of Jesus’ reply: You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great men exercise authority over them. It shall not be so among you; but whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be your slave; even as the Son of man came not to be served but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom (lytron) for many. (Mt 20:25-8; Mk 10:41-5)

The term “ransom (lytron)” with which Jesus describes His impending death often referred to the money paid for the manumission of slaves; but it could also connote any act of rescue. It points to the paschal sacrifice of Jesus’ life, therefore, as a liberating rescue of those who believe in Him. In describing the ambition of James and John and the envy of the Ten, Matthew, then, reproduces the main lines of Mark’s story. Matthew, however, treats the event as the culmination of Jesus’ denunciation of clerical ambition among Church leaders.36 The Disciples in the Jerusalem Ministry As in Mark’s account of the triumphal entry into Jerusalem, Jesus, in sending the disciples to prepare for this event, foresees with preternatural clarity the circumstances of preparation. Matthew embellishes Mark’s account, however, with the theme of fulfillment. He cites Zech 9:9, the prophecy which Jesus’ prophetic gesture imitates. I shall consider Matthew’s use of Zechariah below when I reflect on the theme of fulfillment in his gospel. The disciples observe the withering of the fig tree in Matthew, who, however, modifies Mark’s account of this strange event in several ways. 35. Cf. José O’Callaghan, “Fluctuacion textual en Mt 20,21. 26.27,” Biblica, 71(1990), pp. 553- 558. 36. Cf. NJBC, 42:122; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 264-265; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 286- 289; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 241-247; Emily Cheney, “The Mother of the Sons of Zebedee (Matthew 27.56),” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 68(1997), pp. 13-21.


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He omits Mark’s observation that it was not the season for the tree to bear fruit. That takes some of the paradox and contradiction out Mark’s account of Jesus’ action. Moreover, when Matthew’s Jesus curses the tree, it withers instantly. In Mark time lapses between Jesus’ prayer that no one eat of the tree and its actual withering. Moreover, Matthew downplays somewhat the symbolic meaning of Jesus’ gesture. In Mark the story of the fig tree brackets the cleansing of the temple. As a consequence, the withered tree dramatizes the spiritual barrenness of the temple priesthood. Instead, Matthew undoes Mark’s literary sandwich and tells the story of the fig tree as a literary unit in its own right. Matthew uses the miracle primarily as an occasion for Jesus to instruct the disciples once more in the efficacy of prayer, an important theological theme in Matthew. In Mark, Jesus’ teaching on prayer implicitly contrasts the authentic efficacy of Christian prayer with the impotence of the commercialized worship conducted in the temple. When, however, in Matthew the disciples ask Jesus why the tree withered instantly, Jesus replies hyperbolically: Truly, I say to you, if you have faith and never doubt, you will not only do what has been done to the fig tree, but even if you say to this mountain, “Be taken up and cast into the sea,” it will be done. And whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive, if you have faith. (Mt 21:18-22)

Jesus words reiterate His explanation to the disciples of why they could not exorcise the moonstruck boy. On that occasion Jesus reproached the disciples’ lack of faith and insisted on expectant faith as a condition for driving out demons. Here Jesus’ words reaffirm the typical Matthean theme of the need for expectant faith as a condition for prayer. Jesus’ response in Matthew thus moralizes the cursing of the fig tree and in part, at least, distracts the reader from the oddness of the incident. Finally, despite the fact that Matthew gives Peter even more prominence in his gospel than Mark, Matthew edits out Mark’s reference to Peter in this incident, possibly because it serves no clear symbolic purpose.37 Matthew inserts into his account of Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry the parable of the king who gives a wedding feast for his son. The parable targets the chief priests and scribes and chides them for refusing to enter the kingdom. Matthew, however, appends a postscript to the parable which focuses on the disciples. One of the guests herded in from the streets to attend the wedding arrives without a wedding garment. When the king sees him improperly dressed, he orders him cast into the outer darkness where people wail and grind their teeth. (Mt 22:1-14) 37. Cf. NJBC, 42:126; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 271-272; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 296- 298; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 259-261.

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The postscript makes it clear that the warning against obstinacy and against spiritual complacency applies as much to Jesus’ disciples as it does to the high priests. Garments symbolize the way one relates to other persons. The lack of a wedding garment, therefore, symbolizes that the guest came to the wedding but without the transformation of social conduct which repentance and faith require. For this reason the king casts him out. The parable concludes with a stern warning to the disciples: “For many are called, but few are chosen.” The disciples must display the fruits of repentance and perseverance in good works if they hope to share in the eschatological banquet.38 As in Mark, the disciples also occasion Jesus’ eschatological discourse by remarking on the wonderful stonework in the temple. I shall consider the content of Jesus discourse when I reflect systematically on His teachings in Matthew. (Mt 24:1-2) Matthew’s Jesus, however, concludes the eschatological discourse with a final prediction to the disciples of His impending death. He warns the disciples that He has only two days left before He is delivered up and crucified. (Mt 26:1-2) The story of Jesus’ anointing at Bethany follows this prediction. Matthew again edits Mark but preserves the substance of Mark’s account. The woman anoints Jesus’ head in apparent recognition of His messianic dignity. When the disciples complain about the waste of the precious ointment, whose sale could have produced money for the poor, Jesus defends the woman, saying that the disciples always have the poor with them, but that the woman has in fact anointed Him to prepare Him for burial. Matthew, however, edits out the words of Jesus which in Mark follow His statement: “You always have the poor with you.” Mark, as we have seen, alludes to Deut 15 in order to make it clear that Christians have only one proper response to poverty: namely, to alleviate it. Mark’s Jesus also stresses the need for practical care for the poor by adding: “...and whenever you will you can do good to them.” (Mk 14:7) Some commentators have suggested that Matthew’s deletion of this final admonition not only impoverishes the text but leaves it open to the misinterpretation of sanctioning indifference to the poor. Matthew, however, would almost certainly have expected his readers to recognize in Jesus’ reply an allusion to Deut 15:1-11. Since, moreover, Matthew elsewhere urges care and concern for the poor, his editing of Mark on this occasion in no way seeks to sanction indifference to the poor.39 38. Cf. NJBC, 42:130; Radermakers, op. cit., II, p. 278; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 305-308; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 268-270; David C. Sim, “Matthew 22.13 and 1 Enoch 10.4a: A Case of Literary Dependence,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 47(1992), pp. 3- 19. 39. Cf. Robert Holst, “The One Anointing Jesus: Another Application of Form-Critical Method,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 3(1976), pp. 435-446; Dale C. Allison, “Anticipating the Passion: The Literary Reach of Matthew 26:47-27:56,” Catholic


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The Disciples in the Passion As in Mark, the disciples prepare the upper room for the last supper. Matthew, however, edits out of Mark’s text the fact that Jesus had preternatural foreknowledge of the details of the preparation. In Mark, as we have seen, Jesus predicts that a man carrying a water jug will lead the disciples to the cenacle. Matthew’s Jesus just sends them to a particular unnamed person. Matthew emphasizes instead the disciples’ obedience to Jesus in preparing the meal. Like Mark, however, Matthew portrays the last supper as a seder. (Mt 26:17-9) In both gospels, when Jesus sits at table with the disciples, He foretells that one of them will betray Him and says that it would have been better had the man never been born. Later Matthew, in contrast to Mark, will illustrate this saying by describing Judas’s despair and suicide. (Mt 27:3-10) As in Mark, the disciples ask Jesus one by one if Jesus speaks of him. In Matthew, however, when Judas asks, “Is it I, Master?” Jesus replies, “You have said so.” (Mt 26: 20-5) Mark makes no mention of this last detail. (Mk 14:17-21) The institution of the eucharist follows. Matthew reproduces Mark’ version of this event with a few modifications. Matthew adds the command “Eat” to the distribution of the bread and the command “Drink of it” to the distribution of the cup. Moreover, Matthew appends the phrase “for the forgiveness of sins” to the consecration of the cup. As we have seen, Matthew deleted the same phrase from his description of Johannine baptism. For Matthew, the new covenant in Jesus’ blood alone effects the forgiveness of sins. Then, Matthew’s Jesus, like Mark’s, says: “I tell you I shall not drink from now on (aph’ arti) of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom.” Matthew adds the phrase “from now on” to this last saying. The addition points to the paschal mystery as the crucial turning point in salvation history. (Mt 26:26-9) The prophetic gestures of Jesus in giving the disciples his body as bread to eat and his blood as wine to drink have, then, the same basic meaning as in Mark. Jesus trusts that His death will bring life to the disciples and will seal a new covenant between them and God. As a covenant renewal, Jesus’ death takes on the character of an atoning sacrifice.40 As in Mark, they all sing a hymn and depart for the Mount of Olives. As in Mark Jesus, also predicts that when they strike Him, the shepherd, the sheep, the disciples, will scatter; but that after He is raised from the dead He will precede the disciples into Galilee. As in Mark, when Peter Biblical Quarterly, 56(1994), pp. 701-714; NJBC, 42:148; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 330-332; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 361-365; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 314-315. 40. Cf. Schürmann, op. cit., pp. 66-96.

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predicts that he will never abandon Jesus, Jesus foretells his triple denial. As in Mark, the disciples all insist they will never deny Jesus, even though they suffer death. Matthew edits out a few words from Mark; but he reproduces most of the latter’s text.41 (Mt 26:3-5; Mk 14:26-31) The image of Jesus as shepherd of Israel resonates with other passages in Matthew’s narrative. The infancy gospel proclaims Jesus the Davidic shepherd of Israel. (Mt 2:6) Jesus feeds the Jewish crowds because their perfidious leaders have left them without a shepherd. (Mt 9:36) Jesus sends the disciples to proclaim the gospel in His image to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. (Mt 10:6, 14:14, 15:24,32) Jesus views His disciples as sheep in the midst of wolves. (Mt 10:16) Ever the good shepherd, Jesus does not will to lose a single sheep (Mt 18:12-14), but as final judge He will separate the sheep from the goats. (Mat 25:31-46) Even after the false shepherds of Israel strike Jesus down, He will regather His sheep in Galilee, reconstitute them as the new Israel, and send them to evangelize the world.42 (Mt 26:31-32, 28:16-20) Matthew modifies slightly Mark’s account of the “agony in the garden.” While Mark describes Jesus as “greatly distressed and troubled,” Matthew describes Him as “sorrowful and troubled.” (Mt 26:37; Mk 14:33) The substitution attenuates somewhat the degree of struggle Jesus experiences in the face of death. Nevertheless, Matthew, like Mark, has Jesus say to Peter, James, and John: “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death; remain here and watch with me.” (Mt 26:38; Mk 14:34) Matthew’s Jesus, moreover, prays basically the same two prayers to the Father: “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will but as you will” and “My Father, if this cannot pass unless I drink it, your will be done.” (Mt 26:39, 42) In Matthew, the prayers explicitly echo the Our Father. (Mt 6:10) While Mark has Jesus address the Father simply as “Abba, Father,” Matthew adds the pronoun “My” which underscores the intimacy of Jesus’ relationship to the Father.43 41. Cf. NJBC, 42:15-152; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 332-335; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 365- 371; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 318-324. 42. Cf. John Paul Heil, “Ezechiel 34 and the Narrative Strategy of the Shepherd and Sheep Metaphor in Matthew,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 55(1993), pp. 695-708; Domingo Muñoz Leon, “‘Ire delantro de vosotros a Galilae’ (Mt 26,32 y par: Sentido mesianico y possible Sustrado Arameo del Logion,” Estudios Biblicos, 48(1990), pp. 215-241; Dale C. Allison, “Anticipating the Passion: The Literary Reach of Matthew 2647-27:56,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 56(1994), pp. 701-714. 43. As in Mark, Jesus prays three times and chides Peter the second time he visits the sleeping disciples for his inability to pray even for an hour with Jesus. As in Mark, Jesus expresses concern that the disciples’ lack of prayer will leave them unprepared to face the eschatological test which is about to descend upon them. As in Mark, the third time Jesus wakes them, he speaks ironically, telling them to get well rested; for the hour of His betrayal has arrived. Matthew distinguishes more clearly than Mark does between


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In his account of Jesus’ betrayal, Matthew adds a touching detail absent from Mark. When Judas arrives with an armed mob and, as previously arranged, identifies Jesus, he does so with a kiss. Matthew’s Jesus then asks him: “Friend, why are you here?” (Mt 26:47-49) Matthew’s Jesus continues to call Judas “friend” even in the very act of betrayal. As in Mark, one of the disciples severs the ear of the servant of the high priest. Mark’s Jesus says nothing. Matthew’s Jesus, however, rebukes the disciple for this violent act: Put your sword back into its place; for all who take the sword will perish by the sword. Do you think that I cannot appeal to my Father, and He will at once send Me more than twelve legions of angels? But how then should the scriptures be fulfilled, that it must be so? (Mt 26:52-54)

The rebuke not only enjoins on the disciples not to respond to violence with further violence, but it also underscores Jesus’ free submission to violence at the hands of others, violence which He could avoid, if He chose to exercise His divine authority over the angels. As in Mark, Matthew’s Jesus rebukes those arresting Him by telling them that they are skulking around in the dark, when they could have arrested Him openly. In addition, however, Matthew’s Jesus again invokes the notion of fulfillment: “But all this has taken place, that the Scriptures and the prophets might be fulfilled.” Jesus’ words implicitly proclaim that His death follows God’s providential plan of salvation. (Mt 26:55-56) The disciples than abandon Jesus to His enemies. Matthew mentions nothing about a naked young man escaping the soldiers when he slips out of the linen cloth he is wearing. (Cf. Mk 14:51) In Mark, as we have seen, the young man foreshadows the resurrection which will leave the enemies of Jesus bereft of His body and with only the linens which wrapped them. Matthew, however, typically either misses this allusive reference in Mark or more likely chooses to omit it, since he, unlike Mark, intends to describe Jesus’ appearance to the disciples instead of just obscurely symbolizing it.44 Jesus’ three visits to Peter, James, and John, although in both gospels Jesus returns to them three times. Matthew also changes Mark’s peremptory “The hour has come” to “The hour has come near.” The hour of Jesus ordeal will not actually arrive until His betrayal by Judas and His arrest. (Cf. Mt 26:39-46; Mk 14:35-42; see also: Brown, The Death of the Messiah, I, 209-210). Cf. NJBC, 42:153; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 335-337; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 372-378; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 325-327. 44. Cf. R.S. Barbour, “Gethsemane in the Tradition of the Passion,” New Testament Studies, 16(1969-1970), pp. 231-251; David M. Stanley, Jesus in Gethsemane: The Early Reflection on the Suffering of Jesus (New York, NY: Paulist, 1980), pp. 155-187; A. Feuillet, L’agonie de Gethsemani (Paris: Gabalda, 1977), pp. 77-141.

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As in Mark, Judas and Peter symbolize the two fundamental ways a disciple who backslides can relate to Jesus. The disciple can either despair, like Judas, or repent and experience Jesus’ saving forgiveness, like Peter. As we have already seen, after the Sanhedrin condemns Jesus, Matthew’s Judas, filled with remorse, flings the money which has rewarded his treachery at the feet of the chief priests, declares Jesus’ innocence, and hangs himself. (Mt 27:3-10) As in Mark, Peter alone among the disciples follows Jesus and the arresting mob to the house of the high priest. Matthew, however, in contrast to Mark, notes that Peter expects only the worst. He has come to “see the end.” (Mt 26:57-8) Like Mark, Matthew ironically brackets the story of Jesus’ trial and mockery by the Sanhedrin with the story of Peter’s denial. The denial itself follows the story of the trial. Matthew edits and rewrites Mark’s account of the denial, but he preserves its substance. Peter denies Jesus three times, the last time with curses and oaths. Then Peter remembers Jesus’ prediction, goes out, and weeps bitter tears of repentance.45 (Mt 26:69-75) As in Mark, Matthew records that the soldiers forced Simon of Cyrene to help Jesus carry His cross to execution. As in Mark, Simon, even though constrained, functions as an ironic type of the true disciple, who follows Jesus carrying the cross even to Calvary. (Mt 27:32, 16:24-8; Mk 15:21) As in Mark, among Jesus’ disciples only the women who had ministered to Jesus and supported Him materially—Mary Magdalene, Mary, the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of the sons of Zebedee— witness Jesus’ death, but from a distance. Joseph of Aramathea, whom Matthew describes as rich man and a disciple of Jesus, secures Jesus’ body from Pilate, wraps it in a clean linen shroud. Mark, as we have seen, describes Joseph as a respected member of the Sanhedrin who awaited the reign of God; but Mark makes no mention either of Joseph’s wealth or of his discipleship. (Mk 15:43) Matthew may have included that detail as a way of illustrating that God can touch even the hearts of the wealthy. (Mt 19:26) Matthew also identifies the tomb in which Joseph buries Jesus as Joseph’s own. The evangelist describes it as “new” or hitherto unused. The mention of Joseph’s Christian affiliation provides some evidence that he eventually became a Christian and generated a developing tradition about his role in Jesus’ passion. Matthew closes his account of the passion with Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of James and Joseph, the first witnesses of the resurrection, sitting in sorrow at the tomb. (Mt 27:57- 61) As in Mark, the women

45. Cf. David Daube, “Limitations of Self-Sacrifice in Jewish Law and Tradition,” Theology, 72(1969), pp. 291-304; NJBC, 42:156; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 337-343; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 378-387; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 337-341.


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take no active part in Jesus’ burial and serve primarily as witnesses to both the death and resurrection. As witnesses, they link the two events.46 The Disciples and the Risen Christ Matthew, as we have seen, records that the chief priests and Pharisees had requested Pilate to post a guard at the tomb lest Jesus’ disciples steal the body and pretend that He had risen from the dead. (Mt 27:62-6) Since the presence of the guards would have made anointing the body impossible, Matthew, unlike Mark, does not portray the women as coming to the tomb to perform this charitable act. They simply come to the tomb to “see the sepulcher,” presumably to mourn there. As at the moment of Jesus’ death, a great earthquake occurs at the moment when they reach the tomb. The two earthquakes link the death and the resurrection of Jesus as flip sides of the same apocalyptic event and, as we have seen, point to the first calming of the storm and to Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem as anticipations of the paschal mystery. (Mt 28:1-2) Matthew transforms the young man whom the women encounter in Mark’s resurrection narrative into “an angel of the Lord” who descends from heaven and terrifies the guards by rolling back the stone in front of Jesus’ tomb. The angel ignores the guards, who fall to the ground like dead men because of their fear. The angel speaks instead to the women: Do not be afraid; for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. He is not here; for He has risen, as He said. Come, see the place where He lay. Then go quickly and tell His disciples that He is going before you into Galilee; there you will see Him. Lo, I have told you. (Mt 28:5-8)

In contrast to Mark, Matthew paradoxically makes no special mention of Peter in the command to tell the disciples what has happened. I say paradoxically because Peter in other respects tends to play a somewhat more prominent role in Matthew. The omission could, however, suggest that resurrection faith claims all the disciples impartially. Otherwise Matthew reproduces the speech of the young man to the women in Mark, although he places it on the lips of an apocalyptic angel. The women in Matthew react very differently from the women in Mark. The latter disobey the young man’s command and say nothing to the disciples. Matthew clearly finds this an inappropriate response to the good news, as Mark probably intended he should. Matthew prefers to portray the women rushing from the tomb. Despite their initial fear, they joyfully carry out the errand with which the angel has entrusted them. 46. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, II, pp. 1225-1226; F. Neirynck, “Les femmes au tombeau: étude de la redaction matthéenne (Matt. XXVIII. 1-10),” New Testament Studies, 15(1968-1969), pp. 168-190.

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Matthew also inserts an encounter between the women and the risen Christ. As the women abandon the tomb, Jesus Himself suddenly appears to them. They prostrate themselves before Him, grasping His feet in an act of worship. Their worship (proskynesan) recalls the worship of the disciples after Jesus had walked upon the water and calmed the waves the second time. (Mt 14:33) That miraculous event had foreshadowed the full revelation of Jesus and His divinity which the resurrection accomplishes. The women’s action also recalls the worship of the magi in the infancy gospel which there foreshadowed the conversion of the Gentiles. (Mt 2:11) Jesus repeats the angel’s command to the women to tell the disciples that He will precede them into Galilee, where they too will see Him.47 (Mt 28:9-10) The Eleven hasten to Galilee and ascend the mountain which Jesus had indicated. The Twelve minus Judas the traitor here symbolize the shattered remnant of the new Israel which Jesus had begun to found during His ministry. The mountain recalls both the mount of the beatitudes and the mountain of the transfiguration. As in the sermon on the mount, Jesus once again speaks as God from the mountaintop. (Mt 5:1-2) The disciples worship Jesus when they see Him, despite the fact that some of them doubt their very eyes. Jesus, however, brooks no doubt on their part and immediately utters the Great Commission: All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Breath, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age.” (Mt 28:16-20)

Here several points need noting. 1) The risen Christ speaks with a divine authority conferred upon Him by the Father. The resurrection reveals that authority finally and decisively. 2) Despite His rejection, betrayal, and death, Jesus remains unchanged. He still lives to fulfill His commissioning by the Father to proclaim the kingdom; but He will now do so by acting through His disciples. He therefore commissions them to speak and act in His name and with His divine authority. In uniting Himself to the Eleven (“Lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age.”), the risen Christ reconstitutes the Twelve. He joins Himself to the Eleven as the twelfth apostle and thus insures that the new Israel will endure until He returns in judgment at the close of “the age.” Moreover, in Greek, the risen Christ actually says, “I with you am (ego meth’ hymon eimi).” By inserting “with you” between “I” and “am,” Matthew asserts that, as the 47. Cf. Olaf H. Schumann, “Ein Missionsbefehl?” Zeitschrift für Mission, 20(1994), pp. 130- 132; NJBC, 42:166; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 350-352; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 408-413; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 357-360.


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great I AM, the risen Christ encompasses the new Israel in its evangelization of the nations. 3) Jesus had originally restricted His ministry to “the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” He now proclaims a universal salvation. 4) In commissioning the disciples to baptize in the triune name, Jesus stands finally revealed as the Breath-baptizer, as the mightier one whom John the Baptizer had predicted would baptize with “a Holy Breath and fire.” Moreover, the obedience of faith through fidelity to the moral demands of discipleship provides the authentic sign of Breath-baptism. 5) As we have also seen, Jesus’ revelation as Breath-baptizer coincides with His final and full revelation as Immanuel, God-with-us. That revelation insures that He will take providential care of the Church He is founding until He ends the final age of salvation by returning to judge the world. 6) Jesus commissions the disciples corporately, collegially. The great commission engages the whole of the new Israel.48 The Analogy of Christological Knowing How does one account for the difference between Mark’s and Matthew’s portrait of the disciples? The difference between the situation of two communities for whom each evangelist wrote accounts for much of the contrast. Mark seems to have written his gospel for a Christian community either as it suffered persecution under Nero or (more likely) as it attempted to deal with its aftermath. It seems reasonable to suppose that persecution would have evoked a broad variety of responses from different members of the community, from apostasy to martyrdom. Mark has nothing but approval for those disciples who follow Jesus willingly even to the cross. His negative portrait of the disciples during Jesus’ ministry probably targets the opposite constituency in his community: those who out of weakness denied Jesus under persecution or wavered in their religious commitment. I find it at least plausible that Mark’s negative portrait of the disciples sought to offer hope and encouragement to weaker Roman Christians who had faltered or even denied the faith under the threat of torture and of death. Accordingly, Mark often 48. Cf. George Howard, “A Note on the Short Ending of Matthew,” Harvard Theological Review, 81(1988), pp. 117-120; John Paul Heil, “The Narrative Structure of Matthew 27:55- 28:20,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 110(1991), pp. 419-438; Joachim Lange, Das Erscheinen des Auferstandenen im Evangelium Matthäus: Einie traditionsgeschichtliche Unterzuchung zu Mt 28,16-20 (Würzburg: Echter Verlag, 1973); Jane Schabert, The Father, the Son, and the Spirit (Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1982); Elian Cuvillier, “Particularisme et universalisme chez Matthieu: quelques hypothèses à l’épreuve du texte,” Biblica, 78(1997), pp. 481-502; NJBC, 42:168; Radermakers, op. cit., II, pp. 357-387; Harrington, op. cit., pp. 414- 417; Albright and Mann, op. cit., pp. 361-363; Levine, op.cit., pp. 165-192; Reginald Fuller, The Formation of the Resurrection Narratives (New York, NY: Macmillan, 1971), pp. 71-93.

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portrays the disciples as obtuse, even faithless; but in a number of miracle stories he holds out the hope that the resurrection has the power to transform even the weakest and least faithful. In this context the figure of Peter takes on special symbolic meaning in Mark. Peter, the great apostle who died in Nero’s persecution, makes his last appearance in Mark when he denies Jesus. That one could deny the Lord, repent, and still discover in the Breath the strength to lay down one’s life for Him must have offered considerable consolation and healing to the Roman community as it attempted to deal with its apostates. Matthew, by contrast, deals with a very different pastoral situation. His community does not face the trauma of actual persecution by Roman authorities. Instead, Matthew’s community is dealing with the challenge of asserting its Christian identity while clinging to its Jewish roots. The Antiochene church must, moreover, make that assertion in the face of growing hostility from the Pharisaical leaders of the Jewish community. Matthew, therefore, acknowledges the weakness of Jesus’ disciples; but he also goes out of his way to contrast their faith in Jesus with the unbelief of their fellow Jews. Matthew draws the sharpest contrast between the faith of the disciples and the hostile unbelief of the Pharisaical leaders of the Judaism of his day. The contrast helps account for Matthew’s more sympathetic portrait of the disciples. Still, Matthew endorses the main lines of Mark’s portrait of the demands of discipleship. He also develops Mark’s portrait. Matthew, for example, stresses more the importance of expectant faith and prayer than Mark does. Matthew also insists more on the day-to-day living of the gospel and warns against religious and moral complacency. Significantly, Matthew makes different symbolic use of Peter from Mark. Writing as he does for a Petrine community, he tends to use the figure of Peter as a symbol of Christian Church leadership. Peter’s weakness and lack of faith cautions those leaders to examine themselves and to resist the nascent clericalism which seems to have begun to surface among the leadership at Antioch. Matthew alone of the three synoptic gospels talks about Jesus conferring the power of the keys on Peter and the Eleven; but in Matthew’s text Jesus’ endorsement of the Antiochene Church’s “rabbinic” authority structures comes with serious qualifications. Matthew insists that the wielding of apostolic authority in the Church does not make one more important than later converts who do not exercise the same kind of judicial authority. Christian leadership in Matthew as in Mark means leadership in service in the image of a servant messiah. Authentic leadership also precludes ambition and lording it over others. Even more than Mark, Matthew strongly defends a non-clericalized, egalitarian Church order.


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This chapter and the two preceding it have reflected on the dramatic linkages which structure the “plot” of Matthew’s gospel. The time has come to turn to the thematic linkages. The next chapter examines the first of those linkages: namely, the teachings of Jesus, which play such a prominent role in Matthew’s gospel narrative.

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Chapter 10 Jesus’ Teaching in Matthew As in the case of Mark, Matthew uses thematic linkages in order to explicate the moral demands of discipleship. To this end, however, Matthew makes much more extensive use than Mark of Jesus’ teachings. Matthew, however, discovers in Jesus’ basic message three of the same elements as Mark: 1) the need for repentance, 2) the immanent coming of the kingdom, and 3) the need to submit to God’s reign. (Mk 1:14-5, 4:17) As we have seen, Mark’s gospel focuses more on event than on word as a way of disclosing to the reader sacramentally Jesus’ true identity and mission. Matthew, by contrast, tells Jesus’ story as Christian Torah. Jesus’ five discourses constitute the five books of the new Law. Moreover, like the original Torah, the narrative in which the new Law embeds itself contextualizes it. In this sense, Matthew subordinates the events of Jesus’ ministry to His teachings. The Jewish Torah narrates the giving of the Law during the exodus from Egypt. The narrative contextualizes the Law and provides the key for interpreting it. Matthew narrates the giving of Christian Torah and the creation of the new Israel. The story of Jesus contextualizes the new covenant and provides the key for interpreting it. Matthew clearly desires the reader to ponder and obey the sayings of Jesus which he has culled and arranged with scribal care. He also expects the reader to adopt the teachings of Jesus as the lens through which to read the deep meaning of the Jewish Torah. Each major discourse of Jesus develops a theme. The sermon on the mount proclaims the kingdom for the first time and describes its scope and intent. Matthew understands the kingdom as the fulfillment of the old Law. Fulfillment means that the new covenant demands more, not less, than Mosaic piety.1 As we have seen, Matthew arranges the discourses chiastically. The first discourse, the sermon on the mount, announces the kingdom; the last, the eschatological discourse, describes its consummation. The second and fourth discourses deals with Church matters: its missionary activity and communal structure. The parabolic discourse, which presents the kingdom as a saving mystery, holds the central place.2 1. Cf. Günther Bornkamm, Gerhard Barth, and Heinz Joachim, Tradition and Interpretation in Matthew, translated by Percy Scott (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster, 1963). 2. Cf. Beda Rigaux, The Testimony of St. Matthew, translated by Joseph Oligny (Chicago, IL: Franciscan Herald Press, 1968); Richard B. Edwards, “Narrative Implications of Gar in Matthew,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 52(1990), pp. 636-655.

Chapter 10: Jesus’ Teaching in Matthew

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This chapter divides into five parts. Each part examines the overall structure and message of one of the major discourses. (I) Jesus proclaims the sermon on the mount to both His disciples and the crowds. (Mt 5:1-2) The inclusiveness of the sermon’s audience foreshadows in a way the universality of the Great Commission which closes Matthew’s gospel.3 (Mt 28:16-20) The Sermon on the Mount The sermon divides into five parts: 1) The beatitudes enunciate a program for discipleship, 2) The proclamation of a new ethic fulfills rather than abolishes the Torah, 3) Jesus instructs His disciples on how to deepen and authenticate traditional practices of Jewish piety like prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, 4) Jesus enunciates basic moral demands of a life of discipleship. 5) The discourse concludes with warnings and injunctions.4 The Mosaic Torah ended with blessings and curses: blessings for those who keep the Law, curses for those who violate it. (Deut 27:9-28:69) The Beatitudes enunciate the blessings promised in the new covenant. The woes against the scribes and Pharisees enunciate its curses. Luke records four beatitudes. (Lk 6:20-26) Matthew records eight. Scripture scholars suggest that Matthew has expanded the original number of beatitudes by drawing on the psalms and other Old Testament texts in order to expand the blessings of the kingdom. The expansion exemplifies Matthew’s scribal ideal of blending old and new wisdom. (Mt 13:52) In what follows I shall examine each beatitude in turn.5 “Blessed are the poor in spirit (ptôchoi tô pneumati), for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” (Mt 5: 3) The poor designates the anawim, the physically poor who prefer the service of God to the heaping up of riches. Matthew’s addition of the phrase “in spirit” does not seek to attenuate the call to physical poverty but to interiorize it. One must not only renounce riches physically, one must also renounce them in one’s heart. Those who renounce not only large possessions but also the very desire for wealth will find themselves blessed because their physical and interior poverty will free them to accept with joy the kingdom and all the blessings it brings. 3. Cf. Lorenz Oberlinner, “Wem gilt die Bergprädigt?” Biblische Zeitschrift, 34(1990), pp. 104-108. 4. Cf. Dieter Betz, Essay on the Sermon on the Mount (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1985); Charles E. Carlston, “Betz on the Sermon on the Mount—A Critique,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 50(1988), pp. 47-57; Watejen, op. cit.,pp. 84-114. 5. Cf. Emile Peuch, “4Q525 et les pericôpes des béatitudes en Ben Sira et Matthieu,” Revue Biblique, 98(1991), pp. 80-106.

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Even more, Jesus proclaims, “the kingdom of heaven is theirs.” He uses here the present tense, although He will use the future tense in all the other beatitudes except the eighth. In other words, physical and interior poverty yield present possession of the kingdom. This beatitude, therefore, identifies the very reality of the kingdom with a renunciation of wealth which it calls blessed. The first beatitude also foreshadows the story of the rich young man and Jesus’ remarks on that occasion. Implicitly, then, this beatitude also calls one to sell what one has, share it with the poor, and follow a poor and humble messiah.6 (Mt 19:16-22; cf. Mt 12:28-30) “Blessed are those who mourn (penthountes), they shall be comforted.” (Mt 5:4) This beatitude promises divine and human consolation to all those who grieve. It implicitly enjoins compassion for the sorrowing as a fundamental obligation of those who live in the kingdom. The second beatitude alludes to Is 61:2, which proclaims a day of vindication when God will comfort all who mourn. The grief in question, therefore, involves more than just personal grief. It promises consolation to all those who allow their hearts to empathize with and grieve for the evil and misery present in the human condition. “Blessed are the meek (hoi praeis), for they shall inherit the land.” The meek and the anawim coincide. Both terms designate the little folk, the people of the land, vulnerable to exploitation by the rich and the powerful. This beatitude echoes Ps 37:11, which makes the same promise. It also recalls the promise of the land made by God to the patriarchs. The third beatitude proclaims as well the messianic reversal of values. In the eschatological age begun by Jesus’ proclamation of the kingdom (Cf. Mt 11:2-10), the people of the land, the poor, the marginal, the outcast, not the rich landowners and royal oppressors, shall possess the land of Israel as their own instead of working it for the profit of others. “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness (peinôntes kai dipsôntes tên dikaiosynên), for they shall be satisfied.” (Mt 5:6) Righteousness means standing in a good relationship with God as a consequence of obedient submission to the divine will. As the sermon on the mount will make abundantly clear, true righteousness transcends Pharisaical legalism and demands a genuine transformation of heart, a deep hunger and thirst for authentic faith and virtue. (Cf. Mt 5:20) This beatitude promises that those who yearn for such a transformation of heart will indeed experience it.7 6. Cf. John Christopher Thomas, “The Kingdom of God in the Gospel According to Matthew,” New Testament Studies, 39(1993), pp. 136-146; David Alan Black, “Conjectural Emendations in the Gospel of Matthew,” Novum Testamentum, 31(1989), pp. 1-15. 7. Cf. Benno Przybylski, Righteousness in Matthew and His World of Thought (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980); Wraid Popkes, “Die Gerichtigkeit im MatthäusEvangelium,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 80(1989), pp. 1-23.


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“Blessed are the merciful (hoi eleêmones), for they shall obtain mercy.” (Mt 5:3-12) Mercy here connotes both compassion and forgiveness. It enunciates the same principle which Jesus later pronounces after the Our Father: only those who compassionately forgive one another will experience divine forgiveness; for those who refuse to forgive sin by setting their hearts against a God who remains lovingly and absolutely set on the forgiveness of anyone who repents of sin. (Mt 6:14-5) “Blessed are the pure in heart (hoi katharai tê kardia), for they shall see God.” (Mt 5:8) As we saw above in reflecting on Jesus’ relationship to the Father, purity of heart means avoiding all moral and legal taint or impurity. It transforms one into the very antithesis of the Pharisaical “brood of vipers” whose wickedness of heart leads them to speak poisonous words against Jesus. Impurity of heart also means “murder, adultery, fornication, theft, perjury, slander.” (Mt 15:1-20) This beatitude promises that the cultivation of moral and legal purity will one day culminate in the vision of God. It alludes to Ps 24:3-4, which equates purity of heart with the refusal to lift one’s soul up to what is false or to swear deceitfully. “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake (hoi dediôgmenoi hekenen dikaiosynês), for the kingdom of heaven is theirs.” This beatitude echoes the first with its present promise of possessing the kingdom. Willingness to suffer persecution for standing in a correct and obedient relationship with God makes one here and now a member of the kingdom. The term righteousness also connotes here, as it can, the notion of vindication. God will vindicate Himself and those who suffer for their obedience to His will, for through their obedience they manifest that they do indeed belong to the kingdom and have submitted to the divine reign. “Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so people persecuted the prophets before you.” (Mt 11-2) This beatitude reflects more the situation of Matthew’s church and of the apostolic Church in general, although Jesus may have anticipated the persecution of His disciples. The final beatitude functions as a commentary on the eighth beatitude and applies it to the situation of the post-resurrection Church The beatitude portrays the Church as standing in the same prophetic tradition as Jesus Himself when it shares the same intransigent rejection as both He and the ancient prophets experienced. Jesus, as we have seen, will make the same point in His denunciation of the scribes and Pharisees and in His confrontation with the chief priests and elders. (Mt 21:33-46, 23:33-6) The missionary discourse, as we shall also see, will develop the theme of constancy under persecution in greater detail.

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Several comparisons follow the enunciation of the Beatitudes which make it clear that they provide a program of life for anyone living in the kingdom. You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trodden under foot by people. You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hid. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a bushel, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. Let your light so shine before others, that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven. (Mt 5:13-6)

These teachings serve a double function in the overall structure of the sermon on the mount. First, they transform the beatitudes into a program of life which manifests the saving power of God. The first parable warns of the fate of those who hear the message of the beatitudes and of the gospel as a whole and then grow tepid and complacent. Unless the disciples salt their lives with the good works demanded by the beatitudes, they will find themselves repudiated for their mediocrity and sinfulness. The city on a hill could allude to Jerusalem which lay atop Mount Zion and functioned in Jesus’ day as the center of Palestinian Jewish worship. If so, the parable implicitly portrays the community of disciples as the new temple which replaces the old as the source and center of authentic Jewish worship. That worship, moreover, contributes to the light which the disciples by living the gospel shine upon a darkened and sinful world.8 The second parable and the teachings which accompany it spell out the proper attitudes which should motivate obedience to the beatitudes and to the message of the kingdom: Living the gospel will make one conspicuous, but one should practice virtue in such as way as to call attention away from oneself and to God. In the third section of the sermon on the mount, Jesus will elaborate further this theme, when he excoriates the hypocritical practice of religion as a way of seeking self-adulation. (Mt 6:1-6, 16-8) Here I note in passing that while Matthew uses the parable of the lamp in order to exhort the disciples to self-effacing obedience to the Father, Mark uses the same saying of Jesus in order to assure the disciples that the final judgment will bring all hidden truth to light. These preliminary teachings serve a second function in the overall structure of the sermon on the mount, They mark a transition from the beatitudes to the proclamation of the new morality which the next section of the sermon on the mount enunciates.9 8. Cf. J. Duncan M. Derrett, “The Light and the City: Mt 5:14,” Expository Times, 103(1992), pp. 174-175. 9. Cf. Gerhard Schneider, “Das Bildwort von der Lampe: Zur Traditionsgeschichte eines Jesus- Wortes,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestametlische Wissenschaft, 60(1970, pp. 183-209.


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The proclamation of a new morality develops the central message of the sermon on the mount: Jesus in proclaiming the kingdom comes, not to abolish the Law, but to fulfill it by demanding more, not less, than Torah piety demands. Think not that I have come to abolish the Law and the prophets; I have come not to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished. Whoever, then relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others so shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven; but one who does them and teaches them shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. (Mt 5:17-20)

This passage serves as the preface of the second part of the sermon. In what follows, Jesus will give six examples of the way in which His teaching fulfills the Law and prophets by demanding more, not less, than Torah piety. A pattern emerges as one example follows another: Jesus transforms negative commands into positive ideals and demands a deep personal appropriation of these ideals, one which springs from repentance of heart. The pattern gives concrete meaning to two affirmations in the preceding passage: 1) It clarifies in a practical way what Matthew means by fulfillment. 2) It also clarifies what Matthew means by a righteousness which exceeds that of the legalistic piety of the scribes and Pharisees. As we have seen, Matthew will return to this second point in the third part of the sermon. The preceding passage, as we have seen, also articulates Matthew’s ecclesiology, in which pride of place goes to those who keep the Torah but interpret it in the light of Jesus’ teachings. Gentile “God fearers” belong in the kingdom but follow a less perfect path. The warning against Pharisaical piety makes it clear that interpreting Torah in the light of Jesus’ teaching will set His disciples in opposition to the piety of the “synagogue across the street.”10 Matthew gives this section of the sermon a tight literary structure. Jesus reminds the disciples of some prohibition under Torah piety. Jesus introduces each prohibition with the phrase: “You have heard that it was said” or “It was also said.” He then states the prohibition His teaching fulfills. 10. Cf. Paul Beauchamp, “L’évangile de Matthieu et l’heritage d’Israel,” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 76(1988), pp. 5-38; Wiard Popkes, “Die Gerichteigkeittradition im Matthäus- Evangelium,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 80(1989), pp. 1-23; Robert Mohrlang, Matthew and Paul: A Comparison of Ethical Perspectives (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984).

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Jesus then calls for the interiorization of a positive ideal of conduct which demands more than the negative prohibition He has just cited. The pattern suggests teaching patterns in rabbinic schools, where a rabbi first cites a verse from the Torah and then corrects its misunderstanding. At the end of the sermon, however, Matthew makes it clear that Jesus speaks with a Breath-inspired authority which transcends utterly ordinary scribal instruction. (Mt 7:28-9) Matthew cites six examples of how Jesus’ teaching fulfills the Law and the prophets. First, Jesus does more that just forbid murder as the Mosaic law does. His disciples must not only refrain from killing others, but they must uproot from their hearts any anger, ill will, or contempt which might incline one to hurt or even to contemn another. (Mt 5:21-2) Jesus also demands mutual forgiveness as the test of the authenticity of prayer. He warns that a sacrifice offered to God has no value in God’s eyes when those who offer it remain personally unreconciled with others whom they have wronged. (Mt 5:23-4) Moreover, as He does elsewhere, Jesus also warns that the refusal to forgive others leaves one under the stern judgment of God, who demands our forgiveness of one another as a condition for God’s forgiving us. (Mt 5:21-6) Here, Jesus is not recommending the neurotic repression of negative emotion but its healing in faith through forgiveness.11 Second, Jesus recalls the Old Testament prohibition of adultery. Then He Himself demands not only the avoidance of marital infidelity but the repentance of lustful desires which lead to adulterous conduct. (Mt 5:27-30) Jesus goes further still: He demands that the disciples shun utterly any occasion of sexual sin, or any other sin, for that matter. Jesus uses the hyperbolic language of the middle east: If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and throw it away; it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. (Mt 5:29)

Third, Jesus cites rabbinic debate over the Deuteronomic text which allows husbands to divorce their wives for “some indecency.” Jesus Himself, as He will later do when confronted on the issue by some Pharisees, (Mt 19:3-9) repudiates divorce, except in the case of incestuous union, and warns that the husband who divorces his wife makes her into an adulteress. (Mt 5:31-2) The gloss on incestuous union comes, as we have seen, from Matthew’s pen. The warning about adultery suggests that this third example of how Jesus’ teaching fulfills the Law functions as a commentary on the second: 11. Cf. David Alan Black, “Jesus on Anger: The Text of Matthew 5:22a Revisited,” Novum Testamentum, 30(1988), pp. 1-8.


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namely, on the avoidance of adultery. Jesus warns Hebrew men that if they divorce their wives they equivalently accuse them publicly of adultery and thus make them liable under the Law to death by stoning (Lev 18:20, 20:10; Deut 22:20-1); but He then also warns them that, if they marry a divorced woman, they themselves commit adultery. (Mt 5:32) The first warning alerts the husband to the grave, even fatal consequence, his act might have for his wife. The second warns him not to lust after a divorced woman. These prohibitions presuppose Jesus’ doctrine of the indissolubility of marriage. (Cf. Mt 19:3-9) Fourth, Jesus alludes to the prohibition of perjury in Lev 19:12. Jesus Himself then forbids His disciples to use oaths in ordinary conversation. Jesus seems especially to object to oaths which substitute for the divine name something less sacred: heaven, the temple, earth, Jerusalem. Nor should the disciples in ordinary speech swear by themselves (by their own heads). A “yes” or “no” should suffice. In Jesus’ new ethic, personal integrity of life guarantees the truth of one’s words, not the rhetorical appeal to oaths.12 (Mt 5:33-37) Fifth, Jesus then cites Lev 24:19-20, which prescribes that anyone who disfigures another should as a punishment suffer the same disfigurement: “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.” Jesus, however, enjoins His disciples to resist evil non-violently. Jesus reflects on three typical cases of injustice and oppression. He then suggests particular strategies for responding to oppressive violence non-violently. When masters give a slave a back-handed slap on the right cheek, the slave should turn the left cheek as well. This surprising response is calculated to force the master to confront his or her own violence and to recognize in the one abused a human being with autonomy and personal dignity. (Mt 5:38-39) When in violation of the Torah (Ex 22:25-27), avaricious rich people haul the poor into court to take the very coats off their backs in payment of a debt, the poor should offer their shirts as well in order to dramatize and hold up to ridicule the insatiable greed of the wealthy. (Mt 5:40) When a Roman soldier forces a citizen to carry his pack for a mile, as Roman law allowed, the citizen should offer to go another mile. The soldier who accepted such an offer would, also under Roman law, have himself risked disciplinary action, possibly even flogging. (Mt 5:41-42) In each of the above cases, Jesus does not enunciate a universal principle of moral behavior but gives an example of how to resist violence 12. Cf. Dennis C. Duling, “‘[Do not Swear] by Jerusalem because it Is the City of the Great King’ (Matt 5:35), Journal of Biblical Literature, 110(1991), pp. 291-309; Aiko Ito, “The Question of the Authenticity of the Ban on Swearing (Matthew 5.33-37),” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 43(1991), pp. 5-13; Serbe Ruzer, “The Technique of Composite Citation in the Sermon on the Mount,” Revue Biblique, 103(1996), pp. 65-75; Dernd Kollmann, “Das Schwurverbot Mt 5, 33-37/Jak 5,12 im Spiegel antiker Eidkritik,” Biblische Zeitschrift, 40(1996), pp. 179-193.

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non-violently. Each strategy counsels the disciples to seize the moral initiative in a way which forces the authors of violence both to confront those they oppress as people and to face the violence and injustice of their own behavior. The symbolic act of non-violent resistance challenges those who act violently to repentance and to reconciliation. These concrete strategies do, however, illustrate a general moral principle which Jesus next enunciates: namely, love of enemies. Jesus, in concluding this section of the sermon, alludes to a popular interpretation of Lev 19:17-8, which prescribes love of neighbor. Apparently, some of Jesus’ contemporaries interpreted this to mean that hatred of enemies does not contradict love of neighbor. Jesus, however, demands that His followers love even their enemies and persecutors. Jesus could here be distancing Himself from the Essenes who exhorted their followers “to love all the sons of light....and hate the sons of darkness.”13 (1QS1:9-10) Those who love universally imitate the “perfect (teleios),” universal love of God, who sends the blessings of nature to good and evil alike. Jesus dismisses the idea that one should love only one’s friends as worthy of a self-serving tax collector or a Gentile. He demands much more of His own followers. (Mt 6:43-8) Nowhere does the Old Testament recommend universal love of enemies. The Torah describes three ways of responding to violence: 1) unlimited revenge (Gen 4:15, 24); 2) limited revenge (the lex talionis) (Deut 19:16-21); and 3) the silver rule: “Do not do unto others what you would not have them do unto you.” (Tob 4:15) In calling for love of enemies, Jesus does, then, go beyond what the Law demands.14 The third section of the sermon on the mount enunciates norms for the Christian practice of traditional forms of Jewish piety. It also develops Jesus’ earlier prohibition of performing acts of piety in order that others might see and praise one’s devotion. Matthew’s Jesus approves of such practices but seeks to deepen and purify them. (Mt 5:16; 6:1) Jesus requires that one should conceal traditional acts of personal devotion from the eyes of others, trusting that the Father who knows all things, even secret acts and aspirations, will see and reward one’s piety. By contrast, Jesus denounces the hypocrisy of those who give alms ostentatiously or pray long prayers in public in order to attract attention and have others think them pious. Since such acts of hypocrisy seek an earthly rather than a heavenly reward, the Father will ignore them utterly. The Father will also ignore fasting, if one draws attention to one’s penance for the sake of praise. Since, as we have seen, Jesus and His disciples did not fast with the same rigor as the Pharisees or John’s disciples, this 13. Cf. Joseph Fitzmyer, S.J., “The Dead Sea Scrolls and Early Christianity,” Theology Digest, 42(1995), pp. 303-319. 14. Cf. Mohrland, Matthew and Paul, pp. 94-125.


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teaching about the proper way to fast target ascetical practices in Matthew’s community.15 (Mt 6:5-8, 16-8) After Jesus’ injunction that the disciples do their praying in private, Matthew inserts the Our Father as a paradigm of Christian prayer. (Mt 6:9-13) Since I have already reflected in some detail on the meaning of the Our Father in the course of examining Jesus’ relationship to the Father, I refer the reader here to that commentary. The fourth part of the sermon on the mount enunciates seven fundamental precepts for life in the kingdom of God: 1) the willingness to live not just for this life but for the next (Mt 6:19-21), 2) integrity of intention (Mt 6:22-3), 3) the renunciation of riches (Mt 6:24), 3) trust in God’s providential care (Mt 6:25-34), 4) the repentant refusal to judge other people harshly (Mt 7:1-5), 5) reverent care for holy things (Mt 7:6), 6) faith-filled prayer (Mt 7:7-11), and 7) the willingness to abide by the golden rule.16 Matthew probably intended these seven injunctions to illumine one another. For example, in enjoining His disciples to live for the next life rather than for this one, Jesus uses the image of storing up treasures in heaven rather than on earth. (Mt 6:19-21) The renunciation of riches expresses, then, eschatological longing. (Mt 6:1-4) The willingness to live poorly (Mt 6:24) presupposes and expresses trust in the providential care of the Father, who clothes the very grass with flowers and feeds the wild birds. (Mt 6:25-34) Those who live thus value life more than possessions. They also set their hearts first on the kingdom, in confidence that the Father will in fact tend to their physical needs. (Mt 6:24-34) Similarly, trust in the Father’s providential care (Mt 6:24-34) also takes concrete expression in one’s willingness to bring before Him one’s every need in prayer; for if human children can trust sinful parents to care for them, how much more will the heavenly Father care for those who turn to Him in need! (Mt 7:7-18) Trust in the Father’s providential care does not, however, mean that one closes one’s eyes unrealistically to the needs and hardships of this life. (Mt 6:34) The golden rule seeks to alleviate those hardships. It enjoins active mutual concern for one another’s needs. In citing the golden rule, Jesus notes that it summarizes the meaning of the Law and the prophets which He has come to fulfill. (Mt 7:12, 5:17) In other words, besides simple living, active mutual care and concern for one another lie at the heart of the kingdom Jesus proclaims. 15. Cf. Kari Syreeni, “Separation and Identity: Aspects of the Symbolic World of Matt. 6.1- 18),” Novum Testamentum, 40(1994), pp. 522-541. 16. Cf. J. Duncan M. Derrett, “Christ and Reproof (Matthew 7. 1-5/ Luke 6.37-42),” New Testament Studies, 34(1988), pp. 271-281; Albright and Mann, op.cit., pp. c-cv.

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Such mutual love and care must also express a mutual personal openness to one another which precludes passing judgment on one another. Jesus warns that those who judge others can expect God to judge them by the same standard with which they measure other people. Moreover, judgmental attitudes betray a self-righteousness which needs repentance. (Mt 7:1-5) Self-righteousness violates purity of intention. By the same token, commitment to all of these practical ideals of life in the kingdom must flow not only from a repentant heart but from an intention purified of all hypocrisy and duplicity. (Mt 6:22-3) Jesus next enunciates two proverbs. The first forbids giving dogs meat sacrificed to God. The second forbids throwing pearls to swine lest they turn and rend one. Both sayings probably refer to the proclamation of the gospel. (Mt 7:6) They probably reflect Matthew’s belief that the gospel enunciates a secret wisdom to which the disciples of Jesus have privileged access in faith. (Mt 13:10-7) Here Matthew’s Jesus warns His disciples against sharing this secret wisdom indiscriminately. Rather, communicate it only to those inclined to respond favorably. The warning could well reflect pastoral experience in Matthew’s community.17 Having summarized the fundamental demands of life in the kingdom, Matthew’s Jesus concludes the sermon on the mount with three warnings and an injunction. First, Jesus warns His disciples not to underestimate the difficulty of doing what He says; but He also warns them that the stakes are high. Like the book of Deuteronomy, Jesus is placing before the disciples a choice between life and death. (Mt 7:13-4; Deut 30:15-20) The second and third warnings probably target problems in the Antiochene church. Jesus cautions His disciples against false prophets and gives them a norm for identifying them: what they say and do will bear evil fruit. Matthew’s Jesus also warns His disciples against charismania: against prizing dramatic feats of charismatic prowess—like prophesying, exorcising, or working miracles—more than the obedience of faith. Those who covet such gifts but neglect the moral demands of gospel living will find themselves rejected by Jesus in the final judgment. (Mt 7:21-3; cf. 1 Cor 13) This final warning introduces the injunction which closes the sermon on the mount. The parable describes two men who built their homes, one on rock, the other on sand. The first house withstood the onslaught of nature; the second fell. The disciples must either build their lives on the solid rock of Jesus’ teaching or face utter ruin under the stress of

17. Cf. Neil J. McEleny, “The Unity and Theme of Mt 7:1-12,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 56(1994), pp. 490-500; Stephen Llewelyn, “Mt 7:6A: Mistranslation of Interpretation,” Novum Testamentum, 31(1989), pp. 97-103; Hermann von Lips, “Schweine Füttert man, Hunde nicht— ein Versuch, das Rätsel von Matthäus 7:6 zu lösen,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 79(1988), pp. 165-186.


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adversity. They will build on rock, if they not only hear what Jesus says but do what He demands. (Mt 7:24-27) After Jesus finishes speaking the crowds marvel at the personal authority (exousian) of His discourse. Unlike other scribes and rabbis, Jesus has no need to cite other authorities to justify His teaching. Matthew, of course, recognizes Jesus’ authority as prophetic, divine, and Breath-inspired.18 (Mt 3:16-7, 21:23-7) (II) Jesus’ second great discourse, His missionary discourse, follows His admonition that the disciples should ask the Father, “the Lord of the harvest,” to send more laborers into the harvest. It also follows the call of the Twelve. (Mt 9:35-38) That call fulfills in turn Jesus’ promise in calling Peter, Andrew, James, and John that He would make them “fishers of men.” (Mt 4:19-20) Matthew underscores this last point by having Jesus communicate to the Twelve before He sends them to work in the harvest of souls His own charismatic authority over demons as well as His power to heal. (Mt 10:1, 8) Finally, the missioning of the Twelve also foreshadows the Great Commission which closes Matthew’s gospel. (Mt 28:16-20) The Missionary Discourse The missionary discourse divides into two parts: 1) the formal commissioning of the disciples and 2) warnings and counsels about the correct fulfillment of the commission.19 As we have seen, in contrast to the Great Commission which closes Matthew’s gospel, in the missionary discourse Jesus sends the Twelve exclusively to “the lost sheep of the house of Israel,” neither to the Gentiles nor to Samaritans. In other words, like Jesus Himself they must seek out especially the poor, the marginal, and the oppressed members of Israel, “the people of the land,” the slaves, and the expendables. (Mt 10:5-6) As He sends the Twelve forth to labor, Jesus explicitly tells them to proclaim the reign of God and to confirm their message with miracles and exorcisms, just as Jesus does. Jesus explicitly gives them the power to cleanse lepers: i.e., to work miracles of inclusion. He even empowers them to raise the dead, no doubt as a foreshadowing of the gift of risen life which they will impart when they baptize in the triune name. (Mt 10:7-8) Instructions on the proper way to evangelize follow the commissioning. First, membership in the kingdom has come to the disciples as pure gift; hence, they must give the same gift to others free of charge, although they can legitimately claim the hospitality of those who accept their teach18. Cf. Mohrlang, Matthew and Paul, pp. 72-93. 19. Cf. Waetjen, op.cit., pp.131-138.

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ing in faith. Indeed, the kingdom demands such free sharing of the physical supports of life. (Mt 10:8) Second, the disciples must travel light and move fast because they recognize the urgency of their message and because they trust in God to provide for their needs through those whom they will evangelize. Third, they must not waste their breath on those who reject their message; instead, they should shake the very dust of the unbelieving town from their feet as a sign that they share nothing in common with it. The peace with which they greet believers will rest on them, but not upon unbelievers. Those who refuse them faith will risk a worse judgment than Sodom and Gomorrah on the last day. (Mt 10:11-15) As in Mark, these instructions, like the others which Matthew later appends to Mark’s original discourse, provide Christian missionaries with a compendium of practical norms for the conduct of their ministry. Jesus next warns the Twelve that they can, like Him, expect to meet with violent opposition and hostility. With these warnings, Matthew’s account of Jesus’ ministry which began on a note of hope and healing takes a decisive turn toward Calvary. Behold I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves; so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves. Beware of men; for they will deliver you up to councils, and flog you in their synagogues, and you will be dragged before governors and kings for my sake to bear testimony before them and the Gentiles. When they deliver you up, do not be anxious how you are to speak or what you are to say; for what you are to say will be given to you in that hour; for it is not you who speak, but the Breath of your Father speaking through you. (Mt 10:16-20)

Matthew situates the missionary discourse during Jesus’ mortal ministry; but this passage contains three clues that the evangelist intends it to apply to the situation of the apostolic Church and, more specifically, of His own community: 1) testifying before governors and kings contradicts Jesus’ earlier charge not to preach to the Gentiles. 2) Nowhere in the gospels does one find a case of one of the disciples undergoing flogging in a synagogue. 3) The disciples reliance on the “Breath of your Father” suggests the situation of the post-resurrection, Breath-baptized Church. Jesus next warns that hostility to the spread of the gospel will come even from members of one’s own family and that faith in Him will divide members of one’s own household against one another. This prediction probably envisages especially the ostracism of converts by Jewish families when they converted to Christianity. (Mt 10:21-22) In proclaiming the gospel, the Twelve should expect to encounter a universal hostility: “you will be hated by all for my name’s sake.” (Mt 10:22) With the wisdom of serpents (Mt 10:14), they should not resist


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hostility but flee it. Moreover, Jesus promises that, as they move from town to town to avoid persecution, “you will not have gone through all the towns of Israel, before the Son of Man comes.” (Mt 10:23) As we have seen, this saying of Jesus suggests that at some point in His ministry He may have hoped that the kingdom would come soon. If so, Matthew probably records this pronouncement because he looked upon Jesus’ resurrection as sufficient fulfillment of what He prophesied. Matthew’s Jesus warns the Twelve to expect hostility and persecution to come especially from the Pharisees. If the Pharisees have called Jesus Beelzebul, they will call the disciples even worse. (Mt 10:24-5) In other words, the conflict between the church at Antioch and the “synagogue across the street” prolongs the hostility with which at least some Pharisees greeted Jesus’ ministry. Having commissioned, instructed, and warned the Twelve, Jesus appends three additional norms for correct evangelization. First, despite persecution, the Twelve must proclaim the secret wisdom of the gospel boldly and fearlessly: “from the housetops.” Reverence for God and fear of damnation must relativize any fear they have for mere humans who can only kill the body. (Mt 10:24-9) Instead, a sure hope for vindication at the last judgment should ensure bold proclamation: “for nothing is covered that will not be revealed, or hidden that will not be known.” (Mt 10:24) Second, in a hostile world, the Twelve must in their ministry of proclamation also trust the Father’s present providential care over each one of them, since His providence encompasses the most insignificant events, even the fall of a sparrow. Jesus adds with peasant irony: “Fear not, therefore, you are worth more than many sparrows.” (Mt 10:29-31) Third in proclaiming the gospel, the Twelve must also trust Jesus Himself. He will testify before the Father on behalf of those who testify to Him and will deny before the Father those who deny Him. (Mt 10:32-3) These verses again strike an eschatological note. The testimony by Jesus of which Matthew speaks suggests the final judgment. Jesus follows these three injunctions with a second warning that suffering and renunciation await any evangelist. In the conduct of the apostolate, the Twelve must stand ready to renounce father and mother, son and daughter, if required, for Jesus’ sake. They must even, when necessary, sacrifice their lives for the gospel. (Mt 10:34-39) This second warning contains Matthew’s first explicit reference to the cross of Jesus: “one who does not take up one’s cross and follow me is not worthy of me.” (Mt 10:38) In the narrative section which precedes the missionary discourse, Matthew, as we have seen first introduces the theme of conflict. Here, in the discourse itself, the evangelist looks forward to Calvary. In Mark, by contrast, Jesus faces toward Calvary from the very

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first. Mark, as we have seen, first refers explicitly to Calvary in the third of the five conflict stories which begin Jesus’ Galilean ministry. In the fifth story, Jesus enemies begin to plot against His life. The missionary discourse concludes on a positive note. Jesus reflects on the privileges and rewards of the apostolate. He first promises: “Whoever receives you receives Me, and whoever receives Me receives Him who sent Me.” (Mt 10:40) The apostles should realize that despite any opposition to their proclamation of the gospel, they bear God to people. Both the Father and the Son so identify with them that, in accepting the disciples, people will in fact be accepting God and God’s own Son. The apostolate will, moreover, bring a rich reward to those who engage in it, a reward in which those who receive the gospel will share. The smallest kindness showed to the apostles, prophets, and evangelists in their ministry will have its appropriate reward, since the kindness associates one with and fosters the ministry of those helped. (Mt 10:41-3) (III) As in Mark, Jesus begins the parabolic discourse from a boat on the Sea of Galilee in order to avoid the press of the crowds. (Mt 13:1-2; Mk 4:1) In Mark Jesus directs some parables to the crowd and others to the disciples. Matthew, however, clearly divides the parabolic discourse into two parts. In the first, Jesus teaches the crowds from the boat; in the second, He leaves the crowds behind and instructs the disciples in parables in the secrecy of a house to which they retire.20 (Mt 13:34-6) The Parabolic Discourse As we have seen, Matthew adopts Mark’s interpretation of the parables as conundrums designed to conceal the mystery of the kingdom from unbelievers at the same time that they disclose it to believing disciples. In fact, Jesus used parables in order to subvert the familiar world of sympathetic listeners and to open them to the inbreaking reality of God’s reign. Jesus may, however, have trusted in part to the ambiguity of narrative thought in order to conceal the more revolutionary implications of His teachings from His enemies. Matthew, however, softens somewhat Mark’s teaching on this point. Mark portrays the parables as the instruments of a mysterious providence which reveals the gospel to some and conceals it from others. (Mk 4:11-2) Matthew, however, wants the reader to understand that lack of faith rather than an arbitrary divine decree prevents unbelievers from grasping the message of parables. In explaining why He teaches in parables, Matthew’s Jesus says: 20. Cf. Jürgen Roloff, “Das Kirchenverstœndnis des Matthœus in Spiegel seiner Gleichnisse,” New Testament Studies, 38(1992), pp. 337-356; Watejen, op. cit., pp.151-158.


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For to the one who has will more be given, and he will have abundance; but from the one who has not even what he has shall be take away. This is why I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. (Mt 13:12-13)

In other words, Matthew insists that lack of generosity and of faith on the part of those who hear the gospel renders the parables meaningless to them. Mark, as we have seen, applies the proverb to the disciples. (Mk 4:5) Moreover, Matthew embellishes Mark’s theological interpretation of the parables in three other ways. First, he links the parables to the theme of fulfillment, so prominent in his gospel. He cites the unbelief which greeted Jesus’ preaching as a fulfillment Is 6:9-10. Second, Matthew insists on the blessedness which comes from grasping the mystery of the kingdom. That knowledge fulfills the longings of all the prophets and righteous people of the old Law. Finally, Matthew portrays the obscurity of the parabolic discourse as a fit literary medium for conveying the secret plan of salvation conceived by God before the creation of the world and only now revealed in the teachings of Jesus. He alone has privileged access to the Father’s saving intentions. (Mt 13:14-7, 34-5) The fact that the evangelist records seven parables in all probability implicitly invokes ancient numerology, which regarded seven as a perfect number. The seven parables symbolize, therefore, the perfection of the salvation revealed in Christ. In his parabolic discourse to the crowds, Matthew’s Jesus uses the parables to strike largely apologetic themes. The parable of the astonishing harvest predicts that the kingdom, despite some setbacks, will bear astonishingly abundant fruit. (Mt 13:1-2) The parable of the wheat and the weeds predicts that hostility will not prevent the kingdom from bearing fruit; nor will its enemies escape retribution, even though God presently suffers their hostility with patience. (Mt 13:24-30) The parable of the mustard seed foretells that despite the smallness of its beginnings, the kingdom will develop into a great, welcoming, and subversive reality.21 (Mt 13:31- 32) Finally, in comparing the kingdom to a woman leavening dough, Jesus foretells that eventually the kingdom will impregnate and transform everything. (Mt 13:33) The warnings which these parables contain suggest two motives for the crowd’s failure to put faith in Jesus. First, they long for a different kind of kingdom from the humble kingdom which Jesus proclaims. Second, they want immediate results from Jesus’ ministry and lack the patience and insight to abide God’s timing. 21. Cf. Jean Bernardi, “‘Cent, soixante et trente’: Matthieu 13,8,” Revue Biblique, 98(1991), pp. 398-402.

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In the first part of the parabolic discourse, Matthew allegorizes the parable of the astonishing harvest and applies it to the disciples. The parable teaches the same lessons as Mark: the need for deep faith to resist Satan in times of persecution, the renunciation of worldly wealth and cares. (Mt 13:18-30; Mk 4:13-20) The second part of the parabolic discourse, which Matthew’s Jesus also addresses specifically to the disciples, takes place privately, in the intimacy of a house. This part of the discourse also introduces completely new material absent from Mark’s parabolic discourse. This section of the discourse begins with an allegorization of the parable of the weeds among the wheat. As we saw in considering Jesus’ relationship to Satan, the allegory endows the parable with eschatological meaning by transforming it into a description of the last judgment. Despite Satan’s attempt to undermine the kingdom, by sowing his “children” among the “children of the kingdom,” at the last judgment (symbolized by the harvest) Jesus will send His angels (laborers) to separate the good (the wheat) from the evil (the weeds). He will reward the former and cast the latter into the burning fire of divine judgment. For Matthew, the weeds refer especially to those harrassing his community and trying to subvert its faith in Jesus’ resurrection. (Mt 13:36-43) A later parable describes fishermen sorting out the edible and inedible fish caught in an enormous dragnet. Jesus then compares the fishermen to the angels who will assist in the final judgment by separating the good from the wicked. They cast the wicked into a furnace of fire where they wail and grind their teeth. (Mt 13:47-50) Both allegories deal with the final judgment. In the allegory about the weed and wheat, the angels sort out good from evil in the world. Since the allegory of the fishermen targets the disciples in a special way, it warns that the angels of judgement will also sort out those who claim to belong to the kingdom. The parable about the fish, then, warns against complacency. One cannot assume that membership in the kingdom assures salvation unless one brings forth works of righteousness. This second allegory makes fundamentally the same point as Matthew’s addition to the parable of the king who gave a banquet. (Mt 22:11-4) Clearly, Matthew desires the disciples of Jesus to keep before them the winnowing which will occur on the last day.22 The parables of the treasure in the field and of the pearl of great price also target the disciples. As we have seen, both parables portray the kingdom as of incomparable value. In both a person finds something (the treasure hidden in the field, the extremely valuable pearl) of such worth that he willingly and joyfully sacrifices the rest of his possessions in order 22. Cf. Charles E. Carleston, “Parable and Allegory Revisited: An Interpretative Review,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 43(1981), pp. 228-242.


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to have it. (Mt 13:44-5) These parables portray the kingdom as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, as something not to miss but also as something demanding the sacrifice of everything else. The reward, however, far outstrips the sacrifice; and both the reward itself and the search for it have priceless value. The parabolic discourse, as we have also seen, ends with Jesus asking the disciples if they have understood the parables He has told them. With an insight which far surpasses the disciples in Mark, they reply that they have. (Mt 13:51) Jesus then tells a final parable which depicts the disciples as scribes for the kingdom of heaven. He compares them to a householder who brings out from his treasure both new and old things. (Mt 13:52) A sound interpretation of the gospel, Matthew is asserting, does not reject the Torah, but interprets it in the light of the new revelation made by God in Jesus. (Mt 5:17-9) (IV) Scholars debate whether the ecclesial discourse targets all the disciples or just Church leaders. Some take the three references to “little ones” in the first part of the discourse as referring to the relationship between leaders of the community and the rest of the disciples, who constitute the “little ones”. (Mt 18:6, 10, 14) The term “little ones,” however, could just as well refer to the weakest, lowliest, and most marginal members of the community who should engage the special active concern of better advantaged Christians. In verse 21, concern shifts from the “little ones” to “your brother.” I do not, then, find in the references to the “little ones” conclusive evidence that the first part of the discourse targets leaders only. I therefore take the discourse as targeting all disciples, leaders included. Such an interpretation also better accords with Matthew’s egalitarian vision of Church leadership. The Ecclesial Discourse The discourse develops several themes, all of them related to right relations among the disciples in community: 1) the need for humility and self-effacement, 2) absolute avoidance of scandalizing another believer, 3) concern to reconcile those who stray, 4) the need for mutual forgiveness as well as proper procedures for effecting mutual reconciliation in community, and 5) the need to offer heartfelt forgiveness no matter how many times one needs to do it. Two teachings in the ecclesial discourse derive from Mark: the practice of hospitality (Mk 9:33-37) and the avoidance of scandal. (Mk 9:42-50, 18:7-9) The rest of the discourse derives from other sources.23 23. Cf. Watejen, op. cit., pp. 183-191; O Hermant, “Structure litteraire du ‘discours communautaire’ de Matthieu 18,” Revue Biblique, (103), pp. 76-90.

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The disciples occasion the discourse by asking Jesus, “Who is greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” (Mt 18:1) The disciples’ question suggests that they have been arguing about which of them counts as greatest in the kingdom and can find no answer. Mark, in a parallel passage makes it perfectly clear that the disciples were indeed disputing about which of them ranks as the greatest. (Mk 9:33) Matthew, once again, however, paints a less negative portrait of the disciples than Mark and only hints at the dispute. Jesus dramatizes His response by calling over a small child. Symbolically, He puts the child in the midst of the disciples and says: Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child, he is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. (Mt 18:2-5)

This saying of Jesus does not occur in Mark. Jesus is not suggesting that all children display spontaneous humility. Rather He uses the child as a symbol of one who consciously experiences personal neediness, vulnerability, and dependence. In ancient law a child did not become a person until it reached maturity. It lacked any power of self-assertion and independent action. Jesus makes the willingness to embrace freely such lowly self-effacement not only the criterion for greatness in the kingdom but a condition for entering it. The response rebukes the arrogance and ambition of any Christian by making it clear that far from having a special claim to greatness in the kingdom, the ambitious and arrogant have yet to comprehend the most basic conditions for membership. They must “turn,” repent of all self-promotion and lust for power, even in order to enter the kingdom. Once in it, they must then cultivate the lowliness, vulnerability, and dependency of a child if they hope for greatness. The reply applies to all disciples; but, as we shall see, it rebukes especially arrogance and ambition in any who lead the community. Matthew, then, puts fidelity to Jesus’ egalitarian vision of community at the head of the lessons which the disciples need to learn about Church life. Matthew omits the touching detail in Mark that Jesus commanded the disciples to welcome the small child while embracing one. Matthew’s Jesus proclaims: Whoever receives one such child in my name receives Me; but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened round his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea. Woe to the world for temptations to sin! For it is necessary that temptations come, but woe to the one by whom the temptation comes! (Mt 18:5-8; cf. Mk 9:36, 42-50)


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In warning against scandalizing other members of the community, Jesus begins by reminding the disciples that He identifies personally with the least and lowliest so totally that He regards anything done to them as done to Himself. The reminder puts the first prohibition of scandal into its proper Christological context. Like Mark, Matthew portrays scandalizing another member of the community—”who believes in Me”—as a betrayal of Christological faith through failure to recognize Christ in one’s neighbor. Jesus recognizes the moral inevitability of scandal but holds accountable the one who causes another disciple to sin gravely. Matthew’s Jesus then echoes Mark’s with the hyperbolic warning that it would be better to amputate any part of the body which becomes an occasion of sin rather than commit the sin itself. In Matthew, this teaching echoes a similar teaching in the sermon on the mount. (Mt 18:8-9; cf. Mt 5:29-30, Mk 9:43-8) Its presence in two major discourses underscores the importance of avoiding sin and scandal. Finally, Matthew’s Jesus warns against looking down on (kataphronesete) one of the “little ones,” since “their angels behold the face of Father who is in heaven.” Having an angelic look-alike who dwells in the presence of God asserts the personal care which God takes of each individual. (Mt 18:10) If the Father shows a personal care for the smallest and the least, the disciples can do no less. The negative precept of avoiding scandal and arrogance now finds a positive correlate in active concern to search out and bring to reconciliation disciples who do sin. This active concern to reconcile sinners imitates in its own way not only the Father’s providential care for each person but also Jesus’ proclamation of divine forgiveness and table fellowship with sinners. What do you think? If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go in search of the one that went astray? And if he finds it, I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over the ninety-nine that ever went astray. So it is not the will of my Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish. (Mt 18:12-4)

This teaching too has no parallel in Mark and portrays the Father as absolutely committed to forgive the repentant sinner any evil he or she has done. (Mt 9:10-13) Accordingly, Matthew’s Jesus warns the Christian community never to hold grudges against those who betray it. Instead, the community should rejoice when backsliders repent and seek reconciliation. The saying especially challenges community leaders to take risks—to leave the ninety-nine, if necessary—in order to reconcile the fallen.24 24. Cf. Donahue, op.cit., pp. 72-73.

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Procedures for mutual reconciliation in community follow. These procedures probably reflect Church discipline at Antioch. If Christian offends Christian, reconciliation begins when the offended party seeks out the offender. That the offended party takes the initiative exemplifies active concern to reconcile sinners. One “gains” the offender by bringing the individual to repentance and recommitment to gospel living. If at all possible, then, reconciliation should advance initially at a private, personal level and should engage only those already involved in the offense. (Mt 18:15) If this initial attempt at reconciliation fails, then, the one offended should appeal to other members of the community to act as mediators. If this mediatorial intervention fails, then the matter should come before the entire community and its leaders for judgment. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. (Mt 18:17)

The fact that the offense in question could occasion excommunication suggests that Matthew has serious wrongs in mind. Moreover, Matthew portrays the act of excommunication as not simply the act of the community’s leaders but as an act of the entire community acting corporately and collectively. In this context, Matthew’s Jesus fulfills the promise He had made to Peter in Mt. 16:19 and confers the power of the keys, the power to bind and loose upon the church and its leaders. In other words, Matthew makes it clear that any rabbinic exercise of the power of the keys requires the community’s sanction. Church leaders cannot, then, bind or loose any member of the community out of personal whim or spite. The action requires the community as a whole to endorse it. (Mt 18:18) Matthew’s Jesus underscores both the collegial and the communal character of any exercise of the power of the keys. He does so in the following terms: Again I say to you, if any of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst of them. (Mt 18:19-20)

These two pronouncements sanction the communal exercise of binding and loosing by appealing to the experience of shared worship. Answered prayer manifests the presence of the risen Jesus in His community. That presence in turn sanctions the community’s exercise of the power of the keys.25 25. Cf. Kilian McDonnell and George Montague, Christian Initiation and Baptism in the Holy Spirit: Evidence From the First Eight Centuries (Collegeville, MI: The Liturgical


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The ecclesial discourse ends with a strong insistence on the need for limitless forgiveness as the mark of any Christian community. In a passage which again finds no parallel in Mark, Peter asks Jesus: “Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me and I forgive him? As many as seven times?” (Mt 18:21-2) In ancient numerology, the number seven counts as a perfect number. Peter is therefore asking Jesus, “At what point does forgiveness reach perfection?”; or, to put the matter differently, “As what point have I forgiven sufficiently so that I no longer have any further need to forgive?” Jesus replies: “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy times seven times.” (Mt 18:22) In effect, Jesus replies: “No definite number makes forgiveness perfect. Rather, keep on forgiving as often as you find offense.” Jesus’ reply could possibly allude to and reverse the bloodthirsty boast of Lamech who promises to take more than ten times as much vengeance for any offense as Cain did. (Gen 4:24) In the kingdom limitless forgiveness, not limitless vengeance, provides the fundamental rule of life. Jesus then tells the parable of the unforgiving servant as a way of re-enforcing the need for unlimited forgiveness. A servant owes his Gentile lord an enormous sum: ten thousand talents, or more than fifteen annual salaries. When called to account, he finds himself and his family threatened with slavery by an angry lord. Their price on the slave block will only partially replace the debt the servant owes. When the servant begs for mercy and for time to pay, the lord who ordinarily acts with Gentile ruthlessness surprisingly relents and forgives the entire enormous sum. The forgiven servant, however, shows no such mercy to a fellow servant who owes him a significant but comparatively trifling sum: a hundred denarii, or one hundred days’ wages. When the second servant begs the first for mercy in exactly the same way as the latter had begged the lord, the first servant has the second servant thrown into prison. When the other servants inform the lord, the latter in anger rebukes the unforgiving servant for not showing the same mercy he received. The lord then inflicts on the unforgiving servant, not slavery, but the same Press, 1991); José Caba, S.J., “El poder de la peticion communitaria (Mt 18:19-20), Gregorianum, 54(1973), pp. 609-654; J. Duncan M. Derrett, “‘Where Two or Three Are Convened in My Name’: A Sad Misunderstanding,” Expository Times, 91(1979), pp. 83-86; Jean Galot, S.J., “Qu’il soit pour toi comme le paien et le publican,” Nouvelle Revue Théologique, 96(1974), pp. 1009-1030; Jacob Neusner, “‘By the Testimony of Two Witnesses’ in the Damascus Document IX, 17-22 and in Pharisaic Rabbinic Law,” Revue de Qumran, 8(1972-1975), pp. 197-217; Beat Weber, “Schulden erstatten, Schulden erlassen: Am matthäschen Gebrauch einiger juristischer und monetäer Begriffe,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 83(1992), pp. 253- 256.

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fate as he had decided for his debtor: imprisonment until he pays in full. Even in his anger, however, the lord still grants the first servant’s original request. He gives him time to pay the huge debt; but for his lack of mercy the first servant will spend that time in prison. The parable concludes on a familiar theme in Matthew: “So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart.” (Mt 18:23-35) Because the refusal to forgive sets one in opposition to a forgiving God, one cannot experience forgiveness unless one repents of one’s own unwillingness to forgive. Compassionate mutual forgiveness among fellow servants characterizes life in Matthew’s egalitarian Christian community.26 The eschatological discourse prophesies the kingdom’s consummation. The following section examines its message. (V) In Matthew, as we have seen, the eschatological discourse follows both upon the woes against the scribes and Pharisees and upon Jesus’ lament over Jerusalem. As in Mark, the discourse targets the disciples. As in Mark, it predicts the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem and gives the disciples instructions about how to live in the eschaton. As in Mark, the disciples occasion the discourse by pointing out the temple buildings to Jesus. Matthew, however, edits out Mark’s reference to the massive stonework of the Herodian temple.27 (Mt 24:1; Mk 13:1) The Eschatological Discourse As in Mark, Matthew’s Jesus predicts that cataclysmic events will precede the arrival of the final judgment. They, however, only begin the trials which will visit the earth before the parousia. (Mt 24:3-14) Like Mark’s Jesus, Matthew’s envisages no idyllic “end time” for His disciples. At this point Matthew departs from Mark’s text. Mark’s Jesus prophesies that the disciples will face fierce persecution from state and synagogue and will suffer betrayal even by members of their own families. (Mk 13:9-13) Matthew has transposed this prediction into his missionary discourse (Mt 10:17-23) and therefore omits it here. Instead, he replaces it with a general warning to the disciples to expect tribulation, martyrdom, betrayal, the defection of believers, and hatred everywhere. 26. Cf. Martinus C. De Boer, “Ten Thousand Talents? Matthew’s Interpretation and Redaction of the Parable of the Unforgiving Servant,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 50(1988), pp. 214-232; Thomas Brodie, O.P., “Fish, Temple, Tithe, and Remission: The God-Based Generosity of Deuteronomy 14-15 as one Component of Matt 17:22-18:23,” Revue Biblique, 99(1992), pp. 697-718; Dominique Hermant, “Structure litteraire de ‘discours communitaire’ de Matthieu 18,” Revue Biblique, 103(1996), pp. 76-90. 27. Cf. Watejen, op. cit., pp. 225-234.


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Jesus also foresees the coming of false prophets, the multiplication of wickedness, and the loss of religious fervor. As in Mark, however, Jesus warns that the end will not come until all nations hear the gospel preached to them. Here as in Mark, that warning puts the second coming off to a very indefinite future.28 (Mt 24:9-14; Mk 13:9-13) The prophecy of the abomination of desolation follows. In Mark, as we saw, this prophecy could refer to Caligula’s attempt to erect his own statue in the Jerusalem temple. Matthew, however, writes after the destruction of the temple. He, therefore, probably sees that tragedy as the fulfillment of Jesus’ prophecy. (Mt 24:15; Mk 13:15) Matthew reproduces with only minor editing the substance of Mark’s version of Jesus’ advice to the disciples in Jerusalem as doom approaches the holy city.29 (Mt 24:15-22) Matthew expands somewhat the prediction which follows in Mark’s discourse. The prediction warns that many false prophets will arise and seek to deceive, if possible, even the elect. Matthew Jesus adds: So if they say to you, “Lo, he is in the wilderness,” do not go out; if they say, “Lo, he is in the inner rooms,” do not believe it. For as lightning comes from the east and shines as far as the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. Wherever the body is, there the vultures will be gathered. (Mt 24:25-8)

The passage provides a transition from the warning against false prophets to the description of the day of the Son of Man which follows. The image of lightning suggests that the second coming will happen suddenly, unpredictably, and with complete openness. The proverb about vultures openly congregating around carrion also points to the public and unmistakable character of the second coming. One can usually espy circling vultures from a distance, especially in the desert. The saying about the vultures also connotes inevitability: as vultures gather with unavoidable 28. Cf. Domingo Muñoz León, “Jesus y la apocaliptica pesimista (A proposito de Lc 18:8b y Mt 24:12,” Estudios Biblicos, 46(1988), pp. 457-495; Ingo Broer, “Redaktionsgeschichtliche Aspecke von Mt 24:1-28,” Novum Testamentum, 35(1993), pp. 209-233; Justin Taylor, S.M., “‘The Love of Many will Grow Cold’: Matt 24:9-13 and the Neronian Persecution,” Revue Biblique, 96(1989), pp. 352-357; David C. Sim, Apocalyptic Eschatology in the Gospel of Matthew (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996). 29. Cf. Nikolaus Walter, “Tempezerstörung und synoptische Apokalypse,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 57(1966), pp. 38-49; Graham N. Stanton, “‘Pray that your Flight may not be in Winter or on a Sabbath (Matthew 24.20),”Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 37(1989), pp.17-30; Eric Kun-Chun Wong, “The Matthaean Understanding of the Sabbath: A Response to G.N. Stanton,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 44(1991), pp. 3-18.

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predictability to consume desert carrion, so with a similar predictability will the day of judgment come.30 Again following Mark, Matthew’s Jesus next describes the second coming: after the tribulations which precede the second coming have played themselves out, cosmic signs in the heavens will announce the arrival of the Son of Man. At His approach the powers of heaven will be shaken, since He comes to end their domination of the earth. (Mt 24:29; Mk 13:24-5) While Mark simply says that after cosmic portents “they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds with great power and glory,” (Mk 13:26) Matthew’s Jesus says: Then will appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. (Mt 24:30)

The “sign of the Son of Man” and His appearance riding gloriously and majestically on clouds probably refer to the same event. Matthew’s text alludes both to the vision of the Son of Man in Daniel (Dan 7:13-4) and to Zechariah’s prophecy of the pierced one. (Zech 12:10) Matthew’s vision of the second coming also differs slightly from Mark’s, who portrays it in purely positive terms. Mark’s Jesus returns to break the powers which oppress the earth; He also sends His angels to gather His elect to Himself from the four corners of the earth. Matthew, by contrast, has the appearance of the Son of Man elicit grief and mourning from all the tribes of the earth, namely, from those who do not number among the elect and who recognize that the time of retribution has come. (Mt 24:30-1; Mk 13:26-7) Mark’s eschatological discourse ends with admonitions about the need for watchfulness and readiness for the end whenever it comes. Matthew repeats these warnings and expands them. As in Mark, Matthew’s Jesus uses the parable of the fig tree to bring his discourse to a conclusion. When leaves appear on the fig, one knows that summer approaches: so too when “all these things happen” the disciples will know that the second coming approaches. (Mt 24:32-3; Mk 28-9) As in Mark, Jesus predicts that “this generation will not pass away until all these things take place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.” (Mt 24:34-5; Mk 13:30-1) Like Mark, Matthew has placed the second coming at a distant future, after the evangelization of all the nations. To what then does “all these things” refer? As in Mark, the phrase could point either to the destruc30. Cf. Matthew Black, “The Aramaic Dimension in Q with Notes on Luke 17.22 and Matthew 24.26 (Luke 17.23),” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 40(1990), pp. 33-41; Nikolaus Walter, op. cit., pp. 38-49.


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tion of Jerusalem or to Jesus’ resurrection as the event which assures a final judgment. Or Matthew, like Mark, could be reproducing a saying of Jesus which indicates that He hoped for the rapid establishment of the kingdom. In the last analysis, however, the disciples can have no more certain knowledge than Jesus about the precise date for “all these things” to happen. Mark at this point concludes the discourse with a brief but urgent warning to live in watchfulness, ready for the second coming whenever it occurs. (Mk 13:33-7) Matthew, however, expands considerably on Mark’s text. In a sense, all nineteen verses of the rest of the eschatological discourse in Matthew take the form of an extended meditation on verse 36: But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only. (Mt 24:36; cf. Mk 13:32)

In appending several teachings about watchfulness to Mark’s original eschatological discourse, Matthew shatters its chiastic structure. Moreover, Matthew’s Jesus repeatedly warns in the extended eschatological discourse that external appearances count for nothing in the final judgment. Hence, all Christians, including their leaders, must live in sincere readiness for the final judgment. Matthew compares the second coming to the flood which took the whole human race, with the exception of Noah, by total surprise. (Mt 24:37-9) Matthew’s Jesus then warns: Then two men will be in the field; one is taken and one is left. Two women will be grinding at the mill; one is taken and one is left. (Mt 24:40-1)

The saying warns that the second coming will bring to light the real truth about people and the lives that they lead. Prior to the second coming, people might look and act alike; but the second coming will make it clear those who will in fact survive the judgment and those who will not. A parable urging constant readiness for God’s judgment follows. A householder who knows that thieves will assault his home on a particular night will take precautions to see that they do not succeed. Similarly, the disciples must take precautions to stand ready for the final judgment whenever it dawns. “Therefore you must be ready; for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.” (Mt 24:44) Matthew’s Jesus then singles out the leaders of the Church for special warning. The warning puts into an eschatological context Matthew’s earlier polemic against nascent clericalism in Antioch. Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom his master has set over his household, to give them food in proper time? Blessed is that servant

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whom his master when he comes will find so doing. Truly, I say to you, he will set him over all his possessions. But if that wicked servant says to himself, “My master is delayed,” and begins to beat his fellow servants, and eats and drinks with the drunken, the master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he does not know, and will punish him, and put him with the hypocrites; there people will weep and gnash their teeth. (Mt 24:37-51)

Consistent with Matthew’s egalitarian view of the Christian community, this parable warns Church leaders that they stand in the same relationship to the Son of Man as the other members of the community. All count as servants, or slaves, though some may have more responsibilities than others. Once again, the parable makes it clear that the mere possession of office in the Church offers no exemption whatever from the demands of gospel living. Community leaders must display the same obedience of faith as the other members of the community. Those who use their office in the Church to oppress the community or who exploit it for self-indulgent reasons will find themselves judged with the hypocritical scribes and Pharisees and will suffer the same damnation.31 Having especially warned the leaders of the community to exercise special vigilance, Matthew’s Jesus extends the same warning to the community in general by telling the parable of the wise and foolish maidens who attended a wedding celebration. The wise maidens bring oil for their lamps; but the foolish bring none. Their foolishness becomes clearer when the bridegroom surprises everyone by arriving at an unexpected hour: the middle of the night. The foolish maidens face another unpleasant surprise: when they return from an excursion to buy oil, the bridegroom excludes them from the wedding feast. (Mt 25:1-13) In Matthew the lighted lamp symbolizes good works. (Cf. Mt 13:43) The foolish maidens have no good works to show at the moment of the bridegroom’s coming an so find themselves shut out of the marriage celebration. Matthew applies this parable allegorically to his community. Unless they live in readiness for the arrival of the divine bridegroom, the disciples will find themselves excluded from the messianic banquet. Their failure to live the obedience of faith by producing good works will transform them into strangers whom Jesus cannot recognize as His own. Hence, watchfulness embodied in a life of good deeds expresses authentic eschatological hope. (Mt 25:1-13) The parable of the talents follows. It also makes it clear that the watchfulness for which Jesus calls involves much more than passive waiting. One must use the gifts given one by God so that one may have something to show to the Son of Man on His return. 31. Cf. Donahue, op.cit., pp. 98-101.


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In the parable a person (anthrôpos) departs and leaves his property to servants to manage. One receives five talents, another two, and a third one. The first two double the money entrusted to them during the master’s long absence. On returning the master praises them and promises to entrust them with even greater responsibilities. The third servant, however, buries the one talent out of fear of the master’s severity. The master castigates the servant as “wicked and slothful,” surprisingly gives the one talent to the servant with ten, and casts the third servant outside, where people wail and grind their teeth. (Mt 21:14-27) The parable makes it clear that Jesus recognizes that God gives some people more gifts than others. As a consequence, God will expect people to bear fruit in proportion to the gifts which they have received. Although the third servant thought his master “hard,” the master in fact entrusted a magnanimous sum to all three servants. The third servant’s fear of failure prevented him from even trying to use the sum he received. His sloth consists in failing to appreciate both the gift entrusted to him and the opportunity it offered him. By falsely perceiving himself as a victim, he unwittingly transformed himself into one by his slothful inaction. Like the foolish maidens, the third servant has no good works to show the master and so experiences rejection and condemnation. Moreover, the master orders the one talent taken from him and given to the one who has transformed five talents into ten. This twist in the story introduces the maxim: “For to every one who has will more be given, and he will have abundance; but from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away.” (Mt 25:29) Matthew cites the same adage at the end of the parabolic discourse; and it has here the same meaning here as it does there. Jesus transforms the worldly wise and cynical notion that those who have get and those who don’t won’t into a reflection on the workings of divine grace in the kingdom. Gifts grow through use. The more generously one responds to the gift of the kingdom the more fit one finds oneself to experience more and more of its blessings. The eschatological discourse ends with the parable of the sheep and the goats. In concluding the eschatological discourse, Matthew has so far reflected on the readiness for judgment expected of Church leaders and of members of the community. In this concluding parable he turns his attention to the judgment of the all the nations. The parable puts the Great Commission which ends the gospel in an eschatological context by projecting its final outcome.32 32. Cf. John R. Donahue, S.J., “The Parable of the Sheep and the Goats,” Theological Studies, 47(1986), pp. 3-31; Kathleen Weber, “the Image of Sheep and Goats in Matthew 25:31-46,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 59(1997), pp. 657-678; Mohrlang, Matthew and Paul, pp. 48-71.

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As we have already seen, the parable asserts that anyone who performs the works of mercy not only toward Christians but toward any in need will not have to fear the judgment of Jesus. As we have also seen, in welcoming the sheep into “the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world,” Jesus makes it clear that works of mercy shown to “one of these the least of my brethren”—i.e. to any Christian—incorporates one into the kingdom. In rejecting the goats, however, Jesus also proclaims that the failure to minister to the neediest, “to one of the least of these,” whether Christian or not, merits damnation.33 (Mt 25:31-46) The Analogy of Christological Knowing The five discourses in Matthew endow his account of Jesus with its distinctive narrative flavor by transforming his gospel into Christian Torah. For Matthew, as for Mark, moral assimilation to Jesus in the power of His Breath provides faith with its primary challenge. Mark, however, regards the willingness to risk one’s life in testifying to the gospel as the primary sign of Breath-baptism. Matthew acknowledges the importance of such a witness; but Matthew shows more concern to call his community back to fidelity in the day-to-day living out of a Christian commitment as believing Jews. Accordingly, Matthew insists more than Mark on the life-long cultivation of good works. The five discourses focus the disciples’ attention on those areas of life in which they most need to allow Jesus’ baptismal Breath to inspire in them the obedience of faith. The sermon on the mount urges the church at Antioch to place the beatitudes and the fundamental moral imperatives of gospel living at the heart of their commitment to Christ. It summons them to humility, to integrity of heart, and to self-effacement in the practice of traditional Jewish piety. Jesus’ inaugural discourse also explains how He fulfills the Torah: namely, by transforming negative commands into positive ideals which demand more, not less, that the old Law. The missionary discourse challenges Church leaders especially to the courageous proclamation of the word in the face of opposition and persecution. The parabolic discourse warns unbelievers against despising the humble origins of the gospel. The same discourse warns the disciples to stand ready to sacrifice all for membership in God’s reign. They should expect solid faith to bear astonishing fruit. They need to interpret the Old Testament in the light of the New. The ecclesial discourse reminds the Antiochene community of virtues and discipline which make for good Church order. The discourse especially commends fidelity to Jesus’ egalitarian vision of community. It encourages good works, the generous use 33. . Cf.Victor Kossi Agbanou, Le discours eschatologique de Matthieu 24-25: Tradition et rédaction (Paris: Librairie Lecoffre, 1983).


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of gifts, avoidance of scandal, seeking out sinners for reconciliation, and unlimited forgiveness of the repentant. The eschatological discourse warns against any flagging in eschatological hope and in vigilant longing for the second coming. It inculcates readiness for judgment by practical fidelity to the ideals of gospel living. For Matthew, then, the five discourses symbolize five fundamental imperatives which ought to shape Christological knowing. 1) Remain true to the fundamental demands of gospel living. 2) Proclaim the gospel fearlessly and persistently. 3) Acknowledge the mysterious demands which the kingdom, despite its humble origins, makes on you. 4) Preserve right order in community and be reconciled to one another. 5) Remain constant, vigilant, and fruitful in service as you long for the second coming.34 Mark the evangelist would, no doubt, have resonated to these imperatives; but had he read Matthew’s gospel he would have had to concede that this Christian scribe surpassed him in amassing and organizing teachings of Jesus which illumine each of these fundamental imperatives. Matthew’s scribal zeal to preserve Jesus’ teaching expresses, moreover, a central concern of his gospel: namely, that ecclesiastical structures taking shape in Antioch embody Jesus’ vision of an egalitarian community of mutual service. This chapter has reflected on the first set of major thematic linkages in Matthew: namely, the five discourses. The chapter which follows analyzes two other thematic linkages and ponders Matthew’s use of descriptive allusion.

34. Cf. Kingsbury, op.cit., pp. 105-112; Riley, op.cit., pp.37-68.

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Chapter 11 Miracles, Fulfillment, and Allusion in Matthew This chapter completes the analysis of the thematic linkages in Matthew. It also reflects on what Matthew’s editorial pen did to Mark’s allusive linkages. This chapter divides into three parts. Part one meditates on Matthew’s presentation of Jesus’ miracles and exorcisms. Part two reflects on how the evangelist develops the notion of fulfillment. Part three examines his use of allusion as a literary device. (I) Matthew handles the miracles of Jesus very differently from Mark. The latter scatters the healings of Jesus throughout his narrative and endows them with symbolic revelatory significance. Matthew’s editing mutes somewhat the symbolic meaning of the miracles as Mark narrates them. Moreover, Matthew clusters most of Jesus’ miracles around the sermon on the mount. As we have seen, Matthew prefaces the sermon on the mount with an outpouring of healings and exorcisms. (Mt 4:23-5) Ten miracle stories follow the sermon on the mount. Unlike Mark, whose narrative launches Jesus into immediate conflict with Satan and with His enemies, Matthew portrays the initial proclamation of the kingdom as an event of enormous healing and of hope. Matthew begins the narrative section which follows the sermon on the mount with two miracles of inclusion: the cure of a leper and the healing of the centurion’s servant. Matthew then transforms Mark’s account of the beginning of Jesus’ ministry into a typical day in the life of the messiah. Jesus’ first calming of the watery forces of chaos follows. As in Mark, it foreshadows the revelation of Jesus’ divinity after the first miracle of the loaves. Jesus’ power over the aquatic forces of chaos also prepares the way for the exorcisms of the two Gadarene demoniacs. The exorcism culminates, as we have seen, in the destruction of the possessed herd of pigs in the very waters of chaos over which Jesus has already wielded sovereign, divine authority. The first conflict story in Matthew follows: the healing of the paralytic. It reveals Jesus’ authority to forgiven sins. A symbolically impoverished account of Jesus’ healing of two women follows: Jesus delivers an older woman from a flux of blood and raises the deceased daughter of a ruler from the dead. The cluster of miracle stories closes with the healing of two blind men and the deliverance of a dumb demoniac.

Chapter 11: Miracles, Fulfillment, and Allusion in Matthew

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Matthew’s clustering of miracle stories after the sermon on the mount makes a cumulative statement about the scope of the divine reign which Jesus has just proclaimed. In what follows, I shall reflect on that scope. Moreover, Matthew’s Jesus performs ten miracles in all. Matthew probably intended here an allusion to the ten wonders performed by Moses prior to the exodus. (Ex 7:8-10:29) One suspects too a tacit allusion to the theme of fulfillment, so central to Matthew’s telling of Jesus’ story; for Jesus as Immanuel embodies a divine reality which far surpasses anything which Moses embodied.1 Immediately after the sermon on the mount, Matthew narrates two miracles of inclusion. In the first miracle, the crowds follow Jesus down the mountain and watch Him cure a leper. (Mt 8:1-4) In Mark, as we have seen, this cure foreshadows Jesus’ growing margenalization. Mark symbolizes that margenalization by having Jesus and the leper trade places. Matthew, however, edits out this particular narrative detail from Mark’s gospel. In the process, Matthew changes the symbolic meaning of the miracle. In both gospels the cure of the leper functions as a miracle of inclusion. Matthew, however, makes inclusiveness the primary point of the miracle. It reveals that Jesus the healer has come to break down the social barriers which turn Jews into lepers and outcasts. The cure of the leper re-incorporates him into Israel. Matthew then underscores the universal inclusiveness of the gospel by having Jesus cure a Gentile: the servant of a God-fearing Roman centurion. Astonished by the centurion’s faith, Matthew’s Jesus predicts that Gentiles will come in multitudes to share in the eschatological feast of the kingdom with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, while the “sons of the kingdom” will weep and gnash their teeth in the outer darkness to which they have been banished. (Mt 8:5-13) The miracles of inclusion which follow the sermon on the mount dramatize the fact that the message of the kingdom embraces everyone, including Gentiles and marginal Jews. The second miracle also foreshadows the Great Commission which ends the gospel.2 (Mt 8:5-13) In Mark, as we have seen, the exorcism in the synagogue at Capernaum, the cure of Peter’s mother-in-law, and the evening of cures and exorcisms which follow describe the very beginning of Jesus’ Galilean ministry. In Matthew the cure of Peter’s mother-in-law follows the cure of the centurion’s servant. By locating these events later in Jesus’ ministry than

1. Cf. Watejen, op. cit, pp. 115-130. 2. Cf. Robert A.J. Gagnon, “The Shape of Matthew’s Q Text of the Centurion at Capernaum: Did It Mention Delegations?” New Testament Studies, 40(1994), pp. 133-142; Christoph Burchard, “Zu Matthœus 8, 5-13,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 84(1993), pp. 278-288.

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Mark does, Matthew transforms them into an account of a typical day in the life of the messiah. Mark’s Jesus “raises up” Simon’s mother-in-law, who then serves Him and His disciples. The “raising” has revelatory significance in Mark: those whom Jesus “raises up” by giving them a share in His risen life find themselves thereby empowered to serve Him and His disciples. Matthew, however, has the woman rise up by her own power. He thus mutes the story’s symbolic significance and transforms it into one of the many miracles which Jesus performs in the wake of His first solemn proclamation of the kingdom. Even in Matthew’s account, however, healing by Jesus bears fruit in service. Moreover, in the healings and exorcisms in Capernaum which follow this event, Matthew edits out Mark’s reference to demonic conflict. The editorial change reflects, as we have seen, the evangelist’s habitual concern to downplay a theme which plays a prominent part in Mark’s narrative. The first calming of the storm follows the healings at Capernaum. (Mt 8:23-7) As we saw in reflecting on Jesus’ relationship to His disciples, in both Matthew and Mark this cosmological miracle prepares the story of the second calming of the storm, which reveals Jesus’ divinity even more clearly than the first. In his account of the second calming of the storm, however, Matthew, as we have already seen, alters Mark’s account in three significant ways. First, he edits out Mark’s reference to the miracle of the loaves and with it Mark’s insistence that eucharistic faith affirms the divinity of Jesus. The omission, as we have seen, mutes the eucharistic significance of the miracle. Second, Matthew describes how Peter, at Jesus’ command, walked on the water to meet Him but wavered because of His fear and lack of faith. This second interpolation, as we have also seen, transforms Mark’s story into a cautionary tale directed to the leaders of the Petrine community. Third, instead of responding with obtuseness and unbelief as they do in Mark, Jesus’ disciples fall down and adore Him as Son of God when He joins them in the boat. (Mt 14:22-33) Their adoration foreshadows the adoration which the women give the risen Christ and recalls the adoration of the magi. (Mt 2:11, 28:9-10) The exorcism of the Gadarene demoniacs follows the first calming of the storm. As we saw in reflecting on Jesus’ relationship to Satan, Matthew modifies Mark’s account by turning the single demoniac in Mark into a pair of demoniacs. Matthew edits out many descriptive details in Mark, especially details which dramatize the conflict between Jesus and the demon. Matthew also fails to name the demon “Legion.” As we have seen, the omission of the demon’s name deprives the story of the exorcism of much of its political punch. While the persecuted Roman community saw in the empire and in its legions the Satanic incarnation of


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anti-Christ whom Jesus treats as God treated Pharoah and his army in the Exodus, Matthew shows more concern to excoriate the proselytizing leaders of the “synagogue across the street.” As in his other accounts of exorcism, Matthew’s Jesus drives the demons out with sovereign, divine authority. He expels them with a single word: “Go.” As in Mark, the exorcism manifests Jesus divine authority over the demons as they rush into the sea, the symbol of chaos, which Jesus has just calmed with a simple command. Finally, the hostile response of the Gadarenes in Matthew introduces the theme of conflict into Matthew’s account of Jesus’ public ministry. (Mt 8:28-33; Mk 9:1-8) In the cluster of miracles which follow the sermon on the mount, Matthew next inserts the first of the conflict stories which open Mark’s gospel: namely, the healing of the paralytic and the forgiveness of his sins. (Mt 9:1-8) Matthew also follows this initial story of conflict with the same two conflicts which follow in Mark. The conflict stories heighten the opposition to Jesus which the Gadarenes lack of openness began. As in Mark, the healing of the paralytic confirms the fact that as Son of Man Jesus has divine authority to forgive sins. Matthew, however, by including it in the many miracles which follow the sermon on the mount endows the story with theological connotations somewhat less prominent in Mark. The story in Matthew dramatizes yet another facet of the healing which the kingdom brings: namely, it effects the forgiveness of sins. In Matthew the raising of the dead daughter of a ruler and the healing of the woman with a flux of blood count as the eighth and ninth miracles which follow inaugural proclamation of the kingdom. (Mt 9:18-26) As we saw in reflecting on Jesus’ relationship to His disciples, Matthew’s editing of Mark’s prose leaves this story symbolically impoverished. Matthew edits out the parallelism between the twelve year old girl and the woman who had suffered her illness for twelve years. In the process, Matthew mutes their symbolic function in Mark’s story. In Mark, the number twelve recalls the twelve tribes of the first Israel and the Twelve who symbolize the new Israel. In Mark, therefore, therefore, the two women symbolize the two covenants and Jesus’ relationship to them; but not in Matthew. Matthew also fails to mention the presence of Peter, James, and John at the second miracle. Their absence eliminates Mark’s allusion to the passion and resurrection of Jesus, since in Mark these three disciples also witness both Jesus’ agony in Gethsemane and the proleptic revelation of His glory in the transfiguration. Finally, Matthew does not link the young girl’s raising to life to the multiplications of the loaves and to eucharistic faith as Mark does. (Mt 9:18-26; Mk 5:21-43) Matthew, however, does not eliminate all symbolic meaning from his account of the healing of the two women. The healing of the older woman still liberates her from the curse of the Law and from the legal impurity

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which ostracizes her. The raising of the young girl also foreshadows the Christian’s participation in the risen life of Jesus. In Mark, as we have seen, the cure of blind Bartimaeus brings the “way” section of Mark to a narrative climax. The cure foreshadows dramatically the change which resurrection faith will make in the disciples. After the resurrection, the disciples will see Jesus truly and will follow him, like Bartimaeus, “on the way” of discipleship even if it leads to Calvary. Matthew, however, includes this miracle in the final healings which follow the sermon on the mount. He transforms Mark’s blind Bartimaeus into two blind beggars whom Jesus heals. Matthew also transforms Mark’s Gerasene demoniac into two Gadarene demoniacs. The two doublings link the two events allusively and suggest that those whom Jesus delivers from the power of Satan He also enlightens. (Mt 20:29-34) Matthew also omits Mark’s assertion that the healed blind man followed Jesus “on the way.” The omission mutes (without totally destroying it) the symbolic character of the miracle. In both gospels, the restoration of sight to the blind suggests the risen Christ’s power to heal the blindness of unbelief through active faith. (Mt 9:27-31) The exorcism of a dumb demoniac closes the cycle of miracle stories which follow the sermon on the mount. The cycle ends on a note of deepening conflict. While the crowds marvel at what Jesus has done, the Pharisees accuse Him for the first time of exorcising in the power of Beelzebul. (Mt 9:32-4) As we have seen, Matthew has already included three conflict stories in this narrative section of his gospel. The missionary discourse, which immediately follows this narrative section, will deepen and develop the theme of conflict and make a decisive turn toward Calvary. Like the healing of the two blind men, the healing of the dumb demoniac in Matthew also makes a theological statement: those whom Jesus frees from Satan He also empowers to proclaim the good news. This healing, therefore, looks forward in a special way to the missionary discourse which soon follows. Matthew ends this narrative section of His gospel with a final allusion to Jesus’ healing of the crowds out of compassion for their confusion. These attitudes also motivate His calling the Twelve and commissioning them in the missionary discourse. The healing of the crowds, then, underlines the apostolic significance of the miracles which Mark has just narrated. The spate of healings which follow the sermon on the mount makes a cumulative theological statement about the healing character of the kingdom Jesus proclaims. In proclaiming the kingdom, Jesus seeks to heal social separation among Jews and between Jews and Gentiles. The kingdom mediates a universal salvation. Jesus’ miracles disclose His divinity. They reveal His sovereign divine authority over Satan and his demons. The manifest the divine source of


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Jesus’ authority in proclaiming the kingdom as well as its ultimate victory over the powers of evil. The divine healing which Jesus effects includes the forgiveness of sins. It frees women from the curse of the Law. It communicates the light of faith by freeing one to both hear and proclaim the good news. It imparts risen life. As we have seen in reflecting on Jesus’ relationship to John the Baptizer, Jesus, in response to John’s question about His messianic identity, explains the revelatory significance of His miracles and exorcisms. They reveal that the messianic era has arrived, even though Jesus Himself eschews Davidic messianism in favor of a humbler ministry to the poor and outcast. (Mt 11:2-6) For Matthew, the miracles which follow the sermon on the mount also disclose the arrival of the messianic era. They do so by dramatizing the saving scope of the kingdom which Jesus, the non-Davidic messiah, proclaims to the poor. In the narrative section which follows Jesus’ missionary discourse, Matthew relates the last two of the five conflict stories which open Mark’s gospel. The second story contains a healing: the cure of the man with a withered hand on the sabbath. As in Mark, Jesus justifies His act by appealing to traditional Jewish piety, which did not consider doing good on the sabbath a violation of the sabbath prohibition of work. As in Mark, the Pharisees take scandal at what Jesus has done and begin to plot against him. Matthew, however, once again mutes the theme of conflict in Mark by not mentioning that the Pharisees began to plot with the Herodians to have Jesus killed. (Mt 12:9-14; Mk 3:1-6) Typically, however, Matthew immediately underscores the malice and unbelief of the Pharisees. After a spate of miracles which reveal Jesus as the suffering servant of God, the Pharisees commit the unforgivable sin of Breath-blasphemy for the second time. They accuse Jesus of exorcising in the power of Beelzebul. (Mt 12:15-21; Mk 3:7-12) In other words, Matthew combines the story of the cure of the man with a withered hand with yet another outpouring of miracles in order to dramatize the obstinate unbelief of the Pharisees. The two miracles of the loaves follow the parabolic discourse in Matthew, who omits Mark’s pastoral imagery in telling the story of the first miracle. (Mt 14:15-21, 15: 32-9; Mk 6:35-44, 8:1-10) As in Mark the two miracles foreshadow the eucharist, although Matthew omits Mark’s repeated allusion to the symbolic importance of the multiplications for understanding the doctrinal and moral conditions for eucharistic worship. The second multiplication in Matthew as in Mark includes Gentiles in eucharistic communion. Indeed, like Mark, Matthew underscores this point by prefacing the story of the second multiplication with the story of Jesus’ exorcism of the daughter of the Canaanite woman. Her faith foreshadows the faith of Gentile Christians, as does the faith response of

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the Gentile crowds whom Jesus cures and exorcises. In response they praise the God of Israel. (Mt 15:21-31) Moreover, by calling the woman Canaanite rather than Syro-Phoenician, Matthew recalls the ancient enmity between the Hebrews and the Canaanites. The Canaanites had long since ceased to exist at the time Matthew wrote. Matthew’s allusion to Israel’s traditional enemies indicates, however, that the new covenant ends all enmity between Jew and Gentile. In burying that enmity, the evangelist no doubt sought to foster harmony between his community’s Petrine Christians and its Christian, Gentile “God-seekers.” As in Mark, Matthew’s Jesus works His final miracle when he exorcises the moonstruck boy. As we have already seen, Matthew severely edits Mark’s text. Matthew omits all allusive references to other miracles. He does not link the miracle to resurrection as Mark does. Matthew also omits any reference to the wavering faith of the boy’s father. (Mt 17:14-8; Mk 9:14-7) In Matthew as in Mark, Jesus rebukes the self-reliance and lack of faith which had prevented the disciples from successfully exorcising the boy. In Matthew’s edited version, the story stresses, then, as Matthew does elsewhere, the efficacy of faith-informed prayer.3 (Mt 17:19-20) The Analogy of Christological Knowing Matthew’s editing and regrouping of Mark’s account of Jesus’ healings and exorcisms illustrates the analogy of Christological knowing. In the wake of persecution, Mark seeks to shore up the eucharistic faith of his beleaguered community by using the miracle stories in two ways: they dramatize the demands of eucharistic faith, and they confirm the church at Rome in its belief that the risen Christ has power to heal and to deliver them despite any lack of faith or human weakness. Matthew’s telling of the miracle stories illustrates other practical theological concerns. Matthew desires his community to acknowledge the healing power of Jesus’ message. The good news about the kingdom binds together Jews and Gentiles, men and women in the same community of faith. Jesus’ miracles reveal His divinity, which Christians continue to proclaim even in the face of unbelief and Pharisaical opposition. Faith in 3. Cf. Albright and Mann, op.cit., pp. cxxiv-cxxxi; William G. Thompson, S.J., “Reflections on the Composition of Mt 8:1-9:34,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 33(1971), pp. 365-388; Jack Dean Kingsbury, “Observations on the Miracle Chapters in Matthew 8-9,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 40 (1978), pp. 559-573; John Paul Heil, “Significant Aspects of the Healing Miracles in Matthew,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 41(1979), pp. 274-287; Henry Joachim Held, “Matthew as Interpreter of the Miracle Stories,” in Tradition and Interpretation In Matthew, edited By G. Bornkamm et al., translated by Percy Scott (London: SCM Press, 1963), pp. 165- 299; Birger Gerhardsson, The Mighty Acts of Jesus According to Matthew, translated by Robert Dewsnap (Lund: CWK Gleerup, 1979).


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Jesus’ divinity also demands a corresponding confidence in His total victory and sovereign divine authority over the realm of Satan. Jesus’ miracles reveal His power to enable those who put faith in Him to see the truth about Him, to hear the good news, and to proclaim it to others. In all of these ways, the miracles of Jesus make manifest a fundamental truth which Jesus Himself proclaimed: namely, that His miracles manifest the incipient presence of the kingdom, which is nevertheless still coming and has yet to arrive in its fullness. I have considered two thematic linkages in Matthew. Two yet remain: the theme of fulfillment and Matthew’s use of narrative allusion. The next section analyzes the way in which Matthew develops the theme of fulfillment. (II) As we have seen, Matthew occasionally takes note of the theme of the messianic secret which runs throughout Mark’s narrative. Matthew, however, also edits out some of Mark’s references to the secret; and, on occasion, Matthew links the notion of the messianic secret to the idea of atonement. Jesus’ desire to avoid notoriety expresses His determination not only to bear the burdens of sinful humanity without sinning but also to identify totally with the anonymous poor. The secret, therefore, has considerably less significance in Matthew’s telling of Jesus’ story. What the theme of the messianic secret does for Mark’s gospel, the theme of fulfillment does for Matthew’s. It stitches the text together like a single, colored thread running through an embroidery. The term “fulfill” occurs fourteen times in Matthew’s gospel; and we find implicit references to the notion of fulfillment in other texts as well. In the course of examining both the infancy gospel and the dramatic linkages in Matthew I have reflected on this or that text in which the theme of fulfillment has prominence. In what follows, I shall attempt to trace the theme of fulfillment more systematically through Matthew’s narrative. When at the beginning of the sermon on the mount, Matthew’s Jesus warns: “Think not that I have come to abolish the Law and the prophets; I have come not to abolish them but to fulfil (plerosai) them,” (Mt 5:17-8) He enunciates a major theme, not just of the sermon on the mount, but of the gospel as a whole. Jesus, as we have seen, fulfills the Law in the sermon by demanding more, not less than the Law. This He does by transforming the negative precepts of the Law into positive, interiorized ideals of life which lure the disciple toward ever greater righteousness.4 4. Cf. M. Trimaille, “Citations d’accomplissement et architecture de l’évangile selon S. Matthieu,” Estudios Biblicos, 48(1990), pp. 47-79.

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As we saw above, Matthew first introduces the theme of fulfillment, not in the sermon on the mount, but in his infancy narrative. Jesus’ conception by the Holy Breath of God fulfills Isaiah’s prophecy of Immanuel. (Is 7:14) Isaiah spoke the original prophecy of Immanuel to the wicked king Ahaz. Isaiah was proclaiming the coming of the ideal Davidic prince whose righteous rule would make God a living reality in the midst of His people. In Matthew’s eyes, Jesus fulfills this prophecy by embodying much more than Isaiah had foreseen. Matthew presents Jesus as God made visible in human form, although the evangelist postpones the full revelation of Jesus’ divinity until His resurrection. Then, as Immanuel, Jesus pronounces the Great Commission and promises to “be with” the Eleven until the end of the age. That promise joins Him to the Eleven as the twelfth apostle and decisively recreates the new Israel which Judas’s treachery had temporarily shattered. As the great I AM, the risen Christ encompasses the evangelizing new Israel in His divine reality. (Mt 28:20) In the infancy narrative, the miraculous virgin birth of Jesus in the power of the divine Breath foreshadows the miracle of the resurrection, the moment when Jesus also becomes the Breath-baptizer foretold by John by commissioning ritual baptism in the triune name. (Mt 3:11) Nevertheless, even prior to the resurrection, Matthew’s Jesus makes the Father present in His person, life, and ministry. (Mt 11:25-7) In the course of his infancy gospel, Matthew takes up the theme of fulfillment again in the story of the magi. The chief priests, in response to Herod’s question about where the messiah would be born, respond, “in Bethlehem of Judea.” They then justify their position by citing Mic 5:2. (Mt 2:5-6) Matthew sees Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem as a fulfillment of this prophecy. Once again, however, Matthew finds more meaning in Micah’s text than the prophet himself. Micah probably did not mean that the messiah would be born in Bethlehem (or bet ephrathah) but of David’s line. Matthew, however, situates Jesus’ birth quite literally in the city of David and of David’s ancestress Ruth. (Cf. Mt 1:5) Moreover, as we have already seen, while Matthew regards Jesus as the messiah, he subordinates Jesus’ messianic dignity to His divinity. Jesus reigns as messiah because He confronts us as Immanuel, God-with-us. Matthew sees the massacre of the holy innocents as a fulfillment of Jer 31:15. As we have seen, the death of the innocents also reveals Jesus as the new Moses. In Jeremiah’s prophecy, Rachel, the mother of Joseph, Manasseh, and Ephraim, weeps for her children because they no longer exist. Her sorrow interrupts a series of prophecies about the joyful restoration of Israel after the exile. After the tears of Rachel, God comforts her with the knowledge that her exiled sons will return and enjoy divine favor. In citing this prophecy, Matthew implicitly promises that God will


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comfort the mothers in Bethlehem and its vicinity who mourn their murdered babes. It also foreshadows Jesus’ return from Egypt like the exiled descendants of Jacob. Matthew’s allusion to Jeremiah could also point to Jesus as a second Jeremiah, a point which Matthew will underscore in the cleansing of the temple. (Mt 21:13; Jer 7:11) Once again, however, for Matthew the reality of Jesus exceeds that of Jeremiah, who called for the purification of God’s temple. In Matthew’s account of the triumphal entry, God-with-us reclaims His temple to the liturgical accolades of the crowds and to the messianic proclamation of the little children. Jesus prophesies against the temple as Jeremiah once did; but He claims to embody a greater reality than the temple itself and in a way which parallels His divine authority over the sabbath.5 (Mt 12:7-8) Matthew presents the flight into Egypt as a necessary condition for the fulfillment of fourth Old Testament text, Hos 11:1: “Out of Egypt have I called my son.” In Hosea the text recalls Yahweh’s merciful deliverance of Israel from Egyptian bondage and their subsequent ingratitude and infidelity. Matthew has Jesus relive the exodus experience of the people of God. Jesus embodies the new Israel He came to create. Moreover, the deliverance wrought by God in Jesus effects an even greater liberation than the first exodus. Once again, Jesus fulfills the prophecy of Hosea by embodying more than the prophet intended. One final fulfillment text occurs in Matthew’s infancy narrative. Matthew sees Jesus’ childhood as fulfilling the “prophecy”: “He shall be called a Nazarene.” (Mt 2:23) As we saw above, the name Nazareth does not occur in the Old Testament. Instead, Matthew could be punning on Nazarene and Nazarite and comparing Jesus to another Samson. (Judg 13:5) Matthew certainly regards Jesus as a judge, but as a far more exalted judge than Samson. John the Baptizer warns the stiff-necked Sadducees and Pharisees that God will transform Jesus into the instrument of a divine judgment upon them. (Mt 3:7-12) By baptizing in a sanctifying Breath Jesus will call down upon the world the fire of divine holiness, a fire which will purify His disciples and destroy His enemies. (Mt 3:11-2) Moreover, the judgmental action of the Breath-baptizer foreshadows an even more solemn act of judgment: His return as Son of Man to sit in judgment over all the nations of the earth. Then he will gather the righteous into the fullness of His kingdom and cast the wicked into the same unquenchable fire as torments Satan and his demons. (Mt 24:31-46, 26:64-66) Matthew’s infancy narrative both introduces the theme of fulfillment and develops it in considerable theological depth. The initial revelation 5. Cf. M.J.J. Menken, “The References to Jeremiah in the Gospel According to Matthew,” Ephemerides Theologiae Lovaniensis, 60(1984), pp. 5-24.

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of Jesus as Immanuel—God-with-us—creates the context for interpreting all the other fulfillments to which Matthew alludes. As Immanuel, Jesus fulfills the saving significance of other Old Testament figures: the messiah, Israel itself, Moses, possibly Jeremiah, possibly Samson and the judges. This Jesus accomplishes by embodying much more than any of the preceding figures embodied. The “more” in question derives from the fact that Jesus confronts both Jew and Christian alike as God made present in human form. Like Mark, Matthew regards the preaching of John the Baptizer as itself a fulfillment of Is 40:3. John’s desert ministry begins the final saving act which culminates in Jesus own ministry. As Elijah redivivus the Baptizer prepares Israel to hear Jesus’ message by summoning it to repentance. The Baptizer’s own ministry fulfills Old Testament prophecy. As the greatest born of woman, he brings Mosaic religion to its culmination (Mt 11:7-15); but, once again, the reality which Jesus brings, the reality which Old Testament prophecy foresaw, far exceeds the Baptizer and his ministry. The least in the kingdom comes before John in the history of salvation. As we have seen in reflecting on Jesus’ relationship to the Baptizer, in their tete-a-tete before Jesus’ baptism, Jesus assures John that, by baptizing Him, John will fulfill all righteousness. (Mt 3:13-5) Jesus’ assurance points to Christian baptism as the fulfillment of Johannine. Johannine baptism expresses repentance but does not forgive sins. Jesus’ baptism forgives sins by pouring out the purifying fire of a sanctifying, divine Breath on those who receive it. (Mt 3:11, 26:28, 28:19-20) One finds a tacit reference to the theme of fulfillment in Jesus’ desert temptations. In the power of the Breath whom He will one day impart to the new Israel. Jesus confronts and confounds the powers of evil and of antichrist which Satan personifies. Satan, as we have seen, tempts Jesus to self-reliance, to test God, and to the idolatry of founding the kingdom on the coercive power of earthly kingdoms. Since Jesus both embodies and begins the new Israel, its members can expect to face similar temptations and must respond as Jesus did to the wiles of the Evil One. When one reads Matthew’s temptation narrative in the light of the theme of fulfillment, the fact that Jesus replies to each of Satan’s temptations by citing the Torah takes on new significance. The story of Jesus’ temptations in Matthew as in Mark serves as a preface to His entire ministry. As a consequence, one needs to interpret the meaning of Matthew’s citations of the Torah not only in their original context but especially in the light of everything which follows in Matthew’s narrative. When one interprets Jesus’ responses in the light of the Christian Torah which He will proclaim, then one can recognize in the three citations of the old


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Law an attempt on Matthew’s part to point to those aspects of the original Torah which Jesus’ own teaching will especially fulfill. As we have seen, Satan first tempts Jesus to abandon the fast which expresses His trust in the Father. Jesus responds to Satan’s temptation by declaring that His trust in the Father remains unshaken. That trust fulfills the meaning of Deut 8:3, which Jesus cites in confounding Satan. As Matthew’s narrative unfolds, Jesus demands a similar trust of His own disciples. (Mt 6:11, 25-34) The disciples must trust in the Father’s providential care in a way which frees them to share their possessions liberally with those in greatest need. (Mt 25:31-6) Having failed to cause Jesus to commit the sin of self-reliance, Satan next tempts Him to “test God” by setting the conditions under which He will trust God. Jesus replies by citing Deut 6:16. The citation commits Him to trusting the Father unconditionally. (Mt 4:7) That trust that will lead Him ultimately to the cross. (Mt 26:39) In the end, therefore, Jesus’ trust during His passion fulfills the meaning of Deut 6:16. As in the case of the first temptation, Jesus requires the same unconditioned trust of His disciples. They must lay down their lives for the gospel, if necessary. (Mt 10:17-31) Moreover, because the disciples’ trust in the Father expresses itself in the willingness to share the physical supports of life with others, unconditioned trust in the Father also expresses itself in the willingness to imitate the perfection of divine love by sharing with saint and sinner alike, even with one’s enemies. (Mt 5:38-48) In his third and final temptation, Satan tempts Jesus to model the kingdom on the principalities and powers of this world. Jesus replies by paraphrasing Deut 6:13. In doing so He announces that He will found the kingdom on authentic worship of the Father and not on law or coercive violence. (Mt 4: 10) In other words, the authentic worship of the Father which Jesus embodies and inculcates fulfills Deut 6:13. In His own teachings, Jesus demands similar attitudes of His disciples. The disciples’ mutual forgiveness must authenticate their prayer to the Father. (Mt 6:12-5) They must serve one another in the image of a servant messiah, who lays down His life for “the many.” (Mt 18:21-2) In addition, in Matthew, the Our Father provides a paradigm of the authentic worship of the Father on which the kingdom must rest. (Mt 6:7-13) When, therefore, one reads Matthew’s temptation narrative in the light of the Christian Torah which Matthew’s gospel narrates, Jesus’ replies to His temptations indicate those aspects of the Law which He and His vision of the kingdom especially fulfill. The kingdom demands that one give to Jesus’ Father the unconditioned trust which the Law called Israel to place in God. As an expression of that trust, the members of the new Israel must freely share the material supports of life with one another in a community which seeks simultaneously to break down any social barri-

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ers which separate people from one another. In God’s kingdom, sharing excludes no one and includes sinner as well as saint, Gentile as well as Jew, enemy as well as friend. Sharing must also express a mutual forgiveness which in turn authenticates the worship which the new Israel offers to the universal Father of all. In Matthew, as we have seen, this vision of the kingdom fulfills the Torah by holding up a positive ideal which demands more, not less, than the negative prescriptions of the Law. Matthew twice asserts that Jesus’ healing ministry fulfills the servant songs of Deutero-Isaiah.6 (Mt 8:17, 12:17-18; Is 53:4, 42:1-2) In other words, Matthew sees Jesus’ healing ministry as an expression of His free desire to enter totally into the human condition by suffering the consequences of sin without Himself sinning. Implicitly, Matthew is also portraying the atonement effected by the incarnation of God as healing. Moreover, the paschal mystery reveals an even deeper mystery than Second Isaiah foretold: namely, the atoning death of the Son of God. (Mt 27:25-44) Matthew also believes that the Scriptures foretell Jesus’ rejection by His contemporaries. The parables of Jesus fulfill Is 6:9-10 by concealing the meaning of the kingdom from the unbelieving crowds. Their unbelief keeps them from hearing the message of the kingdom and from experiencing the healing which the kingdom brings. Matthew, therefore, sees in much of Israel’s failure to heed Jesus’ message a sin of unbelief which has ample precedent in the history of God’s people. (Mt 13:10-7) Nevertheless, despite the blindness of the Jewish crowds. Jesus’ parabolic discourse also fulfills Ps 78:2-3 by expressing a hidden divine wisdom to which Jesus has privileged access: in the face of human unbelief, the parables express the saving intentions of God which the deity conceived before the foundation of the world. (Mt 13:34-5) Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem fulfills Zech 9:9. The prophecy, as we have seen, blends two Old Testament themes: Davidic messianism and the anawim. Zechariah portrays the coming of a messiah whose meekness and identification with the little ones of this world ushers in an era of peace. In telling the story of the triumphal entry, however, Matthew once again makes it clear that what occurred in Jesus goes far beyond what such messianic prophecies seemed to promise. Matthew does so by noting that the crowds welcomed Jesus joyfully but failed to perceive the full reality that He embodied. They regard Him as a messianic leader and as a prophet, but fail to recognize Him as Immanuel. The acclamations of the children, of God’s “little ones,” in the temple, however, clarify the 6. Cf. Claude Tassin, “Matthieu ‘Targumiste’?; l’exemple de Mt 12, 18(=Is 42,1),” Estudios Biblicos, 48(1990), pp. 119-214; Maartin J.J. Menken, “The Source of the Quotation from Isaiah 53: 4 in Matthew 8:17,” Novum Testamentum, 39(1997), pp. 313-327.


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liturgical symbolism which Matthew weaves into his account of the triumphal entry. In Matthew’s eyes, in Jesus’ cleansing of the temple, God has visited and reclaimed His sanctuary.7 (Mt 21:7-11; cf. 1:23, 28:19-20). At the moment of His arrest, Matthew’s Jesus insists twice that His betrayal, suffering, and death all fulfill the Old Testament, which foresaw their inevitability. Like the unbelief which greets Jesus’ message, Matthew sees His passion as part of a providential plan of salvation conceived by God before the foundation of the world. Mt 26:54-56; 13:34-35) Moreover, Jesus’ sayings place the paschal mystery at the heart of Matthew’s theology of fulfillment. Not only does the vision of the kingdom go beyond what the Law demanded, but the atoning death of the Son of God and His full revelation as Breath-baptizer in risen glory disclose realities at which the Old Testament only dimly guessed. Finally, when the high priests use the thirty pieces of silver which Judas threw at their feet to buy a potters’ field for burying strangers, the priests fulfill Zech 11:12-3. The text points to the chief priests as incompetent shepherds who failed to appreciate the value of the divine reality Jesus which embodied and proclaimed. Instead, they misprized it at the trifling sum of thirty pieces of silver. In Matthew’s eyes, the same prophetic text also designates the priestly aristocracy as the ones chiefly responsible for voiding God’s covenant with Israel and for dividing the people of God by their malice and unbelief. Since Matthew closely associates the chief priests and the Pharisees, the prophecy also implicitly faults the leaders of the “synagogue across the street.”8 The Analogy of Christological Knowing The very fact that fulfillment replaces the messianic secret as the dominant theme in Matthew’s gospel illustrates the analogy of Christological knowing. Mark uses the messianic secret in order to call attention to the deeper revelatory significance of the events which he narrates; for only with the full revelation of the secret in the paschal mystery does its content finally reach full clarity. The messianic secret in Mark, therefore, constantly reminds the reader to see deeply into the events which the evangelist narrates. It also keeps the faith of the reader focused on the paschal mystery as the culminating historical revelation of God. Both Matthew and Mark look upon the paschal mystery as the supreme revelation of Jesus’ person and mission. Mark, however, views it through the eyes of a persecuted community confronting the reality of martyrdom, while Matthew views it through the eyes of a Jewish Christian who is watching the kingdom of God begin to transform itself into 7. Cf.Walter Bauer, “The ‘Colt’ of Palm Sunday (der Palmesel),” Journal of Biblical Literature, 43(1953), pp. 220-229. 8. Cf. Albright and Mann, op.cit., pp. liv-lxxiii; Stanton, op.cit., pp.346-363.

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the institutional Church. Accordingly, Matthew shows much more concern than Mark does to contextualize Jesus within the sweep of salvation history. Like the good scribe whom he describes, Matthew keeps the church at Antioch solidly rooted in Old Testament faith at the same time that it acknowledges and proclaims the radical newness of what God has accomplished in Jesus. Matthew’s Jesus makes sense out of traditional Jewish faith. He does not abolish that faith. Matthew also prefers the theme of fulfillment to Mark’s theme of the messianic secret in part because the idea of fulfillment allows Matthew to stress the practical demands of discipleship. Those demands, foreshadowed in Matthew by Jesus’ responses to Satan’s temptations, explicitate the practical significance of Christological knowing. This section has considered how Matthew uses fulfillment in order to endow the story of Jesus with thematic unity. The following section ponders his use of narrative allusion as a literary device. (III) Matthew preserves some of the allusive linkages in Mark’s text. In both miracles of the loaves, Jesus’ actions of taking, blessing, breaking, and giving link these two miracles to the last supper and to the paschal mystery which Jesus’ eucharistic words and gestures interpret. (Mt 14:19, 15:36; Mk 6:41, 14:22) Like Mark, therefore, Matthew views both multiplications as a foreshadowing of the eucharist. Like Mark, Matthew uses Jesus’ cosmological miracles in order to signal the correct answer to the central question which Jesus puts to His disciples: namely, “Who do you say that I am?” (Mt 16:13-20) Matthew agrees with Mark that only a man who is also God can calm with a word the winds and the waters of chaos. (Mt 14:27, 32; Mk 6:50-1) As in Mark, the first calming of the storm sets the stage for the exorcism which follows. Jesus casts the demons from the Gadarene demoniacs into a herd of swine who rush into the sea. The symbol of the forces of chaos which Jesus with sovereign, divine authority has just conquered with a word. (Mt 8:28-33; Mk 5:1-14) Matthew, however, edits out many of the key allusions which tie Mark’s gospel tightly together and focus it on the two miracles of the loaves. For example, in both gospels the calming of the aquatic forces of chaos reveals Jesus’ divinity. Mark, as we have seen, uses allusion in order to make belief in Jesus’ divinity the doctrinal condition for eucharistic faith and the rejection of the leaven of the Pharisees and of Herod its moral condition. (Mk 6:52, 8:21) Matthew edits out the key, organizing Markan allusions to the eucharist. That omission alone shatters the two complex retes of allusion which organize Mark’s gospel theologically.


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Matthew, as we have also seen, omits the presence of Peter, James, and John at the raising of the ruler’s daughter; the evangelist thus fails to link this event, as Mark does, to the transfiguration, to the agony in the garden, and to the eschatological discourse. (Mk 5:33) Matthew also edits from the young woman’s raising Mark’s allusion to the miracles of the loaves. (Mk 5:43) Matthew deletes as well the symbolic number twelve which in Mark transforms the daughter of Jairus and the woman with a flux of blood into symbols of the old and new Israels. (Mk 5:25, 42; Mt 9:18-26) Matthew eliminates the Markan allusions which link the cure of Peter’s mother-in-law to the raising of the ruler’s daughter, to the cure of the moonstruck boy, and finally to Jesus’ own resurrection. In Mark Jesus symbolically “raises” the woman up so that she can serve Him and the disciples, while in Matthew, she rises of her own power. (Mt 8:15) Mark’s Jesus also “raises up” the epileptic demoniac, whom the crowds erroneously think dead. (Mk 9:26-7) Matthew merely states that the rebuked devil left the boy instantly and that he experienced a cure. (Mt 17:18) Matthew omits too Mark’s symbolic and allusive reference to the boy’s deafness and dumbness. (Mk 9:25) The allusion in Mark has, as we have seen, symbolic significance: those whom Jesus “raises up” find themselves empowered to hear the gospel and proclaim it. (Mk 7:31-7) Matthew omits the reference. Other significant Markan allusions also fall victim to Matthew’s editorial terseness. In Mark, Jesus’ invocation of the divine name in his trial before the Sanhedrin (Mk 14:62) alludes to His use of the divine name when He calms the storm for a second time. (Mk 6:51) Matthew omits this cryptic Markan allusion. Matthew mutes the symbolic significance of the healing of the two blind men by omitting Mark’s reference to the fact that they followed Jesus “on the way” of discipleship which leads to Calvary. (Mt 20:34; Mk 10:52) Finally, because Matthew transforms the young man who greets the women in the tomb into a powerful angel, he also omits mention of the young man who escaped in Gethsemane and like the risen Christ left behind him only the garments which covered Him. In Mark the young man in the garden alludes to the young man whom the women encounter in the empty tomb. (Mk 14:51-2, 16:5) Matthew, however, adds other allusive references absent from Mark. As the crucified savior hangs on the cross, for example, the passersby deride him and use the same words as Satan had in Jesus first two desert temptations: “If you are the Son of God.” (Mt 27:40, 43; 4:3, 6) In other words, Matthew portrays the crucifixion of Jesus as the culminating test to which Satan and the powers of antichrist put Him. He also depicts the mocking crowds as Satanic.

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Moreover, the epithet “brood of vipers” links allusively three events in Matthew’s gospel: 1) the initial confrontation between John the Baptizer, on the one hand, and the Pharisees and Sadducees, on the other; 2) the controversy over Beelzebul; and 3) the woes against the scribes and Pharisees. (Mt 3:7, 12:34, 23:33) Clearly, Matthew wants these three events to cast light on one another. Their linkage in his text suggests that the Pharisees commit the unforgivable sin against the Holy Breath, because like the Sadducees they refuse to repent at the message of John and of Jesus. As a consequence, from the sinfulness of their hearts they speak venomous words which seek to undermine faith in Jesus. They therefore incur all the woes which the new covenant visits upon the unrepentant. The confrontation between John, on the one hand, and the unrepentant Pharisees and Sadducees (Mt 3:7) also foreshadows Jesus warning against the wicked leaven of their teaching. (Mt 16:12) When Matthew describes the cloak the soldiers put on Jesus in mocking Him as scarlet, he alludes, as we have seen, to the Jewish rite of atonement and implicitly portrays the blood which the people call down upon themselves in Jesus’ trial before Pilate as the blood of atonement. (Mt 27:25, 28) That event alludes in turn to the angel’s prophecy that Jesus would one day save the people of Israel from their sins. (Mt 1:21) The Great Commission Finally, having shredded Mark’s two retes of allusions clustering around the two miracles of the loaves, Matthew creates a rich network of allusions around the Great Commission which closes his gospel. (Mt 28:16-20) Matthew’s account of the Great Commission begins with “the Eleven” climbing a mountain in Galilee. The Eleven, the mountain, and Galilee all recall other incidents in Matthew’s gospel. Galilee recalls the command of the apocalyptic angel at the empty tomb that the disciples should rendez-vous with Jesus in Galilee, the scene of most of His mortal ministry. (Mt 28:1-8) The mount of the great commission recalls other mountaintops in Matthew’s story: The mount of the temptations, where Jesus refused to adore Satan in exchange for the kingdoms of this world (Mt 4:8); the mount of the beatitudes (Mt 5:1, 8:1), where Jesus announced he kingdom in His inaugural discourse (Mt 5:3-7:27); the mountain of the transfiguration, where the anticipatory revelation of Jesus’ glory began to draw the disciples into His baptismal commissioning (Mt 17:1-8); the mountain where Jesus prayed before walking on the water and invoking the divine name (Mt 14:22-23). Each of these mountains has further connotations. The mountain of Jesus’ final temptation reminds the reader of His victory over Satan and over those who act as His agents. The mount of the beatitudes recalls not


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only Jesus’ first discourse but implicitly all five discourses, which in Matthew proclaim Christian Torah. So does the risen Jesus’ reference to “all I

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commanded you.” (Mt 28:20) The mount of the transfiguration foreshadows Jesus’ resurrection. The mountain where Jesus prayed, by alluding to Jesus’ first stilling of a storm, implicitly recalls the other events associated with that miracle. The miracle itself, of course, foreshadows the paschal mystery and the revelation of Jesus’ divinity (Mt 14:27); but it also recalls Peter’s walking on the water and near drowning. (Mt 14:28-33) That event recalls Peter’s denial of Jesus and subsequent repentance and re-habilitation. (Mt 26:69-75) Jesus’ rebuke to Peter for his weakness of faith implicitly recalls all the other admonitions which Matthew’s Jesus addresses to Peter: not only Jesus’ stern reprimand to Peter for trying to talk Jesus out of the passion but also Jesus’ warnings against clericalism in Antioch. (Mt 16:22-23, 17:24-27; 26:33-35) The seismic agitation of the sea in Jesus’ first calming of the waters foreshadows the agitation of the Holy City when Jesus reclaims the temple of God after His triumphal entry. It also foreshadows the two earthquakes which link Jesus’ death and resurrection. (Mt 27:60, 28:2) The Eleven climb the mountain so that Jesus can join Himself to them as the twelfth apostle in the Great Commission. (Mt 28:20) The reduced number of the apostles recalls Judas’s betrayal of Jesus and the circumstances surrounding the apostle’s despairing suicide. (Mt 26:14-16, 47-56, 27:3-10) The reconstitution of the Twelve as a symbol of the new Israel recalls Jesus’ choice of the Twelve and commissioning of them in His missionary discourse to proclaim the good news to the lost sheep of the house of Israel; and that commissioning, as we saw above, stands allusively linked to other texts which refer to Jesus as the divine shepherd of Israel. The Great Commission now extends the apostles’ mission to include all the nations of the world. The Great Commission therefore begins a process whose termination the parable of the sheep and the goats describes; for that parable narrates the final judgment of the nations. (Mt 25:31-46) The Eleven fall down in adoration before the risen Christ. Their homage recalls the worship of the magi whose homage to the baby Jesus foreshadows the conversion of the nations which the Great Commission will effect. Allusion to the magi, however, recalls the futile attempt of Herod the Great to kill the infant Jesus with the connivance of the chief priests. (Mt 2:1-6) Herod’s failure foreshadows the risen Christ’s victory over all His human enemies: the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the chief priests, Pilate, and the Roman empire. The disciples’ worship of the risen Christ also recalls the worship of the women who encountered Him after finding the empty tomb (Mt 28:9) Their worship also reminds the reader of the adoration offered Jesus after He walked on the water, invoked the divine name, and stilled the storm for a second time. (Mt 14:33)


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Jesus claims that all power in heaven and on earth now belongs to Him in virtue of His resurrection. The claim recalls Jesus’ prayer to the Father, “the Lord of heaven and earth.” In the prayer Jesus praised the Father for revealing Him to the anawim, to the small and weak of this world, by drawing them into His Abba experience. (Mt 11:25-27) Now the proclamation of the risen Christ will extend that revelation. Claiming universal divine power, Jesus commissions the reconstituted new Israel to baptize in the triune name. That commission reveals Jesus as the Breath-baptizer foretold by John, as the mightier one who would baptize not just with water but with a sanctifying Breath and with fire, the fire of divine holiness and judgment. (Mt 3:11-12) The commissioning therefore also implicitly recalls that Christian baptism fulfills Johannine baptism (Mt 3:13-17), thus revealing Jesus’ superiority to John. Moreover, as I have already indicated, the Great Commission recalls, expands, and fulfills the original mission of the Twelve to Israel. Jesus enjoins the disciples to teach all nations to obey everything He has commanded them. That injunction transforms the five discourses in Matthew into Christian Torah. The conversion of the nations which the Great Commission will effect alludes to other events in Matthew which foreshadow that conversion: the story of the magi (Mt 2:1-12), the cure of the centurion’s servant (Mt 8:5-13), the exorcism of the Canaanite woman’s daughter (Mt 15:21-28), the second multiplication of the loaves (Mt 15:29-39), and the testimony of the centurion at the foot of the cross.9 (Mt 27:54) This impressive clustering of allusions around the Great Commission endows it with enormous narrative importance. It designates the Great Commission as the culminating event of Jesus’ story which sums it up and endows it with ultimate meaning. The Analogy of Christological Knowing Mark views the Christian community primarily as a eucharistic community gathered to profess its practical faith in the risen Christ. Matthew, however, views the Christian community more as a Church (ekklesia) in the making. In Matthew, the Great Commission transforms the gospel into Christian Torah, creates the Church as the new Israel, and sends it on its mission of world-wide evangelization. These differences illustrate the analogy of Christological knowing because they reflect the different contexts which shape each evangelist’s account of Jesus. Those contexts require the gospel’s recasting in ways which will advance a particular community’s progress in the kind of knowledge which Breath-baptism effects. Others may find additional allusive link9. Cf. David P. Scaer, “The Relation of Matthew 28:16-20 to the Rest of the Gospel,” Concordia Theological Quarterly, 55(1991), pp. 245-266.

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ages in Matthew; but the preceding analysis should suffice to introduce converting adult Christians to some of the more important dialectical contrasts between Matthew and Mark. This chapter concludes the comparative dialectical analysis of Matthew and of Mark. The following section ponders Luke’s narrative Christology.


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Part 3 Luke’s Narrative Christology Chapter 12 Luke’s Prologues and Infancy Narrative In this section of volume two, I undertake a comparative dialectical analysis of Luke’s two volume account of Christian origins: his gospel and the Acts of the Apostles.1 I shall employ the same strategy as in analyzing Mark and Matthew. I shall trace through Luke’s gospel narrative his use of dramatic, thematic, and allusive linkages. In the process I shall attempt to uncover the fundamental Christological statement which the third evangelist makes about Jesus Christ. I shall then compare and contrast his narrative Christology with the two which I have examined so far. This third section divides into seven chapters. Chapter one summarizes what historical criticism can tell us about Luke and about the community for which he wrote. It also reflects on Christological themes in Luke’s infancy narrative. Chapter two examines the positive dramatic linkages which structure Luke’s gospel. As in the other synoptic gospels, Luke’s Jesus relates positively to John the Baptizer, to the Father, and to the Holy Breath. Chapter three looks at Luke’s handling of negative dramatic linkages: namely, Jesus’ relationship to Satan and his demons, to the scribes and Pharisees, to Herod, to the chief priests, and to Pilate. Chapter four focuses on the same two ambivalent linkages which structure the other synoptic gospels: namely, on the way in which Luke’s Jesus relates to the crowds and to His own disciples, and they to Him. Chapter five analyzes the way in which Luke uses thematic and allusive linkages in structuring his narrative. Chapter six meditates on the Christology of Acts. As we shall see, Luke locates his major Christological statements in Acts in the kerygmatic proclamation of the risen Christ. In addition, the evangelist also portrays Peter, Stephen, and Paul as examples of Christological knowing. In the course of proclaiming Christ in the power of His Breath, all three men find themselves assimilated to Him and drawn into His passion. Chapter seven examines how synoptic narrative Christology engages 1. For two different interpretations of the narrative unity of Luke’s two volumes, see: Robert C.Tannehill, The Narrative Unity of Luke-Acts: A Literary Interpretation (2 vols.; Minneapolis, MI: Fortress Press, 1990); Charles L’Eplattenier, Lecture de l’évangile de Luc (Paris: Desclée, 1982).

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Part 3: Luke’s Narrative Christology

the imagination in forming the Christian conscience. This final chapter uses pragmatic logic in order to clarify how Christological knowing happens. This first chapter of section three divides into two parts. Part one summarizes what we know at present about Luke and about the community for whom he wrote. Part two examines major Christological themes in Luke’s infancy narrative. (I) Most of what we can say about the third evangelist and about the community for whom he wrote we must glean from his own writings. Some other ancient sources do, however, yield glimmerings concerning the third synoptic evangelist and his community. An ancient extra-textual prologue to Luke’s gospel describes its author as “a Syrian of Antioch, by profession a physician, the disciple of the apostles, and later a follower of Paul until his martyrdom. He served the Lord without distraction, without a wife, and without children. He died at the age of eighty-four in Boeotia, full of the Holy Breath.”2 Origen, Eusebius, and Jerome speak of Luke in analogous terms. Tertullian describes Luke as “not an apostle, but a disciple, inferior indeed to a master.” Tertullian also depicts Luke as a disciple of Paul. (Tertullian, Adversus Marcionem, 4.5, 3) Luke’s two volumes, however, show no direct dependence on the writings of Paul. As we shall see in reflecting on Acts, Luke uses the figure of Paul and others in order to articulate the evangelist’s own theology of salvation history. If then, Luke did know Paul at Antioch, their meeting probably occurred early in Paul’s career. Certainly, we find factual discrepancies between Luke’s account of Paul in Acts and the apostle’s own letters.3 Several clues allow for an approximate dating of Luke’s gospel. Acts ends abruptly with Paul preaching the gospel in Rome, perhaps between 61 and 63 a.d. (Acts 28:30) Luke reproduces about sixty per cent of Mark’s narrative. Mark, as we have seen, wrote in the late sixties. Lk 13:35 almost certainly refers to the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 a.d. Luke, then, wrote his gospel no earlier than the eighth decade. Since Luke’s portrait of Paul in Acts shows no direct knowledge of the great apostle’s letters, Luke probably wrote prior to the formation and circulation of the 2. Cf. K. Aland, Synopsis quattuor Evangeliorum (Stuttgart: Württembergische Bibelanstalt, 1964), p. 553. 3. Cf. Philip Vielhauer, “On the ‘Paulinism’ of Acts” in Studies in Luke-Acts, edited by Leander E. Keck and J. Louis Maryn (New York, NY: Abingdon, 1966) pp. 33-50; Günther Bornkamm, “The Missionary Stance of Paul in 1 Corinthians 9 and in Acts” in Studies in Luke- Acts, pp. 194-207; John Wenham, “The Identification of Luke,” Evangelical Quarterly, 63(1991), pp. 3-44.

Chapter 12: Luke’s Prologues and Infancy Narratives

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New Testament corpus of Pauline epistles. Scholars therefore deem it likely that Luke wrote his gospel in the eighties, possibly in the early eighties. No one knows for certain where the Lukan community lived. The tone and rhetoric of the gospel makes its likely, however, that Luke was writing primarily for Gentile Christians. In his account of Christian origins, Luke stresses the continuity between Jewish and Gentile Christianity; but the evangelist portrays the Pauline Gentile mission as the culmination of early Christian evangelization. The Prologues No other synoptic gospel begins with the kind of formal prologue which opens both Luke’s gospel and Acts. (Lk 1:1-4; Acts 1:1-5) They yield a solid insight into the evangelist’s intentions in writing. No other synoptic evangelist tells us so clearly exactly why he is retelling Jesus’ story. Luke’s prologues imitate in their literary structure the prefaces to historical works by pagan historians like Herodotus, Thucydides, and Polybius. They adopt the periodic sentence structure of classical Greek authors. From the standpoint of stylistic elegance, the prologue to the gospel succeeds somewhat better than the prologue to Acts. Taken together the two prologues make it clear that Luke intended from the beginning to write a two-volume study of the origins of Christianity. He planned his study as an account of Jesus’ proclamation of the kingdom and of the Christian community’s subsequent proclamation of the risen Christ. The evangelist addresses both books to Theophilus, whom Luke refers to as “excellent” or “your Excellency (kratiste Theophile).” (Lk 1:3-4; Acts 1:1) The title “kratiste” has parallels in pagan prologues dedicated to a patron. In Roman society, one applied the title to a member of the equestrian order; but it also functioned as a general honorific title. That Theophilus functioned as Luke’s patron remains questionable. Most scholars regard Theophilus as a specific individual, but debate whether or not he belonged to the Christian community. Some regard him as a catechumen. In both prologues, however, the name would seem to have a symbolic function: it means “friend of God.” Even if the name of an historical personage, Luke’s use of the name suggests that he is writing his two-volume study for any “friend of God.” Moreover, Luke tells Theophilus why he is writing: He wants “God’s-friend” to “realize what assurance you have for the instructions you have received (katêchêthês).” (Lk 1:4) The verb “katêchêthein” connotes formal instruction. In other words, Luke is trying to buttress the oral catechesis which Theophilus has received by writing a carefully researched, well ordered, written account of the origins of the Christian movement, one which clearly establishes the historical link between it

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and Jesus. Luke hopes to deepen Theophilus’s insight into the historical grounds for Christian faith, into the events which gave rise to it. Luke writes out of a sense of an oral tradition, but he recognizes that “many (polloi)” (Lk 1:1) have committed the things he will narrate to writing. How many written sources Luke draws upon apart from Mark we cannot say for certain. If Q existed, then Luke, like Matthew, adapts materials from Q to his own narrative purposes; but he also draws on sources to which Matthew had no access or which Matthew chose to ignore. Luke, however, clearly ambitions a more comprehensive account of Christian origins than any he has examined. Luke writes about events which have really occurred. He calls them “pragmatôn” (Lk 1:1) The term means facts, happenings, things done or accomplished. Like Matthew, Luke situates the events he narrates within salvation history, but their visions of salvation history contrast in significant ways. Matthew, as we have seen, in writing his gospel developed in a systematic way the notion of “fulfillment.” The term had for him theological as well as historical connotations: Jesus fulfills the Old Testament by providing the correct lens through which to read and interpret Torah. As we have seen, Matthew’s Jesus fulfills the Law by turning negative commands into positive ideals which demand more than the Law ever did. He fulfills the prophets as Immanuel, as the divine embodiment of everything which the prophets foretold and more. Luke, if anything, has an even more evolved sense than Matthew of salvation history as an unfolding event; but, while Matthew views the history of salvation through the eyes of a Jewish Christian, Luke writes primarily with Gentile Christians in mind. Like Matthew, Luke invokes the concept of “fulfillment”; but in Luke the term has different connotations. While Matthew sees the past fulfilled and brought to perfection in the eschatological present established by the Christ event, Luke portrays salvation history as advancing in three successive, if slightly overlapping, stages: 1) from the creation of the world up to the appearance of John the Baptizer: the period of the Law and the prophets; 2) from Jesus’ conception and baptism to His ascension: the period of His public ministry, death, and exaltation, and 3) from Jesus’ ascension to the second coming: the age of universal evangelization and of the Church. Whereas Matthew sees the Church as an institution founded on Petrine Christianity, Luke takes a more broadly universalist view of salvation history and portrays the proclamation of Christ as culminating in Paul’s Gentile mission.4 4. Cf. NJBC, 43:11; Joseph A. Fitzmyer, The Gospel According to Luke (2 vols.; New York, NY: Doubleday, 1983), pp. 289-302 [hereafter abbreviated, Fitzmyer, Gospel]; Luke Timothy Johnson, The Gospel of Luke (Collegeville, MI: The Liturgical Press, 1991), pp. 27-30 [hereafter abbreviated as Johnson, Gospel]; C.F. Evant, Saint Luke (London:


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The prologue to the Acts of the Apostles summarizes rapidly the story of Jesus which Luke narrated in his gospel. It portrays the gospel as concerned primarily with the words and deeds of Jesus “from the beginning (achri) until the day He gave His instructions to the apostles He had chosen through the Holy Breath, and was take up into heaven.” (Acts 1:1-2) The “beginning” to which Luke refers means primarily the inception of Jesus’ public ministry, but the term embraces also Jesus’ birth and childhood narrated in Luke’s infancy gospel. The reference to the “beginning” of Jesus words and deeds implicitly portrays the events narrated in Acts as the continuation of everything which He began. In the Breath-filled witness of the apostles, the risen Christ continues in the paschal mystery the work He began by His own life and ministry. One finds, then, two significant “beginnings” in the latter half of Lukan salvation history: 1) the new beginning which Jesus’ conception, ministry, death, and resurrection inaugurate and 2) Pentecost, which begins the era of the Church.5 In constructing his two-volume account, Luke draws a parallel between the movement of the good news from Galilee to Jerusalem, on the one hand, and its movement from Jerusalem to Rome, on the other. Both cities function symbolically. Jerusalem symbolizes the center of the Jewish world; Rome, the center of the Gentile world. Luke portrays Jesus carrying the word into the heart of the Jewish world, into Jerusalem and its temple. There, instead of acceptance, He experiences rejection, crucifixion, and glorification. The paschal mystery occurs in the heart of Judaism; and it begins a counter movement of universal saving significance. In Acts the Pentecost of the Jews functions as a prelude to the “Pentecost” of the Samaritans and to the “Pentecost” of the Gentiles. Peter preaches the first Pentecost and officially baptizes the first uncircumcised Gentiles, but Paul serves as God’s chosen instrument for evangelizing the nations. Physical movement plays, then, a more important role in Luke’s narrative Christology than it does in the other synoptic gospels. Luke’s two volume history SCM Press, 1991), pp. 27-30 [hereafter abbreviated as Evans, Luke] Hans Conzelmann, The Theology of St. Luke, translated by Geoffrey Buswell (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress, 1961); Darrell L. Bock, Luke: Volume I: 1:1-9:50 (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1994), pp. 51-67 [hereafter abbreviated as Bock, Luke]; Josef Ernst, Das Evangelium nach Lukas (Regensburg: Verlag Friedrich Pustet, 1993), pp. 45-50. 5. Cf. NJBC, 44:14; F.F. Bruce, The Book of Acts (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1988), pp. 28-33 [hereafter abbreviated at Bruce, Acts]; Hans Conzelmann, Acts of the Apostles, translated by J. Limberg, A.T. Brabee, and D.H. Juel (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress, 1987, pp. 3-4 [hereafter abbreviated at Conzelmann, Acts]; Ernst Hänchen, The Acts of the Apostles (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress, 1971), pp. 135-147 [hereafter abbreviated at Hänchen, Acts]; E. Samain, “La notion de ARXH dans l’oeuvre lucanienne” in L’évangile de Luc, edited and revised by F. Neiryuck (Leuven: University Press, 1989), pp. 209-238; David L. Meland, “Luke-Acts and the Verbs of Dionysius of Halicarnassus,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 63(1996), pp. 63- 86.

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portrays Jesus’ ministry as an implosion within Judaism which triggers the explosion of the gospel into the entire Gentile world. The Structure of Luke’s Gospel Luke’s gospel divides into seven sections. 1) Luke’s infancy narrative and account of Jesus’ hidden life opens the gospel. 2) The ministry of John the Baptizer, Jesus’ baptism, genealogy, and confrontation with Satan in the wilderness provide the immediate narrative prelude to Jesus’ public ministry. 3) Luke then adapts the first part of Mark’s account of Jesus’ Galilean ministry to his own purposes. Luke prefaces the Galilean ministry with his own version of Jesus’ rejection at Nazareth. The unbelief and murderous hostility of the Nazarenes dramatizes the fundamental sin of many Jewish people: namely, their refusal to recognize that God chose them, not for their own sake, but in order to bring about the conversion and salvation of the Gentiles. Luke, however, made place in the Christian community for both Jewish and Gentile converts. The evangelist also reminded his community of Christianity’s roots in the Jewish tradition. After the incident at Nazareth Luke narrates Jesus’ Galilean ministry. He begins with Mark’s account of Jesus’ initial activities in Capernaum. The five conflict stories which open Mark’s gospel appear in edited form. Luke then describes the call of the disciples. Jesus preaches both the sermon on the plain and the parabolic discourse. Luke records only one multiplication of the loaves and fish. The evangelist closes his account of the Galilean ministry by describing various responses to it. 4) The journey discourse follows. The journey discourse transforms the way section of Mark into a Lukan metaphor for discipleship as the disciples accompany Jesus from Galilee to Jerusalem, to the cross, and to glory. As the disciples travel on pilgrimage with Jesus, He instructs them at great length about life in the kingdom. 5) Luke adapts Mark’s account of Jesus’ final Jerusalem ministry, including his version of the eschatological discourse. In Luke’s account of Jesus’ final activities in Jerusalem, however, the temple priests function as His only adversaries. Luke’s Jesus conducts virtually all His final ministry within the temple precincts; for Luke depicts that ministry as a struggle between the messiah and the high priests for control of the temple. Accordingly, Luke’s Jesus in contrast to Mark’s and to Matthew’s directs the eschatological discourse primarily to the crowds in the temple and only secondarily to the disciples. 6) As in Mark and Matthew, the passion narrative follows. At the last supper, Luke’s Jesus institutes the eucharist and delivers a brief last discourse. Moreover, as we shall see, the evangelist depicts Jesus’ crucifixion as the supreme expression of divine forgiveness.


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7) Finally, the gospel concludes with Jesus’ resurrection and appearances to the disciples in Jerusalem rather than in Galilee. In these accounts Luke presents his own narrative interpretation of the meaning of Jesus’ resurrection. The gospel closes with a brief account of Jesus’ ascension into heaven.6 This section has reflected on what historical-critical method tells us about Luke, about his community, and about his intentions in writing his gospel and Acts. The following section examines Christological themes in the infancy narrative. (II) Luke’s infancy narrative tells the story of two births: that of Jesus and that of John the Baptizer. The narrative, therefore, provides a prolonged theological reflection, undertaken in the light of the paschal mystery, on the relationship between the two men. The story unfolds in two major diptychs. In the first, an angel announces the birth of both John and Jesus. In the second, Luke recounts the birth of both babies and their circumcision and naming. The infancy gospel begins in the temple in Jerusalem and culminates there, with the story of Jesus’ presentation.7 Luke’s account of the finding of the boy Jesus in the temple does not strictly speaking belong to his infancy narrative, since it describes Jesus as an adolescent. Rather it provides a transition from the infancy narrative to the story of Jesus’ public 6. Cf. J. Sawsey, “The Literary Unity of Luke-Acts: Questions of Style—A Task for Literary Critics,” New Testament Studies, 35(1989), pp. 48-66; Heinrich Baarlink, “Die Zyklische Struktur for Lukas 9.43b-19.28,” New Testament Studies, 38(1992), pp. 481-506; F. Gerald Dowling, “A Paradigm Perplex: Luke, Matthew, and Mark,” New Testament Studies, 38(1992), pp. 15-36; Michael Goulder, “Luke’s Compositional Options,” New Testament Studies, 39(1993), pp. 15-152; C.K. Barrett, Luke the Historian in Recent Study (London: The Epworth Press, 1961); Stephen G. Wilson, Luke and the Pastoral Epistles (London: SPCK, 1979), Charles H. Talbert, Literary Patterns, Theological Themes and the Genre of Luke/Acts (Missoula, MN: Scholars Press, 1974); Conzelmann, The Theology of Luke, translated by Geoffrey Buswell (New York, NY: Harper & Row, 1960); I. Howard Marshall, Luke: Historian and Theologian (Grand Rapids, MI: Academe Books, 1970); Craig A. Evans and James A. Sanders, Luke and Scripture: The Function of Sacred Tradition in Luke-Acts (Minneapolis, MI: Fortress, 1993); Philip Francis Esler, Community and Gospel in Luke-Acts: The Social and Political Motivations of Lukan Theology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987); Robert L. Brawley, Text to Text Pours Forth Speech: Voices of Scripture in Luke-Acts (Minneapolis, MI: Indiana University Press, 1995); Harold E. Dollar, A Biblical- Missiological Exploration of the Cross-Cultural Dimensions in Luke-Acts (San Francisco, CA: A. Mellen Research University Press, 1993); Michael Dömer, Das Heil Gottes: Studien zur Theologie des lukanischen Doppelwerkes (Köln-Bonn, Verlag Peter Hanstein, 1978); James M Dawsey, The Lukan Voice: Confusion and Irony in the Gospel of Luke (Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 1986). 7. Cf. John Navone, S.J., Themes of Luke (Rome: Gregorian Press, 1970), pp. 64-70.

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ministry. The finding in the temple also culminates in Jerusalem, as does Luke’s gospel as a whole. As the infancy narrative evolves Luke punctuates the events he describes with both angelic and human proclamations about the person and mission of both of the children. Gabriel in announcing each birth predicts the future ministry of each child. An angel announces the birth of Jesus to shepherds and interprets the circumstances of His birth. When humans testify, the Holy Breath of God inspires their witness. Elizabeth, Zechariah, Simeon, and Anna all prophesy about Jesus and John in the power of the divine Breath. This outpouring of the Breath foreshadows Pentecost. In addition to the proclamations, Luke has all the principal characters in the infancy narrative acknowledge in faith the action of God in their midst. Elizabeth praises God for her own pregnancy. Mary pronounces her Magnificat; and Zechariah, his Benedictus.8 The Two Annunciations The infancy narrative closely parallels the events of John’s and of Jesus’ birth. The angel Gabriel announces both births before they occur: John’s to Zechariah and Jesus’ to Mary. In both annunciations the angel foretells each child’s special mission from God. One finds several parallels between the two accounts. 1) Zechariah and Elizabeth expect no child because of their advanced years: Elizabeth is barren and has passed the time of child bearing. (Lk 1:5-10) Mary and Joseph expect no child because they have not yet married. (Lk 1:26-7) 2) The appearance of the angel leaves both Zecharaiah and Mary troubled. (Lk 1:11-2, 28-9) 3) The angel tells both not to fear and then announces the child’s birth. In announcing the birth, the angel also names the child. (Lk 1:13, 31) The angel recognizes greatness in both children but surpassing greatness in Jesus. (Lk 1:13-17) 4) Both Zechariah and Mary pose questions to the angel. (Lk 1:18, 34) 5) The angel responds to the question posed and then gives a sign of the truth of his message. As a sign, Zechariah becomes temporarily mute. (Lk 1:19-22) The angel explains to Mary that she will conceive Jesus through the power of the Holy Breath and gives as a sign the fact that Elizabeth has conceived John in her advanced age. (Lk 1:35-38) 6) Both annunciation scenes end with the departure of the angel. 8. Cf. Mark Coleridge, The Birth of Lukan Narrative: Narrative and Christology in Luke 1-2 (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1993); Gabriel Perez Rodriguez, “Dimension existencial de Mt 1-2; Lc 1-2,” Estudios Biblicos, 50(1992), pp. 161-175; Domingo Munoz Leon, “Deras e Historia: La Distincion entre Acontecimiento-Base y Artificio literario en los Relatos Derasicos,” Estudios Biblicos, 50(1992), pp. 123-148; George, op. cit., pp. 43-50; Lou H. Silberman, “A Model for the Lukan Infancy Narratives?” Journal of Biblical Literature, 113(1994), pp. 491-493; Salvatore A. Panimolle, “La Christologia di Luca 1-2,” Augustinianum, 35(1995), pp. 61-73.


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Luke uses analogous parallels in describing the birth and circumcision of both John and Jesus. Here it suffices to note that the parallelism in the two annunciations serves two interrelated functions. It validates the divine origin of the missions of both Jesus and of John. They will both function as prophetic voices in the drama of salvation which is beginning to unfold. The parallelism also serves to underscore the superiority of Jesus to John at every point. John will function as Jesus’ forerunner, as the one who prepares Israel for the coming of the messiah. Jesus will function as messiah, savior, and Son of God.9 The miraculous births of John and of Jesus parallel other such births in salvation history. Elizabeth resembles Sarah, Abraham’s wife, in her inability to bear children because of advanced age. (Gen 18:11) Hannah, the barren mother of the prophet Samuel, conceived miraculously and in response to prayer. (1 Sam 1:3,17) In Judges Minoah conceived Samson miraculously after seeing an angel. (Judg 2:1-5) As in these earlier accounts, the miraculous character of the births of Jesus and of John portends the special role both will play within salvation history. Jesus’s conception, however, in contrast to John’s, results from the direct action of the creative Breath of God. His conception by the Breath dramatizes the special transcendent origin of His person and mission. In his account of the annunciation of Jesus’ birth, Luke identifies the angel of the two annunciations as Gabriel. (Lk 1:26) In Dan 9:24-7, the angel Gabriel announces the prophecy of the Seventy Weeks and of the coming of a messianic figure. Gabriel reappears with messages to Zechariah and Mary as a sign that the births of John and especially of Jesus fulfill that prophecy. Although Luke does not name Gabriel in his appearance to Zechariah, the evangelist clearly has Gabriel in mind because one finds too many parallels between the apparition of Gabriel to Daniel and his appearance to Zechariah. (Dan 8:17, 9:20-1, 10:7-15) The fact that Gabriel gives John a name indicates that he has a divinely foreordained role to play within the history of salvation. (Lk 1:13) John means “Yahweh has given grace.” John’s appearance will then inaugurate a season of grace which Jesus’ mission will bring to perfection. John’s birth will bring joy to not only to his parents but to many others, presumably to those who long for the season of grace which John will announce. (Lk 1:14) Gabriel gives Jesus a different name. Jesus means “Yahweh saves.” (Lk 1:31) Jesus, then, will bring a salvation which John will only prepare the people to receive. Gabriel predicts that both John and Jesus will achieve greatness; but their greatness will take different forms. In the case of John, he will espouse the ascetic way of the Nazarite, and the prophetic Breath who will 9. Brown, Birth of the Messiah, pp. 250-251; NJBC, 43:13; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 51-57.

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inspire his ministry will guide him from his mother’s womb. (Lk 1:15) John will act “in the spirit and power of Elijah.” As Elijah redivivus, he will prepare the way for the Lord’s coming. The title “Lord” designates Jesus. (Lk 1:16-7) John will prepare Jesus’ coming by turning the hearts of Israelites back to God. He will recall people to their fundamental religious responsibilities, as Elijah should do. (Cf. Mal 3:24; Sir 48:10) By recalling people to obedience to the divine wisdom, John will prepare them for the coming of the Lord. (Lk 1:17) As Lord, Jesus manifests a more excellent form of greatness than John. While John enjoys the dignity of an Elijah, Jesus enjoys the dignity of Son of God from the very first moment of His conception. (Lk 1:32-3) As messiah He will inherit the throne of David and reign there in perpetuity, just as God had once promised the house of David. (2 Sam 7:9-16) Moreover, Jesus’ miraculous conception by the very Breath of God manifests His identity as Son of God. (Lk 1:35) Mary’s overshadowing by the divine Breath so that she can conceive God’s Son transforms her into the Tabernacle of God. (Cf. Ex 40:35; Num 9:18, 22) The miraculous conception of Jesus in the power of the Breath does not connote, however, a sexual relationship between Mary and the Breath. Jewish tradition formed Christian sensibilities. Both would have found such pagan conceptions of God blasphemous and abhorrent. Instead the conception of Jesus results from a transcendent act of divine creativity. (Cf. Gen 1:2) Matthew tells the story of Jesus’ conception by the Holy Breath in a way which makes it quite clear that Joseph did not father the child. (Mt 1:18-25) While Luke does not rule out explicitly the presence of human seed, he clearly intends Jesus’ conception by the Breath of God (Lk 1:35) to parallel and surpass John’s possession of a prophetic Breath from his mother’s womb. (Lk 1:15) He would, therefore, seem to portray Jesus’ conception as both virginal and miraculous. Moreover, while Luke does not link Jesus’ virginal conception to the prophesy of Immanuel, as Matthew does, he does assert that Jesus’ virginal conception in the power of the divine Breath reveals His divine Sonship. (Lk 1:35) Luke portrays the parents of John as members of the priestly class: Zechariah belongs to the tribe of Levi, while Elizabeth descends from Aaron. The evangelist also describes them as people who live upright and legally blameless lives. Luke, therefore, probably desires to depict the elderly couple as representing the best of the Jewish tradition. Advanced in age and childless, Zechariah and Elizabeth recall the aged and childless Abraham and Sarah, who began the story of Israel. (Gen 15:1-2, 18:1-15) In Zechariah and Elizabeth, the history of Israel comes round full circle. (Lk 1:5-7)


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Zechariah’s responds to the angel’s prediction of John’s birth with a question: “How shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in age?” (Lk 1:18) His query does not differ that markedly from Mary’s question, “How shall this be, since I have no husband?” (Lk 1:34) The angel, however, rebukes Zechariah’s unbelief but finds no fault with Mary. Moreover, the angel strikes Zechariah mute as a sign, possibly as a way of instilling greater faith in the old man. Since the entire passage has many parallels to the apparition of Gabriel to Daniel, the sign of muteness probably derives from Dan 10:15, where Daniel also finds himself struck dumb. Elizabeth, after conceiving John, acknowledges the divine blessing which the conception represents, since the Lord has finally taken away from her the reproach of barrenness.10 (Lk 1:24- 5) Gabriel addresses Mary as “highly favored (kecharitomenê)” and tells her that the Lord is with her. (Lk 1:28) The greeting causes Mary to wonder why she should stand in such a privileged relationship with God. (Lk 1:29) The angel, however, assures her that she has “found favor (charin) with God” and points to the coming birth of Jesus as proof of the fact. Jesus’ dignity and accomplishments—His divine Sonship, His inheritance of the kingdom of David in perpetuity—give concrete meaning to the grace which Mary has received from God. From all other women God has chosen her to give birth to the messianic Son of God. (Lk 1:31-3) Once Mary understands that the Holy Breath of God will conceive the child within her, she consents and calls herself “the handmaiden of the Lord.” (Lk 1:38) Her response also recalls the response of Hannah when she discovered that God will grant her a son: “Let your handmaiden find favor in your eyes.”11 (1 Sam 1:18) Jesus’ virginal conception begins a new Israel in a way which dramatizes both its continuity and discontinuity with the old Israel. Jesus’ miraculous conception marks a new beginning in salvation history at the same time that it fulfills the ancient Israel’s messianic longings. The story of the visitation provides a narrative transition from the annunciation of the births of John and of Jesus to the events themselves. It also contains the first human testimony to Jesus, a testimony which Luke places on the lips of Elizabeth. 10. Cf. NJBC, 43:12-18; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 303-333; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 31-36; Evans, Luke, pp. 137-153; Brown, Birth of the Messiah, pp. 256-285; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, I, pp. 303-333; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 303-333; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 51-57. 11. Cf. NJBC, 43:19-20; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 334-355; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 36-40; Evans, Luke, pp. 153-166; Brown, Birth of the Messiah, pp.286-329; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, I, pp. 334-355; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 102-32; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 51-57; Antionio Vincent Cernuda, “El domicilio de José y la fama de Maria,” Estudios Biblicos, 46(1988), pp. 5-25; George, op. cit.. pp. 431-464; John J. Kilgallen, S.J., “The Conception of Jesus (Luke 1,35),” Biblica, 78(1997), pp. 225-246.

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Mary journeys to the hill country of Judea in order to assist Elizabeth in her pregnancy. At the moment she greets Elizabeth, the infant John stirs in her womb. (Lk 1:39-42) The Holy Breath then inspires Elizabeth to exclaim in a loud voice: Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb! And why is this granted to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For behold, when the voice of your greeting came to my ears, the babe in my womb leaped for joy. And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her from the Lord. (Lk 1:42-5)

Elizabeth’s testimony especially praises Mary for her faith, which contrasts with Zechariah’s unbelief, and once again makes explicit Jesus’ pre-eminence over John. Her prayer of blessing echoes similar prayers in the Old Testament. (Judg 5:24; Judith 13:18) The fact that the Holy Breath inspires her words endows them with divine authority. Elizabeth pronounces Mary doubly blessed: blessed in being the mother of the Lord, blessed because she believed the word of God that she would conceive Jesus miraculously in the power of the Breath. The testimony of Elizabeth thus defines Mary’s role in the infancy gospel. She confronts the reader as the type of the true disciple, as one who hears the word of God and heeds it obediently in faith. (Cf. Lk 11:27-8) The blessing also assimilates Mary to Judith, the woman who had single-handedly delivered Israel. Judith too was also called “blessed among women.” (Judith, 13:18) Mary’s faith will, of course, mediate a transcendent kind of deliverance. Elizabeth, moreover, makes it clear that in virtue of her divinely appointed role as Mother of the messiah Mary outranks her in dignity, even though Elizabeth outranks Mary in age. In calling Jesus “my Lord” Elizabeth alludes to the messianic Psalm 110:1. Elizabeth mothers a second Elijah; Mary mothers the messiah and Son of God. The Holy Breath also inspires Elizabeth to recognize symbolic significance in the fact that John stirred in her womb at the sound of Mary’s voice. Destined to play a subordinate role in the history of salvation to that which Jesus will play, the infant John rejoices to find himself in the presence of the messianic Lord he will serve. Elizabeth’s prophecy thus calls attention to the contrast already implicit in Gabriel’s description of the missions of John and of Jesus.12 (Gen 25:22-3) 12. Cf. Juan B. Cortes-Quirant, S.J., “‘Bendita tu sobre todas las Mujeres’: Gabriel o Isabel,” Estudios Biblicos, 49(1991), pp. 271-276; Alfonso de la Fuente, “Isabel, llena de Espiritu Santo: Lc 1,41 a la Luz de la Tradicion rabinica,” Estudios Biblicos, 50(1992), pp. 73-83; Luis Diez Merino, “Transfondo semitico de Lucas 1-2,” Estudios Biblicos, 50(1992), pp. 35-72; Max Turner, “The Spirit of Prophecy and the Power of Authoritative Preaching in Luke-Acts: A Question of Origins,” New Testament Studies, 38(1992), pp. 66-88.


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Mary responds to Elizabeth’s prophetic greeting by blessing God for what He has accomplished in her. Her canticle nuances and deepens Luke’s portrait of her as the type of the faithful disciple. Mary speaks with the voice of the anawim, of the lowly and dispossessed of the earth who must look to God for their vindication. Mary’s canticle divides into two parts. In the first, she blesses God for the ways in which He has blessed her. (Lk 1:47-9) In the second part, Mary draws a parallel between what God has done for her and His merciful vindication of all the lowly ones who place their confidence in Him. (Lk 1:50-5) Mary’s canticle introduces, therefore, a major theme in Luke’s gospel: namely, God’s special care for the lowly and the dispossessed. Luke again implicitly parallels Mary and Hannah, the mother of Samuel. (Cf. 1 Sam 2:1-2) The first two verses of her canticle—”My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my savior”—also echo Ps 35:9 and Hab 3:18. Indeed, virtually every verse in the Magnificat has a parallel in the Old Testament. Those allusions underscore the point made in the canticle’s conclusion, namely, that what God is about to accomplish in Jesus fulfills all the promises which God has made to Israel in the course of its history. In calling herself the handmaiden of the Lord, Mary identifies with the anawim. She calls attention to the lowliness of her condition in life as a way of giving God entire credit for what He has accomplished in her. (Lk 1:48) God has exalted her into a source of blessing for “all generations.” They will bless Mary for the universal salvation which God has accomplished through her. Moreover, what God has done in Mary manifests His holiness. (Lk 1:49) In the second strophe of her canticle, Mary points to God’s action in her as typical of His constant vindication of the lowly who reverence Him. God has toppled the mighty from their thrones but exalted those of low estate. He has fed the hungry but sent the rich away empty. (Lk 1:50-3) Although Luke uses the past tense to describe these saving acts of God, one should probably also take these verses as a foreshadowing of the social transformation which God will begin to accomplish in the ministry of Jesus. By using the past tense Luke would seem to endow the divine saving actions soon to occur with historical inevitability. In the conclusion of the Magnificat, Mary acclaims the saving act God is accomplishing specifically in Jesus. He will fulfill the promises He has made to Israel over the generations. (Lk 1:54-5) The conclusion thus locates the saving ministry of Jesus and His messianic reversal of values within the context of salvation history. Any promise made by God in the past will find its fulfillment now in Him. Mary pronounces her canticle in response to Elizabeth’s blessing. It therefore sanctions what Elizabeth has just said and develops it. Elizabeth

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has proclaimed Jesus the messiah whom John will serve. Mary in response attributes the messiah’s coming to God’s constant care and concern for the lowly of this earth. God’s choice of one of the anawim as the messiah’s mother proves that abiding concern. As messiah, Jesus will turn the social order upside down by exalting the lowly and deposing the powerful and rich. Finally, Jesus’ ministry fulfills all of God’s saving promises to Israel and effects a universal salvation which encompasses “all generations.” As we shall see, Luke will develop all these themes in the course of his gospel and of Acts.13 Two Births For some unexplained reason, Mary departs before John’s birth. (Lk 1:56) Her departure probably reflects Luke’s narrative concern not to include in his account of John’s birth personages involved in Jesus’ birth. Different casts of characters at each birth dramatize the different providential roles which the two infants will each play in salvation history. After Elizabeth gives birth to John, on the day of his circumcision she insists that he bear the name assigned him by the angel. When relatives protest, Zechariah decides the matter by writing on a tablet: “John is his name.” The dumb Zechariah then bursts into speech to the astonishment of those present and of all who hear of these events. (Lk 1:57-65) The loosing of Zechariah’s tongue confirms the name assigned the child by the angel. It also sets the stage for Zechariah’s testimony to John, the culminating event of this incident. Zechariah utters a canticle which parallels Mary’s. It describes the salvation which is dawning in the births of John and of Jesus and reasserts the fact that John will play only a subordinate role in the events which will soon unfold. The first part of the Benedictus develops the conclusion of the Magnificat. In raising up Jesus, God is in fact visiting Israel and redeeming it from bondage to its enemies. This act of divine salvation fulfills all the prophecies made to Israel in ages past. Specifically, the messiah’s arrival makes good the divine promises to the house of David. Those promises include Nathan’s prophecy (2 Sam 7:4-16) and other messianic prophecies. Jesus’ coming also fulfills the covenant which God made with Abraham. Luke alludes to Gen 17:1-27 where God promises to multiply Abraham’s 13. Cf. Joel B. Green, “The Social Status of Mary in Luke 1,5-2,52,” Biblica, 73(1992), pp. 457-472; Jesus Luzarraga, “Las Versiones Siriacas del Magnificat,” Estudios Biblicos, 50(1992), pp. 103-122; Joaquin Gonzales Echegaray, “Las tres Ciudades de los Evangelios de la Infancia de Jesús: Nazaret, Belén y Jerusalen,” Estudios Biblicos, 50(1992), pp. 85-102; Jean Irigoin, “La composition rhythmique des cantiques de Luc,” Revue Biblique, 98(1991), pp. 5-50; David Peter Seccombe, Possessions and the Poor in Luke-Acts (Linz: Studien zum Neuen Testament und seine Umwelt, 1982); Brown, Birth of the Messiah, pp. 330-366; NJBC, 43:21-23; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, I, pp. 356-371; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 132-162; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 65-71.


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offspring like the stars of the heaven and sands of the seashore. Jesus begins a new Israel by sealing a new covenant between God and humanity. That covenant effects in turn a universal salvation by drawing the nations in to God’s saving plan. (Acts 1:7-9) The new covenant empowers the new and universal Israel to serve God without fear of its enemies and “in holiness and righteousness all the days of our life.” (Lk 1:68-75) In fact, Luke’s Zechariah says that God has already accomplished all these things. Once again, Luke probably uses the aorist tense as a way of asserting the historical inevitability of what God is about to accomplish in Jesus. Zechariah’s canticle suddenly switches to the future tense, as the old man addresses the infant John in prophecy. Zechariah echoes Gabriel’s words concerning the child. (Lk 1: 15-7) John will himself engage in a prophetic ministry: he will “go before the Lord to prepare His ways, to give knowledge of salvation to His people in the forgiveness of their sins.” (Lk 1:76-7) In contrast to Matthew, Luke follows Mark in attributing the forgiveness of sins to John’s baptism. (Lk 3:3) Israel will, however, gain full knowledge of salvation in the forgiveness of sins, when, through the tender mercy of God, the messiah dawns upon her like the sun. In a cryptic allusion to the resurrection, Zechariah prophesies that the messianic light will especially console those “who sit in darkness and the shadow of death.” In addition, Jesus will bring the messianic gift of peace: not just the absence of war but harmony, well-being, prosperity, security, and right order in society. This concluding promise of peace echoes the messianic reversal of values which Mary’s Magnificat celebrates.14 The story of John’s circumcision closes with a summary statement about his growth: And the child grew and became strong in spirit, and he was in the wilderness till the day of his manifestation to Israel. (Lk 1:80)

This final allusion to John in the infancy narrative ties it explicitly to John’s preaching in the deserts east of Jerusalem. It also foreshadows the summary of Jesus’ hidden life which closes Luke’s infancy narrative.15 (Lk 2:39-40) Luke has now set the stage for the birth of the messiah. While Matthew’s infancy narrative seems to have assumed that Joseph and Mary lived in 14. Cf. Warren Carter, “Zechariah and the Benedictus (Luke 1, 68-79): Practicing What He Preaches,” Biblica, 69(1988), pp. 239-247. 15. Fitzmyer deems it plausible that John received his education with the Essenes in the Judean desert; Cf. Joseph A. Fitzmyer, “The Dead Sea Scrolls and Early Christianity,” Theology Digest, 42(1995), 303-322. See also: NJBC: 43:24-26; Brown, Birth of the Messiah, pp. 367-392; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 372-390; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 44-48; Evans, Luke, pp. 177-188; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 63-198; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 72-79.

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Bethlehem prior to Jesus’ birth and came to Nazareth only after they returned from Egypt, Luke places Jesus’ conception in Nazareth and has to explain how it came about that he was born in Bethlehem. Luke finds his explanation in a census decree by Caesar Augustus which required all Roman subjects to enroll in the town of their birth. As a consequence, Joseph must take the pregnant Mary from Nazareth to Bethlehem, where she gives birth to Jesus. (Lk 2:1-7) Luke’s census locates Jesus’ birth in the pax augustiniana; but secular history remains silent about any census of the whole world under Augustus, although more limited census taking did occur during his reign. Luke may have known of such a limited census; but, if so, the evangelist exaggerates its scope. The universal census of which Luke speaks would have prepared Roman tax rolls. Those taxes caused enormous suffering especially among the poor. Luke, then, in recording a world-wide census implicitly depicts the Roman empire as a world-wide system of economic and political oppression. Later in his gospel, Luke will insist on the Satanic character of the kingdoms of this world, among which Rome held pride of place when Luke wrote. (Lk 4:6-7) As we shall also see, the message of the angel after Jesus’ birth will suggest that Jesus rather than Augustus reigns as the true imperator of the entire world. Luke’s Gentile Christians must choose between the Satanic Roman empire and the reign of God which Jesus embodies and proclaims.16 Possibly because of the overcrowding in Bethlehem, Mary swaddles the newborn Jesus and cradles him in a manger, although in first-century Palestine peasants did keep animals in their homes.17 (Lk 2:7) The swaddling suggests that Jesus receives Mary’s loving care. The manger may allude to Is 1:3: “The ox knows its owner; and the donkey knows the manger of its lord; but Israel has not known me; my people has not understood me.” If so, Luke would be suggesting that the coming of Jesus abrogates this divine complaint against Israel, since the shepherds to whom the angel will announce Jesus’ birth seek Him out immediately and rejoice when they find Him. I find the preceding interpretations possible, but somewhat forced. I believe instead that the angel’s message to the shepherds probably provides the key for the symbolism of the manger. The humble resting place of the infant messiah contrasts with the exalted titles with which the 16. Cf. Royce L.B. Morris, “Why Augoustos? A Note to Luke 2.1,” New Testament Studies, 38(1992), pp. 142-144; G.D. Kilpatrick, “Luke 2:4 and Leviticus 25:10,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 80(1989), pp. 264-265; Paul W. Walaskay, “And So We Came to Rome”: The Political Perspective of St. Luke (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983). 17. Cf. L. Paul Trudinger, “No Room in the Inn: A Note on Luke 2:7,” Expository Times, 102(1991), pp. 172-173; A.J. Kerr, “No Room in the kataluma,” Expository Times, 103(1991), pp. 15-16.


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angel names Jesus. The humble character of Jesus’ first bed foreshadows the fact that He will champion the cause of the poor. In so acting, He will differ from the bone-crushing Davidic messiah for whom many Jews hoped. He will also differ from Caesar Augustus and from all other imperial workers of oppression. (Lk 7:18-23) Less plausibly, some commentators see an allusion to the eucharist in the Luke’s identification of Jesus’ resting place with a place for food. The shepherds near the city of David remind the reader that David kept sheep before his anointing as King. (1 Sam 16:1-13) Their presence at the manger therefore alludes to Jesus’ messianic dignity. It also identifies the new born messiah with the disenfranchised peasantry, with the “people of the land.” An angel appears to the watching shepherds as the glory of the Lord descends upon them. (Lk 2:8-9) The appearance of the divine glory lends special divine sanction to the angel’s message. The angel tells the terrified shepherds not to fear: Be not afraid; for behold, I bring you good news of a great joy which will come to all the people; for to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger. (Lk 2:10-2)

With a uniquely Lukan narrative touch, the angel speaks the language of the imperial decree which announced the birth of an heir to the emperor. The angel’s proclamation therefore tacitly contrasts Jesus, the poor, humble messiah and Lord, with the proud and oppressive Caesar Augustus. The angelic message also points to Jesus, not to Caesar, as the true ruler of the world. In addition, the angel’s message alludes to Is 9:5-6, which announces the birth of the Wonder Counselor, Divine Hero, Everlasting Father, and Prince of Peace. Luke, however, has substituted for these Isaian formulas three titles from the early Christian kerygma: Savior, Christ, and Lord. The angel’s message, therefore, actually begins the proclamation of the gospel, of the good news which the angelic hymn celebrates. As noted above, therefore, the resting place of the new born Savior contrasts sharply with the exalted titles which the angel has just conferred on Him. The contrast points to Jesus as a different kind of messiah, a lowly and humble one. The titles which the angel gives to Jesus further explain that difference. As messiah, Jesus will bring a universal salvation grounded in His divine Lordship.18 18. Cf. José O’Callaghan, “Detalle Critico en Lc 2,11,” Estudios Biblicos, 50(1992), pp. 157- 160; Mark L. Strauss, The Davidic Messiah in Luke-Acts (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, Ltd., 1995); Navone, op.cit., pp. 88-94.

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The angel is suddenly surrounded by a multitude of the heavenly army, who chant: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those on whom His favor rests.” (Lk 2:14) The appearance of the chanting angels in the midst of the divine glory gives the shepherds a glimpse of the heavenly court of God, where angels sing the divine praises. Now, however, the angels glorify God because Jesus has brought to humans the eschatological gift of peace together with the justice and right order which that peace connotes. The messianic era of peace and of justice comes to those who receive it as God’s free gift.19 The angels first announce the divine gift of peace and justice to the lowly, ostracized shepherds, to men whose profession rendered them legally impure. The shepherds foreshadow all the “little ones,” the anawim to whom Jesus will bring good news, the ostracized whom God will gather in. (Lk 7:22-23) The astonished shepherds obey the angel and spread the good news about Jesus to the wonderment of all who hear their testimony. Their witness to the newborn Jesus foreshadows the apostles’ proclamation of the risen Lord. (Lk 2:15-20) Luke completes his second diptych by parallelling Jesus’ circumcision and John’s naming and by describing Jesus’ presentation in the temple. The parallel accounts both describe a birth, a naming of the child, and the wonderment which the birth occasions. Luke also describes briefly each child’s growth. Once again, however, the circumstances of Jesus’ circumcision outstrip by far those of John’s. John the precursor must give way before Jesus, who comes as Savior, Christ, and Lord. After eight days, Jesus undergoes circumcision and receives the name given Him by the angel, a name which foreshadows the salvation He will bring. (Lk 2:21) Jesus’ circumcision and naming parallels John’s. Luke’s Mary treasures and ponders all these events in her heart, in the deepest center of her being. (Lk 2:19) Mary appears again as the type of the faithful disciple. In his portrait of Mary, the evangelist is also implicitly instructing the reader about how to read Jesus’ story. One must meditate it at the deepest center of the self, not study it with shallow, intellectual curiosity.20 The Presentation in the Temple The infancy narrative began in the Jerusalem temple. It ends there as well when Mary and Joseph there present Jesus, their firstborn son. The presentation culminates in Simeon’s pronouncement concerning Jesus. The

19. Cf. Ross S. Kilpatrick, “The Greek Syntax of Luke 2.14,” New Testament Studies, 34(1988), pp. 472-475. 20. Cf. Brown, Birth of the Messiah, pp. 393-434; NJBC, 43:27-30; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, I, pp. 391-417; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 199-229; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 79-90.


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finding in the temple, which mediates between the infancy gospel and Jesus’ ministry, will culminate in Jesus’ own pronouncement about Himself. Although only women needed purification after childbirth, Luke says that Mary and Joseph went up to the temple for purification. Luke also alludes to the Torah’s requirement that every first-born male be consecrated specially to God. (Lk 2:22-3; cf. Ex 13:2, 12, 15; Num 8:15-6) Mary and Joseph sacrifice the offering of the poor: a pair of turtledoves, two young pigeons, presumably because they cannot afford the more expensive sacrifice of a one-year old lamb. (Cf. Lev 12:8) Their offering accords with Joseph’s lowly social status as tektos. The trip to the temple creates the occasion for the holy family to encounter the old man Simeon, whom the evangelist describes as saintly: “righteous and devout, looking for the consolation of Israel.” By the consolation of Israel Luke means its redemption by the messiah. The Holy Breath of God not only rests upon Simeon but has assured him that he will see the messiah before he dies. The divine Breath leads Simeon to Mary and Joseph. (Lk 2:25-7) The old man takes the child in his arms and blesses God: Lord (despota), now you let your servant (doulon) go in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the sight of all peoples, a light of revelation to the Gentiles, and the glory of your people Israel. (Lk 2:29-33)

In the Septuagint the Greek term “despota” translates “Adonai.” Taken together the two terms “ despota” and “doulon” suggest that Simeon acknowledges God’s absolute dominion over the world and over life and death. The Breath-inspired Simeon also recognizes Jesus as the one who brings the salvation for which he longs. The images in the Nunc Dimittis echo a number of passages in Isaiah which speak of Israel as God’s instrument for effecting a universal salvation. (Is 40:5, 42:6, 46:13, 49:6, 52:9-10) Jesus, the glory of Israel, shines as a saving light upon all the nations. Simeon, then, in his holiness and Breath-inspired state, spontaneously recognizes what the people of Nazareth will refuse to acknowledge at the beginning of Jesus’ ministry: namely, that God has chosen Israel for the sake of saving the Gentiles.21 (Lk 4:16-30) In Simeon’s testimony to Mary, however, the infancy narrative takes a turn toward the cross. The old man blesses both parents but says to Mary in particular: 21. Cf. Alfonso Simon Muñoz, “Cristo, Luz de Gentiles: Puntualizaciones sobre Lc 2.32,” Estudios Biblicos, 46(1988) pp. 27-44.

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Behold, this child is set for the fall and rising (anastasin) of many in Israel, and for a sign which will be contradicted—an sword shall pierce your own soul—so that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed. (Lk 2:34-5)

Jesus, the bringer of a universal salvation, will meet opposition within Israel. Those who contradict Him will fall; but those who do not will rise with Him. The noun “anastasin” connotes resurrection. The fact that many Jews will believe in Jesus dramatizes the Jewish origins of Christian faith. Simeon prophesies that conflict will characterize the revelation which Jesus brings. That same conflict will dramatize where the hearts of God’s people lie. They must either accept or reject the universal salvation which Jesus beings. Simeon addresses this message especially to Mary, as the one who typifies the believing disciple. The sword to which Simeon alludes has received a variety of implausible interpretations. The image seems, however, to connote discrimination and judgment rather than destruction. (Cf. Ezek 5:1-2, 6:8-9, 12:14-6; Mt 10:34-6) Mary, as the type of the believing disciple, will face the same radical choices which confront all believers, although as the type of the faithful disciple she will choose to rise with Jesus. In Acts Luke will include Mary among the disciples who gather in the upper room to pray for the coming of the divine Breath. (Acts 1:14) Later in his gospel, Luke will insist that Mary’s obedient faith counts even more than the fact that she gave birth to Jesus. A woman, on hearing Jesus refute those who accuse him of exorcising in the power of Beelzebul, cries out: “Blessed is the womb who bore you and the breasts which you sucked!” Jesus, however, replies: “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it.” (Lk 11:27-8) The woman fulfills Mary’s prophecy in the Magnificat that later generations will call her blessed. Only the willingness to do God’s will wins the blessing of God. If Mary enjoys God’s blessing, then she does so in virtue of her obedient faith.22 Anna the prophetess, a widow of eighty-four who lives in the temple and dedicates herself to fasting and prayer day and night, also testifies about Jesus to all of those who, like Simeon, long for the messianic redemption of Israel. Anna foreshadows the great apostle of the Gentiles who like her will worship God day and night and pray regularly in the temple. (Cf. Acts 26:7) The fact that she is a prophetess filled with the Holy Breath also foreshadows Pentecost day when the divine Breath will come to the disciples to transform them into a prophetic community which bears witness to Jesus. (Acts 2:1-41) Hence, Anna’s prophetic testimony to Jesus also foreshadows His proclamation by the apostles as the risen Christ. (Lk 2:36-8) So, in their own way, do the other Breath-filled 22. Cf. Alfonso Simon Muñoz, “A ‘Permanencia’ de Israel: Una nueva Lecture de Lc 2,34a,” Estudios Biblicos, 50(1992), pp. 191-223.


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testimonies to Jesus scattered throughout the infancy gospel.23 (Lk 1:41, 67, 25-27) The Finding in the Temple After Jesus’ presentation, Luke summarizes His boyhood in Nazareth in terms which parallel John’s maturation in the desert. (Lk 1:80, 2:40) The return to Nazareth after the Presentation (Lk 1:80, 2:40) sets the stage for the finding of the boy Jesus in the temple. As we have seen, this final story about the hidden life marks a transition from the infancy narrative to Luke’s account of Jesus’ adult ministry. At the age of twelve Jesus returns to the temple. He and His parents go up to Jerusalem for the feast of Passover. Their pilgrimage foreshadows Jesus’ final journey to Jerusalem prior to His death at Passover time. The entire incident also provides an opportunity for the boy Jesus to make a personal pronouncement about Himself, one which parallels and develops the pronouncements others have made about Him in the infancy gospel. Later pronouncements about Jesus in the gospel proper will further enhance and clarify these early pronouncements. When Mary and Joseph return to Nazareth after the Passover, Jesus remains in Jerusalem. After three days of distraught searching, Jesus’ parents find Him in the temple listening to the teachers of the Law and asking them questions. Jesus has joined the ranks of disciples studying Torah. The boy Jesus’ desire to study Torah with the temple teachers foreshadows the mature Jesus’ debates with His adversaries about the true intent of the Law. When Mary complains to Jesus that He has caused her and Joseph much anxiety as they searched for Him, He replies: “Why did you seek me? Did you not know that I would be in the things of My Father? (en tois tou Patros mou)” (Lk 2:41-9) Mary and Joseph find themselves baffled by Jesus’ reply; and it continues to baffle exegetes who translate “en tois tou Patros mou” in three different ways: 1) “about My Father’s business,” 2) “among My Father’s people,” or 3) “in My Father’s house.” The third translation has the greatest plausibility and fits the context best. Mary and Joseph had no need to seek for Jesus because they should have known they would find Him in His Father’s house, i.e., in the temple. Jesus’ reply, if historically grounded, indicates that by the age of twelve He already had an experience of God as Abba. It also suggests that He saw that relationship as making a more fundamental claim on Him than 23. Cf. J.K. Elliot, “Anna’s Age (Luke 2:36-37),” Novum Testamentum, 30(1988), pp. 100- 102; Paul S. Minear, “Luke’s Use of the Birth Stories” in Studies in Luke-Acts, pp. 111-130; NJBC: 43:32-34; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 418-433; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 49-53; Evans, Luke, pp. 209-221; Brown, Birth of the Messiah, pp. 435-470; NJBC, 43:32-34; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, I, pp. 418-433; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 230-258.

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any other relationship. Moreover, as the culminating testimony of the infancy narrative, Jesus’ reply places His Abba experience at the heart of the message of salvation which He as savior, messiah, and Lord will bring. Mary the type of the faithful disciple, once again ponders the words of her son in her heart. Mary and Joseph spend three days searching for Jesus. They had journeyed for a day before discovering Him missing. (Lk 2:44-5) A second day would have brought them back to Jerusalem. They would then have spent a third day looking for Jesus in the holy city itself. Since Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem as a boy of twelve foreshadows His final journey, crucifixion, and resurrection, Jesus’ three days of separation from His parents possibly foreshadows the three days He will spend in the tomb. Jesus sacrifices His desire to study Torah in the temple to His obedience to His parents: He returns to Nazareth, submits to their authority and thus grows in wisdom, stature, and favor with both God and humans. (Lk 2:51-2) This final description of Jesus’ growth parallels Luke’s earlier account of His maturation (Lk 2:40) and for a second time recalls John’s coming of age in the desert.24 (Lk 1:80) The Analogy of Christological Knowing Both Matthew and Luke depict Jesus’ birth as a radical new beginning in salvation history. Matthew, the Jewish Christian, portrays Jesus as Immanuel and therefore as the fulfillment of Jewish salvation history. Luke, writing as he does for Gentiles, focuses on Jesus’ relationship to John the Baptizer. As Luke’s story unfolds, John the Baptizer emerges as the last and greatest Old Testament prophet, while Jesus, the son of God and Breath-baptizer foretold by John, stands at the center of salvation history. Moreover, the outpouring of the Holy Breath which accompanies Jesus’ birth foreshadows the Breath-baptism which He, not John, will effect. The Breath’s Pentecostal arrival inaugurates the final age of salvation, the age of the Church. It also reveals the universal scope of God’s saving will by incorporating the Gentiles into the new Israel. This chapter has compared and contrasted Luke’s and Matthew’s infancy narratives. Let us now turn to Luke’s account of Jesus’ public ministry. To this task the following chapter addresses itself.

24. Cf. Alberto Valentini, “La Rivelazione di Gesu dodicenne al Templo (Lc 2, 41-52),” Estudios Biblicos, 50(1992), pp. 261-304; Antionio Rodriguez Carmona, “Jesús Comeinze su Vida de Adulto (Lc 2, 41-52),” Estudios Biblicos, 50(1992), pp. 179-189; NJBC: 43:35-36; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 434-448; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 53-58; Evans, Luke, pp. 221-227; Brown, Birth of the Messiah, pp. 271-499; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, I, pp. 434-462; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 259-275.

Chapter 13: Positive Dramatic Linkages in Luke

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Chapter 13 Positive Dramatic Linkages in Luke This chapter examines the way in which Luke adapts to his own narrative purposes the positive dramatic linkages which he finds in Mark. In both gospels, Jesus relates positively to John the Baptizer, to the Father, and to the divine Breath. This chapter divides into three parts. Part one examines Jesus’ relationship to John. Part two focuses on His relationship to the Father. Part three meditates His relationship to the divine Breath. In examining each relationship, I shall compare and contrast Luke with Mark and with Matthew. (I) Luke dates the beginning of John’s preaching more precisely than any other evangelist: namely, in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar.1 (Lk 3:1-3) Moreover, like Mark and in contrast to Matthew, Luke describes the baptism John preaches as one of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. Matthew, as we have seen, prefers to reserve the forgiveness of sins to the paschal mystery. (Lk 3:3) In introducing John’s ministry, Luke also alludes to his infancy gospel by designating John as “the son of Zechariah.” (Lk 3:2) John the Baptizer and Jesus Like the other synoptics, Luke identifies John with the voice in the wilderness described in second Isaiah; but Luke cites the text of Isaiah more extensively than the other two evangelists as a way of developing the theme of universal salvation in Christ so prominent in his gospel: The voice of one crying in the wilderness: prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be brought low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways smooth; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God. (Lk 3:4-6; Is 40:3-5)

The text from Isaiah describes a second exodus. Its citation portrays the salvation foreshadowed in the preaching of John as a new liberation. The reference to “all flesh” asserts its universality. Luke omits Mark’s description of John’s garments and diet. Both Mark and Matthew describe John in ways which suggest both his asceticism 1. Cf. August Strobel, “Plädoyer für Lukas: Zur Stimmigkeit des chronistischen Rahmens von Lk 3.1,” New Testament Studies, 41(1995), pp. 466-469.

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and his mission as a second Elijah. Luke has indicated in his gospel preface that he likes a well-ordered narrative. (Lk 1:1-4) Quite possibly, then, Luke may have omitted these descriptive details because he anticipated that his Gentile Christians would probably miss Mark’s allusions or because he makes both theological points more clearly elsewhere in his narrative. Like Matthew and Mark, however, Luke finds it significant that John preached in the desert, from which Israel expected God’s final saving action to emerge.2 Like Matthew, Luke shows a concern to preserve more of John’s teaching than Mark, who records only the Baptizer’s prophecy of the coming of a mightier one who would baptize with a sanctifying Breath. Drawing, possibly, on Q, Luke records substantially the same sayings of John as Matthew, but Luke’s John, in contrast to Matthew’s, addresses them to the crowds in general rather than to the Pharisees and Sadducees. In the process Luke downplays the conflict between John, on the one hand, and the Pharisees and the high priests, on the other, a conflict which Matthew enhances. Of the three synoptics, Luke gives the completest account of the Baptizer’s preaching. Luke’s John develops three interrelated themes: repentance in the face of an immanent eschatological judgment, the ethical transformation which repentance demands, and predictions about the coming of the messiah. In the eschatological section of John’s discourse, Luke has the Baptizer call the multitudes who come to him “a brood of vipers.” Matthew, as we have seen, applies the same epithet to the Pharisees and Sadducees. On the lips of Luke’s John, the image probably connotes the corrupting and dangerous power of unrepented sin. Luke’s John warns the crowds that racial descent from Abraham offers no guarantee of salvation: only the works born of repentance have the power to save. Like Matthew’s John, Luke’s also warns of an immanent divine judgment: “Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees; every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.” (Lk 3:7-9; Mt 3:7-10) Moreover, in Luke as in Matthew, John warns that God can raise up children of Abraham from inert stones. In both gospels, the warning foreshadows the incorporation of the Gentiles into the kingdom; but John’s words accord especially well with Luke’s stress on a universalist soteriology. Luke, moreover, shows more concern than either Matthew or Mark to preserve a sample of the Baptizer’s moral teaching. Luke does so in a dialogue between the Baptizer and the repentant multitudes who flock to 2. Cf. Walter Wink, John the Baptist in the Gospel Tradition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1968), pp. 42-45; Robert J. Muller, “Elijah, John, and Jesus in the Gospel of Luke,” New Testament Studies, 34(1988), pp. 611-622.


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hear him. In contrast to Matthew’s stony-hearted Pharisees and Sadducees, Luke’s crowds respond positively to John’s warning about immanent judgment. They ask the Baptizer what repentance demands of them in practice. (Lk 3:7) John responds: “He who has two coats, let him share with him who has none; and let him who has food, do likewise.” (Lk 3:11) To the tax collectors, John says: “Collect no more than is appointed you.” (Lk 3:13) To the soldiers, presumably Jewish men in the service of Herod Antipas, who collaborated with the occupying Romans in “policing” Palestine, John responds: “Rob no one by violence or by false accusation, and be content with your wages.” (Lk 3:14) Luke, in other words, situates John in the tradition of the great Old Testament prophets who demanded as the condition for authentic worship of Yahweh the creation of a just social order. As we shall see, Luke’s Jesus places the sharing of the physical supports of life with the needy at the heart of the moral demands of entry into the kingdom. John demands moral transformation as the condition for avoiding immanent judgment; but he does not recommend political subversion. He does not forbid the tax collectors to collect Roman taxes; he only forbids extortion. He does not tell the soldiers to quit the army, only not to use a position of power as a basis for exploitation, bribery, and injustice. He requires of all an active compassion for the poor.3 Luke’s account of John’s preaching suggests, then, that Jesus may have derived His messianic reversal of values in His own teaching in part from listening to John. Luke follows his sample of Johannine moral teaching with an example of the Baptizer’s messianic message. Asked by the crowds if he is the messiah, John equivalently denies it. He responds with his prediction of the coming of one mightier than himself who will baptize, not just with water but with a sanctifying Breath and with fire. The mightier one, not John, will have messianic authority. (Lk 3:16) Luke, then, asserts more clearly than either Matthew or Mark that John looked upon the coming “mightier one” as the messiah, even though, as we have seen, in Matthew’s gospel, when John sends to Jesus to ask Him if He is the one who is to come, the question suggests implicitly that John did in fact equate the two figures. Luke, moreover, underscores the fact that the baptism which the disciples will confer on others at Pentecost fulfills John’s prophecy of the Breath baptizer. Both at the end of his gospel and at the beginning of Acts, Luke portrays the risen Christ telling the disciples to go to Jerusalem where He will send them “the promise of my Father.” (Lk 24:49; Acts 1:4) The phrase “promise of my Father” alludes to John’s prophecy, 3. Cf. NJBC, 43:45-46.

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which the arrival of the Pentecostal Breath will fulfill. On Pentecost the Holy Breath will come from the ascended Christ in order to create by an outpouring of charisms the Church into which people can then be baptized. (Acts 2:1-41) As in Matthew, Luke’s John points to Jesus as the messianic instrument of divine judgment. His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor, and to gather the wheat into his granary, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire. (Lk 3:17; Mt 3:12)

Here as in Matthew’s account, fire symbolizes the holiness of God which transforms and purifies believers but consumes the unrepentant. In Luke, however, this Johannine prophecy has connotations absent from Matthew’s text. In using the winnowing fork, the farmer relied on the wind to separate out the grain from the chaff. The same images of wind and fire will dominate Luke’s account of Pentecost. On Pentecost day, while a great wind blows, the tongues like fire will descend on the disciples in the upper room. The fiery tongues foreshadow the purification and judgment which the proclamation of the risen Christ will effect. Moreover, as we shall see, like the message of the angel to the shepherds, the fiery tongues also symbolize in their own way a choice between Jesus and imperial Rome. (Acts 2:1-5) Luke closes his account of John’s preaching by underscoring the continuity between the Baptizer and Jesus. The evangelist actually describes John’s preaching as an anticipatory proclamation of the gospel. He asserts that John “evangelized the people” (euaggelizeto ton laon). Luke also records the themes which unite the preaching of both men: conversion, repentance of sin, immanent judgment, and moral reform in accord with fundamental demands of covenant religion. As we shall see later, Luke also recognizes significant discontinuity between Jesus and John.4 Luke alone records that John publicly denounced Herod Antipas not simply for having adulterously married his brother’s wife but also for all the other wicked deeds which Herod had committed. (Lk 3:19-20) In other words, of the three synoptic evangelists, Luke only portrays John as having engaged in a wide ranging critique of the evils and injustices of Antipas’s regime. Luke, moreover, makes this sweeping moral and political critique the reason for Herod’s placing John under arrest. In Luke, the wider scope of John’s verbal assault on Antipas also endows Jesus’ endorsement of John with broader political significance than concern with 4. Cf. Robert L. Webb, “The Activity of John the Baptist’s Expected Figure at the Threshing Floor (Matthew 3:12=Luke 3:17),” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 43(1991) pp. 103-111; NJBC, 43:47.


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“family values.” (Lk 3:19-20) Of the three synoptic evangelists, Luke’s account of the relationship between the Baptizer and Herod best approximates that of Josephus.5 (Cf. Josephus, Antiquities, 116-119) Only Luke among the synoptics will portray Herod as conspiring with Rome in Jesus’ death. For Luke, client kings like Herod form an integral part of the oppressive political and economic power structures which his Gentile Christians should regard as anti-Christ. Moreover, condemnation of political and economic oppression accords well with Luke’s concern to warn his Gentile converts against the corrupting influences of Greco-Roman mores.6 (Lk 4:6) Luke modifies Mark’s account of Jesus’ baptism in several ways. As we have seen, the first Christians found the fact that Jesus had submitted to the baptism of another religious leader embarrassing. Luke reflects that embarrassment by refusing to describe the baptism itself. Instead, He depicts Jesus praying on the banks of the Jordan after John has finished baptizing. (Lk 3:21; Mk 1:9; Mt 3:13-6) Luke throughout his narrative lays greater emphasis on Jesus’ prayerfulness than the other evangelists. In fact, Jesus’ prayer in Luke prefaces any event of special significance. Accordingly, only Luke’s Jesus prays at the moment of the Breath’s descent. (Lk 3:21; Mk 1:10; Mt 3:16) Jesus’ prayer also assimilates the Breath’s descent upon Him to Her descent on the disciples on Pentecost. On Pentecost, after the disciples gather in the upper room, presumably to continue their constant prayer for the Father’s “promise,” the Holy Breath descends on them in tongues “like fire.”7 (Acts 2:1) Like the other synoptics, Luke has the Holy Breath descend on Jesus under the sign of a dove. Like Matthew, Luke distinguishes Jesus’ relationship to the Breath from the disciples’ relationship to Her. She descends on Jesus under the sign of the dove in order to begin His revelation as God’s “pet,” as the beloved of God and beginning of a new Israel. (Lk 3:22; Ps 74:19) She descends on the disciples under the sign of fire: i.e., in purification and in judgment. Because Luke separates temporally the descent of the dove from John’s baptizing, Luke attenuates somewhat the rich baptismal symbolism in Mark’s account of Jesus’ baptism. Mark, as we have seen, uses the image of the Breath over the waters and of the dove over the waters in order to evoke ideas of a new creation and of a new covenant. Moreover, unlike Mark, Luke has the dove descend on Jesus in bodily form. (Lk 3:22) The 5. Cf. Meier, A Marginal Jew, II, pp. 56-62. 6. Cf. NJBC, 43:48; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, I, pp. 449-478; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 63-68; Evans, Luke, pp. 229-244. 7. Cf. James D.G. Dunn, Baptism in the Holy Spirit (London: SCM Press, 1970);, pp. 23-54; Ledger Feldkaemper, S.V.D., Der betende Jesus als Heilsmittler nach Lukas (Bonn: Styler Verlag, 1978), pp. 40-50; George, op. cit., pp. 87-108.

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physicality of the dove further mutes its symbolic character. As we shall see, Luke also “naturalizes” the symbolic darkness which in Mark settles on Israel as Jesus hangs on the cross. Luke calls the darkness an eclipse.8 (Lk 23:43) Luke, like Mark and in contrast to Matthew, portrays the theophany which Jesus experiences during His messianic commissioning as a personal experience of Jesus Himself. As Jesus prays, the heavens open, an apocalyptic sign of the last age of salvation, and the Holy Breath descends. Only after She descends does Jesus hear the Father’s voice personally. Luke follows Mark in having the Father combine a verse from the messianic Psalm 2 and the first line of the first of the servant songs. The Father says to Jesus: “You are my beloved Son, with you I am well pleased.” (Lk 3:22) The Father, therefore, commissions Jesus as messiah, beloved Son, and suffering servant. As in the other synoptics, the fact that the Breath descends on Jesus before He hears the Father’s voice suggests that He hears the Father speak through Her empowering enlightenment.9 In recording the controversy over fasting, Luke, in contrast to Mark and Matthew, notes that the disciples of John not only fasted frequently but also that they frequently prayed. (Lk 5:33) Later, Luke indicates that the Baptizer gave his disciples instructions in how to pray. (Lk 11:1) These additional details accord well with the evangelist’s narrative stress on the importance of prayer. Matthew has the disciples of John accost Jesus personally for not requiring his disciples to fast; but Luke follows Mark by having others raise the question to Jesus. Mark leaves the questioner anonymous. Luke links this controversy to another controversy with some Pharisees over table fellowship with sinners. In Luke, it would appear that Pharisees question Jesus about why His disciples do not fast. (Lk 5:30, 33) Jesus gives substantially the same reply as in the other synoptics. He says that wedding guests cannot fast in the presence of the bridegroom. He thus assimilates Himself to the divine bridegroom of Israel, faithful in His love for His chosen people despite their sinfulness. (Lk 5:34) Jesus then assures the Pharisees that His disciples will fast when the bridegroom is taken from them, i.e, after Jesus’ death. Luke, then, follows Mark by portraying fasting in the apostolic Church as an expression of eschatological longing for Jesus’ return. Moreover, like Mark, Luke asserts that even though Jesus and His disciples did not undertake the optional fasts which the disciples of John and the Pharisees did, nevertheless, the Christian practice of fasting has sanction in Jesus’ attitudes. 8. Cf. Leander E. Keck, “The Spirit and the Dove,” New Testament Studies, 17(1970-1971), pp. 41-67; NJBC: 43:49; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 479-487; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 68-72; Evans, Luke, pp. 245-250. 9. Cf. NJBC, 43:49; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, I, pp. 479-487; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 331-347; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 117-119.


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As in Mark, Luke’s Jesus justifies a lack of asceticism on the part of His disciples with the parables about the patch and the wine skins. Both parables describe the novelty of what is happening in Jesus’ presence and ministry. (Lk 5:36-9; Mk 2:20-2; Mt 9:16-7) Jesus’ questioners focus too narrowly on traditional forms of piety. As a result, they cannot recognize the entirely new initiative of divine grace which Jesus embodies. In all this Luke follows Mark but focuses Jesus’ response on the Pharisees. Later, as we shall see, Luke equates “the leaven of the Pharisees” with hypocrisy. (Lk 12:1) Luke also appends to the parable of the wine skins a saying of Jesus unique to his gospel: “And no one after drinking old wine desires new; for he says, ‘The old is good.’” (Lk 5:39) This proverb portrays Jesus as offering new wine which the religiously conservative will probably find unpalatable. The new wine would also have had eucharistic connotations for Luke’s readers; and it would probably have connoted the wine served at the final messianic banquet. The proverb makes another point as well. It cautions against a narrow preoccupation with novelty which overlooks the value of older traditions. “The old is good.” Luke’s Jesus warns His Gentile disciples against deracinating the kingdom from its foundations in the Old Testament. The warning also undergirds Luke’s polemic against the many Jews who failed to recognize in the Christian community the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies.10 Luke, like Matthew, derives possibly from Q the tradition that the Baptizer, from his prison cell, sent disciples to ask Jesus if He is “the one who is to come.” In Luke, however, the incident occurs after Jesus raises the dead son of the widow of Nain. (Lk 7:11-7) Matthew makes no mention of this miracle. Moreover, Luke links the two events by having John’s disciples tell him about this astonishing resuscitation of the dead as well as about the other things that Jesus is doing. (Lk 7:18) Moreover, Luke, like Matthew, indicates that the question came right after Jesus had healed and exorcised a large number of people. Luke has already made it clear that John equates the Breath- baptizer with the messiah. In effect, Luke’s John asks Jesus: “Are you the more powerful, messianic Breath-baptizer I foretold?” Jesus replies in Luke’s narrative as He does in Matthew’s. Jesus points to His miracles and proclamation of the gospel as signs that in the kingdom which He is proclaiming and embodying the messianic age has already arrived. Luke, however, suggests somewhat more explicitly that resurrection above all characterizes the messianic age. 10. Cf. NJBC, 43:80; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, I, pp. 549-603; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 96-100; Evans, Luke, pp. 309-312; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 513-522; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 154-156.

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As in Matthew, Luke’s Jesus asserts that, because He has chosen to focus His ministry especially on the poor and disenfranchised, He has chosen a different kind of messianic identity from popular expectation. Jesus differs too from the stern judgmental figure whom John had predicted. As in Matthew, Luke’s Jesus concludes His response with a beatitude: “And blessed is He who takes no offense at Me.” (Lk 7:18-23; Mt 11:2-6) Jesus is urging John, as he urged the Pharisees, not to let messianic preconceptions blind them to the unexpected reality which He, Jesus, embodies and proclaims.11 As in Matthew’s account, after the departure of John’s disciples, Luke’s Jesus eulogizes John as a courageous man, as an ascetic, and as more than just a prophet. He has been sent by God to prepare the way for Jesus; and his faithful accomplishment of that role even at the risk of his life qualifies him as the greatest among those born of women. Still, great as he is, the least in the kingdom of heaven ranks before John. John prepares a reality which surpasses anything he himself anticipates. (Lk 7:24-8) John, then, bridges the first age of salvation in which God revealed Himself to Israel, and the second age, the time of Jesus. In what concerns the second age, however, the Baptizer plays a strictly subordinate role to Jesus, even to the point of ranking behind Jesus’ disciples, since the Baptizer himself failed to embrace the kingdom.12 Like Matthew, Luke then records the parable of the children in the market place; but Luke’s version probably better approximates the way in which Jesus originally told it. In Luke’s version of the parable, the fickle children in the market place, who reject and slander John for his asceticism and Jesus for His lack of it, contrast with the children of wisdom. (Lk 7:31-5; cf. Mt 11:16-9) Luke, moreover, goes out of his way to identify the children of wisdom. He notes that after Jesus’ encomium of John, the people, including the tax collectors, “justified God” because they accepted John’s baptism of repentance. The Pharisees and lawyers did not “justify God” because they refused to repent at John’s preaching. The repentant crowds exemplify the children of wisdom; the unrepentant lawyers and Pharisees, the children in the market place.13 Luke modifies significantly Mark’s account of Herod’s perception of Jesus. In Mark, Herod superstitiously believes that Jesus is in fact the murdered John returned to life. (Mk 6:16) Luke’s Herod shows more shrewdness. Luke notes that while some popularly regarded Jesus as John 11. Cf. NJBC, 43:43:96; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, I, pp. 662-676; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 663- 666; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 188-191. 12. Cf. Wink, John the Baptist in the Gospel Tradition, pp. 46-58. 13. Cf. Wink, John the Baptist in the Gospel Tradition, pp. 54-55; NJBC, 43:97-98; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, I, pp. 662-682; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 121-125; Evans, Luke, pp. 349- 359; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 666-686; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 191-195.


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raised from the dead and others regarded him as Elijah or one of the prophets, Herod himself recognized realistically that John still lay in his grave. Still, the tyrant entertained considerable curiosity about Jesus, even to the point of wanting to see Him with his own eyes. (Lk 9:7-9; cf. Lk 9:19) Herod’s curiosity will find fulfillment later during Jesus’ passion, when Pilate sends Jesus to Herod for judgment. (Lk 23:6-12) Luke alone among the evangelists records the encounter. Herod’s remark about having beheaded John constitutes Luke’s sole comment on that event. He omits from his gospel any description of the beheading itself. As we shall see, the omission heightens the direct conflict between Luke’s Herod and Luke’s Jesus.14 Matthew inserts in Jesus’ encomium to John the Baptizer Jesus’ teaching about the kingdom of heaven suffering violence. Luke places the same teaching in Jesus’ journey discourse, as He goes up to Jerusalem for the last time. Moreover, Luke modifies this saying in a way which better accords with his sense of salvation history. Matthew’s Jesus says: “From the days of John the Baptizer until now the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence, and the violent take it by force.” (Mt 11:12) Luke’s Jesus says, “The law and the prophets were until John; since then the good news of the kingdom of God is preached, and every one enters it violently.” (Lk 16:16) In Matthew the violence done to the kingdom probably refers to the violence Herod is doing to John; but Luke insists that entry into the kingdom itself happens violently. In Luke the violence probably symbolizes the trauma of repentance and the sacrifices demanded by life in the kingdom.15 Moreover, in comparing Himself to John, Luke’s Jesus distinguishes between the time of the Law and prophets and the time of the kingdom; but the evangelist immediately links the two periods by citing a pronouncement of Jesus which Matthew puts in the sermon on the mount. Luke’s Jesus says: “But it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away, than for one dot of the Law to become void.” (Lk 16:17) Matthew’s Jesus says: “For truly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished.” (Mt 5:18) Clearly, for Luke, Jesus’ proclamation of the kingdom does not abolish the moral demands of the Torah. Recall Jesus’ earlier pronouncement that “the old is good.” Heaven and earth appear in both versions of this pronouncement as images of the Law and prophets; but heaven and earth symbolize something different in the Lukan and Matthean versions. In Luke, they function as images of enduring stability, while Matthew portrays them as eventually perishing with this world. 14. Cf. NJBC, 43:112; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, I, pp. 756-760, 191-195; Johnson, Gospel, pp. pp. 144-150; Evans, Luke, pp. 397-399; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 820-824; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 223-224. 15. Cf. Wink, John the Baptist in the Gospel Tradition, pp. 46-58.

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Even so, the two versions of this saying make fundamentally the same point: Jesus did not view his proclamation of the kingdom as an abrogation of the Torah. Matthew typically develops this insight by alluding to the theme of fulfillment. Luke makes no such allusion; but clearly the evangelist desires his Gentile Christians to acknowledge the continuity which links the new covenant to the old.16 Luke makes a final allusion to the Baptizer in Jesus’ final Jerusalem ministry. Following Mark, Luke records how the chief priests challenged Jesus to name the source of the authority with which He acted. Jesus replies by asking by what authority John baptized. When they say they do not know the origin of John’s authority, Jesus refuses to name the origin of His authority. (Lk 20:1-8; Mk 11:23-33) The story in Luke makes basically the same points as it does in the other synoptics. It indicates that Jesus recognized the prophetic character of John’s ministry and claimed to act with a similar prophetic authority. The story also shows Jesus endorsing John’s ministry to the end of His own career; and it also challenges both the chief priests and the reader to acknowledge the prophetic authority of both Jesus and John.17 The Analogy of Christological Knowing Like the other synoptic evangelists, Luke uses Jesus’ relationship to John in order to describe fundamental realistic and moral conditions for assimilation to Jesus in the power of the divine Breath. Luke’s Jesus differs from John both in what He embodies and in what He accomplishes. In addition, Jesus, not John, baptizes with a sanctifying Breath and with fire. Among the synoptic evangelists, however, Luke in some ways sharpens the contrast between Jesus and John, even though he recognizes real continuity between the two. Luke’s infancy narrative insists again and again on Jesus’ superiority to John. Moreover, Luke’s Jesus, as the Breath-baptizer, stands at salvation history’s pivotal center. While Jesus endorsed John, the Baptizer apparently never endorsed Jesus and failed to enter the kingdom. This section has considered the first of the positive dramatic linkages in Luke. The following section examines the second: namely, Jesus’ relationship to the Father. (II) In Luke, as in the other synoptics, the term “God (ho Theos)” designates the Father. Hence, I shall consider here the texts in which either term occurs.18 Moreover, one discovers references to the Father scattered 16. Cf. NJBC, 43:150; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, II, 1114-1119; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 249257; Evans, Luke, pp. 605-610. 17. Cf. NJBC, 43:167-168; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, II, pp. 1269-1276; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 303-309; Evans, op. cit., pp. 691-695. 18. Cf. Navone, op.cit., pp. 51-55; John T. Squires, The Plan of God in Luke-Acts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993); Robert L. Brawley, Centering on


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throughout Luke’s gospel: in the infancy narrative, in Luke’s account of Jesus’ Galilean ministry, in the journey discourse, in the passion narrative, and in Jesus’ resurrection appearances. I shall consider each cluster of texts in turn. The Father in the Infancy Narrative In his infancy gospel, Luke uses the phrase “before God” several times. The phrase also surfaces in the appearance of Jesus to the disciples on the way to Emmaus. Elizabeth and Zechariah live “righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless.” Zechariah serves as priest “before God.” (Lk 1:6, 8) Moreover, the angel Gabriel promises that John the Baptizer will be great “before the Lord” because he will “turn many of the sons of Israel to the Lord their God.” (Lk 1:15-6) The disciples on the way to Emmaus describe Jesus as “a prophet mighty in deed and word before God.” (Lk 24:19) In Luke, the phrase “before God” connotes obedient submission to the divine will. Matthew uses the term “God” only once in his infancy narrative: namely, in explaining the prophecy of Immanuel; but in Luke’s infancy gospel, “God” recurs frequently. In responding to Zechariah’s request for a sign that the angel’s message about John will prove true, Gabriel replies that he stands in the presence of God. (Lk 1:19) Gabriel is sent “from God” to announce to Mary that she will conceive the messiah in the power of God’s Breath; and after greeting Mary, Gabriel assures her that she has found favor with God. (Lk 1:26, 30) The God who sends the angelic messenger holds the initiative in accomplishing all the events which the angel foretells. Jesus’ greatness stems from the fact that He is “Son of the Most High.” He receives from God’s hands the throne of David which He will occupy in perpetuity. (Lk 1:33) The Holy Breath who effects Jesus’ conception acts in “the power of the Most High,” a Semitic euphemism for God. (Lk 1:34) Hence, Jesus’ miraculous conception through the creative power of the Breath manifests that He is God’s Son. (Lk 1:34) Moreover, the omnipotence of God guarantees that the angel’s message to Mary will come to pass. (Lk 1:37) In the Magnificat, Mary acknowledges that “God my Savior” deserves all the credit for her becoming mother of His Son. (Lk 1:46-7) Zechariah too blesses God at the birth of John (Lk 1:64, 67) and foresees that as “prophet of the Most High” John will prepare the way for the coming of the Lord in obedience to a divine initiative. In the Benedictus Zechariah also foretells that the ministry of Jesus will manifest God’s mercy. (Lk God: Method and Message in Luke-Acts (Louisville, KY: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1990).

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1:78) As we shall see, Luke tells Jesus’ story in a way which stresses the divine forgiveness which He both announces and embodies. At Jesus’ birth, the angelic hosts praise God for sending the messiah into the world as its savior and Lord. (Lk 2:13) The shepherds praise God for the revelation they have received. (Lk 2:20) When Mary and Joseph present Jesus to “the Lord” in obedience to the demands of the Law, Simeon addresses his Nunc Dimittis to God. (Lk 2:22-4, 26, 27-8) Anna praises God for the coming of the messiah. (Lk 2:38) As the child Jesus grows, “the favor of God” rests upon Him. (Lk 2:40. 52) In Jerusalem, the boy Jesus recognizes in the temple His Father’s house. (Lk 2:49; cf. 6:4, 19:45) In sum then, in Luke’s infancy narrative, God the Father appears as the aboriginal source of the divine salvation which Jesus brings. As the author of salvation, the Father also receives reverential obedience and thankful praise for His saving action in Christ.19 Let us turn next to the Father texts in Luke’s preface to Jesus’ public ministry. Jesus and the Father In Luke, the prophetic word of God inspires John to proclaim the universal salvation which God will accomplish in Jesus. (Lk 3:2, 6) Luke stresses the universality of the salvation which is dawning by tracing Jesus’ genealogy, not to Abraham, as Matthew does, but to “Adam, the son of God.” (Lk 3:38) Luke’s genealogy employs an ascending Greek order, in contrast to Matthew’s descending Hebraic order. Adam, “the son of God,” therefore ends Luke’s list. The first Adam, foreshadows the coming of the last. Neither has a human father. Jesus, the new Adam, in virtue of His divine Sonship transcends the first Adam in dignity and stands not only at the head of a new Israel, but at the head of a new humanity recreated in Him. Luke’s universalism suits well His predominantly Gentile audience. Luke’s genealogy has more than seventy names. Ancient numerology regarded seven as a sacred number. Seven times eleven names stretch between Joseph, Jesus’ legal father, and God. Luke thus associates the name of God with the doubly perfect number 77. Jesus begins the twelfth and final set of seven names and so functions historically in the genealogy as the culmination of what God has done both for His creation and for His chosen people. David in the genealogy enjoys the number 42 (6 x 7). As the new David, Luke’s Jesus brings salvation history, which began with the story of Adam, to its supreme and central saving moment. Luke’s genealogy contrasts, then, with Matthew’s at several points: 1) Matthew follows a descending order by tracing Jesus’ ancestry from Abraham to Jesus. Luke follows an ascending Greco-Roman order by beginning with Jesus and tracing His origins back to the first human and 19. Cf. NJBC, 43:12-36; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp 303-448; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 31-60; Evans, Luke, pp. 137-227; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 51-275; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 51-104.


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ultimately to God. 2) Matthew uses rabbinic gametria to structure his genealogy symbolically. Luke uses ancient Greek numerology. 3) Matthew’s gametria calls special attention to Jesus’ Davidic messianism. Luke situates Jesus messianic mission within the history of humanity and portrays Jesus as the mediator of a universal salvation. Luke’s numerology also portrays Jesus as the culmination of God’s saving action within the whole of history. 4) Matthew’s genealogy prefaces his gospel and links Jesus to major figures in Hebrew history. Luke’s genealogy comes between Jesus baptism and temptation in order to underscore the universal saving significance of both of these events. 5) Matthew’s genealogy cites Jewish woman whose role in salvation history foreshadowed Mary’s. Luke’s does not.20 In Jesus’ messianic commissioning, as we have seen, the voice of the Father proclaims Jesus His beloved Son and commissions Him messiah in the image of the suffering servant. (Lk 3:22); and in Luke’s temptation narrative as in Matthew’s, Satan addresses Jesus with the title “Son of God.” (Lk 3:3, 9) In citing the Torah in response to Satan’s desert temptations Luke’s Jesus, like Matthew’s, twice invokes the name of God. (Lk 3:8, 12) For Luke as for Matthew, then, Jesus’ temptations engage His relationship to His Father in a profound way. Moreover, since, in both gospels, Jesus in His temptations embodies the new Israel in its desert sojourn, His responses to Satan mirror the way in which the members of the new Israel ought also to relate to the Father. Satan tests Jesus with the same temptations as in Matthew’s temptation narrative, but Luke reverses the order of the second and third temptation. Satan first tempts Jesus to self-reliance by abandoning His fast. As in Matthew, Satan is tempting Him to replace trust in the Father with trust in His own charismatic prowess. (Lk 4:3-4) Matthew’s Jesus replies to the temptation by citing the same text from Deuteronomy at somewhat greater length: “One shall not live by bread alone but by every word which proceeds from the mouth of God.” (Mt 4:4) Luke’s Jesus replies to Satan: “One shall not live by bread alone.” (Lk 4:3-4; cf Dt 8:3) The terseness with which Luke’s Jesus replies to Satan rules out any inclination to greed or avarice at the same time that it ex20. Cf. Gert J. Steyn, “The Occurrence of ‘Kainam’ in Luke’s Genealogy: Evidence of Septuagint Influence?” Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 65(1989), pp. 409-411; Richard Bauckham, “More on Kainam, the Son of Arpachshad in Luke’s Genealogy,”Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 67(1991), pp. 95-103; Gert J. Steyn, “A Short Reply,”Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 67(1991), pp. 103-104; Brown, Birth of the Messiah, pp. 64-94; NJBC, 43:50-51; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, I, pp. 488-505; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 68-72; Evans, Luke, pp. 250-254; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 348-362; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 120-122; William S. Kurz, “Luke 3:23-32: Biblical Genealogies” in Luke-Acts: New Perspectives from the Society of Biblical Literature Seminar, edited by Charles H. Talbot (New York, NY: Crossroad, 1984), pp. 169-187.

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presses trust in God. As we shall see, throughout his gospel Luke will insist even more strongly than Matthew on the importance of sharing one’s bread with others. The evangelist repeatedly warns the followers of Jesus to repent of greed. Luke also stresses even more than Matthew or Mark the eschatological hope which such sharing expresses: it keeps one’s heart anchored in one’s true heavenly home. Luke’s Satan next shows Jesus all the kingdoms of this world and says to Him: “To you will I give all this authority and their glory; for it has been delivered to me, and I give them to whom I will. If you, then, will worship me, it shall all be yours.” (Lk 4:5-7) Luke’s Satan asserts more strongly than Matthew’s that the kingdoms of this world really do belong to him and lie under his evil domination. Satan’s assertion reflects Luke’s concern that his Gentile Christians recognize in the Roman empire and in all such morally corrupt and oppressive political and economic institutions the embodiment of Anti-Christ. (Cf. Mt 4:9) Satan’s assertion does not, however, change the meaning of the temptation as one finds it in Matthew. In both temptations, Satan is in effect urging Jesus to espouse a secular messianism and to found the kingdom on law and coercive violence. Luke’s Jesus, like Matthew’s, rejects such a vision of the kingdom as idolatry and devil worship. He insists that one must found the kingdom only on authentic worship of the Father. (Lk 4:4-8; cf. 19:45-8; Mt 4:7-10; cf. Dt 6:13) As we saw, Matthew’s opposition to a nascent clericalism at Antioch led him to regard as the supreme temptation of the Christian community replacing with power politics Jesus’ vision of an egalitarian community of mutual service. Matthew therefore makes lust for power Jesus’ last and culminating temptation. Luke places Matthew’s second temptation last and in so doing gives it the greatest prominence. The devil takes Jesus to the pinnacle of the temple and urges Him to tempt God by throwing Himself down in the expectation that the Father will send angels to rescue Him. (Lk 4:9-12) One tempts God by setting the conditions under which one is willing to relate to Him. Jesus rejects the temptation outright, saying: “You shall not tempt the Lord your God.” (Lk 4:9-12; cf. Dt 6:16) I shall consider later the reason why Luke reorders the desert temptations as he does. Here it suffices to reflect on what the temptations say about Jesus’ relationship to the Father. Like Matthew’s Jesus, Luke’s relates to the Father in an attitude of unconditioned trust. He also founds the kingdom, not on coercive violence and law, but only on authentic worship of the Father. Luke, however, portrays testing God, setting conditions on trusting the Father, as Jesus’ culminating temptation and therefore as the culminating temptation of the new Israel which He begins.21 21. Cf. NJBC, 43:52-54; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 506-518; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 73-77; Evans, Luke, pp. 254-260; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 363-385; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 123-127.


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Luke’s preface to Jesus’ public ministry makes, then, three basic affirmations about the Father. 1) The Father initiates the salvation accomplished in Jesus. 2) That salvation has a universal scope. 3) The acceptance of that salvation demands both the renunciation of the institutionalized violence of worldly kingdoms and unconditioned trust in God. During his account of Jesus’ public ministry, Luke portrays Jesus as speaking with divine authority. He proclaims to the crowds the word of God. (Lk 5:1, 8:11) Moreover, like Mark and Matthew, Luke also endows Jesus with God’s own authority to forgive sins.22 (Lk 5:17-26; cf. Mk 2:1-12; Mt 9:1-8) As we have seen, during His ministry Luke’s Jesus prays to the Father more frequently than in the other synoptics. Apart from the agony in the garden, both Matthew and Mark describe Jesus praying on only two other occasions. (Mt 14:23, 19:13, 26:36-44; Mk 1:35, 6:46, 14:32-9) The frequency of Jesus’ prayer in Luke expresses the evangelist’s concern to hold up Jesus as the model for frequent Christian prayer. Jesus’ prayer in Luke manifests His saving relationship to the Father. Besides modeling prayer for the disciples, Luke’s Jesus also intercedes for them. (Cf. Lk 22:32) Moreover, as we have also seen, Jesus’ prayer in Luke tags the event which follows it as one of special significance.23 Luke’s disciples ask Jesus to teach them how to pray while Jesus Himself is rapt in prayer. The request dramatizes the true disciple’s desire to imitate Jesus’ prayer. Jesus’ response presents the Father prayer as the prototypical Christian prayer. In Matthew, the Our Father occurs in the ser22. As in the other two synoptics, the crowds on seeing the miracle experience amazement, glorify God. In Luke and Mark, however, they also acknowledge the strangeness of what they have just seen. NJBC, 43:78-79; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 577-586; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 91-96; Evans, Luke, pp. 296-304; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 478-488; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 148-151. 23. Cf. Feldkämper, op. cit., pp. 333-338; Oscar Gerald Harris, Prayer in Luke-Acts: A Study in the Theology of Luke (Doctoral Dissertation: Vanderbilt University, 1966). As we have seen, Luke’s Jesus is praying when He experiences His messianic commissioning. (Lk 3:21) Similarly, when Jesus calls the Twelve, Luke says that the night before He prayed to God all night. After Jesus cures the leper Jesus withdraws to the wilderness, not to avoid the crowds, as he does in Mark, but in order to pray. (Lk 6:12; Mk 1:40-5) Jesus prays in the presence of the disciples before He asks them who they believe Him to be. (Lk 9:18) The other two synoptics say that Jesus ascended the mount of the transfiguration to be alone with the disciples; Luke says He ascended the mountain with the disciples in order to pray. Moreover, the transfiguration occurs while Jesus is at prayer. (Lk 9:28-9) Jesus’ prayer motivates the disciples to ask Him to teach them how to pray. (Lk 11:1) Like the other synoptics, Luke portrays Jesus praying to the Father in Gethsemane. In Luke, moreover, Jesus prays in the presence of all His disciples. (Lk 22:41, 45) Luke, however, adds the detail that Jesus in the garden prayed all the more earnestly because of the anguish He felt. (Lk 22:44)

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mon on the mount. Luke’s Jesus functions as the model of Christian prayer, as the praying messianic savior, and after His glorification as heavenly intercessor. Luke records a terser version of the Father prayer than Matthew. (Mt 6:9-16) The Didache preserves the longest version of the prayer. (Did. 8:2). Luke’s leaner version probably best approximates the prayer which Jesus formulated. Luke’s prayer reads as follows: Father, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread; and forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us; and lead us not into temptation. (Lk 11:1-4)

Instead of Matthew’s “Our Father in heaven,” Luke’s prayer begins more simply with “Abba.” As we saw in the preceding section, heaven in Matthew symbolizes the awesome throne of God. Luke’s simpler form of address evokes more a sense of intimacy than of awe. The fact, however, that the disciples call God “Abba” makes them members of His family. In Luke as in the other synoptics, Jesus, by drawing His disciples into His Abba experience, incorporates them into the family of God; and membership in that family has as its condition obedience to God’s will. In both gospels, the first petition—“hallowed be your name”—teaches the disciples to approach the Father with reverence.24 (Lk 8:19-21; Mk 3:31-5; Mt 12:46-50; cf. Lk 11:27-8) The second petition begs for the final and definitive establishment of God’s reign. The petition implies that the kingdom’s realization results from the Father’s action in the world and that its final realization lies in the future. The next two petitions allude to the moral conditions for membership in the kingdom: trust in God to provide for one’s physical needs, personal repentance, and mutual forgiveness. In Luke as in Matthew trust in God’s providence frees one to share one’s bread and the other physical supports of life with others. As in Matthew, the term “daily (epiousion)” which qualifies “bread” could mean “tomorrow’s,” “daily,” “needful,” or “future” and probably connotes all four meanings. For the post-resurrection Christian, “needful bread” would have taken on eucharistic connotations. Moreover, like Matthew’s Jesus, Luke’s makes it clear that mutual forgiveness functions as the presupposition of all Christian prayer. The final petition asks for deliverance from the power of sin and from any inclination to commit it. Luke’s version does not pray for deliverance from the Evil One.25 24. Matthew makes this point explicit in the Our Father by adding the petition: “Your will be done on earth as in heaven.” Luke does not. Cf. NJBC, 43:104; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, I, pp. 722-725; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 748-753; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 209-210. 25. Cf. NJBC, 43:128; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 869-909; Evans, Luke, pp. pp. 475-487; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 176-189; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 268-275; David Crump, Jesus the


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During Jesus’ ministry, Luke attributes Jesus’ mighty works to the Father’s action in Him. When, for example, Jesus raises the son of the widow of Nain, the crowds not only recognize Jesus as a prophet but they also acknowledge the miracle as a visitation from God. (Lk 7:16) After Jesus heals the epileptic demoniac boy, the witnesses express astonishment at the majesty of God which the exorcism has revealed. Matthew and Mark portray the same crowds as mere curiosity seekers. (Lk 9:43) When on a sabbath Jesus heals a woman ill for eighteen years, she too praises God. (Lk 13:13) Finally, when Jesus enter Jerusalem in triumph, the disciples praise God “for all the mighty works they had seen.” (Lk 19:37) The repeated enthusiastic responses of the crowds to God’s action in Jesus enhance Luke’s portrait of Jesus as the joyful prophet of good news. Moreover, Luke’s Jesus expects thankful praise of God in response to His healings. When He heals ten lepers, and only a Samaritan responds by praising God and thanking Jesus, Jesus rebukes the silence of the other nine because they have failed to recognize in His person the healing power of God. (Lk 17:11-14) In Luke as in Mark, the Gerasene demoniac recognizes that Jesus is “the Son of the Most High God.” (Lk 8:28) Matthew contents himself with the title “Son of God.” Moreover, after Jesus delivers the demoniac,26 Luke’s Jesus, like Mark’s, sends the man home to testify to what God has done for him. The delivered demoniac testifies in fact to how much Jesus did for him. In both Mark and Luke, the man’s testimony to Jesus foreshadows the evangelization of the Gentiles.27 (Lk 8:39) Luke’s Jesus teaches His disciples about the Father. After Jesus testifies to John, Luke says that those who received John’s baptism “justified God,” while the Pharisees and lawyers did not because in rejecting John’s baptism they rejected God’s purpose for them. (Lk 7:29-30) We find no parallel statement either in Matthew or Mark. “Justifying God” means publicly attesting to His saving action in John’s ministry. The repentant also “justify God” by acknowledging the justice of God’s judgment upon human sinfulness and by accepting the justification which repentance mediates.28 Intercessor (Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr, 1992); Stanley E. Porter, “Mt 6:13 and Luke 11:4: ‘Lead us not into temptation,’” Expository Times, 101(1990), pp. 359-362; Joachim Jeremias, Die Botshaft Jesu vom Vater (Stuttgart: Calver Verlag, 1968); Abba: Studien zur neutestametlische Theologie und Zeitgeschichte (Göttingen: Vanderhoeck and Ruprecht, 1966); The Lords’ Prayer, translated by John Reumann (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress, 1964); Nicholas Ayo, C.S.C., The Lord’s Prayer (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1992). 26. Luke, like Mark, speaks of only one demoniac instead of the pair one encounters in Matthew. 27. Cf. NJBC, 43:106; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, 732-740; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 135-140; Evans, Luke, pp. 382-387; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 766-784; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 213-216. 28. Cf. NJBC, 43:98; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 670-676; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 121-126; Evans, Luke, pp. 353-356; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 748-753; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 209-210.

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As we have seen, when Matthew’s Peter confesses Jesus as messiah, he also acknowledges that Jesus is “the Son of God.” Matthew’s Jesus responds that only the Father could have revealed this to Peter, since only the Father, the source of saving enlightenment, could have empowered Peter to grasp Jesus’ divine sonship. (Mt 16:13) In Luke’s account of Peter’s confession, the evangelist has Peter acknowledge that Jesus is “the Christ of God.” (Lk 9:20) Mark, as we have seen, has Peter confess only that Jesus is “the Christ.” (Mk 8:29) In adding the phrase “of God,” Luke’s Peter names the divine origin of Jesus’ messianic commissioning. The confession of Luke’s Peter stands theologically somewhere between Mark’s account and Matthew’s.29 During Jesus’ Galilean ministry, then, Luke makes the following assertions about Jesus’ relationship to the Father: 1) Jesus possesses the Father’s unique divine authority to forgive sins. 2) Jesus teaches His disciples how to pray to the Father by word and example. 3) Jesus’ miracles manifest that the Father acts through Him. 4) Jesus draws His disciples into His Abba experience and through the obedience of faith transforms them into God’s family. Luke, however, collects most of Jesus’ teachings about the Father in the journey discourse. To those teachings I turn in the paragraphs which follow. The Father in the Journey Discourse The first reference to the Father during the journey discourse occurs when the seventy-two disciples joyfully recount the success of their mission of evangelization, exorcism, and healing. Luke describes Jesus’ response in the following terms. In that same hour He rejoiced in the Holy Breath and said, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to babes; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. All things have been delivered to me by My Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father, or who the Father is except the Son and any one to whom the Son chooses to reveal Him. (Lk 10:21-2)

Like Matthew, Luke presumably derives this saying of Jesus from Q. (Mt 11:25-7) Matthew, however, records this pronouncement in a very different context. Matthew inserts it in Jesus’ testimony to John. (Mt 11:25-7) Luke’s Jesus praises the Father for the evangelizing disciples’ 29. Cf. Brown, Peter in the New Testament, pp. 64-69, 111-112; M. Corbin, S.J., “Le Christ de Dieu: Méditation sur Luc 9:18-27,” Nouvelle Revue Théologique, 99(1977), pp. 641-680; NJBC, 43:114; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, 770-782; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 150-157; Evans, Luke, pp. 403-412; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 838-843; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 228-230.


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faith. Moreover, when read in context, Luke’s Jesus also thanks the Father for their efficacious proclamation of the kingdom, which foreshadows the Pentecostal Church’s proclamation of the risen Christ. In both gospels Jesus speaks as divine wisdom incarnate and claims privileged knowledge of the Father. Luke, however, suggests more explicitly than Matthew that the Holy Breath inspires Jesus’ Abba awareness just as She had inspired His messianic commissioning. In Luke, Jesus rejoices in the divine Breath before proclaiming His unique knowledge of and cognitive access to the Father. (Lk 3:21-2) In both gospels, the things which God has revealed to the disciples include Jesus and His mission in proclaiming the kingdom. In Luke the disciples share explicitly in that mission. In both gospels, they recognize in Jesus’ unique relationship to the Father the revelation of a relationship in which they themselves may also participate. Jesus alone has the power to reveal the Father because the Father has given Him authority over all creation. That authority includes the ability to reveal the Father to whomever He chooses. Jesus’ possession of universal sway suggests a post-resurrection perspective in both Matthew and Luke. It also implies Jesus’ divinity; for only God exercises dominion over “all things.”30 Luke’s handling of the great commandment differs from both Mark’s and Matthew’s. Luke locates this pronouncement story in Jesus’ journey discourse. Its placement in Luke identifies obedience to the great commandment as an fundamental expression of discipleship. In Mark, a scribe asks Jesus which commandment counts as the greatest; and Jesus cites the two great commandments. The scribe then approves Jesus’ answer, and Jesus tells him he is not far from the kingdom. Jesus’ second response suggests that one should read the great commandment not only in the light of Torah but also in the light of Jesus’ proclamation of the kingdom. (Mk 12:28-34) Matthew makes a similar theological point to Mark’s by having Jesus assure his questioner that these two commandments fulfill the Law and the prophets. In Matthew, of course, Jesus in turn fulfills both. For Matthew, then, one must interpret the great commandments in the light of the Torah read through the filter of Jesus’ proclamation of the kingdom. (Mt 22:34-40) Luke, however, has a lawyer ask Jesus what he must do to have eternal life. When Jesus asks him for his reading of the law, the lawyer replies: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your 30. Cf. Joseph A. Fitzmyer, S.J., “Abba and Jesus’ Relation to God” in A cause de l’évangile (Paris: Editions du Cerf, 1985), pp. 13-38; Gospel, II, 864-876; NJBC, 43:125; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 166-171; Evans, Luke, pp. 456-463; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 256-259.

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soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus then approves the lawyer’s response.31 (Lk 10:25-9) Luke orchestrates the scene in this way because he wants to interpret second of the great commandments in the light of the parable of the good Samaritan. In Luke’s account of the exchange, the lawyer feels embarrassed for having asked a question whose answer he already knew. He therefore justifies having raised the issue by asking Jesus to clarify the meaning of the term “neighbor.” (Lk 10:29) In effect, the lawyer is asking, “Whom should I consider a fellow Israelite?” He seems to assume that not every Jew would fit the category. Jesus replies with the story of the good Samaritan, a parable unique to Luke. Robbers waylay a man on the desert road from Jerusalem to Jerico, rob, strip, and beat him. They leave him half dead. A priest and a levite both pass by and refuse to touch an apparent corpse lest they incur defilement. A Samaritan, however, takes pity on the man, pours wine and oil into his wounds to disinfect and heal them, takes him to an inn, and pays for the man’s care and lodging with the promise to make good any further expense the innkeeper might incur on the man’s account. This promise expresses the Samaritan’s concern lest the robbed man become liable to enslavement for his inability to pay his debts. (Lk 10:30-5) Jesus then reverses the lawyer’s question and asks him who acted like a “neighbor” toward the robbed man. The lawyer cannot bring himself even to use the term “Samaritan” and replies that the one who showed mercy acted as neighbor. Jesus then replies, “Go and do likewise.” (Lk 10:36-7) In effect, then, Jesus tells the lawyer: treat anyone in need as your neighbor, even an enemy and a heretic, for Palestinian Jews regarded the Samaritans as both. Luke, then, in his own way, makes the same theological point about the great commandments as the other two synoptics: namely, that one must interpret them in the light of Jesus’ proclamation of good news. Luke, however, makes this point in his own distinctive way. Luke focuses on the second commandment and universalizes it to include even enemies and heretics, like Samaritans. Through the parable, Luke’s Jesus makes universal love of neighbor the practical test of love of God. The parable also insists that any authentic love of neighbor liberates those it benefits and does not enslave them. Finally, in response to the lawyer’s original question, Luke’s Jesus proclaims that anyone, even a despised Samaritan, who acts with the compassion which both the Law and the gospel require belongs to the true Israel.32 31. Cf. S.G. Wilson, Luke and the Law (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), pp. 28-29. 32. Cf. J. Duncan M. Derrett, “Law in the New Testament: Fresh Light on the Parable of the Good Samaritan,” New Testament Studies, 11(1964-1965), pp. 22-37; J.M. Furness, “Fresh Light on Luke 10:25-37,” Expository Times, 80(1968-1968), p. 182;


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In Mark and Matthew, Jesus, in the controversy over Beelzebul claims to cast out demons by the power of the Breath of God. (Mk 3:23-30; Mt 12:28) In Luke, Jesus claims to do so by “the finger of God.” (Lk 11:20) Luke is referring to Ex 8:15, where Pharaoh’s magicians recognize that Moses performs the signs he does by the finger of God. Through the reference the evangelist makes three points. First, Jesus assimilates His power to exorcise to the same liberating, divine power which brought about the exodus. Second, Luke rebukes the unbelief of Jesus’ adversaries by suggesting that Gentile sorcerers had more insight than those who accused Jesus of exorcising through the power of Beelzebul. Third, the allusion to the exodus points to Jesus as the promised prophet like Moses.33 (Dt 18:18-20) In the first section of his journey discourse, Jesus instructs his disciples about how to relate to Father, Son, and Breath in times of persecution. I tell you, my friends, do not fear those who kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. But I will warn you whom to fear: fear Him who, after he has killed, has power to cast into hell; yes, I tell you, fear Him. Are not two sparrows sold for two pennies? And not one of them is forgotten before God. Why even the hairs of your head are numbered. Fear not; you are of more value than many sparrows. (Lk 12:4-7)

Luke cites a terser version of a similar saying in Matthew. (Mt 10:26-30) Both evangelists, however, portray Jesus teaching substantially the same thing. The disciples should let the fear of God’s ultimate condemnation take away any fear they may have for their persecutors and potential executioners. In both gospels, Jesus lightens this stern admonition by an immediate assurance of the Father’s meticulous care for each of His children. His assurance has a touch of ironic peasant humor. Jesus promises the disciples that God keeps count of the number of hairs on their balding heads and values them more than a flock of birds. In times of persecution, the disciples should testify courageously to the Son: And I tell you, every one who acknowledges Me before others, the Son of man also will acknowledge before the angels of God; but anyone who denies me before others will be denied before the angels of God. (Lk 12:8-9)

Dietfried Gewalt, “Der baumhertziger Samaritäner,” Evangelische Theologie, 38(1978), pp. 403-417; NJBC, 43:126; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 876-890; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 171-176; Evans, Luke, pp. 463-471; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 259-265. 33. Cf. NJBC, 43:129; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 916-923; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 180-184; Evans, Luke, pp. 488-493; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 276-280.

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This saying finds a parallel in the other two synoptics. (Mt 10:32; Mk 8:38) Fearless testimony to Jesus under persecution will ensure that He will testify on the disciples’ behalf. The angels of God make up the heavenly court. In testifying “before the angels” therefore, Jesus testifies to the Father.34 In the journey discourse, Jesus also tells the parable of the rich fool as a way of manifesting God’s attitude toward extreme wealth. Only Luke records this parable; and it reflects his concern lest Christians settle into this world too comfortably. In the parable, the rich fool can think of nothing to do with his abundant wealth other than to heap it all up in one place. He tears down his old barns to build larger ones which will store all his possessions. He then says to his soul: “Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; take your ease, eat, drink, and be merry.” Luke portrays the rich man as completely self-preoccupied and self-isolated in his wealth. He speaks only to himself, cares only about his own possessions, his own future, his own personal pleasures. He has not even made provision for disposing of his fortune when he dies. God, however, replies to this selfish complacency with a rebuke: “Fool! This night your soul is required of you; and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?” (Lk 12:13-21) God’s rebuke in the parable expresses bitter irony. The rich man’s folly consists in this: while still alive, he could have shared his wealth with others and did not. Once he dies, all his labor to gather his wealth in one place will come to naught, as others divide his possessions among them. The rich man’s folly also recalls Ps 14:1: “The fool says in his heart there is no God.” His folly consists in his failure to foresee that he would one day have to answer to God for his selfishness. The parable also implicitly equates greed with unbelief The parable ends with the observation: “So is he who lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.” (Lk 12:21) Selfish concern with amassing personal wealth leaves one poor in the eyes of God. By reverse logic, those whom God regards as rich share their possessions with others. Both the parable and this final observation exemplify the messianic reversal of values.35 34. Cf. Von Rudolf Pesch, “Über die Autorität Jesu: Eine Rückfrage anhand des Bekenner- und Verleugnungspruchs Lk 12. 8f par.” in Die Kirche des Anfangs, edited by R. Schnackenburg et al. (Leipzig: St. Benno Verlag, 1977), pp. 25-55; I. Howard Marshall, “Uncomfortable Words VI. ‘Fear Him who can destroy both soul and body in hell’ (Mt 10, 28 RSV),” Expository Times, 81(1969-1970), pp. 276-280; John M. McDermott, S.J., “Luke XII, 8-9: ‘Stone of Scandal,’” Revue Biblique, 84(1977), pp. 523-537; NJBC, 43:133; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 955-961; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 193-197; Evans, Luke, pp. 510-519; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 291-294. 35. Cf. Donahue, op.cit., pp. 176-180; J. Duncan M. Derrett, “The Rich Fool: A Parable of Jesus Concerning Inheritance,” Heythrop Journal, 10(1977), pp. 127-151; Paul


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Luke follows the parable of the rich fool with the parable of the lilies of the field, which Matthew includes in the sermon on the mount as an expression of one of the fundamental demands of discipleship. (Lk 12:22-34; Mt 6:25-34) Luke again preserves a leaner version of the parable, but it says substantially the same things as the parable in Matthew. Luke’s Jesus urges his disciples to put aside all anxiety about their lives and the physical supports of life: food, drink, clothing. They should recognize that life is more important than food and the body than clothing. (Lk 12:22-3) Matthew’s version of the parable of the lilies of the field cites the example of the birds of the air who look to God to feed them. Luke’s Jesus refers to ravens, which in Jewish law counted among the unclean animals. (Lk 12:24; Lev 11:15; Deut 14:14) In other words, in Luke not only does the Father’s providence include every sparrow, but it even encompasses the unclean animals and birds as well. By shifting from birds to ravens, Luke’s Jesus asserts that the Father’s care reaches out universally to all and abolishes traditional distinctions between clean and unclean, between those who belong and outcasts.36 In Luke as in Matthew, the example of God’s care for things as ephemeral as birds and wild flowers rebukes the lack of trust which humans put in His providential care of them, who have much more value in His eyes. (Lk 12:24-8; Mt 6:26-30) In both gospels, anxiety about the future motivates this lack of faith; and Jesus urges his disciples to put such anxiety from their minds. The same anxiety motivated the rich fool’s amassing of wealth. Matthew’s Jesus repudiates such anxious concerns for the physical supports of life as typical of unbelieving Gentiles; Luke’s Jesus attributes these vicious attitudes to “the nations of the world”: in other words, to unconverted Gentiles who espouse the values of this world: wealth, self-indulgence, and power. (Lk 12:30; Mt 6:32) Instead, the disciples of Jesus must recognize the Father’s care and concern for each of His children. They then should seek the kingdom of heaven first and trust the Father to take care of them. (Lk 12:30-1; Mt 6:32-3) Matthew’s Jesus concludes the parable of the lilies of the field with a realistic proverb: Let tomorrow worry about itself; every day brings troubles enough. (Mt 6:34) Luke, however, follows the parable with another sayJouon, “La parabole du riche insensé,” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 29(1939), pp. 486-489; John Reid, “The Poor Rich Fool, Luke XII, 21,” Expository Times, 13(1901-1902), pp. 567-568; NJBC, 43:134; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 967-970; Evans, Luke, pp. 520-524; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 294-297. 36. Cf. Richard Dillon, “Ravens, Lilies, and the Kingdom of God (Matthew 6:25-33/ Luke 12:22-31,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 53(1991), pp. 605-627; J.F. Healey, “Models of Behavior: Matt 6:26(// Luke 12:24) and Prov 6:6-8,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 108(1989, pp. 497-498.

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ing of Jesus which Matthew had recorded earlier in the sermon on the mount. Moreover, Luke prefaces this saying differently from Matthew. Luke’s Jesus says: Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father’s pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions, and give alms; provide yourselves with purses which do not grow old, with a treasure in the heavens which does not fail, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is there will your heart be. (Lk 12:32-4; cf. Mt 6:19-21)

Luke omits Matthew’s realistic proverb, which one could take as qualifying the parable of the lilies of the field by conceding that life has its anxieties. Instead, Luke insists on what it means to seek the kingdom of God before all else. Typically, he understands the kingdom in eschatological terms. He contrasts the kingdom which the disciples will one day receive with their present condition of vulnerability as the “little flock” of God. The disciples must never doubt that in the end the Father will hand over to them the kingdom He has promised. One seeks the promised kingdom in this life by selling one’s possessions, giving them to the poor. Luke regards such conduct not as a counsel for a religious elite but as a condition for close discipleship. Here as elsewhere in his gospel, Luke again insists that the free sharing of one’s possessions with others keeps one’s heart anchored with God in the life to come rather than on the “kingdoms of the world” and their values. This eschatological interpretation of the practice of sharing one’s possessions with others typifies Luke. The gift of the kingdom recalls Dan 7:13-14, 27, which describes a bestowal of the kingdom upon “the saints of the Most High. The Act of the Apostles will describe the Breath-baptized disciples taking responsibility for the kingdom and exercising judgmental authority on God’s behalf.37 Luke further underscores the eschatological character of the kingdom by telling the parable of the servants who await their master’s return from a wedding feast. Not only will the master reward them if he finds them watching and ready for his return, but he will also defend them from anything which could harm them. (Lk 12:35-8) Luke seems to feel concern that the delay of the second coming has caused some Christians to settle in too comfortably into this world by looking to their own needs while neglecting those less advantaged. Only by persevering in active concern for the poor can Christians hope to live prepared to welcome Jesus when He returns. The selfish and complacent, 37. Cf. Paul S. Minear, Commands of Christ (New York, NY: Abingdon, 1972), pp. 132-151; NJBC, 43:135; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 975-981; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 197-202; Evans, Luke, pp. 524-531; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 298-302.


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like the rich fool, will find themselves suddenly startled by the Son of Man’s arrival as eschatological judge.38 (Lk 12:40) Later in the journey discourse, Luke’s Jesus makes a similar point. Luke notes that the Pharisees “were lovers of money.” Jesus rebukes them for thinking that they can reconcile greed and genuine faith in God. Those who do live in self-righteous self-deception: “You are those who justify yourselves before men, but God knows your hearts; for what is exalted among men is an abomination in the sight of God.” (Lk 16:14-5) The Pharisees compound the sin of greed with self-righteous self-justification and religious pretense. In the process, they simply show that they do not really know God, who reads hearts and abominates both greed and self-righteousness. Since Luke equates Pharisaism with hypocrisy (Lk 12:1), in condemning pious greed the evangelist denounces the hypocrisy of covetous Christians. In overturning traditional human judgments, the kingdom effects the messianic reversal of values. The incident follows a strong condemnation by Jesus of all desire for wealth. Jesus has just told the parable of the unjust steward. Called to account for having swindled his master, the steward, knowing that he is out of employment, makes sure that someone will befriend him in his need by further swindling the master. Before abandoning his post, he forgives a large portion his master’s debts. (Lk 16:1-9) Jesus ends the parable with the following observations: And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous mammon, so that when it fails they may receive you into the eternal habitations. The one who is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much; and one who is dishonest in a very little is dishonest also in much. If then you have not been faithful in the unrighteous mammon, who will entrust you with true riches? And if you have not been faithful in what was another’s, who will give you that which is your own? No servant can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. (Lk 16:10-13)

In the sermon on the mount, Matthew cites a similar pronouncement about the impossibility of serving God and mammon (Mt 6:24); but Luke re-enforces the point of this teaching by prefacing it with other sayings of Jesus absent from Matthew, including the parable of the unjust steward. Those who cannot use wealth in a way which pleases God prove themselves unworthy of the greater gift of eternal life. (Lk 16:9) Riches have insignificant value by comparison with life in the eternal mansions. The rich, moreover, in their selfish greed appropriate what actually be38. Cf. NJBC, 43:136; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 981-993; Evans, Luke, pp. 532-539; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 203-307; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 302-307.

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longs to others: namely, to the poor and needy. Their mismanagement of wealth proves them unworthy of the greater gift of eternal life. As we have seen in other contexts, rhetorical stress on active concern for the poor as an expression of eschatological longing typifies Luke’s portrait of Jesus.39 Luke’s rhetorical stress on divine forgiveness also leads him to write a gospel of great pardons; and in the journey discourse he insists on the fact that God rejoices in the repentance of every sinner.40 Luke makes the point in two parables which Jesus tells in response to a criticism from the Pharisees that he receives sinners and eats with them. Prior to the confrontation, Luke describes the tax collectors and sinners crowding around Jesus. (Lk 15:1-3) Luke typically doubles parables with the first involving a man and the second a woman. This stylistic device expresses the evangelist’s concern to shatter sexual stereotypes by including women in the kingdom, even though women enjoy little prominence in the evangelist’s account of Christian origins in Acts. In the first parable, a shepherd with a hundred sheep loses one “in the wilderness,” a place of danger.41 The lost sheep symbolizes the sinner as abandoned and hopeless in a hostile world.42 The shepherd leaves the ninety-nine sheep and searches “until he finds it.” Contrast Matthew’s phrase “if he finds it.” (Mt 18:13) When the shepherd finds the lost sheep, only in Luke does he lift it tenderly to his shoulders. (Cf. Is 40:11, 49:22, 50:4, 56:12; Hos 11:3) On restoring the sheep to the fold, the shepherd rejoices more than in the possession of the other ninety-nine.43 (Lk 15:4-7) In the second parable, a woman sweeps her house diligently until she finds a lost drachma and rejoices on finding it more than in the possession of nine other coins like it. Comparing God to a woman would have 39. Cf. Richard H. Hiers, “Friends By Unrighteous Mammon: The Eschatological Proletariate (Luke 16:9),” Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 38(1970), pp. 30-36; Geoffrey Paul, “The Unjust Steward and the Interpretation of Luke 16.9,” Theology, 61(1958), pp. 189- 193; Hans-Joachim Degenhardt, Lukas Evangelist der Armen (Stuttgart: Katolisches Bibelwerk Verlag, 1965), pp. 120-131; NJBC, 43:149; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 1104-1114; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 243-249; Evans, Luke, pp. 594-605; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 350-353. 40. Cf. J. Cantinat, C.M., “Les paraboles de la misericorde,” Nouvelle Revue Théologique, 77(1955), pp. 246-264. 41. Cf. F. Bussby, “Did a Shepherd Leave Sheep Upon the Mountains or in the Desert? A Note on Matt 18.12 and Luke 15.4,” Anglican Theological Review, 45(1963), pp. 93-94. 42. Cf. Wilhelm Schmidt, “Der Gute Hirte: Biblische Besinnung über Lukas 15:1-7,” Evangelische Theologie, 24(1964), pp. 173-177. 43. Cf. Robert J. Karris, “Women and Discipleship in Luke,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 45(1992), pp. 59-78; NJBC, 43:146; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 1071-1082; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 234-242; Evans, Luke, pp. 584-587; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 336-339.


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shocked and challenged Palestinian Jewish misogynism. Moreover, the woman in the parable faces an even greater loss than the shepherd: one drachma had much more value than one sheep. She searches diligently, lighting a lamp and sweeping the floor, until she finds the coin. (Lk 15:8-10) Both parables make the same point: there is more rejoicing “in heaven” and “before the angels of God” over one repentant sinner than over ninety-nine who do not need repentance. Moreover, God not only welcomes repentant sinners; He actively searches for those lost in sin until He finds them. Jesus’ willingness to welcome tax collectors and sinners expresses God’s active concern to reconcile backsliders and sinners, because the reconciliation of sinners causes God and the heavenly court enormous joy. (Lk 15:3-10) In Matthew, the parable of the shepherd targets Church leaders especially and urges them to reach out actively to sinners and backsliders as an expression of God’s will to forgive. Luke shifts the primary focus of the parable to the great joy and satisfaction which the Father finds in forgiving repentant sinners.44 That God takes great joy in forgiving also finds expression in the parable of the two sons, which immediately follows. Often called the parable of the prodigal son, the story really concerns both sons. The first squanders his inheritance on loose living and experiences abasing poverty. Dire need forces him to consort with Gentiles and to accept degrading employment from them as a keeper of pigs. The pigs for all their unclean flesh fare better than the young man. His hunger makes him want to feed on the unclean animals’ swill. Utterly degraded, the younger son repents. In a rehearsed soliloquy, the young man decides to return to his father’s house thinking that he can earn the father’s forgiveness by working as his servant. The father, who has been looking for his son’s return with maternal anxiety, welcomes him back with extravagant affection and forgiveness. The father further violates middle eastern male decorum by actually running to the younger son when from afar he espies the returning youth. More important still, the father interrupts the repentant son before he can complete his prepared apology and offer to work for the father as a servant. Instead, the elated father with prodigal and gratuitous love welcomes the young man as his true son, clothes him sumptuously, and throws a banquet to celebrate his return. When the second son refuses self-righteously to join the feast, the father goes out to him in an attempt to persuade him to show the same 44. J. Duncan M. Derrett, “Fresh Light on the Lost Sheep and the Lost Coin,” New Testament Studies, 26(1979-1980), pp. 36-60; Dennis Buzby, S.C.J., “La brébis perdu,” Revue Biblique, 39(1930), pp. 47-61.

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joyful forgiveness to the boy as the father had. The second, older son commits the same error as the first. He thinks that by faithful service and obedience over the years, he has earned the father’s love and fails to recognize that the father’s love comes to him as pure gift. Through the experience of sin, repentance, and gratuitous forgiveness, the younger son has learned to accept the father’s love as free gift and not as something he can earn. By the end of the parable, one does not know whether or not the second son will ever achieve the same insight and join in the festivities. (Lk 15:11-32) The parable of the two sons addresses the self-righteous Pharisees who had disapproved of Jesus’s hobnobbing with tax-collectors and sinners. Luke’s Jesus responds that repentant sinners know in a way in which the self-righteous do not that the Father’s forgiving love comes to them as pure, gratuitous, and joyful gift. Self-righteousness, by contrast, excludes one from the (messianic) banquet which the Father is throwing by trapping one in the illusion that one needs to earn God’s love.45 Later in the journey discourse, Jesus rebukes such Pharisaical self-righteousness in the parable of the tax collector and the Pharisee. The parable describes how sinners ought to relate to God. First century Jews who collected taxes (or tolls) incurred defilement. In the parable a Pharisee and a tax-collector both go to the temple to pray. The Pharisee stands as he prays, assuming the normal prayer posture in Judaism and in early Christianity. He prays in a soliloquy which boasts to God of all his virtuous acts and thanks God that he differs from the sinful tax-collector. The Pharisee’s prayer focuses on himself and on his virtuous behavior, rather than on God. With eyes lowered in shame and humility, the tax collector beats his breast and prays for God’s mercy on his sinfulness. Unlike the Pharisee’s prayer, the tax-collector focuses on God and on God’s merciful willingness to forgive the repentant. The tax collector goes home justified in the eyes of God; while the Pharisee, who ironically thanked God for not being like the tax-collector, does not go home justified. The Pharisee correctly deemed himself different from the tax-collector but misunderstood in his religious smugness 45. Cf. Donahue, op.cit., pp. 151-162; Otfried Hofius, “Alttestamentlische Motive im Gleichnis vom verlorenen Sohn,” New Testament Studies, 24(1971-1978), pp. 240-248; Jack T. Sanders, “Tradition and Redaction in Luke XV. 11-32, New Testament Studies, 15(1968-1969), pp. 433- 438; Philip Sellew, “Internal Monologue as a Narrative Device in the Parables of Luke,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 111(1992), pp 239-253; M.J.J. Menken, “The Position of splagchnizesthai and splagchna in the Gospel of Luke,” Novum Testamentum, 30(1988), pp. 107-114; Ernesto Borghi, “Lc 15, 11-32. Linee esegetiche globali,” Rivista Biblica, 34(1996), pp. 279-308; J. Albert Harrill, “The Indentured Labor of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:5),” Journal of Biblical Literature, 115(1996),pp. 714-717; NJBC, 43:147; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1982- 1094; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 234-242; Evans, Luke, pp. 587-594; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 34-345.


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the reason for the difference. Humble repentance yields justification in God’s eyes; self-righteous boasting to God does not.46 (Lk 18:9-14) Toward the end of the journey discourse, Luke’s Jesus teaches at length about prayer to the Father. He tells the parable of the unjust judge in order to dramatize the fact that God will hear the prayers of those He has chosen. The parable occurs only in Luke. A widow keeps pestering an unjust judge who habitually hands down corrupt judgments. He has no concern for God or pity for the poor. The widow, however, keeps demanding insistently that the judge do her justice. Widows would not normally have acted with the self-assertion of this one. Moreover, this widow eschews the common means of dealing with judicial injustice: namely, bribery. Instead, she demands her just rights. In the end, she wears the judge down with her relentless persistence. The word which the judge in the parable uses to describe the woman’s activity (hypopiaze me) suggests ironically that he feels pummeled like a boxer by the weak woman’s tenacity. (Lk 18:1-8) Luke concludes the parable with the following words: And the Lord said: “Hear what the unrighteous judge says. And will not God vindicate his elect, who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long over them? I tell you, he will vindicate them speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of man comes, will He find faith on earth? (Lk 18:6-8)

Jesus here speaks allegorically as “the Lord” and as the eschatological “Son of man.” In that capacity he contrasts the action of God with that of the unjust judge. The judge shilly-shallies; God responds promptly to the prayers of those He has chosen. The unjust judge hands down corrupt verdicts and does justice reluctantly; God vindicates His elect who trust in Him. The fact of divine election ought therefore to inspire confident prayer for the rectification of injustice and oppression. Jesus’ final rhetorical question suggests that unless the elect persevere in prayerful resistance to injustice the Son of man will not find faith on earth when He returns.47 46. Cf. Donahue, op.cit., pp. 187-193; F. Gerald Dowling, “The Ambiguity of ‘The Pharisee and the Toll-Collector’ (Luke 18:9-14) in the Greco Roman World of Late Antiquity,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 54(1992), pp. 80-99; NJBC, 43:155; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1175-1182; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 268-274; Evans, Luke, pp. 634-640; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 373-375. 47. Cf. Donahue, op.cit., pp. 180-185; Herman Ljungvik, “Zur Erklärung einer Lukas-Stelle (Luk. XVIII, 7),” New Testament Studies, 10(1963-1964), pp. 289-294; Albert Wifstrand, “Lukas XVIII.7,” New Testament Studies, 11(1964-1965), pp. 72-74; J. Duncan M. Derrett, “Law in the New Testament: The Parable of the Unjust Judge,” New Testament Studies, 18(1971-1972), pp. 178-191; Heinrich von Zimmermann, “Das Gleichnis vom Richter und Witwe (Lk 18, 1-8)” in Die Kirche des Anfangs, edited by R. Schnackenburg (Leipzig: St. Benno Verlag, 1977), pp. 79-95; Domingo

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In another parable about perseverance in prayer, a friend seeks a favor from another friend in the middle of the night. The friend seeking the boon finds himself with an empty larder and surprised by an unexpected guest. The surprised host seeks the bread he needs from a friend who, in the middle of the night, of course lies abed. The parable focuses on the persistence of the friend in need. If he just keeps knocking, the sleeping friend will eventually relent and begrudgingly grant his request. (Lk 11:5-8) Unlike the unjust judge, the sleeping man in the parable relates in friendship to the man banging on the door. Inconvenience rather than vice motivates his reluctance to respond to the friend’s importunity. In both parables, however, human reluctance to respond to prayer contrasts with God’s willingness to do so.48 Luke reproduces in the journey discourse Mark’s account of the rich man who cannot follow Jesus because of his attachment to his wealth. Luke transforms the man into a ruler (archon); but in other respects he reproduces Mark’s story with minor editing. The man’s status as a ruler suggests that attachment to power offers as much an obstacle to following Jesus as attachment to wealth. Luke rewrites the story in a manner which suggests God’s power to save even the rich.49 (Lk 18:18-9) As in Mark, when the man asks Jesus what he must do to gain eternal life, Jesus replies that he should keep the commandments and names several. Luke’s Jesus does not add to Mark’s list the second of the great commandments, as Matthew’s does. When the man says he has kept the commandments from his youth, Jesus invites him to sell all he has, give it to the poor, and come follow Him.50 (Lk 18:22; Mt 19:21; Mk 10:21) The ruler becomes sad because he finds it difficult to part with his riches and relinquish his power. At his sadness Jesus warns the disciples Muños-Leon , “Jesús y la apocaliptica pesimista (a proposito de Lc 18:8b / Mt 24:12), Estudios Biblicos, 46(1988), pp. 457-495; NJBC, 43:156; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 1182-1190; Evans, Luke, pp. 640-645; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 375-377. 48. Cf. Donahue, op.cit., pp.185-187; Jacques Dupont, “La prière et son efficacité dans l’évangile de Luc,” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 69(1981), pp. 45-56; A.D. Martin, “The Parable Concerning Hospitality,” Expository Times, 37(1925-1926), pp. 411-414; Herbert Pegg, “The Scorpion and the Egg (Luke xi.12),” Expository Times, 38(1926-1927), pp. 468-469; Borge Hjerl-Hansen, “Le rapprochement poisson-serpent dans la predication de Jésus (Mt VII, 10 et Luc XI, 11),”Revue Biblique, 55(1948), pp. 195-198; NJBC, 43:129; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 909-913; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 276-180; Evans, Luke, pp. 474-488; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 268-275. 49. Luke does not have the ruler prostrate himself before Jesus in an exaggerated gesture of homage, as Mark does. The man does, however, indulge in exaggerated courtesy by calling Jesus “Good Teacher.” As in Mark, Jesus replies dryly and self-deprecatingly: “Why do you call me good, no one is good but God alone.” 50. Luke does not say, as Mark does, that Jesus looked on him with love. Nor does Luke preface the invitation, as Mt does, with the phrase: “If you would be perfect.” By adding the phrase, Matthew, as we have seen, depicts imitation of the universality of divine love.


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that a camel can pass more easily through the eye of a needle than a rich man enter the kingdom of God. Luke, however, in contrast to Mark does not say that the man departed. Instead, Luke leaves it an open question whether or not the man finally decides to follow Jesus. By leaving the ruler’s response ambiguous, Luke foreshadows dramatically the point he next makes: namely, that God can save even the rich.51 (Lk 18:23-25) As in the other synoptics, Luke’s Jesus also promises Peter that those who have left all to follow Him will receive much more in return and will inherit eternal life. Moreover, Luke, like Mark and in contrast to Matthew insists that some of the manifold rewards of discipleship will come in this life as well as in the life to come. Luke, however, speaks only vaguely about the “much more (pollaplasiona)” which the disciples will receive in this world, while Mark names the benefits: “houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands.” Luke, moreover, omits Mark’s promise that along with the rewards of discipleship will come persecutions. (Lk 18:28-30; Mk 10:28-31) Luke, in other words, fails to portray the Church as a second family, as Mark does. Nor does Luke follow Mark in stressing the inevitability of persecutions.52 During the journey discourse, then, Luke makes the following important affirmations about relating to the Father. 1) Jesus reveals the Father in a unique and normative way which transforms Him into the personal paradigm of any human filial relationship to the deity. 2) One who relates to the Father in Jesus’ image must love Him with an all-consuming love and must practice a universal, reconciling, liberating charity toward all people. 3) In times of persecution, the disciples should relate to the Father with a reverential fear greater than any fear inspired by their persecutors. On the last day, Jesus will testify to the Father on behalf of those who testify to Jesus in times of persecution. 4) Trust in the Father’s providential care must free the disciples from all covetousness and greed; and that same trust must inspire in them generous liberality toward all people, including social outcasts. 5) That same trust should inspire the disciples to leave their future in the Father’s hands. 6) The Father together with all the court of heaven rejoices over the repentance of every sinner. 7) The Father yearns for sinners with a forgiveness which they can never earn. 8) The Father hears and answers prayers, especially persistent ones. 9) God has the power to save even the rich. 10) The Father rewards generous 51. Cf. Degenhardt, op. cit., pp. 136-153; Ernest Best, “Uncomfortable Words VII: The Camel and the Needle’s Eye (Mk 10.25),” Expository Times, 82(1970-1971), pp. 83-89; J.W. Whenham, “Why Do You Ask Me About Good? A Study of the Relation Between Text and Source Criticism,” New Testament Studies, 28(1982), pp. 116-125; Walther Zimmerli, “Die Frage des Reichen nach dem ewigen Leben,” Evangelische Theologie, 19(1959), pp. 90-97. 52. Cf. NJBC, 43:157; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, II, pp. 1195-1201; Evans, op. cit., pp. 648- 655; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 379-383.

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service in this life and in the next. In the paragraphs which follow, I shall consider next Lukan texts about the Father taken from Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry, passion, and resurrection. The Father in the Jerusalem Ministry The dispute over tribute to Caesar occurs in Luke, as in the other synoptics, during Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry. As in Mark and Matthew, those who ask Jesus about paying tribute to Caesar first flatter him hypocritically by telling Him that He speaks and teaches rightly, fears no one, and teaches truly the way of God. Mark identifies Jesus’ adversaries as Pharisees and Herodians; Matthew calls them Pharisees. Luke, however, portrays them as spies sent by the temple priests and scribes. (Lk 20:20; Mk 12:13; Mt 22:15) Their mission as spies underscores the hypocrisy of their flattery of Jesus. Moreover, as we shall see, in Luke the temple priests and Jesus constantly battle one another for proprietorship of the temple. As in the other synoptics, Jesus sees through their guile and makes them show him a Roman coin with Caesar’s image on it. When they identify the image, Jesus tells them, as He does in the other synoptics, to render to Caesar what belongs to Caesar but to God what belongs to Him. (Lk 20:20-6; Mk 12:13-7; Mt 22:15-22) Jesus makes no direct pronouncement on the justice or injustice of Roman taxes, but tells His adversaries to give to Caesar whatever Caesar has to right to demand of them. Jesus’ rhetorical emphasis falls, of course, on His second injunction: namely, render to God what belongs to Him. As in Mark and Matthew, one can see in Jesus’ reply an allusion to Gen 1:26-7, which states that God created men and women in His image. The coin bearing Caesar’s image belongs to him, while humans, who bear God’s image, belong to God. Those who render to God what belongs to God therefore reverence His image in others.53 Luke reproduces Mark’s account of Jesus’ encounter with the Sadducees during His Jerusalem ministry. They pose the case of the seven brothers who married the same wife and ask Jesus whose wife she will be in the resurrection. (Lk 20:27-32) As in Mark, Jesus rebukes the Sadducees for confusing resurrection and resuscitation; and He endorses the Pharisaical belief that the risen body has a heavenly, “angelic” character. Luke’s Jesus, however, goes beyond Mark’s when He interprets the meaning of this transformed existence. He says that the risen enjoy immortality, stand on an equal plane with the angels, and enjoy divine sonship, in virtue of the fact that they are “sons of the resurrection.” In other words, for Luke resurrection brings to perfection a human’s filial relationship 53. Cf. Herbert Lowe, Render Unto Caesar: Religious and Political Liberty in Palestine (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1940); NJBC, 43:170; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1289- 1298; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 310-319; Evans, Luke, pp. 703-710; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 410-412.


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with God which the obedience of faith in this life begins. In also translates one into an angelic mode of existence, different from embodied human existence. (Lk 20:34-7) As in the other synoptics Jesus cites Ex 3:6 and argues that the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is a God of the living, not of the dead. Hence, the patriarchs live in God. Luke, however, adds to Mark’s response, the phrase: “for all live to him.” Luke, who writes for a predominantly Gentile audience, makes it clear that Jesus, besides joining the Pharisees in defending the resurrection of the body, also upholds personal survival after death.54 (Lk 20:37-40) Mark locates the dispute among the Twelve about which of them ranks greatest at the end of the way section of his gospel. (Mk 10:41-5) Luke, however, places it at the last supper itself, right after Jesus has instituted the eucharist and has announced His immanent betrayal and death. (Lk 22:14-24) The relocation of the incident puts the disciples in an even worse light: at the very moment when Jesus faces His ultimate ordeal of suffering and gives Himself to them eucharistically, they remain ambitious, self-serving, and self-preoccupied. In addition, after Jesus calls the Twelve to leadership in service, Luke inserts a slightly modified version of a saying of Jesus which Matthew places after the story of the rich young man. Then Matthew’s Jesus promises the disciples a reward for having renounced all to follow Him. At the last supper Luke’s Jesus says: You are they who have continued with me in my trials; and I assign to you, as my Father has assigned to me, a kingdom, that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom, and sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel. (Lk 22:28-30)

Luke’s version of this saying of Jesus differs from Matthew’s in several notable respects. First, Luke explains why Jesus gives the Twelve special authority in the Church: they have accompanied Him throughout His ministry and sufferings. In Acts that same experience will provide the criterion for choosing someone to replace Judas. (Acts 1:21) Second, Luke’s Jesus names the source of His right to confer judicial authority on the Twelve: the Father has given the kingdom of God into His hands, so that He might confer authority within it on those whom He chooses. Moreover, Jesus “bequeaths (diatithemai)” the kingdom to the disciples. The verb comes from the same root as “diatheke (covenant)” and connotes 54. Cf. D.M. Cohn-Sherbok, “Jesus’ Defense of the Resurrection of the Dead,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 11(1981), pp. 64-73; F. Dreyfus, O.P., “L’argument de Jésus en faveur de la resurrection des morts (Marc XII, 26-27),” Revue Biblique, 66(1959), pp. 213-224; NJBC, 43:171; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1298-1308; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 310-319; Evans, Luke, pp. 710-720; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 413-416.

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that the transfer of the kingdom will result from the sealing of the covenant which the eucharistic words of Jesus have just prophesied. In other words, in Luke’s ecclesiology apostolic judicial authority functions in a eucharistic context.55 (Lk 22:20) Finally, Luke’s Jesus, like Matthew’s, promises that the Twelve will exercise judicial authority in the new Israel; but Luke adds that they will also share in the messianic banquet with Jesus. Coming after the institution of the eucharist with its allusion to the eucharist as a covenant, this phrase points to eucharistic worship as a foretaste of the messianic banquet. In Matthew Jesus’ promise especially empowers the Twelve to pass judgment on Israel at the parousia. In Luke, apostolic judgment has the same ambivalence as eating and drinking “at my table” in the kingdom. In Luke one must understand both judgment and table fellowship in the context of a realized eschatology. In Acts both the proclamation of the risen Christ and the exercise of disciplinary authority in the Church have a judgmental character which anticipates the final and full arrival of the kingdom in the parousia.56 (Cf. Acts 2:1-41; 5:1-11, 8:18-24, 15:1-29) The Father in the Passion Luke attenuates even more than Matthew the sense of struggle with which Mark depicts Jesus’ prayer in Gethsemane. Luke’s Jesus does not fling Himself to the ground as Mark’s does. Instead, He kneels down to pray, just as His disciples will kneel to pray in Acts. (Lk 22:41; Acts 20:22, 36-37) The Father does not respond to Jesus’ garden prayer in Mark until Jesus has died, apparently forsaken even by God as He hangs on the cross. In Luke, the Father responds to Jesus’ prayer in the garden immediately. When Luke’s Jesus asks the Father to take away the cup of suffering, the Father responds by sending Him an angel to strengthen Him. (Lk 22:43) As we have seen, during Jesus’ desert temptations in Mark, angels support Him as He struggles with Satan. (Mk 1:12-13) The temptation account in Matthew ends with angels ministering to Jesus after He has vanquished Satan. (Mt 4:10-11) In Luke’s narrative of Jesus’ desert encounter with Satan, the tempter withdraws until a more opportune time presents itself. (Lk 4:13) No ministering angels appear in Luke’s tempta55. Cf. Robert Tannehill, “A Study in the Theology of Luke-Acts,” Anglican Theological Review, 143(1961), pp. 195-203. 56. Cf. Jacques Dupont, “Le logion sur les douze trônes (Mt 19,28, Lc 22, 28-30),” Biblica, 45(1964), pp. 355-392; Augustin George, S.M., “La royauté de Jésus selon l’évangile de Luc,” Sciences Ecclesiastiques, 14(1962), pp. 55-69; Jacques Guillet, “Une formule Johannique dans l’évangile de Luc?” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 69(1981), pp. 113-122; Juergen Roloff, “Anfänge der soteriologische Deutung des Todes Jesu (Mk x,45 und Lk xxii, 27),” New Testament Studies, 19(1972-1973), pp. 38-64; NJBC, 43:181; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 1411-1419; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 350-356; Evans, Luke, pp. 798-801; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 453-457.


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tion narrative. Instead, the third evangelist introduces a strengthening angel at the moment when Satan returns to the attack, namely, in Gethsemane at the beginning of Jesus’ passion. The hour of renewed Satanic onslaught has arrived; and the Father sends a strengthening angel in response to Jesus’ prayer so that Jesus can vanquish Satan this second time by enduring faithfully the ordeal which awaits Him. The Father’s immediate response to His prayer heartens Luke’s Jesus to pray “more earnestly.” In His struggle (agonia), Jesus pours with sweat, which streams from Him in torrents, “like blood.” (Lk 22:44) Luke is probably not thinking of a bloody sweat but of profuse perspiration, which indicates the intensity of Jesus struggle. The Greek word for struggle (agonia) connotes the agonistic contests of the athletes in the Roman arenas. As a consequence of the Father’s immediate response to His prayer, Luke’s Jesus faces His eschatological test with a divine empowerment communicated to Him by the ministering angel. The struggle loses nothing of its intensity and reality; but Luke’s Jesus enters into His ordeal like an athlete straining for victory.57 Luke also modifies Mark’s account of Jesus’ trial before the Sanhedrin. In Luke, the trial occurs during the morning and not at night, as it does in the other synoptics. Mark and Matthew both portray Jesus as silent in the face of accusation, until the high priest questions Him; but Luke’s Jesus dialogues actively with the Sanhedrin. The dialogue differs somewhat from the final dialogue between Jesus and the high priest in the other two synoptics. (Lk 22:66-71; Mk 14:55-65; Mt 26:59-68) In Luke’s dialogue, when the Sanhedrin asks Jesus if He is the Messiah, Jesus replies: “If I tell you, you will not believe; and if I ask you, you will not answer. But from now on the Son of Man will be seated at the right hand of the power of God.” (Lk 22:67-8) Mark’s Jesus claims messianic authority outright when questioned by the high priest (Mk 14:62), while Matthew’s replies more non-committally. Luke’s Jesus recognizes that His accusers have already prejudged Him and points to the uselessness of their pretending justice or fairness in His trial. While Mark’s Jesus warns His enemies that He will one day return to judge them as the eschatological Son of Man, Luke’s Jesus speaks of His present and future enthronement at the right hand of God (apo tou nyn). His response provokes a further question: “Are you the Son of God?” to 57. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, I, pp. 180-190; Thorlief Forman, “Der Gebetkampf Jesu,” New Testament Studies, 10(1963-1964), pp. 261-273; R.S. Barfour, “Gethsemane in the Tradition of the Passion,” New Testament Studies, 16(1969-1970), pp. 231-251; Jerome Neyrey, “The Absence of Jesus’ Emotions—The Lukan Redaction of Lk 22, 39-46,” Biblica, 61(1980), pp. 153-171; NJBC, 43:184; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 1436-1446; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 350-356; Evans, Luke, pp. 808-813; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 461-464.

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which Jesus replies: “You say that I am.” The Sanhedrin then pronounces Jesus guilty. (Lk 22:69-71; cf. Mk 14:55-65 and Mt 26:59-68) In contrast to Mark, Luke does not make Jesus’ assault on the temple one of the central issues in His trial. Initially, a single issue preoccupies the chief priests in Luke: namely, Jesus’ messianic claims. In Luke, therefore the chief priests and Pilate pass the same judgment on Jesus: both condemn Him as a messianic usurper. Indeed, by always locating Jesus’ teaching in the temple, Luke transforms His final Jerusalem ministry into a struggle between the messiah and the chief priests for control of God’s house. Luke’s account of the trial makes no mention of blasphemy; but it does assert that the Sanhedrin condemned Jesus because they viewed Him as claiming divine Sonship. Jesus’ claim to enthronement at the right hand of God places Him in a divine, heavenly realm, on a par with God and transforms the title “Son of God” into much more than a messianic title. It connotes as well divine dignity and prerogative.58 In some versions of Luke’s gospel, the crucified Christ prays to the Father a prayer of forgiveness: “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” (Lk 23:34a) Jesus seems to pray for anyone responsible for His death. Moreover, the prayer occurs in a scene of extreme brutality where not only the chief priests but the Roman soldiers mock Jesus. The priests call on Jesus to save Himself and prove He is “the Christ of God.” The soldiers offer Him vinegar to drink and speak in similar terms. Their violent contempt for a dying man contrasts starkly with the forgiveness which Jesus begs from His Father. Luke’s Jesus also pardons one of the “evildoers” crucified with Him. In the other synoptics, those crucified with Jesus both join in reviling Him. (Mk 15:32; Mt 27:44) In Luke, one of the malefactors does in fact mockingly challenge Jesus to save both Himself and the two crucified with Him. The other rebukes the first saying: “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? And we indeed justly; for we are receiving the due reward of deeds; but this man has done nothing wrong.” The repentant “evildoer” then begs Jesus to remember him when He comes into His kingdom. In response to this compassionate act of faith, Jesus replies: “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise.” (Lk 23:39-43) 58. Cf. Paul W. Walaskey, “The Trial and Death of Jesus in the Gospel of Luke,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 94 (1915), pp. 81-93; Joseph Plevnik, “Son of Man Seated at the Right Hand of God: Luke 22,69,” Biblica, 72(1991), pp. 331-347; John Paul Heil, “Reader Response and the Irony of Jesus before the Sanhedrin in Luke 22:66-71,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 51(1989), pp. 271-284; Frank J. Matera, “Luke 22, 66-71: Jesus before the Presbyterion,”Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 65(1989), pp. 43-59; NJBC, 43:186; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1452-1471; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 356-363; Evans, Luke, pp. 830-839; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 471-473.


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The second malefactor proclaims Jesus’ innocence even as the two of them die on the cross. In response, the crucified Son of God not only offers forgiveness to the evildoer even at death’s door but also promises personal intimacy in the future: “you will be with Me.” Jesus includes the repentant malefactor among those who share in the destiny of all Christian believers, a destiny which goes beyond this life and includes the life to come. That the repentant evildoer will enjoy the blessings of the kingdom “today” accords well with Luke’s earlier assertion of universal human immortality. Mark and Matthew cite Ps 22:1, the prayer of the innocent poor man, as Jesus’ last words; and they portray Jesus dying with a loud cry of inarticulate dereliction. (Mk 15:33-7; Mt 27:45-50) Luke, however, portrays Jesus dying with a prayer of trust upon His lips. Luke has the dying Jesus cry out with a loud voice: “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.” (Lk 23:46) The prayer removes any ambiguity about the meaning of Jesus’ final words in Mark: “My God, My God, why have your forsaken Me?” Luke apparently did not trust his Gentile audience to recognize these words as the prayer of the innocent poor man of the psalms who dies trusting in divine vindication. Instead, the evangelist makes it quite clear that Jesus did indeed die trusting in the Father to receive His soul and welcome Him into the divine presence. While Luke’s reformulation of Jesus’ last words contrasts on first reading with Mark’s and Matthew’s passion account, in the end all three synoptic evangelists make the same assertion about Jesus’ death: namely, that He died trusting in the Father to vindicate Him and His cause.59 God in the Resurrection After Jesus rises from the dead and before He ascends into heaven, He opens the disciples’ minds to understand that the scriptures had foretold His death and resurrection. Jesus then instructs the disciples in the following way: “You are witnesses to these things. And behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you; but stay in the city, until you are clothed with power from on high.” (Lk 24:48-9) The phrase “the promise of my Father” refers, as we have seen, to the fulfillment of John the Baptizer’s prophecy about the coming of the mightier one who would baptize with a sanctifying Breath and fire. Breath-baptism has as its purpose to empower the disciples to proclaim universal repentance and the forgiveness of sins accomplished in Jesus’ 59. Cf. Xavier Léon-Dufour, S.J., “Le dernier cri de Jésus,” Études, 348(1978), pp. 667-682; NJBC, 43:190-192; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1507-1511; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 375-385; Evans, Luke, pp. 864-874; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 483-491; George, op. cit., 185-212.

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ministry and especially in the paschal mystery. Although Jesus baptizes with the Holy Breath, the Father once again in Luke functions as the ultimate source of both Son and Breath.60 (Lk 24:53) The Analogy of Christological Knowing Luke endorses the broad lines of Mark’s portrait of Jesus’ relationship to the Father. Like Mark, Luke portrays that relationship as one of perfect obedience, unconditioned trust, and absolute love. In all three synoptics, these attitude characterize the way in which Jesus’ disciples relate to the Father. Like Matthew, Luke echoes Mark in portraying the kingdom as the family of God and regards obedience to the divine will as the condition for membership in that family. One also finds, however, some typically Lukan stresses in the evangelist’s understanding of the disciples’ relationship to the Father. Typically, in characterizing the Christian’s relationship to the Father, Luke stresses the universality of Christian love, the importance of prayer, God’s joy in forgiving the repentant, and the eschatological dimensions of Christian sharing. Luke agrees with the other synoptics that one must interpret the great commandment in the light of Jesus’ proclamation of the kingdom. Luke, however, does so by using the parable of the good Samaritan in order to elucidate the meaning of the second of the two great commandments: “you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” In the process, Luke universalizes the scope of the great commandment to include any needy person, even outcasts, enemies, and heretics. Luke stresses more than the other synoptics the fact that Jesus prayed constantly to the Father and holds Jesus up more explicitly than the other synoptics as the model for Christian prayer. Moreover, Luke reproduces a briefer version of the Our Father than Matthew, Luke transforms the final cry with which Jesus dies in Mark and Matthew into a prayer of trust and total self-donation into the Father’s hands. Luke thus clarifies for his Gentile Christians the meaning of Mark’s citation of Ps 22:1. Since Luke clearly portrays Jesus as the model of Christian prayer, Jesus’ final prayer transforms His death into the model Christian death. Jesus dies forgiving His enemies and trusting unconditionally in the Father. Mark sought to shore up faith and commitment among Roman Christians in the wake of imperial persecution. Matthew sought to strengthen the resolve of the church in Antioch as it confronted “the synagogue across the street.” Luke especially inculcated those religious attitudes which con60. Cf. Benjamin J. Hubbard, “The Commissioning Stories in Luke-Acts: A Study of Their Antecedents,” Semeia, 8(1977), pp. 103-123; NJBC, 43:197; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 1578-1585; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 400-406; Evans, Luke, pp. 916-928; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 513-515.


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tradicted the corrupt mores of a Satanic Roman empire: prayer, not self-reliance; forgiveness, not vengeance; eschatological hope, not this-worldly security; compassionate care for the poor, not greed and class distinctions; universal love, not the violent pursuit of self-interest. This section has reflected on Jesus’ relationship to the Father. How, then, does Luke’s Jesus relate to the Holy Breath? To this question the following section turns. (III) Luke stresses Jesus’ relationship to the Holy Breath more than any other synoptic evangelist.61 For example, as we saw in considering his infancy narrative, Luke suggests that an outpouring of God’s Breath accompanied the birth of Jesus. Mary conceives Jesus in the divine Breath’s power, an event which transforms her into the tabernacle of God. Elizabeth, Zachary, and Simeon all experience the divine Breath’s enlightenment. Anna the prophetess foreshadows the Pentecostal Church. (Lk 1:15, 35, 41, 67; 2:25-7, 36-8) This mini-Pentecost foreshadows the multiple “Pentecosts” in Acts. Jesus and the Divine Breath As we saw above, in Luke as in the other synoptics, John foretells the coming of the mightier one who will baptize with a sanctifying Breath and with fire. Luke, then, like Matthew differentiates Jesus’ relationship to the Breath from Her relation to His disciples. She comes to Jesus under the sign of the dove in order to reveal Him as beloved Son of God and as the beginning of a new Israel. She comes to the disciples under the sign of fire, that is, in purification and judgment. (Lk 3:16, 22) In Acts, Luke will develop the purification and judgment which the fire of Breath-baptism effects more extensively than Matthew. Moreover, Luke’s Jesus during His journey discourse longs to cast the fire of sanctification and of judgment upon the earth, and He links this saving, judgmental action to His impending passion. His own suffering and death will complete His own baptismal commissioning and mediate the coming of the sanctifying Breath of purification and of judgment.62 (Lk 12:49-50) As we also saw, Luke describes Jesus’ messianic commissioning in the power of the Breath in a way which anticipates Her coming on Pentecost. Luke does so by having Her descend on Jesus after John has finished baptizing and while Jesus Himself is at prayer. She comes to the disciples 61. Cf. Robert P. Menzies, The Development of Early Christian Pneumatology with Special Reference to Luke-Acts (Worchester: Billings & Sons Ltd., 1991); Navone, op.cit., 151-169. 62. Cf. Cesar-Augusto Franco Martinez, “Lc 12,50: Angustia de Jesús antes de su muerte?,” Estudios Biblicos, 50(1992), pp. 423-441.

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on Pentecost after they gather in persistent prayer for Her coming. (Acts 2:1-2) As we have already seen, Luke’s separation of Her descent from Jesus’ baptism mutes the connotations of the image of the dove which one finds in Mark’s account of Jesus’ baptism. Moreover, as we have also seen, Luke makes the descent of the Breath more public than either of the other two synoptics by having her settle on Jesus “in bodily form.”63 (Lk 3:22) Like Matthew, Luke does not have the Breath drive Jesus into the desert to confront Satan, as Mark does. She leads (êgeto) rather than drives. As in the other two synoptics, however, the Holy Breath presides over the entire temptation narrative. As in Matthew, therefore, She inspires Jesus’ response to Satan’s temptations. (Lk 4:1) Luke begins his account of Jesus’ public ministry very differently from either Matthew or Mark. Moreover, he does so in a way which calls dramatic attention to the fact that Jesus conducts His ministry in the power of the divine Breath.64 After His desert temptations Jesus returns to Galilee “in the power of the Breath (en te dynamei tou pneumatos).” She inspires His proclamation of the good news in the synagogues of Galilee. Because of His Breath-inspired preaching Jesus’ reputation grows, and all speak in His praise. (Lk 4:14-5) From the outset of His ministry, Luke’s Jesus speaks and acts as the Breath-filled messenger of good news. As we shall see, Luke also desires the reader to recognize in Jesus the prophet like Moses whose coming the book of Deuteronomy had foretold. (Deut 18:18-20) Luke makes the same point at the beginning of his account of Jesus’ rejection at Nazareth, which in Luke opens Jesus’ public ministry. In Nazareth Jesus attends the sabbath service in the synagogue. He rises to read the scriptures and to comment on them. He opens the scroll at a messianic prophecy in the book of Isaiah: The Breath of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord. (Lk 4:18-9)65 63. Cf. A. Feuillet, “Le symbolisme de la colombe dans les recits évangeliques du baptème,” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 46(1958), pp. 524-544; Leander E. Keck, “The Spirit and the Dove,” New Testament Studies, 17(1970-1971), pp. 41-67; NJBC, 43:49; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 479-487; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 331-347; Ernst, Luke, pp. 117-119; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 68-72. 64. Cf. Navone, op.cit., pp. 132-150, 185-187. 65. Luke rewrites Isaiah’s prophecy. The original prophecy reads: The Breath of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to bring good tidings to the afflicted; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound. (Is 61:1-2)


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Luke identifies the afflicted ones to whom Jesus ministers as “the poor.” Debtors would have numbered among those whom Jesus seeks to release from prison; and Luke’s text may well have had them particularly in mind. As we have seen in reflecting on the parable of the good Samaritan, Luke regards the gospel as a liberating message. Moreover, the release (aphesis) of debtors connotes the jubilee year when all debts were canceled and slaves released. The “acceptable year” which Jesus proclaims also alludes to the jubilee year, a season which Jesus will extend beyond the limits of only twelve months. (Cf Ex 23:10-3; Lev 25:1-19) Jesus informs his fellow townspeople: “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” (Lk 4:21) Jesus’ claim in the other synoptics to exorcise in the power of God’s Breath makes an analogous point (Mk 4:29; Mt 12:28); but by portraying Jesus at the very start of His ministry as publicly claiming the Breath’s illumination, Luke gives this prophetic dimension of Jesus’ ministry more dramatic emphasis. The word “today” introduces another important Lukan theme. It refers not so much to historical time as to the present moment of eschatological opportunity and fulfillment which Jesus’ ministry inaugurates. Moreover, Luke attributes this remarkable proclamation to the “anointing” of the divine Breath. The reference to anointing alludes to Jesus messianic commissioning on the banks of the Jordan. Luke, however, seems also to have a prophetic anointing in mind, since the passage lacks any clear Davidic references. The fact that Jesus in verses 25-7 will compare Himself with the prophets Elijah and Elisha also favors a prophetic interpretation of Jesus’ anointing.66 As we saw above, Luke stresses in a way in which Matthew does not that the divine Breath inspired Jesus’ Abba awareness. (Lk 10:17-20) Luke also makes it clearer than the other two synoptics that Jesus’ disciples should desire the gift of the Holy Breath above any other blessing which the Father can give. Luke’s Jesus says: And I tell you, Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and one who seeks finds, and to one who knocks it will be opened. What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead of a fish give him a serpent; or, if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, who 66. Cf. Finkel Asher, “Jesus’ Sermon at Nazareth” in Abraham Unser Vater, edited by Otto Betz et al. (Köln: Brill, 1963), pp. 106-115; Jeffrey S. Seker, “‘First to the Gentiles’: A Literary Analysis of Luke 4:16-30,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 111(1992), pp.73-90; D.A.S. Ravens, “Luke 9.7-62 and the Prophetic Role of Jesus,” New Testament Studies, 36(1990), pp. 119-129; Vittorio Fusco, “Luke-Acts and the Future of Israel,” Novum Testamentum, 38(1996), pp.1-7; NJBC, 43:57-62; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 525-540; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 77-82; Evans, Luke, pp. 265-276; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 394-421; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 129-135.

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are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Breath to those who ask Him? (Lk 11:9-13)

Matthew’s Jesus says: “....how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him.” (Mt 7:11) By changing the phrase “good things” into “the Holy Breath” Luke points to the gift of the Pentecostal Breath as the Father’s supreme gift to His children. Moreover, he turns the moral of the parable into a kind of prophecy which anticipates the Breath’s arrival on Pentecost. She will come to the disciples as they pray persistently to receive “what the Father has promised.”67 (Acts 1: 4; 2:1) As we saw above in reflecting on Jesus’ relationship to the Father, Jesus, during His journey discourse, instructs His disciples about how to relate to Father, Son, and Breath in times of persecution. They should show a reverential fear of the Father which exceeds the fear they may have of their persecutors. They should bear fearless witness to Jesus, the Son, so that He may testify in turn about them to the Father. In this context Luke introduces Jesus’ saying about blaspheming the Holy Breath: And every one who speaks a word against the Son of man will be forgiven; but one who blasphemes against the Holy Breath will not be forgiven. And when they bring you before the synagogues and the rulers and the authorities, do not be anxious how or what you are to answer or what you are to say; for the Holy Breath will teach you in that very hour what you ought to say. (Lk 12:10-12)

As we saw in both Mark and Matthew, one blasphemes the Breath by attributing Jesus’ Breath-inspired exorcisms to Beelzebul. (Mt 12:32; Mk 3:28-29) Luke, by contrast, transforms the sin of Breath-blasphemy into the apostasy of the Breath-baptized disciple. Luke, like Mark and Matthew, assures the disciples that, when they testify to Jesus under persecution, the Breath will inspire their testimony; so that they need not plan in advance what they will say.68 Luke’s Jesus gives, then, both negative and positive advice about how the disciples should relate to the Breath in times of persecution. Nega67. Cf. Jacques Dupont, “La prière et son efficacité dans l’évangile de saint Luc,” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 69(1981), pp. 45-56; NJBC, 43:129; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 913-916; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 176-180; Evans, Luke, pp. 475-487; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 268-275. 68. Luke follows Mark in attributing the inspiration to “the Holy Breath,” while Matthew, who stresses somewhat more than the other two synoptic evangelists that the Father sends the Breath, has Jesus promise that “the Breath of your Father” will inspire the beleaguered disciples. (cf. Mk 13:11; Mt 10:19-20)


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tively, they should avoid blaspheming Her by denying the faith; positively, they should look to Her to inspire their faithful testimony to Jesus.69 Of all the evangelists, only Luke attempts to describe the actual experience of Breath-baptism which fulfills John the Baptizer’s prophecy of the coming of a “mightier one.” (Lk 3:16) Luke does so initially in his Pentecost account. As we shall see, however, the Baptizer’s prophecy does not find fulfillment in the text of Acts until after Peter’s Pentecost sermon. Luke’s Jesus anticipates Pentecost in a section of the journey discourse which deals with the need for eschatological readiness. Jesus says: I came to cast fire upon the earth; and I would that it were already kindled! I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how I am constrained until it is accomplished! (Lk 12:49-50)

Jesus then recalls the prophecy of Simeon by warning that He and His message will sow deep divisions among those who hear it. They will even pit the members of the same family against one another. (Lk 12:51-53) The eschatological fire of which Jesus speaks anticipates the fiery tongues of Pentecost, when the divine Breath will settle on the disciples in purification and in judgment. Their proclamation of the risen Christ which the fiery tongues anticipate and empower will effect judgment by forcing a choice for or against the risen Christ. Jesus’ reference to baptism recalls His own messianic commissioning and the Baptist’s prophecy of the coming Breath-baptizer. Pentecost will fulfill that prophecy and extend the time of eschatological testing which the paschal mystery begins.70 (Lk 22:40) When the day of Pentecost itself arrives, the community, which includes the reconstituted twelve apostles,71 Mary, Jesus’ brothers, and about 69. Cf. I. Howard Marshall, “Hard Sayings—VII,” Theology, 67(1964), pp. 65-69; Owen E. Evans, “The Unforgivable Sin,” Expository Times, 68(1956-1957), pp. 240-244; Gottfried Fitzer, “Die Sünde wider den Heiligen Geist,” Theologische Zeitschrift, 13(1957), pp. 161-182; James G. Williams, “A Note on the ‘Unforgivable Sin” Logion,” New Testament Studies, 12(1965-1966), pp. 75-76; NJBC, 43:133; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 913-916; Evans, Luke, pp. 510-519; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 290-294; Rudolf Pesch, “Über die Authorität Jesu: Eine Rückfrage anhand des Bekenner- und Verleugnungsspruchs Lk 12, 8f,” in Die Kirche des Anfangs, edited by R. Schnackenburg et al. (Leipzig: St. Benno Verlag, 1977), pp. 25-55. 70. Cf. J. Duncan M. Derrett, “Christ’s Second Baptism (Luke 12:50, Mk 10:38-40),” Expository Times, 100(1989), pp. 294-295. 71. Luke prefaces his account of Pentecost by recording the reconstitution of the Twelve in the period between Jesus’ ascension into heaven and Pentecost. At one of their gatherings, Peter urges the community to elect a replacement for Judas. He proposes that the community “choose someone who has been with us the whole time that the Lord Jesus was traveling round with us....from the time when John was baptizing until the day when He was taken up from us.” He explains that only someone who has witnessed Jesus’ entire ministry, death, resurrection, and ascension can serve as a fit replacement for Judas. (Acts 1:12-22) The community nominates two candidates,

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one hundred and twenty disciples, gathers again, presumably as a prolongation of their “continuous prayer.”72 (Acts 2:1, 1:14) The arrival of the Breath recalls not only the Baptizer’s prophecy of the mightier one but also the images of fire and wind with which John portrayed the judgmental character of Breath-baptism. In Luke’s account of John’s preaching, John, as we have seen, compares Breath-baptism to winnowing, which employs both wind and fire as its instruments. The winnower throws the wheat into the air. The heavier grain falls to earth while the wind blows away the chaff, which the winnower then burns. John warns that those who resist Breath-baptism will burn “with a fire which will never go out.” (Lk 3:17) Now on Pentecost, the Breath finally arrives under the same judgmental sign of wind and of fire. The images also recall Is 66:15-22, which closes an apocalyptic poem describing the regathering of Israel. The fiery flames which settle on the disciples may also derive from Roman political iconography. Pliny tells us that, shortly after Julius Caesar’s assassination, a comet appeared in the skies and remained for seven days. (Pliny, Natural History, 2.93-94) Coin portraits of Caesar with a star above his head began to appear as a symbol of his apotheosis. The emperor Augustus subsequently appropriated the Julian star with a flaming tail as a symbol of his own divinity. Coins minted under Augustus show the emperor’s head surmounted by a flame and a star. In the Aenead, tongues of flame and a falling comet point to Anchises, Aeneas’s son, as the ancestor of the Roman race. (Virgil, Aenead, 2.634-729); and book eight of the Aenead describes Augustus triumphing over Antony and Cleopatra with the Julian star and double flame surmounting his brow. (Ibid., 6.680-681) In his infancy narrative, Luke proclaimed Jesus rather than Augustus the divine imperator. (Lk 2:10-13) At the beginning of Acts, the evangelist confronts the reader with an analogous choice: those who follow the risen Jesus must choose between the flaming tongues of Pentecost, which foreshadow the judgmental proclamation of the risen Christ, and the imperial supercephalic flame.73 Joseph and Matthias; but they decide to leave the final choice to God by having the two candidates draw lots. The lot falls to Matthias. (Acts 1:23-6) In establishing the criteria for the replacement of Judas, Luke does not intend to question the authenticity either of Paul’s apostolic status or of his witness to the risen Christ. Rather he concerns himself here with the reconstitution of the Twelve as a group of leaders who link the apostolic witness to the ministry of Jesus Himself. As the story of Acts unfolds, Paul, like Peter and, especially, like Stephen before him, will, as we shall see, render a witness analogous to Jesus’ own by being drawn through his testimony to the risen Christ into Jesus’ passion. 72. Cf. Curt Niccum, “A Note on Acts 1:14,” Novum Testamentum, 36(1994), pp. 196-199. 73. Cf. Richard Oates, “Numismatic Windows into the Social World of Early Christianity: A Methodological Inquiry,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 101(1982), pp. 195-223.


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The group of disciples gathered in the upper room hears the sound of a powerful wind which fills the house, the sound of God breathing. “Tongues like fire (glossai hosei pyros)” settle on the heads of each of the disciples. The appearance of the tongues designates the entire assembly of the disciples, including the Twelve, as the recipients of the Breath. The Breath’s arrival under the image of tongues foreshadows their proclamation of the risen Christ in the power of the Breath. The fiery character of the tongues symbolizes divine holiness and portends the purifying, sanctifying, judgmental character of that proclamation. The disciples’ infilling with the Breath manifests itself in their eruption into glossolalic speech, after which they rush out into the streets. Pilgrims to Jerusalem express astonishment because each one hears the disciples speaking in his or her own native language. Nowhere else in Acts does Luke describe tongues as the miraculous speaking of a foreign language. One is, then, probably dealing with Luke’s midrashic reading of the Breath’s arrival. The glossolalia which reveals the Breath’s arrival foreshadows the “miracle” of Pentecost, when those gathered for the feast hear the apostles proclaim the risen Christ each in his or her own language. The “miracle” manifests that the proclamation of Christ will cross over national boundaries and embrace peoples of all nations. Here, however, in the Pentecost of the Jews, it portends more immediately the regathering of Israel from the four corners of the earth. That gathering prepares the ingathering of the Samaritans and of the Gentiles. Luke notes that Jews “from every nation under heaven” had gathered in Jerusalem for the feast of Pentecost. In first Corinthians Paul describes the experience of tongues as unintelligible speech. (1 Co 14:8-9) Had those who heard the disciples speaking in tongues actually heard them in their own native voice, they would have experienced nothing surprising; nor would they have had reason to suppose the apostles drunk as they do in Luke’s narrative. Unintelligible glossolalic speech might, however, have very well motivated the bystanders’ charge of drunkenness. (Acts 2:13) I deem it at least plausible that Luke’s description of Pentecost as the miraculous speaking of foreign languages also alludes by way of reverse imagery to the story of Babel. At Babel God confounded human tongues as a strategy for scattering a sinful humanity across the face of the earth. (Gen 11:1-9) Now on Pentecost God confounds human tongues anew as a reverse sign of the gathering of Israel from all the nations of the earth. Moreover, God regathers Israel so that she may serve as the divine instrument for the salvation of the Samaritans and the Gentiles. (Acts 2:1-13) In other words, the “miracle” of tongues foreshadows the universal salvation which Breath-baptism will accomplish.74 74. Cf. George T. Montague, “Baptism in the Spirit and Speaking in Tongues,” Theology Digest, 21(1973), pp. 342-360; Jacques Dupont, Nouvelles Études sur les Actes des

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Does the initial arrival of the Holy Breath under the sign of wind and tongues like fire fulfill the Baptizer’s prophecy of the coming of a Breath-baptizer? At no point does Luke describe the initial arrival of the Breath as a baptism. Indeed, the term “baptism” does not appear in Luke’s Pentecost narrative until the end of Peter’s Pentecost sermon. When the crowds, touched by Peter’s words ask what they must do in response, Peter tells them: You must repent and everyone of you must be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Breath. The promise which was made is for you and your children, and for all those who are far away, for all those whom the Lord our God will call to Himself. (Acts 2:38-9)

The promise to which Peter alludes has a double meaning. In the first instance, it refers to God’s promise to Abraham that in His offspring all nations would be blessed (Acts 3:25; Gen 12:3). In the second instance, the promise also alludes to the “promise of the Father” to which the risen Christ refers in Acts 1:4. As we have seen, the “promise of the Father” means the fulfillment of John’s prophecy of the Breath-baptizer. Peter, however, refers to a single promise because he sees both promises fulfilled in the Pentecost event. By becoming Breath-baptizer the risen Christ will in fact fulfill the promise made to Abraham by incorporating the Gentiles into the new Israel. Christian baptism, then, in Luke’s Pentecost account finally fulfills the Baptizer’s prophecy. The arrival of the Breath under the sign of wind and tongues like fire creates the community of faith into which others can subsequently enter through baptism. In other words, the initial charismatic arrival of the Breath creates the conditions under which the Baptizer’s prophecy will find its subsequent fulfillment; but the actual fulfillment occurs in the experience of ritual baptism. Later, in Luke’s account of the “Pentecost” of the Gentiles, when the God-fearing Gentile Cornelius and his household burst into glossolalic speech, Peter interprets the event not as a sign that they have already been baptized but that they ought to be. (Acts 10:44-48) Like Paul, Luke envisages a complex relationship between the baptized and the divine Breath. She sanctifies them, and She also empowers them charismatically. Like Paul, moreover, Luke deems sanctification the more fundamental of the two relationships. (Cf. 1 Cor 13) Apôtres (Paris: Editions du Cerf, 1984), pp. 193-209; Joseph A. Fitzmyer, S.J., “The Ascension of Christ and Pentecost,” Theological Studies, 45(1984), pp. 409-440; A.J.M. Wedderburn, “Traditions and Redaction in Acts 2:1-13,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 55(1994), pp. 27- 54; NJBC, 43:22-28.

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Luke’s summary account of the life of the Jerusalem community dramatizes the primacy of sanctification among the effects of Breath-baptism. The community of the baptized listens in faith to the teaching of the apostles, remains faithful to one another as members of the same family, cultivates shared prayer and eucharistic worship. In addition, the newly baptized submit spontaneously to the moral demands of discipleship by sharing all their possessions in common and by seeing to it that the needs of no member of the community go unmet. The community practices Christian hospitality gladly and generously. Even if one concedes the idealized character of this portrait in Acts, it describes the moral ideals to which the first Christians felt bound in virtue of their baptism in the Breath; and in the process it holds up to Luke’s Gentile community an ideal to emulate. The Jewish-Christian character of the community appears in the fact that in addition to gathering for eucharistic worship, the new Christians also engage in temple worship. The miracles and signs worked by the apostles make a deep and wide impression, and many other converts join the community.75 (Acts 2:42-47) The Analogy of Christological Knowing Among the synoptic evangelists, only Luke actually describes the arrival of the Breath on Pentecost. She comes in tongues like fire which portend the judgmental proclamation of the risen Christ. She creates the Christian community through Her charismatic gifts. In Luke’s Pentecost narrative, however, ritual baptism fulfills the Baptizer’s prophecy about Breath-baptism. Ritual baptism has as its most immediate consequence the moral conformity of the Christian community to the demands of life

75. Cf. NJBC, 44: 20-28; Bruce, Acts, pp. 49-75; Conzelmann, Acts, pp. 13-24; Friedrich Wilhelm Horn, Glaube und Handeln in der Theologie des Lukas (Göttingen: Vanderhoeck & Ruprecht, 1983); Maria Ancia Co, “The Major Summaries in Acts: Acts 2, 42-47; 4,32-35; 5:12-16: Linguistic and Literary Relationships,”Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 68(1992), pp. 49-85; Alan C. Mitchell, “The Social Function of Friendship in Acts 2:44-47 and 4:32-37,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 111(1992), pp. 255-272; Dietrich Werener, “Grenzüberschreitung als Lebensprinzip von Kirche oder: Missionarische Ekklesiogenesis als Werk des Heiligen Geistes,” Zeitschrift für Mission, 16(1990), pp. 194-210; J.C. O’Neill, “The Connection between Batpism and the Gift of the Spirit in Acts,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 63(1996), pp. 87-103; John Gillman, Possessions and the Life of Faith: A Reading of Luke-Acts (Collegeville, MI: The Liturgical Press/Michael Glazier, 1991); Kilian McDonnell and George Montague, Christian Initiation and Baptism in the Holy Spirit: Evidence from the First Eight Centuries (Collegeville, MI: The Liturgical Press, 1991); Luke Timothy Johnson, The Acts of the Apostles (Collegeville, MI: The Liturgical Press, 1992), pp. 41-63; Ernst Hänchen, The Acts of the Apostles, translated by Basil Blackwell (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster, 1971), pp. 166-196.

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in the kingdom. The charisms enhance and confirm the apostles’ preaching and attract new converts into the Jerusalem community. As in the other synoptic gospels, the Pentecostal Breath comes to the disciples in order to conform them corporately and personally to Jesus. As we shall see, in Acts Luke actually describes in some detail how the proclamation of Jesus transforms Peter, Paul, and Stephen into other Christs. Luke gives this familiar theme his own development in other ways as well. Luke describes Jesus’ baptism in a manner which foreshadows the Breath-baptism of the disciples on Pentecost. Luke also stresses more than the other synoptics the importance of praying for the divine Breath as the Father’s best gift to those who believe. The same Breath which inspires Jesus’ Abba awareness, conforms the Christian community to Him through both the obedience of faith and charismatic witness. That witness prolongs Jesus’ public ministry of proclamation, exorcism, and healing. Finally, Luke, who writes for a predominantly Gentile church, stresses the universal salvation which Breath-baptism accomplishes. The first Pentecost of the Jews prepares the “Pentecosts” of the Samaritans and of the Gentiles. In addition, the tongues like fire which settle on the disciples’ heads on Pentecost have prophetic and judgmental meaning. By inspiring the prophetic community’s witness to the risen Jesus, they force a choice between the reign of God which Jesus and His Church proclaim and the supercephalic, flaming tongues of an idolatrous Roman empire. Judgment follows and responds to choice. This chapter has considered how Luke transforms the positive dramatic linkages which he finds in Mark’s gospel. As in the other synoptics, these positive linkages define the realistic and moral conditions for growth in Christological knowing. The following chapter considers how Luke modifies and develops Mark’s negative linkages.

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Chapter 14 Negative Dramatic Linkages in Luke Luke develops the same set of negative dramatic linkages as the other two synoptics. Luke’s Jesus relates negatively to Satan and his demons, to the scribes and Pharisees, to Herod, to the chief priests, and to Pilate. This chapter divides, then, into five parts. Part one examines Jesus’ confrontation with Satan. Part two describes Jesus’ conflict with the scribes and Pharisees. Part three analyzes Luke’s distinctive depiction of Jesus’ relationship to Herod. Part four focuses on Jesus’ confrontation with the chief priests. Part five ponders His relationship to Pilate and to the Roman empire whom Pilate represents. (I) Luke identifies Jesus’ tempter in the desert as “the devil (tou diabolou).” While Luke does not name the devil as Satan in his temptation narrative, he elsewhere identifies the two. (Lk 10:18, 11:18, 13:16, 22:3, 31) As in Matthew then, Luke’s Jesus confronts explicitly, not just one who puts Him to the test, but the chief devil, the prince of darkness himself. Jesus and Satan Luke’s Satan, moreover, insists more than Matthew’s that the kingdoms of this world belong to him to give to whomever he desires. (Lk 4:6) The boast designates oppressive secular institutions like the Roman empire as Satanic realities and as anti-Christ. This uniquely Lukan narrative detail gives one more indication that the evangelist expected his Gentile Christians to define themselves religiously in moral opposition to a demonic empire and to everything which it incarnated. Matthew, as we have seen, apparently expected his Petrine Christians to define themselves primarily over against “the synagogue across the street.”1 As in Matthew, the devil in tempting Jesus reveals His strategy for opposing the work of the kingdom. The devil seeks to persuade both Jesus and the members of the new Israel He founds to replace trust in God with sinful self-reliance, to test God by setting conditions on one’s willingness to obey Him, and to replace God’s kingdom with one founded of coercive violence and law. (Lk 4:3-12) Luke, however, reverses the order of the last two temptations as we find them in Matthew. In Luke, Jesus’ temptations culminate in the temptation to test God. As we have seen, physical movement plays an important 1. Cf. Susan R. Garrett, The Demise of the Devil: Magic and the Demonic in Luke’s Writings (Minneapolis, MI: Fortress, 1989).

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role in Luke’s gospel and in Acts. Luke portrays Jesus’ ministry as the movement of the gospel from Galilee to Jerusalem. In placing the temptation atop the temple last, Luke makes the movement of his temptation narrative parallel the movement of his infancy narrative and of his gospel as a whole.2 A deeper reason, however, motivates Luke’s ordering of the temptations. Luke regards “testing God” as the supreme temptation confronting any Christian. As we shall see in considering the teachings of Luke’s Jesus, unconditioned trust in God comes to practical expression in an unconditioned willingness to share one’s physical possessions with others. Anyone who sets conditions on the willingness to share one’s possessions with others “tests God.” Luke makes this point dramatically in Acts when he tells the story of Ananias and Sapphira. The story alludes explicitly to Jesus’ final temptation in the desert and illustrates its relevance to the disciples. In contrast to the generous Barnabas, who sells his property and gives all the money it brings to the apostles for distribution to the needy, Ananias and Sapphira sell their property but turn in only some of the proceeds for distribution to the poor. They pretend to give all but keep something for themselves. In other words, the husband and wife set conditions on their willingness to share with the needy at the same time that they hypocritically play the part of devout, committed Christians. They incarnate therefore the kind of Christian religious hypocrisy which Luke denounces as “Pharisaical.” (Lk 12:1) When Ananias confronts Peter, the apostle says to him: Ananias, how can Satan have so possessed you that you should lie to the Holy Breath and keep back part of the money from the land? While you still owned the land, wasn’t it yours to keep, and after you sold it wasn’t the money yours to do with as you liked? What put this scheme into your mind? It is not to men that you have lied but to God.” (Acts 5:3-5)

The unfortunate Ananias instantly drops dead. The same fate awaits his wife. When Sapphira confronts Peter he says: So you and your husband have agreed to put the Breath to the test! What made you do it? You hear those footsteps? They have just been to bury your husband; they will carry you out too.” (Acts 5:8-9)

Sapphira too drops dead.

2. Cf. NJBC: 43:52-54; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 506-520; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 73-77; Evans, Luke, pp. 254-260; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 123-127.


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Here several points need noting. First, Satan is tempting Ananias and Sapphira to test God, just as he once tempted Jesus. They, however, have yielded to the temptation. Jesus refused to test God; but they have put the Holy Breath to the test. They have done so, first, by setting conditions on their willingness to share their possessions with others and then by hypocritically pretending that they were giving everything to the poor. Luke, as we have seen, has the Breath come to the disciples under the sign of fire because She comes to them in purification and judgment. He tells the story of Ananias and Sapphira as a tale about the way the Breath judges the sin of testing God. The unfortunate couple suffers instant retribution.3 When one reads Jesus’ final temptation in the light of the story of Ananias and Sapphira, it becomes clear that, for Luke, testing God—i.e., setting conditions on one’s willingness to trust in God’s providential care— leads one to set conditions on one’s willingness to share one’s goods with others, especially with the needy. One tests God by hypocritically pretending to love God unconditionally in the poor while holding back one’s goods from the needy. Luke therefore made testing God Jesus’ final and culminating temptation because he wanted to make it clear that this temptation constitutes the supreme temptation of most Christians.4 In other words, while Matthew’s anti-clericalism led him to view replacing the kingdom of God with power politics as the culminating Christian temptation, Luke feared that, with the delay of the second coming, his Gentile community was settling too comfortably into this world. In the process, Luke’s community was in his eyes beginning to set conditions both on its trust in God’s providential care and on its willingness to reach out actively to the poor. Luke denounces such conditioned faith as rank Christian hypocrisy.5 Mark describes angels ministering to Jesus in His temptations. They seem to support Him in His confrontation with Satan. (Mk 1:12-13) Matthew describes angels surrounding Jesus after He has routed the tempter. (Mt 4:11) Luke omits all mention of angels and ends his temptation narrative by saying: “And when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from Him until an opportune time.” (Lk 4:13) Luke equates the “opportune time” with Jesus’ passion. He therefore portrays Jesus’ passion as His supreme moment of testing; and, as we have seen, the evangelist describes angelic succor for Jesus in Gethsemane. In other words, Luke postpones the angelic support which Mark describe in his temptation narrative until Satan’s second assault on Jesus during the latter’s 3. Cf. NJBC: 43:37; Bruce, Acts, pp. 102-108; Conzelmann, Acts, pp. 37-38. 4. Cf. Navone, op.cit., pp. 103-117, 170-181. 5. Cf. NJBC, 43:52-54, 44:37; Johnson, op. cit., pp. 82-93; Hänchen, op. cit., pp. 236-241.

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passion. During Luke’s account of the passion, Satan will “sift” Peter and cause him to deny Jesus. (Lk 22:31) Satan will also use Judas as his instrument for destroying Jesus. Moreover, as we shall see, both the chief priests and Pilate will incarnate the powers of darkness. (Lk 22:3) A ministering angel will succor Luke’s Jesus as He prays in Gethsemane prior to His arrest. Like Matthew, Luke mutes the theme of demonic conflict which he finds in Mark’s version of Jesus’ desert temptations; but Luke does so for different reasons. Matthew does so in order to assert the sovereign authority of Jesus, Immanuel, over Satan and his minions. After Jesus’ temptations Luke postpones Jesus confrontation with Satan until His passion so that the evangelist can portray Jesus as the joyful prophet of good news. Luke, then, describes two major conflicts between Jesus and Satan: one at the beginning of Jesus’ ministry in the desert; the other, in Jesus’ passion. In the first conflict, Satan confronts Jesus personally; in the second he acts through human instruments, through the Satanic institutions of the Roman empire and its clients.6 Luke inserts Mark’s account of Jesus’ exorcism at Capernaum after the story of His rejection at Nazareth. As a result, Luke tells the story of Jesus in a way which suggests that His move from Nazareth to Capernaum resulted in part from the hostility of the Nazarenes. In Mark the exorcism parallels Jesus’ confrontation with Satan in the desert. Matthew omits the incident altogether. Mark describes how the demon, on leaving the screaming demoniac, convulsed his body. (Mk 1:25) Luke omits these violent descriptive details. Instead, Luke observes: “And when the demon had thrown him down in the midst, he came out of him, having done him no harm.” (Lk 4:35) Luke alludes to the violence in Mark by having the demon knock the man down; but then he immediately assures the reader that no harm came from the fall. In both Luke and Mark, however, the story pits the pneumatic authority present in the Breath-filled Jesus against the power of Satan. As in Mark, Jesus’ power over demons reveals that He has effectively broken the devil’s power over humans. In Luke as in Mark, after the sabbath ends, the people of Capernaum bring their sick and possessed to Jesus to heal. As in Mark, the demons identify Jesus as the Son of God, but he silences them and drives them

6. Cf. Jacques Dupont, Die Versuchung in der Wüste (Stuttgart: Katolisches Bibelwerk, 1969), pp. 42-69; Heinz Kruse, S.J., “Das Reich Satans,” Biblica 58(1977) pp. 29-61; Wilhelm Wilkens, “Die Versuchungsgeschichte Luk. 4, 1-13 und die Komposition des Evangeliums,” Theologische Zeitschrift, 30(1974), pp. 267-272; Niels Hydahl, “Die Versuchung auf die Zinne des Temples,” Studia Theologica, 15(1961), pp. 113-127.


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out. (Lk 4:40-1; cf. 8-26-34) The messianic secret does not, however, play as prominent a role in Luke as in Mark.7 Luke includes in his gospel Mark’ allegorical interpretation of the parable of the sower. In so doing, he also endorses Mark’s portrayal of “the devil” as the enemy of faith in Jesus. (Lk 8:12) Luke introduces only minor editorial changes into Mark’s story of the Gerasene demoniac. As in Mark, the exorcism follows Jesus’ calming of the storm, a cosmic miracle which manifests His divine authority over the forces of chaos. (Lk 8:22-5) Luke, like Mark, notes that the demon endowed the demoniac with dangerous, preternatural strength but edits out Mark’s comment that the demon caused the man to mutilate himself. (Lk 8:29, Mk 5:3-5) As in Mark, the story dramatizes Jesus’ power over the demonic realm despite its power and numbers. When Jesus drives “Legion” into the swine, they rush headlong into the sea over which Jesus has just exercised divine authority. (Lk 8:30-3, Mk 5:9-13) The event has the same symbolism as in Mark. In calming the storm, Jesus, has already mastered the forces of chaos symbolized by the sea. Now He conquers Satan and His minions by hurling them into the same sea which with divine authority He mastered through a mere word. Satan’s minions include the Roman legions and the empire which they serve. Their destruction in the Sea of Galilee recalls the destruction of Pharaoh and his army in the Red Sea. In Mark, Rome serves especially as a symbol of persecution and oppression. In Luke, Rome symbolizes more the moral corruption from which his Gentile Christians must distance themselves. As in Mark, those whom Luke’s Jesus delivers from the power of Satan He transforms into His witnesses. When the Gerasenes beg Jesus to leave their country and He complies, the delivered demoniac begs permission to go along with the other disciples. Jesus, however, sends him to his own people to testify to what God has done for him. As in Mark, his proclamation of Jesus foreshadows the risen Christ’s proclamation to the Gentiles.8 (Lk 8:34-9; Mk 5:14-20) As in the other synoptics, Jesus, in sending the Twelve out to evangelize, also communicates to them the power of heal and to exorcise. (Luke 9:1-2; Mk 6:7; Mt 10:1) By involving the Twelve in the work of evangelization, Jesus draws them into His own onslaught on the kingdom of 7. Cf. J. Duncan M. Derrett, “Getting on Top of a Demon (Luke 4:39),” Evangelical Quarterly, 65(1993), pp. 99-109; Charles H. Talbert, “The Lukan Presentation of Jesus’ Ministry in Galilee, Luke 4:31-9:50,” Review and Expositor, 64(1967), pp. 485-497; NJBC, 43:53-66; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 525-540; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 540-554; Evans, Luke, pp. 277-283; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 394-421. 8. Cf. John. F. Craghan, C.SS.R., “The Gerasene Demoniac,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 30(1968), pp. 522-536; NJBC, 43:106-107; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 541-547; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 135-140; Evans, Luke, pp. 382-387; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 428-435; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 136- 138.

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Satan. Later, Jesus will extend the same mission to all disciples by commissioning the seventy-two. Their commissioning will extend symbolically the work of evangelization to the Church as a whole. In Acts, Luke narrates that proclamation. (Lk 10:1-16) After the transfiguration, Luke records a severely edited version of Mark’s account of the exorcism of the demoniac, epileptic boy. Like Matthew, Luke in the process of editing Mark eliminates all the symbolic and allusive details from Mark’s original text. Luke thus transforms Mark’s highly symbolic account of the deliverance into a straightforward exorcism which reveals primarily the divine majesty manifest in Jesus’ power to deliver and to heal.9 (Lk 9:37-43) When, during the journey discourse, the seventy-two disciples return from their missionary work reporting that “even the demons are subject to us in your name,” Jesus announces: I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. Behold, I have given you authority to tread upon serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy; and nothing shall hurt you. Nevertheless, do not rejoice in this that the spirits are subject to you; but rejoice that your names are written in heaven. (Lk 10:17-20)

Only Luke among the synoptic evangelists records the mission and return of the seventy-two disciples, who foreshadow the missionary activity of the Pentecostal Church. Jesus’ response to the disciples’ report of apostolic success makes it clear that the proclamation of the kingdom with healing and exorcism casts Satan out of heaven. Satan’s fall symbolizes his loss of power; but it also suggests that the court of a forgiving Father has no place in it for the scheming angelic prosecuting attorney of the book of Job. (Job 1:6-12, 2:1-7) As we have seen, the mission of the seventy-two extends the earlier mission of the Twelve to the entire Church. Hence, the entire Christian Church’s prophetic witness to Jesus routs Satan and casts him out of the heavenly court.10 9. Cf. NJBC, 43:117; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 805-818; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 157-161; Evans, Luke, pp. 422-426; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 878-885; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 236-238. 10. Cf. Pierre Grelot, “Etude Critique de Luc 10, 19,” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 69(1980), pp. 87-100; Friedrich Spitta, “Der Satan als Blitz,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 179(1988), pp. 160-163; Julian V. Hills, “Luke 10.18—Who Saw Satan Fall,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 46(1992), pp. 25-40; David Crump, “Jesus the Victorious Scribal Intercessor in Luke’s Gospel,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 38(1992), pp. 51-65; Samuel Vollenweider, “‘Ich sah den Satan wie einen Blitz von Himmel fallen’ (Lk 10:18),” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 79(1988), pp. 187-203; NJBC: 43:124; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp.858-864; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 166-171; Evans, Luke, pp. 543-556.


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Jesus’ second response to the disciples’ report of success warns them against charismania, against coveting charismatic prowess and power over the demonic realm for its own sake. Such powers in themselves do not guarantee salvation. The disciples’ authority to tread on serpents and scorpions assures them of protection against physical harm; but that too does not save. Only having one’s name recorded in heaven does. That record insures one’s entry into the heavenly realm.11 Luke modifies Mark’s account of the controversy over Beelzebul in several ways. First, Luke contextualizes the controversy differently. Mark has scribes from Jerusalem make the accusation. (Mk 3:22) In Luke the controversy occurs right after the exorcism of a deaf and dumb demoniac. The man, once delivered, hears and speaks. Luke then mentions that some witnesses of the exorcism made the charge that Jesus has delivered the man by invoking the power of Beelzebul. (Lk 11:14-5, 12:10) Matthew records a similar exorcism but attributes the blasphemy to the Pharisees. (Mt 9:32-33) In both Matthew and Luke, the exorcism has the same symbolic connotations: those whom Jesus delivers from the power of Satan He also empowers us to hear and proclaim the good news. Such faith contrasts with the unbelief of Jesus’ adversaries. Second, Luke’s Jesus replies to the slander in much the same way as He does in the other synoptics. (Lk 11:17-19; Mk 3:24-7; Mt 12:25-8) As noted above, however, Luke’s Jesus, in contrast to Mark’s and Matthew’s, claims to exorcise not by the power of God’s Breath but by “finger of God.” Both texts claim divine power for Jesus’ exorcisms; but in Luke, the allusion to Ex 8:15 further develops the evangelist’s portrait of Jesus as the prophet like Moses. As we also saw, in Exodus the Pharaoh’s magicians recognize that Moses does miracles through “the finger of God.” The phrase suggests that Jesus’ adversaries have less insight than these pagan magicians. The link with exodus also implicitly portrays the deliverance from Satan which Jesus effects as divine liberation. Third, like Matthew’s Jesus, Luke’s ends with the stern warning: “Whoever is not with Me is against Me and whoever does not gather with me scatters.” (Lk 11:23; Mt 12:30) Unless Jesus’ adversaries renounce their unbelief and recognize the arrival of God’s reign in Jesus’ exorcisms, they will find themselves routed with Satan and His minions. While Matthew directs Jesus’ warning to the Pharisees, Luke targets the unbelieving crowds. In other words, Luke universalizes the warning. Finally, Luke differs from the other synoptics in his handling of this incident by making no reference whatever to blasphemy against the Holy 11. Jesus’ warning resembles themes enunciated in 1 Co 13. There Paul insists that without faith, hope, and love charismatic prowess counts for nothing. It also recalls Matthew’s insistence that the obedience of faith saves while the mere possession of charismatic gifts does not. (Mt 7:21-3) (Cf. NJBC, 43:125; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, II, pp. 864-876; Evans, op. cit., pp. 453-456; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 250-256.

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Breath. As we saw above, Luke equates Breath-blasphemy with the apostasy of the baptized Christian.12 During the journey discourse, Luke on another occasion equates deliverance from Satan with liberation. Jesus cures a woman whose infirmity has deprived her of the ability to stand up straight, He defends His right to cure her on the sabbath by saying to the ruler of the synagogue who protests against sabbath healing: You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the sabbath untie his ox or his ass from the manger and lead it away to water it? And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen years, be loosed from this bond on the sabbath day? (Lk 13:15-6)

In describing the woman as having lived in bondage to Satan for eighteen years Jesus assimilates her infirmity to the afflictions which Satan visited on Job to test His faith in God. (Job 2:8-10) Some exegetes have read the woman’s condition as demon possession, since the evangelist attributes her infirmity to a “spirit (pneuma).” Luke, however, is probably personifying the illness rather than attributing it to demon possession as such. In healing the woman, however, Jesus liberates her from the severe testing to which Satan has subjected her. Luke’s Jesus also rebukes the sexism of His antagonists who value chattel more than a Jewish woman who enjoys personal human dignity. Implicitly, then, Luke also rebukes the sexism of Graeco-Roman society. The woman’s faith and praise also mark her as a model of belief and contrast her with Jesus’ unbelieving adversaries. No other evangelist records this incident.13 The Analogy of Christological Knowing In Luke as in the other synoptics, Satan personifies all those forces which oppose Jesus and the kingdom. On the whole Luke endorses Mark’s por12. Cf. Robert J. Scirock, “Whose Exorcists are They? The Referents of hoi hyioi hymon at Matthew 12:27/Luke 12:27,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 46(1992), pp. 41- 51; B. Couroyer, O.P., “Le droit de Dieu,” Revue Biblique, 63(1956), pp. 481-495; A. George, “Note sur quelques traits lucaniens de l’expression ‘Par le droit de Dieu’ (Luc XI, 20),” Sciences Ecclesiastiques, 18(19660), pp. 461-466; NJBC, 43:130; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 916-923; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 180-184; Evans, Luke, pp. 488-493; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 276-280. 13. Cf. Robert F. O’Toole, S.J., “Some Exegetical Reflections on Luke 13, 10-17,” Biblica, 73(1992), pp. 84-107; Joel B. Green, “Jesus and a Daughter of Abraham (Luke 13:10-17): Test Case for a Lucan Perspective on Jesus’ Miracles,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 51(1989), pp. 643-654; John Wilkinson, “The Case of the Bent Woman in Luke 13:10-17,” Evangelical Quarterly, 49(1977), pp. 195-205; NJBC, 43:139; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1009-1014; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 210-215; Evans, Luke, pp. 549-553; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 314-316.


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trait of Satan. Characteristically, however, Luke stresses hypocrisy and greed as two related Satanic temptations against which believers should especially arm themselves. The evangelist’s emphasis suggests that both posed a problem in the community for which he wrote. The problem stems from the false values of Greco-Roman society, which Luke depicts as a Satanic source of testing God. Luke alone among the synoptic evangelists portrays the proclamation of the kingdom in power, through works of exorcism, as having the effect of casting Satan out of heaven. The image dramatizes Satan’s overthrow; but it also suggests that the heavenly court of a merciful, forgiving Father has no use for a conniving angelic prosecuting attorney. All of this accords well with Luke’s stress on divine forgiveness. Like Matthew, Luke mutes Mark’s theme of demonic conflict but does so for a different reason. Matthew finds it unsuitable that God-with-us should struggle with demons. Luke desires to portray Jesus as the promised second Moses, as a Breath-filled prophet of good news whose coming evokes joy, gratitude, and praise. This section has considered the first of Luke’s negative dramatic linkages. The section which follows examines the second: namely, Jesus’ relationship with the scribes and Pharisees. (II) All three synoptics portray Jesus in an adversarial relationship to the scribes and Pharisees. In Mark, from the very beginning of Jesus’ ministry, they conspire with the Herodians to destroy Him. (Mk 3:1-6) Luke, more than Matthew, seems to find this portrait of the relationship between the Pharisees and the Herodians as overdrawn or perhaps as irrelevant to his community. Like Matthew (Mt 12:9-14), Luke edits out Mark’s reference to the conspiracy. Moreover, Luke more than either Mark or Matthew refuses to stereotype the Pharisees in their relationship to Jesus. Luke, for example, puts some Pharisees in friendly relationship with Jesus and in an adversarial relationship with Herod. During the journey discourse, concerned Pharisees warn Jesus that Herod desires His death. Moreover, elsewhere in his gospel, Luke suggests that Jesus evoked a variety of responses from the Pharisees, not just hostility. Nevertheless, conflict between Jesus and the Pharisees does escalate as Luke’s narrative unfolds.14 (Lk 13:31-33)

14. Cf. David B. Gowler, Host, Guest, Enemy, and Friend: Portraits of the Pharisees in Luke and Acts (New York, NY: Peter Lang, 1991); Joseph B. Tyson, The Death of Jesus in Luke-Acts (Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press, 1986), pp. 64-72.

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Jesus and the Pharisees Luke reproduces with minor editorial changes the five conflict stories which open Mark. Luke even expands slightly Mark’s account of the controversy over the healing of the paralytic.15 None of Luke’s changes, however, modify the central point of the healing story: namely, that Jesus claimed the power to forgive sins, a power which only God possesses. Luke’s Jesus also validates His claim by the miraculous cure of the paralytic. (Lk 5:17-26; Mk 2:1-12; Mt 9:1-8) As in the other synoptics, after Jesus calls Matthew the tax collector, He comes under attack by Pharisees for eating with tax collectors and sinners.16 In relating the encounter, Luke again makes fundamentally the same point as the other synoptic evangelists. Jesus justifies His socializing with tax collectors and sinners by His mission from the Father to summon sinners to repentance. Just as doctors risk contact with disease to cure illness, so too Jesus risks contact with sin to reclaim the sinner. (Lk 5:27-32; Mk 2:14-7; Mt 9:10-13) In the controversy over fasting, Mark says that some of Jesus’ listeners asked Him why His disciples did not fast like the scribes and Pharisees. (Mk 2:18) Matthew attributes the question to the disciples of John. (Mt 9:14-7) Luke attributes it to the Pharisees and portrays the question as a prolongation of the debate over table fellowship with sinners. Jesus replies substantially as He does in the other synoptics.17 (Lk 5:33-9) As we have seen, however, Luke’s Jesus appends the following proverb to His response: “And no one after drinking old wine desires new; for he 15. Luke makes the following principal changes in Mark’s text. He does not, as Mark does, identify the site of the miracle as Capernaum. (Lk 5:17; Mk 2:1) Instead of identifying Jesus’ adversaries simply as scribes, as Mark does (Mk 2:6), Luke speaks of Pharisees “from every village of Galilee and Judea and from Jerusalem itself.” (Lk 5:17) Luke stresses that Jesus healed the paralytic in “the power of the Lord.” (Lk 5:17) Luke also describes in greater detail than Mark the difficulty the friends of the paralytic had in getting the man to Jesus. (Lk 5:18) He states that the roof through which they lowered the man consisted of tiles; Mark leaves its composition vague. (Lk 5:19, Mk 2:4) In Mark Jesus calls the man “child (teknon),” while Luke has Jesus call him “man (anthrôpe).” (Lk 5:20; Mk 2:4) Luke adds the term “alone” to the question of the scribes and Pharisees: “Who can forgive sins but God?” (Lk 5:21; Mk 2:7) Luke stresses in a way Mark does not the instantaneous character of the cure. (Lk 5:25) Finally, Luke intensifies the reaction both of the cured paralytic and of those who witness the miracle. (Lk 5:26; Mk 2:12) 16. Mark calls Jesus’ attackers scribes who also belong to the party of the Pharisees. (Mk 2:16) Matthew calls them simply Pharisees. (Mt 9:11) Luke tries to clarify what Mark says by calling them “the Pharisees and their scribes.” (Lk 5:30) 17. Jesus compares Himself to the divine bridegroom and says that the joy His presence brings the disciples prevents their doing penance. He predicts that they will fast after His death, a reply that points to fasting in the apostolic Church as the expression of eschatological longing. Finally, Jesus uses the parables of the patch and the wineskins to point to the novelty of what He and His ministry embody.


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says ‘The old is good.’” (Lk 5:39) The proverb dramatizes the contrast between traditional forms of piety and the new and joyful message of the kingdom. One too habituated to traditional forms of piety will find Jesus’ new vision unpalatable. At the same time, the proverb sanctions the good, the validity of ancient Jewish traditions. The newness which Luke’s Jesus brings endorses and builds upon a more ancient revelation. This endorsement of Old Testament revelation develops Luke’s polemic against those Jews who failed to recognize in Jesus the promised prophet like Moses.18 Like Matthew, Luke edits out a number of details from Mark’s account of the controversy with some Pharisees over picking grain on the sabbath but without changing the story’s point, namely, that as Son of Man Jesus exercises Lordship over the sabbath.19 (Lk 6:1-5; Mk 2:23-8; Mt 12:1-8) As in Mark, a second conflict over sabbath violations closes this cycle of conflict stories. It too involves scribes and Pharisees. Despite minor editorial variations the story makes the same fundamental point. Jesus’ defends His right to heal the man with the withered hand on the sabbath by appealing to the traditional Jewish belief that doing good deeds does not violate the sabbath rest. (Lk 6:6-11; Mk 3:1-6; Mt 12:9-14) Later, the cure of the man with dropsy makes a similar point. (Lk 14:1-6) Luke, then, endorses Mark’s overall account of the issues which divided Jesus and the Pharisees: Jesus’ authority to forgive sins, His table fellowship with sinners, His lack of austerity, and His violation of the sabbath rest. We find here, however, one special Lukan emphasis: the Pharisees’ rigid traditionalism, despite its ancient validity, prevents them from accepting the novelty of Jesus’ message.20 Only Luke tells the story of the woman who was a sinner. While Jesus reclines at table with Simon the Pharisee, a woman (a known sinner but not necessarily a harlot) crashes the stag party, washes Jesus’ feet with her tears, and anoints them with ointment. 18. Cf. A.H. Mead, “Old and New Wine: St. Luke 5:39,” Expository Times, 99(1988), pp. 234-235. 19. Luke, like Matthew, makes no mention of Abiathar the high priest and omits the maxim: “The sabbath was made for humans, not humans for the sabbath.” Luke replaces Mark’s remark that the disciples were making their way through the fields with the detail that they not only plucked the heads of grain but rubbed them with their hands to detach the grain and eat it. Unlike Matthew, Luke makes no mention of the temple or the fact that Jesus holds greater dignity than the temple. In Luke’s streamlined version of the story, it makes a single, clear theological point: Jesus justifies actions which the Pharisees regarded as violations of the sabbath by appealing to the precedent of David doing legally unlawful things which human need justified. In addition, Jesus claims Lordship over the sabbath. Like Mark’s readers, Luke’s would have seen in that claim to Lordship an allusion to the Lordship Jesus enjoys in virtue of His resurrection. Cf. Jean Bernardi, “Des chiffres et des lettres: le Texte de Luc 6.1,” Revue Biblique, 101(1994), pp. 62- 66. 20. Cf. NJBC, 43:75-82; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 577-612; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 91-105; Evans, Luke, pp. 296-317; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 478-536; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 148-160.

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Luke’s story bears only superficial resemblance to the story recorded in both Mark and Matthew of the woman who anointed Jesus on His head prior to His passion. (Mk 14:3-9; Mt 26:6-13) While both stories mention an anointing, in Mark’s and Matthew’s tale, the woman gives Jesus a messianic anointing on the head. In Luke, she anoints his feet. In Mark and Matthew, she anoints Jesus’ body for burial. In Luke she anoints Jesus’ feet in love and gratitude for having been forgiven. In the end, the two stories describe different events and make very different points. It would appear that Simon has invited Jesus to dine with him more out of curiosity than friendship; for Simon discourteously omits offering to Jesus the opportunity to wash His feet on arrival. The woman makes up for Simon’s rudeness. Simon instantly and silently dismisses Jesus’ prophetic pretensions on the basis of the fact that a prophet would have known the woman’s sinfulness and would not have incurred the defilement of allowing her to touch Him. Simon also seems outraged at the woman’s loosing her hair in public, a shocking gesture for a Jewish woman of the time to perform. (Lk 7:36-39) Jesus, however, immediately proves His prophetic insight to the skeptical Simon. He reads Simon’s thoughts and rebukes him with a parable. Jesus tells of a creditor who forgives two debts, one trivial, the other the equivalent of five hundred days wages and asks Simon which debtor would have shown greater gratitude. When Simon replies that the one who owed more would, Jesus approves his answer and adds: Do you see this woman? I entered your house, but you gave me no water to wash my feet, but she has wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment. Therefore I tell you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved much; but one who is forgiven little, loves little. (Lk 7:44-47)

By His response to Simon, Jesus proves that He does indeed have prophetic insight into the woman’s religious condition. The woman’s gestures of love and gratitude prove to Him that she has heard His proclamation of divine forgiveness, has believed it, and has repented of her sins. Jesus also reveals that He knows and rebukes Simon’s secret, censorious thoughts. Simon, not Jesus, has misjudged the woman. As a result of her faith and repentance she no longer counts as a sinner in God’s eyes. Her gestures of homage toward Jesus flow from the love and gratitude she feels for having claimed the divine forgiveness which He has announced and embodies. Jesus then turns to the woman and says, “Your sins are forgiven.” This further scandalizes those at table who ask, “Who is this who even forgives


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sins.” Jesus, however, does not take back His words. Instead, He commends the saving faith which has motivated the woman’s repentance and acceptance of the divine forgiveness which He proclaims.21 (Lk 7:48-50) The Pharisees in the Journey Discourse In the course of the journey discourse, Luke’s Jesus rebukes the Pharisees for their cupidity. The rebuke occurs at yet another banquet hosted by a Pharisee. When the host shows astonishment that Jesus omitted the ceremonial washing of hands prior to eating, Jesus first rebukes his unspoken censure. Then Jesus says: Now you Pharisees cleanse the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside you are full of extortion and wickedness. You fools! Did not he who made the outside make the inside also? But give for alms those things which are within (ta enonta); and behold everything is clean for you. (Lk 11:39-41)

Matthew includes among his woes an analogous saying of Jesus. Matthew’s Jesus accuses the Pharisees of extortion and rapacity. He also summons the Pharisees to cleanness of heart. (Mt 23:25-6) Luke’s Jesus condemns their greed and wickedness, and He reminds them that the one who made the outside of the cup also made the inside. Luke’s Jesus uses the metaphor of a potter to allude to the fact that God, who creates all things creates the human heart as well. On Jesus’ lips this saying would have challenged the Pharisees to a genuine interiorization of religious ideals instead of squabbling over ritual externals.22 Then in a typical Lukan twist, Jesus exhorts the Pharisees to replace extortion and wickedness with active concern for the poor. Jesus’ phrase 21. Cf. John J. Kilgallen, “A Proposal for Interpreting Luke 7,36-50,” Biblica, 72(1991), pp. 303-330; “Forgiveness of Sins (Luke 7:36-50), Novum Testamentum, 40(1998), pp. 105-116; D.A.S. Ravens, “The Setting of Luke’s Account of the Anointing,” New Testament Studies, 34(1988), pp. 282-292; Otfried Hofius, “Fusswaschung als Erweis der Liebe: Sprachliche und sachliche Anmerkungen,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 181(1990), pp.171-177; Ulrich Wilckens, “Vergebung für die Sünderin (Lk 7,36-50)” in Orientierung an Jesus, edited by Paul Hoffmann et al. (Freiburg: Herder, 1973), pp. 394-424; Hans Drexler, “Die grosse Sünderin, Lukas 7:36-50,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 59(1968), pp. 159-173; Paul Jouon, “La pécheresse de Galilee et la parabole des deux debiteurs (Luc 7, 36-50),” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 29(1939), pp. 615-619; John R. Donahue, S.J., “The Penitent Woman and the Pharisee: Luke 7:36-50,” American Ecclesiastical Review, 142(1960), pp. 414-421; R. Holst, “The One Anointing Jesus: Another Application of Form Critical Method,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 95(1976), pp. 435-446; NJBC, 43:99-100; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 683-692; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 127-130; Evans, Luke, pp. 359-365; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 689-709; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 196-200. 22. Cf. Jacob Neusner, “‘First Cleanse the Inside’: The Halakhic Background of a Controversy Saying,” New Testament Studies, 22(1975-1976), pp. 486-495.

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“those things which are within (ta enonta)” has received a variety of interpretations. It probably refers to the contents of cup and dish, i.e. food and drink. In that case, Jesus is simply exhorting the Pharisees to share the physical supports of life with the poor. Others, however, think that Jesus is exhorting the Pharisees to give alms from the heart: i.e., to replace extortion and wickedness with heartfelt concern for the poor. In either case, Jesus is clearly calling for repentance of greed and wickedness and for active concern for the needy. Moreover, He does so with the assurance that such conduct will make the Pharisees inwardly as well as outwardly clean. For Jesus purity of heart counts for much more than mere ritual purity.23 The issue of Pharisaical greed surfaces again later in the journey discourse. There Luke notes that the Pharisees loved wealth. They therefore scoff at Jesus when He teaches that one cannot serve God and money. (Lk 16:13-4) Apparently the Pharisees covet wealth for the good esteem its possession will bring them. Jesus, however, rebukes their vanity and cupidity: You are those who justify yourselves before others, but God knows your hearts; for what is exalted among humans is an abomination in the sight of God. (Lk 16:15)

The hypocrisy of the Pharisees sets them against Jesus; and their self-righteous refusal to repent transforms them into an abomination in God’s eyes. They fallaciously regard wealth as the reward and sign of virtue while pretending to a virtue they do not possess. In rebuking Pharisaical cupidity, Luke, who writes for a predominantly Gentile audience, also targets Christians who imagine that they can reconcile faith and the amassing of wealth. The other synoptic evangelists fail to record this incident.24 During the journey discourse Jesus, as we have just seen, rebukes Pharisaical greed at a banquet. At the same banquet, Jesus then utters three woes against the Pharisees: But woe to you Pharisees! for you tithe mint and rue and every herb, and neglect justice and the love of God; these you ought to have done, without neglecting the others. Woe to you Pharisees! for you love the best seat in the synagogues and salutations in the market places. Woe to you! for you are like graves which are not seen, and men walk over without knowing it. (Lk 11:42-44; cf. Mt 23:5-7, 23-6) 23. Cf. NJBC, 43:132; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, II, pp. 941-953; Evans, op. cit., pp. 500510; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 285-290. 24. Cf. NJBC, 43:50; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1111-1114; Evans, Luke, pp. 604-605; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 352-354.


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Both Luke and Matthew may derive the woes from Q, but Luke offers a terser version of them than Matthew. Luke omits the epithet “hypocrites,” which Matthew repeats over and over. For Luke as for Matthew, however, religious hypocrisy remains the issue. Luke’s Jesus accuses the Pharisees of replacing concern for the true intent of the Law—justice and the love of God—with concern for external and relatively superficial things like tithing. As in Matthew, Jesus does not condemn the practice of tithing as such. Instead, he calls attention to the fundamental intent of the Law: to promote love of God and just dealings with one’s neighbor. Luke’s Jesus next rebukes love of public honors and adulation. Jesus is not only objecting to the vanity which such love expresses, but to its hypocrisy as well: the Pharisees desire honor and praise but neglect justice and the love of God. Craving for public honor hides their inner corruption. The final rebuke also points to the Pharisees as a source of impurity in others, since under the Law those who came in contact with graves incur legal defilement. This diatribe against the Pharisees provokes a protest from one of the lawyers, or scribes, also present at the dinner. Jesus responds by including them in his Jeremiad. Matthew, of course, directs all the woes impartially against the scribes and Pharisees. Luke divides them between the lawyers and the Phraisees. Symmetry with the three authentic Lukan beatitudes may motivate the division. (Lk 6:20-3) Jesus denounces the lawyers 1) for using the Law to oppress people rather than to liberate them; 2) for pretending devotion to the memory of the prophets while cultivating the same murderous attitude toward them as their ancestors; and 3) for failing to grasp the true wisdom present in Torah and thereby preventing others from doing so as well: Woe to you lawyers also! for you load people with burdens hard to bear, and you yourselves do not touch the burdens with one of your fingers. Woe to you! for you build the tombs of the prophets whom your fathers killed. So you are witnesses and consent to the deeds of your fathers; for they killed them and you build their tombs. Therefore, the wisdom of God said: “I will send them prophets and apostles, some of whom they will kill and persecute,” that the blood of all the prophets, shed from the foundation of the world, may be required of this generation, from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who perished between the altar and the sanctuary. Yes, I tell you it shall be required of this generation. Woe to you lawyers! for you have taken away the key of knowledge; you did not enter yourselves, and you hindered those who were entering.” (Lk 11:45-54; cf. Mt 23:4, 13, 29-36)

Luke attributes the promise of retribution for murdering the prophets to “the Wisdom of God,” while Matthew puts it on Jesus’ own lips. The

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wisdom text which Luke cites, however, never appears in the Old Testament. Like Matthew, Luke leaves vague the promised retribution for shedding prophetic blood; but the evangelist probably saw this prophecy fulfilled in the destruction of Jerusalem. Not surprisingly, the Pharisees and lawyers whom Jesus has attacked react with hostility.25 (Cf. Lk 11:53-54, 13:31-35, 19:41-44) In all three synoptics leaven symbolizes an evil influence which can gradually permeate the conscience.26 Mark’s Jesus warns against the leaven of the Pharisees and of Herod, and makes it clear that the attitudes which they embody contradict eucharistic faith. (Mk 8:15) Matthew’s Jesus warns against the leaven of the Pharisees and Saducees and identifies the leaven with their teaching. (Mt 16:16) Luke’s Jesus warns against the leaven of the Pharisees only, and identifies it with hypocrisy. (Lk 12:1) The warning provides an important key to Luke’s narrative portrait of the Pharisees. They function in His gospel primarily as symbols for Christian religious hypocrisy. Luke’s Jesus also promises that everything, even secret sins, will finally come to light. The promise has eschatological overtones and probably refers to the last judgment. (Lk 12:2-3) It also dramatizes the futility of religious pretense before an all-knowing God.27 During the journey discourse Luke develops further the theme of Pharisaical hypocrisy. Some scribes and Pharisees complain that Jesus receives sinners and eats with them. Jesus responds with three parables: the parable of the lost sheep, the parable of the lost coin, and the parable of the two sons. As we have seen, the first two parables make the same point: God and His angels rejoice more over the repentance of a single sinner than over ninety-nine righteous people who do not need repentance. The joy comes from finding what one has lost. Through repentance, therefore, God re25. Cf. Robert J. Miller, “The Rejection of the Prophets in Q,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 107(1988), pp. 225-240; Hans Klein, “Gerichtsankündigung und Liebesforderung: Lk 6.24-26 und 27 innerhalb der Botschaft des Frühen Christentums,” New Testament Studies, 42(1996), pp, 421-433; J. Duncan M. Derrett, “‘You Build the Tombs of the Prophets’ (Lk 11:47-51; Mt 23:29-31)” in Studia Evangelica, edited by F.L. Cross (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1968), pp. 187-193; O.J.F. Seitz, “The Commission of Prophets and ‘Apostles’: A Re-examination of Matthew 23:34 with Luke 11:49,” Ibid., pp. 236-283; Huges Vincent, “Le tombeau des prophetes,” Revue Biblique, 10(1901), pp. 72-88. 26. Cf. Leslie Mitten, “New Wine in Old Wine Skins: IV, Leaven,” Expository Times, 84(1972-1973), pp. 339-343. 27. Cf. David P. Mœssner, “The ‘Leaven of the Pharisees’ and ‘This Generation’: Israel’s Rejection of Jesus According to Luke,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 34(1988), pp. 21-46; NJBC, 43:133; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 953-955; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 187-193; Evans, Luke, pp. 511-519; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 291-294.


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claims the sinner as His own. Luke’s God actively pursues the unrepentant. (Lk 15:1-10) Both parables also target Pharisaical hypocrisy among Luke’s Gentile Christians. Here Christian hypocrisy takes the form of judgmentalism and the refusal to forgive. The two parables about the lost sheep and coins defend Jesus’ table fellowship with sinners. The parable of the two sons challenges the self-righteous legalism of the scribes and Pharisees. As, we have seen, when the parable of the two sons ends, one does not know if the self-righteous elder son will join the feast or not. The younger prodigal has learned from his sin and repentance that he cannot earn the father’s love; the self-righteous older son has learned no such lesson. His self-righteousness keeps him from sharing in the banquet. (Lk 15:11-32) The elder son symbolizes the scribes and Pharisees. They think that they can earn God’s love by their meticulous observance of the Law; but in the end their self-righteousness threatens to exclude them from the messianic banquet. In another encounter with the Pharisees unique to Luke, they ask Jesus when the kingdom of God will come. Jesus replies: The kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed; nor will they say, “Lo, here it is!” or “There!” for behold, the kingdom of God is within You (entos hymôn). (Lk 17:21)

Exegetes debate the meaning of the phrase “entos hymôn.” Greek grammatical usage, however, suggests that one ought to translate it as “within you.” If one reads the text in this sense, Jesus is challenging the Pharisees to recognize that the kingdom which Jesus proclaims consists not in some striking public, even miraculous, event but in transformation of heart. Some exegetes prefer to render the phrase as either “in your midst” or “within your grasp.”28 28. Cf. Tom Holman, “The Alternatives of the Kingdom: Encountering the Semantic Restrictions of Luke 17. 20-21 (entos hymôn),” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 87(1996), pp. 204-229; Harald Reisenfeld, “Le règne de Dieu parmi vous ou en vous?” Revue Biblique, 98(1991), pp. 190-198; Burton Scott Easton, “Luke 17:20-21, An Exegetical Study,” American Journal of Theology, 76(1912), pp. 275-283; Andre Feuillet, “La venue du règne de Dieu et du fils de l’homme d’apres Luc, XVII, 20 a XVIII, 8,” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 35(1948), pp. 544-548; “La double venue du règne de Dieu et du fils de l’homme en Luc XVII, 20-XVIII,8: Recherches sur l’eschtologie des Synoptiques,” Revue Thomiste, 81(1981), pp. 6-15; J. Gwinn Griffiths, “entos hymôn (Luke XVII, 21),” Expository Times, 63(1951-1952), pp. 30-31; Richard H. Hiers, “Why Will They Not Say, ‘Lo, Here!’ or ‘There!’” Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 53(1967), pp. 379-384; NJBC, 43:154; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1157-1163; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 262-268; Evans, Luke, pp. 625-634; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 367-372.

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Jesus directs the parable of the Pharisee and the tax-collector against religious self-righteousness. Unique to Luke, the parable, as we have seen, deals in deep irony. The Pharisee thanks God that he does not resemble the publican, but the Pharisee does not realize that in God’s eyes the self-abasement of the publican makes the latter more acceptable to God than the boastful, self-righteous Pharisee. In the course of the parable Luke presents the Pharisee as an example of hypocritical, self-justifying prayer; but Jesus’ final warning about the need for all to humble oneself suggests that the evangelist intends the parable to apply to Christian prayer as well.29 (Lk 18:9-14) The Pharisees in the Entry into Jerusalem When Jesus enters Jerusalem at the end of His pilgrimage to Jerusalem, He does so seated on a colt. On that occasion, Luke has the disciples, rather than the crowds, cry out: “Blessed be the King who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!” (Lk 19:38) In Mark the crowds make a similar shout: “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Blessed is the kingdom of our father David that is coming! Hosanna in the highest!” (Mk 11:9) Luke, by placing a similar cry on the lips of the disciples, transforms the entry from Jesus’ triumphant welcome by the inhabitants of the holy city into the joyful culmination both of the journey discourse and of the pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Luke also modifies Mark in other ways. He omits any reference to the kingdom of David but has the crowds call Jesus king. Moreover, in a Biblical inclusion, Luke has the praise of the disciples echo the praise of the angels at Jesus’ birth. (Lk 2:14) Since, as we have seen, the angels’ song hails Jesus’ imperial dominion, Luke’s omission of any reference to Jesus’ Davidic authority probably points to His universal dominion over the nations. Some Pharisees who are accompanying Jesus urge him to rebuke His disciples for saying such things. Jesus replies “I tell you, if these were silent, the very stones would cry out.” In an obscure reference to Hab 2:11, Jesus seems to be saying that if His disciples kept silence, the very stones, which in the text of Habakkuk personify witnesses for God’s rectification of injustice, would proclaim Jesus as the one who has come to effect that vindication.30 After replying to the Pharisees, Jesus weeps over Jerusalem and prophesies that the city will experience a final devastation in which her enemies 29. Cf. NJBC, 43:156; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1182-1190; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 268-274; Evans, Luke, pp. 640-645; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 375-377. 30. Cf. A. George, “La Royauté de Jésus selon l’évangile de Luc,” Sciences Ecclesiastiques, 14(1962), pp. 57-69; NJBC, 43:163; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, II, pp. 1241-1253; Evans, op. cit., pp. 676-682; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 396-400.


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will leave not one stone on another because the city failed to recognize its hour of visitation. The image of stones ties Jesus’ lament to His reply to the Pharisees. In their own way the stones of the devastated city will testify to its failure to acknowledge Jesus as God’s agent for vindicating the oppressed. This final confrontation marks the last appearance of Pharisees in Luke’s account. In Matthew’s gospel, as we have seen, they play a much more prominent role in Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry than in Mark. Luke does portray the scribes as participants in Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry. Since, however, the scribes in question probably belong to the Sanhedrin, I shall consider their activities later when I reflect on Jesus’ relationship to the high priests. The disappearance of the Pharisees from Luke’s account of Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry transforms it into a prolonged struggle between Jesus and the chief priests for proprietorship of the temple where Luke’s Jesus habitually teaches. Matthew involves the Pharisees actively in Jesus’ death because he perceives them as perpetuating in his own day the same unbelief and hostility to the gospel as the chief priests exhibited at the time of Jesus. Luke eliminates even the minor role which the Pharisees play in Mark’s account of Jesus’ final days. In part, Luke desires to present His Gentile Christians with a clean option between Jesus, on the one hand, and the Satanic institutions which conspire to kill Him: namely, the client priests, the client Jewish aristocracy, and the Roman empire itself. These institutions constitute the kingdoms of this world which Satan owns and rules. (Lk 4:6) They function as Satan’s instruments when the prince of darkness renews His assault upon Jesus at the “more opportune time” of His passion.31 (Lk 4:13) The Analogy of Christological Knowing Like the other two synoptic evangelists, Luke uses the Pharisees to warn the disciples against attitudes incompatible with their commitment to Christ. The warnings could conceivably target the Pharisaical leaders of the Jewish community; but Luke’s gospel gives fewer signs than Matthew’s of serious confrontation with the synagogue. Writing as he does for a predominantly Gentile community, Luke’s diatribes against Pharisaism probably target more sinful Christian attitudes. 31. Cf. David L. Tiede, Prophecy and History in Luke-Acts (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress, 1980), pp. 65-96; Bo Reicke, “Synoptic Prophecies on the Destruction of Jerusalem” in Studies in New Testament and Early Christian Literature, edited by D.E. Aune (Leiden: Brill, 1972), pp. 121-134; Jacques Dupont, “Il ne sera pas laissé pierre sur pierre (Marc 13,2; Luc 19, 44),” Biblica 52(1971), pp. 301-320; NJBC, 43:164; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1253-1260; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 295-302; Evans, Luke, pp. 682-685; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 400-402.

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Luke stresses more than either of the other two synoptics the avarice and cupidity of the Pharisees because the evangelist’s diatribes against the Pharisees envisage especially hypocritical and covetous tendencies in his own community. As the story of Ananias and Sapphira shows, Luke regarded the Christian whose pretended piety masks cupidity as a rank hypocrite. The theme of forgiveness, as we have seen, also plays a major role in Luke’s narrative Christology. It also colors the evangelist’s handling of the Pharisees. Luke alone uses the two parables of the prodigal son and of the tax-collector and the Pharisee to dramatize the fact that self-righteous judgmentalism has no place among those who live in the kingdom. This uniquely Lukan material traces the roots of the Pharisees’ hypocrisy to an unrepentant refusal to recognize both one’s own need for forgiveness and God’s gratuitous desire to forgive. Here too Luke probably censures Christian self-righteousness. Of the three synoptic evangelists, Luke minimizes Pharisaical opposition to Jesus in His final Jerusalem ministry. In the woes, Luke attributes violence of heart more to the lawyers than to the Pharisees; and in Luke’s account of Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry, scribes do indeed seek to engineer His death. In Luke, then, the Pharisees typify especially self-righteousness, hypocrisy, and greed—attitudes which Luke deplored among his Gentile Christians. This section has examined Luke’s use of Jesus’ conflict with the scribes and Pharisees. The following section reflects on his unique handling of the relationship between Jesus and Herod. (III) Luke dates the Baptizer’s ministry during the reign of Herod as tetrarch in Galilee. (Lk 3:1) Luke, however, handles the figure of Herod Antipas differently from either of the other synoptics. As we have seen, Luke alone of the three synoptic evangelists insists that John publicly denounced Herod not only for his adulterous relationship with his brother’s wife but for a host of other crimes. (Lk 3:19) Luke has Herod allude to the fact that he beheaded John the Baptizer; but, alone among the synoptics, Luke fails to narrate the event. (Lk 9:7) Luke alone mentions that among the women disciples who traveled with Jesus one, Joanna, belonged to Herod’s household. (Lk 8:3) Jesus and Herod While Matthew and Mark both portray Herod as believing superstitiously that Jesus is John the Baptizer risen from the dead (Mk 6:14; Mt 14:1-2), Luke does not. Instead, he portrays Herod as perplexed at the different interpretations of Jesus’ identity which he hears. Luke alone insists that Herod had a great desire to see Jesus. (Lk 9:9) Moreover, in Luke, Herod’s


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question: “John I beheaded, but who is this about whom I hear such reports?” finds its answer in the confession of Peter (Lk 9:18-21) and in the Father’s testimony to Jesus in the transfiguration. (Lk 9:28-36) While Mark mentions that the Herodians conspired with the Pharisees to assassinate Jesus (Mk 3:6), Luke alone indicates that Herod himself wished Jesus dead. (Lk 13:31) Herod’s desire to kill Jesus explains initially the tyrant’s curiosity to see Him. Only in Luke’s gospel does Jesus comment directly on Herod. Warned by some friendly Pharisees that Herod seeks His life, Jesus replies: Go and tell that fox, “Behold, I cast out demons and perform cures today and tomorrow, and the third day I finish my course. Nevertheless, I must go on my way today and tomorrow and the day following; for it cannot be that a prophet should perish away from Jerusalem.” (Lk 13:32-3)

Jesus’ rhetorical command suggests that, while He recognizes Herod’s power, His death fulfills a providential plan which guarantees that He will die only in Jerusalem. In calling Herod a “fox,” Jesus proclaims him cunning, not wise. The healing and deliverance which Jesus works contrasts starkly with Herod’s murderous oppression. The “third day” probably connotes here both a time of fulfillment and the day of resurrection. The incident dramatizes the deadly serious conflict between Jesus and Herod; and it places Herod among the kings of this world whom Satan rules. Finally, the story foreshadows the role which Herod will play in Jesus’ crucifixion. So too does the lament over Jerusalem which immediately follows.32 In Luke’s text, Jesus’ tender lament over Jerusalem follows His reply to Herod. The lament re-enforces His assertion that no one can harm Him until He sets foot in Jerusalem. Jesus says: O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, killing the prophets and stoning those who are sent to you! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not! Behold, your house is forsaken. And I tell you, you will not see me until you say “Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!” (Lk 13:34)

As we have seen, Matthew cites substantially the same lament but puts it to very different theological use. In Matthew, it provides the transition from the woes against the scribes and Pharisees to the main body of the eschatological discourse. In Luke, the lament prophesies Jesus’ triumphal 32. Cf. M. Rese, “Übige Überlegungen zu Lukas XIII, 31-33” in Jésus aux origine de la Christologie, edited by Jacques Dupont (Leuven: University Press, 1989), pp. 201-225; L.H. Bunn, “Herod Antipas and ‘That Fox,’” Expository Times, 43(1931-1932), pp. 380-381; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, II, pp. 1027-1033; Evans, op. cit., pp. 559-562.

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entry. Since in Matthew, Jesus has already entered Jerusalem when He utters the lament, it predicts the second coming. Accordingly, Matthew has Jesus say you will not see me “again.” In both gospels, however, the lament contrasts what might have been with what will be. Had Jerusalem accepted the tender offer of love Jesus made it, the city could have escaped the devastation which His rejection will inevitably bring down upon it. By linking the lament to Jesus’ rebuke to Herod with its sense of historical inevitability, Luke underscores the inexorable character of the double tragedy which lies in the future: the death of Jesus and the destruction of the Holy City. By locating the lament after an attempt by Herod on Jesus’ life, Luke pits Jesus against Herod Antipas more explicitly than any other evangelist. As we shall soon see, Luke portrays Herod as one of the Satanic powers arraigned against Jesus. Luke will make a similar point in the condemned Jesus’ encounter with the women of Jerusalem who lament His death.33 (Lk 23:26-33) Finally, of the four evangelists, only Luke mentions that Herod played a role in Jesus’ trial. Some have questioned the historicity of this event but have failed to offer compelling reasons for denying that it could have happened. In Luke’s passion narrative, when Pilate, in the course of interrogating Jesus, hears that he comes from Galilee, he hands Jesus over to Herod for judgment. Jesus’ trial at the hands of the Roman authorities finds a parallel in Paul’s trial by the Romans at the end of Acts. In both trials, the Roman judge hands the accused over to a Jewish ruler who equivalently declares the accused not guilty. Pilate hands Jesus over to Herod Antipas. In Acts, the governor Felix refers Paul’s case to King Herod Agrippa, who also finds Paul innocent of any crime against Rome. (Cf. Lk 23:6-7; Acts 25:13-26) In his account of Jesus’ encounter with Herod, Luke reminds the reader that Herod has been wanting to see Jesus. While before Luke indicated that Herod wanted to do so for murderous reasons, he here suggests another motive. Out of idle curiosity, Herod demands that Jesus work a miracle. Jesus, however, does nothing of the sort and refuses even to answer either Herod’s verbose questioning or the accusations of the chief priests and scribes. As in the other synoptics, Jesus’ silence recalls implicitly the silent suffering of the servant of God in second Isaiah. (Is 53;7) In Luke, however,

33. Cf. Joseph B. Tyson, “Jesus and Herod Antipas,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 79(1960), pp. 239-246; NJBC, 43:143; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1033-1038; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 215- 222; Evans, Luke, pp. 563-566; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 321-323.


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Jesus’ silence also serves another narrative purpose. It re-enforces the impression given by Jesus’ former use of the epithet “that fox” that He does not hold Herod in very high regard. Herod for his part responds to Jesus’ silence and intransigence with contempt. He mocks Jesus by throwing an elegant garment around Him and sending Him back to Pilate. Some see in the whiteness of the robe a symbol of Jesus’ innocence. Others see in the garment a mockery of the garment worn by candidates for office. In the latter interpretation, Herod ironically clothes Jesus in a way which prepares the crowds’ choice between Him and Barabbas. (Lk 23:8-11) Luke ends his account of Jesus’ encounter with Herod on an ironic and prophetic note. The entire incident brings about the reconciliation of Herod and Pilate, who had formerly regarded one another with enmity. Did the enmity result from Pilate’s slaying the Galilean pilgrims? Or did Pilate’s refusal to respond to the petition of the Herodian princes in the matter of the shields set him and Antipas at odds? We have no way of answering such questions. In Luke’s story line, however, Pilate and Herod, despite all the power they wield, seem to lack the ability to free someone whom they both now seem to regard as politically harmless. Moreover, ironically, Jesus, who will soon die their victim, brings about their reconciliation, but not their conversion. (Lk 23:12) The reconciliation only creates friendship among villains and draws Herod into the conspiracy against Jesus. (Acts 3:27-8) In Acts, Luke will describe Herod’s part in Jesus’ trial as the collusion of secular princes with Israel against God’s anointed. These combined Satanic forces put Jesus to His final test.34 (Acts 4:25-31) By failing to release Jesus and by returning Him to Roman jurisdiction, Herod becomes in the evangelist’s eyes co-responsible with Pilate and the chief priests for Jesus’ death.

34. Cf. Brown, Death of the Messiah, I, pp. 756-757, 760-778; Ernst Bammel, The Trial of Jesus (Napierville, IL: Allenson, 1970), pp. 84-90; Erwin Buck, “The Function of the Pericope ‘Jesus Before Herod’ in the Passion Narrative of Luke,” in Wort in der Zeit, edited by Winfrid Harbeck and Michael Bachmann (Leiden: Brill, 1980), pp. 165-178; Josef Blinzler, Der Process Jesu (Regensburg: Friedrich Pustet Verlag, 1969), pp. 284-300; Michael Corbin, “Jesus devant Herode: Lecture de Luc 23,6-12,” Christus, 25(1978), pp. 190-197; Martin Dibelius, “Herodes und Pilatus,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 16(1975), pp. 113-126; NJBC: 43:187; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1478-1486; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 363-369; Evans, Luke, pp. 839-859.

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The Analogy of Christological Knowing While Mark and Matthew concentrate on Herod’s relationship to John the Baptizer, Luke seeks instead to establish a direct relationship between Herod and Jesus. Luke’s omission of Mark’s story of the death of John the Baptizer serves this end. Luke’s Herod alludes to the Baptizer’s death but expresses far more interest in Jesus. By including Herod in Jesus’ trial before Pilate, Luke makes him co-responsible with Pilate for Jesus’ death. In Luke’s portrait of Herod, the Jewish tyrant embodies with Pilate the secular powers which futilely conspire against the Lord and His anointed. As we have also seen, Luke also goes out of his way to insist that the kingdoms of this world belong to Satan and that he gives power to anyone he chooses. (Lk 4:6) In other words, in portraying the Jewish king to Gentile Christians, Luke desires his readers to regard Herod as an integral part of the oppressive, imperial Roman power system which the reign of God subverts and replaces. Both Herod and Rome function as Satan’s instruments in his final assault on Jesus. (Lk 4:13) In Luke, moreover, as we shall see, both Peter’s confession and the Father’s testimony to Jesus answer Herod’s question about Jesus’ identity. Jesus confronts Herod as messiah and as Son of God. In Luke, therefore, Peter’s confession and the Father’s testimony challenge the disciples to choose between oppressive imperial power, on the one hand, and Jesus, the messianic Son of God, on the other. I have considered three of the negative dramatic relationships which structure Luke’s gospel. The section which follows examines the fourth: namely, Jesus’ relationship to the chief priests. (IV) Luke dates the ministry of the Baptizer during the pontificates of Annas and Caiphas. (Lk 3;2) We hear nothing more of the chief priests until Jesus’ first prediction of His passion. After Peter names Jesus “the Christ of God,” Jesus predicts that “the Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised.” (Lk 9:20-22) Luke edits out of Mark any explicit mention of the chief priests in both the second and third predictions of the passion, although Luke clearly attributes Jesus’ death to a conspiracy among the chief priests, Herod, and Pilate.35 (Acts 4:24-27) Jesus and the Chief Priests Luke also edits Mark’s account of the cleansing of the temple. He omits any mention of Jesus overturning the tables and seats of the merchants and money changers. Luke records only that Jesus drove the money chang35. Cf. F. Neirynck and T.A. Fredricksen, “Note on Luke 22: A Response to M.D. Goulder,”Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 65(1989), pp. 390-394.


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ers from the temple saying: “It is written ‘My house shall be a house of prayer’; but you have made it a den of robbers.” (Lk 19:45-8) As in Mark, Jesus’ words allude to Is 56:7 and to Jer 7:11. Luke, like Mark, implicitly portrays Jesus as a second Jeremiah, consumed with zeal for the temple. Unlike Mark, however, Luke does not refer to the temple as a house of prayer for all the nations, no doubt in part because the non-existence of the temple at the time the evangelist wrote made such a sentiment seem superfluous. It also seems unlikely that Luke would have seen Christian Gentile worship culminating in Jewish temple ritual. The omission of the phrase “for all nations” also places rhetorical emphasis on the term “prayer” and highlights the incompatibility between authentic worship of God and greed.36 Like Mark, Luke notes after the cleansing of the temple that the chief priests and scribes wanted to destroy Jesus but feared to act because of His popularity with the crowds. (Lk 19:45-8, 22:1-2) Unlike, Matthew, Luke makes no attempt to nuance Mark’s account of the reason why the chief priests sought Jesus’ death.37 Luke, like Mark and Matthew, records that the chief priests, scribes, and elders challenged Jesus to name the authority which sanctioned His actions. As in the other synoptics, Luke’s Jesus responds by challenging the priests to acknowledge that both He and John speak with prophetic authority. Luke, however, adds the colorful narrative detail that Jesus’ adversaries feared that if they denied that John baptized with divine sanction, the crowds would stone them on the spot.38 (Lk 20:1-8) As in the other synoptics, after Jesus tells the parable of the wicked tenants who mistreated their master’s servants and eventually killed his son, the scribes (read “members of the Sanhedrin”) and chief priests recognize that Jesus intends the parable to apply to them. Moreover, but for their fear of the crowds, they would have arrested Jesus then and there. Luke follows Mark’s version of the story and has Jesus himself draw the allegorical moral of the parable instead of eliciting it from His adversaries, as Matthew’s Jesus does. The moral remains the same: that the owner of the vineyard (God) will take His vineyard (the kingdom) from the 36. Cf. Charles Kingly Barrett, “The House of Prayer and the Den of Thieves” in Jesus und Paulus, edited by E. Earl Ellis and Erich Graesser (Göttingen: Vanderhoeck & Ruprecht, 1975), pp. 13-20; F.M. Baum, O.P., “L’expulsion des vendeurs du temple,” Revue Biblique, 38(1929), pp. 178-200; Neill Q. Hamilton, “Temple Cleansing and Temple Bank,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 83(1964), pp. 365-372; Etienne Trocmé, “L’expulsion des marchands du Temple,” New Testament Studies, 15(1968-1969), pp. 3-22; Siegfried Mendner, “Die Templereinigung,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 47(1956), pp. 93-112; NJBC, 43:165; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, II, pp. 1260-1268; Evans, op. cit., pp. 686-689; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 402-404. 37. Cf. NJBC: 43:167; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp 1271-1276; Evans, Luke, pp. 691-695. 38. Cf. NJBC, 43:167-168; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, II, 1271-1276; Evans, op. cit., pp. 691- 695; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 404-406.

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rebellious tenants (the chief priests and scribes) and give it to others (those who believe in Jesus, including the Gentiles). (Lk 20:9-19; Mk 12:1-12; Mt 21:33-46) In Luke’s version of this story, however, the Jerusalem crowds cry out, “God forbid!” This repudiation of Jesus’ prophecy by the crowds marks the turning point in their relationship to Him. In response, Luke’s Jesus, like Mark’s, cites Ps 118:22: “The very stone which the builders rejected has become the head of the corner.” Then, however, Luke’s Jesus adds a saying found in neither Mark nor Matthew: “Every one who falls on that stone will be broken to pieces; but when it falls on any one it will crush him.” One cannot trip over a cornerstone imbedded in a wall, nor can it fall on anyone unless the wall collapses. Luke, however, has chosen to develop the image of stone with a proverb which probably alludes to Is 8:14-5. There Isaiah states that the Lord of hosts will become “a stone of offense, a rock of stumbling to both houses of Israel, a trap and a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem. Many will stumble thereon; they will fall and be broken to bits.” Jesus’ teaching about the stone probably also alludes to the prophecy of Simeon in Luke’s infancy gospel that Jesus would cause many in Israel to stumble and fall.39 (Lk 2:34) Luke has the chief priests, scribes and elders send spies to question Jesus about paying taxes to Caesar. Matthew, as we have seen, has Pharisees raise the issue with Jesus, while Mark has a conspiracy of Pharisees and Herodians do so. The absence of Herodians in both Matthew and Luke depoliticizes the incident somewhat and transforms it into an in-house, religious debate among Jews. In this context, Luke underscores the hypocrisy of Jesus’ questioners. Luke’s staging of the incident reflects his concern to portray Jesus’ final Jerusalem ministry as a struggle between Jesus and the chief priests. (Lk 20:20-6; Mk 12:13-7; Mt 22:15-22) In other respects, Luke’s version of the story repeats Mark’s and makes the same point: those who can recognize Caesar’s image on his coins should give Caesar his due; but they should show greater concern to give to God what God justly claims from them. As in the other synoptics, Jesus is probably also calling His adversaries to recognize God’s image where they find it: namely, in other persons, especially in the poor and needy.40 The Sadducees who question Jesus about resurrection belonged to the temple priesthood. Luke expands slightly Mark’s version of Jesus’ reply; 39. Cf. J. Duncan M. Derrett, “The Stone That the Builders Rejected” in Studia Evangelica, edited by F.L. Cross, (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1968), pp. 180-186; NJBC: 43:170; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1289-1298; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 303-307; Evans, Luke, pp. 703-710; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 410-412. 40. Cf. Richard J. Cassidy, Jesus, Politics, and Society: A Study of Luke’s Gospel (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1978), pp. 55-61; Charles Homer Giblin, S.J., “‘The Things of God’ in the Question Concerning Tribute to Caesar (Lk 20:25; Mk 12:17; Mt 22:21),” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 33(1971), pp. 510-511; NJBC: 43:170; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp 1289-1297; Evans, Luke, pp. 703-709.


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and Luke’s Jesus asserts more clearly than Mark’s the immortality of those who die in God. He adds that those who die destined for resurrection cannot marry or give in marriage because “they cannot die any more.” In Luke personal immortality as well as the transformation of the human body into an angelic, heavenly one makes marriage superfluous in heaven. The insistence on personal immortality reflects the Gentile character of Luke’s audience. Gentiles tended to think of life after death as personal immortality, while Jews looked forward to bodily resurrection.41 (Lk 20:27-40; Mk 12:18-27; Mt 22:23-33) The confrontation with the chief priests ends with Jesus questioning them about why David calls the messiah Lord in Ps 110:1. Luke insists perhaps even more than the other two synoptics that Jesus has Davidic descent. As in the other synoptics, however, Luke’s Jesus is distancing Himself from any understanding of the messiah as another warrior king like David. Moreover, the saying implicitly points to Jesus’ resurrection, when He will stand revealed as Lord and therefore as incomparably superior to David.42 (Lk 20:41-4; Mk 12:35-6; Mt 22:41-6) Luke’s Jesus, like Mark’s, warns His disciples not to imitate the scribes, who like to receive public marks of honor. Nor should the disciples pretend piety while at the same time they devour the homes of widows, as the scribes do. (Lk 20:45-7; Mk 12:38-40) Following Mark, Luke also contrasts the greed and hypocrisy of these scribes with the widow who gives all she has, two copper coins, to the temple tax. (Lk 21:1-4) As in Mark, the taxing of poor widows also illustrates the fact that the chief priests and Sanhedrin have transformed the temple from a house of prayer to a robbers’ den. Jesus, then, points to the widow for all her generosity more as conspiring in her own exploitation than as a strict model for emulation.43 (Lk 20:45; Mk 11:17) 41. All three synoptics, however, make the same basic points in reproducing this story: 1) The Sadducees denied the resurrection because they confused it with resuscitation, while Jesus, with the Pharisees, regarded resurrection as the transformation of an earthly body into a heavenly one. 2) Those who die continue to live in God while they await final resurrection because God is the God of the living. Luke alone has scribes approve of Jesus response. In Matthew, the crowds respond to Jesus’ reply with astonishment. Cf. Nils A. Dahl, “The Story of Abraham in Luke-Acts” in Studies in Luke-Acts, pp. 139-158; Jean le Moyne, O.S.B., Le sadducéens (Paris: Librairie Le Coffre, 1972), pp. 123-127, 129-135; D.M. Cohn-Sherbok, “Jesus’ Defence of the Resurrection of the Dead,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 11(1981), pp. 64-73; E. Earl Ellis, “Jesus, the Sadducees, and Qumran,” New Testament Studies, 10(1963-1964), pp. 274-279; NJBC: 43:171; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1298-1308; Evans, Luke, pp. 710-720; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 413-416. 42. Cf. Bruce Chilton, “Jesus ben David: Reflections on the Davidssohnsfrage,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 14(1982), pp. 88-112; NJBC: 43:172; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 1308-1316; Evans, Luke, pp. 720-723; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 416-418. 43. Cf. Degenhardt, op. cit., pp. 93-97; Addison G. Wright, “The Widow’s Mite: Praise or Lament?—A Matter of Context,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 44(1982), pp.

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As Passover approaches, the chief priests plot to have Jesus killed; but they fear the people. Luke explains to his Gentile audience that Passover celebrates the feast of Unleavened Bread. To the delight of the chief priests, Judas offers to betray Jesus. The priests engage to pay the traitor for his treachery. We find in Luke no mention of the amount paid or of the eventual purchase of a Potters’ Field with it. In describing Judas’s treachery, Luke deviates from the other synoptic evangelists in one significant detail. He portrays the incident as Satan’s return after his defeat in the desert to put Jesus to the test once again.44 (Lk 22:1-5; Mk 14:10-11; Mt 26:1-2) Both Mark’s and Matthew’s account of Jesus’ arrest leave the impression that possibly only one temple official accompanied the mob sent by the chief priests to arrest Jesus: namely, the “servant of the high priest” who loses his ear in the garden. (Mk 14:43-52; Mt 26:47-56) Luke, however, has a group of chief priests and elders personally accompany the arresting mob. Their presence in the garden heightens the sense of conflict between Jesus and the priestly aristocracy. Luke moreover has Jesus direct his reproach specifically to them. Luke also modifies the reproach slightly. Jesus says to the chief priests: “Have you come out as against a robber with swords and clubs? When I was with you daily in the temple, you did not lay hands on me. But this is your hour and the power of darkness.” As we shall see in greater detail in considering Jesus’ relationship to the crowds, only in Luke does Jesus conduct virtually all of His Jerusalem ministry in the temple. Not only does Luke depict Jesus and the chief priests locked in mortal combat; but the evangelist also names the object of their struggle: namely, control and possession of God’s house. The temple priests win the combat and thus doom the temple to destruction. (Lk 22:52-3) Luke’s Jesus rebukes the cowardice and hypocrisy of the chief priests for not arresting Him openly. Then, like the Johannine Jesus, Luke’s Jesus alludes to their act as the victory of the powers of darkness. (Cf Jn 13:30, 19:11) The struggle between light and darkness does not play the central role in Luke which it does in John. Here Luke transforms the fact that Jesus’s arrest took place under the cover of darkness as a metaphor for the evil in the hearts of the high priests, who in Lukan theology at this point 256-265; R.S. Sugirtharajah, “The Widow’s Mite Revalued,” Expository Times, 103(1991), pp. 42-43; NJBC: 43:173; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1316-1322; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 310-319; Evans, Luke, pp. 725-729; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 418-421. 44. Cf. Fernando Morell-Baladron, “El Relato de la Pasion segun San Lucas,” Estudios Biblicos, 54(1996), pp. 79-114; Kenneth Hein, “Judas Iscariot: Key to the Last Supper Narratives,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 17(1970-1971), pp. 227-232; NJBC: 43:177; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 1373-1375; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 331-336; Evans, Luke, pp. 771-776; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 440-442.


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function, together with Judas, as the instruments of the prince of darkness.45 (Lk 22:47-54; Mk 14:43-52; Mt 26:47-56) After the arresting mob has Jesus in custody, they mock and beat him. They blindfold Him and challenge Him mockingly to say who struck Him. They subject Him to prolonged reviling. (Lk 22:63-65) Luke adapts this incident from Mark’s account of Jesus night trial. (Mk 14:65) Luke, however, makes no mention at all of a night trial. Instead, he speaks only of the insult and physical abuse which Jesus suffered at the hands of those who arrested Him. Luke interprets the mockery and abuse as an act of blasphemy against the person of Jesus. Moreover, the third time the Lukan Jesus prophesies His passion, He portrays the cursing and reviling which He will endure as arrogance against God (hybrizein). The blasphemy which Jesus endures at the hands of His captors fulfills that prophecy. Since one blasphemes against God, the evangelists is implicitly endowing Jesus with divine dignity.46 In his account of Jesus’ morning trial, Luke omits any mention of witnesses. Luke, as we have seen, also gives no indication that Jesus’ prophecy of the destruction of the temple played a part in His trial, although it will in Stephen’s trial in Acts. He does not, as Mark and Matthew do, depict Jesus as the suffering servant, silent in the face of false accusation. As we have already seen in another context, Luke makes Jesus’ messianic identity and claim to divine Sonship the basis for the Sanhedrin’s verdict of condemnation. In Luke, however, the Sanhedrin does not explicitly condemn Jesus for uttering blasphemy as it does in Mark. (Lk 22:67-68) Luke found the testimony of the false witnesses and the charge of blasphemy in Mark’s account of Jesus’ trial; but Luke transposed these details to the trial of Stephen, the protomartyr, before the Sanhedrin in Acts. Luke may have intended this editorial transposition to assimilate Christian martyrdom to the fate of the crucified Christ. If so, Luke would have presupposed that his readers had read Mark’s account of Jesus’ trial. Otherwise, they could not have recognized that an editorial transposition of events had occurred. Since, however, Luke used Mark’s gospel as a source, the Lukan community probably had some familiarity with the Markan text.47 (Cf. Acts 6:11-14) Moreover, Luke’s Jesus does not promise the Sanhedrin that they will “see” the Son of Man doing anything, as He does in both Mark and 45. In contrast to both Mark and Matthew, Luke makes no mention that this event and the passion of Jesus as a whole fulfills the Scriptures. (Mk 14:48-9; Mt 26:55-6) Cf. NJBC: 43:185; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp 1446-1452; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 350-355; Evans, Luke, pp. 813-821. 46. Cf. NJBC, 43:185; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, II, pp. 1446-1452; Evans, op. cit., pp. 813- 830; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 464-467. 47. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, I, pp. 69-70.

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Matthew. Instead, Luke’s Jesus proclaims: “From the present, there the Son of Man will be sitting at the right of the power of God.” In other words, Jesus’ trial by the Sanhedrin begins His exaltation to the right hand of God. As in John, the passion of Jesus begins His divine enthronement; and that entronement reverses human judgments on Jesus.48 The Sanhedrin hands Jesus over to Pilate. They accuse Him before Pilate of political crimes: deceiving the people by forbidding tribute to Caesar and claiming to be the messianic king. (Lk 23:1) Luke thus underscores the priests’ deceit, malice, and hypocrisy. In Luke, the priests know very well that Jesus does not forbid paying taxes to Caesar, since, as we have seen, in Luke’s account of the Jerusalem ministry, emissaries of the chief priests put the question about tribute to Caesar to Jesus. The priests, then, know well that He answered: “Render to Caesar what belongs to Caesar.” Later, the chief priests accompany Jesus in His trial before Herod and there press their accusations vehemently. They fail, however, to secure a negative judgment from Herod beyond a judgment of contempt for Jesus and the decision to resubmit Jesus to the tender mercies of Roman “justice.”49 (Lk 23:8-12) Luke handles the choice between Jesus and Barabbas (“son of the father”) somewhat differently from the other two synoptics. When Luke’s Jesus returns from Herod, Pilate summons the chief priests, the elders, and the people and tells them that since neither he nor Herod found any fault with Jesus, he, Pilate, will simply scourge Jesus and release Him. At this suggestion the chief priests call for the release instead of Barabbas. Luke mentions no custom of releasing a prisoner at the time of Passover. Like Mark, Luke mentions that Barabbas stood charged with insurrection and murder. Matthew describes Barabbas as notorious, without naming his crimes. Luke’s Pilate remonstrates a second time with the chief priests and people; but they demand Jesus’ execution, drowning out Pilate’s third protest that Jesus had committed no crime worthy of death. “And their voices prevailed.” (Lk 23:13-25) Luke does not say that the chief priests incited the crowds to call for Jesus’ blood but has them call spontaneously with the chief priests for the judgment of crucifixion.50 (Cf. Mk 15:6-15; Mt 27:15-26) On Calvary, the religious leaders of the people, i.e., members of the priestly caste and the Sanhedrin, mock Jesus as He hangs on the cross: 48. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, I, pp. 495-506; NJBC: 43:186; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 1452-1471; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 356-363; Evans, Luke, pp. 830-839; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 471-473. 49. Cf. Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, II, pp. 1471-1477; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 474-476; Gerard S. Sloyan, Jesus on Trial (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress, 1973), pp.89-109. 50. Cf. NJBC: 43:187; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 1483-1493; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 363-375; Evans, Luke, pp. 839-859; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 478-481.


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“He saved others; let Him save Himself, if He is the Christ of God, His Chosen One!” Luke, however, contrasts the attitude of the religious leaders with the response of the crowds on Calvary. As we shall see, in Luke, the crowds on Calvary repent. Among the chief priests one finds no hint of repentance.51 (Lk 23:35-6, 48) The Analogy of Christological Knowing In all three synoptics, the high priestly caste functions as negative models for all Christians and especially for Christian leaders. By underscoring their malice and their unbelief, Luke if anything stresses even more than the other two synoptics the gulf which lies between them and Jesus. Luke portrays the temple priests as hypocritical, lying, conniving, cowardly, ruthless, unrepentant, and murderous. He dramatizes their deceit by having them confront Jesus on the issue of paying taxes to Caesar; for, later they accuse Him of forbidding the payment of the imperial taxes, even though they know He did nothing of the sort. At His arrest Jesus reminds the priests that he had taught daily in the temple. Only Luke portrays Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry as a stake-out between the messiah and the chief priests for control of the temple. The chief priests win the contest and doom the city and its temple to destruction. Only Luke insists that a conspiracy of the chief priests and the people of Jerusalem, on the one hand, and of both Herod and Pilate on the other, engineered Jesus’ death. In all the gospels, the paschal mystery functions as the time of decision for the disciples. In Luke one must choose between Jesus, the messianic Son of God, and a phalanx of adversaries who all incarnate Satan and his kingdoms. Satan has returned in human form to put once again the Son of God to the test. In the end, therefore, the disciples must opt between Jesus and the Satanic Roman empire with its client vassals. Only one negative dramatic linkage in Luke needs examination: namely, Jesus’ relationship to Pilate. To that task I turn in the section which follows. (V) At the beginning of his gospel, Luke notes that John the Baptizer began preaching “in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea.” (Lk 3:1)

51. In the conversation between Jesus and the disciples on the way to Emmaus, Luke underscores the fact that the chief priests and rulers delivered Jesus up and had Him condemned. (Lk 24:13-27) Cf. Mark Allen Powell, “The Religious Leaders in Luke: A Literary-Critical Study, Journal of Biblical Literature, 109(1990), pp. 93-110; NJBC: 43:191; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1499-1506; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 375-381; Evans, Luke, pp. 864-874; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 483-488.

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Jesus and Pilate Luke alone of the synoptic evangelists alludes to the atrocities committed by Pilate during his reign. Some people recount to Jesus the story of Galileans butchered by Pilate in the forecourt of the temple of the priests where all sacrificial animals met their deaths. (Lk 13:1) Pilate’s aggression against Antipas’s subjects could conceivably have contributed to the breach between the two men which Luke’s Pilate tries to smooth over by sending Jesus to Antipas for judgment.52 (Lk 23:6-12) The people who inform Jesus apparently expect Him to denounce Pilate’s violence. The non-violent Jesus, however, uses the occasion to call all of His hearers, not just Pilate, to repentance. Instead of demanding vengeance against the violence and oppression of Roman rule, Jesus assures His audience that sudden death, like that suffered by the Galileans, provides no proof that they had sinned any more than anyone else. All have sinned, all must deal with the contingencies of life and of death. All must repent. (Lk 13:1-4) In order to re-enforce His point, Jesus cites an accident, the collapse of a tower at the pool of Siloam in Jerusalem which killed eighteen people. Then He draws the same conclusion as He had concerning the deaths of the Galileans. These victims of a terrible accident had not deserved to die any more than any other inhabitant of Jerusalem. Jesus, then repeats a second time: “No, but unless you repent you will all likewise perish.” (Lk 13:5) The theme of judgment in this section of the journey discourse suggests that “perishing” involves more than just physical death. It means ultimate repudiation by God. The universal repentance for which Jesus calls includes the renunciation of violence; but Jesus refuses to target just the violent injustices of Pilate. Instead, He universalizes the summons to repentance to include all His contemporaries as well as all sinfulness, including the sins of violence and injustice. Nevertheless, by calling special attention to the Roman governor’s atrocities, the story does challenge Luke’s Gentile Christians to distance themselves morally from the evils incarnate in Roman oppression.53 A parable about a fig tree follows Jesus’ response to Pilate’s atrocities. It underscores the theme of judgment. This parable could conceivably have provided the basis for the cursing of the fig tree in Mark. (Mk 11:12-4, 20-5; Mt 21:18-22) The owner of a fig tree has waited three years and received no fruit from the tree. He tells his vine dresser to cut it down;

52. Cf. Josef Blinzler, “Die Niedermetzlung von Galilärn durch Pilatus,” Novum Testamentum, 2(1957), pp. 24-49; Günther Schwarz, “Eine Emendation, Lukas 13:1-5,” Novum Testamentum, 11(1969), pp. 121-126. 53. Cf. Robert Shirock, “The Growth of the Kingdom in the Light of Israel’s Rejection of Jesus: Structure and Theology in Luke 13:1-35,”Novum Testamentum, 35(1933), pp. 15-29.


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but the vine dresser asks for one more year of grace. If the tree still remains barren, then he will cut it down. (Lk 13:6-9) The parable makes two points simultaneously. A compassionate God will postpone judgment in the hope that the unrepentant will change their hearts and begin to bear fruit. Nevertheless, God cannot wait indefinitely; and, when the time of judgment comes, the spiritually barren will find themselves cut down and rejected. The parable underscores the universal call to repentance which Jesus pronounced in response to the news of Pilate’s crimes; and it contains a special warning to Jesus’ contemporaries that time is running out.54 In all three synoptics, Jesus explicitly warns His disciples never to imitate the oppressive ways of pagan kings. Luke, however, locates the warning at the last supper immediately after the institution of the eucharist. The relocation endows Jesus’ words with greater solemnity and transforms them into a fundamental moral condition for eucharistic faith. Moreover, by including a warning against aping the publicly celebrated “benefactions” of the rich which only perpetuated unjust class structures, Luke’s Jesus also indites aristocratic pagan mores which foster hypocrisy among Gentile Christians.55 (Lk 22:24-27; cf. Mk 10:42-44; Mt 20:25-27) Luke alone indicates that already during Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry the chief priests had determined to hand Him over to Pilate. To this end they send spies to trap Jesus into denying tribute to Caesar. Luke consistently attributes Jesus’ death to a conspiracy involving the chief priests and imperial Rome.(Lk 20:20) When the chief priests and the Sanhedrin finally do hand Jesus over to Pilate for trial, Pilate asks Jesus directly, as he does in Mark, “Are you the King of the Jews.” Jesus replies as He does in Mark, with a diffident “You have said so.” In Mark’s account of the passion, Pilate makes no comment upon Jesus’ reply. In Luke, however, he says: “I find no crime in this man.” Throughout his passion narrative, Luke insists that Roman law dealt unjustly with an innocent Jesus. The fact that Pilate recognizes Jesus’ innocence and yet condemns Him to death by torture dramatizes the arbitrariness of Roman justice.(Lk 23:4) As we have seen, Luke names the charges the high priests bring against Jesus: deceiving the nation, forbidding paying taxes to Caesar, and claiming to be Christ the King. When they let slip that Jesus has been active in 54. Cf. Hyacinthus M. Faccio, O.F.M., “De ficu sterili (Lc 13:6-9),” Verbum Domini, 29(1951), pp. 233-238; Jean Georges Kahn, “La parabole du figurier stérile et les arbres récalcetrants de la Gènese,” Novum Testamentum, 13(1971), pp. 38-45; NJBC: 43:138-139; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 1003-1009; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 210-215; Evans, Luke, pp. 545-549; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 311-314. 55. Cf. Friedrick W. Danker, Benefactor: Epigraphic Study of a Graeco-Roman and New Testament Semantic Field (St. Louis, MO: Clayton House,1982); NJBC: 43:181; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1411-1419; Evans, Luke, pp. 779-808.

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Galilee, Pilate asks if He comes from Galilee. When Pilate finds that Jesus is Galilean, Pilate tries unsuccessfully to pass the buck to Herod and sends Jesus to Herod for judgment. As we have seen, this gesture brings about an ironic reconciliation between the two despots.56 (Lk 23:5-12) When Jesus returns from Herod mockingly clad in a sumptuous robe, Pilate interprets Herod’s act as a confirmation of Pilate’s own judgment that Jesus poses no threat to the state and has done nothing deserving of death. Luke’s Pilate paradoxically concludes this declaration of innocence by saying: “I will therefore scourge Him and release Him.” (Lk 23:16) Luke never describes Jesus’ scourging and crowning with thorns. Instead the evangelist only records Pilate’s offer to have Jesus scourged. Why does Pilate first declare Jesus innocent and then propose to scourge Him? As Jesus’ trial before Pilate moves to a quick resolution in Luke, Pilate retreats before the vehement attacks of the chief priests and members of the Sanhedrin. It fits the tone of Luke’s narrative that Pilate offers to scourge Jesus as a sop to the chief priests and elders’ malevolence. By omitting Mark’s account of Jesus’ scourging and mockery by the Roman soldiers, Luke also focuses Jesus’ trial before Pilate single-mindedly on the crucifixion, which, as we have seen, Luke portrays as the supreme expression of divine forgiveness. Outraged at the suggestion that Pilate might release Jesus, the chief priests and the crowds call for the release of Barabbas instead of Jesus.57 Pilate makes two more attempts to get Jesus off with a scourging but succeeds only in provoking the priests and elders to greater hostility. Finally, the governor yields to the demands of Jesus’ enemies. He releases Barabbas and condemns Jesus to die on the cross. (Lk 23:18-25) The chief priests’ success in bending the governor to their will fulfills the words of Jesus in the garden at His arrest: “This is your hour and the power of darkness.” (Lk 22:53) The chief priests and the blood-thirsty crowds have become the instruments of Satan and the powers of evil. Pilate’s capitulation joins him to their ranks and dramatizes Satan’s boast in Jesus’ desert temptations that the kingdoms of this world do indeed belong to him. Far from excusing Pilate’s action, Luke dramatizes his willingness for reasons of political expediency to condemn an innocent man to death. This act of violence and injustice accords well in Luke’s eyes with Pilate’s other atrocities.58 (Lk 4:6) 56. Cf. Martin Dibelius, “Herodes und Pilatus,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 16(1915), pp. 113-126. 57. Luke in contrast to the other synoptics makes no mention of an annual custom of releasing prisoners at Passover. (Mk 15:6; Mt 27:15) 58. Cf. Gottfried Rau, “Das Volk in der lukanischen Passionsgeschichte: Eine Konjectur zu Lk 23.13,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 56(1965), pp. 41-51; NJBC: 43:187-188; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 1471-1493; Evans, Luke, pp. 837-859; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 474-481.


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Luke describes the unscourged Jesus led out to execution. As in the other synoptics, the soldiers force Simon of Cyrene to carry the cross behind Jesus. (Lk 23:26, Mk 15:21; Mt 27:32) As in the other synoptics, Simon’s action, even though coerced, transforms him into an ironic type of a faithful disciple.59 (Lk 23:26; 9:23, 14:27) Luke then adds an incident which neither Mark nor Matthew record. Jesus encounters on the way to Calvary women of Jerusalem who bewail His death. The women symbolize those people who support Jesus and who grieve for His martyrdom. Jesus, however, warns the weeping women that their grief will not protect the Holy City from the destruction and judgment which His death makes inevitable. Jesus turns to the women and admonishes them: Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children. For behold, the days are coming when they will say: “Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bore, and the breasts that never gave suck!” Then they will begin to say to the mountains, “Fall on us; and to the hills, “Cover us.” For if they do this when the wood is green, what will happen when it is dry?” (Lk 23:28-32)

What Jesus is about to suffer will pale by comparison with the tragedy and torment soon to descend on the Holy City. His death makes the destruction of Jerusalem inevitable. Better never to have seen the light of day than to face the coming retribution. The city’s inhabitants will find death by cataclysm preferable to the terrible ordeal soon to overwhelm them. The women should, then, weep, not for Jesus, but for themselves and for their descendants; for the consequences of Jesus’ unjust execution will extend beyond His and the women’s own generation and will visit grief upon future generations as well. Jesus’ discourse to the women ends with the enigmatic pronouncement: “For if they do this when the wood is green, what will happen when it is dry?” (Lk 23:32) The pronouncement probably means: If the chief priests and elders with the connivance of the Romans treat me so in a time of grace and favor, how much worse will those who reject me suffer at the Romans’ hands when the time of judgment comes.” Luke wrote his gospel after the destruction of Jerusalem. He therefore looks back to that tragedy as ample fulfillment of Jesus’ prophecy that only repentant acceptance of God’s reign could ward off the destruction

59. Like Matthew, Luke fails to mention (Mark does) that Simon has two sons: Alexander and Rufus. (Cf. Mk 15:21) Possibly known to the Markan community, the two sons had apparently no significance for the Lukan church.

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of the Holy City and of its temple. Josephus’s account of the fall of the Holy City documents the truth of Jesus’ grim prophecy.60 As we have seen in reflecting on Jesus’ relation to the Father, Luke transforms Jesus’ crucifixion and death into the supreme expression of divine forgiveness and of Jesus’ personal trust in the Father. (Lk 23:33-43) In Mark and Matthew, the darkness which reigned over the land while Jesus hung on the cross functions as a cosmic symbol of judgment. Luke explains the darkness as an eclipse of the sun. Although astronomically impossible, the notion of an eclipse restricted to Palestine probably made the apocalyptic darkness which Mark describes more credible to Luke’s Gentile Christians; but the explanation attenuates somewhat the darkness’s symbolism. Luke also has the rending of the temple veil precede rather than follow Jesus’ death. By associating the rending of the veil with the darkness, Luke underscores the judgmental character of God’s abandonment of His former sanctuary. The rending, however, signifies much the same thing as in the other synoptics: the passing of the old religious order and the inevitable destruction of the temple itself.61 (Lk 23:44-9) As in the other synoptics, after Jesus dies, the centurion testifies to Him; but each evangelist gives a different explanation for the testimony. In Mark, Jesus’ death with a loud cry seems to provoke the centurion’s testimony. (Mk 15:39) In Matthew, the earthquake which accompanies Jesus’ death, the opening of the tombs, and the resurrection of those who were in them at the moment of Jesus’ death motivates the centurion’s words. (Mt 27:51-4) Other things move Luke’s centurion: the forgiveness of the dying Jesus, the testimony of the crucified, repentant malefactor, and the faith in the Father which Jesus professes with His dying breath. Stirred by all these events, Luke’s centurion praises God and confirms the repentant criminal’s judgment by saying: “Certainly, this man was innocent.” Ironically, the centurion’s testimony echoes Pilate’s initial verdict concerning Jesus; and it reminds the reader of the capacity of a Satanic kingdom like the Roman empire to murder the innocent.62 (Lk 23:47) 60. Cf. Jerome H. Neyrey, “Jesus Addresses the Women of Jerusalem (Lk 23. 27-31)— A Prophetic Judgment Oracle,” New Testament Studies, 29(1983), pp. 74-86; NJBC, 43:189; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, II, pp. 1493-1499; Evans, op. cit., pp. 859-864; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 481-483. 61. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, II, pp. 1103-1118; Maria Rufino-Grandez, “Las tinieblas en la muerte de Jesús: Historia de la exegesis de Lc 23:44-45a (Mt 27:45; Mc 15:33),” Estudios Biblicos, 47(1989), pp. 177-223; Joel B. Green, “The Demise of the Temple as Culture Center in Luke-Acts: An Exploration of the Rending of the Temple Veil (Luke 23:44-49),” Revue Biblique, 101(1994), pp. 495-515. 62. Cf. NJBC, 43:192-193; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, II, pp. 1507-1523; Evans, op. cit., pp. 864-879; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 483-491; J. Smit, “The Making of Luke 23:26-56: An Analysis of the Composition Technique in Luke’s Crucifixion Narrative,” Revue Biblique, 104(1997), pp. 378- 404..


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As in the other synoptic gospels, Joseph of Aramathea secures the body of Jesus from Pilate and buries it in a rock-hewn tomb. Luke follows Mark in not portraying Joseph as a disciple of Jesus. Luke describes Joseph as “good and just”: in other words, as made of the same stuff as the parents of John the Baptizer. (Lk 1:5-7) Like Matthew, Luke describes Jesus’ tomb as hitherto unused, but the evangelist does not say that it belonged to Joseph. Luke also asserts that Joseph disapproved of the Sanhedrin’s condemnation of Jesus. (Lk 23:50-6, Mk 15: 42-7, Mt 27:57-61) As in the other gospels, the women who will discover the empty tomb watch as Joseph inters Jesus in haste. In Luke, however, they play a slightly more active role. With the sabbath hard upon them, the women hurriedly prepare the spices which they plan to use in supplying the burial preparations which Joseph has had no time to perform.63 The Analogy of Christological Knowing Like the other synoptic evangelists, Luke portrays Pilate and all other oppressive secular rulers as negative role models for Christian leaders. Luke who insists even more than the other synoptics on the importance of non-violent resistance to personal and institutional violence goes out of his way to stress Pilate’s violent abuse of power. Luke even makes the repudiation of the self-serving mores of pagan aristocrats a condition for eucharistic faith. In Luke’s passion narrative, moreover, the priests’ victory over Pilate joins him to them as an instrument of the powers of darkness. Finally, because in Luke Jesus’ death exemplifies the supreme expression of divine forgiveness, it functions as the Christian non-violent alternative to secular violence and oppression. In all these ways, Luke dramatizes the fact that his Gentile Christians must choose between Jesus and the Satanic powers of this world. I have considered all the negative dramatic linkages in Luke. In what follows, I shall examine the way in which Luke modifies Mark’s ambiguous linkages. As in dealing with the other two synoptic gospels, I shall first reflect on Jesus’ relationship to the crowds, then on His relationship to His own disciples.

63. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, II, pp. 1226-1234; NJBC, 43:194; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, II, pp. 1523-1531; Evans, op. cit., pp. 879-884; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 491-497.

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Chapter 15 Ambiguous Dramatic Linkages in Luke This chapter examines Jesus’ relationship to the crowds and to His disciples. As in the other synoptics, Jesus relates positively to both groups; but they relate ambiguously to Him. As in both Mark and Matthew, for both constituencies, the passion marks the moment of decision for or against Jesus. This chapter divides into two parts. Part one ponders how Luke handles Jesus’ relationship to the crowds. Part two describes how Jesus and the disciples interact. (I) In Matthew, John addresses the Pharisees and Sadducees as a brood of vipers. Luke’s John addresses similar comments to the crowds. John says: You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruits which befit repentance, and do not begin to say to yourselves, “We have Abraham as our father”; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. (Lk 3:7-9)

In Matthew, as we have seen, the phrase “brood of vipers,” besides connoting repulsiveness and danger, has a very specific meaning: the enemies of Jesus speak from the rottenness of their hearts poisonous, slanderous words about Him which seek to undermine faith in Him and in His message. Because in Luke John applies the epithet to the crowds rather than the scribes and Pharisees, the phrase has no so such specific connotations. In Luke, the phrase simply asserts that as long as the crowds trust in racial pride, rather than in repentance, to save them, they, despite all their ethnic self-preening, remain repulsive in the eyes of God and dangerous to others. In Matthew, the Pharisees and Sadducees ignore John’s warning of immanent judgment. In Luke the crowds repent and seek more specifics from John about the way they should amend their conduct. (Lk 3:10-4; Mt 3:7-12) Moreover, in Luke, their repentance foreshadows their repentance of Jesus’ death on Calvary.1 (Lk 23:48) 1. For Luke’s vagaries in his use of the term “crowds (ochloi),” see Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, p. 467. See also: Harold Sahlin, “ Die Früchte der Umkehr,” Studia Theologica, 1(1948), pp. 54-68; Jens-W. Töger, Der Mensch und sein Heil: Studien zum Bild des Meschen und zur Sicht der Berkehrung bei Lukas (Gutersloh: Gerd Mohn, 1982); NJBC: 43:38-46;


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Jesus and the Crowds As we have seen, Luke begins Jesus’ ministry with His proclamation of a season of jubilee to the Nazarenes. The people of Nazareth initially react as Jesus’ other auditors had: they speak approvingly of Him and wonder at the graciousness of His speech. In this respect, Luke’s account of Jesus’ encounter with His fellow townspeople differs from Mark’s and from Matthew’s, who present Jesus’ auditors as hostile from the beginning. (Mt 13:53-58) Even in Luke, however, the townspeople begin quickly to show skepticism. Familiarity has bred contempt; and they challenge Jesus, whom they know familiarly as “Joseph’s son,” for putting on airs. (Lk 4:22) Jesus replies to their skepticism in the following manner: “Doubtless you will quote me this proverb, ‘Physician heal thyself; what we have heard you did at Capernaum, do here also in your own country.’” And He said, “Truly, I say to you, no prophet is acceptable in His own country. But in truth, I tell you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years and six months, when there came a great famine over all the land; and Elijah was sent to none of them but only to Zarephath, in the land of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow. And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha; and none of them was cleansed, but only Naaman the Syrian.” (Lk 4:24-7)

Jesus recognizes the skepticism of the Nazarenes as lack of faith. They cannot bring themselves to believe that He can perform in their midst the miracles He did elsewhere. Luke’s Jesus, however, in contrast to Mark’s and Matthew’s, immediately makes a doctrinal point. The Nazarenes have a deeper reason for rejecting him than the familiarity which breeds contempt. At the basis of their unbelief lies an unwillingness to recognize that God freely and graciously chose Israel to function as the instrument of a universal salvation which includes the Gentiles. The miracles performed for the widow of Zarephath and for Naaman the Syrian foreshadow the reconciliation and cleansing of the Gentiles which Luke will describe in Acts. Jesus has come to proclaim just such a universal season of jubilee. The Nazarenes respond to Jesus’ prophetic challenge with a murderous rage which echoes Israel’s past opposition to prophetic preaching at the same time that it foreshadows Jesus’ own rejection in Jerusalem. The Nazarenes rise up against Jesus and seek to assassinate Him by throwing Him from the brow of the hill on which the city of Nazareth lies. Jesus however “passes through their midst” and departs. (Lk 4:28-30) Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 463-478; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 302-316; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 63-68; Evans, Luke, pp. 229- 244; Ernst, op. cit., pp. pp. 108-112.

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Jesus’ unexplained deliverance foreshadows His paschal victory. By the same token, Luke’s narrative has transformed the Nazarenes into a symbol of all of those Jews who will reject Jesus’ message of universal salvation. Later in Acts, Luke will dramatize this same doctrinal point several times. It could conceivably have functioned as a bone of contention between the Lukan community and the local synagogue.2 As we have seen, Mark begins his account of Jesus’ public ministry with the story of the initial spread of the gospel from the disciples to the people of Capernaum and from them to the rest of Galilee. Luke, as we also saw, places these incidents after Jesus has begun His public ministry and so transforms them into a typical day in the life of the messiah. As in Mark, when Jesus seeks solitude for prayer, the crowds come seeking Him out. Jesus resists their attempt to keep Him in Capernaum with the words: “I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other cities also; for I was sent for this purpose.” (Lk 4:42-3; Mk 1:35-9) In recounting this incident Luke interpolates Mark’s text in two ways. In Mark we find no mention of the kingdom. Luke, on the other hand in his initial general description of Jesus’ early ministry had made no mention of Jesus’ central message: namely, the eschatological approach of God’s reign. Now as Jesus departs from Capernaum, Luke makes up in part for this earlier omission and indicates that the kingdom lies at the heart of Jesus’ preaching. Moreover, while Mark has Jesus preaching throughout Galilee, Luke portrays Him departing now to preach “in the synagogues of Judea.” (Lk 4:44; Mk 1:39) Luke later distinguishes Judea from Galilee. It seem therefore unlikely that Luke would use the name “Judea” to designate Palestine in general. Although Luke confines most of Jesus’ early ministry to Galilee, the evangelist now has Jesus make an early foray into Judea apparently because he wants to portray Jesus even in his Galilean ministry as having an impact beyond Galilee. (Cf. Lk 5:17, 6:17, 7:17) As we shall 2. Cf. John G. Kilgallen, “Provocation in Luke 4, 23-24,” Biblica, 7(1989), pp. 511-516; Dirk Monshouwer, “The Reading of the Prophet in the Synagogue at Nazareth,” Biblica, 72(1991), pp. 90-99; Robert C. Tannehill, “The Mission of Jesus According to Luke IV.16-30” in Jesus in Nazareth, edited by Walther Eltester (Berlin: Waelter de Bruyter & Co., 1972), pp. 51-75; Walther Eltester, “Israel in lukanischen Werk und die Nazarethperikope,” op. cit., pp. 76- 147; Asher Finkel, “Jesus’ Sermon at Nazareth (Luke 4, 16-30)” in Abraham Unser Vater, edited by O. Betz et al. (Köln: E.J. Brill, 1963), pp. 106-115; David Hill, “The Rejection of Jesus at Nazareth (Luke IV 16-30),” Novum Testamentum, 13(1971), pp. 161-180; Hugh Anderson, “Broadening Horizons: The Rejection of Jesus at Nazareth in Light of Recent Critical Trends,” Interpretation, 18(1964), pp. 257-275; Larrimore Crockett, “Luke 4.25-27 and Jewish-Gentile Relations in Luke-Acts,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 88(1969), pp. 177-183; NJBC: 43:57- 62; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 525-540; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 77-82; Evans, Luke, pp. 265-276; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 394-421; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 129-135.


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see in volume three, the fourth gospel has Jesus preach in Jerusalem several times during His public ministry.3 As in the other synoptics, the crowds in Luke serve as the anonymous backdrop to Jesus’ ministry. Among the synoptics, however, Luke especially conveys a sense of the joy and astonishment which Jesus’ presence inspired.4 The repeated response of the crowds in Luke develops the evangelist’s portrait of Jesus as the joyful prophet of good news. Like the other synoptics, Luke indicates that Jesus’ miraculous powers provided an important key to His popularity. (Lk 6:19; Mk 6:56; Mt 14:36) Moreover, following Mark, Luke indicates that the crowds, despite their enthusiasm, failed to grasp the real truth about Jesus and about His mission. (Lk 9:18-22) Luke records only one multiplication of the loaves and fishes. Since the second multiplication of the loaves in both Mark and Matthew foreshadows the eucharist of the Gentiles, Luke, who intends to describe in Acts the conversion of the Gentiles may have judged such foreshadowing superfluous.5 (Mk 8:1-10; Mt 15:32-9) Like the other synoptic evangelists, Luke assimilates the one miracle of multiplication to the eucharist. Before Jesus has the Twelve distribute the 3. Cf. Michael Wolter, “‘Reich Gottes’ bei Lukas,” New Testament Studies, 41(1995), pp. 541-563; NJBC: 43:67; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp.554-558; Evans, Luke, pp. 283-286. 4. Before the call of the disciples in Luke, the milling crowds force Jesus to commandeer Peter’s boat as a pulpit for instructing them. (Lk 5:1-3) As Jesus’ reputation grows, “great multitudes” of people gather to hear Him. (Lk 5:15) The density of the crowds around Jesus force the friends of the paralytic to lower him through the roof into Jesus’ presence. (Lk 5:19) Luke describes the guests at Levi’s feast as “a large company of tax collectors and others.” (Lk 5:29) Crowds gather to hear the sermon on the plain, the equivalent in Luke of Matthew’s sermon on the mount. (Lk 6:17) Luke, however, directs the sermon itself to the disciples rather than to the crowds. (Lk 6:20) Crowds accompany the widow of Nain and witness Jesus’ raising of her dead son. (Lk 7:11-2) The crowds pressing around Jesus keep His relatives from approaching Him. (Lk 8:19) Crowds await Jesus’ return from the country of the Gerasenes and press about Jesus when the woman with a flux of blood touches Him. (Lk 8:40, 42, 45) Crowds greet Jesus when He descends from the mountain of the transfiguration and express astonishment at His exorcism of the epileptic demoniac boy. (Lk 9:37, 43) The crowds react with amazement when Jesus exorcises a dumb man and cures him. (Lk 11:14) Luke at times insists on the size of the crowds as a way of dramatizing Jesus’ popularity. At one point the evangelist notes that “so many thousands of the multitude had gathered together that they trod upon one another.” (Lk 12:1) In one of Jesus’ sabbath cures the synagogue official rebukes the people for coming to Jesus for healing on the sabbath; but the people rejoice in Jesus’ sabbath healings anyway. (Lk 13:14, 17) In the cure of the blind man the noise of the crowds accompanying Jesus alerts him to Jesus’ presence. (Lk 18:36) Finally, the crowds surrounding Jesus force the short-legged Zacchaeus to climb a tree in order to see Jesus. (Lk 19:3) 5. Both Mark and Matthew situate this miracle in a “lonely place,” Luke locates the “lonely place” near the city of Bethsaida. The crowds learn of Jesus’ arrival and swarm to hear Him. He continues instructing them in the way of the kingdom and cures the sick. (Lk 9:10-12; Mk 6:35; Mt 14:15)

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five loaves and two fish, He performs the eucharistic gestures of taking, blessing, breaking, and giving. (Lk 9:16; Mk 6:41; Mt 14:19) Luke, however, adds his own narrative touches to Mark’s story. He notes, for example, that “the day began to wear away” when Jesus performed the miracle. (Lk 9:12-7) The same expression occurs toward the end of the encounter between the risen Christ and the disciples on the way to Emmaus. As evening draws near and the day wears away, they invite Jesus to stay with them. He does and again breaks bread in a way which recalls the eucharist; and the disciples recognize Him in the breaking of the bread. (Lk 24:28-35) Luke thus brackets the event of the eucharist itself with a symbolic foreshadowing prior to the passion as well as a symbolic recall after the resurrection. Luke thus underscores the fact that the eucharist not only recalls the last supper and the passion which it interprets but also celebrates the resurrection.6 On occasion, Luke explicitly directs some of Jesus’ teachings toward the crowds. Luke’s Jesus, for example, addresses his encomium of John the Baptizer to the crowds. (Lk 7:24) Jesus warns against self-exaltation. (Lk 14:7-10) As in Mark’s parabolic discourse, Luke’s Jesus addresses the first parable of the astonishing harvest to the crowds; but the other parables all concern the disciples directly. (Lk 8:4-8) The parable of the astonishing harvest serves the same apologetic purpose in Luke as in the other synoptics: it warns the unbelieving crowds that, despite initial setbacks, the kingdom will bear astonishing fruit. I shall reflect on the rest of the parabolic discourse in describing the Lukan Jesus’ relationship to His disciples and in analyzing the scope of His teachings. Mark leads Luke, as he leads Matthew, to misinterpret the parables as attempts on Jesus’ part to conceal His message from the unbelieving crowds. Moreover, Luke, like Mark, contrasts the unbelieving, uncomprehending crowds with the disciples who have access to “the secrets of the kingdom.” (Lk 8:9-10; Mk 4:10-12; Mt 13:10-7) As we shall see when we consider Jesus’ relationship to His disciples, Luke has reservations about Mark’s stress on the esoteric character of the Christian message.7 6. Luke also edits Mark’s version of this miracle. He omits some descriptive details and adds others. On the one hand, he shortens the dialogue between Jesus and His disciples; on the other he names the disciples specifically as the Twelve. (Lk 9:12-6; Mk 6:35-40; cf. Mt 14:15-9) Luke probably names the Twelve because of the twelve baskets of leftovers to which Mark alludes at the end of his account of the miracle. Luke’s account implicitly portrays each of the Twelve returning with a hamper full of fragments. (Lk 9:17; Mk 6:43) Cf. NJBC: 43:113; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 761-769; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 144-150; Evans, Luke, pp. 399-403; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 825-836; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 224-227; F. Neirynck, “The Matthew-Luke Agreements in Mt 14,13-14/Lk 9,10-11 (Par. Mk 6, 30-34),”Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 60(1984), pp. 25-44. 7. Cf. Edward F. Siegman, C.SS.P., “Teaching in Parables,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 23(1961), pp. 161-181.


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The Crowds in the Journey Discourse Sometimes Luke’s Jesus speaks to individuals in the crowds. After the controversy over Beelzebul, a woman in the crowd cries out: “Blessed is the womb which bore you, and the breasts which you sucked!” Jesus replies: “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it.” (Lk 11:28) No other evangelist mentions this incident. The woman’s outburst recalls the Magnificat: “From now on all generations will call me blessed.” (Lk 1:48) Jesus, however, responds to the woman’s praise with typical self-effacement. He draws attention away from Himself and to the heart of His message: He has come to call people to the obedience of faith. That means more to Him than any relationship based only in physical descent. Jesus’ reply also recalls His words to His own relatives when they attempt to speak with Him: “My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.”8 (Lk 8:19-21) When a man in the crowds asks Jesus to tell his brother to share his inheritance with him, Jesus replies that no one has appointed him to judge such matters. (Lk 12:13-4) The man has failed to understand the purpose of Jesus’ own mission. Jesus comes not to settle legal questions of inheritance but instead to summon people to renounce all forms of covetousness. The story ends with the pronouncement: “Take heed, and beware of all covetousness; for a man’s life does not consist in abundance of his possessions.” (Lk 12:15) Jesus’ reply to the man also hearkens back to His first temptation in the desert and to His response there to the devil: “One does not live by bread alone.” (Lk 4:4) One must look to God, not to wealth, as the ultimate source of one’s life. The parable of the rich fool follows, which further develops this last point. (Lk 12:16-21) I have reflected on the meaning of the parable in another context.9 Mark’s Jesus, as we have seen, rejects the hypocritical challenge posed to Him by some Pharisees to work some great sign which authenticates His ministry. Luke’s Jesus rebukes the crowds, not the Pharisees, for flocking to Him in search of a sign. Luke’s Jesus, like Matthew’s, refuses to work a sign and promises instead the “sign of Jonah.” Luke’s Jesus, however, interprets the “sign of Jonah,” not as the resurrection, but as the conversion of the Gentiles. Luke observes: When the crowds were increasing, He began to say, “This generation is an evil generation; it seeks a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah. For as Jonah became a sign to the people of Nineveh, so will 8. Cf. Raymond E. Brown et al., Mary in the New Testament (New York, NY: Paulist, 1978), pp. 170-172; NJBC, 43:130; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 926-929; Evans, Luke, pp. 495- 500; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 280-281. 9. Cf. Engelbert Neuhösler, Anspruch und Antwort Gottes (Düsseldorf: Patmos Verlag, 1962), pp. 170-185; NJBC: 43:134; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 967-970; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 197-202; Evans, Luke, pp. 520-529; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 294-297.

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the Son of man be to this generation. The Queen of the South will arise at the judgment with the men of this generation and condemn them; for she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and behold, something greater than Solomon is here. The men of Nineveh will arise at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and behold, something greater than Jonah is here.” (Lk 11:29-32)

The faith of the Gentile Ninevites and of the Gentile Queen of Sheba rebukes the unbelief of Jesus’ own generation. Their unbelief foreshadows with reverse symbolism the conversion of the Gentiles which Luke will describe in Acts. The Lukan sign of Jonah also recalls Jesus’ proclamation of a universal salvation at Nazareth. The crowds’ unbelief parallels that of the Nazarenes.10 The parable of the lamp which follows reflects further on the crowds’ unbelief. In the parabolic discourse, as we shall soon see, Jesus has already applied the same parable to the disciples. During the journey discourse, however, Jesus puts the parable of the lamp this way: No one after lighting a lamp puts it in a cellar or under a bushel, but on a stand, that those who enter may see the light. Your eye is the lamp of your body; when your eye is sound your whole body is full of light; but when it is not sound, your body is full of darkness. Therefore, be careful lest the light in you be darkness. If then your whole body is full of light, having no part dark, it will be wholly bright, as when a lamp with its rays gives you light. (Lk 11:33-36)

In Luke’s parabolic discourse, the lamp symbolizes the faith of the disciples which draws others into the Church. Here Jesus Himself functions as the light. He warns the crowds that their own blindness to the fact that they confront a greater than Solomon or Jonah leaves them in darkness. The problem lies not with the light itself but with the darkening of the crowds’ vision. Their lack of faith keeps them from seeing the light and excludes them from the household of the faith. The illumination of the entire body-person through healthy vision resembles a house completely lit up by a lamp. (Cf. Lk 8:19-21) Only repentance from unbelief—”Therefore be careful lest the light in you be darkness”—will allow the crowds to acknowledge the light of Jesus. The clear-sightedness, or simplicity (haplous), of vision to which Jesus 10. Cf. Richard Alan Edwards, The Sign of Jonah in the Theology of the Evangelists and Q (Napierville, IL: Alec R. Allenson, 1971), pp. 89-95; John Howton, “The Sign of Jonah,” Scottish Journal of Theology, 15(1962), pp. 288-304; NJBC: 43:131; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 929-938; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 184-193; Evans, Luke, pp. 496-500; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 281-283.


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calls the crowds connotes sincerity and the absence of hypocritical pretense.11 In the presence of an enormous multitude of people, Jesus warns His disciples against the Pharisaical leaven of hypocrisy. (Lk 12:1) Clearly, Luke’s warning applies to both groups, to believers and to unbelievers alike. Later in the journey discourse, Jesus calls the crowds themselves “hypocrites.” Jesus warns: When you see a cloud rising in the west, you say at once, “A shower is coming”; and so it happens. And when you see the south wind blowing, you say, “There will be scorching heat”; and it happens. You hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of the earth and sky; but why do you not know how to interpret the present time? (Lk 12:54-6)

The hypocrisy of the crowds consists in the fact that they flock to Jesus but finally do not believe in Him. Their blindness to the signs of the times keeps them from interpreting correctly the significance of Jesus and of His ministry. Some interpreters also see in this teaching a reference to the fact that Palestinian Jews had embarked on a collision course with the Roman empire, even though rebellion against Roman rule in fact intensified in the decades which followed Jesus’ ministry and death. If Jesus does refer to contemporary political unrest, He is warning the crowds that only repentance and submission to God’s reign can save them from national disaster.12 Jesus continues: And why do you not judge for yourselves what is right? As you go with your accuser before the magistrate, make an effort to settle with him on the way, lest he drag you to the judge, and the judge hand you over to the officer, and the officer put you in prison. I tell you, you will never get out until you have paid the very last penny. (Lk 12:57-9)

11. Cf. Marc Philonenko, “La parabole sur la lampe (Luc 11:33-36) et les horoscopes qumraniens,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 79(1988), pp. 145-151; Gottfried Nebe, “ Das estai in Lk 11,36—eine neuer Deutungsforschlag,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 83(1992), pp. 108-114; Ferdinand Hahn, “Die Worte vom Licht: Lk 11:33-36” in Orientierung an Jesus, edited by Paul Hoffmann et al. (Freiburg: Herder, 1973), pp. 107-138; P. Benoit, “Le logion sur l’oeil lampe du corps,” Revue Biblique, 60(1953), pp. 603-605; NJBC: 43:131; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 938-941; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 184-187; Evans, Luke, pp. 496-500; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 283-285. 12. Cf. H.G. Wood, “Interpreting this Time,” New Testament Studies, 2(1956), pp. 262-266; Günther Klein, “Die Prüfung der Zeit (Lukas 12:54-56),” Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche, 61(1964), pp. 373-390; NJBC: 43:137; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 998-1003; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 207-210; Evans, Luke, pp. 542-544; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 309-311.

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The question “And why do you not judge for yourselves what is right?” probably links this second teaching to the preceding one. In effect, Jesus warns the crowds that unless they acknowledge their hypocrisy and repent of their failure to respond to Him and to His message, they run the risk of facing a severe judgment. The Crowds in Jesus’ Jerusalem Ministry In Luke’s account of Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, the disciples of Jesus, rather than the crowds, greet Him with rejoicing. In the other synoptics, as we have seen, the Jerusalem populace greets Jesus. (Lk 19:37; Mk 11:8-9; Mt 21:1-11) Nevertheless, as in the other synoptics, Jesus’ initial popularity with the crowds in Jerusalem affords Him temporary protection from the malice of the chief priests. (Lk 22:6) The crowds also function as a backdrop in Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry. While Jesus is instructing the people, the temple priests confront Him concerning the authority which justifies His words and actions. (Lk 20:1-8) Luke’s Jesus addresses the parable of the wicked tenants to the shocked crowds. In it He warns them against the wickedness of their religious leaders. (Lk 20:9-19) Finally, Jesus warns “all the people” to guard against the religious hypocrisy and avarice of the scribes. (Lk 20:45-7) In Mark and Matthew, Jesus delivers the eschatological discourse on the Mount of Olives in private conference with His disciples. Luke’s Jesus delivers the discourse publicly in the temple itself whose destruction He is predicting. During Luke’s account of the Jerusalem ministry, Jesus, as we have seen, delivers virtually all His teachings in the temple precincts.13 (Lk 21:5; Mk 13:3; Mt 24:3) Luke’s Jesus, then, in contrast to Mark’s and Matthew’s directs the bulk of the eschatological discourse to the crowds, even though sections of it target the disciples in particular. When the crowds admire the temple with its massive stones and offerings, Jesus responds: As for these things which you see, the days will come when there shall not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down. (Lk 21:6)

This prompts Jesus’ audience to ask Him when this will happen and the signs which will accompany it.14 13. The discourse which follows divides into five parts. It follows the general plan of the eschatological discourse in Mark, but does so with greater terseness of style. In the first part of the discourse, Jesus warns against listening to false messiahs who claim to bring the end time. In the second He warns that His disciples must suffer much persecution before the end time comes. In the third part, Jesus describes the destruction of Jerusalem. The fourth section of the discourse describes the final judgment. The discourse ends with the parable of the fig tree and an exhortation to readiness. 14. Cf. Nickolaus Walter, “Tempelzerstörung und synoptische Apokalypse,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 57(1966), pp. 38-49; A. Feuillet, “Le discours de Jésus sur la ruine du temple,” Revue Biblique, 55(1948), pp. 481-495.


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Despite minor changes, Luke’s message remains much the same as in corresponding passages in Mark and Matthew: namely, before the end time, history will bristle with tribulations.15 In the first part of the discourse, Jesus warns the crowds that false messiahs will announce the last day but that people should ignore them. As in the other synoptics, catastrophes give no certain sign that the end has arrived. (Lk 21:8-10; cf. Mk 13:3-8; Mt 24:3-7) Mark, as we have seen, refers to “the abomination of desolation” as the sign of the approaching doom of the holy city. Luke, writing after the city has fallen, has Jesus say that the encampment of the avenging armies around the city will signal the its immanent destruction. (Lk 21:20; Mk 13:14; Mt 24:15) Luke’s Jesus, like Mark’s, advises His disciples to flee a doomed Jerusalem. (Lk 21:20-4) Unlike Mark, however, Luke describes the fate of the city with grim accuracy: For great distress shall be upon the earth and wrath upon this people; they will fall by the edge of the sword, and be led captive among all nations; and Jerusalem will be trodden down by the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled. (Lk 21:23-4)

Luke omits Mark’s promise that God would shorten the time of siege and suffering for the sake of the elect. Instead, Luke speaks in terms of unrelenting retribution. The “times of the Gentiles,” the period allotted to them for effecting the utter destruction of Jerusalem, must play themselves out. Luke records Jesus’ prophecy of an event which has already transpired as a way of shoring up his community’s faith in the second coming. If Jesus’ proved right about the destruction of Jerusalem, He will also prove right about final judgment.16 As in Mark, the Son of man arrives announced by signs and disasters in heaven and on earth. Luke, however, embellishes Mark’s text. Luke’s Jesus says: And there will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and upon the earth distress of nations in perplexity at the roaring of the sea and waves, men fainting with fear and foreboding of what is coming on the world; for the 15. Luke adds pestilences and great portents in the sky to the earthquakes and famines and wars which will precede the second coming. 16. Cf. Felix Fleckiger, “Luk 21, 20-24 und die Zerstörung Jerusalems,” Theologische Zeitschrift, 28(1972), pp. 385-390; Georg Braumann, “Die lukanische Interpretation der Zerstörung Jerusalems,” Novum Testamentum, 6(1963), pp. 120-127; A. Feuillet, “Le discours de Jésus sur la ruine du temple,” Revue Biblique, 52(1949), pp. 61-82; Arthur Wainwright, “Luke and the Restoration of the Kingdom of Israel,” Expository Times, 89(1977-1978), pp. 76- 79; James A. Gardiner, “Studies in Texts: Luke 21.28,” Theology, 59 (1956), pp. 460-462.

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powers of the heavens will be shaken. (Lk 21:25-6; cf. Mk 13:24-5; Mt 24:29)

The roaring waters could refer Ps 46:4. The roaring flood connotes the unleashing of the forces of chaos. Matthew’s Jesus, as we have seen, predicts that the Son of man’s arrival will cause grief to many. Luke’s, however, sees His approach as terrifying for sinners but not for the elect: And then they will see the Son of man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. Now when these things begin to take place, look up and raise your heads, because your redemption is at hand. (Lk 21:27-8)

Luke omits Mark’s reference to the Son of man sending out angels to gather the elect from the four corners of the earth. Instead, he replaces this encouraging descriptive detail with an exhortation to rejoice, since Jesus comes to redeem those who have lived faithful to Him. The parable of the fig tree closes the eschatological discourse. The parable refers to the cosmic signs Jesus has described in vv. 11 and 25. People recognize the approach of summer by the appearance of leaves on the fig tree. So too when these cosmic signs appear, people should recognize that the full and final establishment of the kingdom of God approaches. (Lk 21:29-31) The discourse ends with the prediction: Truly, I say to you, this generation will not pass away till all has taken place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. (Lk 21:32-3)

This prediction reflects the one made in Lk 2:27, Mk 9:1, and Mt 16:28. Exegetes argue over the meaning of the phrase “this generation.” They identify it with Jesus’ own contemporaries, the whole of humanity, the Jewish people, and the generation alive at the time of the parousia. Jesus, however, is probably referring to the original question about the destruction of the temple which prompted the discourse. In that case, Jesus would be saying that His own generation would live to see the destruction of Jerusalem, even though the time of the second coming remains shrouded in obscurity. By directing most of the eschatological discourse to the crowds, Luke universalizes the need of eschatological readiness. All people, not just the disciples, must live in active preparedness for the final judgment.17 17. Cf. Feuillet, loc. cit., pp. 82-92; Ruthild Geiger, Die Lukansichen Endzeitreden: Studies Zur Eschatologie des Lukas Evangeliums (Frankfurt: Peter Lang, 1973), pp. 149-268; Josef Zmijewski, Die Eschatologiereden des Lukas-Evangeliums (Bonn: Peter Hanstein Verlag, 1972), pp. 43-325; NJBC: 43:174-176; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1323-1256; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 319-331; Evans, Luke, pp. 729-765; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 421-437.


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The Crowds in the Passion Having called for Jesus’ blood during His trial, the Lukan crowds, as we have seen, repent on Calvary. Motivated apparently by the forgiveness and faith with which Jesus dies, the people return from the place of execution beating their breasts. (Lk 23:48) Their compunction recalls their repentance at John’s preaching (Lk 3:10) and foreshadows the large number of conversions which will follow Peter’s Pentecost sermon.18 (Acts 2:41) The Analogy of Christological Knowing Luke, as we have seen, stresses the forgiveness of God more than the other synoptic evangelists. The repentance of the Judean crowds at the conclusion of Luke’s passion account suggests that the mercy and forgiveness of God have the power to overcome even the most obstinate unbelief. It also foreshadows the conversion of the Jerusalem crowds after Peter’s Pentecost sermon. Luke on occasion portrays the crowds somewhat more negatively than the other synoptic evangelists. Luke has Jesus rebuke the crowds rather than the scribes and Pharisees for seeking a sign. Luke’s Jesus promises the sign of Jonah to the crowds but interprets it differently. By the sign of Jonah Luke means the conversion of the Gentiles whose faith in Jesus will stand in judgment over the unbelief of the Palestinian crowds. Other rebukes to the crowds follow in Luke as Jesus moves toward His passion. Luke’s Jesus challenges the hypocrisy of the crowds: they can read the signs of changing weather but can neither read the signs of the times correctly nor respond to Jesus with appropriate faith. In other words, Luke occasionally uses the crowds to underscore the unbelief with which Jesus’ fellow countrymen responded on the whole to His mission. One senses here a Lukan commentary on Jewish indifference to the gospel during the evangelist’s own day. Luke departs even more significantly from Mark and Matthew by having Jesus deliver the eschatological discourse to the crowds in the temple, not to His disciples in private. The shift in audience results in part from the fact that Luke’s Jesus in His messianic struggle with the chief priests for the temple prefers it as a classroom. Nevertheless, in redirecting the discourse to the crowds, Luke makes clearer its universal import. Universal salvation means universal judgment and requires universal readiness. As a Pauline Christian speaking to Gentile Christians, Luke once again underscores the universality of salvation in Christ.

18. Cf. Gottfried Rau, “Das Volk in der lukanischen Passionsgeschichte: Eine Konjectur zu Lk 23, 13,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 56(1956), pp. 41-51; NJBC: 43:193; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1513-1528; Evans, Luke, pp. 875-879; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 488- 491.

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Only one final set of Lukan dramatic linkages needs consideration: namely, Jesus’ relationship to His disciples. As in the other synoptics, this linkage more than any other defines the “plot” of Luke’s gospel. As we shall see, Luke handles that relationship in an original and distinctive way. (II) As we have seen, in Mark the call of the disciples parallels Jesus’ own messianic commissioning. Luke, however, places the call of the disciples later in Jesus’ ministry, after His presumed return from an excursion into Judea. The displacement destroys the Markan parallelism.19 (Lk 4:44) Jesus and His Disciples In Mark Jesus exorcises the demoniac at Capernaum in the presence of the disciples and the exorcism parallels Jesus’ desert temptations. (Mk 1:21-8) Luke destroys this parallelism as well and locates the call of the disciples after the exorcism. Hence, Luke’s Jesus seems to perform this initial deliverance alone. (Lk 4:31-7) Nevertheless, Luke follows Mark by having Jesus retire to Simon’s house after the exorcism. There Jesus cures Simon’s mother-in-law. (Lk 4:38-9) As Luke tells Jesus’ story, Simon knows Jesus before Jesus calls him. Luke also expands Mark’s brief account of the call of the disciples and focuses the story on the call of Simon. (Lk 5:1-3) Luke’s special concern with Simon Peter foreshadows the prominent role which the apostle will play in the first part of Acts. The call of Simon in Luke has several parallels to the encounter between the risen Jesus and His disciples in Jn 21:1-11. 1) In both gospels, the disciples have fished all night and caught nothing. Jesus directs them to cast their nets again. The disciples pull in an extraordinary catch of fish. 2) Simon reacts to the catch. 3) Simon calls Jesus “Lord.” 4) The other fishermen take in the haul but say nothing. 5) The story culminates in the following of Jesus. 6) The huge haul of fish symbolizes a successful missionary endeavor. 7) Both stories use the name “Simon Peter.” (Lk 5:1-11) The two stories, however, also exhibit real dissimilarities. 1) In John the disciples at first do not recognize the risen Christ as Jesus. In Luke Jesus has yet to rise from the dead. 2) In John, Simon Peter and the Beloved Disciple share the same boat. In Luke they do not. 3) In John, Peter leaves the hauling of fish to the other disciples, but not in Luke. In John, the net does not tear; in Luke it begins to break. 4) In John, but not in Luke, the disciples catch the fish near shore and drag them in. 5) In John, Peter rushes through the water to the risen Lord whom he has denied, while in Luke Peter asks Jesus to depart from him because of his sinfulness. 19. Cf. George, op. cit., pp. 351-427.


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Contemporary exegetes tend to agree that Luke and John have probably put a story about an extraordinary catch of fish to different narrative uses. In Luke the story stands in counterpoint to Jesus’ rejection at Nazareth. (Lk 4:16-30) Instead of rejection, Jesus here encounters disciples whose generosity leads them to abandon all they possess—goods and family—in order to join Jesus in proclaiming the kingdom. In the process Jesus transforms them from “fishermen” to “fishers of men.” Simon’s fearful plea that Jesus depart from him because of his sinfulness and Jesus’ call to Simon to follow Him despite the fisherman’s sinfulness both foreshadow Peter’s denial of Jesus and Jesus’ forgiveness of that denial after Peter repents. (Lk 5:8-11, 22:31-4, 54-62) Jesus’ call also makes it clear that he has no hesitation about gratuitously choosing sinners to follow Him and to proclaim the gospel. In his account of Paul’s apostolic vocation, Luke will make the same point.20 (Acts 9:1-19) As in the other synoptics, Jesus’ table fellowship with sinners begins to draw the disciples into conflict with Jesus’ adversaries. In Acts, the proclamation of the risen Christ will draw the disciples into His passion. (Lk 5:27-32) The call of the Twelve in Luke follows the five conflict stories which the evangelist adapts from Mark.21 As we have seen, Luke’s Jesus always prays before major events in His ministry. Luke alone of the synoptic evangelists says that Jesus’ choice of the Twelve followed an entire night of prayer on a mountaintop, the traditional Biblical place to encounter God.22 (Lk 6:12-6; Mk 3:13-9; Mt 10:1-4) 20. Cf. Antonio Pitta, “Ichthya ed opsarion in Gv 21,1-14,” Biblica, 71(1990), pp. 348-363; Christian-B. Amphoux, C.N.R.S., “Les premières éditions de Luc: Le texte de Luc 5,”Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 67(1991), pp. 312-327; Günther Klein, “Die Berufung des Petrus,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 58(1967), pp. 1- 44; Jean Delorme, “Luc v.1-2: Analyse structurale et histoire de la redaction,” New Testament Studies, 18(1971-1972), pp. 331-350; R. Pesch, “La rédaction lucanienne du logion des pécheurs d’hommes (Lc v. 10c),” in L’Évangile de Luc-The Gospel of Luke, re-edited by F. Neirynck (Leuven: University Press, 1989), pp. 135-154; NJBC: 43:68-72; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 559-576; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 87-91; Evans, Luke, pp. 286-293; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 448- 463; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 142-146. 21. In Luke as in the other synoptics, Jesus vindicates His divine authority to forgive sins by healing a paralytic. (Lk 5:17-26) He justifies His hobnobbing with sinners by appealing to His mission from the Father. He can risk contagion with sin in order to heal it in the same way that physicians risk contagion with physical illness in order to heal it. (Lk 5:27-32) Luke records the dispute over fasting as an extension of the dispute with the Pharisees over table fellowship with sinners. (Lk 5:33-9; Mk 2:18-22; Mt 9:14-7) As we have seen, Luke reproduces the substance of Mark’s account of this conflict. Luke also reproduces with minor editing the dispute over picking grain on the sabbath. (Lk 6:1-5; Mk 2:23-8; Mt 12:1-8) Cf. NJBC: 43:78-82; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp.577-612; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 91-105; Evans, Luke, pp. 296-317. 22. Cf. NJBC: 43:84; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp.612-621; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 100-105; Evans, Luke, pp. 317-322.

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The call of the Twelve in Luke serves as a prelude to the sermon on the plain, Luke’s equivalent of Matthew’s sermon on the mount. In Luke as in Matthew, the sermon follows an initial outpouring of miracles and exorcisms which manifest the healing and liberating character of Jesus’ message. (Lk 6:17-9) Matthew locates Jesus’ inaugural discourse on a mountain top because he desires to portray Jesus as Immanuel, as God-with-us. Like God who proclaimed the first covenant from Mount Sinai, Matthew’s Jesus proclaims the kingdom initially from a symbolic mountain top. Luke, however, portrays Jesus the joyful prophet of the kingdom, as the “prophet like Moses” whom the book of Deuteronomy had foretold. (Deut 18:15-18; cf. Acts 7:24-41, 51-53) Moses brought the Law down from the mountain top and proclaimed it to the people at its base. Accordingly, Luke’s Jesus, after an night of prayer atop a mountain first chooses the Twelve there and then descends to the plain to proclaim the beginning of a new Israel. The choice of the Twelve from a mountain top enhances its authority and solemnity. Luke presents a much shorter version of Jesus’ inaugural discourse than Matthew does because Luke includes most of Jesus’ teachings in the journey discourse. In both gospels, Jesus addresses His discourse to both the disciples and the crowds; but, in both gospels, His message applies especially to the disciples. Luke employs the same literary device as Mark to indicate this point and says that Jesus “raised His eyes on His disciples” before He began to speak. The stare indicates that His words envisage the disciples in a special way. (Lk 6:20, 7:1; Mt 5:1) In other words, the sermon on the plain did not exclude the crowds as an audience; but it deals primarily with the demands of discipleship.23 Luke’s Jesus begins the sermon on the plain by eyeing His disciples and saying: “Blessed are you poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.” (Lk 6:20) Matthew’s Jesus blessed the “poor in spirit” and spoke of them in the third person. (Mt 5:3-12) By adding “in spirit” Matthew insisted on the importance not only of poverty but of a personally appropriated detachment from any desire for wealth. Luke’s more direct form of address identifies the disciples with the poor. Luke’s Jesus equivalently says “If you would follow me and enter God’s kingdom, share the lot of the poor.” Luke’s version of the beatitudes preserves the same realized eschatology as Matthew’s. The first beatitude promises a present share in the kingdom; the other two beatitudes promise future blessings: Blessed are you who hunger now, for you shall be satisfied. Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh. (Lk 6:21-2; cf. Mt 5:4, 6) 23. Cf. Indrich Manek, “On the Mount-On the Plain (Mt v 1—Lk vi 17),” Novum Testamentum, 9(1967), pp. 124-131; H.-W. Bartsch, “Feldrede und Bergpredigt,” Theologische Zeitschrift, 16(1960), pp. 5-18.


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Luke records a terser and probably more authentic version of the beatitudes. Matthew’s Jesus blesses those who “hunger and thirst for righteousness.” (Mt 5:6) Luke’s Jesus promises food to the starving. Matthew’s Jesus promises comfort to the grieving; Luke’s promises them that they will rejoice. (Mt 5:4) Moreover, Luke’s Jesus explicitly contrasts the situation of the hungry and grieving “now” with what will be. The beatitudes give no indication when food and joy will become the lot of those now needy; but the contrast between “now” and “then” probably points to the end time as the final and full arrival of the kingdom. Luke, then, portrays the disciples of Jesus in this life as poor, hungry, grieving outcasts but blessed and beloved of God in their poverty, hunger, and grief. In other words, in his version of the beatitudes, Luke stresses even more than Matthew the sacrifices which membership in the kingdom demands. Luke’s fourth beatitude, like Matthew’s ninth, probably envisages primarily the situation of the post resurrection Church. It promises: Blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you and revile you, and cast out your name as evil, on account of the Son of Man! Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold your reward is great in heaven; for so their fathers did to the prophets. (Lk 6:22; cf. Mt 5:11)

The fourth beatitude makes it clear that the complete fulfillment of the blessings promised in the first three will indeed come “in heaven.” The identification of Christians’ enemies with the persecutors of the prophets could allude to conflicts between the Lukan Church and the synagogue, although Luke’s gospel gives no evidence of the kind of embittered confrontation with the synagogue which Matthew’s does. Three woes follow which reverse each of the blessings promised in the beatitudes: But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation. Woe to you who are full now, for you shall hunger. Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep. Woe to you, when all people speak well of you, for so their fathers did to the false prophets. (Lk 6:24-6)

As we have seen, the woes in Matthew target the hypocrisy of the scribes and Pharisees. (Mt 23:13-32) While they correspond in general to the beatitudes, they do not reverse one by one the blessings promised in the beatitudes in the way in which Luke’s woes do. Riches, abundance of food, and joy in this life (“now”) not only offer no assurance of ultimate membership in the kingdom but even exclude one from sharing in its blessing. Nor does the approval of others make one secure. Far from it, their approval means rather that one has strayed from the path of God’s truth.

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In other words, while Matthew portrays the beatitudes and the woes as the blessings and curses of the new covenant, Luke uses them to insist that the proclamation of the kingdom effects a radical messianic reversal of values. Luke’s woes and beatitudes also give eloquent testimony to the radical character of Jesus’ social program. Social status, wealth, happiness, far from symbolizing divine approval, exclude one from the blessings of God’s kingdom which belongs to the poor, the hungry, the grieving, the persecuted.24 Luke follows the beatitudes of Jesus with reflections on the moral conditions for membership in the kingdom. Luke lists as the first condition a universal love which includes even one’s enemies. Love of enemies takes practical shape, moreover, in nonviolent resistance to evil and oppression: But I say to you that hear, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who persecute you, pray for those who abuse you. To the one who strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also; and from him who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt. Give to everyone who begs from you; and of him who takes away your goods do not ask them again. As you wish that people would do to you, do so to them. And if you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same. And if you lend to those from whom you hope to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, to receive as much again. But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High; for He is kind to the ungrateful and the selfish. Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful. (Lk 6:27-36; cf. Mt 5:38-48)

The disciples must, like Jesus, walk in the path of non-violent resistance to evil. As in Matthew, in turning the other cheek and giving away one’s shirt, one counters oppression by seizing the moral initiative and forcing one’s oppressors to confront the people whom they abuse in a new light. Non-violent protest against oppression seeks to convert the oppressor. Matthew, as we have seen, presents Jesus’ counsels about how to resist oppression non-violently as a dimension of Jesus’ new morality. Matthew follows these counsels with an exhortation to love one’s enemies. By bracketing the counsels on non-violent resistance between two exhortations to love of enemies, Luke’s Jesus makes it even clearer that non-violent resis24. Cf. Raymond S. Brown, S.S., New Testament Studies (Milwaukee, WI: Bruce, 1965), pp. 265-271.


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tance to oppression exemplifies love of enemies. The disciples must counter enmity with love, hatred with good deeds, curses with blessing, stinginess with generosity, and abuse with prayer for the abuser. The disciples must abide by the “golden rule.” They must treat others just as they would want others to treat them. Such conduct presupposes the selfless ability to view situations empathetically. Universal love must replace exclusive love of one’s own. Jesus’ teachings here demand exactly the opposite of what Essene piety did: the Essenes blessed their own members but cursed their enemies and those who defected from their ranks. (1QS 2:2-17) Moreover, Luke’s Jesus typically insists on the eschatological significance of care for the needy: one must share one’s goods with others without any expectation of return in this life. One’s reward will come, as the beatitudes promise, “in heaven.” (Lk 6:23) Love of enemies conforms one to Jesus because it makes one a child of the Father. Matthew’s Jesus counsels “You, therefore, must be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect.” (Mt 5:48) Luke’s Jesus says: “Be merciful, even as you Father is merciful.” While Matthew portrays divine, universal love as the perfection of loving, Luke portrays it as the expression of a divine mercy and compassion toward sinners. The disciples must refrain from passing judgment on one another and must forgive one another if they expect to experience divine forgiveness. (Lk 6:37; cf. Mt 7:1-5) They must give generously to those in need in the confident expectation that the degree of their generosity will determine the extent of their reward. Luke’s God will not allow anyone to outdo Him in generosity.25 (Lk 6:37-42) The disciples will find themselves in positions of leadership and will have to instruct others. Leading others, however, presupposes repentant self-confrontation. Repentant confrontation with one’s own blindness and limitations must, always precede any attempt at correcting others. One must remove the “log” in one’s own eye before I can see to take the speck out of another’s eye. (Lk 6:41-2) Otherwise like one blind person leading another, both will fall into a pit. (Lk 6:39) By the same token, the disciples can instruct others truly only if they allow the teachings of Jesus, which they hand on, to conform them to Him. (Lk 6:40) Like Matthew’s Jesus, Luke’s insists that only practical living of the gospel proves goodness of heart: For no good tree bears bad fruit, nor again does a bad tree bear good fruit; for each tree is known by its own fruit. For figs are not gathered from 25. Cf. J. Duncan M. Derrett, “Christ and Reproof (Matthew 7.1-5;Luke 6.37-42),” New Testament Studies, 34(1988), pp. 271-281; W.C. van Unik, “Die Motivierung der Feindesliebe in Lukas VI 32-35,” Novum Testamentum, 8(1966), pp. 284-300.

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thorns, nor grapes from a bramble bush. The good person out of the treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil person of his evil treasure produces evil; for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks. (Lk 6:43-5; cf. Mt 12:33-7)

Luke’s Jesus likens the human heart, the deepest center of a person, to a storehouse where one hides one’s most prized treasure. The image suggests that one’s deepest attitudes constitute the most valuable part of the self, the part most worth sharing with others. Moreover, words and deeds express the contents of one’s heart. Good treasure comes from a good heart; evil treasure, from an evil heart. One knows the heart, therefore, through the deeds and words which flow from it, just as one knows trees by their fruit. Those who hear the good news need, therefore, both to interiorize it and to embody it. The sermon on the plain closes with a warning similar to the one which closes Matthew’s sermon on the mount: Why do you call me “Lord, Lord,” and not do what I tell you? Every one who comes to me and hears my words and does them, I will show you who he is like: he is like a man building a house, who dug deep, and laid the foundations upon rock; and when a flood arose the stream broke against that house and could not shake it because it had been well built. But he who hears and does not do them is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation; against which the stream broke, and immediately it fell, and the ruin of that house was great. (Lk 6:46-9; Mt 7:24-7)

In both gospels, the parable makes fundamentally the same point. In times of trial and testing, only one thing will assure one’s deliverance from evil and ruin: not just hearing the gospel but living it. The lived word provides the only solid foundation for a life of discipleship.26 The disciples witness Jesus raise the son of the widow of Nain to life. The miracle, unique to Luke, alludes to Elijah’s raising of the son of the widow at Zarepath. (1 Kgs 17:10-24) The miracle reveals Jesus as “a great prophet” like Elijah and Jesus’ ministry as a divine visitation. Jesus in fact shows even greater power over death than Elijah: Jesus raises the boy by a mere word, while Elijah had to prostrate himself over the dead boy three times and engage in prolonged prayer. The miracle also teaches other lessons to the disciples: Jesus has special compassion for the widow in her grief and need. She embodies the third beatitude. Moreover, in turning her sorrow to joy, Jesus reveals that He possesses sovereign authority over death itself.27 (Lk 7:11-7) 26. Cf. NJBC: 43:85-92; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 625-646; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 105-116; Evans, Luke, pp. 322-340; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 548-625; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 165-181. 27. Cf. Barnabas Lindars, S.S.F., “Elijah, Elisha, and the Gospel Miracles” in Miracles, edited by C.F.D. Moule (London: A.R. Mowbray & Co. Ltd., 1965), pp. 63-79;


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Luke records that many women disciples traveled around with Jesus. The evangelist names three: Mary of Magdala, from whom Jesus had driven seven devils, and two other woman, one named Joanna and the other Suzanna. As the wife of Chuza, Herod’s steward, Suzanna would have commanded considerable financial means. Indeed, the fact that all these women supported Jesus financially puts them in the upper financial bracket of society. While women commonly supported a rabbi financially, for them to travel around with him would have caused considerable scandal. Luke, then, notes this aspect of Jesus’ ministry as a way of dramatizing three points. First, unlike other rabbis, Jesus had women disciples who even traveled about with Him like male disciples. Second, Jesus apparently did not care about the raised eyebrows which His actions caused. Third, discipleship requires the rich to share their wealth with others. While Luke portrays Jesus’ relationship to women as shattering gender stereotypes, private women take a back seat to public men in the Acts of the Apostles.28 (Lk 8:1- 3) Luke observes that the large gathering of people “from town after town” heard Jesus’ parabolic discourse. (Lk 8:4) In Mark the parabolic discourse takes place on a lake. Luke makes no mention of a lake, possibly as a way of avoiding the awkward switch in location which occurs in Mark’s discourse. In Mark, as we have seen, Jesus’ discourse shifts implausibly back and forth from the boat in which it begins to a private chat between Jesus and the disciples. Moreover, Luke has already used Mk 4:1-2 as the setting for the call of Simon. Apparently, then, the evangelist felt disinclined to employ the same pericope as a setting for the parabolic discourse. To do so may have offended Luke’s sense of an orderly (Lk 1:3) narrative. (Lk 5: 1-3) While Matthew expands Mark’s parabolic discourse, Luke edits it slightly. As in Mark, the discourse begins with the parable of the astonishing harvest followed by Mark’s allegorized rendering of the parable. (Lk 8:4-15) Luke, however, eliminates Mark’s parable about the seed which grows without help from the farmer and yet yields a harvest. (Mk 4:26-9) Luke also displaces the parable of the mustard seed to his journey discourse. (Mk 4:30-2; Lk 13:18-9) The rest of parabolic discourse in Luke consists of the parable of the lamp and two proverbs. (Lk 8:16-18) In Mark’s sermon on the lake, the lamp shining on a lamp stand signifies that everything hidden or secret will eventually come to light. (Mk 4:21-3) The universal character of the disclosure in Mark suggests the NJBC: 43:95; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 655-661; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 116-121; Evans, Luke, pp. 345-349; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 646-655; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 185-188. 28. Cf. Turid Karlsen Seim, The Double Message: Patterns of Gender in Luke-Acts (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1994), NJBC: 43:701; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 695-698; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 130-135; Evans, Luke, pp. 365-367; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 710-715; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 201-203.

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final judgment when all hidden deeds will lay open to the light and when the kingdom will come to final and full disclosure In Luke, however, the lamp seeks to light people into the house. (Lk 8:16-7) Luke’s lamp symbolizes the light of faith which attracts others into the Christian community. The faith of the disciples should, then, seek to draw the unbelieving crowds, the outsiders, into the household of faith. In the journey discourse. Luke’s disciples will share in the responsibilities of evangelization. (Lk 10:1-12) Luke’s modification of the parable of the lamp also gives different meaning to the proverb which follows it: “For nothing is hid which shall not be made manifest, nor anything secret which shall not be known and come to light.” (Lk 8:16-7) In Luke, instead of connoting the ultimate disclosure of a secret wisdom, this proverb suggests that those who have access to the secrets of the kingdom ought to share them with those who do not know them.29 Luke also abbreviates and rewrites the final proverb of this short discourse. In Luke it reads as follows: “Take heed then how you hear; for to the one who has will more be given, and from the one who has not, even what he things he has will be taken away.” (Lk 8:18) Luke changes Mark’s “what you hear” (Mk 4:24) to “how you hear.” The phrase “how you hear” seems to allude to the allegorical interpretation of the parable of the astonishing harvest which in Luke as in Mark describes different ways of responding to the word of God: 1) initial faith, followed by unbelief, 2) a faith which has shallow root and so withers in time of temptation, 3) a faith choked by “the cares, riches, and pleasures of life,” and 4) faith received in a good and honest heart which bears astonishing fruit. (Lk 8:11-5) Those who respond generously to the word will receive more and more abundant gifts; those who respond in a niggardly way risk losing what little faith they have.30 Luke, like Matthew, edits from Mark’s text the embarrassing fact that Jesus’ relatives thought Him mad and came to take custody of Him (Lk 8:19; Mt 12:46; Mk 3:20-1, 31) After the parabolic discourse, Luke simply notes that “His mother and brethren” came looking for Him but could not reach Him because of the crowds. Luke does not indicate why they came looking for Jesus, while Matthew says that they wanted to speak with Him. Luke, however, uses the story to make the same fundamental point about the life of discipleship as the other two synoptics. Those who fol29. Cf. Jacques Dupont, Au service de l’évangile (Namur: Editions J. Duculot, 1968), pp. 43- 59; Gerhard Schneider, “Das Bildwort von der Lampe: Zur Traditionsgeschichte eines Jesus-Wortes,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 60(1970), pp. 183-209. 30. Cf. NJBC, 43:103; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 699-721; Evans, Luke, pp. 368-376; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 727-747; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 205-209.


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low Jesus and obey His teachings belong to the household of God. They become Jesus’ own family because, by imitating Him, they enter into the same obediential relationship with the Father as He.31 (Lk 8:19-21; Mk 3:31-5; Mt 12:46-50) Although Luke omits Mark’s account of Jesus walking on the water, Luke does recount with minor editing Jesus’ calming of the storm. Luke portrays the disciples as terrified by Jesus’ display of divine power. They ask, “Who then is this, that He commands the wind and water, and they obey Him?” (Lk 8:22-5; Mk 4:35-41; Mt 8:23-7) Luke uses this cosmological miracle in exactly the same way which Mark and Matthew do. The story underscores the question which Jesus puts to His disciples: “Who do you say that I am?” (Lk 9:20) As in the other synoptics, the calming of the storm in Luke functions as a theophany: it reveals the divinity of Jesus by endowing Him with a power which only God possesses. (Ps 65:7) As in the other synoptics, the story also sets the stage for the exorcism of the Gerasene demoniac. When the demons enter the swine which then plunge into the sea, their deaths reveal Jesus sovereign authority over the forces of chaos: over Satan, over his minions, and over the principalities and powers of this world, symbolized by the demon named “Legion.” In contrast to Matthew, then, Luke endorses Mark’s identification of the Roman legions with Satanic powers.32 (Lk 8:26-34) The disciples witness the cure of the woman with a flux of blood who touches Jesus while the crowds jostle Him. (Lk 8:42-4; Mk 5:24-31) As in Mark, Peter, James, and John witness the raising of the daughter of Jairus. (Lk 8:40-2, 49-56) In Luke as in Mark, the number twelve links the women symbolically. The daughter of Jairus has lived twelve years, the older woman has suffered from the flux of blood for twelve years. The number twelve also transforms both women into symbols of the old and new Israel. The old Israel had twelve tribes; the new one has twelve apostles. As in Mark, Jesus delivers the older woman from the impurity and condemnation of the Law. He establishes the new covenant by giving His disciples a share in His resurrection. Moreover, Luke, following Mark, links resurrection faith to the eucharist by having Jesus command that someone give the young girl something to eat. As in Mark, Jesus will give the same command to His disciples in the multiplication of the loaves and fishes, a miracle which, as we have seen, symbolizes the eucharist. 31. Cf. Brown, Mary in the New Testament, pp. 167-170; NJBC: 43:104; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 722-725; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 130-135; Evans, Luke, pp. 377-378; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 748-753; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 209-210. 32. Cf. NJBC: 43:105-106; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 726-741; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 135-140; Evans, Luke, pp. 379-387; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 754-784; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 211-216.

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(Lk 8:55, 9:13; Mk 5:43, 6:37) Matthew, as we have seen, edits this text more radically than Luke and eliminates most of Mark’s symbolism.33 Luke records a slightly edited version of the mission of the Twelve, but he preserves all the essential points which Mark makes. Jesus involves the Twelve actively in His own ministry, gives them authority to proclaim the word, and empowers them to heal and exorcise. The urgency of their message forces them to travel light: without staff, bed, bread, or money. The poverty with which they proclaim the word will force them to trust the providence of God and the hospitality of those to whom they preach. Wherever they find resistance to the word, they should withdraw and shake the town’s dust from their feet as a sign that they have nothing in common with unbelief. As in Mark, the gesture expresses the judgmental character of their preaching and ministry, a theme which Luke will develop in greater narrative detail in Acts. (Lk 9:1-6; Mk 6:7-13; cf. Acts 13:50) In all the synoptics, the mission of the Twelve foreshadows the mission of the apostolic Church and prescribes the attitudes which should accompany the apostolic proclamation of the good news. In Luke, however, the sending of the Twelve also foreshadows the “acts of the apostles” which the evangelist will describe in his second volume. Luke, in contrast to Mark makes no mention of the fact that the Twelve anointed with oil. Nor does Luke say that the Twelve preached a message of repentance, a theme otherwise dear to his heart. (Cf. Mk 6:12) Luke simply says that the disciples preached and healed everywhere. Their ministry foreshadows their activities in the Acts of the Apostles. Their ministry also imitates the Lukan Jesus’ joyful message of good news.34 (Lk 9:6) The return of the Twelve introduces the miracle of the loaves and fishes. (Lk 9:10-1) The Twelve disciples distribute the miraculous food to the crowds, an act which alludes to their future role as eucharistic presiders. They return from distributing the food, each with a basket full of fragments. The full baskets suggest messianic abundance.35 (Lk 9:12-17; cf. Mk 6:35-44; Mt 14:15-21) In Luke, the confession of Peter follows immediately upon the miracle of the loaves. Luke omits all the intervening material in Mark: the cures at Gennesaret, Jesus’ disputes with the Pharisees over their legalistic attitudes, the exorcism of the daughter of the Syrophoenician woman, the healing of a deaf man outside of Galilee, the second miracle of the loaves, 33. Cf. Rudolf Pesch, “Jairus (Mk 5,22, Lk 8, 41),” Biblische Zeitschrift, 14(1970), pp. 252- 256; H. van der Loos, The Miracles of Jesus (Leiden: Brill, 1965), pp. 509-519, 567-573; NJBC: 43:43; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, 785-808; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 140-144; Evans, Luke, pp. 389-393; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 785-808; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 216-220. 34. Cf. NJBC: 43:110; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 751-755; Evans, Luke, pp. 393-396; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 809-819; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 220-222. 35. Cf. NJBC: 43:113; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 761-769; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 144-150; Evans, Luke, pp. 399-403; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 825-836; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 224-227.


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the story of Jesus walking on the water and invoking the divine name, the Pharisees’ demand for a sign of heaven, and the progressive cure of a blind man. (Mk 6:45-8:26) Luke, as we have seen, relocates Jesus’ polemic against seeking signs as well as the warning against the leaven of the Pharisees in the journey discourse.36 (Lk 11:29-32, 12:1) In Luke, the great omission puts Peter’s confession in close narrative proximity to Herod’s question: “John I beheaded; but who is this about whom I hear such things?” (Lk 9:9) In Luke, Peter’s confession begins to answer Herod’s question. Accordingly, Luke omits the account of the confrontation between Jesus and Peter after the latter’s confession. Luke’s Jesus never calls Peter Satan. Nor does Luke turn Peter’s confession into a Church founding story as Matthew does. Instead, Luke makes it clear that those who profess faith in Jesus as messiah stand with Him and in opposition to the Herods of this world. (Cf. Mk 8:31-3; Mt 16:22-3) Luke’s infancy gospel has already identified Jesus as the Davidic messiah; hence, Peter’s confession does not tell readers anything they do not already know. Luke, however, situates Peter’s confession during one of Jesus’ prayer times. In fact, Luke finds it more important to locate Jesus’ question and Peter’s response in the context of prayer than to name the place where the incident occurred, namely, Caesarea Philippi. In Luke, then, prayer inspires Jesus’ question: “Who do the people say that I am?” and “Who do you say that I am?” These narrative details underscore the solemnity of what Jesus is asking and of Peter’s response. (Lk 9:18-20; cf.Mk 8:27-30; Mt 16:13-15) As in the other synoptics, the disciples respond that people regard Jesus as John the Baptizer returned from the grave or as Elijah or as one of the Old Testament prophets. When Jesus counters with the question: “But who do you say that I am?” Luke’s Peter responds: “The Christ of God.” (Lk 9:19-20) Mark’s Peter says simply: “You are the Christ.” (Mk 8:30) As we have seen, Luke’s Peter does not at this point confess Jesus’ divine sonship as Matthew’s does. (Mt 16:16-17) Instead, Luke’s Peter contents himself with designating the Father as the source of Jesus’ messianic commissioning. Peter’s response in Luke stands somewhere in between the corresponding response in Mark and Matthew. As in the other synoptics, Jesus charges the disciples to tell this to no one and immediately begins to qualify Peter’s confession with the first prediction of the passion. Like Mark and Matthew, Luke identifies the messiah with the suffering servant of second Isaiah.37 (Lk 9:22; Mk 8:30-1; Mt 16:20-1) 36. Cf. Michael Pettin, “Luke’s Great Omission and His View of the Law,” New Testament Studies, 42(1996), pp. 35-54. 37. Cf. Brown, Peter in the New Testament, pp. 64-69, 111-112; NJBC, 43:114; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, I, pp. 770-776; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 838-843.

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Following Mark, Luke underscores the point he has made in narrating Peter’s confession by having Jesus immediately insist that discipleship draws one into His passion. Luke’s Jesus says: If any one would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it; and whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the world and loses or forfeits himself: For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words, of him will the Son of man be ashamed when He comes in His glory and the glory of the Father and the holy angels. But I tell you truly, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the kingdom of God. (Lk 9:23-7)

Luke modifies this saying as he finds it in Mark. Luke inserts the word “daily (kath’ hemeran).” By the insertion, Luke makes it clear that the way of the cross and the day to day living of the gospel coincide. The disciple’s cross may include martyrdom, but it also includes suffering the ordinary tribulations of life in atoning love. As we have already seen, if authentic, this saying of Jesus need not imply that He foresaw His own crucifixion with any certitude. He could, however, have used the image of the condemned criminal, reviled and pelted by the crowds as a startling image of discipleship. On Jesus’ lips, then, the first saying would have challenged the disciples to endure any rejection, indignity, and suffering which discipleship entails. As in Mark, this first saying of Jesus forms a kind of topic sentence which the three following pronouncements develop. The word “for (gar)” which introduces the subsequent sayings subordinates them to the first, whose central insight they expand. The first pronouncement describes a fundamental condition for “daily” carrying one’s cross. It inculcates strict self-denial: in order to save one’s life one must live ready to sacrifice it for the sake of Jesus and of the gospel which He proclaimed and embodied. The second pronouncement teaches that, compared with saving oneself, even great wealth and power pale to insignificance. Indeed, the life of discipleship demands the renunciation of both wealth and power. Finally, the third pronouncement asserts that Christian self-denial expresses itself in the willingness to bear fearless testimony to Jesus, no matter what the consequences. To deny Him makes one liable to condemnation at the final judgment. The three pronouncements, then, extend to ordinary disciples the same point which Luke dramatizes in Peter’s confession, namely: that ordinary discipleship sets one in opposition to the principalities and powers of this world and causes one to share in Jesus’ sufferings. Following Mark, Luke has Jesus predict next that some of his audience will see the arrival of the kingdom during their lifetimes. Mark’s Jesus predicts that the kingdom will arrive “with power (en dynamei).” (Mk


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9:1) Luke omits this phrase possibly as a way of indicating that he regards the resurrection as the fulfillment of this saying. If so, then Luke is contrasting the way the kingdom begins to arrive in the resurrection with its final and full establishment when the Son of Man returns to judge the world.38 Like Mark, Luke uses the first prediction of the passion and the teachings of Jesus about the way of the cross in order to qualify Peter’s confession of Jesus as “the messiah of God.” As in the other synoptics, however, the story of the transfiguration qualifies the qualification by manifesting Jesus’ divine Sonship and by foreshadowing the resurrection. (Lk 9:28-36) Luke reproduces Mark’s account of the transfiguration with some editorial changes.39 Mark makes no mention of prayer prior to the transfiguration. Luke does. In Luke, as we have seen, Jesus’ prayer precedes any event of importance. Luke has the disciples fall asleep on the mountain and awaken to the vision of Jesus transformed. Mark makes no mention of sleep. Luke’s allusion probably links this event to Jesus’ prayer in the garden prior to His arrest. There again the disciples will fall asleep while Jesus prays. (Lk 22:45-6) Luke also mentions that Jesus’ face underwent alteration in the transfiguration and that Moses and Elijah appeared with Him “in glory.” Mark speaks only of the transformation of He clothes. Luke describes Jesus’ garments as “dazzling white” but omits Mark’s homely comparison to clothes whitened by a fuller. In Luke, the alteration of Jesus’ face probably alludes to the transformation of Moses’ face, which glowed with reflected divine glory after he spoke with God face to face. (Ex 34:34-35) The allusion assimilates Jesus implicitly to the prophet like Moses; but the alteration of Jesus’ face seems to express an inner personal quality, Jesus’ own glory. As in Mark, Moses and Elijah appear to Jesus. In Luke, the two Old Testament figures, like Jesus, participate in heavenly glory. Moreover, only Luke actually names what Jesus discusses with Moses and Elijah: namely, “His departure (ten exodon autou),” which He was to accomplish at Jerusalem.” Scholars debate whether the term “departure (exodon)” refers to Jesus death, resurrection, or ascension. It probably includes all three. However one takes it, the term certainly points to the paschal mystery as a new exodus, a new and universal liberation of humanity from bondage 38. Cf. M. Corbin, S.J., “Le Christ de Dieu: Méditation théologique sur Luc 9, 18-27,” Nouvelle Revue Théologique, 99(1977), pp. 641-680; B. Willaert, “La connexion entre la première prédiction de la passion et la confession de Pierre chez les synoptiques, “ Ephemerides Theologiae Lovaniensis, 32(1958), pp. 24-45; NJBC: 43:114; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 777-790; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 150-157; Evans, Luke, pp. 403-412; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 844-861; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 228-232. 39. Luke dates the transfiguration eight days after the confession of Peter and the instructions on the way of the cross. Mark puts it six days later. The change in number has no apparent significance.

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to Satan. The allusion again implicitly assimilates Jesus to the prophet like Moses, but with a difference. The resurrection, ascension, and Pentecost will effect an exodus superior to liberation from physical bondage. Mark makes no mention of any such “departure.” That Luke’s Jesus discusses the paschal mystery with the two who symbolize the Law and the prophets suggests that the paschal mystery fulfills both. As we shall see, Luke will insist on this point in his resurrection narratives.40 (Lk 24:27, 45-46) In Luke the Father calls Jesus “My Son, the chosen one.” In Mark the phrase “the chosen one” does not appear. Luke inserts it as a way of insisting on Jesus’ divine election as messianic Son of God. As in the other two synoptics, the Father’s testimony also recalls His words to Jesus in His messianic commissioning after His baptism by John. On that occasion, the Father’s commission began Jesus’ revelation as messianic Son of God in the image of the suffering servant. As in the other synoptics, the Father’s witness in the transfiguration begins to draw the disciples into Jesus’ own messianic commissioning. In Luke, however, the words of the Father also answer Herod’s question about Jesus’ identity and further qualify Peter’s confession of Jesus. Messiah and suffering servant, Jesus also confronts the disciples as the Son of God and therefore as the object of a unique divine election. Only God speaks with more authority than the Law and the prophets. In Luke, the Father proclaims this truth, not just to the disciples, but to client kings like Herod Antipas. In Mark as Jesus and the disciples descend the mount of transfiguration, they discuss John the Baptizer. Luke omits the conversation. Luke merely notes at the end of his account of the transfiguration that the disciples kept the incident secret. (Lk 9:28-36; Mk 9:2-8) Despite these Lukan modifications, the transfiguration has the same generic import as in the other two synoptics. Jesus takes the three disciples to a mountain top, the Biblical place for encountering God. Jesus’ transformation there manifests His divine glory and anticipates His resurrection. Moses symbolizes the Law and Elijah, the prophets, which Peter mistakenly puts on a par with Jesus’ own teaching by suggesting that they erect a tent for each of the interlocutors. The Father then testifies to Jesus and designates Him as His Son, as the chosen one of God, to whom the disciples must listen. The Father’s testimony endows Jesus’ teaching with a divine authority which surpasses both Moses and Elijah, both the Law and the prophets.41 40. Cf. Susan R. Garrett, “Exodus and Bondage: Luke 9:31 and Acts 12:1-24,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 52(1990), pp. 656-680. 41. Cf. Jindrich Manek, “The New Exodus in the Books of Luke,” Novum Testamentum, 2(1957), pp. 8-23; A. Feuillet, “Les perspectives propres à chaque evangeliste dans les recit de la transfiguration,” Biblica, 39(1958), pp. 281-301; Johannes M. Nuetzel, Die Verklärungserzälung im Markusevangelium: Eine redactionsgeschichtliche Untersuchung (Wurzburg: Echter Verlag, 1973), pp. 289-299; NJBC: 43:115-116; Fitzmyer, Gospel,


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Like Mark, Luke places the cure of the epileptic demoniac boy after the transfiguration; but like Matthew Luke severely edits Mark’s text. He omits many of the descriptive details in Mark. In Luke the boy’s father shows no signs of unbelief. In Mark he does. Mark portrays the crowds who witness the exorcism as curiosity seekers. Luke describes them as thunderstruck at the majesty of God which the exorcism has revealed. Luke’s Jesus does not call the demon “deaf and dumb” as Mark’s does; nor does Luke assimilate the deliverance to resurrection, as does Mark. In Mark the demon convulses the boy as it leaves him; but in Luke it convulses him as the boy comes into Jesus’ presence. The convulsion in Luke expresses the demon’s reaction to confronting Jesus rather than the struggle of deliverance. (Lk 9:37-43; Mk 9:14-27) As Luke tells the story, Jesus’ majestic authority over the demons contrasts with the unbelief of the disciples whose lack of faith has prevented them from casting the demon out. In Luke as in Mark, Jesus utters the rebuke: “O faithless and perverse generation, how long am I to be with you and bear with you?” (Lk 9:41) In Luke, the rebuke targets the disciples, while in Mark it refers to all of Jesus’ unbelieving contemporaries, the scribes, the disciples, and the curious but unbelieving crowds. Finally, Luke’s Jesus counters the admiration of the crowds with the second prediction of His impending death. Mark separates the second prediction of the passion from the exorcism of the demoniac boy.42 (Lk 9:43-5; Mk 9:30-2) The story of the demoniac boy dramatizes the disciples’ lack of faith. Luke follows it with two incidents which also dramatize their ambition and cliquishness. Jesus rebukes both attitudes. Luke’s Jesus first discovers the disciples arguing over which of them ranks greatest. Jesus recognizes that the argument springs from ambition: “Jesus perceived the thought of their hearts.” (Lk 9:46) As in Mark, whose version of this incident Luke edits, Jesus draws a child to Himself before instructing the disciples. Luke, moreover, combines into one the two sayings of Jesus which he finds in Mark. Luke’s Jesus says: “Whoever receives this child in My name receives Me, and whoever receives Me receives Him who sent Me; for the one who is least among you is the one who is greatest.” (Lk 9:48) Jesus demands that the disciples replace their egotistical aspirations to personal greatness with the recognition that in the new Israel, the least and most vulnerable count as the greatest. The dignity of the “little ones” derives from the fact that both Jesus and the Father identify most intimately I, pp. 791-804; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 790-804; Evans, Luke, pp. 413-421; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 862- 876; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 233-236. 42. Cf. Van der Loos, op. cit., pp. 397-405; NJBC: 43:117; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, pp. 805-811; Evans, Luke, pp. 422-426; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 878-885; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 236-238.

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with them. In the new Israel, therefore, true greatness expresses itself in humility and personal self-effacement. Jesus gives personal example to the disciples by identifying with the child in its smallness and vulnerability. (Lk 9:46-50; Mk 9:33-7) In contrast to Matthew, Luke does not use this incident as an occasion to denounce giving scandal.43 (Mt 18:1-10) Luke also edits slightly the next incident in Mark. The disciple John tells Jesus that the disciples had told a man exorcising in Jesus’ name to stop doing so “because he does not follow with us.” (Lk 9:49) Luke’s Jesus responds: “Do not forbid him; for he that is not against you is for you.” (Lk 9:50) Luke, however, omits Jesus’ statement in Mark that no one with faith enough to perform a work of power in Jesus’ name will tend to speak evil of Jesus. (Mk 9:39) The fact, however, that Luke focuses the story of the epileptic demoniac boy on the unbelief of the disciples, gives their intolerance of the successful exorcist a special ironic twist. They forbid someone with greater faith than they from doing what their lack of faith prevented them from doing. As in Mark, Jesus’ rebuke to the disciples’ intolerance and cliquishness challenges them to honor the signs of faith wherever they find it, even outside the circle of disciples, even therefore outside the Christian community.44 After these rebukes to the disciples, Luke begins his great journey discourse. During Jesus’ Galilean ministry, then, Luke has already made the following narrative affirmations about discipleship: 1) Jesus calls sinners to follow Him and transforms them into apostles and evangelists. 2) Discipleship commits one to the messianic reversal of values which Jesus proclaims. 3) Discipleship requires universal love, even of one’s enemies. It also requires non-violent resistance to evil. 4) The care for the poor which expresses authentic discipleship anchors one’s heart in heaven. 5) Repentance corrects judgmentalism in those who follow Jesus. 6) Authentic faith requires living the gospel and insures membership in God’s family. 7) In the family of God, women disciples stand on an equal footing with men. 8) The disciples’ living faith should draw others into the Church. 9) Jesus frees His followers from the constraints of the old Law by giving them a share in His risen life through eucharistic faith. 10) Confession of Jesus draws one into conflict and associates one with Him in His passion. The journey discourse develops and deepens many of these themes.

43. Cf. Legasse, Jésus et l’enfant, pp. 195-209; Robert Leaney, “Jesus and the Symbol of the Child (Luke ix. 46-48),” Expository Times, 66(1954), pp. 91-92; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, I, pp. 815-818; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 891-897; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 239-240. 44. Cf. NJBC: 43:118; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, 819-822; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 157-161; Evans, Luke, pp. 426-430; Bock, op. cit., I, pp. 897-900; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 240-242.


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The Disciples in the Journey Discourse The journey discourse encompasses nine chapters of Luke’s gospel. Besides collecting most of the teachings of Jesus into this discourse, Luke punctuates the journey with pronouncement stories. Although in the journey discourse, Luke develops the way section of Mark’s gospel, the evangelist endows this final journey with distinctive narrative and symbolic significance. At the beginning of the discourse, Luke points to Jesus’ ascension as its terminus. (Lk 9:51) Jesus’ journey, then, encompasses not only traveling to Jerusalem but the whole of the paschal mystery as it touches Him personally: His exodus. The discourse also functions as an extended metaphor for discipleship as it describes the pilgrimage of Jesus with His disciples into God. Not all the sayings of Jesus in the discourse target the disciples explicitly. I shall consider the thematic structure of the journey discourse in the following chapter when I reflect on the teachings of Jesus in Luke. Here I focus only on those teachings in the discourse which explicitly target the disciples. Shortly before the journey discourse, Luke’s Jesus predicts the passion for a second time. As the disciples marvel at the things which Jesus is doing, Jesus warns them: “Let these words sink into your ears; for the Son of man is to be delivered into the hands of men.” (Lk 9:43-5) Later in the gospel, Luke recalls this warning. After the women discover the empty tomb and hear the message of the two angels, they remember this second prediction and recognize the supreme importance of the paschal mystery. While terse, the second prediction of the passion in Luke has, then, considerable importance for understanding the correct way to read the journey discourse. The paschal mystery endows with ultimate significance everything which Jesus says, especially the journey discourse which soon follows. Luke begins the journey discourse with a lesson about non-violent resistance to hostility. Unfriendly Samaritans refuse to welcome Jesus and the disciples into their village. Outraged James and John ask Jesus if He wants them to destroy the village by calling down fire from heaven. The two disciples are imagining themselves as prophets like Elijah who confounded pagan prophets by calling down fire from heaven in order to consume his sacrifice to God. (1 Kgs 12:28) James and John, however, want to outdo Elijah. They desire the fire to consume the hostile Samaritan town and transform it into another Sodom, although James and John may also have been thinking of the two troops of soldiers whom Elijah incinerated with fire from heaven.45 (2 Kgs, 1:1-18) Jesus rebukes the fire-breathers and goes instead to another village. 45. Cf. Thomas L. Brodie, “The Departure for Jerusalem (Luke 9, 51-56) as a Rhetorical Imitation of Elijah’s Departure for the Jordan (2 kgs 1,1-2,6),” Biblica, 70(1989), pp. 96-109.

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Clearly, the disciples have yet to comprehend Jesus’ teaching about love of enemies, a teaching which Jesus now exemplifies for them. They also need to learn that as the suffering servant, Jesus humbly walks the path of nonviolent resistance to evil. Luke alone records this incident. (Lk 9:51-6) Moreover, the evangelist follows it with further reflections on discipleship.46 Three sayings about the practical demands of discipleship follow. The first two appear in Matthew, but Luke appends a third. (cf. Mt 8:18-22) To a man who protests that he will follow Jesus wherever He goes, Jesus replies: “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man has nowhere to lay His head.” (Lk 9:57-8) Jesus seems to sense a naive enthusiasm in the man’s protest and warns him to count the costs before throwing in His lot with the other disciples. Jesus can only offer him a life of austerity and of poverty which make even animal existence look good. Discipleship also commits one to a vagabond existence which serves the proclamation of the kingdom. Jesus then calls a disciple who begs permission to return home and bury his father, a praiseworthy act of filial piety. Jesus’ shocking response forbids him: “Leave the dead to bury their dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the reign of God.” (Lk 9:59-60) Jesus’ words, which would have deeply scandalized his contemporaries, make it clear that one can place no conditions on a life of discipleship: it claims one totally and takes precedence over all other obligations, even the most sacred. Discipleship, moreover, includes one among the living. Non-disciples might as well be dead. Discipleship also dedicates one to proclaiming the gospel. Luke appends a final saying about discipleship unique to him among the synoptics. A third potential disciple asks permission to say goodbye to his family. Again Jesus forbids it. Jesus responds: “No one who puts his hand to the plough and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.” (Lk 9:61-2) The third potential disciple also puts a condition on following Jesus. Like Elisha called by Elijah, the man asks permission to inform his family of his departure. Elijah allows Elisha to do so; but Jesus will not. Life in the kingdom demands single-hearted devotion which takes precedence over even the closest family ties and most solemn responsibilities. “Looking back” alludes to Lot’s wife, whose disobedience to God caused her to perish along with the wicked cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. (Gen 19:15-26) Authentic discipleship allows for no such vacillation. These sayings of Jesus dramatize the sacrifices which discipleship demands. They also implicitly hearken back to Jesus’ third and final desert temptation in Luke: His refusal to test God by setting conditions on His obedience to His mission.47 (Lk 4:12-3) 46. Cf. NJBC: 43:120; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 823-832; Evans, Luke, pp. 436-438; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 244-245. 47. Cf. Otto Glombitza, “Die Christologische Aussage des Lukas in seiner Gestätung der drei Nachfolgeworte Lukas IX 57-62,” Novum Testamentum, 13(1971), pp. 14-23;


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Matthew and Mark both describe Jesus’ commissioning of the Twelve to preach, heal, and exorcise. (Mk 6:7-13; Mt 9:35-8) Luke alone describes the additional commissioning of the seventy-two disciples, whom Jesus on His final journey sends ahead of Him in pairs to prepare His way. In Luke the instructions to the seventy-two echo the instructions which Matthew’s Jesus gives to the Twelve; but while Matthew’s Jesus sends the Twelve only to “the lost sheep of the house of Israel,” (Mt 10:5-6) Luke’s Jesus places no such restriction on either the Twelve or on the seventy-two. Luke views evangelization as all-inclusive in its scope. The mission of the seventy-two foreshadows, then, the Pentecostal Church’s universal proclamation of the risen Christ.48 (Lk 10:3) Luke prefaces the commissioning with a saying which also appears in Matthew: “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; pray therefore the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest.” (Lk 10:2; Mt 9:37) As in Matthew, this saying asserts that one does not take up the work of evangelization on one’s own initiative. One accepts it rather as a vocation from God. The commissioning of the seventy-two also makes it clear that the Twelve hold no corner on the vocation of evangelization. It comes with discipleship. Luke’s Jesus will allude to both commissionings at the last supper. On the threshold of the passion Jesus will bolster the disciples’ faith in the Father by reminding them of the latter’s providential care of them in their proclamation of the word. At the same time, Luke’s Jesus warns the disciples that the paschal mystery marks a radical shift in their relationship to God. Beginning with the passion, they will confront violence head on.49 (Lk 22:35-38) NJBC: 43:121; Fitzmyer, Gospel, I, 833-837; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 161-165; Evans, Luke, pp. 439-441; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 246-249. 48. As in the commissioning of the Twelve, Jesus’ instructions set basic guidelines for evangelization in the Lukan community. The evangelizing disciples, like the Twelve, must travel light and move fast. They must not waste time in idle chatter. Such behavior betokens the urgency of their message. Traveling light also means traveling in poverty and need: hence, the disciples should accept the hospitality of those they evangelize, blessing in reward with the gift of peace those who receive them. They should remain in one house and not move from one to another. They must heal the sick and proclaim the approach of the kingdom. They can expect resistance: they go “like lambs in the midst of wolves.” They should not, however, persist in the face of opposition, but instead they should move on, shaking the dust from their feet in testimony of the town’s unbelief. (Lk 10:3-12) 49. Cf. A.E. Harvey, “‘The Workman Is Worthy of His Hire’: Fortunes of Proverb in the Early Church,” Novum Testamentum, 24(1982), pp. 209-221; Bruce Metzger, “Seventy or Seventy- Two Disciples?” New Testament Studies, 5(1958-1959), pp. 299-306; Sidney Jellicoe, “Luke and the ‘Seventy(-Two),’” New Testament Studies, 6(1959-1960), pp. 319-321; NJBC: 43:122; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 841-850; Evans, Luke, pp. 441-450.

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Luke ends the commissioning of the seventy-two with an allusion to the opposition which they encounter. Opposition to the gospel also motivates the woes which Jesus immediately calls down on Bethsaida, Chorizin, and Capernaum for their unbelief. (Lk 10:13-15) Matthew inserts Jesus’ lament over the lake towns in His eulogy of John the Baptizer. Since, however, the woes do not directly concern the seventy-two, its insertion here makes them read almost like an aside, a burst of exasperation as Jesus contemplates the failure of His Galilean ministry. Luke offers a somewhat shorter version of the lament than Matthew does; but he preserves its gist. Stern judgment awaits the towns in which Jesus chiefly ministered because of their persistent refusal to respond to Him and to His message. The miracles performed in them will bring down upon them divine condemnation. Luke’s Jesus, like Matthew’s, complains that, had He worked these signs in Tyre and Sidon, they would have long since repented and believed. The complaint, however, has slightly different connotations in Luke, since the theme of universal salvation looms larger in his gospel than in Matthew’s. In Luke, the putative conversion of Tyre and Sidon foreshadows Paul’s successful Gentile mission in Acts. (Lk 10:13-15) The commissioning of the seventy-two concludes with the assurance: “Whoever listens to you listens to Me; whoever rejects you rejects Me, and whoever rejects Me rejects Him who sent Me.” (Lk 10:16) The same assurance ends the commissioning of the Twelve in Matthew. (Mt 10:16) This pronouncement endows the preaching of the seventy-two with the same prophetic authority as Jesus Himself and transforms them into prototypes of the prophetic Pentecostal Church. Jesus promises that the mission of the disciples, and therefore the mission of the post-resurrection Church which it foreshadows, will prolong in space and time Jesus’ own messianic commission from the Father.50 Luke makes the same point when he immediately recounts the joyful return of the seventy-two and their elated report to Jesus, “Lord, even the demons are subject to us in your name!” (Lk 10:17) The apostles in Acts will repeatedly invoke the name of Jesus to heal and exorcise. Hence, the report of the seventy-two like their commissioning also transforms them into a prototype of the apostolic Church. As we saw in reflecting on Jesus’ relationship to Satan, Jesus replies to the seventy-two that He saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. The ministry of proclamation deprives Satan of his power and casts the angelic prosecuting attorney from the court of a forgiving Abba. So too will the apostolic proclamation of the risen Jesus. Jesus’ assurance to the seventy-two that he has given them authority “to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy” 50. Cf. NJBC: 43:123; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 850-857; Evans, Luke, pp. 450-452.


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(Lk 10:19) finds an echo in the pseudonymous conclusion of Mark’s gospel. (Mk 16:15-8) Jesus in effect promises to protect the evangelizing disciples from physical evil as well as from the power of Satan. Finally, Jesus, as we have seen, ends by warning the disciples against self-inflated pride in their charismatic prowess. Only salvation brings ultimate joy, and the disciples should aspire to that instead of glorying in their feats of exorcism.51 (Lk 10:18-20) Having pondered some basic moral conditions for discipleship as well as its missionary character, Luke’s Jesus next reflects on its rewards. The account of the return of the seventy-two ends with Jesus’ praise of the Father for hiding “these things from the wise and understanding” and for revealing them “to children.” Jesus, speaking with the voice of divine Wisdom, asserts that He alone has the power to reveal the Father in virtue of the fact that the Father has delivered all things into His hands. In sanctioning Jesus’ words and action, the Father, of course, also sanctions His disclosure of the Father to the disciples. As we have seen, Luke insists more explicitly than Matthew that Jesus knows the Father through the enlightenment of the divine Breath. (Lk 10:21-2; Mt 11:25-7) Implicitly, therefore, the evangelist suggests that Jesus reveals the Father to the disciples through the enlightenment of the Breath whom He will impart to them on Pentecost. Knowledge of the Father in Jesus’ image during this life and salvation in the next constitute, then, fundamental rewards of discipleship. Moreover, one comes to know who Jesus is by sharing in His mission and pneumatic inspiration. As we shall see, in Acts, the Breath of the risen Christ will transform Stephen, Peter, and Paul into “other Christs.” Finally, Luke’s Jesus ends his instruction to the seventy-two with a meditation on the privileges of discipleship: Blessed are the eyes which see what you see! For I tell you that many prophets and kings desired to see what you see and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it. (Lk 10:23-4)

The blessing points to the disciples as privileged witnesses to Jesus and to His ministry. Implicitly it also points to them as privileged witnesses to the resurrection which brings the ministry of Jesus to its culmination. The blessing reflects as well Luke’s understanding of salvation history. Jewish history up to John the Baptizer simply prepares for the coming of Jesus. The whole of the Old Testament functions as a foreshadowing and prophecy of His ministry and of the paschal mystery. By the same token, Jesus and the paschal mystery endow ancient prophecies with their ultimate meaning.52 51. Cf. NJBC: 43:124; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 858-864; Evans, Luke, pp. 453-456. 52. Cf. Celestin Charlier, “L’action de Jésus (Luc 10, 17-24 et Matth. 11, 25-30),” Bible et Vie Chrétienne, 17(1957), pp. 87-99; A. Feuillet, “Jésus et la sagesse divine d’après

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The pronouncement story about Martha and Mary further dramatizes the fact that Jesus, in contrast to other rabbis, had women disciples. Martha, fretted with the fact that Mary has left her alone to prepare dinner and deal with the housework, asks Jesus to order Mary to bear her share of woman’s work. Jesus replies: Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things; one thing is needful. Mary has chosen the best portion, which shall not be taken away from her. (Lk 10:38-42)

Martha values woman’s work more than the “one thing” which matters: namely, responding to Jesus and His message. Mary, in daring to flout convention and relate to Jesus as a disciple, has chosen the “best portion.” One suspects a pun in the phrase “best portion.” Mary has opted for the most delectable dish or all: God’s word. Jesus therefore sanctions Mary’s action and challenges Martha to move beyond the role conventionally assigned to women by imitating Mary’s good example. We find this story only in Luke.53 During the journey discourse, the disciples see Jesus praying and ask Him to teach them to pray. He responds by teaching them the Father prayer. (Lk 11:1-4) I have reflected already on the Father prayer in considering Jesus’ relationship to the Father and refer the reader to that discussion. Two other teachings about prayer follow the Father prayer. The first occurs only in Luke; the second surfaces with minor differences in Matthew’s sermon on the mount. The first saying counsels persistence in prayer. It takes the form of a parable about a man importuned by a friend in the middle of the night. (Lk 11:5-8) I have commented on this parable in greater detail above. Here it suffices to recall that it demands of the disciples persevering prayer. The pronouncement which follows it, as we have also seen, requires the disciples to seek the gift of the divine Breath as the Father’s best gift. (Lk 11:9-13; Acts 2:1) During the journey discourse, Jesus admonishes the disciples about how to conduct themselves under persecution. He prefaces the admoniles évangiles synoptiques,” Revue Biblique, 62(1955), pp. 161-196; NJBC: 43:125; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 864-876; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 166-171; Evans, Luke, pp. 456-463; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 250-256. 53. Cf. Robert W. Wall, “Martha and Mary (Luke 10.38-42) in the Context of a Christian Deuteronomy,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 35(1989), pp. 19-35; Mary Rose D’Angelo, “Women in Luke-Acts: A Redactional View,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 109(1990), pp. 441-461; J. Lionel North, “oligon de estin chreis hê henos (Lyuke 10.42): Text, Subtext and Context,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 66(1997), pp. 3-13; NJBC: 43:127; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 891-895; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 176-180; Evans, Luke, pp. 471-474; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 266-268.


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tion, however, by warning them in the presence of enormous crowds against the “leaven of the Pharisees,” which Luke equates with hypocrisy. In a sense, Jesus here addresses the crowds as a foreshadowing of those before whom the disciples will have to testify. I have also considered these texts elsewhere.54 Luke includes in his journey discourse the parable about the lilies of the field which Matthew locates in the sermon on the mount. In both gospels, the parable targets the disciples and inculcates trust in the Father’s providential care. In the journey discourse, the parable of the rich fool follows it. It targets the crowds. I have already pondered both parables in another context. Both call for the renunciation of avarice and wealth; but the parable of the rich fool presupposes a lack of repentance, while the parable of the lilies presupposes a converted hearer.55 (Lk 12:13-34) Later in the journey discourse, Luke develops at some length the theme of eschatological readiness. Here Luke’s Jesus directs to the disciples warnings like those which the eschatological discourse will address to the crowds. After rebuking some Pharisees who want to see the kingdom arrive with extravagant signs and wonders, Jesus at the end of the journey discourse, instructs the disciples on the need to live in readiness for the second coming. (Lk 17:22-37) Luke here clusters several teachings which Matthew locates at the end of Jesus’ eschatological discourse. (Cf. Mt 24:17-8, 26-7, 37-41) Luke prefaces these eschatological warnings with the observation: “The days are coming when you will desire to see one of the days of the Son of man, and you will not see it.” (Lk 17:22) The precise meaning of “one of the days of the Son of Man” remains both debated and obscure, especially since in this passage Luke’s Jesus alternates between singular and plural in his use of the Greek word “day (hêmera). In verse 26 the evangelist refers to “the days of the Son of man” and in verse 30 to “the day of the Son of man.” The “day of the Son of man” most probably refers to the 54. As we have seen, Luke’s Jesus wants the disciples to relate differently to each of the divine persons during persecution. Their reverential fear of the Father, who has power to cast into hell after death, should outstrip any fear they have of their persecutors. They must bear fearless witness to Jesus in the confidence that He will then testify on their behalf on the last day. They should trust the Holy Breath to instruct them what to say to their persecutors and should avoid apostasy, which Luke identifies with Breath blasphemy. (Lk 12:1-12; cf. Mt 10:19-20, 26-33, 12:23; Mk 3:28-9, 4:21-23, 8:38, 13:11) 55. As we have seen, Luke makes minor editorial changes in the parable. He changes the reference to “birds of the air” to “ravens,” as a way of stressing the universality of the Father’s providential concern: the Father even looks after unclean beasts. The other changes qualify as stylistic. The parable makes the same point in Luke as in Matthew: because the Father knows your needs, let your trust that He will care for them even more carefully than He cares for birds and flowers free you to set your heart first of all on the kingdom and not on physical needs and their fulfillment. (Lk 12:22-31)

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day of the last judgment. The phrase “days of the Son of man” could suggest the messianic era which will follow. If so, “one of the days of the Son of man” would seem to mean “even one of the days of the messianic era.” In any case, verse 22 offers good evidence that hope for a quick second coming was beginning to fade in the Lukan community. Hence, the evangelist warns yet again: let not the delay of the second coming lull you into complacency.56 Despite their longing for Jesus’ return, the disciples should refuse to listen to false prophets who announce the arrival of a final judgment. (Lk 17:23) No predictions will precede the genuine arrival of the Son of man. “For as lightning flashes and lights up the sky from one side to the other, so will the Son of man be in His day.” (Lk 17:24) The real parousia will arrive with brilliance and with an unannounced suddenness. Luke’s Jesus here inserts an allusion to His impending passion. He warns that before the second coming the Son of Man must suffer grievously. (Lk 17:25) We can also hear in this allusion a tacit reference to the sufferings which the disciples must face before the end arrives. (Cf Acts 9:4) As in Matthew’s eschatological discourse, Luke’s Jesus cites the example of Lot and of Noah to dramatize the suddenness and unexpectedness of the final judgment. The flood caught a sinful humanity completely unawares, as did the fire and brimstone which destroyed Sodom. (Lk 17:26-31) Luke’s Jesus warns: On that day, let him who is on the housetop, with his goods in the house, not come down to take them away; and likewise let him who is in the field not turn back. Remember Lot’s wife. Whoever seeks to gain his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life will preserve it. I tell you, in that night there will be two in one bed; one will be taken and the other left. There will be two women grinding together; one will be taken and the other left.” (Lk 17:31-4)

In Mark’s eschatological discourse, the warnings to the man on the housetop and to the man in the field apply to the people of Jerusalem at the approach of the Roman army which will destroy the city. The warnings there stress the importance of instant flight if one hopes to avoid the coming disaster. (Mk 13:14-6) Luke, who writes after the destruction of Jerusalem, applies the same warnings to the second coming. As a consequence, on the lips of Luke’s Jesus, the warning to the man on the roof serves the opposite purpose from Jesus’ warning in Mark. In Mark it 56. Cf. Robert Leaney, “The Days of the Son of Man,” Expository Times, 67(1955), pp. 28-29; E. Ashby, “The Days of the Son of Man,” Expository Times, 67(1955), pp. 124-125; W. Powell, “The Days of the Son of Man,” Expository Times, 67(1955), p. 219; NJBC, 43:154.


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warns Christians in Jerusalem to avoid the coming retribution; in Luke it underscores the futility of any human attempt to avoid the final judgment. On the last day, personal possessions will offer no comfort. In Mark the man in the field foolishly returns to retrieve his cloak. Luke, however, transforms the man’s turning around into an allusion to the unbelief and disobedience of Lot’s wife. Take care, Luke’s Jesus warns lest at the second coming you incur a similar judgment. Both Mark and Matthew record Jesus’ warning that those who seek to save their lives will lose them and those who lose their lives will gain them. The warning underscores the disciples’ need to follow Jesus, if necessary, even to the cross. (Mk 8:35; Mt 10:39) The same saying, when read in context, enunciates the only way to avoid final judgment. As in Matthew’s eschatological discourse, Jesus’ saying about those taken and those left asserts that despite their superficial resemblance to one another in human eyes, saints and sinners will suffer very different fates on the day of judgment. Those “taken” probably alludes to Noah and Lot who where delivered (taken) from judgment; those “left” designates those who experience no such deliverance and must face condemnation. Luke puts the man in bed, while Matthew locates him more decorously in the field.57 (Lk 17:34-5; cf. Mt 24:37-41) As the end of these warnings, the uncomprehending disciples in Luke commit the same blunder as the Pharisees whom Jesus has just rebuked. They ask specific information about the coming of the kingdom: “And they said to Him, ‘Where, Lord?’” Jesus replies vaguely and with apparent frustration: “Where the body is, there the eagles will be gathered.” (Lk 17:37) In Matthew the proverb alludes to the public, manifest character of the second coming. (Mt 24:28) On the lips of Luke’s Jesus it would seem to connote the inevitability of the second coming. Luke’s Jesus refuses, however, to give the disciples any specific information about where He will appear and only assures them that the judgment will surely come. At the beginning of Acts, the risen Christ will censure the disciples’ persistent concern with dating and locating the kingdom’s arrival.58 (Acts 1: 6-8) Luke’s Jesus closes these eschatological reflections with the parable of the unjust judge. Like Jesus’ earlier teachings on prayer, this parable counsels perseverance but puts it in an explicitly eschatological context. As we have seen, the unjust judge of the parable has no fear of God and no concern for the fate of other people; but he nevertheless renders a just 57. Cf. Xavier Léon-Dufour, “Luc 17,33,” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 69(1981), pp. 101-112; J. Schlosser, “Les jours de Noé et de Lot: À propos de Luc XVII, 26-30,” Revue Biblique, 80(1973), pp. 13-36; NJBC: 43:154; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1163-1174; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 262-268; Evans, Luke, pp. 625-634. 58. Cf. NJBC: 43:154; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 1163-1175; Evans, Luke, pp. 625-634; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 367-372.

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verdict in the case of a widow who keeps badgering him. The judge acts justly but from pure self-interest. He has tired of the widow’s bold and persistent petitions. (Lk 18:1-5) Luke’s Jesus then draws the following moral: “Hear what the unjust judge says. And will not God vindicate his elect, who cry to Him day and night? Will He delay long over them? I tell you, He will vindicate speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes will He find faith on earth?” (Lk 18:6-8) This parable and the interpretation of its significance occur only in Luke. Moreover, only in this passage does Luke refer to Christians as the elect of God. The evangelist is seeking to shore up flagging faith in the second coming and exhorts the “chosen ones” not to number among the faithless when God comes “speedily” to vindicate believers. Jesus will find faith on earth when He returns only if the disciples keep faith.59 In the journey discourse, two other parables develop the theme of eschatological vigilance. The second parable applies especially to Church leadership. The first of these parables describes a watchful master. The master of a house, alerted to a prowling burglar in the neighborhood, takes due precaution to insure that the burglar find no entry to his home. Luke’s Jesus warns after the parable: “You also must be ready; for the Son of man is coming at an unexpected hour.” (Lk 12:39-40) Peter then asks Jesus whether He is telling this parable for the Twelve or for the crowds. (Lk 12:35-8) Jesus replies that it applies especially, though not exclusively, to those who occupy positions of authority in the new Israel. Jesus says: Who then is the faithful and wise steward, whom the master will set over his household, to give them their portion of food at the proper time? Blessed is that servant whom his master when he comes will find so doing. Truly, I say to you, he will set him over all his possessions. But if that servant says to himself, “My master is delayed in coming,” and begins to beat the menservants and maidservants, and to eat and drink and get drunk, the master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he does not know, and will cut him in two and put him with the unfaithful. And that servant who knew his master’s will, but did not make ready or act according to his will, shall receive a severe beating. But he who did not know, and did what deserved a beating, shall receive a light beating. Everyone to whom much is given, of him will much be required; and of him to whom men commit much they will demand the more. (Lk 12:42-8)

59. Cf. Geiger, op. cit., pp. 11-148; Zmijewski, op. cit., pp. 326-572; NJBC, 43:155; Fitzmyer, Gospel of Luke, II, pp. 1175-1182; Evans, op. cit., pp. 634-640; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 372-375.


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Here several points need noting. Peter’s question creates the context for interpreting the parable. The question applies the parable especially to those in positions of authority in the apostolic Church. The phrase “give them their portion of food at the proper time” could refer to the care of the poor in the early Church, to communal meals, and even to the eucharist. In effect, Jesus says that more will be demanded of those in authority than of others if, knowing full well what God demands of them, they choose instead to act in oppressive and self indulgent ways. Not only can they not presume upon their position in the community to excuse them; but they will suffer even harsher punishments because of their weightier responsibilities.60 Luke returns to the theme of eschatological watchfulness in a second parable, the parable of the wicked steward. Typically, the evangelist links eschatological readiness to care for the poor. This parable occurs only in Luke. In the parable, a steward accused of mismanaging his master’s goods finds himself discharged. Before he leaves his post, however, he deliberately forgives all his master’s debtors to the master’s considerable financial loss. Moreover, the steward does so as a way of insuring that those whose debts he forgives will take care of him once he loses his position and pay. The master surprisingly commends the steward for his shrewdness. Luke’s Jesus draws the moral: “For the children of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than the children of light. And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous mammon, so that when it fails they will receive you into the eternal mansions.” (Lk 16:1-9) Luke immediately clarifies what Jesus means by befriending unrighteous mammon. Luke’s Jesus says next: One who is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much; and one who is dishonest in very little is dishonest also in much. If then you have not been faithful in the unrighteous mammon, who will entrust to you the true riches? And if you have not been faithful in that which is another’s, who will give you that which is your own? No servant can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. (Lk 16:10-3)

Matthew’s Jesus also requires a radical choice between God and mammon. Matthew locates the challenge in the sermon on the mount. (Mt 6:24) Luke’s Jesus asserts that compared with the true riches of eternal salvation, mere material wealth has only trivial value. Greed for worldly 60. Cf. NJBC: 43:136; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 983-991; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 203-207; Evans, Luke, pp. 532-538; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 302-307.

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possessions causes one to forfeit true wealth in the next life. Moreover, in saying that material possessions belong to someone other than the one who owns them, Luke’s Jesus is asserting two things. First, God gives physical possessions to humans to manage as stewards. They, therefore, stand accountable to God for how they use them. Second, one who owns more than one needs has equivalently stolen the surplus from the poor to whom it rightfully belongs. Many of the fathers of the Church would develop this Lukan insight in their preaching.61 Luke follows these teachings with the observation that the Pharisees loved wealth; and Jesus condemns the self-righteous rich as abominations in the sight of God. History gives us no reason to regard Pharisees as particularly covetous, although many may have regarded wealth as a sign of divine blessing. Luke, however, here uses the Pharisees as symbols of Christian religious hypocrisy. Luke’s Jesus implicitly points to rich or covetous Christians as nothing more than “Pharisaical hypocrites” and adversaries of Jesus. (Lk 16:14-15) The evangelist makes the same point more explicitly in the parable of the rich man and Lazarus. The parable follows several sayings about the abiding force of the Law and the prophets. (Lk 16:16-17) The parable illustrates the same points as the sayings; but Luke gives this parable a special eschatological twist by invoking Christian resurrection faith. The parable tells about the reversal of fortunes in this life and in the next. A rich man lives sumptuously, while, Lazarus, a beggar, scratches out a marginal existence at the rich man’s door. Starving, covered with sores, the beggar hasn’t even the strength to keep the street dogs from licking the pustules on his body. Both men die. The beggar goes to “Abraham’s bosom,” while the rich man roasts in Hades. (Lk 16:14-31) This parable stands out from all the other parables by assigning a name to one of the characters. The beggar has the name of Lazarus. His name 61. Cf. Mary Ann Bevis, “Ancient Slavery as an Interpretative Context for the New Testament Servant Parables with Special Reference to the Unjust Steward (Luke 16:1-8),” Journal of Biblical Literature, 111(1992), pp. 37-54; Douglas M. Parrott, “The Dishonest Steward (Luke 16:1-8a) and Luke’s Special Parable Collection,” New Testament Studies, 37(1991), pp. 499- 515; William Loader, “Jesus and the Rogue in Luke 16, 1-8a: The Parable of the Unjust Steward,” Revue Biblique, 96(1989), pp. 518-532; M.G. Steinhauser, “Noah in his Generation: An Allusion in Luke 16:8b, ‘eis tên genean tên heauton,’” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 79(1988), pp. 152-157; Charles Avila, Ownership: Early Christian Teaching (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1983); Richard H. Hiers, “Friends By Unrighteous Mammon: The Eschatological Proletariate (Luke 16:9), Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 38(1970), pp. 30-36; Geoffrey Paul, “The Unjust Steward and the Interpretation of Luke 16.9,” Theology, 61(1958), pp. 189-193; A. Descamps, “La composition litteraire de Luc XVI, 9-13,” Novum Testamentum, 1(1956), pp. 47-53; C.S. Mann, “Unjust Steward or Prudent Manager?,” Expository Times, 102(1991), pp. 234-235; NJBC: 43:148-149; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1094-1111; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 243-249; Evans, Luke, pp. 594-604.


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derives from the same root as the Semitic name Eliezar. Abraham had a servant called Eliezar. (Gen 15:2) Moreover, in Jewish midrash, Eliezar descends periodically to earth in order to report to Abraham about the state of Israel, especially about its care of the poor and its hospitality to strangers. Lazarus’s return to the bosom of Abraham as well as the rich man’s suggestion that Abraham send Lazarus next to his brothers’ homes both identify the Lazarus of the parable as Eliezar in disguise. In fact, the surprising identification of Lazarus as Abraham’s Eliezar gives the parable much of its punch.62 So too does the fate of the rich man. Those who originally heard this parable would not necessarily have cast the rich man in the role of a villain. In first-century Palestine, riches often went as a sign of divine blessing; poverty, as a sign of divine displeasure. In the literary flow of Luke’s narrative, Lazarus, who during life hungered for the scraps from the rich man’s table, reminds the reader of the prodigal son, who in the depths of his degradation yearned to eat pig food. Another parabolic surprise comes, then, when the rich man finds himself after death plunged into the torments of Hades, while Lazarus/Eliezar finds himself translated into heaven. (Lk 16:20-21, 15:16) Lazarus had spent his entire life at the rich man’s door; but the rich man sees him for the first time when he raises his eyes from his own torments in Hades and sees the former beggar ensconced in Abraham’s bosom. The rich man’s wealth had blinded him to Lazarus’s very existence in this life; and, in the next, his former blindness continues to separate the two, since a great gulf prevents Lazarus from relieving the rich man’s thirst, with even a drop of water. The rich man begs Abraham to send Lazarus to warn his rich brothers to avoid both his own mistakes and the place of torment in which he finds himself. Abraham replies that the Law and prophets already instruct them to care for the poor and the marginal. On Jesus’ lips, then, this parable would have ended here and would have struck a familiar note: namely, that practical care of the poor and destitute lies at the heart of Torah piety. Luke, however, goes further. The evangelist applies the parable to his Gentile Christians when the rich man objects that his brothers will listen if warned by someone from the dead. (Lk 16:30) Abraham, however, replies that “even if someone rise from the dead,” the rich man’s brothers will neither believe nor repent. The reference to resurrection which Luke interpolates at the end of the parable transforms it from a story about the perennial binding character of Torah morality into a reflection on the eschatological dimensions of Christian care for the poor. Those who covet wealth in this life not only blind themselves to the suffering of the poor 62. Cf. Donahue, op.cit., pp. 168-170.

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and the marginal; but, by claiming to believe in the resurrection while neglecting the poor, hypocritical Christians confess with their lips a faith which their lives belie.63 Immediately after Jesus’ proclamation of the perenniel value of the Law (Lk, 16:16-17), Luke’s Jesus denounces remarriage after divorce. Luke’s Jesus says: “Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery; and he who marries a woman divorced from her husband commits adultery.” (Lk 16:18) Since the Law allows divorce “because of uncleanness” (Dt 24:1), Luke seems to show less concern about divorce and more about remarriage after divorce. In contrast to both Matthew and Mark, Luke fails to record the debate between Jesus and His adversaries concerning the correct interpretation of the divorce text in Deuteronomy.64 During the journey discourse, Jesus warns the disciples sternly against giving one another scandal. One finds analogous statements of Jesus in both of the other synoptics. (Cf. Mk 9:42; Mt 18:6-7, 18:21-2) Luke’s version of this teaching takes the following form: Temptations to sin are sure to come; but woe to the one by whom they come! It would be better for him if a millstone were hung round his neck and he were cast into the sea, than that he should cause one of these little ones to sin. Take heed to yourselves. (Lk 17:1-3a)

Like Matthew’s Jesus, Luke’s recognizes the inevitability of scandal but refuses to condone it in any way. Mark and Matthew focus the teachings against scandal explicitly on the Christian community by identifying the little ones with those “who believe in Me.” (Mk 9:42; Mt 18:6-7) Luke omits the phrase “who believe in me” and equates the “little ones” with any needy person. The fact that Jesus regards death by drowning preferable to giving anyone scandal gives vivid expression to the horror in which He holds the sin. The warning: “Take heed to yourselves” envisages anyone who ever feels tempted to corrupt another; but it probably also serves as a transition to Jesus’ injunction on mutual admonition and forgiveness, which follows. Jesus says: 63. Cf. Donahue, op. cit., pp. 168-174; C.H. Cave, “Lazarus and the Lukan Deuteronomy,” New Testament Studies, 15(1968-1969), pp. 319-325; A. Feuillet, “La parabole du mauvais riche et du pauvre Lazare (Luc 16, 19-31), antithèse de la parabole du l’intendant astusieux,” Nouvelle Revue Théologique, 101(1979), pp. 212-223; Eckart Reinmuth, “Ps-Philo, Liber Antiquitatum Biblicarum und die Auslegung der Parabel Lk 16:19-31,” Novum Testamentum, 31(1989), pp. 16-38; NJBC: 43:148; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1094-1104; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 249-257; Evans, Luke, pp. 611-617; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 346-350. 64. Cf. John J. Kilgallen, S.J., “The Purpose of Luke’s Divorce Text,” Biblica, 76(1995), pp. 229-238; Larry Kreitzer, “Luke 16:19-31 and 1 Enoch 22,” Expository Times, 103(1992), pp. 139-142.


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If your brother sins rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him; and if he sins against you seven times in the day, and turns to you seven times and says, “I repent,” you must forgive him. (Lk 17:3b-4)

This pronouncement enjoins the opposite of giving scandal. Far from causing one another to sin, Christians should exercise a watchful vigilance over one another by calling one another to mutual repentance and reconciliation. Jesus binds the disciples to forgive another no matter how often an individual offends, provided that the offender also truly repents. As in Matthew’s gospel, Luke’s Jesus puts the responsibility for initiating the reconciliation on the one offended. (Cf. Mt 18:15) Luke’s Jesus requires an expectant faith especially of the apostles and Church leaders. When the apostles ask Jesus to increase their faith, “the Lord” responds: “If you had faith as a grain of mustard seed, you could say to this sycamore tree, ‘Be uprooted, and be planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.” (Lk 17:5-6) Matthew inserts an analogous saying of Jesus after the deliverance of the epileptic demoniac boy. In Matthew the saying explains why the disciples failed in their attempt to exorcise the lad: they lacked sufficient faith to do so. (Mt 17:20) Mark too cites an analogous version of this saying but inserts it as a teaching about prayer after the withering of the fig tree. (Mk 11:22-3) Mark and Matthew talk about moving mountains; Luke about self-transplanting trees which grow in the ocean. Both hyperbolic images intend to suggest something impossible under ordinary circumstances. Luke, who consistently paints a somewhat more positive portrait of the disciples than either of the other two synoptics, describes the apostles spontaneously longing to grow in faith. In the same passage, however, Luke’s Jesus recognizes an ambivalence at the basis of the disciples’ request. His reply puts them on the spot. So far they possess a faith smaller even than a mustard seed. Luke, however, commends the apostles’ desire to increase in faith as an attitude proper in a disciple and in a Church leader. The parable of the unprofitable servant follows. It notes that a slave who works all day does not expect his owner on his return home to show the slave any special gratitude. Much less will the owner sit the slave at table and wait upon him. Instead, the owner will expect the slave to wait on all his own needs. Comparing discipleship to slavery would have shocked Jesus’ listeners. The parable, however, commends, not the arrogance of the owner, but the humility of the slave. It concludes with the moral: “So also, when you have done all that is commanded you say, ‘We are unprofitable slaves; we have done what we ought to have done.’” (Lk 17:7-10)

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The parable makes two fundamental points: 1) Through the obedience of faith, one renders to God something which one already owes Him. 2) Authentic Christian service excludes all boasting and self-aggrandizement. The parable applies to all disciples; but, by inserting it immediately after the apostles’ request to grow in faith, Luke is suggesting that Jesus’ words apply in a special sense to Church leaders. One finds this teaching in neither Mark nor Matthew.65 Luke records at the end of the journey discourse how Jesus welcomed even infants (kai ta brephe). Luke adapts Mark’s account of this incident. Mark speaks of children (paida); Luke insists that the children in question were mere babes in arms. As in Mark those who bring the babies to Jesus (presumably the parents) want Jesus to touch them. Matthew, as we have seen, has Jesus bless the children. In Luke, as in Mark, the purpose of the touch remains somewhat ambiguous; but it suggests that the babies had some sickness and that the parents wanted Jesus to heal them. (Lk 18:15; Mk 10:13; Mt 19:13) In Luke as in the other synoptics, Jesus takes His disciples to task when they rebuke the parents for presenting the babies. Luke’s Jesus says: Let the children come to me, and do not hinder them; for to such belongs the kingdom of God. Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it. (Lk 18:16-7; cf. Mk 10:13-6; Mt 19:14-5)

Luke does not describe what Jesus does after these words. Mark has Jesus embrace the children and bless them (Mk 10:16); Matthew has Jesus lay His hands on them in a solemn blessing. By omitting a description of Jesus’ actions, Luke focuses the incident on the pronouncement itself. Jesus’ saying points even to babies—the most innocent, the weakest, the most defenseless—as ideal members of the kingdom. Since the baptism of households in the apostolic Church probably included the baptism of infants, it also seems entirely plausible that Luke, like the other synoptic evangelists, records this incident as a way of justifying this practice, although the original incident had nothing to do with infant baptism.66 65. Cf. Donahue, op.cit., pp. 172-174; Pierre Houzet, “Les serviteurs de l’évangile (Lc 17, 5- 10) sont’ils inutiles ou un contresense traditionelle?” Revue Biblique, 99(1992), pp. 335-372; Paul S. Minear, “A Note on Luke 17:7-10,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 93(1974), pp. 82- 87; Josef Sudbrack, S.J., “Armselige Knechte sind wir; unsere Schuldigkeit was es was wir taten,” Geist und Leben, 41(1968), pp. 308-312; NJBC: 43:152; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1136-1148; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 257-262; Evans, Luke, pp. 617-622; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 359-364; J. Dupont, “Le maitre et son serviteur (Luc 17,7-10),”Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 60(1984), pp. 233-251. 66. Cf. Stephen Fowl, “Receiving the Kingdom of God as a Child: Children and Riches in Luke 18.15ff.,” New Testament Studies, 39(1993), pp. 153-158; Wilhelm Michälis, “Lukas und die Anfänge der Kindertaufe” in Apophoreta, edited by Walther Eltester (Berlin: Alfred Tœpelmann, 1964), pp. 187-193; Friedrick A. Schilling, “What


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The parable of the pounds closes the journey discourse. It resembles a parable in Matthew. Luke’s parable speaks of pounds, Matthew’s of talents; but the two parables exhibit other more significant contrasts. Luke combines the parable of the pounds with another parable. The second parable describes a nobleman who travels to a far country in order to receive a kingdom. After his coronation he returns home. (Lk 19:12) During his absence, the man’s subjects rebel and refuse to submit to his royal authority. (Lk 19:14) This part of the story ends with the punishment of the rebellious subjects, who are slain before the newly crowned king. (Lk 19:27) Before slaying the rebels, however, the king passes judgment on the servants whom he has left behind to manage his property. Before departing the nobleman had given three servants different amounts of money with which to trade until his return. (Lk 19:13) As in Matthew’s parable of the talents, the servant with ten pounds has made ten pounds more. In Matthew, he receives his master’s commendation and enters into his joy. In Luke, he receives from the king dominion over ten cities. A analogous reward greets the servant with five pounds who made five more. (Lk 19:15-9) The fact that the successful servants share in the new king’s jurisdictional authority turns them into types of the saved Christian who will share in Jesus’ eternal reign. The servant with only one pound acts in the same way in Luke as in Matthew: he hides the one pound and returns it unused to the king. As explanation, he offers the fact that he feared to risk losing any money because he knew of the king’s severity in reaping what he had not sown. In Luke, the king turns the excuse against the servant. He rebukes the servant’s failure to use his one pound; and, over protest from the other servants, the king orders the one pound given to the one who has ten. (Lk 19:20-5) The moral of this part of the parable follows: “I tell you, that to everyone who has will more be given; but from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.” (Lk 19:26; cf. Mt 25:29) As Luke tells this parable, it makes three points: 1) the greater one’s generosity and willingness to use one’s gifts for the sake of the kingdom, the greater will be one’s reward. 2) Those who fail to use their gifts for the kingdom will face stern judgment. 3) Those who rebel against the kingdom will suffer divine retribution. Some see in the slaying of the rebels a Lukan comment on Israel’s general refusal to accept the gospel.67 Means the Saying About Receiving the Kingdom of God as a Little Child? (Mk x.15, Lk xviii. 17),” Expository Times, 77(1965), pp. 56-58; NJBC: 43:156; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1191-1195; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 275-282; Evans, Luke, pp. 646-648; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 378-379. 67. Cf. Wilhelm Resenköfft, “Jesu Gleichnis von der Talenten Ergänzt durch die LukasFassung,” New Testament Studies, 26(1979-1980), pp. 318-331; Jack T. Sanders, “The Parable of the Pounds and Lukan Anti-Semitism,” Theological Studies, 42(1981),

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The last words Jesus speaks to the disciples in the journey discourse warn them of His coming passion and resurrection. This warning marks Jesus’ third prophecy of the paschal mystery. (Lk 18:31-4; cf. Mk 10:32-4; Mt 20:17-9) In the course of the journey discourse, then, Luke makes the following assertions about discipleship: 1) Discipleship demands commitment to Jesus’ way of non-violence, and it requires the willingness to sacrifice all, even the most sacred ties. 2) Discipleship commits one to proclaim the good news and to confront in the process the same forces of unbelief as Jesus did. 3) Missionary disciples enjoy Jesus’ protection from natural harm and from the malice of their enemies; but they should rejoice, not in charismatic prowess, but in the gift of salvation. 4) Discipleship brings the reward of sharing in Jesus’ filial relationship with the Father through assimilation to Him in His mission from the Father. As a consequence, discipleship confers the privilege of actually experiencing the salvation which the Old Testament foreshadowed and for which great leaders in Israel’s history longed. 5) Among the community of disciples women rank side by side with men. 6) Discipleship commits one to a life of persevering prayer in Jesus’ image. Such prayer expresses eschatological longing. 7) Discipleship requires fearless testimony to the gospel in times of persecution, life long trust in the Father’s providential care, and practical readiness to face the final judgment. 8) Practical care of the poor expresses in a special way one’s eschatological longing and readiness to face final judgment. Hence, those who profess faith in the resurrection and neglect the poor indulge in gross religious hypocrisy. 9) Eschatological readiness to face divine judgment requires actively using one’s gifts to advance the kingdom. 10) Disciples should avoid scandalizing others and should actively seek reconciliation with those who offend them. 11) The true disciple cultivates expectant faith as well as humble self-effacing service. 11) The smallest and weakest in the community model for the rest how to accept the kingdom. As in the other synoptics, Luke’s disciples secure the a young horse or colt on which Jesus rides into Jerusalem.68 In contrast to the other two synoptic evangelists, who describe crowds streaming from the city to welcome Jesus, Luke has the disciples accompanying Jesus, not the crowds, spontaneously break into praise. pp. 660-668; Paul Jouon, “La parabole de mines (Luc 19, 13-27) et la parabole des talentes (Matthieu 25,14-30),” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 29(1939), pp. 489-494; J. Duncan M. Derrett, “Law and the New Testament: The Parable of the Talents and Two Logia,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 56(1965), pp. 184-198; NJBC: 43:161; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1227-1240; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 664-672; Evans, Luke, pp. 664-672; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 391-395. 68. Cf. Walter Bauer, “The Colt of Palm Sunday (Der Palmesel),” Journal of Biblical Theology, 72(1953), pp. 220-229.


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Luke’s disciples shout: “Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and hosanna in the highest.” (Lk 19:28-40; cf. Mk 11:1-10; Mt 21:1-11) In Luke the words of the disciples echo the chant of the angels at Jesus’ birth and fulfill Jesus’ own prophecy about His last visit to Jerusalem. (Lk 2:14; 13:35) In Luke, the entry into Jerusalem follows immediately upon the parable of the pounds and proclaims Jesus the king of the parable.69 In Luke the entry into Jerusalem brings Jesus’ long pilgrimage to Jerusalem to a dramatic climax. Luke endows the event with a strong sense of historical inevitability. He records Jesus’ foreknowledge of events, as do the other two synoptics. In addition, however, Jesus replies to the Pharisees, who urge Him to silence His disciples: “I tell you, if these were silent, the very stones would cry out.” (Lk 19:39-40) As we have seen, Jesus’ allusion to Hab 2:11 suggests what the stones would say: they would cry out for the rectification of injustice, a rectification which Jesus has come to effect. The absence of the crowds from the triumphal entry in Luke changes its context and modifies its significance. In Mark and Matthew, the people of Jerusalem welcome Jesus as the messiah. In Luke Jesus enters the Holy city as a solitary pilgrim accompanied by other pilgrims, His disciples. Luke, moreover, implicitly contrasts the enthusiasm of the disciples with the apparent hostility of the rest of the city: Luke’s Jesus weeps over Jerusalem as He draws near the city and prophesies its destruction for its unbelief. Luke’s Jesus has already prophesied His inevitable death in Jerusalem. Now He weeps prophetically over its consequences. His prophecy describes in graphic detail Jerusalem’s actual destruction. The graphic character of the description makes it sound like a vaticinium ex eventu.70 (Lk 19:41-4) In contrast to the other two synoptics, we find no other mention of the disciples in the Jerusalem ministry, except for a reference to them in the eschatological discourse. Having cheered the end of Jesus’ pilgrimage, the disciples fade into the background as the chief priests and Jesus take the center stage.71 As we have seen, in Luke, Jesus’ eschatological discourse addresses the crowds, not just the disciples. One section of the discourse does, how69. Cf. Augustin George, “La royauté de Jésus selon l’évangile de Luc,” Sciences Ecclesiastiques, 14(1962), pp. 57-69. 70. Cf. Emanuel A. Marco, “Videns civitatem flevit super eam,” Verbum Domini, 10(1930), pp. 245-248; David L. Tiede, Prophecy and History in Luke-Acts (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress, 1980), pp. 65-96; Walter Uhsadel, “Predigt zum Gedächtnistage der Zerstörung Jerusalems” in Abraham Unser Vater, edited by Otto Betz et al. (Leiden: Kroll, 1963), pp. 459-466. 71. Cf. NJBC: 43:163; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1241-1253; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 295-302; Evans, Luke, pp. 675-685; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 396-400.

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ever, target the disciples specifically. Following Mark, Luke’s Jesus predicts that both Jews and Gentiles will persecute His followers. Times of persecution will, however, offer the disciples the opportunity to function as witnesses (apobesetai de hymin eis martyrion). The term “witness,” of course, connotes martyrdom. Luke’s Jesus, however, omits Mark’s assurance that the Holy Breath will inspire the witness of the disciples in times of persecution. Luke has already made that point in the journey discourse. (Lk 12:12) In the eschatological discourse Jesus promises, “I will give you a mouth of wisdom, which none of your adversaries will be able to withstand or contradict.” (Lk 21:15) Luke, of course, understood the faith witness of the disciples as Breath-inspired. Here, then, he implicitly points to the risen Christ as the Breath’s source and the Breath’s inspirations as a word of wisdom. Even one’s most intimate acquaintances—”parents and brothers and kinspeople and friends”—will betray believers to their persecutors. (Lk 21:16) Universal hatred will greet Jesus’ followers. “But not a hair of your head will perish. By your endurance you will gain your lives.” (Lk 21:18-19) Luke here introduces into the eschatological discourse sayings of Jesus which Matthew locates in his missionary discourse. (Mt 10:16-23) The pronouncements, however, make the same fundamental points in both gospels. God will protect the disciples in the midst of persecution. Fidelity under the test will yield salvation.72 The Disciples in the Passion As we have seen, Luke portrays the passion of Jesus as the return of Satan and as a renewal of His desert temptations. A similar idea surfaces in Matthew, where the taunting crowds on Calvary echo Satan’s desert temptations. (Mt 27:40, 4:3, 6) Luke portrays Judas, the chief priests, and eventually Pilate as the agents of Satan. (Lk 22:3-6) In Luke, Judas’s plot to hand Jesus over and Jesus’ arrest in the garden bracket the last supper. The biblical inclusion suggests that Judas betrays everything which the last supper embodies and proclaims.73 Luke reproduces Mark’s account of the preparation of the last supper with minor variations. Luke has Jesus commission Peter and John specifically to make the preparations for the meal. As in Mark, Jesus again dis72. Cf. Albert Fuchs, Sprachilche Unterzuchungen zu Matthäus und Lukas (Rome: Biblical Institute, 1971), pp. 37-44, 171-191; J. Giblet, “Le promesse de l’Esprit et la mission des apôtres dans les évangiles,” Irenikon, 30(1957), pp. 5-43; NJBC: 43:174-5; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1338-1347; Evans, Luke, pp. 739-745; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 425-427. 73. Cf. Herbert Priesker, “Der Verrat des Judas und das Abendmahl,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 41(1942), pp. 151-155; Kenneth Hein, “Judas Iscariot: Key to Last Supper Narratives?” New Testament Studies, 17(1970-1971), pp. 227-232.


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plays a preternatural foreknowledge of events. Like Matthew, Luke follows Mark in portraying the last supper as a passover meal. (Lk 22:7-13) Luke alone among the synoptics records Jesus’ intense desire to celebrate this final meal with the disciples. Luke’s Jesus opens the meal with the announcement: “I have earnestly desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer; for I tell you I shall not eat it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God.” (Lk 22:14-23) The other two synoptics record an analogous version of the second part of this saying but place it after the institution narrative. Neither of them mentions Jesus’ intense yearning for the meal. (Mk 14:25; Mt 26:29) In Luke Jesus’ longing provides an explicit context for the institution of the eucharist which follows immediately after Jesus’ announcement. In Luke as in the other synoptics Jesus’ reference to the fulfillment of the eucharist in the kingdom of God puts it in an explicit eschatological context. The eucharist prefigures the kingdom’s final and full arrival. By locating Jesus’ proclamation of His immanent death at the beginning of the last supper, Luke portrays the entire meal as Jesus’ final testament to His disciples prior to His death.74 In Luke’s account of the last supper, Jesus passes two cups, not one. While some have suggested that this second cup may represent a liturgical development in the Lukan community, it could also refer to one of the earlier cups in the Passover meal. If so, Jesus changes the Passover rite by having all the disciples drink from the same cup. The first cup also calls attention to the eschatological character of what is happening. As Jesus passes it around, He says: “Take this, and divide it among yourselves; for I tell you that from now on I shall not drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes.” (Lk 22:17-8) Later in Acts, Jesus will again share meals with the disciples. His action there suggests, then, that with the resurrection the kingdom has begun to arrive. (Acts 1:4) The institution narrative follows. Jesus performs the eucharistic actions of taking, blessing, breaking, and giving while saying: “This is my body which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of Me.” (Lk 22:19) As we have seen, Mark’s Jesus says, “Take, this is My body.” (Mk 14:22) Matthew’s Jesus says: “Take, eat; this is my body.” (Mt 26:26) The phrase “for you” in Luke underscores the fact that Jesus dies out of love for His disciples. The gift of His death coincides with His gift of Himself in the eucharist. Luke’s Jesus also commanded that Christians remember Him by repeating His eucharistic actions. The text in no way suggests sacra74. Cf. F.C. Burckett, “St. Luke XXII, 15, 16: What is the General Meaning?” Journal of Theological Studies, 9(1908), pp. 569-571; Xavier Léon-Dufour, “Das letzte Mahl Jesu und die Testamentarische Tradition nach Lukas 22,” Zeitschrift für die Katolische Theologie, 103(1981), pp. 33-55.

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mental ordination; nor does Jesus designate who ought to lead the act of recall. After the supper, Luke’s Jesus passes the cup of blessing saying: “This cup which is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood.” (Lk 22:20) Mark’s Jesus says: “This is my blood of the covenant which is poured out for the many.” The phrase “the many” assimilates Jesus to the suffering servant. (Mk 14:22; cf. Is 54:11) Matthew’s Jesus says: “Drink of it, all of you; for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for the forgiveness of sins.” Luke’s Jesus says He sheds His blood for His disciples and by His death seals with them a new covenant. In all three gospels, Jesus portrays the shedding of His blood as a covenant sacrifice. Matthew insists as well on its atoning character. Since, however, the sacrifice of atonement renewed the covenant, all three evangelists probably allude to the rite of atonement. Among the synoptic evangelists, however, Luke alone refers to Jesus’ covenant self-sacrifice as “new.” In doing so Luke alludes to Jeremiah’s prophecy of the sealing of a new covenant written on human hearts, not on stone. (Jer 31:31-4) In Acts, as we have seen, the coming of the Breath will seal that covenant by inspiring the disciples to live spontaneously the ethics of discipleship which Jesus proclaimed. Her coming, therefore, seals the covenant.75 (Acts 2:41-7) After the words of institution over the cup, Luke’s Jesus then adds: But behold the hand of him who betrays me is with me on the table. For the Son of man goes as it has been determined; but woe to that man by whom He is betrayed!” (Lk 22:21)

In the other two synoptics, Jesus announces Judas’s treachery before the institution of the eucharist and warns of the dire consequences of treachery. Luke has the disciples question Jesus about who will betray Him; but Luke’s Jesus does not name Judas as the traitor. In Mark and Matthew, He does. (Mk 14:17-21; Mt 26:20-5) In Acts, moreover, Luke informs the reader of the woe visited upon the traitor. As we have seen, Matthew has the chief priests buy a potter’s field with the blood money which they paid Judas for Jesus. In Acts, Luke says that Judas bought the field. Matthew says that the despairing Judas hanged himself; Luke says that he fell and spewed out his entrails. We do not know exactly how Judas died; but he probably met his end shortly after Jesus’ execution. The first Christians apparently regarded his quick demise as God’s judgment on his treachery. (Acts 1:18; Mt 27:5-10) 75. Cf. Navone, op.cit., pp. 11-37; Kobus Petzer, “Style and Text in the Lucan Narrative of the Institution of the Lord’s Supper (Luke 22.19b-20),” New Testament Studies, 37(1991), pp. 113- 129; NJBC: 43:177-179; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1376-1406; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 331-343; Evans, Luke, pp. 777-791.


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Jesus’ announcement of His immanent betrayal begins His final address to the disciples before His death. Jesus’ last discourse in Luke warns of the changing relationship between Jesus and His disciples which the paschal mystery will bring. Luke’s short final discourse divides thematically into three parts. In the first part, Jesus rebukes the ambition of the Twelve and calls them to humble service in His image. At the same time, He promises them a share in His kingdom as well as judicial authority in the new Israel. In the second part, Jesus predicts Simon’s denial and subsequent repentant leadership. In part three, Jesus warns that the paschal mystery will mark a radical change in the life of the disciples. In Acts, the arrival of the Pentecostal Breath will usher in the third age of salvation, the age of the Church. As we have seen in another context, Luke transposes to the last supper the disciples’ dispute about which of them ranks first. The evangelist places their ambitious bickering after the institution of the eucharist and after Jesus’ announcement of His immanent betrayal. As Luke narrates the incident, Jesus’ announcement seems to provoke the dispute. Confronted with the knowledge that one of them will betray Jesus, the disciples show no concern for Jesus Himself. Instead they seek to exonerate themselves as each claims a greater place in the kingdom than any of the others. As we have also seen in the other two synoptics Jesus’s response to this wrangling rebukes the envy which the rest of the Twelve feel toward James and John when the two brothers try to secure privileged places in the kingdom. In Luke, Jesus speaks in response to squabbling among all the Twelve. (Mk 10:41-3; Mt 20:24-8) Jesus denounces the envy, ambition, and competition of the Twelve: The kings of the Gentiles exercise authority over them; and those in authority are called benefactors. But not so with you; rather let the greatest among you become as the youngest, and the leader as one who serves. For which is greater, one who sits at table, or one who serves? It is not the one who sits at table? But I am among you as one who serves. (Lk 22:25-26)

By locating this saying at the last supper, Luke contrasts the divine reign which the paschal mystery inaugurates with the Satanic kingdom which will soon engineer Jesus’ legal assassination. Moreover, Luke’s Jesus not only forbids the disciples to lord it over one another, but He even rules out their claiming the title of “benefactors.” First century GrecoRoman society had practically no middle class. Society divided for the most part into the rich aristocracy and the great majority of the poor. Pagan society, however, expected the rich to exercise a certain amount of noblesse oblige, by funding public events for the masses. “Benefactions” which only perpetuate class distinctions have, however, no place in the kingdom of God. Jesus holds up instead the ideal of an egalitarian society

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which does not divide into rich and poor. In that society, the disciples should vie with one another in humble service, in doing what in the first century slaves did for their owners. Moreover, Luke’s Jesus, in contrast to Mark’s and Matthew’s, again alludes to the youngest members of the community, the children, as the ideal the disciples should emulate. They should relate to one another in powerlessness and in mutual vulnerability. Finally, Luke’s Jesus singles out those in authority especially as bound to give leadership in service by imitating Jesus’ own service to others. Luke’s Jesus does not state explicitly that His service consists ultimately in His death which ransoms “the many,” as does Mark’s Jesus. The fact, however, that Jesus alludes to His service immediately after the institution of the eucharist calls implicit attention to the service of His impending death.76 Luke then counterbalances the call to service with a promise of the rewards of authentic Christian leadership. Matthew’s Jesus says something analogous in His response to Peter’s question about the reward which awaits those who have left all to follow Him. (Mt 19:27-9) Luke’s Jesus speaks, however, in somewhat different terms from Matthew’s: You are those who have continued with Me in My trials; and I assign to you, as My Father assigned to me, a kingdom, that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom, and sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel. (Lk 22:27)

In Acts companionship with Jesus from the beginning of His ministry will provide a key criterion for replacing Judas, the traitor. Here Jesus proclaims such companionship a distinguishing and untransferable trait of the Twelve. (Acts 1:21-22) Luke’s Jesus also asserts that the Father has given the kingdom into His hands. In other words, the Father has bestowed on Jesus royal dignity; and the Twelve will sit at the royal table in the messianic banquet. That same royal dignity Jesus promises to share with the Twelve by giving them authority to judge Israel. The promise of the twelve thrones in Luke could conceivably allude, as it seems to do in Matthew, to an apostolic role in the final judgment; but the images in Luke do have other connotations. In Acts, Luke will portray the Twelve exercising that judicial authority in the apostolic Church, the new Israel. (Acts 5:1-11; 15:5-29) In the second section of Jesus’ last discourse in Luke, Jesus predicts the denial of Peter: 76. The fourth gospel describes how at the last supper Jesus washed the disciples’ feet. (Jn 13-1- 11) Since Luke transposes Jesus’ teaching about service from a different section of Mark’s gospel, the evangelist need not allude to this event. Cf. Peter K. Nelson, “The Flow of Thought in Luke 22.24-27,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 43(1991), pp. 113-123.


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“Simon, Simon, behold Satan demanded to have you, that he might sift you like wheat, but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail; and when you have turned again, strengthen your brethren.” And he said to him, “Lord, I am ready to go with you to prison and to death.” He said, “I tell you, Peter, the cock will not crow this day,77 until you three times deny that you know me.” (Lk 22:31-4)

Luke alone among the synoptics attributes Peter’s denial explicitly to the activity of Satan. In the process, the evangelist indicates that Satan has returned to test, not just Jesus, but the disciples as well, and Peter especially. Peter’s denial of Jesus, his repentance, and his rehabilitation will, however, in the providence of God prepare him to support the other disciples after the passion. Only in Luke does Jesus predict that Peter will in fact repent of his denial of Jesus and once again assume a leadership position among the Twelve. Only Luke attributes Peter’s repentance to Jesus’ prayer for Peter, probably as a way of underscoring the efficacy of Jesus’ intercessory prayer. Hence, in Luke, Peter’s repentance illustrates the efficacy of Jesus’ prayer. In Acts Luke will portray Peter repeatedly “strengthening the brethren” by exercising a leadership function in the apostolic Church.78 (Acts 1:15-26, 2:14, 4:22, 5:1-11, 10:1-11:18, 12:1-19, 15:7-12) The last discourse to the disciples closes with Jesus’ warning that His immanent death will change radically the disciples’ way of living and relating to Him: And He said to them: “When I sent you out with no purse or bag or sandals, did you lack anything?” They said, “Nothing.” He said to them, “But now, let him who has a purse take it, and likewise a bag. And let him who has no sword sell his mantle and buy one. For I tell you that this scripture will be fulfilled in me, ‘And he was reckoned with transgressors’; for what is written about me has its fulfillment.” And they said to Him, “Look, here are two swords.” And he said to them, “It is enough.” (Lk 22:35-8)

Only Luke records these words of Jesus. Jesus begins by recalling His instructions in sending out both the Twelve and the seventy-two disciples and God’s providential care for them. (Lk 9:1-6; 10:3-7) Jesus then re77. Luke’s Jesus, like Matthew’s, mentions only a single cock crow. Mark mentions two. (Mk 14:26-31; Mt 26:30-5) 78. Cf. Edmund F. Sutcliff, S.J., “Et tu aliquando conversus, St. Luke 22,32,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 15(1953), pp. 305-310; Werner Foerster, “Lukas 22,31 f.,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 46(1955), pp. 129-133; Eta Linnemann, “Die Verleugnung des Petrus,” Zeitschrift für die Theologie und Kirche, 63(1966), pp. 1-32; William J. Tobin, “The Petrine Primacy, Evidence of the Gospels,” Lumen Vitae, 23(1968), pp. 27-70.

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verses those same instructions as a warning to the disciples that a serious crisis looms, one which will draw them into its toils. The fact, moreover, that the coming tragedy fulfills a prophecy makes it clear that what follows—the death of Jesus as well as its aftermath—expresses a divine purpose. The passion will begin a new conflicted era in the preaching of the gospel: the era of the Spirit and of the Church. The warning also foreshadows the persecution which the apostles will encounter as they proclaim the risen Christ in Acts. In instructing the disciples to bring purse, bag, and sword, Jesus speaks symbolically about the need for readiness to face the new situation which confronts them all; but the foolish disciples understand Him literally and show Him two swords. Jesus replies in apparent exasperation at their obtuseness: “It is enough.” One might also translate His words as: “Enough of that.” At the very moment when Jesus goes without resistance to His own death, the disciples mistakenly imagine that He is urging them to armed resistance.79 The Disciples in the Passion In Mark and in Matthew, Jesus and the disciples depart together from the upper room. (Mk 14:17; Mt 26:20) In Luke, Jesus leads the disciples forth, just as He led them in the journey discourse. The journey is continuing and will culminate finally in Jesus’ glorification and in the Pentecostal mission of the Church. The Church’s mission prolongs the journey. By having Jesus take the initiative to lead His followers into the passion Luke links the passion to the journey discourse. The discourse and the paschal mystery both illumine one another.80 As we have seen, Luke describes Jesus’ prayer in the garden very differently from either of the other synoptics. Luke makes no mention of Gethsemane. Luke’s Jesus exhorts all the disciples to pray, not just Peter, James, and John; and Luke omits mention of any distress Jesus felt prior to His prayer. In the other synoptics, Jesus separates Himself from all the disciples in order to pray. In Luke Jesus prays only once (not three times as in the other synoptics). The disciples come off somewhat better in Luke’s severely abbreviated account of Jesus’ prayer in the garden. Luke does not insist on their fail79. Cf. R. Heiligental,”Wehrlosigkeit oder Selbstschutz? Aspekte zum Verständnis des lukanischen Schwertwortes,” New Testament Studies, 41(1994), pp. 39-58; Stephen Hobhouse, “And He that hath no Sword, Let him Buy one (Luke xxii, 35-38),” Expository Times, 30(1918- 1919), pp. 278-280; S.K. Finlayson, “The Enigma of the Swords,” Expository Times, 50(1939), p. 563; Paul S. Minear, “A Note on Luke xxii.36,” New Testament Studies, 7(1964-1965), pp. 128-134; Arthur Voorbus, The Prelude to the Lukan Passion Narrative (Stockholm: Estonian Theological Society in Exile, 1968); NJBC: 43:180-183; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1407-1435; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 343-350; Evans, Luke, pp. 791-808; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 451-461. 80. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, I, pp. 123-124.


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ure to pray as Mark does. Luke even excuses their failure: Luke’s disciples sleep from sorrow. Luke, however, frames the story with a warning to the disciples at its beginning and again at its end to pray lest they enter into temptation. (Lk 22:39-46) The disciples confront the eschatological trial and need to seek from God the strength to surmount it. That they sleep instead dramatizes their unpreparedness for what will immediately follow. The story, also, holds up Jesus’ persevering prayer in the face of eschatological testing as a model for how the disciples should pray when they themselves face the test of being drawn into the eschatological struggle against the forces of evil. In Luke, all the disciples, not just Peter, James, and John, witness Jesus’ prayer.81 Following Mark, Luke stresses the fact that “one of the Twelve” handed Jesus over. Jesus responds to Judas’ treachery by saying: “Judas, would you betray the Son of man with a kiss?” (Lk 14:47-8) In Mark, Jesus says nothing. (Mk 14:45-6) In Matthew, Jesus says: “Friend, why are your here?” (Mt 26:50) Matthew’s Jesus continues to call Judas friend even as He challenges him to acknowledge the enormity of what he is doing. Luke’s Jesus, however, focuses on the hypocrisy of Judas’s act as a way of jolting the disciple to self-knowledge and repentance. Even though Judas serves as Satan’s instrument in handing Jesus over to His enemies, Jesus continues to appeal to the disciple’s power to choose otherwise.82 Moreover, the Lukan Jesus knows what Judas is about to do even before the disciple does it. As we have seen, Matthew’s Jesus claims the power to summon twelve legions of rescuing angels but refrains from doing so. Even at the moment of betrayal, therefore, Luke’s Jesus shows more control over events than Marks’ does but less than Matthew’s Jesus. As we shall see in the next volume, John’s Jesus shows the greatest mastery of all. The other disciples persist in misunderstanding Jesus’ final words in His last discourse and imagine that the time for armed resistance against which He warned them has arrived. They ask: “Lord, shall we strike with the sword?” (Lk 22:49) Luke alone records the question, which contextualizes the attack on the “servant of the high priest.” Luke’s Jesus, however, once again rebukes the disciples’ incomprehension and violence with a curt order: “That is enough!” [Literally: “Let them be, even thus far (eate hos toutou).”] Jesus then heals the severed ear. (Lk 22:50-1) The other two synoptic evangelists make no mention of the miracle, which in Luke exemplifies Jesus’ benevolence and forgiveness even toward enemies. Luke also departs from Mark in failing to mention the fact that the disciples then deserted Jesus.83 81. Cf. NJBC, 43:184; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, 1436-1446; Evans, Luke, pp. 808-813; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 461-464. 82. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, I, pp. 258-259. 83. Cf. NJBC: 43:185; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1446-1452; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 350-356; Evans, Luke, pp. 813-821; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 464-467.

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While the other two synoptics situate the denial of Peter during Jesus’ trial at night before the Sanhedrin, Luke, as we have seen, makes no mention of a night trial. Luke also edits Mark’s account of Peter’s denial. He omits a number of descriptive details, including the fact that in his third denial Peter cursed and swore that he did not know Jesus. Luke’s Peter simply says, “Fellow, I do not know the man.” (Lk 22:54-62) As Luke describes the scene, however, those who arrest Jesus take Him into a courtyard, kindle a fire and sit down. Peter follows and sits among them. Luke, then, makes Peter’s denials of Jesus all the more poignant by having Jesus witness them. After Peter’s denials, “the Lord” turns and looks upon Him. Jesus’ gaze reminds Peter that Jesus has already forgiven Him in advance. (Lk 22:31-4, 61) Peter, cut to the heart, remembers Jesus’ prediction, departs, and weeps bitter tears of repentance.84 (Lk 22:61-2) As in the other synoptic gospels, Luke describes how the soldiers forced Simon of Cyrene to carry the cross after Jesus. (Lk 23:26) As in the other synoptics, Simon functions as an ironic type of the true disciple.85 (Cf. Lk 9:23) Luke adds to the group of women disciples who witness Jesus’ death at a distance some male disciples as well. (Lk 23:49) Following Mark, Luke also records that Joseph of Aramathea, a member of the Sanhedrin and “a good and righteous man,” asked Pilate for Jesus’ body. Luke edits out from Mark Pilate’s surprise that Jesus has died so quickly. Joseph wraps Jesus’ body in linen. Some think that the linen symbolizes immortality. Joseph then lays the body of Jesus in a rock-hewn tomb. Luke adds the detail that the tomb has never seen use. John’s gospel records the same tradition. (Jn 19:41) Matthew states that the tomb was “new” but says nothing explicit about prior use, although Matthew does note that Joseph had the tomb constructed for his own burial. Probably, then, in Matthew too the tomb has never known use. The women view where the body lies. Luke alone adds the detail that they could not prepare the body properly for burial because the sabbath was already beginning. Accordingly, the women go home and prepare spices to embalm the body with the intention of returning after the sabbath rest passes. Only in Luke do the woman take this active role in Jesus’ interment. Luck mentions no guards at the tomb.86 (Lk 23:50-56; Mk 15:42-47; Mt 27:57-61) 84. Cf. NJBC: 43:186; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1452-1471; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 356-363; Evans, Luke, pp. 821-830; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 467-469. 85. Like Mark, Luke suggests that Simon had come as a pilgrim to Jerusalem for the feast of Passover. Like Matthew, Luke edits out the names of Simon’s sons, Alexander and Rufus. Presumably, Mark’s community knew the two sons, while Luke’s did not. (Lk 23:26; Mk 15:21) 86. Cf. Fernando Morell-Balderón, “El Relato de la Pasión segun San Lucas,” Estudios Biblicos, 54(1996), pp. 79-114; NJBC: 43:194; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1523-1531; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 382-387; Evans, Luke, pp. 879-884; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 491-467.


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The Disciples and the Risen Christ Like Mark, Luke records that the women returned to the tomb at early dawn on the Sunday after sabbath. They find the stone door of the tomb rolled away and the tomb itself empty. Suddenly two young men in dazzling garments appear to them with the message: “Why do you seek the living among the dead? Remember how he told you, while he was in Galilee, that the Son of man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and on the third day rise.” (Lk 24:1-11) Luke transforms the young man in a white robe in Mark into two young men whose sudden appearance and dazzling garments suggest their angelic character. (cf. Lk 24:23) They foreshadow the two angels who appear after the ascension and link the two events as facets of the same mystery. (Acts 1:11) Luke does not call the youths angels, although the women react to them as if they were: they bow to the ground in fright. (Lk 24:4-5) Later, however, the disciples on the way to Emmaus will describe them as angels. (Lk 24:23) Luke’s two angels speak a different message from the young man in Mark. Mark’s young man tells the women that Jesus has risen and that the disciples will see Him in Galilee. (Mk 16:5-7) Since Luke locates the apparitions of the risen Christ on the road to Emmaus and in Jerusalem, his angels make no mention of Galilee and simply allude to Jesus’ predictions of His own passion and resurrection. Later in his resurrection narrative, Luke will assert that Jesus’ resurrection fulfills not only His own predictions of His death and glorification, but the entire Old Testament as well. Luke’s relocation of the resurrection apparitions in Jerusalem rather than in Galilee reflects the theological importance which movement plays in his gospel. The journey discourse portrays the progress of the good news from Galilee to Jerusalem. For the disciples to return to Galilee in order to encounter the risen Christ would reverse the geographical movement of Luke’s story and destroy the symbolism both of the journey discourse and of Jerusalem as the center of the Jewish world from which the gospel of Jesus shall flow to the Gentiles. Only after the women have seen the apparition of the angels and heard the message does Luke name them: Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and other women. (Lk 24:10) The women in Luke, in contrast to those in Mark, obey the angels and tell the apostles what they have seen. The apostles, however, dismiss their story and refuse to believe it. Luke, in contrast to Matthew, makes no mention of the women’s encounter with the risen Christ.87 (Lk 24:11-12; cf. Mk 16:8; Mt 28:8) 87. Cf. Anton Dauer, “Zur Authentizität von Lk 24,12,” Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 70(1994), pp. 294-318; F. Neirynck, “Once More Luke 24,12,”Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 70(1994), pp. 319-340; J. Schmitt, “Le récit de la resurrection dans l’évangile de Luc; étude de critique litteraire, I,” Recherches de Science

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Luke alone records the apparition of Jesus to the disciples on the road to Emmaus. The story contains many of the salient ideas in a Lukan theology of the resurrection. 1) The resurrection so transformed Jesus that it made it difficult for those who had known Him to recognize Him initially. In the case of the disciples journeying to Emmaus, Luke says specifically that “their eyes were held from recognizing Him.” (Lk 24:13-27) This detail lends considerable drama to the story. 2) Nevertheless, those who saw the risen Christ did in fact encounter the same Jesus who had been crucified. 3) The encounter had a physical dimension, because of the transformation of Jesus’ body. 4) The recognition of Jesus came as an unexpected revelation. 5) The Old Testament predicted Jesus’ resurrection. Hence, resurrection faith causes one to read the Old Testament with new eyes.88 6) The resurrection encounter transformed the disciples from people bereft and distraught into joyful witnesses to the risen Christ. 7) The resurrection encounter included a conversation with the risen Jesus. Jesus approaches two disciples on their journey to Emmaus and asks them what they are talking about. They tell Him the things which recently occurred in Jerusalem. When He asks, “What things?” they narrate in astonishment Jesus’ prophetic mission, His passion, the women’s discovery of the empty tomb, and their vision of the angels announcing His resurrection. (Lk 24:13-24) Jesus then chides the two for their failure to understand the historical necessity of all these events. He explains to them how Moses and the prophets—the entire Old Testament—had foretold the inevitability of all these things. As He speaks, He stirs their hearts profoundly. Evening approaches as it had in the multiplication of the loaves. (Lk 9:12) The disciples urge Jesus to stay with them. At supper He performs the eucharistic gestures of taking, blessing, breaking, and giving. Suddenly the disciples recognize Jesus “in the breaking of the bread”; but He vanishes instantly. They return to Jerusalem with joy to report to the Eleven what they have experienced only to hear that “The Lord is risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon!” (Lk 24:25-35) It typifies the forgiveness of Luke’s Jesus that the risen Christ would appear first to the repentant Peter. Luke stresses twice that these events happened to the two disciples “on the way (en te hodo).” (Lk 24:32, 35) The phrase links the resurrection appearance to the journey discourse and asserts that the Christian “way” does not end at Jerusalem. On the contrary, the resurrection prolongs it and inaugurates a new pilgrimage: the journey of the Christian disciples in resurrection faith which Luke will narrate in Acts as they spread the Religieuse, 25(1951), pp. 119-137; NJBC: 43:195; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1532-1553; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 386- 391; Evans, Luke, pp. 885-900; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 497-501. 88. Luke makes this same point in Jesus’ third prediction of His passion. (Lk 18:31-34)


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gospel to the heart of the Gentile world. Moreover, the fact that the disciples recognize Jesus “in the breaking of the bread” links resurrection faith to eucharistic faith and in the process makes eucharistic faith an intimate part of “the way.” As we have seen, the term “the way” designated the Christian movement as a whole.89 (Cf. Acts 9:2) Even as the disciples from Emmaus hear the news of Jesus’ appearance to Peter, Jesus Himself suddenly appears in their midst. The frightened disciples think they are seeing a ghost. Jesus shows them his wounds and insists that He is flesh and blood, not a ghost.90 When the disciples still doubt, Jesus eats some broiled fish to convince them.91 Then Jesus says to them: “These are my words which I spoke to you, while I was still with you, that everything written about Me in the Law of Moses and the prophets and psalms must be fulfilled.” Then He opened their minds to understand the scriptures, and said to them, “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead and that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be preached in His name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are my witnesses of these things. And behold I send the promise of my Father upon you; but stay in the city, until you are clothed with power from on high.” (Lk 24:44-9)

Jesus’ words here function in a manner analogous to the Great Commission in Matthew, even though in Luke the commission takes more the form of a prophecy. Matthew’s Jesus as we have seen issues the Great Commission as a direct command to baptize in the triune name. (Mt 28:16-20) In Luke the actual commissioning of the apostles will happen after Jesus’ ascension, on Pentecost, when the arrival of the Holy Breath transforms them into a prophetic community which witnesses to the paschal mystery. (Acts 2:1-41) Matthew, as we have also seen, links the commission to the resurrection and to faith in Jesus as Immanuel. We find no such allusion to Immanuel in Luke. 89. Cf. Jeanne d’Arc, “Catechesis on the Road to Emmaus,” Lumen Vitae, 32(1977), pp. 143- 156; “Un grand jeu d’inclusion dans ‘les perlins d’Emmaus,’” Nouvelle Revue Théologique, 99(1977), pp. 62-76; Friedrich Wulf, S.J., “Sie erkannten ihn beim Brechen des Brotes (Lk 24,35),” Geist und Leben, 37(1964), pp. 81-83; Raymond Orlett, “An influence of the Early Liturgy upon the Emmaus Account,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 21(1959), pp. 212-219; J. Duncan M. Derrett, “The Walk to Emmaus (Lk 24, 13-35): The Lost Dimension,” Estudios Biblicos, 54(1996), pp. 183-193; NJBC: 43:196; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1553-1572; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 392-400; Evans, Luke, pp. 900-915; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 501-508. 90. The fourth gospel also states that Jesus’ risen body retained the wounds of crucifixion. (Jn 20:24-7) 91. Cf. Gerald O’Collins, “Did Jesus Eat the Fish (Lk 24:42-43),” Gregorianum, 69(1988), pp. 65-75.

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Both evangelists, however, see the commissioning of the disciples as a fulfillment of John the Baptizer’s prophecy of the coming of a “mightier one” who will baptize with a Holy Breath and fire. In Luke the phrase “the promise of my Father alludes” to John’s prophecy. In Matthew baptism in the triune name fulfills that prophecy. In Acts, as we have seen, Christian baptism will perform the same function.92 (Acts 2:40-1; Mt 28:16-20) Luke closes his gospel with a very cryptic account of the ascension of Jesus. We find no mention at all of an ascension in the other two synoptics. John’s gospel does, however, speak of Jesus’ ascension to the Father. (Jn 20:17-8) In Luke, Jesus departs for heaven with a blessing. Thereafter, the disciples imitate the prophetess Anna in Luke’s infancy narrative by remaining “continually in the temple blessing God.” (Lk 24:50-3, 2:37) Luke’s Jesus ascends from the Mount of Olives, the scene of His prayer with the disciples in Gethsemane. Jesus’ ascension also recalls the ascent of Elijah (2 Kings 2:1-25), who in Luke frequently foreshadows Jesus and His ministry. Like Elijah, Jesus too will return. (Mal 3:1-23) Mountain tops in Luke and the Mount of Olives in particular have rich Old Testament connotations. The Lukan Jesus prefers mountain tops as a place of prayer. (Lk 6:12, 9:28) David, as Jesus’ messianic prototype, wept and prayed on the mount of Olives after his betrayal by intimates: Absalom, his son, and Ahitophel, his trusted counselor. (1 Sam 15:30) Jesus was betrayed on the Mount of Olives by Judas. The fourteenth chapter of Zechariah designates the Mount of Olives as the place where God will stand when He pronounces final judgment. Jesus will return as the apocalyptic Son of Man riding on the clouds of heaven (Dan 7:13); and He will fulfill Zechariah’s prophecy by pronouncing divine judgment on all the nations, including Israel.93 At the beginning of Acts, Luke says that the resurrection appearances spanned a period of forty days. The forty days of resurrection appearances recall Jesus’ forty-day fast in the desert, which in turn recalls the exodus. Luke also speaks of this period as a time of apostolic catechesis. Jesus’ agenda has not changed an iota. In His risen glory, He instructs the apostles in the reign of God whose proclamation will continue. In Acts, moreover, Jesus appears to more people than the disciples journeying to Emmaus and the Twelve. (Acts 1:1-5; Lk 4:1-13) 92. Cf. Peter Hebblethwaite, S.J., “Theological Themes in the Lukan Post-Resurrection Narratives,” The Clergy Review, 50(1965), pp. 360-369; Joseph Plevnik, “The Origin of Easter Faith According to Luke,” Biblica, 61(1980), pp. 492-508; J. Schmitt, “Le recit de la resurrection dans l’évangile de Luc: étude de critique litteraire, II,” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 25(1951), pp. 219-242; NJBC: 43:197; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1572-1585; Ernst, op. cit., pp. 508-513. 93. Cf. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, I, pp. 125-126; NJBC: 43:197-198; Fitzmyer, Gospel, II, pp. 1572-1585; Johnson, Gospel, pp. 400-406; Evans, Luke, pp. 916-128.


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Before Jesus ascends in Acts a gathering of disciples asks Him if He is now going to restore the kingdom of Israel. Jesus replies: It is not for you to know times and seasons (chronous e kairous) which the Father has decided by His own authority; but you will receive power when the Holy Breath comes upon you, and you will be my witnesses (martyres) in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and even to the end of the earth. (Acts 1:7-9)

Jesus refuses to give the disciples precise time tables; but He does not completely rule out the restoration of Israel. He indicates, however, that restoration will take a form which the disciples apparently do not expect. First, the Samaritans and then the Gentiles must be incorporated into the new Israel through the pneumatically inspired witness of the disciples themselves. Jesus’ words in effect outline the plot of Acts, which will narrate the Pentecost of the Jews, the conversion of the Samaritans, the baptism of the first Gentiles, and Paul’s Gentile missions.94 After saying this Jesus is taken up from the Mount of Olives (Acts 1:12) into heaven and received into a cloud, which marks this event as a theophany. (Ex 13:22ff; Lk 9:34) The cloud also recalls the cloud on the mount of the transfiguration. (Lk 9:35) As the disciples stare after Jesus, two men, who recall the angelic duo who announced Jesus’ resurrection to the women, appear and announce to the disciples: Men of Galilee, why to you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus who was taken up from you into heaven will return in the same way as you saw Him going into heaven. (Acts 1:9-11)

The ascension terminates the apparitions of the risen Christ to the disciples who knew Him during His ministry. The next time they will see Him He shall return as Son of man, riding the clouds of heaven. The ascension, therefore, recalls the account of the second coming in Jesus’ eschatological discourse (Lk 21:27) and foreshadows the parousia, when Jesus will return on the clouds, this time in vindication and in judgment. In the final age of salvation, the age of the Church, the risen Christ will make His presence felt through the Holy Breath whose charisms will empower the apostolic witness.95 94. Cf. Anthony Buzzard, “Acts 1:6 and the Eclipse of the Biblical Kingdom,” Evangelical Quarterly, 66(1994), pp. 197-215. 95. Cf. NJBC, 44:17; Conzelmann, Acts, pp. 5-8; Bruce, Acts, pp. 28-39; Hänchen, op. cit., pp. 135-152; R.F. O’Toole, S.J., “Activity of the Risen Jesus in Luke-Acts,” Biblica, 62(1981), pp. 471-498; Gilbert Bouwman, “Die Erhöhung Jesu,” Biblische Zeitschrift, 14(1970), pp. 257- 263; David L. Meland, “The Phrase ‘Many Proofs’ in Acts 1,3,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 80(1989), pp. 134-135;

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The Analogy of Christological Knowing Like the other synoptic evangelists, Luke discovers genuine ambivalence in the disciples’ relationship to Jesus prior to His passion. As in the other two gospels, Jesus constantly challenges them to a repentant confrontation with their ambivalence. In the end, the disciples must choose in the face of the paschal mystery. A number of traits, however, distinguish Luke’s portrait of the disciples from that of the other synoptic evangelists. Mark stresses the sacrifices demanded by a life of discipleship. Luke concedes the point but stresses more its universal missionary character. In Luke, every disciple, not just Church leaders, share the responsibility of spreading the good news. Luke recognizes with Matthew that Jesus fulfills the Law and the prophets. In Luke, by fulfilling the Old Testament, the paschal mystery ushers in the third and final age of universal salvation in Christ. Luke, however, shows more concern than the other synoptic evangelists that, with the postponement of the second coming, his Gentile Christians will yield to the temptation of settling too comfortably into this world. More than Mark or Matthew, therefore, Luke links eschatological hope and readiness for the final judgment to identification with and care for the poor and weak. Luke writes for a predominantly Gentile audience. Many of the issues which most preoccupy Matthew, the Jewish Christian, do not preoccupy Luke. Matthew writes to help Jewish Christians define their religious identity in relationship to Torah and to the rest of Judaism. Luke realizes that Gentile Christians should acknowledge their religious roots in Judaism; but Luke discerns an even more urgent need for them to define their Christian identity over against the violent and oppressive reality of the Roman empire, which he regards as Satanic. As we have seen, in Luke’s infancy narrative, the angels use an imperial formula to proclaim the birth of the messiah. From the beginning of his narrative, Luke makes it clear that Christian Gentiles need to choose between Jesus and the reign of God, on one hand, and imperial Rome, on the other. Accordingly, the evangelist insists that the acknowledgement of God’s supreme sovereignty in prayer must claim the disciples’ first and absolute allegiance. Confronted with the power of Rome they must even live willing to give their lives before allowing any created power to subvert that allegiance. Prayer and reverence for God must root and ground their faith. As we saw in volume one, Luke’s Gentile Christians had to live in a stratified class structure which concentrated enormous wealth in the hands of the aristocratic few. In Roman society the middle class and the retainer class of Roman bureaucrats and military personnel served the power inA.W.Zwep, “The Text of the Ascension Narratives (Luke 25.50-3); Acts 1.1-2, 9-11),” New Testament Studies, 42(1996), pp. 219-244.


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terests of the ruling aristocratic elite. The vast majority of the population—the peasants and urban poor—languished in oppression, misery, and need. Slaves formed the under class. The expendables, like beggars and lepers, died on the fringes of organized society. In this context Luke insists again and again that discipleship commits one to active concern for the poor, the sick, and the marginal. Luke also numbers woman among the socially margenalized groups which need inclusion and empowerment within the Christian community, even though in Luke’s account of Church origins in Acts women play only a minor role. Those on pilgrimage with Jesus into God must create a community which includes even the underclass and the expendables. Rich Gentile Christians must recognize that accumulated wealth counts against them in the eyes of God. No amount of symbolic benefaction will excuse cupidity and greed. In addition, Luke insists strongly that Jesus’ messianic reversal of values demands the renunciation of all forms of coercive violence in dealing with others. Rome’s ruthless use of violence to impose its oppressive will must give way to mutual forgiveness, love of enemies, and mutual support in community. Christian leaders must renounce the ways of the kings of the Gentiles. They and the entire Christian community must cultivate humility and mutual service in the image of a servant messiah. In the violent world of Roman society, Luke stresses even more than the other evangelists that those who follow Jesus must walk the path of mutual forgiveness and of non-violent prophetic resistance to all forms of violence against persons. They must stand in solidarity with the masses of the poor and oppose all forms of institutional oppression and corruption.96 The preceding chapters have considered how Luke modifies the positive, negative, and ambiguous dramatic linkages which he finds in Mark. The time has come to examine how the third evangelist handles the other Markan linkages. On this question the following chapter focuses.

96. Cf. Richard J. Cassidy, Jesus, Politics, and Society (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1983); Society and Politics in the Acts of the Apostles (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1987); Halvor Moxnes, The Economy of the Kingdom: Social Conflict and Economic Relations in Luke’s Gospel (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press, 1946); Dennis M. Sweetland, Our Journey with Jesus: Discipleship According to Luke-Acts (Collegeville, MI: The Liturgical Press; Michael Glazier, 1990).

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Chapter 16 Thematic and Allusive Linkages in Luke This chapter examines the thematic linkages in Luke: Jesus’ teachings and miracles. It also begins to reflect on the evangelist’s use of literary allusion. This chapter divides into three parts. Part one summarizes Luke’s account of Jesus’ teaching. Part two reflects on Jesus’ miracles and exorcisms. Part three ponders how Luke uses literary allusion within his gospel. (I) As we have seen, Luke has his own distinctive way of handling the teachings of Jesus. He gathers them into a five small discourses but locates most teachings in the great journey discourse. I have examined all of the minor discourses: the sermon on the plain, the parabolic discourse, the missionary commission to the Twelve, the eschatological discourse, and the discourse at the last supper. The missionary discourse to the seventy-two disciples forms, as we have seen, a part of the journey discourse. As we have also seen, Jesus directs only one of the minor discourses primarily to the crowds: namely, the eschatological discourse. All the other minor discourses and especially the journey discourse target the disciples.1 In the preceding chapters, I have analyzed the content of these discourses in some detail. In this section, I shall summarize the major themes which each discourse develops. While this summary will entail some repetition of themes and ideas already analyzed, it should also give the reader a sense of Luke’s distinctive way of presenting Jesus’ teachings. 1) The sermon on the plain (Lk 6:20-49) announces the messianic reversal of values and enunciates basic moral conditions for discipleship. The poor, the hungry, the sorrowing, the persecuted will inherit the kingdom, while the selfish rich, the self-sated, those who rejoice in self-satisfaction, and those who enjoy worldly success will experience a sharp reversal of fortunes. Membership in the kingdom demands love of enemies, which contextualizes non-violent resistance to evil. Love of enemies, moreover, expresses the universalization of human love which life in the kingdom demands. Universal love exemplifies the same kind of mercy which the Father shows to both saint and sinner. 1. Cf. José Maria Casciaro, “Contribucion al Estudio de los Discursos de Jesús en los Sinopticos,” Estudios Biblicos, 50(1992), pp. 395-409.

Chapter 16: Thematic and Allusive Linkages in Luke

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Only repentant self-confrontation in faith enables the disciples to lead others in the path of holiness. Living the gospel identifies the true disciple. Moreover, Christian practice must spring from purity of intention. Those who follow Jesus without living in His image will not survive the hour of trail and testing. In His inaugural sermon, then, Luke’s Jesus develops four major themes: 1) the messianic reversal of values; 2) love of enemies and non-violent resistance to evil; 3) repentance; and 4) the need for heartfelt living of the gospel.2 2) The parabolic discourse (Lk 8:4-18) challenges the crowds to recognize that despite initial setbacks, the kingdom will bear abundant fruit. The discourse also introduces the disciples to the mystery of the kingdom. It challenges them to steadfast and deep-rooted faith and to renounce the riches and pleasures of this life. Those who live so will bear abundant fruit. Luke’s Jesus exhorts the disciples to let the light of faith draw others into the household of God. In the parabolic discourse, Luke’s Jesus develops the following themes: 1) the abundant fruit which will result from the proclamation of the kingdom; 2) the need for deep rooted, practical, and other-worldly faith; and 3) faith’s capacity to draw unbelievers into the Church. 3) One may question whether the missionary commissioning of the Twelve in Luke qualifies as a discourse, given its brevity. The commissioning has, however, more the form of a short discourse than of a pronouncement. Moreover the repetition of many of the same themes in the commissioning of the seventy-two endows its message with importance. The missionary discourse to the Twelve (Lk 9:1-6) and the discourse which commissions the seventy-two disciples during the journey discourse (Lk 10:1-12) develop the same themes as the parallel discourses in Mark and Matthew: 1) urgency in proclamation, 2) trust in God, 3) the poverty of the apostolic life, 4) trust in the hospitality of the evangelized, and 4) withdrawal from hostile reception to the gospel.3 4) Deuteronomic themes and imagery fill the journey discourse. (Lk 9:51-19:27) Luke portrays Jesus not only as the joyful prophet of the kingdom but as the one who fulfills Deut 18:15-18. The prophet like Moses whom Deuteronomy foretold, Jesus brings about a new exodus, a new liberation through his ministry, death, and glorification. Moses’s sufferings at the hands of Israel foreshadow Jesus’ passion. Jesus travels to 2. Cf. W. Grundmann, “Die Bergpredigt nach der Lukasfassung,” Studia Evangelica I, (TU 73; 1959), pp. 180-187; Hans Werner Bartsch, “Feldpredigt und Bergpredigt: Redactionsarbeit in Luk. 6,” Theologische Zeitschrift, 16(1966), pp. 5-18. 3. Cf. F.W. Beare, “The Mission of the Disciples and the Mission Charge: Matthew 10 and Parallels,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 89(1970), pp. 1-13; E. Schott, “Die Aussendungsrede Mt 10. Mc 6. Lk 9.10.,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 7(1906), pp. 140-159.

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Jerusalem in order to reap the reward of a prophet, martyrdom in the holy city. The first Moses led a rebellious people; the prophet like Moses dies at the hands of the “sinful generation” to which He preaches. (Cf. Acts 7:17-43) During the journey discourse Luke also depicts Jesus as the journeying guest. The many meals which punctuate the discourse re-enforce this image. The meals foreshadow the eucharist, and the conflicts which take place at them foreshadow the passion. After the passion, in the apparition at Emmaus, the journeying guest stands revealed as the Lord of the banquet. Conflicts during the journey discourse culminate in Jesus’ crucifixion and in the paschal mystery. Jesus’ glorification effects the new exodus which He as the new Moses has come to lead. The paschal mystery offers Israel its last and best chance to renounce the sins of the past and accept the forgiveness and reconciliation which Jesus proclaims and embodies. The new exodus, however, reaches out to the Gentile world as well by incorporating them into the new Israel which Jesus creates.4 Lessons in the Journey Discourse The journey discourse divides roughly into three parts. A reference to Jerusalem as Jesus’ destination occurs at the beginning of each part. (Lk 9:51-13:21, 13:22-17:10, 17:11-19:27) Since I have reflected in other contexts on the different pericopes which constitute the journey discourse, I seek here only to give the reader a sense of the journey discourse as a whole and of the major themes which it develops. As the first part of the discourse unfolds, it reflects on the following themes: 1) the strenuous demands of discipleship (Lk 9:51-62), 2) its missionary character (Lk 10:1-6), 3) the blessings of discipleship (Lk 10:17-24), 4) the inclusiveness of the kingdom (Lk 10:25-42), 5) the need for expectant and persistent prayer (Lk 11:1-13), 6) the victory over Satan (Lk 11:14-26), 7) obedience (Lk 11:27-28), 8) faith (Lk 11:29-36), 9) the evil of hypocrisy and legalism (Lk 11:37-12:1), 10) strength under temptation (Lk 12:2-12), 11) the need to share one’s goods with others out of trust in the Father’s providential care (Lk 12:13-34), 12) the need for eschatological vigilance (Lk:35-13:9), and 13) the ultimate triumph of the kingdom despite opposition (Lk 13:10-21). The second part of the journey discourse develops the following themes: 1) the difficulty of entering the kingdom (Lk 13:22-30), 2) the inevitability of Jesus’ prophetic martyrdom in Jerusalem (Lk 13:31-35), 3) heal4. Cf. David P. Mössner, Lord of the Banquet: The Literary and Theological Significance of the Lukan Travel Narrative (Minneapolis, MI: Fortress Press, 1989); David L. Tiede, Prophecy and History in Luke-Acts (Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press, 1980); Frank J. Matera, “Jesus’ Journey to Jerusalem (Luke 9,51-19,44): A Conflict with Israel,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 51(1993), pp. 57-77.


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ing (Lk 14:1-6) 4) humility (Lk 14:7-11), 5) the inclusiveness of the kingdom (Lk 14:12-24), 6) self-denial and the willingness to renounce one’s possessions (Lk 14:25-33), 7) the evil of tepidity (Lk 14:34-35), 8) divine forgiveness (Lk 15:1-32), 9) the sin of remarrying after divorce (Lk 16:18) 10) right use of money (Lk 16:1-15) 11) the fulfillment of the old Law in the new covenant (Lk 16:16-33) 12) the evil of giving scandal and the need for mutual reconciliation (Lk 17:1-4), and 13) the importance in apostles of strong faith and of humble service (Lk 17:5-10) The following themes structure the third and final part of the journey discourse: 1) the importance of gratitude (Lk 17:11-19), 2) the immanent presence of the kingdom (Lk 17:20-21), 3) readiness to face final judgment (Lk 17:22-37), 4) the importance of persevering prayer (Lk 18:1-8), 5) the need for humble repentance and the evil of self-righteousness (Lk 18:9-14), 6) childlike faith (Lk 18:15-17), 7) the danger of riches and the need to renounce them (Lk 18:18-30), 8) the inevitability of Jesus’ passion (Lk 18:31-34), 9) the power of faith to speed one joyfully along the way of discipleship (Lk 18:35-43), 10) sharing one’s goods with others insures salvation (Lk 19:1-10), and 11) the need to cultivate the gifts God gives if one wishes to avoid divine condemnation (Lk 19:11-27). As the journey discourse unfolds, Luke sometimes treats the same theme in more than one section. Repetition nuances the same theme and endows it with enhanced importance. The following themes recur with greatest frequency in the journey discourse: 1) the demands and privileges of discipleship, 2) poverty, 3) faith, 4) prayer, and 5) eschatological readiness. Three other themes occur somewhat less frequently in the journey discourse: 1) the difficulty of entering the kingdom, 2) the need for repentance, and 3) the reality of divine forgiveness. I begin with the theme of the demands and privileges of discipleship. As we have seen, the journey discourse begins with several reflections on the demands of discipleship; but Luke returns again to this theme in other contexts. Luke’s Jesus requires the disciples to learn as their very first lesson the need for non-violent resistance to hostility. (Lk 9:51-56) In addition, the disciples must recognize that they follow a vagabond leader, whose poverty they must imitate. Discipleship makes peremptory demands which go beyond the most sacred family ties. (Cf. Lk 14:25) It requires unconditioned commitment. It commissions one to proclaim the kingdom, and it brings with it the assurance of life with God. (Lk 9:57-62) In the second part of the journey discourse, Luke’s Jesus equates discipleship with total self-abnegation. Day by day, one must carry the cross behind Jesus. (Lk 14:25-35) The fact that discipleship demands that one “renounce all that one has” means that one should consider carefully whether or not one can make such sacrifices before one decides to join

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Jesus’ pilgrimage into glory. (Lk 14:28-33) Christian self-denial permits no backsliding. The tepid disciple resembles worthless salt which has lost its taste. (Lk 14:34-35) The third prophecy of the paschal mystery occurs in the third part of the journey discourse. It challenges the disciples to recognize in the paschal mystery, in the death and resurrection of Jesus, events which fulfill the scriptures and which embody an all encompassing divine plan of salvation. (Lk 18:31-4) That plan includes the disciples and draws them into the passion. The inevitability of Jesus’ passion makes it also inevitable that those who follow Him will suffer persecution at the hands of the same powers which murdered Him. In times of persecution, however, the disciples should let reverential fear of the Father’s condemnation allay any fears they may have of their persecutors. Instead, the disciples under persecution should bear fearless witness to Jesus in the assurance that on the day of judgment He will testify to the Father on their behalf. Persecuted disciples should trust the Holy Breath to inspire their testimony to Jesus and should avoid apostasy, which blasphemes the Breath. (Lk 12:4-12) In Acts, Luke will describe how the disciples in prolonging Jesus’ mission confront the same Satanic forces of evil which murdered Him. That confrontation will give them a share in Jesus’ passion. Among the demands of discipleship, Luke’s Jesus includes mutual care for one another in community. He warns His disciples that they should prefer death by drowning to giving scandal to anyone. (Lk 17:1-2) They must also forgive a repentant offender as often as he or she asks for forgiveness. (Lk 17:3-4) The parable of the pounds closes the journey discourse. Luke’s Jesus tells the parable to disciples who suppose that the kingdom of heaven will appear immediately. (Lk 19:11) The parable makes practical readiness to face final judgment, no matter when it comes, a fundamental demand of discipleship. The disciples will live in readiness to face final judgment if they use their gifts generously and courageously in order to advance the reign of God. (Lk 19:12-27) The universality of the kingdom poses another challenge to missionary disciples. As we have seen, Luke uses Jesus’ teaching about the two great commandments in order to stress the inclusiveness of the kingdom. The parable of the good Samaritan interprets the great commandments in the light of Jesus and of His message of universal reconciliation. The parable forces the disciples to recognize that the kingdom reaches out to anyone in need and heals them in ways which also liberate them. Moreover, Christian love extends even to enemies and heretics. (Lk 10:30-5) The cure of the ten lepers begins the third part of the journey discourse. In its own way it too stresses the inclusiveness of the kingdom.


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Jesus cures ten lepers, but only one of them, a Samaritan, returns to thank Jesus. The Samaritan’s gratitude rebukes the ingratitude of the nine Jewish lepers and shows that grace and healing extend to non-Jews as well as to Jews. The cured Samaritan returns to thank God in Jesus’ presence because he recognizes in the very person of Jesus the presence and healing power of God.5 (Lk 17:11-14) Similarly, the story of Martha and Mary makes it clear that the kingdom also breaks down sexual barriers in society: Jesus calls and includes women among His disciples. (Lk 10:38-42) Jesus’ rebuke to the disciples who try to prevent parents from bringing their infants to Him to touch makes two major points: 1) the innocence of the babies, their weakness and vulnerability makes them ideals for the disciples to imitate. 2) Their inclusion in the kingdom probably justifies their baptism in the apostolic Church. (Lk 18:15-7) Finally, the story of Zacchaeus also makes a statement about the kingdom’s inclusiveness. The kingdom embraces Jew as well as Gentile. It even includes Jewish outcasts, like the toll collectors, provided they manifest repentance and obedience of faith. I shall consider the case of Zacchaeus in greater detail below in reflecting on the right use of material possessions. The second part of the journey discourse closes with the parable of the unprofitable servant. The parable teaches the gratuitous character of salvation; and it excludes all boasting in those who serve. After they have done all they should to, Jesus’ disciples must acknowledge that they have only done their duty. (Lk 17:7-10) Throughout the journey discourse, then Luke’s Jesus insists that discipleship exacts stringent demands and genuine self-sacrifice. Discipleship, however, also has its privileges: 1) Discipleship empowers one to cast Satan out of heaven by proclaiming the kingdom. 2) It gives one access to the unique knowledge of the Father which Jesus embodies and imparts. 3) It makes one privy to saving events which the prophets and kings of the Old Testament longed in vain to see. 4) It insures that one’s name stands written in the book of life. (Lk 10:17-24) Other recurring themes in the journey discourse implicitly expand and deepen the reader’s insight into the demands and rewards of discipleship. Among these themes, the renunciation of greed and practical care for the poor enjoy special prominence. The parable of the rich fool rebukes the folly of selfishly amassing great riches. (Lk 12:13-21) Christian sharing with the poor expresses a trust in the Father’s providential care; and that 5. Cf. Dennis Hamm, “What the Samaritan Sees: The Narrative Christology of Luke 17:11-19,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 56(1994), pp. 273-287; Wilhelm Bruners, Die Reinigung der zehn Ausssätzigen und die Heilung der Samaritäners: Ein Beitrag zur lukanischen Interpretation der Reinigung von Aussätzigen (Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1977); George, op. cit., pp. 67-78.

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trust eliminates all anxiety about how much one owns. One finds similar themes in Matthew and in Mark. Luke, however, more than the other two synoptic evangelists stresses the eschatological character of Christian sharing: it anchors the heart in heaven. (Lk 12:22-34) Active concern for the poor requires that one “befriend unrighteous mammon.” (Lk 16:1-9) Friendship with mammon requires a choice between God and wealth. One cannot have both. Indeed, the parable of Lazarus and the rich man, a parable unique to Luke, teaches, as we have seen, that greed and cupidity blind one to the misery of the poor, undermine faith in the resurrection during this life, and merit damnation in the world to come. (Lk 16:19-31) Those, then, who befriend mammon share liberally with the poor and needy. (Lk 14:12-14) When, therefore, covetous Pharisees scoff at these teachings, Jesus warns them that greed transforms one into “an abomination in the sight of God.” (Lk 16:10-5) The warning targets hypocritical Christians who imagine that they can cultivate wealth, ignore the poor, and still claim religious authenticity. Attachment to riches makes the following of Jesus extremely difficult, if not impossible, while renouncing riches and caring for the poor insure a rich reward: abundant blessings in this life and eternal life in the world to come. (Lk 18:26-30) Luke alone tells the story of Jesus’ encounter with Zacchaeus as he enters Jericho. Zacchaeus, a tax collector, wants to see Jesus, but his shortness of stature prevents him. He therefore runs ahead of Jesus and climbs a tree in order to see the great rabbi. Jesus calls Zacchaeus down from the tree and invites Himself to supper at the tax-collector’s house. Although people criticize Jesus for His action, Zacchaeus announces that he is giving half of his possessions to the poor. He also promises that should he discover that he has unwittingly defrauded anyone, he restores the loss fourfold to whoever suffered a it. Jesus concludes: “Today salvation has come to this house, since he also is a son of Abraham. For the Son of man came to seek and save the lost.” (Lk 19:1-10) The story dramatizes a familiar theme in Luke: Jesus brings salvation, but only generosity of heart and the liberal sharing of one’s good with the poor readies one to recognize that salvation.6 (Cf. Lk 4:18-19) 6. I agree with those who regard Zacchaeus’s words as an expression of repentance. Cf. Alan C. Mitchell, S.J., “Zacchaeus Revisited: Luke 19,8 as a Defence,” Biblica, 71(1990), pp. 153-176; “The Use of sykophantein in Luke 19:8: Further Evidence of Zacchaeus’s Defence,” Biblica, 72(1991), pp. 546-547; Dennis Hamm, S.J., “Zacchaeus Revisited Once More: A Story of Vindication or Conversion,” Biblica, 72(1991), pp. 249-252; “Luke 19:18 Once Again: Does Zacchaeus Defend or Resolve?,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 107(1988), pp. 431-437; D.A.S. Ravens, “Zacchaeus: The Final Part of a Lucan Triptych,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 41(1991), pp. 19-32; Robert F. O’Toole, S.J., “The Literary Form of Luke 19:1-10,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 110(1991), pp. 107-116.


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In the preceding paragraphs I have considered two themes which Luke weaves together in the journey discourse: the demands and privileges of discipleship, on the one hand, and active concern for the poor. The paragraphs which follow ponder a third prominent theme: namely, the importance of faith. More than once during the journey discourse, Jesus rebukes unbelief and proclaims the saving power of faith. In the first part of the journey discourse, Jesus condemns the curiosity seeking crowds, who flock to Him, not from motives of faith, but simply in order to see His miracles. Jesus warns that the faith of the Gentiles will one day stand in judgment over the unbelief of Jesus’ own Jewish contemporaries. (Lk 11:29-32) Luke follows this rebuke with an encomium of faith. Faith draws other people into the household of God. (Lk 11:33) Like eyes which see, committed faith illumines the whole person. Unbelief, by contrast, plunges one into utter darkness. (Lk 11:34-6) Even the tiniest scrap of genuine faith can work seemingly impossible wonders.7 (Lk 17:5-6) The healing of the blind man outside of Jericho dramatizes the power of faith. The capacity to see causes the healed blind man to follow Jesus joyfully; and his joyful following transforms him into a type of the true disciple. (Lk 18:35-43) The theme of prayer which also occurs with some frequency during the journey discourse has a certain affinity for the theme of faith, since expectant and persevering prayer expresses faith. In the first part of the journey discourse, a praying Jesus teaches the disciples the Father prayer. As in Matthew, the prayer serves as the paradigm of Christian prayer. (Lk 11:1-4) The parable of the persistent friend teaches the need for perseverance in prayer. (Lk 11:5-8) Jesus promises the disciples that the Father will answer their every prayer. Luke’s Jesus does not say that the Father will necessarily give the thing requested. He does say, however, that the Father will give only good gifts. Moreover, the disciples should aspire after the highest gift, the gift of the divine Breath Herself. (Lk 11:9-13) The theme of constant prayer also blends with the theme of eschatological watchfulness. After telling the parable of the unjust judge, Luke’s Jesus assures the disciples that God will vindicate with speed those who call upon Him “day and night.” Jesus then asks: “Nevertheless, when the Son of man comes, will He find faith on earth?” (Lk 18:1-8) The question, as we have seen, suggests that unless the disciples cultivate expectant faith through persevering prayer, it will vanish; and they will find themselves judged with unbelievers. The question also rebukes doubts about the second coming caused by its apparent delay. That delay should in no way undermine prayer motivated by expectant faith. The disciples should, 7. Cf. Susan R. Garrett, “‘Lest the Light in You be Darkness’: Luke 11:33-36 and the Question of Commitment,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 110(1991), pp. 93-105.

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then, pray in expectation of the second coming; for prayers unanswered in this life will find a response in the next. The eschatological dimensions of prayer also link the latter to practical concern for the poor, which, in Luke especially, anchors the heart in the next life. In the first part of the journey discourse, Luke’s Jesus teaches that readiness for the second coming demands active watchfulness not only from ordinary disciples but also and especially from Church leaders. Watchfulness takes practical form in active concern for the poor. It also includes readiness to face persecution and to share in Jesus’ passion. (Lk 12:35-53) It enables one to read correctly the signs of the times and respond to Jesus and His message. Finally, watchfulness demands both genuine repentance and mutual reconciliation. Both deliver one from God’s judgment. (Lk 12:54-9) The parable of the wise and foolish virgins dramatizes the consequence of unreadiness for the second coming: exclusion from the kingdom. Luke’s Jesus warns that many of His fellow Jews will suffer just such a fate, while others, the Gentiles, take their place in the kingdom. (Lk 13:22-30) One cannot, however, expect God to delay judgment indefinitely. (Lk 13:6-9) Aware that some people in his community think the opposite, Luke seeks to shore up faith in the second coming by recalling the fulfillment of Jesus’ prophecy of the destruction of Jerusalem. (Lk 13:31-35) Still, Luke’s Jesus refuses to set timetables for the parousia. Instead, he warns the disciples that they need to live in readiness for its full establishment at the second coming. The day of judgment will arrive with total and sudden unexpectedness, like the flood which destroyed the world in the time of Noah, like the doom visited upon Sodom. On that day, possessions will offer no protection from judgment. Judgment will take place publicly and openly. The obedient will know salvation, the disobedient perdition. The inevitability of final judgment makes constant readiness all the more important.8 (Lk 17:22-37) Luke’s Jesus proclaims a realized eschatology. When Pharisees ask Jesus when the kingdom will come. He tells them not to look for observable signs of its arrival because it already exists in their midst and within their grasp. (Lk 17:20-1) The kingdom, however, has only begun to arrive. Its full realization lies in the indefinite future. The parables of the mustard seed and of the leaven predict the ultimate triumph of the kingdom. Despite its humble beginnings in Jesus’ ministry, the kingdom, like the mustard tree, will develop into a welcoming, encroaching and subversive reality. It will subtly penetrate everything, like leaven in dough. (Lk 13:18-22) 8. Cf. Matthew Black, “The Aramaic Dimension in Q with Notes on Luke 17:22 and Matthew 24:26,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 40(1990), pp. 33-41.


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The final victory of the kingdom will coincide with Satan’s final overthrow. All those who do not hold with Jesus scatter, including Satan and his minions. (Lk 11:14-23) In a world of realized eschatology, however, a share in the final victory over Satan requires present resistance to his wiles. Unless something replaces an exorcised evil spirit, the one possessed remains vulnerable to repossession and even greater bondage. (Lk 11:24-6; cf. Mt 12:43-5) Only obedience to the will of God provides protection against demonic power. (Lk 11:27-8) As the journey discourse unfolds, then, five major themes blend and interweave: 1) the demands and privileges of discipleship, 2) poverty and active concern for the poor; 3) faith, 4) prayer, and 5) eschatological readiness. The theme of the demands and privileges of discipleship contextualizes the other four themes; they concretize the first theme. Moreover, the other four themes all imply one another. Prayer expresses faith. Faith includes eschatological readiness and longing. Christian poverty and active care for the poor keep longing for the second coming alive and anchor the heart in the world to come. Luke develops three subsidiary themes in the journey discourse. They too blend and interweave with one another and with the five major themes. I refer to the following motifs: 1) the difficulty of entering the kingdom; 2) the need for repentance; and 3) the reality of divine forgiveness. The narrow gate which leads into the kingdom challenges both Jew and Gentile. Jews by their unbelief risk forfeiting their right to “sit at table in the kingdom of God,” but so do Christians who claim to know Jesus but fail to practice the obedience of faith. (Lk 11:37-54; 13:10-17, 22-30, 14:15-35) As elsewhere in Luke’s gospel, during the journey discourse, the Pharisees and lawyers symbolize religious hypocrisy. Luke makes it clear, however, that Jesus’ demand for thorough repentance includes the disciples as well. Hypocrisy among Christians can stifle the obedience of faith as effectively as the legalism of the Pharisees. Christians who apostatize commit the ultimate sin of hypocrisy. (Lk 12:1-12) If unbelief, lack of repentance, and religious hypocrisy exclude one from the kingdom, the humble confession of one’s sinfulness wins God’s mercy and justifies sinners in God’s eyes. In the third part of the journey discourse, the parable of the tax-collector and Pharisee who went to pray dramatizes the need for the humble acknowledgement of one’s sinfulness as the only path to justification in the sight of God. (Lk 18:9-14) Those who claim the forgiveness of God seek a boon which God rejoices to give. (Lk 15:1-10) The parable of the prodigal son dramatizes the fact that sinners can never earn divine forgiveness. Instead they must accept it gratefully as a free gift which they can never merit. The parable also challenges the

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self-righteous to recognize that by trying to earn salvation they too have sinned and need to repent. Unless they repent, they will find themselves excluded from the banquet of the kingdom. (Lk 15:11-32) Repentance, of course, bears fruit in a practical faith which takes concrete shape in the prayer, the care for the poor, and the eschatological readiness which exemplify the meaning of discipleship. 5) The eschatological discourse (Lk 21:5-37) reproduces many of the same themes as the discourse in Mark on which Luke patterns it: 1) the need for readiness to face final judgment, 2) the destruction of Jerusalem, 3) the last judgment. Luke’s Jesus, alone addresses this discourse to the crowds in the Jerusalem temple, not just to the disciples. For Luke universal salvation implies universal judgment and universal readiness. In extending eschatological readiness to all people, Luke explicitly includes the disciples.9 6) In His final discourse at the last supper (Lk 22:21-38), Luke’s Jesus 1) censures ambition, 2) promises a share in His messianic authority to the apostles, 3) predicts the denial and repentance of Peter, and 4) warns that Jesus’ immanent death will introduce radical changes into the lives of His disciples. In fact, in Luke’s eyes, it ushers in the last age of salvation. The Analogy of Christological Knowing Luke, then, handles the teachings of Jesus very differently from both Mark and Matthew. Mark scatters most of Jesus’ teachings throughout his gospel in pronouncement stories. While Mark invents the narrative convention of the discourse, he gathers Jesus’ obscurest teachings into two short discourses, the parabolic and the eschatological. Mark’s parabolic discourse portrays the gospel as secret wisdom to which only the disciples have privileged access. Mark’s culminating eschatological discourse describes life in the end time, predicts the destruction of Jerusalem, and describes the second coming, which will effect the final, full disclosure of the kingdom. Matthew, as we have seen, collects Jesus’ teachings into five discourses which propound Christian Torah. Matthew’s gospel expresses strong ecclesiological concerns. It reflects the evangelist’s predilection for Petrine Christianity and his opposition to a nascent clericalism at Antioch. Luke shares both Mark’s and Matthew’s concern with eschatology. Luke, however, frets that the delay of the second coming is causing his Gentile Christian community to settle too comfortably into this world. He fears that they are neglecting the poor and absorbing from pagan society moral attitudes irreconcilable with the gospel. Luke, therefore, insists more than 9. Cf. George, op. cit., pp. 321-347; R. Geiger, Die lukanischen Endzeitreden: Studien zur Eschatologie des Lukas-Evangeliums (Bern: H. Lang, 1973), J. Zmijewski, Die Eschatologiereden des Lukas-Evangeliums: Eine Traditions- und Redaktionsgeschichtliche Untersuchung zu Lk 21, 5-36 und Lk 17:20-37 (Bonn: Hanstein, 1972).


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the other synoptics evangelists that practical concern for the poor expresses eschatological hope; and he warns Gentile believers of the corrupting, Satanic influence of Graeco-Roman institutions and mores. For Luke as for Matthew, readiness to meet Jesus when he returns demands that one actually live the gospel; but, while Matthew’s community defines itself primarily over against “the synagogue across the street,” Mark’s and Luke’s communities define themselves over against the Roman empire. Mark sees the empire as a persecutor and warns the disciples that they must walk the way of the cross, even though it lead to martyrdom. Luke incorporates this Markan theme into His vision of Christological knowing; but Luke sees the empire more as the Satanic embodiment of moral attitudes incompatible with the day-to-day living of the gospel. Luke, therefore, insists more than Matthew or Mark that his Christian Gentile community eschew Roman violence, that they love their enemies, and that they walk the path of non-violent resistance to oppression. As an antidote to religious and moral compromise, Luke inculcates prayer, expectant faith, and mutual forgiveness. Active concern to include within the community the poor and the marginal, including women and the smallest children, anchors one’s heart in the world to come and continues to nourish eschatological longing, despite the delay of the parousia. Even more than Matthew, Luke despairs of the collective conversion of Israel; but he also warns repeatedly of the dire consequences of Christian unbelief. This section has considered Luke’s distinctive handling of the teachings of Jesus. The section which follows examines how the evangelist develops a second thematic link which he finds in Mark’s gospel: namely, the miracles and exorcisms of Jesus. (II) Miracles and exorcisms punctuate Luke’s narrative of Jesus’ ministry. The journey discourse, which dominates the latter part of Luke’s gospel contains, however, only three miracles. Luke derives most of his miracle stories from Mark, although he adds a few from independent sources. Like Matthew, Luke records fewer miracles than Mark. Moreover, Luke shows a concern to balance miracle accounts with teachings. In editing Mark, Luke preserves some of the symbolic significance with which Mark endows Jesus’ mighty acts. Typically, however, Luke uses the miracles, the exorcisms, and the response of wonderment and praise which they evoke in order to portray Jesus as the joyful prophet of good news and His miracles as the proleptic arrival of the kingdom.10 10. Cf. Ulrich Busse, Die Wunder des Propheten Jesus: Die Rezeption, Komposition, und Interpretation der Wundertradition im Evangelium des Lukas (Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1977); Max Turner, “The Spirit and the Power of Jesus: Miracles in the Lucan Conception,” Novum Testamentum, 33(1991), pp. 124-151; George, op. cit., pp. 133-148.

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Luke locates the exorcism in the synagogue at Capernaum after Jesus’ preaching and rejection at Nazareth. The miracle dramatizes Jesus’ pneumatic power over Satan’s realm and confirms His message to the people of Nazareth. (Lk 4:38-39) Like Matthew, Luke transforms Mark’s account of the beginning of Jesus’ ministry into something like “a day in the life of the messiah.”11 Despite Luke’s editing, the story makes some of the same doctrinal points as in Mark. 1) The Breath of God endows Jesus’ teaching with a special authority. 2) That authority extends to the demons and presages the destruction of Satan’s kingdom. 3) Luke also takes note of the Markan theme of the messianic secret and has Jesus silence the demon who identifies Him as the messiah. (Lk 4:31-7) As in Mark, the healing of Simon’s mother-in-law follows; but Luke, like Matthew, edits out Mark’s tacit reference to resurrection. Luke’s Jesus does not “raise” the woman up. Luke instead describes the fever as “great.” Luke’s Jesus stand over the woman and orders the fever to depart. These Lukan details dramatize Jesus’ miraculous powers. (Lk 4:38-9; Mt 8: 14-5; Mk 1:29-31) As in Mark, in the evening after the sabbath ends, a spate of miracles and exorcisms follows this miracle. (Lk 4:40-1; Mk 1:32-4; Mt 8:16-17) The following morning Jesus after prayer decides to begin His first tour of Galilee.12 (Lk 4:42-4; Mk 1:35-9) As we have seen, Luke embellishes the call of the first disciples to become “fishers of men” with the story of the astonishing catch of fish. In the process, Luke focuses the story on the call of the sinful Peter.13 (Lk 5:1-11) In Mark, as we have seen, the healing of the leper foreshadows Jesus’ growing marginalization. (Mk 1:40-5) Like Matthew, however, Luke, tells the story as a simple miracle of inclusion.14 In Mark, the crowds force 11. In Luke Jesus performs the miracle alone. In Mark the disciples witness it. (Lk 4:31; Mk 1:21) Luke identifies Capernaum as a town of Galilee; Mark does not. (Lk 4:31) Luke omits the comparison in Mark between Jesus’ style of teaching and that of the scribes. (Lk 4:32; Mk 1:22) Luke describes the demoniac differently; he says the man “had the spirit of an unclean demon,” while Mark describes the man as a person “with an unclean spirit.” (Lk 4:33; Mk 1:23) Luke adds the exclamation “Ha” before the demon’s question, an expression apparently of surprise and dismay. (Lk 4:34; Mk 1:23) Luke mutes the violence of the scene. He makes no mention of convulsions or cries as the demon leaves the man. Instead, Luke says the demon threw the man down and left him without having done him any harm. (Lk 4:35; Mk 1:26) Luke says Jesus announces “new teaching.” Luke says He speaks “gracious words.” (Lk 4:36; Mk 1:27) 12. Cf. Meier, A Marginal Jew, II, pp. 648-650; René Latourelle, Miracles de Jésus et théologie du miracle (Paris: Editions du Cerf, 1986), pp. 103-108, 191-195; Busse, op. cit., pp. 66-90. 13. Cf. Meier, A Marginal Jew, II, pp. 896-904. 14. Luke edits Mark’s account of the incident in minor ways. In Mark the leper kneels; in Luke, he prostrates before Jesus. (Lk 5:12; Mk 1:40) Luke suppresses any mention of Jesus’ emotion. (Lk 5:13; Mk 1:41) Luke does not have Jesus send the man away. (Lk 5:14; Mk 1:43)


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Jesus to dwell where the leper once did. In Luke, however, Jesus typically seeks solitude in the desert in order to pray. Luke edits from Mark’s original story the cured leper’s disobedience to Jesus’ command to keep the healing secret. (Lk 5:12-16; Mk 1:40-45) Miracle stories in Luke underscore the importance of obedience to Jesus.15 (Lk 5:25, 6:8) As we saw in reflecting on the relationship between Jesus and the Pharisees, the cure of the paralytic opens the cycle of five conflict stories which begin Jesus’ public ministry in Mark. As in the other synoptics, the miracle reveals that Jesus possesses an authority proper to God: the authority to forgive sins. In Luke, however, the theme of forgiveness enjoys special narrative prominence. Typically, the crowds glorify God for the extraordinary events which they have witnessed.16 (Lk 5:17-26) In the sabbath cure of a man with a withered hand, Luke describes Jesus’ enemies as scribes and Pharisees. Mark calls them Pharisees and Herodians. Luke also has Jesus read the minds of His adversaries. As in Mark, Jesus justifies His sabbath healings by an appeal to traditional Jewish piety: namely, that doing good does not violate the sabbath rest. Luke omits Mark’s observation that Jesus left His adversaries silenced. In contrast to both Mark and Matthew, however, Luke suppresses any mention of a plot against Jesus’ life as a result of this miracle. In Luke, after the miracle, Jesus’ enemies simply begin to discuss what to do about Him. In Luke this consultation does, however, begins the opposition to Jesus and His ministry.17 (Lk 6:6-11; Mk 3:1-6; Mt 12:9-14) In Luke, a summary account of Jesus’ mighty acts introduces the sermon on the plain. Matthew makes use of the same kind of material in order to introduce the sermon on the mount. In both gospels, the acts of healing and deliverance characterize the kingdom which Jesus proclaims. Luke, however, adds the detail that when Jesus healed, “power came forth from Him.” (Lk 6:17-19; cf. Mk 3:7-12; Mt 4:24-25) In Matthew, the cure of the centurion’s servant follows the sermon on the mount; and the healing functions primarily as a miracle of inclusion. It foreshadows the conversion of the Gentiles; and it parallels the cure of the leper, which in Matthew incorporates the expendable poor of Israel in the kingdom. (Mt 8:5-13) Luke uses the cure of the centurion’s servant for purposes similar to Matthew’s. Since, however, Luke writes for a Gentile audience, he stresses more than Matthew the faith of the centurion. In Luke synagogue elders serve as the centurion’s messenger. They commend the centurion for his 15. Cf. Meier, A Marginal Jew, II, pp. 701-706; Latourelle, op. cit., pp. 109-111; Busse, op. cit., pp. 103-114. 16. Cf. Latourelle, op. cit., pp. 117-123; Busse, op. cit., pp. 115-134. 17. Cf. Latourelle, op. cit., pp. 123-126; Busse, op. cit., pp. 135-141.

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love of the Jewish nation and for his philanthropy in building the synagogue in Capernaum, a detail absent from Matthew. Matthew’s story culminates in Jesus’ prophecy of the conversion of the Gentiles. Luke’s story, however, culminates in Jesus’ exclamation: “I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.” Luke makes the statement in a response to a second delegation of the centurion’s friends who, at the centurion’s behest, urge Jesus not to bother to come to the centurion’s home but to perform the miracle at a distance. The first Jewish delegation dramatizes the bonds which can unite Gentile and Jew. The second delegation dramatizes the depth to which Gentile faith can reach.18 (Lk 7:1-10; Mt 8:5-13) Luke, then, makes the same fundamental point as Matthew. The righteousness and faith of the centurion foreshadows the righteousness and faith of Gentile converts to Christianity and rebukes Israel’s unbelief.19 (Acts 10:35) As we have already seen, the raising of the widow’s dead son appears only in Luke. The miracle reveals Jesus as a greater prophet than Elijah because it foreshadows His power to impart risen life. The miracle also expresses His predilection for the anawim, among whom widows hold a prominent place.20 (Lk 7:11-17) Luke, like Matthew, records Jesus’ response to the Baptizer’s question about His personal messianic claims. In Luke, the exchange follows the raising of the widow’s son. In both gospels, Jesus’ response gives us a probable insight into how He Himself viewed His miracles: namely, as signs that the messianic age has arrived in His person and ministry. Luke’s Jesus, like Matthew’s, eschews both Davidic messianism and the role of the fire-breathing prophet of judgment whom John seems to have expected.21 (Lk 7:22-3) In Luke as in the other two synoptics, the calming of the storm underscores the question of Jesus’ identity. It also provides the reader with an important clue for answering that question. Jesus exercises the same sovereign, divine, creative authority over the forces of chaos as Yahweh. (Gen 1:1-5) Jesus thus discloses His divinity in act.22 18. Cf. Robert A. Gagnon, “Statistical Analysis and the Case of the Double Delegation in Luke 7:3-7a,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 55(1993), pp. 709-731; “Luke’s Motives for Redaction in the Account of the Double Delegation in Luke 7:1-10,” Novum Testamentum, 36(1994), pp. 122-145. 19. Cf. Meier, A Marginal Jew, II, pp. 718-726; Latourelle, op. cit., pp. 157-164; Busse, op. cit., pp. 141-160. 20. Cf. Meier, A Marginal Jew, II, pp. 788-798; Latourelle, op. cit., pp. 213-223; Busse, op. cit., pp. 161-175. 21. Luke makes a passing reference to Jesus’ power to heal and exorcise when he notes that Jesus had cured and delivered the women disciples who traveled with Him and supported Him. (Lk 8:1-3) 22. Meier, A Marginal Jew, II, pp. 924-933; Latourelle, op. cit., pp. 127-136; Busse, op. cit., pp. 177-185.


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As in the other synoptics, the calming of the sea also sets the stage for the deliverance of the Gerasene demoniac possessed by “Legion.” Like Matthew, Luke mutes the theme of conflict in Mark’s account; but the possessed pigs still perish in the same waters of chaos which Jesus has tamed with only a word. The pigs’ manner of perishing reveals His power over Satan, over his demons, and over the principalities and powers of this world, like the Roman empire’s legions.23 (Lk 8:22-34; Mk 4:35-5:14; Mt 8:23-33) As we have seen, in Luke as in Mark, the number twelve links the daughter of Jairus symbolically to the woman with the flux of blood. The number transforms them into symbols of the old and new Israels. The miracles therefore disclose Jesus’ relationship to both Israels. He delivers people, especially women, from the curse of the Law and imparts to believers the risen life of the new covenant, which gives access to the eucharist. Instead, however, of having Jesus raise the dead girl up symbolically as He does in Mark, Luke has her rise on her own power.24 (Lk 8:40-2; Mk 5:21-43; Mt 9:18-26) As we have seen, Jesus communicates to the Twelve His power to heal and to exorcize. (Lk 9:1) In Luke, however, the seventy-two evangelizing disciples receive the same powers of healing and of deliverance. (Lk 10:17) In Luke, then, the entire Christian community, not just its leaders, functions as an evangelizing source of both graces. As in the other synoptics, Luke’s single account of the miracle of the loaves foreshadows the eucharist. In Luke, the miracle follows the parabolic discourse. As we have also seen, Luke tacitly links this miracle to the resurrection when he observes that the miracle took place as the day began to wear away. At exactly the same time, the disciples in Emmaus will recognize the risen Christ in the breaking of the bread. The appearance at Emmaus reveals Jesus as the Lord of the banquet at the same time that it dramatizes that faith in the resurrection and eucharistic faith coincide.25 (Lk 9:12-7, 24:28-35; Mk 6:35-44; Mt 14:15-21) I have already considered how Luke modifies Mark’s account of the exorcism of the epileptic demoniac boy. Here it suffices to note that Luke in contrast to Mark portrays the miracle as an astonishing revelation of the divine majesty.26 (Lk 9:37-42; Mk 9:14-27; Mt 17:14-18) Four miracles punctuate the journey discourse: the healing of the bent over woman, the healing of the dropsical man on the sabbath, the healing 23. Cf. Meier, A Marginal Jew, II, pp. 650-653; Latourelle, op. cit., pp. 63-71; Busse, op. cit., pp. 196-219. 24. Cf. Meier, A Marginal Jew, II, pp. 708-710, 777-788; Latourelle, op. cit., pp. 146-156; Busse, op. cit., pp. 219-231. 25. Cf. Meier, A Marginal Jew, II, pp. 950-967; Busse, op. cit., pp. 233-248. 26. Cf. Meier, A Marginal Jew, II, pp. 653-656; Latourelle, op. cit., pp. 174-179; Busse, op. cit., pp. 249-267.

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of the ten lepers, and the cure of the blind man. Each miracle advances the didactic movement of the discourse. The healings of the bent over woman and of the dropsical man on the sabbath underscore the evil of religious hypocrisy and legalism. The woman’s healing also dramatizes the dignity of women and the evil of viewing them as mere chattel. Jesus’ cure elevates compassion over legalistic scruples.27 (Lk 13:10-17, 14:1-6) The cure of the ten lepers opens the second section of the journey discourse. As we have seen, the story makes three fundamental points: the importance of gratitude for divine gifts; the power of faith to save; and the universal scope of salvation, which includes even enemies and heretics, like Samaritans. Moreover, as we have seen, the Samaritan’s faith, which Jesus goes out of His way to praise, consists in recognizing that the person of Jesus provides the appropriate place for acknowledging the healing power of God. (Lk 17:11-9) As in Mark, the cure of the blind man foreshadows the gift of faith. (Lk 18:35-43)28 Luke’s Jesus performs one final cure during His arrest. He heals the severed ear of the servant of the high priest. (Lk 22:47-54) As we have seen, among the synoptics, the miracle happens only in Luke. It dramatizes two prominent Lukan themes: the love of enemies and forgiveness which Jesus’ saving death embodies.29 (Lk 22:51) The Analogy of Christological Knowing As we have seen, Mark uses Jesus’ miracles and healings for a variety of narrative purposes; but Mark typically employs miracle stories as a way rehabilitating the obtuse and unbelieving disciples. Their rehabilitation assures a recently persecuted community that Jesus has the power to heal and transform their most extreme blindness and weakness. Matthew uses the miracles and exorcisms in order to portray Jesus’ inaugural proclamation of the kingdom as an event of healing and deliverance. In Jesus’ exorcisms, Matthew also calls his community to recognize Jesus’ victory over the kingdom of Satan. 27. Cf. Elizabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, “Lk 13:10-17: Interpretation for Liberation and Transformation,” Theology Digest, 36(1989), pp. 303-319. 28. Cf. Meier, A Marginal Jew, II, pp. 384-685; 710-711; Latourelle, op. cit., pp. 180-187, 223-232; Busse, op. cit., pp. 268-335. Luke edits from Mark’s account of the cure of the blind man the fact that he had the name Bartimaeus, the encouragement given the blind man when Jesus calls him, and the fact that the healed blind man followed Jesus symbolically “on the way.” Luke typically underplays the symbolic meaning of the miracles in Mark and describes instead the joyful response which the miracle evokes. Still, Luke preserves two key and interrelated symbolic elements from Mark’s narrative: namely, the fact that going from blindness to sight causes the cured man to follow Jesus. 29. Cf. Meier, A Marginal Jew, II, pp. 714-718; Latourelle, op. cit., pp. 232-233; Busse, op. cit., pp. 335-336.


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One finds echoes of Mark in Luke’s handling of the miracle stories; but Luke’s severe editing of the Markan text eliminates many of Mark’s allusive references. Luke typically likes to portray the miracles and exorcisms of Jesus as manifestations of divine power which reveal Him as a different kind of messiah and as the joyful prophet of good news. This section has reflected on Luke’s use of Jesus’ miracles and exorcisms. The following section examines briefly the evangelist’s use of literary allusion.30 (III) As we saw in reflecting on Mark’s allusive linkages, they cluster around the two miracles of the loaves. Luke omits entirely the second miracle of the loaves and much of the narrative material which surrounds it. In the process, he eliminates one entire rete of Markan allusions. Luke’s editorial stylus eliminates other allusions from Mark’s text. Luke, as we have seen, refers to the leaven of the Pharisees in his journey discourse; but he identifies it with hypocrisy. (Lk 12: 1) The richer connotations of Mark’s allusive reference to the “leaven” of the Pharisees and of Herod disappear from Luke’s narrative. Luke also edits out Mark’s insistence on the need to read deeply into the miracles of the loaves. (Mk 6:52) Luke’s single miracle of the loaves does, however, foreshadow the eucharist. Jesus’ actions of taking, blessing, breaking, and giving also link the two events to the apparition at Emmaus. (Lk 9:16, 22:19) Luke also plays havoc with other allusive linkages in Mark. He fails, for example, to connect the cure of Peter’s mother-in-law, the raising of the daughter of Jairus, and the deliverance of the epileptic demoniac boy with resurrection, as Mark does. Luke also destroys Mark’s parallelism between Jesus’ baptism and the call of the disciples, on the one hand, and Jesus’ desert temptations and the exorcism at Capernaum, on the other. (Lk 4:31-37, 5:1-11) While in Luke Peter, James, and John witness the transfiguration and the raising of the daughter of Jairus (Lk 8:51, 9:28), they play no special role either in occasioning the eschatological discourse or in Jesus’ prayer in the garden. (Lk 21:5, 22:39-46) The healing of the leper in Luke does not foreshadow Jesus’ marginalization as it does in Mark. (Lk 5:12-16; Mk 1:40-45) Like Matthew, however, Luke creates a number of literary allusions of his own. Moreover, Luke makes somewhat more extensive list of this particular literary device than Matthew does. First of all, Luke uses allusion in order to link events which take place within the gospel narrative itself. For example, the praise of the disciples at the triumphal entry re30. . See also: Paul J. Achtemeier, “The Lukan Perspective on the Miracles of Jesus: A Preliminary Sketch,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 94(1945), pp. 547-562; Busse, op. cit., pp. 337-485.

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calls the song of the angels at Jesus’ birth. (Lk 2:14, 19:38) The triumphal entry itself fulfills a prophecy of Jesus. (Lk 13:35) The widow of Nain illustrates Luke’s third beatitude (Lk 6:21, 7:11-17) The disciples’ sleep on the mount of transfiguration foreshadows their sleep in Gethsemane. (Lk 9:32, 22:45) When the two women discover the empty tomb, they recall with understanding Jesus’ second prediction of His passion. (Lk 18:31-34, 24:6-7) Luke links through allusion the multiplication of the loaves, the last supper and, the supper at Emmaus (Lk 9:10-17; 22:19-20, 24:28-35) One could conceivably find other uses of literary allusion in Luke’s gospel, but the preceding list provides a representative sample. Of the three synoptic evangelists, only Luke wrote a two-volume study of Christian origins. As a consequence, Luke probably makes his most distinctive use of literary allusion when he employs it to link events in the gospel to those in Acts. I shall, however, postpone considering this example of Lukan allusion until I have considered the Christology of Acts. This chapter has reflected principally on Luke’s use of thematic linkages. The time has come to reflect on the narrative Christology of the Acts of the Apostles. To this task I turn in the following chapter.

Chapter 17: Jesus Christ Proclaimed: The Christology of Acts

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Chapter 17 Jesus Christ Proclaimed: The Christology of Acts In the Acts of the Apostles Luke makes his principal Christological statements in the preaching of Peter, of Stephen, and of Paul. He also portrays all three men as examples of Christological knowing: by their proclamation of the risen Christ in the power of His Breath all three find themselves assimilated to Him, especially in His passion.1 This chapter divides into four parts. Part one examines Peter’s kerygmatic Christology in Acts. Part two details Stephen’s Christological witness. Part three present’s Luke’s version of Pauline Christology. Part three reflects on Luke’s portrayal in Acts of Peter, Stephen, and Paul as examples of Christological knowing. As we shall see, Luke uses Peter, Stephen, and Paul primarily in order to situate the event of Jesus within the evangelist’s own theology of salvation history. Part four examines how Luke uses literary allusiuon to tie together his two-volume account of Christian origins. (I) In Acts, Peter’s Pentecost sermon begins the proclamation of the risen Christ to the Jews. Peter addresses his words to the “men of Judea, and all you who live in Jerusalem”; but he also speaks to them as “men of Israel.” (Acts 2:14, 22) In other words, the message which Peter speaks to crowds envisages ultimately the whole of Israel. (Cf. Acts 2:36) Peter’s sermons to the Jews follow a typical pattern: 1) Peter first refers to a startling or miraculous event which has just occurred. 2) Then he proclaims in summary form Jesus’ ministry, death, and resurrection. That proclamation denounces the people of Jerusalem and their religious leaders for causing Jesus’ death. 3) Finally, Peter summons his hearers to repentance and faith. In

1. For scholarly reflections on the writing of Acts, see: Justin Taylor, S.M., “The Making of Acts: A New Account,” Revue Biblique, 97(1990), pp. 504-524; Josep Ruis-Camps, “El Seguimiento de Jesús, el Señor, y de su Espiritu in los Prologomenos de la Mision (Hch 1-12), Estudios Biblicos, 51(1993), pp. 73-116; David L Meland, “Hellenistic Historians and the Style of Acts,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 82(1991), pp. 42-66; Erwin R. Goodenough, “The Perspective of Acts,” pp. 51-59; Ulrich Wilckens, “Interpreting Luke-Acts in a Period of Existentialist Theology” in Studies in Luke-Acts, pp. 60-83; C.D.F. Moule, “The Christology of Acts” in Studies in Luke-Acts, pp. 159-185; Joseph A Fitzmyer, S.J., “Jewish Christianity in Light of Qumran Scrolls” in Studies in Luke-Acts, pp. 233-257; Ernst Hänchen, “The Book of Acts as Source Material for Early Christianity” in Studies in Luke-Acts, pp. 258- 278; Patrick L. Dickenson, “The New Character Narrative in Luke-Acts and the Synoptic Problem,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 116(1997), pp. 291-312.

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summoning his Jewish audience to conversion, Peter typically employs a variety of scriptural arguments.2 Pentecost and Peter’s Proclamation Peter’s Pentecost proclamation begins by explaining the religious significance of the “miracle” of tongues. Peter speaks as the representative of the Twelve, with the Eleven other apostles gathered about him. They symbolize and embody the new Israel which the arrival of the Pentecostal Breath has begun to create.3 Peter first dismisses the crowds’ misinterpretation of glossolalia as drunkenness. The apostle points to the early hour, about 9:00 a.m., in support of the disciples’ sobriety. (Acts 2:14) Finally, Peter explains the eruption of glossolalic speech among the disciples by citing Jl 3:1-5. Peter’s citation contains four affirmations which illumine the Breath’s Pentecostal arrival. 1) The descent of the Breath on the disciples begins Her universal outpouring. It seeks finally to encompass the whole of humankind. Her arrival therefore respects neither youth nor age. It overlooks gender differences and inspires women as well as men. It obliterates class distinctions and includes slaves as well as free. In other words, the outpouring of the Breath brings into existence the egalitarian community of faith which Jesus proclaimed. 2) The charismatic outpouring of the Breath fulfills the prayer of Moses in Num 11:24-30 by creating an Israel whose members all respond to the charismatic promptings of the Breath. Moreover, through its prophetic response to the Breath’s inspirations, the new Israel prolongs in space and time Jesus’ own mission. 3) The descent of the Breath both begins and prepares the final arrival of the “day of the Lord.” The apocalyptic signs of its final arrival—blood, fire, columns of smoke, a darkened sun, the moon turned to the color blood—underscore the cosmic, eschatological, and apocalyptic significance of the Pentecost event as well as its judgmental character. In citing Joel, Luke’s Peter omits the prophet’s reference to the fact that people will find the day of judgment “terrible.” (Jl 3:4) The omission gives rhetorical prominence to the saving consequences of the Breath’s arrival. (Lk 2:19-20) 4) In order to claim the salvation which the Breath’s arrival begins, one must “call upon the name of the Lord.”(Lk 2:21) As Peter’s Pentecost sermon unfolds, it becomes plain that calling on the name of the Lord means confessing both the messianic mission and the Lordship of the risen Jesus.4 (Lk 2:39) 2. Cf. Eduard Schweizer, “Concerning the Speeches in Acts” in Studies in Luke-Acts, pp. 208211; John Knox, “Acts and the Pauline Letter Corpus” in Studies in Luke-Acts, pp. 279-289. 3. Cf. Ernst Käsemann, “Ephesians and Acts” in Studies in Luke-Acts, pp. 288-297; Klaus Haacker, “Verwendung und Vermeidung des Apostelsbegriffs im lukanischen Werk,” Novum Testamentum, 30(1988), pp. 9-38; George, op. cit., pp. 108-125. 4. Cf. Craig A.Evans, “The Prophetic Setting of Peter’s Pentecost Sermon,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 74(1983), pp. 148-150; Daniel J. Trier, “The


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The second part of the Pentecost sermon recapitulates the public ministry of Jesus and its divine endorsement by the “miracles and portents” which God worked through Him. Peter appeals to the Jerusalem crowds’ direct memory of these events. (Lk 2:22) Peter then accuses the people of Jerusalem of having brought about Jesus’ death by crucifixion through the connivance of the Gentile governor Pilate and his Gentile soldiers, all “men outside the Law.” Without excusing the culpability of those responsible for Jesus’ death, Peter insists that God allowed this sinful act to occur as part of His “deliberate intention and foreknowledge.” (Lk 2:23) Jesus suffered because divine providence intended from the beginning to undo by His death and resurrection the consequences of the sins of those who conspired to nail Him to a cross: “You killed Him; but God raised Him to life.” (Acts 2:23b) In Luke’s interpretation of salvation history, then, the people of Jerusalem and their leaders conspired especially with Pilate to kill Jesus; but they acted in ignorance. They did not realize that they were crucifying the messiah. Moreover, ironically and paradoxically, their action realized God’s plan of salvation. In Acts, the proclamation of that plan produces deep divisions within Israel, just as Simeon had foretold.5 Peter cites Ps 16:8-11 as a prophecy of Jesus’ resurrection. Luke attributes the psalm’s composition to David on the presupposition that David authored all the psalms. The alleged Davidic authorship of the psalm also gives bite to the argument which Peter develops from the text. The psalm promises that God “will not abandon my soul to Hades nor allow your holy one to experience corruption.” (Acts 2:27; Ps 16:10) Peter’s exegesis implicitly invokes Jesus’ empty tomb as an argument for the resurrection. Peter tacitly contrasts the tomb of David, which still contains his corrupted remains with that of the risen Christ, which by implication does not: Brothers, no one can deny that the patriarch David himself is dead and buried; his tomb is still with us. But since he was a prophet, and knew that God had sworn him an oath to make one of his descendants succeed him on the throne, what he foresaw and spoke about was the resurrection of Christ; He is the one who was not abandoned to Hades, and whose body did not experience corruption. God raised this man Jesus to life, and all of us are witnesses to that. Now raised to the heights by God’s right hand, He has received from the Father the Holy Breath, who was promised, and Fulfillment of Joel 2:28-32: A Multiple Lens Approach,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, 40(1997), pp. 13-26. 5. Cf. Frank J. Matera, “Responsibility for the Death of Jesus According to the Acts of the Apostles, “Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 39(1990), pp. 77-93; Daniel Marguerat, “Juifs et chretiens selon Luc-Actes: Surmonter le conflit des lectures,” Biblica, 75(1994), pp. 126-146; Lawrence M. Wills, “The Depiction of Jesus in Acts,”

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what you see and hear is the outpouring of that Breath. For David himself never went up to heaven; and yet these words are his: “The Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for you.” For this reason the whole house of Israel can be certain that God has made this Jesus whom you crucified both Lord and Christ. (Acts 2:29-36)

Here several points need noting: 1) The empty tomb alone does not prove the resurrection. When coupled with the testimony of the apostles who saw the risen Christ, however, it becomes a motive for faith and evidence which supports the reality and truth of their claim.6 2) The resurrection exalts Jesus to the right hand of God and reveals Him as both Lord and Christ. His exaltation reveals His universal sway and His victory over those who killed Him. The paschal mystery, therefore, provides the privileged point for interpreting the ultimate significance of Jesus’ person and ministry. 3) The resurrection answers the conundrum which Jesus posed to the scribes during His Jerusalem ministry. Peter in testifying to Jesus’ resurrection cites the same text from the psalms as Jesus had on that occasion. Jesus had challenged the scribes to explain why in Ps 110:1 David speaks of the Christ as Lord, when in fact the messiah is supposed to be his son. (Lk 21:41-2) The resurrection reveals the answer: Jesus’ messianic authority derives from a source which far transcends his Davidic descent, namely, from His divine Lordship.7 4) The outpouring of the Breath flows from and manifests Jesus’ resurrection. Jesus rises as the source of the Breath. Her charismatic transformation of the apostles gives divine sanction to their testimony to the risen Christ and invites the faith assent of Peter’s hearers. 5) Among the “enemies” whom God will transform into the risen messiah’s footstool, Peter seems to include “the whole house of Israel.” (v. 36) In the past Israel had obstinately resisted the prophets sent them by God. The resurrection of Jesus, however, now offers Israel its last and best chance to repent of its obstinacy by acknowledging the risen messiah’s claim upon their faith.8 Journal of Biblical Literature, 104(1985), pp. 631-654; Helmut Merkel, “Israel im lukanischen Werk, New Testament Studies, 40(1994), pp. 371-398. 6. Cf. Gerald O’Collins, “The Resurrection Revisited,” Gregorianum, 79(198), pp. 169-172. 7. Cf. Michel Gourgues, O.P., “Lecture Christologique du psalm CX et fête de la Pentecote,” Revue Biblique, 83(1976), pp. 5-24. 8. Cf. Marion L. Soards, “The Speeches in Acts in Relation to Other Pertinent Ancient Literature,”Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 70(1994), pp. 65-90; Miguel Rodriguez Ruiz, “Hacia una Definicion del ‘Disurso Misionario’: los Discursos misionarios de los Hechos de los Apostolos a la Luz de la Retorica antigua,” Estudios Biblicos, 49(1991), pp. 425-450; Robert Sloan, “‘Signs and Wonders’: A Rhetorical Clue to the Pentecost


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Peter’s second proclamation of the risen Christ to the Jews in Jerusalem follows the healing of the cripple at the Beautiful Gate to the temple. In the Pentecost sermon, the “miracle” of tongues provides the point of departure for Peter’s proclamation. Here the healing of the cripple “in the name of Jesus Christ, the Nazarene” provides the occasion for Peter’s proclamation. (Acts 3:6) Peter rebukes his fellow Israelites for their astonishment at the cripple’s cure and immediately disclaims any credit for the miracle. Peter has not wrought the miracle by his own power and holiness. (Acts 3:12) Peter has invoked the name of Jesus in working the miracle. Jesus’ name identifies the ultimate source of the miracle. (Acts 3:15-6) The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob has glorified Jesus, who has wrought this cure in His risen glory and by the divine power which the name of Jesus now reveals.9 (Acts 3:13) In Peter’s temple sermon, the proclamation of the resurrection precedes the recall of the passion, precisely because the glorification of Jesus explains the miraculous act of power which Peter has just performed. A recall of the passion, however, quickly follows. Peter again accuses his fellow Israelites of having “handed over (paredokate)” Jesus to Pilate and of having “disowned (ervesasthe)” Him in Pilate’s presence. The “handing over” assimilates Jesus to the servant of Yahweh in Deutero-Isaiah. (Is 53:12) The disowning alludes to the fact that the Israelites treated Jesus as they had once treated Moses. (Cf. Acts 7:35) The fact that during Jesus’ trial Luke’s Pilate had decided to release Jesus only compounds the guilt of those who handed Him over and disowned Him. (Lk 23:15-22) The people of Jerusalem together with their leaders responded to Pilate with a triple accusation of guilt which they directed, with unconscious irony, against “the Holy and Just One (ton hagion kai dikaion).” (Acts 3:14) The messianic titles “the Holy and Just One” take on transcendent connotations when read in the light of Peter’s earlier proclamation of Jesus’ Lordship on Pentecost. (Acts 2:36) The title “prince of life” has similar connotations. It occurs in Peter’s ironic accusation: “You demanded the reprieve of a murderer and killed the prince of life (ton de archegon tes zoes).” (Acts 3:14-5) The term “archegon” means “leader” and designates Jesus as the one who opened the pathway to life with God; but it can also mean “prince,” “originator,” Discourse,” Evangelical Quarterly, 63(1991), pp. 225-240; Stanley E. Porter, “Thucydides 1.22.1 and Speeches in Acts: Is There a Thucydidean View?”, Novum Testamentum, 32(1990), pp. 121-142; Helen Schuengel-Straumann, “Pfingstliche Geistkraft/Lebenskraft (ruah): Alttestamentiche Wurzeln einer verdrängten weiblichen Vorstellung,” Diakonia: Internationale Zeitschrift für die Praxis der Kirche, 21(1990), pp. 149-157; John J. Kilgallen, S.J., “A Rhetorical and Source-Tradition Study of Acts 2, 23,” Biblica, 77(1996), pp. 178-196; NJBC, 44:20-27; Conzelmann, Acts, pp. 13-22; Bruce, Acts, pp. 49-72; Hänchen, Acts, pp. 166-189.

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and “founder.” These last three terms also acquire transcendent connotations when understood in the light of Jesus’ Lordship. An exhortation to repentance and to faith then follows. Peter alludes to Jesus’ forgiveness of His enemies on the cross. (Lk 23:34) He concedes that, when they killed Jesus, neither the people nor their leaders realized what they were doing. In His providence, however, God used their very ignorance to accomplish what He had already foretold through the prophets: namely, that Christ must suffer. (Acts 3:17-8) As in Peter’s Pentecost sermon, the paschal mystery offers forgiveness to Israel and begins the messianic age: “the time of comfort,” the “universal restoration.”10 (Acts 3:20-1; cf. Jer 15:19; Mal 3:22-3) The paschal mystery reveals Jesus as the “prophet like Moses” foretold in Dt 15:15-8. That revelation confronts Israel with a unique opportunity: Moses and the entire prophetic tradition which he founded have foretold the coming of Jesus. As the second Moses, Jesus brings that tradition to its culmination. (Acts 3:21-4) In his peroration, Peter therefore addresses his hearers as “heirs of the prophets” and “heirs of the covenant.” He calls on them to acknowledge in Jesus’ resurrection the fulfillment of God’s promise to Abraham that all the families of the earth would find blessing in him. (Gen 12:3) As a prelude to effecting that universal salvation, God calls for the repentance and conversion of Israel itself. For that purpose He has raised Jesus up as the one who will bless Israel “by turning every one of you from your wicked ways.” (Acts 3:25-6) Peter’s second proclamation of the risen Christ hearkens back to Jesus’ sermon in Nazareth. There Jesus announced that God had chosen Israel as His instrument for effecting a universal salvation. The Nazarenes had on that occasion turned against Him. Now Peter, in the wake of the paschal mystery, makes the same proclamation to those responsible for Jesus’ death. Will they finally hear the message?11 Luke dramatizes the challenge which the paschal mystery poses for Israel by having the Sanhedrin arrest Peter and the apostles for proclaiming Jesus’ resurrection. Luke notes that Sadducees, who denied the resurrection, acted as the principal agents in the arrest. (Acts 4:1) 9. Cf. J.A. Züskern “The Name of Jesus in the Acts of the Apostles,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 4(1979), pp. 28-41. 10. Cf. Frank J. Matera, “Responsibility for the Death of Jesus According to the Acts of the Apostles,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 29(1990), pp. 77-93; Julian Carron Perez, “El Significado de Apokatastasis en Hch 3,21,” Estudios Biblicos, 50(1992), pp. 375- 394. 11. Cf. Navone, op.cit., pp. 38-46, 185-187; William S. Kurz, S.J., “Acts 3:19-26 as a Test of the Role of Ecclesiology in Lukan Christology,” SBL Seminar Papers, 1977, edited by P.J. Achtemeier (Missoula, MT: Scholars Press, 1977), pp. 309-323; NJBC, 44:29-31; Conzelmann, Acts, pp. 27-30; Bruce, Acts, pp. 76-88; Hänchen, Acts, pp. 203-212.


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Instead of intimidating the apostles, their arrest and interrogation provides them with an opportunity to proclaim the risen Christ to the very body which decided on His death. Asked by what power he has cured the cripple at the Beautiful Gate, Peter recalls Jesus’ death, and announces the universal salvation made available through the risen Christ. (Acts 4:8-12) Peter proclaims not only to the Sanhedrin but to the whole of Israel that he has healed the cripple at the Beautiful Gate in the power of “the name of Jesus Christ, the Nazorean.” (Acts 4:9-10) The Sanhedrin condemned Jesus and caused His crucifixion; but God in raising Him from the dead has reversed their judgment. In so acting, God has revealed the universal saving significance of Jesus’ name: that the name of Jesus and it alone has the power to save every human on the face of the earth. (Acts 4:10-2) In other words, the paschal mystery has endowed Jesus’ name with divine, saving significance. Since God alone saves, Peter is equivalently asserting that the human name of Jesus has become the divine name. The miraculous healing of the cripple makes manifest the saving power of the resurrection, which has transformed Jesus from “the stone rejected by the builders”—i.e., by the leaders of Israel—into the keystone. He unifies and holds together every other saving act of God in human history. (Cf. Ps 118:22) Peter’s proclamation to the Sanhedrin echoes his discourse at the Beautiful Gate. Luke ascribes Peter’s inspiration to the Breath of the risen Christ. (Acts 4:7) The Sanhedrin, which had closed its ears to the action of the prophetic Breath in both John and Jesus (Lk 20:1-8), now finds itself astonished at the assurance with which “uneducated laymen” proclaim Jesus’ resurrection. In Jesus’ case, the Sanhedrin had acted decisively to destroy Him. (Lk 22:66-7:1) Now, however, they waffle, embarrassed by the fact that the people know that Peter has cured the cripple in Jesus’ name. They repeatedly warn the apostles to stop proclaiming the risen Christ, but the apostles make it clear that they have no intention of obeying. The apostles explain why: obedience to God takes precedence over obedience to mere humans.12 (Acts 4:13-22) The “little Pentecost” follows immediately upon the apostles’ release and reaffirms the divine sanction of their preaching. When the apostles narrate their interrogation by the Sanhedrin to the Jerusalem church, the entire community responds with a spontaneous prayer. (Acts 4:23-31) The community addresses the Father as “Master (despota),” i.e., as possessing sovereign, divine authority over all the world. In Luke’s infancy gospel, Simeon had used the same title of God in welcoming the messiah and in predicting the divisions within Israel which Jesus began and which 12. Cf. NJBC, 44:33-35; Bruce, Acts, pp. 89-96; Hänchen, Acts, pp. 213-224.

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the apostles are perpetuating. (Lk 2:29) The sovereign God created all things—”heaven, earth, and sea and everything in them.” Through the action of the divine Breath the same God also inspired “David the psalmist” to foretell the futile opposition of the powers of this world to Christ. Ps 2:1-2 predicted that the nations would arrogantly conspire with “the peoples of Israel” to oppose “the Lord and His anointed.” (Acts 4:24-9) In referring to the “alliance (synechthesan)” of Herod and Pilate against Jesus, the prayer alludes to their roles in effecting Jesus’ death and to their subsequent reconciliation. (Lk 22:12) Herod and Pilate in the very act of collaborating in Jesus’ crucifixion had unwittingly served as God’s providential instruments. Through them God effected a salvation which through the prophets He had already predicted would happen. Having asserted God’s triumph over all this-worldly opposition, the prayer then begs God to respond to the threats against the apostles by begging an astonishing outpouring of miracles which will confirm and strengthen the apostles’ persistent proclamation of the risen Christ. (Acts 28:29-31) God responds with a renewal of the community’s first Pentecostal experience. The house rocks as the apostles experience a renewed outpouring of the Breath. The earthquake symbolizes God’s power and authority over “heaven and earth and sea, and everything in them.” The Breath sends the apostles forth anew, just as She did on the first Pentecost to proclaim the gospel with new boldness.13 (Acts 4:31) Peter’s proclamation of the risen Christ draws the apostles into the passion of Jesus. They must confront the same forces as crucified Him. At the same time, the apostles’ preaching swells the ranks of new Jerusalem converts. It finds confirmation in the abundance of the miracles which the apostles work, in the crowds who flock to them for healing, and in the community’s fidelity after the little Pentecost to the same kind of gospel living as characterized the first Pentecost converts. (Acts 4:32-4, 5:12-6) The very success of the apostolic preaching in Jerusalem, however, leads to a second confrontation with the Sanhedrin. The high priest and other Sadducees lead the attack. (Acts 5:17-8, 34-42) The Sanhedrin accuses Peter and the apostles of disobeying their order to cease preaching and reproaches them for blaming the Sanhedrin itself for Jesus’ death. The apostles again reply that they owe first obedience to God. (Acts 5:29) They justify this claim by appealing to God’s action in raising Jesus from the dead after the Sanhedrin had Him crucified. (Acts 5:30) The paschal mystery itself gives divine sanction to their proclamation. In raising Jesus, God has appointed Him Israel’s leader and savior. Finally, Peter appeals to the inspiration of the Pentecostal Breath who empowers their preaching. Submission to Her guarantees obedience to 13. Cf. NJBC, 44:35; Conzelmann, Acts, pp. 34-35; Bruce, Acts, pp. 97-100; Hänchen, Acts, pp. 225-229.


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God. If the Sanhedrin resists that authority, they only betray their sinful lack of repentance. (Acts 5:32) This reply infuriates the Sanhedrin who desire to kill the apostles as they had killed Jesus. Only the intervention of Gamaliel the Pharisee stays their hand. He urges a wait-and-see policy in dealing with the new movement. The Sanhedrin, however, orders the apostles flogged. The apostles for their part rejoice at having known “the honor of suffering humiliation for the sake of the name.” The name of Jesus now designates both the apostles’ message and the transcendent reality for which they suffer. Despite persecution, the proclamation of the risen Christ continues without interruption.14 (Acts 5:34-42) In Acts, the deacon Philip converts the Samaritans and baptizes the first Gentile, an Ethiopian eunuch.15 (Acts 8:4-8, 36-40) Luke also prepares for Paul’s Gentile mission by having Peter persuade the mother church in Jerusalem to sanction the baptism of uncircumcised Gentiles. The fact that Peter, not Paul, brings about the official admission of uncircumcised Gentiles into the Church dramatizes the continuity between his mission to the Jews and Paul’s to the Gentiles. Indeed, the evangelization of Cornelius and his household marks the culmination of Peter’s proclamation of the risen Christ. Independent and parallel visions lend unmistakable divine sanction to Peter’s action. (Acts 10:1-33) An angel appears to Cornelius, a “God-fearing” Gentile convert to Judaism. (Acts 10:3-8) A voice from heaven tells Peter three times not to regard as unclean what God has purified. (Acts 10:9-16; 11:7) Peter’s evangelization of Cornelius and his household lacks the polemic tone of his speeches in Jerusalem. The apostle tells the God-fearers: [God] sent the word to the children of Israel, announcing the good news of peace through Jesus Christ. He is the Lord of all. You must have known the substance of what happened throughout the whole of Judaea beginning from Galilee after John preached baptism, concerning Jesus from Nazareth: how God anointed Him with a Holy Breath and power, how He went about doing good and curing all those overpowered by the devil, and that God was with Him. And we bear witness to all the things he did in the region of Judaea and Jerusalem. Him they killed hanging Him on a tree. 14. Cf. Robert C. Tannehill, “The Composition of Acts 3-5: Narrative Development and Echo Effect,” SBL Seminar, 1984, edited by Kent Harold Richards (Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1984), pp. 217-240; Jacob Jervill, Luke and the People: A New Look at Luke-Acts (Minneapolis, MI: Augusburg, 1972), pp. 75-112; John T. Carroll, “Luke’s Portrayal of the Pharisees,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 50(1988), pp. 604-621; NJBC, 44:39-41; Conzelmann, Acts, pp. 40-43; Bruce, Acts, pp. 109-117; Hänchen, Acts, pp. 247-258. 15. Cf. Patrick L. Dickenson, “The Sources of the Account of the Mission to Samaria in Acts,” Novum Testamentum, 39(1997), pp. 210-234.

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Him God raised on the third day, and allowed Him to show Himself, not to all the people, but to those witnesses whom God chose in advance, [namely] to us who ate and drank with Him after he rose from the dead; and he ordered us to announce to the people and to bear witness to the fact that He it is who has been designated by God judge of the living and the dead. To Him all the prophets bore witness: so that all who believe in Him might receive the forgiveness of sins through His name. (Acts 10:36-43)

Here several things need noting. 1) Jesus’ proclamation of the “good news of peace” reveals Him as the eschatological prophet foretold by Second Isaiah. (Is 52:7) The peace proclaimed in Christ takes the form of the forgiveness of sins: the reconciliation of humans to God and to one another.16 (v.43) 2) Peter’s designation of Jesus as especially anointed by God recalls His messianic commissioning after His baptism by John. (Lk 3:21-2) Jesus’ own Breath-inspired ministry of proclamation and healing reveals Him as one who enters compassionately into the suffering and woundedness of the human condition. (Is 61:1) 3) The paschal mystery endows Jesus with divine authority by transforming Him into the judge of the living and the dead. His appearance to the apostles authorizes their proclamation of His divinely sanctioned authority. The “Pentecost” of the Gentiles follows Peter’s sermon. The Breath of the risen Christ pours out the charisms upon Cornelius and his family as a sign that God wills their incorporation into the Church through ritual baptism in the sanctifying Breath of Christ.17 (Acts 10:44-48) In justifying to the Christian community in Jerusalem his baptism of Cornelius and his household, Peter appeals to John’s prophecy of the Breath-baptizer. (Acts 11:15-7) As we have seen, Pentecost in Luke fulfills the promise of the Father proclaimed by John the Baptizer. The first Pentecost, which culminated in ritual baptism, fulfilled that prophecy. The spontaneous extension to Gentiles of the same gifts which announced the arrival of the Breath on Pentecost gave divine sanction to Peter’s decision to baptize the Gentile converts.18 (Lk 24:49; Acts 1:4) Later in Acts at the Jerusalem convocation which meets to decide whether or not to sanction the Gentile mission of Paul and of Barnabas, Peter appeals to God’s sanction of his baptism of Cornelius and his house16. Cf. Robert F. O’Toole, “Eirene, an Underlying Theme in Acts 10, 34-43,” Biblica, 77(1996), pp. 461-476. 17. Cf. NJBC, 44:58-64; Conzelmann, Acts, pp. 78-84; Bruce, Acts, pp. 201-218. 18. Cf. John J Kilgallen, S.J. “Did Peter Fail to Get a Word in? Acts 11:15),” Biblica, 71(1990), pp. 405-410.


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hold as evidence of God’s general approval of the baptism of uncircumcised Gentiles.19 (Acts 15:7-11) (II) In Luke’s story of Christian origins, the baptism of Cornelius and his household sets the stage for Paul’s Gentile mission. So does the ministry and martyrdom of Stephen. The death of Stephen breaks partially the impasse between the nascent Jerusalem church and the high priests. The persecution of Hellenistic Christians which Stephen’s death inaugurates begins both a geographical and an historical movement which culminates in Paul’s Gentile mission. Within the mother church, Stephen emerges as the leader of the Hellenist Christians. They seem to have functioned as the radical left of the Christian community in Jerusalem. Jesus during His own ministry denounced abuses in temple worship and predicted the eventual destruction of the temple itself. (Acts 6:14) The Hellenists, who seem to have had links to diaspora Judaism, radicalized Jesus’ polemic against the temple by proclaiming that Jesus had replaced both it and its worship.20 (Cf. Acts 7:44-50) The Witness of Stephen Stephen defends his preaching before the Sahnedrin by taking the offensive. He challenges the hypocrisy which motivates his adversaries’ alleged zeal for the Law and temple: “You who had the Law brought to you by angels are the very ones who have not kept it.” (Acts 7:53) In addition, Stephen decries his adversaries’ resistance to Jesus and to Stephen’s own proclamation of the risen Christ. The eloquent deacon portrays the refusal of Jesus’ enemies to believe in Him as the culmination Israel’s historical repudiation of the prophets sent them by God. Stephen’s address to the Sanhedrin summarizes the development of salvation history from Abraham to Jesus. In divides that history into four sections: God’s dealings with Abraham (vv. 2-80), God’s dealings with Joseph (vv. 9-16), God’s dealings with Moses (vv.17-43), and the late and dispensable construction of the Jerusalem temple (vv. 44-50). The per19. Cf. NJBC, 44:63-65; Conzelmann, Acts, pp. 85-86; Bruce, Acts, pp. 219-223; Hänchen, Acts, pp. 343-363; Roland Barthes, “L’analyse structurale du recit a propos d’Actes X-XI,” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 58(1970), pp. 17-37; Robert W. Wall., “Successors to ‘the Twelve’ According to Acts,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 53(1991), pp.628-643; Ronald D. Witherup, “Cornelius Over and Over Again: ‘Functional Redundancy’ in the Acts of the Apostles, Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 49(1993), pp. 45-66; Joseph B. Tyson, “The Gentile Mission and the Authority of Scripture in Acts,” New Testament Studies, 33(1987), pp. 619-631; Mark A. Seifrid, “Messiah and Mission in Acts: A Brief Response to J.B. Tyson,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 36(1989), pp. 47-50. 20. Cf. F. Scott Spencer, “Neglected Widows in Acts 6:1-7,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 56(1944), pp. 715-733.

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oration of the speech then denounces Israel’s resistance to all the prophetic voices sent them by God from Abraham to Jesus. The account of God’s dealings with Abraham diverges in details from the account in the Pentateuch. In his recall of the covenant with Abraham, Stephen stresses the fact that God made it when Abraham had neither land nor offspring. In other words, Stephen dissociates the covenant from the possession of the Holy Land and from racial descent. God’s mandate to Abraham to worship Him in the promised land sets the context for the rest of Stephen’s speech. The protomartyr will present the temple as the culminating expression of Israel’s refusal to offer to God the kind of authentic worship which He enjoined upon Abraham.(Acts 7:1-8) As Stephen’s account of Jewish salvation history unfolds, God predictably holds the initiative in guiding its events. Stephen observes ironically, however, that the covenant of circumcision did not prevent the eleven jealous patriarchs from selling their brother Joseph into slavery. Stephen contrasts the perfidy of the eleven with God’s fidelity to Joseph even in his slavery. God not only delivers Joseph but transforms him into the savior of his treacherous brothers. (Acts 7:8-16) Like the figure of Moses whom Stephen describes next, the figure of Joseph clearly prefigures Jesus, the savior treacherously betrayed by His own. The growth of Israel in Egypt sets the scene for the emergence of Moses. Stephen depicts Moses prior to the exodus somewhat inaccurately as a charismatic leader like Jesus (or like Stephen himself ), “mighty in word and work.” (Acts 7:17-22) Moreover, Stephen paints Moses’ relationship to Israel as marred by contention from the beginning. When Moses slays an Egyptian for abusing a Hebrew, the people of Israel refuse to accept Him as “leader and judge.” Instead, they publicize his deed, and force him to flee into temporary exile. (Acts 7:23-9) God, however, responds to this intransigence on the part of His chosen people by appointing Moses “leader and redeemer” despite Israel’s rejection of him. (Acts 7:35) Luke underscores the parallelism between Moses and Jesus by noting that Moses himself prophesied Jesus, when he foretold the coming of another prophet like himself. (Acts 7:37) Israel’s initial rejection of Moses repeats itself in the forty years of desert wandering. There despite the manifest signs of God’s authorization of Moses’ prophetic ministry and despite the fact that God communicated the Law itself to Israel through Moses, the people refused to listen to him and hankered for the fleshpots of Egypt. (Acts 7:39) Worse still, instead of obeying the Law, the Israelites forced Aaron to lead them in idolatrous worship. Israel’s forty years of infidelity in the desert foreshadowed the idolatry which sent them into exile in Babylon. (Acts 7:41-3, Am 5:25-7) In the fourth section of his defence, Stephen turns his attack on the temple itself. He points out, that until the time of David, God expressed


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no desire to dwell in a temple; but instead dwelt in a moveable tent constructed exactly according to the pattern God revealed to Moses. (Acts 7:44-5) While David asked God in prayer to build a temple as His dwelling place, the temple Solomon built did not fulfill either God’s promise to Abraham or David’s own prayer. Here Stephen cites Is 66:1-2 in support of the experience of diaspora Judaism that Jews do not need a temple to discover and worship God, because the whole world serves as God’s temple. (Acts 7:46-50) In the polemical peroration which ends Stephen’s speech, the inspired deacon accuses the whole of Israel of having obstinately resisted the word of God; of having ignored, persecuted, and murdered the prophets God sent them; and of having suffered the destruction of the kingdoms of Israel and of Judah as a just punishment for their disobedience. Invoking the familiar Lukan theme that the prophets all foretold the coming of Jesus, Stephen draws a pointed parallel between the behavior of former Jews and the attitude of the Sanhedrin. While their ancestors murdered those who foretold the coming of Christ, the Sanhedrin has compounded their sins by murdering and betraying “the Just One” once He appeared. The intransigent stubbornness of the Sanhedrin, which perpetuates the intransigent stubbornness of their ancestors, unmasks their “pagan hearts and pagan ears,” their unrepentant and persistent resistance to the Holy Breath of God, who inspires Christian faith and worship. The phrase “pagan hearts and ears” also rebukes priestly concessions to pagan culture and religion. In Stephen’s eyes (and therefore in Luke’s as well), Jewish resistance to Jesus and to His Breath brings to a culmination Israel’s rejection of the leaders divinely sent them throughout the history of salvation. Moreover, their rejection of God’s own Son and resistance to His Breath vitiates their worship in God’s eyes.21 (Acts 7:51-3) Stephen’s diatribe infuriates the Sanhedrin, who stubbornly “ground their teeth at him.” (Acts 7:54) Stephen’s martyrdom does not, however, flow from his rehearsal of Israel’s resistance to God’s word, a common enough theme in the Old Testament itself. Nor does Stephen’s death result from his endorsement of the attitudes of diaspora Judaism toward 21. Cf. NJBC, 44:45-53; Hänchen, Acts, pp. 275-290; John J. Kilgallen, S.J., “The Function of Stephen’s Speech,” Biblica, 70(1989), pp. 173-193; Dennis D. Sylva, “The Meaning and Function of Acts 7:46-50,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 106(1987), pp. 261-275; Earl Richard, “Acts 7: An Investigation of the Samaritan Evidence,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 39(1977), pp. 190-208; Charles Scobe, “The Use of Source Material in the Speeches of Acts III and VII,” New Testament Studies, 25(1978-1979), pp. 399-421; John Kilgallen, The Stephen Speech (Rome: Biblical Institute Press, 1976); Johannes Bihler, Die Stephanusgeschichte (Munich: Max Hüber Verlag, 1963); Gerhard Schneider, “Stephanus, die Hellenisten und Samaria” in Les Acts des Apôtres, tradition, redaction, théologie, edited by J. Kremer (Leuven: University Press, 1979), pp. 215-240.

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the Jerusalem temple. Rather, it flows most immediately from his visionary experience, which immediately follows his defence. “Filled with the Holy Breath,” Stephen sees the heavens “thrown open” in an apocalyptic rent which recalls Jesus’ messianic commissioning at the beginning of Luke’s gospel. (Lk 3:22) Stephen also sees the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God. (Acts 7:56) Scripture scholars debate the reason for the Son of Man’s unusual standing posture. Ordinarily one would expect to find Him seated at God’s right hand. Some see in the risen Christ’s posture a rhetorical but insignificant variation of more traditional enthronement imagery. Others see the Son of Man standing to welcome His martyr into heaven, or to intercede for Stephen with the Father (Cf. Lk 12:18), or to pass judgment over the unbelief of Israel. In any case, Stephen clearly identifies the figure of the Son of Man with the risen Christ. Stephen’s intent appears more clearly in his prayer as the Sanhedrin stones him for blasphemy: “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” (Acts 7:5-9) Stephen’s prayer to Jesus parallels the dying prayer of Luke’s Jesus. (Lk 23:46) Stephen’s final words also echo the crucified Jesus’ forgiveness of His murderers. Stephen dies praying: “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” (Acts 7:60; Lk 23:34) While Jesus prayed to the Father, Stephen prays to the Lord Jesus. The parallel not only assimilates Stephen’s death to Jesus’ but also attributes to Jesus in Stephen’s prayer a dignity parallel to that which the Father holds in Jesus’ prayer. In other words, in Luke’s account, the stoning of Stephen, while motivated in part by his anti-temple polemic, flows most immediately from his confession of the Lordship of Jesus and his divine, judicial authority as Son of Man: beliefs which sound blasphemous in pious Jewish ears. Stephen’s death partially breaks the stalemate between the Sanhedrin and the embryonic Christian community in Jerusalem. It inaugurates a “bitter persecution” of the Christian Hellenistic community, spearheaded by Saul. (Acts 8:1-3) Moreover, the fact that those who stone Stephen lay their cloaks at the feet of the approving Saul not only dramatizes his approval of the execution but also suggests that he played a leading role in Stephen’s arrest and trial. Stephen’s trial and death seem to have crystallized Saul’s zeal to effect “the total destruction of the Church” through relentless persecution. Ironically, the scattering of the Hellenistic church from Jerusalem effects the “Pentecost” of the Samaritans. It begins the spread of the gospel which the converted Saul, as Paul, the apostle of the Gentiles, will one day spearhead.22 22. Cf. NJBC, 44:50; Conzelmann, Acts, pp. 47-58; Bruce, Acts, pp. 119-160; Hänchen, Acts, pp. 291-299; C. Kingsley Barrett, “Stephen and the Son of Man” in Apophoreta (Berlin: Verlag Alfred Topelmann, 1964), pp. 32-38; P. Doble, “The Son of Man Saying in Stephen’s Witnessing: Acts 6.8-8.2,” New Testament Studies, 31(1984), pp.


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(III) Saul, in pursuing his relentless persecution of the Hellenist Christians, receives authorization to carry the persecution of “the Lord’s disciples” to the town of Damascus. (Acts 9:1-2) The phrase “the Lord’s disciples” again suggests that the confession of the Lordship of Jesus especially stirred Paul’s animus against the first Jewish converts to Christianity. Paul, who was probably walking from Jerusalem to Damascus, finds himself surrounded by “a light from heaven” and hears a voice ask: “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?” When Saul asks the voice to identify itself, it replies: “I am Jesus, and you are persecuting Me; but get up and go to the city, and you will be told what you must do.” (Acts 9:3-6) Paul’s Conversion and Ministry Luke describes the conversion of Saul three times in the course of Acts. The repetition probably dramatizes the irresistible power of the risen Christ to transform the persecutor into a missionary of the gospel. Elsewhere in Acts, triple repetition also expresses divine authoritativeness. (Cf. Acts 10:16) Luke’s three accounts of Paul’s conversion, however, exhibit apparent verbal inconsistency. (Cf. Acts 9:1-19; 22:5-16; 26:10-18) In his first account, the evangelist says that those who accompanied Saul heard the voice but saw no one. In the second account, Paul in testifying before the Sanhedrin says that his companions saw the light but did not hear the voice. Nuances of meaning in the Greek text may account for the discrepancy. In Acts 9:7, the verb “to hear (akouein)” takes a genitive object (phonês). In Acts 22:9, it takes an accusative object (phonên). Akouein with the genitive means to hear without understanding; with the accusative it means to hear with understanding. In other words, in Acts 9:7 Luke says that Paul’s companions heard the voice without understanding it; and in Act 22:9 he says that they did not hear with understanding. In other words, a nuanced reading of the verb “akouein” eliminates the chief discrepancy between the first two accounts.23 The first two accounts also display a discrepancy in describing what Paul’s companions saw. In account one, they see no one; in account two they see a light. One can resolve this second discrepancy as well, if one interprets Luke to mean in the second account that Paul’s companions saw a light but failed to see Jesus in the personal way in which Paul did. 68-84; M Sabbe, “The Son of Man Sayings in Acts 7.56” in Les Actes des Apôtres, tradition, rédaction, théologie, edited by J. Kremer (Leuven: University Press, 1976), pp. 241-279; Joesph Pathrapankal, “Die Kirche der Apostelgeschichte als Modell für unsere Zeit,” Zeitschrift für Missionswissenschaft und Religionswissenschaft, 70(1986), pp. 275-287. 23. Cf. W. Hedrick, “Paul’s Conversion: A Comparative Analysis of the Three Reports in Acts,” Journal of Biblical Literature, 100(1981), pp. 415-432.

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The variations in narrative detail among the three accounts probably reflect as well the fluidity of oral narrative and its relative indifference to textual consistency. Only in the third account do both Paul and his companions fall to the ground. (Acts 26:14) This third discrepancy poses a less serious problem, since failure to mention it in the first two accounts amounts to less than a denial that it happened. In any case, Luke seems to assert in the three accounts that Paul’s companions shared in His experience but only partially and that only Paul saw the risen Jesus personally and conversed with Him. In all three accounts, the risen Christ reveals Himself to Saul while the latter is engaging in the very act of opposing Him by persecuting His disciples. In the verbal exchange between the risen Christ and Saul, Jesus identifies totally with His disciples: in persecuting them, Saul persecutes Jesus Himself. Moreover, despite his opposition to the gospel, the risen Christ has already chosen Saul as His special instrument for the spread of the gospel especially to the Gentiles.24 (Acts 9:15) Luke tells the story of Saul’s encounter with the risen Christ in a way which dramatizes the utter gratuity of Saul’s conversion. Saul’s encounter with the risen Lord transforms him from one who persecutes “the way” into an aggressive witness to the resurrection. Saul’s conversion develops another theme in Acts: namely, that all attempts to suppress the spread of the good news not only fail but end by causing it to spread all the more. The persecution of the Hellenistic church in Jerusalem causes the “Pentecost” of the Samaritans; and Saul, the persecutor of the Hellenistic Church, finds himself predestined by his encounter with the risen Christ and by His conversion to Christianity to become “the apostle of the Gentiles.” (Acts 9:15) The exchange between Saul and the risen Jesus makes another important point: just as Jesus during his ministry had identified with the poor, the marginal, and the suffering, so too the risen Christ, especially in times of persecution, identifies with His disciples.25 24. Cf. John J. Kilgallen, S.J., “Paul Before Agrippa (Acts 26,2-23): Some Considerations,” Biblica, 69(1988), pp. 170-195; Ronald D. Witherup, S.J., “Functional Redundancy in the Acts of the Apostles: A Case Study,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 48(1992), pp. 67-68; NJBC, 44:53, 113, 124; Conzelmann, Acts, pp. 70-73, 185-188, 208-212; Bruce, Acts, pp. 180-189, 414-418, 461-468. 25. Cf. NJBC, 44:53-54; Johnson, op. cit., pp. 161-169; Hänchen, op. cit., pp. 318-329; Gerhard Lohfink, The Conversion of Paul: Narrative and History in Acts, translated and edited by Bruce J. Maling (Chicago, IL: Franciscan Herald Press, 1967); Hans Windisch, “Die Christusepiphanie vor Damaskus und Act 9,23 und 26 und ihre relgionsgeschitlichen Parallelen,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 31(1932), pp. 1-23; David M. Stanley, S.J., “Paul’s Conversion in Acts: Why Three Accounts,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 15(1953), pp. 315-338; C.S. Mann, “Saul and Damascus,” Expository Times, 99(1987-1988), pp. 331-334; Dennis Hamm, “Paul’s Blindness and Its Healing: Clues to Symbolic Intent (Acts 9: 22 and 26),” Biblica,


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Saul’s conversion results directly from his encounter with the risen Christ; but in Luke’s first account, Saul’s conversion does not reach completion until his baptism in the city of Damascus by a Christian disciple named Ananias. The conversion culminates in the baptism in two ways. First, Luke dates Saul’s infilling with the Holy Breath with his baptism by Ananias. Second, the baptism heals Saul’s physical blindness. The scales which fall from Saul’s eyes after his baptism symbolize the new vision of faith which his infilling with the Breath brings. (Acts 9:17-9) Luke dramatizes with two parallel visions the divine providence and predestining authority which sanctions this baptism. The risen Christ appears to Ananias and tells him to go baptize Saul at the same time that Saul sees a vision of Ananias coming to baptize him. (Acts 9:10-2) Besides lending special divine sanction to Saul’s baptism and apostolic commissioning, the double vision also links this event to the “Pentecost” of the Gentiles, which follows soon after Saul’s conversion. Both the pagan Cornelius and Peter receive simultaneous visions which lead to Peter’s baptizing the first uncircumcised Gentile converts with the Jerusalem community’s subsequent sanction. (Acts 10:1-33) The official inclusion of the first Gentile converts into the Christian community without prior circumcision sets the stage for Paul’s Gentile mission, a task for which the risen Christ has already designated Saul in his baptism. The words of the risen Lord to Ananias introduce another theme which Luke will develop in the rest of his narrative; namely, Paul’s identification with Jesus in His passion. In assuring Ananias that he has nothing to fear in confronting the former persecutor of Christians, the risen Jesus says: “I Myself will show him how much he himself must suffer for My name.” (Acts 9:16) Through baptism Saul becomes Paul. Paul’s newfound faith finds expression in his proclamation in Damascus that “Jesus is the Son of God.” (Acts 9:20) His boldness and effectiveness earns him the enmity of the Jews of Damascus, who plot against his life. The persecutor, as the risen Jesus predicted, has joined the ranks of the persecuted. Through the mediation of Barnabas, Saul reports to the apostles in Jerusalem his encounter with the risen Lord and his bold proclamation in Damascus “in the name of Jesus.” Moreover, Saul continues that ministry of proclamation in Jerusalem, until his arguments with immigrant Jews, whom Luke calls “Hellenists,” puts his life again in jeopardy; and the disciples spirit him off to Tarsus.26 (Acts 9:26-30; Gal 1:18-9) (71(1990), pp. 63-72; S. Reymond “Paul sur le chemin de Damas: Ac 9. 22 et 26,”Nouvelle Revue Théologique, 118(1996), pp. 520-538. 26. Cf. NJBC, 44:55-56; Johnson, op. cit., pp. 170-175; Hänchen, Acts, pp. 330-336; J. Dupont, “Les trois premiers voyages de Saint Paul as Jerusalem” in Études sur les Actes des Apôtres (Paris: Éitions du Cerf, 1967), pp. 167-171; J. Cambier, “Le voyage de S. Paul à Jerusalem en Act. ix. 26ss et le schéema missionaire thélogique de S. Luc,” New Testament Studies, 8(1961-1962), pp. 249-257.

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Luke narrates the foundation of the church of Antioch immediately after the baptism of the first Gentiles, because it will serve as the initial center of the missionary activity of the apostle to the Gentiles. (Acts 11:18b-30) During Paul’s first missionary journey, he and Barnabas first attempt to proclaim the risen Christ to the Jews of the Diaspora; but their stubborn resistance forces them to turn instead to the more approachable Gentiles. In Antioch of Pisidia Paul proclaims the risen Christ in one of the synagogues.27 Paul begins by calling explicitly upon the diaspora Jews in his audience and on the “God-fearing” Gentiles among them. (Acts 13:17) The salutation marks off the three sections of Paul’s address. The speech summarizes Luke’s view of salvation history. In the first section of his address, Paul summarizes rapidly the history of Israel from the time of the patriarchs to John the Baptizer. Paul’s account of the events of the Old Testament culminates in David as the prototype of the messiah. Paul points to Jesus as the one who fulfills the Davidic messianic promise, but he does so as a way of introducing the figure of John the Baptizer whose ministry publicly opens the second stage of salvation history. Paul explicitly cites the Baptizer’s prophecy of the mightier Breath-baptizer, a prophecy which Jesus’ glorification fulfills. Paul recognizes that Jesus mediates between the phase of salvation which focused upon the Jews and the dawning of universal salvation. Because Jesus, who stands at the center of salvation history, brings the first phase of salvation history to its climax, Paul feels constrained to proclaim the risen Christ first to the Jews. (Acts 13:17-25, 46) Paul announces to the Jews that God in the first instance intends the salvation accomplished in Christ for them. (Acts 13:26) Paul portrays the people of Jerusalem and their leaders as the unwitting instruments of God’s saving providence when they unjustly condemned Jesus and handed Him over to Pilate for crucifixion. Their actions fulfilled the prophecies read weekly in every synagogue on the Sabbath. After Jesus’ burial, however, God undid everything Jesus’ enemies had done. God raised Him from the dead. He appeared to many witnesses.28 (Acts 13:27-31) Paul appeals to several Old Testament texts in order to interpret the meaning of the resurrection. 1) Jesus’ resurrection fulfills the verse from the messianic psalm 2: “You are my son; today I have begotten you.” (Ps 2:7) Paul points to Jesus’ divine Sonship as the ground of His messianic authority. 2) Paul also cites Is 55:3 LXX. He uses the text to depict Jesus as the heir of “the sure and holy things” promised to David. (Acts 13:32-4) 27. Cf. Richard E. Oster, “Supposed Anachronisms in Luke-Acts’ use of synagoge,” New Testament Studies, 39(1993), pp. 178-208. 28. Paul attributes Jesus’ burial, not to Joseph of Aramathea, but to Jesus’ enemies. Luke’s Paul wants to contrast rhetorically what the enemies of Jesus did with God’s reversal of their perfidy.


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These “sure and holy things” Paul explains by alluding to Ps 16:9. As we have seen, Peter cited the same text in his Pentecost sermon. Moreover, as in the case of Peter, the allusion implicitly invokes the empty tomb as an argument for the reality of the resurrection. The tomb takes on revelatory significance when understood in the light of the testimony of those who saw the risen Christ. David died, was buried, and experienced corruption; but Jesus’ resurrection from the dead after his burial manifests that He received “the true and holy things” of which David spoke, namely, the incorruption promised to God’s “holy one” in Ps 16:9. (Cf. Acts 2:29-36) The final section of Paul’s discourse challenges his audience to respond to God’s present action in the post-Pentecostal Church. The challenge takes the form of an exhortation and a warning. Diaspora Jews like those in Pisidian Antioch must recognize that God accomplishes human justification and the forgiveness of sins through the risen Christ. Through the resurrection and through faith in the glorified Jesus, God effects something the Law could never accomplish. Those who hear the resurrection proclaimed must, therefore, either believe or perish. Those who fail to respond in faith will fulfill Habakkuk’s prophecy of persistent unbelief in the face of God’s saving action.29 (Acts 13:38-41; Hab 1:5) At first Paul and Barnabas find a positive response among many Jews and among the Gentile “God-fearers.” On the next sabbath, however, when great crowds of Gentiles—”almost the whole town”—show up in order to hear Paul and Barnabas preach, the Jews of Pisidian Antioch turn on the two apostles. While Paul has absolved them of any guilt for Jesus’ death (Acts 13:27-9), they nevertheless now join their fellow countrymen in Jerusalem in rejecting Paul’s message. (Acts 13:42-52) As in his account of Jesus’ confrontation with the people of Nazareth, Luke now portrays the majority of the Jewish people in Antioch refusing the revelation of Christ because they will not see themselves as chosen by God for the sake of a universal salvation. In its review of salvation history, Paul’s speech to the Jews in Pisidian Antioch recalls Stephen’s speech, which engaged in a similar rhetorical strategy. Moreover, as in the case of Stephen, Paul experiences rejection, this time at the hands of diaspora Jews. That rejection marks the turning point in Luke’s account of Paul’s ministry. Thereafter, he and Barnabas turn to the Gentiles as their principal target for evangelization.30 (Acts 13:44-9) 29. Cf. NJBC, 44:71-75; Conzelmann, Acts, pp. 101-107; Bruce, Acts, pp. 250-264; Hänchen, Acts, pp. 405-418. 30. Cf. John J. Kilgallen, “Acts 13,38-39: Culmination of Paul’s Speech in Pisidia,” Biblica, 69(1988), pp. 480-506; Huub van der Sandt,”Acts 28,28: No Salvation for the People of Israel? An Answer in the Perspective of the LXX,” Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 70(1994), pp. 341-358; Dixon Slingerland, “The Composition of Acts: Some Redactional-Critical Observations,” Journal of the American

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Later Luke will assimilate Paul to Stephen even more closely in the former’s speech to the Jews in Jerusalem. On that occasion, Paul alludes to Stephen’s death and to his own part in it before announcing his divine commission to proclaim the risen Christ to the Gentiles. That announcement causes Paul’s audience to cry for his blood just as the Sanhedrin had once demanded Stephen’s execution. (Acts 22:17-21) Instead of martyrdom, Paul suffers arrest.31 During Paul’s second missionary journey and before his arrest in Jerusalem, he proclaims the risen Christ in Athens. Paul debates not only Jews and “God-fearers” but Epicurean and Stoic philosophers as well. The latter mock Paul’s message, calling him a “parrot.” They deride his preaching as propaganda for some outlandish religion. Nevertheless, they invite Paul, out of Athenian delight in new ideas and speechifying, to speak before the council of the Areopagus (Acts 17:16-22) In his speech, Paul initially avoids Christological references. Instead, he proclaims to the Athenians the “Unknown God” to whom they have unwittingly erected an altar. This God, “the Lord of heaven and earth,” does not dwell in pagan shrines and needs nothing from humans. Rather He gives everything, “including life and breath” to everyone. The unknown God made the human race from a single stock, and He rules the nations and their destinies. This God dwells close to everyone, because, as a pagan poet suggested, “in Him we live, move, and have our being.” Scholars debate to which poet Luke’s Paul is actually referring.32 As children of God and members of the same family, humans should never worship any idol constructed by human hands. Rather, God is callAcademy of Religion, 56(1988), pp.99-113; Burkill, Now Light on the Earliest Gospel, pp. 48-120; Friedrich W. Horn, “Paulus, das Nasiräat und die Nasiräer,” Novum Testamentum, 39(1997), pp. 117-137. In Thessalonika, Paul during his second missionary journey again appeals first to the diaspora Jews in his preaching. He argues from Scripture for three consecutive sabbaths how “it was ordained that the Christ should suffer and rise again.” He then identifies Jesus as the messiah whom Scripture foretold. He makes converts among some Jews; but more “God-fearers,” Greeks, and women convert than Jews, who accuse Paul of giving Jesus more authority than the emperor. (Acts 17:1-15) In Corinth, Paul, joined now by Silas and Timothy, again proclaims to the Jews that Jesus is the Christ, but finds mostly rejection. Paul, therefore, turns again to the pagans. (Acts 18:5-6) 31. Cf. NJBC, 44:71-76; Hänchen, Acts, pp. 405-418; J. Dupont, Éudes sur les Actes des Apôtres, pp. 335-337; Robert F. O’Toole, S.J., “Christ’s Resurrection in Acts 13, 13-52,” Biblica, 60(1974), pp. 361-372; John J. Kilgallen, “Acts 13, 38-39: Culmination of Paul’s Speech in Pisidia,” Biblica, 69(1988), pp. 180-506; Josep Ruis-Camps, “La Mision hacia el Paganismo avalada por el Senor Jesus e el Espiritu Santo (Hch 13-15),” Estudios Biblicos, 52 (1994), pp. 341-360. 32. Cf. M.J. Edwards, “Quoting Aratus: Acts 17,28,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 83(1992), pp. 266-269.


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ing all nations to repent of such pagan follies, “because he has fixed a day when the whole world will be judged, and judged in the gospel righteousness, and he has appointed a man to be the judge. And God has publicly proved this by raising the man from the dead.” (Acts 17:22-31) Paul’s sermon on the Areopagus makes, then, one already familiar Christological point: namely, that the resurrection manifests the risen Christ’s divine authority to pass final judgment over the whole world. The resurrection, however, proves an intolerable stumbling block for most of Paul’s audience. He makes only a handful of converts in Athens. (Acts 17:32-34) If Paul’s speech at Pisidian Antioch dramatizes Luke’s perception of why Jews often found the Christian kerygma unacceptable, Paul’s speech on the Areopagus dramatizes important reasons for Gentile unbelief: philosophical dilettantism and an unwillingness to credit the resurrection of the body. In Acts, then, the paschal mystery poses a radical challenge for Gentile as well as Jew. It marks a new and decisive intervention of God within human history which requires a radical break with conventional beliefs and attitudes, whether Jewish or pagan.33 Paul’s farewell speech to the elders at Ephesus contains a few Christological references. The speech marks the changing of the guard: Paul the apostle is handing over leadership responsibilities to the elders who will succeed him. Paul reminds the elders of the work he has accomplished in proclaiming the Lord Jesus and expresses his desire to complete the task entrusted to him. (Acts 20:18-24) Paul urges the elders to “feed the Church of God which He [Jesus] bought with His own blood.” (Acts 20:28) His saving death has brought it about that those who believe in Jesus now belong to Him. Paul concludes by exhorting the community to care for the weak by citing a saying of Jesus: “There is more happiness in giving than in receiving.” (Acts 20:34-5) This saying which Paul attributes to Jesus echoes an aphorism of Ben Sirah (Si 4:31); but nowhere in the gospels does it turn up on Jesus’ own lips. Its citation reflects, however, Luke’s habitual concern for the poor. Paul makes the citation in the context of exhorting 33. Cf. NJBC, 44:94; Conzelmann, Acts, pp. 136-195; Bruce, Acts, pp. 328-344; Hänchen, Acts, pp. 515-531; Karl Olav Sandnes, “Paul and Socrates: The Aim of Paul’s Areopagus Speech,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament, 50(1993), pp. 13-26; Jean Calloud, “Paul devant l’Areopagus d’Athens,” Recherches de Science Religieuse, 69(1981), pp. 209-248; Paul Schubert, “The Place of the Areopagus Speech in the Composition of Acts” in Transitions in Biblical Scholarship, edited by J. Coret Rylaarsdan (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago, 1968), pp. 235-261; Hans Conzelmann, “The Address of Paul on the Areopagus” in Studies in Luke-Acts, edited by Leander E. Keck and J. Louis Martyn (Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 1966), pp. 217-230; N. Clayton Croy, “Hellenistic Philosophies and the Preaching of the Resurrection (Acts 17:18,32),” Novum Testamentum, 39(1997), pp. 21-39.

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Church leaders never to burden those they serve and to show special concern for those in greatest need.34 Examples of Christological Knowing In telling the story of Peter, Stephen, and Paul, Luke portrays them as examples of Christological knowing without, of course, using that term as such. Still, Luke makes it clear that Breath-baptism inspired their witness to the risen Christ and assimilated them to Him. In His appearance to Saul on the road to Damascus, the risen Christ insists that in persecuting His disciples Paul is persecuting Jesus Himself. (Acts 9:5; 22:8; 26:15) As we have seen, however, the persecution and stoning of Stephen had already made the same point dramatically. Stephen, the prototypical Christian martyr, dies as an alter Christus. With his dying words he echoes the prayer of the dying Christ. (Acts 7:55-60; Lk 23:34, 46) Acts also assimilates both Peter and Paul to Jesus. Like Jesus, the two apostles confirm their teaching by performing the same kinds of miracles as Jesus had. Like Jesus, both Peter and Paul cure cripple. (Lk 5:15, 7:23; Acts 3:1-10, 14:8-10) All three raise the dead to life. (Lk 7:11-17; Acts 9:36-42, 20:7-12) Like Jesus, first Peter, then Paul, draw to themselves crowds of people seeking healing and exorcism. (Lk 6:17-19; Acts 12:13-6, 19:11-2) Both apostles also find themselves drawn into the passion of Jesus because they proclaim His resurrection. Both experience miraculous deliverances from the persecutors. Both deliverances dramatizes the victory of Christ and the power of His resurrection. (Acts 5:17-21, 12:1-19, 16:25-34) In assimilating Stephen, Peter, and Paul to Christ, Luke tells their stories in a manner which also suggests that the mantle of apostolic leadership passed from Peter to Paul as the Jewish people stiffened their resistance to the apostolic kerygma.35 The assimilation of the three protagonists of Acts to Jesus raises the question of Luke’s use of allusion to tie together his account of Christian 34. Cf. NJBC, 44:105-108; Conzelmann, Acts, pp. 172-176; Bruce, Acts, pp. 387-396; Hänchen, Acts, pp. 589-598; J. Lambrecht, “Paul’s Farewell Address at Miletus” in Les Actes des Apôtres, traditions, redaction, théologie, pp. 307-337; Christoph Zettner, Amt, Gemeinde und kirchliche Einheit in der Apostelgeschichte des Lukas (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lukas, 1991); John J. Kilgallen, “Paul’s Speech to the Ephesian Elders: Its Structure, Ephemerides Theologicae Lovaniensis, 70(1994), pp. 112-121; J.M. Ross, “The Extra Words in Acts 18:21,” Novum Testamentum, 34(1992), pp. 247-249; Eckhard Plümacher, “Eine Thukydides-reminiszenz in der Apostelgeschichte (Act 20,33-35—Thuk. 97, 3f),” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentlische Wissenschaft, 83(1992), pp. 270-275. 35. Cf. David P. Mossner, “‘The Christ Must Suffer’: New Light on the Jesus-Peter, Stephen, Paul Parallels in Luke-Acts,” Novum Testamentum, 28(1986), pp. 220-256.


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origins. In the section which follows, therefore, I shall complete the analysis of Luke’s use of literary allusion which I began in the last chapter. (IV) This section ponders two ways in which Luke uses literary allusion in Acts. First, the evangelist uses it in order to assimilate Paul to Peter. Second, Luke uses literary allusion in order to tie together his gospel and the story of Acts. Since the figures of Peter and Paul dominate the story of Acts, Luke makes most extensive use of allusion in recounting their exploits. The evangelist dramatizes the continuity between Petrine and Pauline Christianity by having Paul in his ministry do the same things as Peter. Both apostles speak four major discourses. (Acts 2:14-36, 3:12-26, 10:34-43; 13:15-41, 14:15-17, 15:7-11, 20:18-35; 22:1-21) Both apostles heal someone crippled from birth. (Acts 3:2-9, 14:8-11) Both Peter and Paul call down the Pentecostal Breath on baptized believers who have not experienced Her charisms: Peter on the Samaritans, Paul on the disciples in Ephesus baptized with Johannine baptism. In both cases, those on whom the apostle imposes hands speak in tongues. (Acts 8:16-17, 19:5-6) Both Peter and Paul go up to the temple in order to pray. (Acts 3:1, 22:17) Both encounter a hostile magician. Peter rebukes Simon (Acts 8:9), while Paul strikes the magician Elymas temporarily blind. (Acts 13:6-8) Both Peter and Paul refuse adoration by others. Peter does it in the house of Cornelius; Paul, in Lystra. (Acts 10:25-26, 14:15) Both apostles pronounce words of divine judgment: Peter on Ananias and Sapphira, Paul on Elymas. (Acts 5:3-11, 13:10-11) Both apostles show extraordinary powers of healing. (Acts 5:15-16, 19:11-12) Both deal with people who covet their charismatic powers: Peter with Simon, Paul with the sons of Sceva. (Acts 8:18-19, 19:13-17) Both apostles raise the dead. (Acts 9:36-42, 20:9-12) In their inaugural discourse, both apostles implicitly invoke the empty tomb in order to elicit faith in Jesus’ resurrection. (Acts 2:29-34, 13:34-37) Peter and Cornelius have corresponding visions prior to the latter’s conversion, while Ananias and Saul have corresponding visions before Saul’s conversion and baptism as Paul. (Acts 10:1-48) Both Peter and Paul experience extraordinary deliverances from prison: Peter in Jerusalem, Paul and Silas at Philippi. (Acts 12:3-11, 16:22-26) Both Peter and Paul receive a special mission to the Gentiles in a vision: Peter to Cornelius and Paul to the Macedonians. (Acts 10:9-16, 16:9-10) Both apostles profess their fidelity to the Torah (Acts 10:14, 25:8), but both also confess that the Law alone cannot save one.36 (Acts 15:10-11, 13:38-39) Of the three synoptic evangelists, only Luke writes a two-volume study of Christian origins. It therefore comes as no great surprise that Luke 36. Cf. George, op. cit., pp. 50-58, 79-84.


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DIAGRAM III: THE ASSIMILATION OF PAUL TO PETER IN ACTS Peter

Paul

Acts 2:14-36; 3:12-26; ————— Four Discourses ——— Acts 13:15-4 1; 17:22-3 1; 10:34-43; 15:6-11 20:18-35: 22:1-21 Acts 3:2-9 ———————— Cures one crippled ——————— Acts 14:8-11 from birth Acts 8:16-17 —————— Lays hands on those baptized ———— Acts 19:1-7 who have not manifest charisms Acts 8:9 ——————— Encounters a magician

—————— Acts 16:6-8

Acts 10:6 ——————— Refuses to be adored——————— Acts 14:15 Acts 5:3-4:9 —————— Pronounces judgment——————— Acts 13:10-11 Acts 5:15-16 —————— Heals the crowds———————

Acts 19:11-12

Acts 8:18-19————— Has charismatic powers coveted ———— Acts 19:13-17 Acts 9:36-42—————— Raises the dead to life——————— Acts 20:9-12 Acts 2:29-34——————— Refers to empty tomb —————— Acts 13:34-37 in inaugural discourse Acts 10: 1-48—————— Parallel visions ————————— Acts 9:10-19 Acts 12:3-11 ——————Freed from prison ——————— Acts 16:22-26 Acts 10: 14—————— Professes fidelity to the Law————— Acts 25:8 Acts 15:10-11—————— Confesses Law cannot save ————— Acts 13:38-39 Acts 10: 1-48————— Sent by revelation to Gentiles ———— Acts 16:19

probably makes his most characteristic use of literary allusion by foreshadowing in his gospel events which will transpire in Acts. The prologue of the gospel (Lk 1:1-4) obviously finds a parallel in the prologue to Acts. (Acts 1:1-5) The account of the ascension which ends the gospel (Lk 24:50-53) anticipates the ascension account which begins Acts. (Acts 1:5-11) Luke underlines the importance of Pentecost by repeatedly alluding to it in the course of his gospel. The Breath’s outpouring in the infancy gospel (Lk 1:42, 67, 2:25-26, 36-38) anticipates her creation of the Church on Pentecost morning. (Acts 2:1-4) Jesus’ mission of the Twelve (Lk 9:1-2) and of the seventy-two disciples (Lk 10:1-16) alludes to the missioning on Pentecost of the disciples gathered in the upper room. Jesus’ prayer at the time of the Breath’s descent upon Him (Lk 3:21) anticipates the disciples’ prayer for their Pentecostal Breath-baptism after the ascension in Acts. John predicts that the mightier one will baptize in a sanctifying


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Breath and fire. (Lk 3:16) John’s prophecy, moreover, anticipates Jesus’ reference to the Father “promise” at the end of the gospel (Lk 24:49) and at the beginning of Acts. (Acts 1:4-5) The fiery tongues fulfill both the prophecy and the promise. John also predicts that the coming mightier one will pronounce judgment in wind and fire (Lk 1:17); and on Pentecost the Breath arrives under the sign of wind and fiery tongues. The prophetic Pentecostal Church imitates the activities of the prophetess Anna, who foreshadows its proclamation of the risen Christ by her proclamation of the infant messiah. (Lk 2:36-38, Acts 1:14, 3:1) Mary’s presence on Pentecost (Acts 1:14) recalls her obedient faith in the infancy gospel. (Lk 1:38) The repentance of the crowds who hear John (Lk 3:10) foreshadows their repentance on Calvary (Lk 23:48); and their repentance on Calvary foreshadows their conversion on Pentecost. (Acts 2:37) Jesus’ counsel to the disciples to beg the Father to give the Breath as His best gift (Lk 11:23) finds obedient fulfillment in Acts in their prayer for the coming of the Pentecostal Breath. Luke also foreshadows in his gospel the opposition to the proclamation of the risen Christ which the evangelist details in Acts. Simeon’s prophecy that Israel will experience Jesus as a sign of contradiction (Lk 2:29-32) finds its fulfillment not only in Palestinian opposition to Jesus’ ministry but also in widespread Jewish opposition to the apostles’ proclamation of the risen Christ. The Sanhedrin persecutes the apostles just as they persecuted Jesus. (Acts 4:23-31) The prayer uttered during the little Pentecost in Acts cites Ps 1:1-2: “Why do the Gentiles rage and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth took their stand and the rulers made common cause against the Lord and against His anointed.” (Acts 4:25-26) The citation recalls the connivance of the chief priests, Herod, Pilate, and the people of Jerusalem in Jesus’ death. Their murder of Jesus also dramatizes Satan’s claim in Jesus’ desert temptations that the kingdoms of this world do indeed belong to him and obey him. (Lk 4:6-7) Hence, Jesus’ legalized murder reveals his murderers as the tools of Satan. (Lk 22:53) Their assault upon Jesus recalls, therefore, Satan’s decision after Jesus’ desert temptation to put Him to the test at a more opportune time. (Lk 4:9-13) In addition, however, Jesus’ final victory over Satan in His desert temptation anticipates by reverse allusion Satan’s victory over Ananias and Sapphira in Acts. (Acts 5:1-11) The unfortunate couple succumb to Jesus’ final temptation by putting God to the test. The Sadducees’ denial of the resurrection in Luke’s gospel (Lk 20:27-40) anticipates their opposition to the proclamation of Jesus’ resurrection in Acts. (Acts 4:1, 23:6-8) In the same way, Jesus’ trial before the Sanhedrin prepares the trials of Peter, of Stephen, and of Paul by that same body. (Lk 22:66-23:1; Acts 4:1-22, 5:21-33, 22:30-23:11) The evangelist, as we have seen, actually transposes narrative details from Jesus’ trial in Mark to Stephen’s

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trial in Acts. The death of Stephen, the protomartyr in Acts, recalls Jesus’ death on Calvary. (Lk 23:34; Acts 7:59-60) Other events in Jesus’ story find an echo in Acts. Jesus’ sermon on the plain and Luke’s reference to the paschal mystery as an exodus in the transfiguration (Lk 6:17-49, 9:29-36) take on clearer theological mean-


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DIAGRAM IV CONTINUED LUKE'S GOSPEL

ACTS

Jesus’ last desert temptation —————— Satan’s victory over Aranias and Sapphira Opposition of Sadducees to Jesus ————— Opposition of Sadducees to apostles (Lk 20:27-40) (Act, 4: 1; 23:6-8) the sermon on the plain (Lk 6:17-49) pascal mystery as exodus (Lk 9:29-36)

Stephen’s proclamation of Jesus as the prophet like Moses (Acts 7:17-43)

the miracle of the loaves (Lk 9:10-17) the last supper (Lk 22:1 the meal at Emmaus (Lk 24:30-33)

Jesus’ meals with disciples between resurrection and ascension (Acts 1:4, 10:41-43)

the meals in the journey section Jesus’ teaching about the sign of Jonah —————————— Paul’s Gentile mission (Lk 10:13-15) journey discourse and Jesus' appearance to the disciples on “the way”

The Church becomes “the Way” (Acts 9:2)

the angels at the tomb ———————————— two angels at the ascension in Acts rending of the heavens at the Breath’s decent on Jesus

rending of the heavens in Stephen’s vision of the Son of Man

ing in Stephen’s proclamation of Jesus as the prophet like Moses in Acts. (Acts 3:22-24, 7:17-43) The many meals which Jesus shares with others in the gospel find a parallel in the miracle of the loaves (Lk 9:10-17), in the last supper (Lk 22:19-22), and in Jesus breaking bread with the disciples at Emmaus. (Lk 24:30-33) All these meals, moreover, find their fulfillment in the meals which the risen Christ shares with His disciples prior to His ascension in Acts. (Acts 1:4) Jesus’ teaching about the sign of Jonah (Lk 11:29-32) foreshadows Paul’s Gentile mission in Acts. Two of Jesus’ miracles (Lk 5:17-26, 7:11-17) foreshadow miracles done by both Peter and Paul in Acts. (Acts 9:32-43, 14:8-18, 20:7-12) The appearance of Jesus to the disciples “on the way” to Emmaus (Lk 24:30) recalls Luke’s journey discourse on the way to Jerusalem and to glory at the same time that it anticipates the transformation of Jesus’ movement into “the Way”

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Part 4: The Pragmatic Meaning of Christological Knowing

in Acts. (Acts 9:2) The two angels at Jesus’ tomb in the gospel (Lk 24:4-5) anticipate the two angels to Jesus’ ascension in Acts. (Acts 1:10) The rending of the heavens prior in Stephen’s vision of the risen Lord recalls the rending of the heavens when the Breath descended on Jesus at the Jordan. (Luke 3:21; Acts 7:56) I have noted other Lukan allusions in commenting on both his gospel and Acts. The preceding catalogue, however, illustrates sufficiently well how the evangelist employs literary allusion to tie together his two volumes. In the process the preceding catalogue also dramatizes the contrast between Lukan use of this literary device and the use made of it by the other synoptic evangelists. The Analogy of Christological Knowing Luke alone among the evangelists actually describes the proclamation of the risen Christ. Like other ancient historians, the evangelist himself composed the speeches which his main characters pronounce. As a consequence, while Luke remains sensitive in Acts to the situational relevance of each kerygmatic proclamation which he describes, the speeches of Peter, of Stephen, and of Paul all reflect Lukan theological concerns and develop the evangelist’s own theory of salvation history as a context for understanding the saving significance of Jesus and of the paschal mystery. Luke, writing as a Pauline Christian for a predominantly Gentile audience, presents apostolic proclamation as culminating in Paul’s Gentile mission, which brings the gospel from Jerusalem, the heart of first-century Judaism, to Rome, the then center of the mediterranean Gentile world. Unlike Matthew, who sees Petrine Christianity as the solid rock on which to build the Church, Luke sees Petrine Christianity as a prelude to the establishment of the Pauline churches. Both Luke and Matthew attested to the resistance among many Jews to the Christian kerygma. Matthew warned that their unbelief would bring down judgment on their Pharisaical hypocrisy. Luke, however, discoverd two specific reasons for Jewish resistance to the gospel: Israel refused to acknowledge the divinity of Jesus and would not recognize that God chose them for the sake of saving the Gentiles in Christ. Ironically, Jewish resistance to the gospel in Acts accomplishes God’s universal saving purpose anyway by motivating Paul’s Gentile mission. This chapter concludes the dialectical analysis of synoptic narrative Christology. The chapter which follows probes its implications for developing foundational Christology.

Chapter 18: Imagination and the Christian Conscience

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Part 4 The Pragmatic Meaning of Christological Knowing Chapter 18 Imagination and the Christian Conscience: The Practice of Christological Knowing The first volume of this study undertook two speculative tasks. First, it attempted to clarify how one can legitimately understand the humanity of Jesus in a contemporary, North American context. Second, it began to examine the ways in which faith in the paschal mystery graces and transvalues natural human hope. The second volume of this study has focused on the intuitive dimensions of Christian faith rather than on Christian hope; and it has examined the narrative Christology of the three synoptic gospels for the light they shed on the practical meaning of Christological knowing. The time has come to summarize the conclusions of that investigation. Such a summary will give a unified account of the analogy of Christological knowing which the synoptic gospels exemplify. By the analogy of Christological knowing, I mean the way in which each of the evangelists modifies the telling of Jesus’s story so that it addresses the conversion needs of the community for whom the evangelist writes. Analogy means similarity in difference. In attempting to advance Christological knowing, the three synoptic evangelists share much in common. They also stress different aspects of the Christian’s relationship to Christ in faith. An insight into the analogy of Christological knowing articulated in the synoptics will tell us much about the synoptic gospels as Christian classics. As we saw at the beginning of this volume, a literary work qualifies as a classic when it continues to speak to generation after generation of readers. Taken together, both the broad areas of narrative consensus and the emphases peculiar to each synoptic evangelist yield an insight into the perennial significance of their gospels. In every generation, those who ponder them in faith find in them practical help in advancing in Christological knowing. In the synoptics, the analogy of Christological knowing results from the different conversion needs of the historical communities whom each evangelist addresses; but the analogy of Christological knowing also en-

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gages contemporary Christians who meditate the synoptics. Contemporary Christians have conversion needs of their own. Accordingly, in the second part of this chapter, I shall begin to show how the kind of Christological knowing which the synoptic gospels promote promises to heal, perfect, and elevate the contemporary Christian conscience. In the final section of volume three, I shall draw on the creative work of William Spohn and of Roberto Unger in order to develop further the construct of the Christian conscience here presented. In challenging their communities to greater assimilation to Jesus in the power of His Breath, all three synoptic gospels presuppose a context of faith. All three challenge the reader to repentance. All three demand commitment to a utopian religious vision which places very specific demands on those who espouse it. This chapter divides, then, into four parts. Part one examines the context of faith which the synoptics propose as the condition for advancing in Christological knowing. Part two ponders the kind of repentance which progress in Christological knowing demands. Part three meditates the utopian vision of the kingdom to which Christological faith commits believers. Part four analyzes how the practice of Christological knowing heals, perfects, and elevates the human conscience. (I) All three synoptic gospels use both positive dramatic linkages and the miracles of Jesus in order to define the context of faith required for assimilation to Jesus in the power of His Breath. In all three gospels, Jesus relates positively to John the Baptizer, to the Father, and to the Breath. Each relationship fleshes out a different dimension of Christological knowing. Positive Dramatic Linkages: The Context of Faith All three synoptic evangelists endorse the ministry of John the Baptizer as genuinely prophetic. All three insist that John prophesied the coming of a mightier one than himself who would baptize with a sanctifying Breath. In other words, all three synoptics use the Baptizer as a way of dramatizing that Jesus, not John, baptizes in the divine Breath. Moreover, Breath-baptism provides the realistic context for the disciples’ growth in Christological knowing. It also implies Jesus’ divinity since only God can function as the source of a divine reality. All three synoptics develop Jesus’ superiority to John in ways which disclose the mystery of Jesus’ own person. Jesus, not John, confronts one as the divine Bridegroom especially endowed with divine authority to forgive sins. Breath-baptism reveals Jesus alone as the anointed Son of God and therefore as messiah. As Breath-baptizer Jesus begins both a


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new Israel and a new creation. Both Jesus and John suffer martyrdom; but only Jesus rises from the dead and sends the Breath. While John stands on the threshold of the messianic age, Jesus begins it. John functions as the Elijah who prepares for Jesus’ coming; but Jesus inaugurates the end time. Matthew and Luke endorse the preceding themes in Mark’s portrait of Jesus; but each nuances Mark’s portrait in slightly different ways. On the whole, the nuances tend to converge or to complement rather than to contradict one another. Occasional contradictions do, however, surface. Mark and Luke both seem to concede to Johannine baptism the power to forgive sins. Matthew reserves that power to the paschal mystery and Christian baptism. All three evangelists, however, discover a sanctifying power in Christian baptism which goes beyond Johannine baptism. That sanctification results from the fact that Christian baptism confers the Breath of God, while Johannine baptism does not. Of the three, Luke portrays Breath-baptism most clearly as both sanctification in Jesus’ image and as charismatic empowerment. Mark does not mention the charisms as such; and Matthew warns against valuing charismatic prowess more than the obedience of faith. Both Matthew and Luke distinguish the way in which the divine Breath relates to Jesus, on the one hand, and to the disciples, on the other. She comes to Jesus in order to reveal Him as Son of God in a unique and privileged sense, as messiah, as suffering servant, and as the beginning of a new Israel. She comes to the disciples under the sign of fire, and therefore in purification and in judgment. Both Matthew and Luke agree that the arrival of the Breath-baptizer puts Israel in a new kind of relationship with God. After Jesus and the paschal mystery, obedience to God in His image, not racial descent, incorporates one into the new Israel. Luke stresses more than Mark or Matthew the continuity between Jesus’ ethical doctrine and John’s; but Luke’s theology of history also sharpens both the contrast and the continuity between the two ministries. The fact, however, that the synoptic gospels offer on the whole convergent and complementary theological portraits of Jesus rather than contradictory ones means that all three synoptic gospels can and ought to contribute to the formation of the Christian conscience. Contemporary Christians will probably find most useful that gospel which originally addressed a social situation analogous to the contemporary one in which believers find themselves. Communities struggling with persecution, injustice, and oppression may, for example, find that Mark’s gospel best illumines their situation. Contemporary Christians wrestling with questions about the Church may well find greatest help in Matthew. Chris-

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tians struggling to preserve their moral and religious identity as Christians in the face of morally and religiously corrupting secular powers may find the greatest guidance in Luke. All three synoptic gospels portray the Father as the source of Jesus’ messianic commissioning, although Luke stresses somewhat more than the other two evangelists the gratuity and sovereignty with which the Father acts to save us. All the synoptics portray Jesus as sharing with the Father the divine power to forgive sins. Matthew asserts the divinity of Jesus by portraying Him as Immanuel, as God-with-us. Moreover, Matthew’s Jesus stands fully revealed as Immanuel when, as the risen Christ, He baptizes with the divine Breath by sending the disciples to baptize in the triune name. For Matthew, then, the fact that Jesus baptizes in the Breath of God reveals His divinity. Resurrection also transforms Jesus into the Breath-baptizer. Both Matthew and Luke portray Jesus as standing in a unique revelatory relationship with the Father and as divinely empowered to reveal the Father to whomever He chooses. Luke stresses even more than Matthew that the divine Breath inspired in Jesus this special Abba awareness. All three evangelists portray Jesus’ relationship to the Father as paradigmatic of the disciples’ relationship to Him. Discipleship draws one into the family of God. It teaches one to call God Father in Jesus’ image. It demands that one relate to Jesus as a brother and to the other members of God’s family with sibling intimacy. All the synoptics use Jesus’ relationship to the Father in order to describe the most fundamental moral conditions for Christological knowing. Assimilation to Jesus in His relationship to the Father requires of the disciples’ unquestioning obedience, absolute trust, and all consuming love. All three evangelists agree that one must interpret the two great commandments of the old Law in the light of Jesus and of His ministry; but each gives this insight a slightly different twist. Mark insists that one must interpret the great commandments in the light of the kingdom which Jesus proclaims. Matthew invokes the notion of fulfillment in interpreting the two great commandments: while they fulfill the Law and the prophets, Jesus fulfills all four. Luke universalizes the second commandment with the parable of the good Samaritan. Because they preserve more teachings of Jesus than Mark, both Matthew and Luke spell out in greater detail the moral consequences of commitment to the Father in faith. In the beatitudes Matthew asserts that living as God’s child in the image of Jesus transforms one into a peace maker. He also teaches that legal and moral purity of heart culminates in the face-to-face vision of God. Both Matthew and Luke use the Our Father in order to describe the fundamental moral stance of the believing disciple toward the Father. That stance includes 1) longing for the estab-


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lishment of God’s just reign; 2) trust in the Father to provide one with “bread” and the other supports of life; 3) the repentant desire for forgiveness; 4) the willingness to forgive others in imitation of God’s forgiveness; 5) reverential trust in the Father in times of testing. Matthew, however, seems to stress more the reverential attitude which the disciples ought to have toward “Our Father” enthroned “in heaven.” The same two evangelists use Jesus’ temptations in the desert in order to describe His stance toward the Father in accomplishing His messianic mission. In the temptations, Jesus looks to the Father in unconditioned trust. Jesus also founds the kingdom, not on coercive power, but on authentic prayer. Both evangelists, moreover, test the authenticity of prayer by a mutual forgiveness which includes even one’s enemies. Luke, however, even more than Mark or Matthew portrays Jesus’ prayer to the Father as the paradigm of Christian prayer. In both gospels, Satan tempts Jesus as the beginning of the new Israel. As a consequence, Jesus’ responses to the tempter model for the members of the new Israel how they must respond to similar temptations. Jesus’ responses therefore commit the disciples to the same ideals as He embodies. Matthew, partly from a concern to temper nascent Christian clericalism, regards the temptation to model God’s kingdom on worldly kingdoms as the supreme temptation of Christians. Luke, however, presents testing God as the supreme temptation. Moreover, Luke equates testing God with hypocritically pretending to piety while neglecting the poor and the needy. All three evangelists regard the amassing of wealth as incompatible with trust in God’s providential care; but Luke stresses this aspect of Christian faith more than either Mark or Matthew. In addition, Luke portrays care of the poor as an expression of eschatological hope and greed as an obstacle to resurrection faith. These Lukan themes express his concern to distance his Gentile Christians from the institutionalized greed of Greco-Roman society. All three evangelists look to the Father as the ultimate source of salvation. All three agree that the Father can save even the rich and that He can raise from the dead. In all three synoptic gospels the Breath impels Jesus and His disciples into conflict with Satan and the powers of evil. All three synoptic evangelists assert that the divine Breath conforms one to Jesus in His passion by empowering the disciples to testify to Him even at the risk of their own lives. Matthew and Luke, however, use the temptation narrative in order to stress that the divine Breath also inspires Jesus’ religious and moral vision. In all three synoptics the Breath presides over Jesus’ temptation in the desert. In Matthew and Luke, however, She also inspires Jesus’ re-

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sponses to each of Satan’s temptations. Those responses in both gospels indicate which aspect of the Law Jesus especially fulfills. As we have just seen, they commit Jesus and those who follow Him to unconditioned trust in the Father and to founding the kingdom on His authentic worship. Matthew and Luke make it clearer than Mark that Breath-baptism and Christian baptism coincide. Matthew does it in the great commission which closes his gospel; Luke does it by describing the effects of Breath baptism on Pentecost. In Acts the Breath first teaches the baptized to embody corporately the vision of the kingdom which Jesus proclaimed; but in addition She empowers by Her charisms their prophetic witness to the risen Christ. That witness not only conforms the disciples to Jesus morally but draws them with moral inevitability into his passion. All three synoptic evangelists use the miracles and exorcisms of Jesus in order to flesh out the context of faith in which Christological knowing transpires. In all three gospels, the exorcisms dramatize the eschatological struggle with evil which Jesus inaugurates. Moreover, in all three gospels, Jesus actively commissions the disciples to perpetuate that struggle. Jesus’ exorcisms reveal that He comes to break the power of Satan. Among the synoptics Mark stresses most the reality of the conflict between Jesus and Satan. Matthew insists most on Jesus’ sovereign victory over Satan. Both Mark and Luke believe that Satan’s power takes concrete shape in oppressive institutions like the Roman empire. Luke, perhaps, stresses this point most eloquently by insisting that his Gentile Christians renounce the greed and violence of the principalities and powers of this world which the Roman empire exemplifies. All three synoptic gospels use Jesus’ cosmological miracles in order to assert His divinity. The story of the calming of the storm alone makes this assertion; but both Mark and Matthew re-enforce this point by having Jesus calm the waters of chaos a second time after walking on the waves and invoking the divine name. In the Bible, only God can perform both acts. Of the three synoptic writers, Mark alone makes extensive use of allusive linkages in order to portray faith in the divinity of Jesus as an explicit condition for eucharistic faith. All three synoptic gospels use the healings of Jesus in order to shore up expectant confidence in His capacity as risen Lord to inspire faith and courageous witness in the disciples. He can give them new eyes to see the truth of the gospel and new ears to hear it. He can loose their tongues to proclaim it. He can strengthen them to serve one another faithfully. Mark uses allusive linkages in order to assert the eucharistic character of Christian faith and practice. Through literary allusion, the mighty acts of Mark’s Jesus disclose the deep meaning of eucharistic faith. The editorial pens of both Matthew and Luke shred Mark’s carefully constructed network of


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literary allusion, even though the other two evangelists use other literary allusions of their own contrivance in order to embellish their own theological portraits of Jesus. Matthew transforms the Great Commission into the culminating event of Jesus’ story. Luke uses allusion in order to assimilate Peter, Stephen, and Paul to Jesus, in order to dramatize the continuity between Peter’s and Paul’s ministry, and in order to foreshadow in His gospel the story of the apostolic Church narrated in Acts. I have considered how the synoptic evangelists use positive dramatic linkages as well as Jesus’ miracles and exorcisms in order to define the context of faith in which Christological knowing happens. All three evangelists also use negative dramatic linkages in order to specify the kind of repentance which Christological knowing demands. To this aspect of Christological knowing I turn in the section which follows. (II) In all three synoptic gospels, the Breath of Christ presides over Jesus’ confrontation with Satan. Mark, who stresses demonic conflict more than Matthew or Luke has the Breath drive Jesus into conflict with the prince of devils. Since in His temptations Jesus embodies the new Israel which He begins, the disciples too should look to the Breath to strengthen them in times of temptation. Like Jesus, they must expect Her to inspire their responses in times of persecution and testing. Negative Dramatic Linkages: The Demands of Repentance In all three synoptic gospels, Satan functions as the enemy of faith in Jesus. Lack of faith leaves one powerless to drive out demons with a word of exorcism. Because he puts Jesus to the test in the desert and in His passion, Satan also confronts the reader of the synoptic gospels as the incarnation of anti-Christ. Satan takes concrete embodiment in all those persons and institutions who foster sin, death, and oppression. In Mark and especially in Luke, Satan takes concrete embodiment in the Roman empire and its clients. The corrupt temple priests also function as Satan’s instruments. In Matthew especially, so do the Pharisees, who symbolize both the Pharisaical leaders of the “synagogue across the street” and clericalizing Christian leaders. Mark uses the metaphor of the “leaven of the Pharisees and of Herod” in order to designate the kinds of values and attitudes of which the faithful disciple of Jesus must repent. Matthew and Luke use a different narrative strategy. They make dramatic use of Jesus’ desert temptations in order to unmask Satan’s plan for frustrating Jesus’ saving mission. The sins to which Satan tempts Jesus identify the sins of which His disciples must especially repent. They must renounce especially sinful self-reliance; and

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they must trust God instead. They must never test God by setting conditions on their willingness to trust Him. They must never replace the kingdom of God with the kingdoms of this world. As we have seen, all three synoptic evangelists use Jesus’ exorcisms in order to proclaim His victory over Satan and the powers of evil and chaos. Here it suffices to note that Jesus’ victory seeks to motivate repentance of all those things which Satan symbolizes. Luke in addition portrays the very proclamation of the gospel as casting Satan out of heaven. Jesus’ message of forgiveness deprives the angelic prosecuting attorney described in Job of any meaningful function in the Father’s court. Mark’s narrative heightens the conflict between Satan’s forces and those of God. Mark and Matthew both warn against the unforgivable sin of attributing to Satan works wrought by the Breath of God. Matthew attributes Breath-blasphemy especially to Pharisaical hypocrisy. Luke equates the unforgivable sin with Christian apostasy. Both sins exemplify attitudes of which Christians need to repent. In all three synoptic gospels, the Pharisees symbolize the following sins: self- righteousness, legalism, religious snobbery, lack of compassion for the disadvantaged, judgmental elitism in dealing with sinners, substituting human customs for the divine will, unbelief, the refusal to credit Jesus’ ability to forgive sin, testing God. In pitting Jesus against the Pharisees, all three synoptic evangelists dramatize the fact that the sins which they symbolize contradict the kind of faith commitment which Jesus demands of His followers. These sins therefore require repentance. All three evangelists require Christians to renounce the “leaven” of the Pharisees. “Leaven” in Mark means all the sinful attitudes which the Pharisees incarnate. In Matthew it means their false teaching. In Luke it means their hypocrisy and, by implication, especially their greed. The scribes tend to symbolize the same sins as the Pharisees. Moreover, all three synoptic gospels tend to refer to members of the Sanhedrin as scribes. The Jerusalem scribes sin especially in their exploitation of the poor and in their sympathy for a militaristic form of messianism. In Mark, Jerusalem scribes blaspheme the Breath of God by accusing Jesus of exorcising by the power of Beelzebul. In Matthew, the Pharisees do. In Luke, the crowds make the accusation. In all three gospels the accusation expresses a blasphemous unbelief of which one must repent if one hopes to escape damnation. The conflict between Matthew’s Jewish Christian community and the Pharisaical leadership of the “synagogue across the street” lead him to paint a particularly black portrait of the Pharisees. As a consequence, Matthew extends somewhat the list of sins which the Pharisees exemplify and which Christians must renounce. Matthew’s Pharisees refuse intransigently to repent. Matthew’s Jesus calls Christians to a more demanding


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form of righteousness than that practiced by the scribes and Pharisees. Christians must replace Pharisaical legalism with mercy and compassion. Matthew also denounces the attempts of the Pharisees to undermine faith in Jesus. Their poisonous doctrine transforms them in his gospel into a “brood of vipers.” Specifically, the evangelist rebukes Pharisaical refusal to credit Jesus’ resurrection. In Matthew, the woes against the Pharisees catalogue the evils they embody: unbelief and the subversion of faith in others, a cupidity which undermines the binding character of oaths, narrow concern with the superficial aspects of Torah, replacing repentance with superficial ritual purity. Finally, Matthew assimilates nascent Christian clericalism to Pharisaical hypocrisy. Luke also records Jesus’ woes but divides them between the Pharisees and the lawyers. Luke’s Jesus accuses both of hypocrisy but reserves the accusation of violence of heart for the lawyers. Moreover, in Luke after the triumphal entry, the Pharisees play no part in Jesus’ Jerusalem ministry. The chief priests and scribal members of the Sanhedrin single-handedly engineer His death. Luke, moreover, more than once equates Pharisaical hypocrisy with the Christian sin of pretending piety while neglecting the poor. In all three synoptic gospels, Herod apes the oppressive ways of the “kings of the Gentiles.” He therefore symbolizes a kind of violence and oppression of which all Christians, but especially Christian leaders, need to repent. Of the three synoptic evangelists, Mark makes the most explicit symbolic use of Herod in order to summon the disciples of Jesus to repentance. He demands as a condition for eucharistic faith the renunciation of the leaven of both the Pharisees and of Herod. Moreover, as in the case of the Pharisees, Mark leaves the meaning of the term “leaven” suggestively vague. Mark’s Christians must repent of all the evils which Herod symbolizes. An examination of Mark’s portrait of Herod suggests that he especially symbolizes superstition, moral and religious vacillation, sensuality, human respect, covetousness, violence of heart, the oppression of others, and unbridled passion. Luke also makes symbolic use of Herod, but Luke uses different narrative strategies from Mark. Instead of pitting Herod against John the Baptizer, as Mark and Matthew do, Luke pits him directly against Jesus. Luke does so because he desires to make Herod conspire with Pilate to kill Jesus. Luke’s Herod, together with Pilate, symbolizes, therefore, the principalities and powers of this world over against which Luke’s Gentile believers must define their Christian moral identity. As Christians they must renounce Satan and all the principalities and powers whom he owns and rules.

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In all three synoptic gospels, the chief priests incarnate all the sinful attitudes which Christian leaders especially need to renounce and avoid. Like the Pharisees, they exhibit an intransigent lack of repentance. Their greed leads them to commercialize divine worship and to use it for their own worldly advantage. The Sadducees pretend to religious faith while skeptically denying God’s power to raise from the dead. The chief priests’ religious hypocrisy cloaks a murderous violence of heart. Given the responsibility to lead others in faith, they usurp the authority of God by refusing to recognize that it sanctions Jesus’ proclamation of the kingdom and summons them to repentance. Their lack of belief tests God and ultimately leads them to condemn the very Son of God to death. Spiritually barren and politically ruthless, they refuse to credit the divinity of Jesus. In Matthew, the chief priests connive with the Pharisees to discredit Jesus’ resurrection. Moreover, Matthew speaks of the “leaven of the Sadducees” rather than of the “leaven of Herod,” as Mark does. That suggests that Matthew regarded skepticism about Jesus’ resurrection as an even greater threat to the faith of his community than the violence and injustice of secular rulers. Luke, for his part, focuses Jesus’ struggle with the chief priests on the issue of who will control the temple. The chief priests win the struggle and doom the temple to destruction. By portraying the chief priests as Jesus’ special enemies and by insisting on their hypocrisy, Luke transforms them into a special symbol of everything which Christians leaders need to abjure. In all three synoptic gospels, Pilate too embodies everything which Christian leaders must avoid. They must eschew the kind of ambition which would prompt them to ape the oppressive ways of Gentile rulers like Pilate. Instead, they must imitate the humble service of Jesus. While all three synoptic gospels place the blame for Jesus’ death primarily on the high priests, they all hold Pilate criminally co-responsible for Jesus’ death. Matthew uses the dream which Pilate’s wife has in order to underscore Pilate’s culpability. Matthew also suggests that Pilate, like the high priests, would have wanted to discredit Jesus’ resurrection. Luke insists that in the end Pilate in crucifying Jesus committed legalized murder of an innocent man. The suggestions makes Pilate into a symbol of Gentile immorality, cruelty, oppression, and unbelief. As we shall see in the next volume, the fourth gospel will make this point even more explicitly than Matthew. Luke alone among the synoptics calls attention to the atrocities which Pilate did in fact commit as governor of Judea. Luke does so as a way of summoning all believers to renounce the kinds of violence which the Roman empire so effectively institutionalized. All three synoptic evange-


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lists summon Christians to imitate Jesus’ non-violent, prophetic opposition to institutional oppression; but Luke makes a special point of this dimension of Christian repentance and commitment, probably because he found violence all too rampant in pagan society. If the synoptic evangelists seek to advance the process of Christological knowing by exemplifying in Jesus’ enemies all those attitudes which His disciples need to renounce, they use ambiguous dramatic linkages as well as Jesus’ teachings in order to describe the utopian religious ideal of the kingdom which binds Christians both religiously and morally. To this aspect of Christological knowing I turn in the paragraphs which follow. (III) All three synoptic evangelists portray Jesus’ call to discipleship as prophetic and peremptory. It demands finally that one abandon everything else in order to follow Him. Abandoning all includes the willingness to walk the way of the cross, if necessary. Among the three evangelists, only Mark clearly parallels both the call of the disciples and Jesus’ baptism, on the one hand, and the exorcism at Capernaum and Jesus’ temptations in the desert, on the other. Ambivalent Dramatic Linkages: The Way of Discipleship All three evangelists agree that the call to discipleship culminates in mission, although Luke stresses this point most of all. Involvement in Jesus’ mission draws the disciples into conflict with Satan and the other forces of evil which conspired to nail Him to a cross. Mark and Matthew both make the point that those who would with Peter dissuade Jesus from the cross fail to see reality with God’s eyes and side instead with Satan. All three evangelists teach that discipleship incorporates one into God’s family. Obedience to God transforms one into a child of God and sibling of Jesus. In addition, all three synoptic evangelists agree that the members of God’s family must avoid cliquishness and scandal. They must renounce ambition and serve one another in the image of Jesus. Mark and Matthew teach that discipleship commits one to life-long marital fidelity. Luke’s Jesus repudiates remarriage after divorce. The three synoptic evangelists all insist on the disciples’ blindness and weakness prior to Breath-baptism, although Mark insists most on this point, probably because the evangelist wishes to assure a shattered, persecuted community that grace has the power to heal the worst expressions of human blindness and weakness. Both Mark and Matthew teach implicitly that Breath-baptism has the power to heal one’s sinful obtuseness and vacillation. Of the two, Mark especially uses the healing miracles of Jesus in order to foreshadow the transformation which Breath-baptism will effect in the disciples. So to some extent does Luke; but in Acts Luke

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describes explicitly how Breath- baptism shaped the shared life and apostolic witness of the first Christians. Matthew too uses miracles of healing in order to foreshadow the transformation which resurrection faith will work in the disciples, but he does so somewhat less systematically than Mark. In summoning the disciples of Jesus to come to terms with any lingering ambivalence in their relationship to Him, the synoptic gospels implicitly endorse the need for ongoing conversion. Despite one’s baptismal commitment of faith, the same forces which Jesus opposed can undermine one’s commitment to Him. Ongoing self-examination and re-commitment to Christ in the power of His Breath can, however, prevent backsliding. All three synoptic gospels insist that one must face the ambivalence in one’s relationship to Jesus and that one must do so in the light of the paschal mystery. They all use the same narrative strategy in order to make this point: they all portray the paschal mystery as the time of decision for the disciples. The disciples’ reactions during the passion provide a menu of possible ways of responding to Jesus. Like Judas, one can betray Him and despair. Like Peter, one can deny Him and repent. With Simon, the ironic symbol of the faithful disciple, one can carry the cross behind Him. With Joseph, one can reverently bury Him. Each synoptic evangelist, however, portrays the disciples’ response to Jesus’ resurrection differently. In Mark, the women conceal the resurrection out of fear, although the evangelist clearly desires the reader to recognize the inappropriateness of their response and to act otherwise. Mark also probably desires to assure the Roman church that despite human fear and weakness the truth about the risen Christ will out. Matthew allows for doubt on the disciples’ part even after the resurrection; but he also makes it clear that the resurrection effects the Great Commission: it reveals Jesus finally and fully as Immanuel and as Breath-baptizer. As God-with-us and as the source of the Breath, the risen Christ sends His disciples forth to proclaim the good news to all creatures and to baptize them in the triune name. Of the three synoptic writers, Luke develops the most systematic narrative theology of resurrection. Luke insists on the reality of the risen body but also on its difference from Jesus’ former body. In Luke, the paschal mystery provides salvation history with its illuminating center: the paschal mystery alone makes sense of the prophecies and longing of the Old Testament. The encounter with the risen Christ effects a radical conversion in those who experienced it; but their conversion serves as a prelude to the Pentecostal outpouring of the divine Breath. That event fulfills the Baptizer’s prophecy of the mightier Breath-baptizer. The outpouring of the charisms creates the Christian community. Breath-baptism


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in Acts teaches the disciples first of all to embody Jesus’ vision of the kingdom; but, through the action of the charisms, Breath-baptism also transforms the Christian community into a prophetic community sent to testify to the risen savior. All the synoptic gospels agree that entry into the kingdom requires a repentance which precludes all forms of religious self-righteousness. All agree that in the person and ministry of Jesus the reign of God has already arrived even though its full realization lies in the future. In the last analysis, it must await the second coming. The three synoptic gospels all teach that Christian conversion demands an interiorization of one’s commitment to God. That interiorization carries one beyond all forms of superficial religious ritualism and legalism. All agree that obedience to God in the image of Jesus incorporates one into God’s family. Moreover, one finds in the synoptic tradition broad agreement about the moral conditions for life in the kingdom. The synoptic Jesus embodies unconditioned trust of the Father and requires the same trust of His disciples. Those who trust God live in confidence of His providential care of them. That trust frees one to share one’s possessions, the physical supports of one’s life with others. It rules out all forms of covetousness as well as the actual amassing of wealth. The unconditioned character of Christian trust comes to practical expression in two ways. Because sharing with others expresses trust, unconditioned trust demands unconditioned sharing in this sense: one shares on the basis of need and not of merit only. As a consequence, Christian sharing reaches out to sinners, to the poor, to the marginal, to the expendable, even to one’s enemies. It seeks to include them all in the family of God. Such sharing universalizes Christian mercy and charity. The most radical expression of unconditioned trust in God finds practical embodiment in love of enemies and in one’s willingness to lay down one’s life for Jesus and for the gospel. All three synoptic writers assert that witness to Jesus draws one inevitably into His passion. The synoptic gospels also agree that one can never found the reign of God on law and coercive violence in the manner of the kingdoms of this world. As a consequence, membership in the kingdom commits one to humble, self-effacing, mutual service in the image of a servant messiah. Authentic worship of the Father provides the only sound basis for building God’s kingdom on earth. The synoptic gospels, moreover, suggest two practical tests of the authenticity of prayer. One cannot pray authentically while simultaneously oppressing the poor. Nor can one pray authentically without forgiving others as God forgives us. That forgiveness includes love of enemies. Moreover, of the three synoptic evangelists, Luke insists most on the fact that love of enemies commits one to the same non-violent, prophetic opposition to evil as Jesus Himself practiced.

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In all the synoptic gospels, the kingdom has an eschatological dimension: the kingdom has already arrived in Jesus and in the paschal mystery; but it will arrive in the plentitude of divine power only at the second coming. In the meantime, one can expect that both cataclysm and persecution will punctuate the history of the Christian community. Even in the midst of suffering and persecution, however, Christians continue to long for the second coming as the vindication of their faithful service of the risen Lord. Eschatological faith also demands that one live ready at any time to confront the Son of Man. Readiness means the practical living of the gospel. All three synoptic gospels insist that Christians, and especially Christian leaders, must never ape the oppressive ways of Gentile tyrants. Of the three, however, Matthew shows the greatest concern to summon Christian leaders to repent of the sin of clericalism. As an antidote to clericalism, Matthew calls the Christian community, and especially its leaders, back to the egalitarian vision of Jesus in which the least important and most vulnerable hold the places of greatest honor. Each synoptic evangelist stresses different aspects of this utopian moral and religious vision. Mark insists on its eschatological dimensions. He portrays the kingdom as both hidden and manifest, as both realized and still to come. Moreover, Mark looks to God finally to make the kingdom a reality: it continues to spread, even when those who sow the seed of faith sleep. Matthew portrays the kingdom as fulfilling the Law and the prophets. By that the evangelist means that Jesus’ utopian vision of the kingdom provides the correct lens for reading the true intent of Torah piety. He also means that the kingdom demands more, not less, than the Law ever did because it transforms negative precepts of Torah piety into more demanding religious and moral ideals. Of the three synoptics, Luke places greatest narrative insistence on the fact that the kingdom effects the messianic reversal of values. His journey discourse stresses especially care for the poor, eschatological readiness, faith, prayer, divine forgiveness, the sacrifices of discipleship, and its missionary character. In all three synoptic gospels the crowds function as the backdrop of Jesus’ ministry. All three synoptic evangelists use the parabolic discourse in order to contrast the unbelief of the crowds with the faith of the disciples; all three synoptic evangelists also use the very ambivalence of the crowds toward Jesus in order to foreshadow the masses of people ripe for conversion to Jesus. The synoptic Jesus, moreover, models for the disciples the way in which they too must relate to the crowds. Despite the crowds’ confusion and failure finally to understand Jesus’ true identity and message, Jesus Himself never wavers in His compassion and pastoral


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concern for them. He teaches them tirelessly. He heals them and delivers them from the power of Satan. He summons them to share His gentle “yoke.” Christians in proclaiming the gospel need to approach unbelievers as Jesus approached the unbelieving crowds. In their capacity for conversion, the crowds foreshadow the Christian family of God, whom Jesus feeds eucharistically on the bread of wisdom. In Matthew and in Luke especially, the unbelief of the crowds challenges the disciples to evangelical witness. In Matthew, the disciples’ mission to the “lost sheep of the house of Israel” foreshadows the great universal commission which ends his gospel. Even Matthew’s polemic against the Pharisees has in the end an evangelical thrust. Matthew desires the first Israel to recognize that in calling for Christ’s blood they in fact called down upon themselves the atoning blood of divine forgiveness. In Luke, the trust and forgiveness with which Jesus dies moves the hostile crowds to repentance. Luke’s Jesus addresses the crowds as well as the disciples in His eschatological discourse: all stand under the same divine judgment. All must live in readiness for the second coming. Moreover, Luke places more narrative insistence on the fact that all disciples share in the prophetic ministry of proclaiming Jesus to the whole world. Their faith must light unbelievers into the household of the faith. This section has reflected on the utopian vision of faith to which the synoptic gospels bind believers. The section which follows reflects on the way in which the analogy of Christological knowing engages contemporary Christians. It argues that a sound insight into Christological knowing makes imagination and narrative forms of thinking central and constitutive to the Christian formation of conscience.1 (IV) This section of the present chapter reflects on the ways in which the kind of Christological knowing which synoptic narrative promotes has the capacity to heal, perfect, and elevate the natural workings of the human conscience. In the course of this chapter I shall develop the following theses: 1) Christological knowing engages the entire person. 2) Christological knowing commits one to embodying Jesus’ utopian vision of God’s kingdom. 3) The utopian character of the kingdom demands that Christians practice a morality of ideals. 4) In a Christian melioristic morality of ideals, the creative imagination mediates between utopian moral ideals and given reality. 1. Cf. William C. Spohn, “Parable and Narrative in Christian Ethics,” Theological Studies, 51(1990), pp. 100-114; John Langan, S.J., “The Christian Difference in Ethics,” Theological Studies, 49(1988), pp. 131-150.

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5) The religious character of the Christian ideal of the kingdom as well as the graced character of Christian living together demand that the illumination of God’s Breath suffuse and transform Christian practice. 6) Communities grow in Christological knowing through shared faith consciousness; individuals grow in Christological knowing through sharing in and contributing to that shared faith consciousness. Let us consider each of these theses in turn. 1) Christological knowing engages the entire person. As we have just seen, synoptic Christological knowing presupposes a context of faith. It summons one to recognize in Jesus the human embodiment of God who models for us the kind of relationship to the Father to which we are called in faith. The illumination and empowerment of the divine Breath conforms us to Jesus in two ways. First of all, She frees us to live together the religious vision which He lived and proclaimed. Second, through Her charisms she transforms us into a prophetic community who proclaims Christ to the world. Christians, then, relate in faith differently to Father, Son, and Breath. They relate to the Father as the ultimate source and goal of human salvation. They relate to the Son as the one who reveals the Father and mediates the Breath. They relate to the Holy Breath as a source of conversion, sanctifying enlightenment, and charismatic empowerment. She teaches us to know who Jesus is by conforming us to Him. She conforms us to Him by drawing us into His Abba experience. This threefold relationship to each of the divine persons engages every aspect of the human person. It springs from justifying faith, from the passage from unbelief to belief in the God revealed historically in Jesus and in His sanctifying Breath. It orients the human self to the reality of the triune God. By focusing the entire person on the saving reality of God, Christian faith elevates the human conscience. Faith in the triune God engages the affections because it demands repentance as its precondition. Synoptic Christology makes it clear that the failure to repent transforms self-professed religious people into hypocrites. One may pretend to believe in God all one wants; but, unless one confronts personal shame and guilt, the fear which causes one to avoid confronting God, and the inner rage which fuels one’s capacity for violence, all religious posturing betrays one into lying to oneself, to others, and to God. One must face and renounce not only disordered personal passions but also the human institutionalizations of neurosis and psychosis which breed disordered passions. One must renounce all forms of bigotry which teach the human heart to hate “the Others”: racism, sexism, classism, chauvinism, religious prejudice. The three synoptic evangelists rebuke all these


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attitudes. Repentance requires us also to abjure the paranoia embodied in militarism and other forms of social defensiveness. In contemporary America institutionalized fear and violence have fueled the cold war and have turned not only our streets but even our schools into armed camps. Repentance also demands that we acknowledge and bring to healing the self-loathing and guilt born of dysfunctional familial and social relationships. Repentance begins in the heart, but it engages the conscience as well; for disordered passions transform themselves into disordered choices; and disordered choices which contradict the will of God count as sin. Moreover, in the confrontation with passional disorders, Christian repentance requires us to face and renounce not only personal sins but the corrupting influence of social sin as well. The Christological knowing born of justifying faith engages the human intelligence because it presupposes a context of faith, of religious belief. Faith demands that we see the world through God’s eyes. Seeing the world through God’s eyes means in turn affirming and proclaiming the divine reality made visible in Jesus and in His indwelling Breath. We see the world with God’s eyes when we can both imagine and explain it incarnationally. We perceive reality incarnationally when we discover God personally embodied in Jesus and corporately embodied in the community created by His indwelling Breath. As conversion and justifying faith heal the human heart, they inspire theological hope. As they inform the mind, they inspire theological faith. As they transform the conscience, they inspire charity and the Christian search for justice. The theological virtue of faith engages both intuitive and rational forms of thought by demanding that both kinds of thinking acknowledge the historical truth of a self-revealing God. Theological faith also demands that we abjure all personal prejudices and social ideologies which blind the human heart to that reality. Theological faith takes two forms: the shared faith of the Christian community and the personal faith of its members. The former nurtures personal faith to adult maturity. Adult personal faith contributes to and enhances the shared faith of the Church through personal holiness and charismatic witness. The Christological knowing engendered by justifying faith transforms one practically. It demands that one live in Jesus’ image. It therefore also engages the Christian conscience. Because the human conscience develops in social dialogue with other persons and with the institutions which persons embody, it struggles with two kinds of moral questions. When the conscience ponders the rights and duties of other persons, it raises questions of personal morality. When

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the human conscience seeks to create a social order in which all can readily contribute to and benefit from the common good, the conscience raises questions of public morality. The Christological knowing which results from justifying faith demands that one resolve questions of personal and public morality in the light of the realities and ideals which Jesus lived and proclaimed. It therefore also demands that one repudiate as sinful and unjust any human actions and institutional arrangements which contradict both that reality and those ideals. As Christological knowing conforms us to the pattern of Jesus’ sinless obedience to the Father, it heals us. Christological knowing also teaches us to transcend our natural limitations by universalizing human love and the graced hope from which Christian charity springs. Christian faith in turn affirms and embodies that same universal commitment. In all these ways, Christological knowing perfects human nature. 2) Christological knowing commits one to embodying Jesus’ utopian vision of God’s kingdom. Jesus of Nazareth would have found any pretense to religious commitment which separates faith from issues of both personal and public morality hypocritical. The vision of the kingdom which He embodied and proclaimed addresses directly both kinds of religious and moral practice. Jesus did not teach a rational ethics. Enlightenment rationalists who try to depict Jesus as another Socrates, as a philosopher of prudential morality, replace the reality of Jesus with shallow lies about Him. Jesus did proclaim a moral vision; but it did not rest on natural prudential reason. Jesus proclaimed a morality of faith. His moral vision gave concrete, practical meaning to His relationship to the Father in faith. He called that vision the reign of God. The reign of God which Jesus proclaimed has a utopian character. It holds up the ideal of a certain kind of religious community; but even those who espouse it have never lived it perfectly. As a consequence, the vision of the kingdom lures and enraptures the corporate and personal consciences of Christians at the same time that it stands in judgment upon their sins and shortcomings. The utopian character of the kingdom could easily tempt the human heart to dismiss it as irrelevant to the real world as we know it. If after centuries of trying, Christians have never succeeded perfectly in living the religious ideals they espouse, then why keep trying? I know of only one answer to that question. The context of faith within which we discover God’s reign revealed transforms abandoning the ideal of the kingdom into sin. Because Jesus confronts us as the very reality of God in human form, His utterly unique, historically particular religious


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vision reveals to us more perfectly than any other moral or religious vision the saving mind of God. Jesus Himself never swerved from that vision even though it led Him to Calvary. Moreover, as the New Testament insists, His fidelity even to death in proclaiming God’s reign revealed the perfection of His sinlessness. For the Christian conscience, then, anything which deviates from or contradicts the kingdom counts as sin. Its historical proclamation by God’s only Son therefore endows the utopian religious vision of the kingdom with moral ultimacy and with moral absoluteness. Something claims us with moral ultimacy when it requires that we not only live for it but, if necessary, die for it. It claims us with moral absoluteness when it binds us in all the circumstances of our lives. By summoning believers to martyrdom, if necessary, synoptic narrative Christology leaves no doubt about the absolute and ultimate claims which the vision of the kingdom makes on the Christian conscience. 3) The utopian character of the kingdom demands that Christians practice a melioristic morality of ideals. Because Christological knowing commits one with moral absoluteness and ultimacy to living the utopian vision of the kingdom, it requires of believers a certain kind of moral idealism. The moral ideal of God’s kingdom calls the disciples of Jesus beyond all forms of conventional wisdom and morality, beyond the equation of morality with law and order, beyond any mere rational ethic, and beyond all natural law morality. In all the synoptic gospels the Pharisees symbolize conventional religion and morality. The fact that the Pharisees refuse to move beyond received attitudes, beyond received human wisdom, beyond received faith, and beyond received morality blinds them to the utterly new reality which Jesus embodies. Synoptic Christology leaves no doubt about the fact that the refusal to recognize the radical novelty of the kingdom and to abide by its moral demands transforms religious faith into religious hypocrisy. Conventional wisdom takes different forms: affective, intellectual, moral, and institutional. The divine reality incarnate in Jesus and in His vision of the kingdom poses an intransigent challenge to all four forms of conventional wisdom. It calls us beyond the personal and institutional neurosis and psychosis which suffuse human relationships and institutions with sinful injustice, violence, and oppression. It calls us beyond religious prejudices which refuse to see in Jesus the very embodiment of God and to acknowledge His power to forgive sin. It warns us that the refusal to see the Breath-inspired word of God in Jesus’ ministry and message betrays one into Breath-blasphemy. As the gospel of Matthew teaches, the divine reality incarnate in Jesus and in His vision of the kingdom

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fulfills all other forms of personal and public morality by demanding more than they do, not less. Moreover, the very utopian character of the kingdom grounds the kingdom’s ability to fulfill other forms of morality. The kingdom confronts us as an ideal which continually challenges any purely rational or natural moral arrangement by demanding that we re-evaluate all natural prudential choices in the light of the moral demands of Christian faith. That same ideal simultaneously challenges those who espouse it to live what they espouse ever more perfectly. The kingdom calls us beyond a law-and-order morality whether that morality enjoys either purely prudential or religious sanction. Law and order morality gives institutional embodiment to conventional moral wisdom; and conventional moral wisdom mixes responsibility with irresponsibility, moral wisdom and moral folly. Even the briefest reflection on the law’s delays and on the insolence of office teaches that truth eloquently enough. In the synoptic gospels, intransigent adherence to law-and-order morality suffuses Pharisaical piety with a self-righteous judgmentalism which contradicts the most fundamental moral demands of the kingdom. Self-righteousness commits one to a campaign of religious self-justification instead of humbly accepting as pure gift the divine forgiveness incarnate in Jesus. Because law-and-order morality commits one to the defense of the status quo, it cannot submit to the novel moral demands of the kingdom. As a consequence, those who choose to adhere to a morality of law and order instead of submitting to the kingdom transform that pseudo-morality into sin. On this point, narrative synoptic Christology leaves no doubt whatever. The utopian vision of the kingdom also calls one beyond all natural law morality. All moral decision making must, of course, take account of the laws operative in concrete moral situations. The commitment to moral living presupposes epistemological realism. As a consequence, judgments of conscience which ignore the developing laws which govern events transform moral utopias into irrelevant pipe dreams. Nevertheless, the vision of the kingdom calls us beyond natural law morality because it demands that we re-evaluate all natural moral judgments in the light of the practical demands of Christian faith. In what concerns this life, the utopian vision of the kingdom articulates those practical demands. Moreover, when natural law theory grounds itself in the essence fallacy it promotes the same kind of moral conservatism as the law-and-order conscience. The essence fallacy reifies abstract essences as principles of being and then uses their essential immutability in order to justify an ethics of conformity and of conservatism. When one fallaciously equates


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the natural laws inherent in things with fixed and immutable essences, then morality consists in conforming to what one already is naturally. The vision of the kingdom, however, demands not conformity to the given but its creative transformation in faith. It therefore fulfills an essentialistic, natural-law ethic in Matthew’s sense of the term “fulfillment.” It demands far more than any pseudo-ethics of natural conformity might require. The vision of the kingdom redefines, then, the meaning of sin. We sin when we choose evil in the sight of God. The Christian conscience needs to regard as sin whatever contradicts the kingdom. In this sense the utopian vision of the kingdom stands in judgment on the human conscience. The Christian conscience also needs to view as moral and religious imperfection anything which falls short of the kingdom. In this sense the vision of the kingdom lures the Christian conscience to ever more perfect embodiment. 4) In a Christian melioristic morality of ideals, the creative imagination mediates between utopian moral ideals and given reality. Utopian ideals which make absolute and ultimate claims orient the conscience toward its ultimate moral and religious goals. Those goals lure the conscience by their excellence at the same time that they judge the concrete decisions which the conscience sanctions. Utopian morality challenges the conscience to bridge the gap melioristically between those ultimate aims and reality as given. It challenges the conscience, in other words, to transform given reality so that it better approximates the ultimate ideals and realities to which one has committed one’s life. The Jesus of the synoptics preaches a demanding utopian morality; but he never demands of His followers instant perfection. On the contrary, as I suggested above, Jesus preaches a spirituality and religious morality of “the off day.” He always assumes the sinfulness and imperfection of the people he confronts, including His own disciples; but neither sin nor imperfection prompts Him to abandon them. Instead, He never ceases to challenge them to do better. Utopian morality invites constant moral growth. It never rests satisfied with the given; because the given always falls short of the ideal. Nevertheless, as a morality of the off day, a melioristic utopianism deals patiently and lovingly with human limitations and frailty. Legalism, rigorism, perfectionism all contradict the patience and compassion which Jesus embodies, as the stories of His conflicts with the Pharisees make abundantly clear. In other words, a melioristic utopian morality of ideals gives rise to an ethics of process and of ongoing development. At the same time, among the ideals which the kingdom inculcates, one must include both ongoing repentance of “Phari-

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saical” perfectionism and the frank and honest confession of one’s imperfection and sinfulness before a forgiving God. The correct formation of a conscience committed to an utopian morality demands first of all that one never lie to oneself or in any way water down the ideals to which one stands committed in principle. When Christians substitute some other form of morality for the kingdom they do precisely that. The results of developmental psychology suggest that the majority of Americans function at the level of conventional morality and religion. Since one cannot endorse conventional values and live a fully responsible life, it follows that the majority of Americans live morally and religiously unconverted lives. Morally unconverted Americans tend to substitute for Christian morality an ethically compromised law-and-order ethics. I say “ethically compromised” for no legal system incarnates ultimate moral perfection. Catholic Christians have in the past all too often replaced the demands of Christian discipleship with a kind of Stoic, natural law morality. Evangelical Protestant Christians have often tended to replace a New Testament utopian morality with the ten commandments or with fundamentalistic moral rigorism. In this country, self-righteous, conservative, religious fundamentalists hypocritically find militaristic, right wing politics completely congenial. That should come as no surprise, since the New Testament warns repeatedly that religious self-righteousness masks unrepented violence of heart. Liberal Protestants have tended to replace a Christian utopian morality with some version of rationalistic, Enlightenment morality. When one lies to oneself about the ideals to which one stands absolutely and ultimately committed as a Christian, one replaces God’s purposes with some inadequate human moral scheme. In making the substitution, one lies to oneself and to others about the moral conditions for salvation. In other words, one transforms oneself, in Jesus’ words, into a pretender, a hypocrite. By salvation I mean standing in a life-giving relationship with God. As we saw in the preceding section, the vision of the kingdom holds up to the disciples of Jesus an ideal of a certain kind of community of faith. Christian faith demands a practical trust in God’s providential care for human communities and for the individuals who make them up. That trust frees one to share one’s “bread,” the physical supports of one’s life with others. Since the amassing of wealth deprives the poor of what rightfully belongs to them, Christian faith demands the renunciation of greed, cupidity, and fortune building. It commits one to building a community of faith which provides for the needs of all, especially the poor, the marginal, the expendable. Christian sharing includes both unbelievers and heretics in its practical concern. It also includes one’s enemies; for the


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sharing which Christian faith demands seeks to express the universal forgiveness and mercy of God revealed and embodied in Jesus. Christian faith seeks, then, to create a genuinely universal community, one so universal that it encompasses finally the entire human race. Because the goods which the Christian community can share include the divine Breath’s inspirations, faith also requires that one also share in community Her charismatic promptings. If the realistic functioning of the Christian conscience demands that one never lie to oneself about the utopian moral and religious ideals to which both communities and individuals stand absolutely and ultimately committed, moral realism also demands that one never lie to oneself about the nature of the moral situation which one confronts. Situations take on a moral character when they engage ideals, values, and realities which make ultimate and absolute claims. In judging a moral situation realistically, one must first appreciate the genuine values and goods it embodies. The human heart cannot, however, appreciate realistically threatening moral situations until it faces their threat. Threatening situations tend to evoke from us negative responses of fear, shame, guilt, or rage. Until one allows such feelings to surface consciously and puts them in their proper realistic and moral perspective, one tends to project them inappropriately on present reality. As a consequence, one finds it difficult to perceive accurately the genuinely valuable aspects of the persons and realities which summon up emotional ghosts from the past. Negative emotions function cognitively like negative judgments. Repressed negative emotions tend to function like cognitive blinders. Ghosts from the past stand between us and reality. They blur our vision. The need to face the negative feelings which new and challenging moral situations evoke from us demands ongoing repentance. Faith transforms affective conversion into repentance. Affective conversion commits us to the ongoing cultivation of healthy and realistic emotional responses to reality. Ongoing repentance commits us to the same enterprise in faith and in discerning responsiveness to the inspirations of God’s Holy Breath. The experience of ongoing repentance frees one to appreciate what is genuinely good and valuable in the persons and situations which pose ethical and religious challenges. In appreciating situations of personal and social conflict, the Christian conscience sincerely tries to understand all the sides of any dispute. The current debate over abortion illustrates what I am saying. Those who use physical violence to oppose abortion by attacking or even by seeking to assassinate those who work at abortion clinics give good evidence of having failed to face their own violence of heart. Even if one opposes abortion on demand and supports the right to life (as I do per-

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sonally), one needs to understand the medical facts about human conception as well as the ways in which they might nuance one’s moral judgments about this complex issue. Abortion opponents also need to understand the legitimate human and moral concerns which might motivate one to take a pro-choice stance. One also needs to appreciate the positions of those who oppose abortion personally but support honestly pro-choice legislation, even if one finally chooses to disagree with the positions some people take. Experience has shown that the failure to understand or appreciate the legitimate needs and moral concerns of others transforms pro-life opposition to abortion into a kind of self-righteous moral fundamentalism which has little to do with Christian love and compassion. On the contrary, it can exemplify precisely the kind of Christian rigorism which according to the gospels excludes one from the kingdom of God and which the synoptic evangelists stigmatize as “Pharisaism.” Having appreciated the good and valuable aspects of a conflicted moral situation, one then needs to regret those aspects of the situation which either contradict or fall short of the ideal to which one is called in Christ. Contradictions demand reversal. As a Christian, one can never consent to murder, rape, child abuse, or any other serious violation of human rights and of gospel living. Merely reversing sinful contradictions so that they conform to the demands of gospel living fails, however, to satisfy fully the demands of a Christian morality of ideals. One must also regret the imperfections in a given moral situation. By imperfections, I mean the ways in which the situation falls needlessly short of the ideal of the kingdom to which Christian faith commits the believing disciple. Having renounced those things which contradict the practical demands of gospel living and having regretted those aspects of the situation which fall short of the gospel ideal, one must then use one’s imagination in prayer and in faith in order to advance the situation creatively the next possible step toward the gospel ideal. In any conflicted moral situation of any complexity one will probably fall short of achieving the ideal; but commitment to a melioristic ethics of ideals demands that one make every effort to improve the situation compassionately and patiently until it better approximates the ideal. Economic Justice for All, the pastoral letter of the National Catholic Conference of Bishops on the United States economy, illustrates well how a utopian Christian morality works. First of all, the bishops’ letter dramatizes the fact that the Christian conscience works corporately and ecclesially. It commits one to social dialogue with people of every kind of relevant opinion, even when those opinions conflict or contradict one’s own and one another. The extensive public hearings which the drafting committee held on the economy to-


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gether with the public discussion of the different drafts of the letter exemplify the kind of dialogue which an appreciative Christian morality demands. Having made a sincere effort to get their facts straight and to hear all sides of a disputed moral question, the bishops in approaching the American economy first appreciated its strengths and achievements. The bishops then discussed those aspects of the kingdom which relate directly to economic morality. From the ideal of the kingdom the bishops derived moral principles which would serve to guide their ethical choices. Preferential option for the poor exemplifies one such moral principle. The bishops concluded quite correctly that in the moral assessment of economic policies the gospel requires us to measure their ethical consequences from the standpoint of the most economically vulnerable members of society. Anyone who claims to follow Jesus must do the same or stand judged before God as a moral and religious hypocrite. A preferential option for the poor sets one in direct conflict with the most aggressive aspects of an aggressive, predatory capitalism and its manifold institutionalizations of manipulative and aggressive greed. In its less corrupt and more humane expressions, capitalism gives top priority to the good of employees, second priority to quality of product, and third priority to turning a profit. Economic leaders who cannot see beyond the need to maximize profits overlook not only the needs of the poor but also of their own employees. Blind to any notion of common good, they end by grinding to pieces the little people, the anawim for whom God especially cares, in the impersonal machinery of an exploitative “free-market” economy. In a capitalistic market place, only the rich enjoy “freedom” to manipulate the economic system to their own advantage. In the Third World, transnational corporations have transformed this kind of oppression into a fine art which hides hypocritically behind the mask of respectability. The bishops derived from reflection on the gospel another fundamental moral principle relevant to economic morality: namely, the responsibility of federal and state governments to care for the common good by seeing to it that all citizens can contribute adequately to and benefit from the goods which our society furnishes. The gospel requires that we serve one another rather than lord it over one another in acts of legal and physical oppression. A government which serves its people seeks to realize the common good of all. Having derived from the vision of the kingdom moral principles to guide United States economic policy, the bishops next regretted those aspects of the American economy which fall short of the religious ideals and moral principles which they had enunciated. The bishops then used their imaginations to suggest policies which promised to remedy the eco-

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nomic injustices which trickle-down economics had spawned. Trickle down economics promised that one could increase national revenues by cutting taxes. The promise never materialized. Nothing trickled down except the self-serving indifference of the rich to the suffering of the poor. As the rich got richer, the poor ended on the streets. Those just above the poverty line sank below it. The middle class began to dwindle. The economic policies enunciated in Economic Justice for All sought to reverse all of these manifest injustices and to mend the critical rents in the economic safety net which trickle-down theory had torn. The so-called “Contract with America” concocted in right-wing “think tanks” would for all practical purposes have removed the federal safety net altogether without the sure promise of replacing it with anything but tax breaks to swell the coffers of the rich. Finally, the bishops then left it to committed Christians to use their creative imaginations in order to formulate strategies which would transform the policies which they had suggested into realities. They also allowed for the modification of those policies in ways which conform to the ideals and principles which they enunciated. I have been arguing that Economic Justice for All illustrates the contribution which the creative imagination makes to the formation of the conscience when a progressive Christian ethics of ideals confronts questions of public morality. I have described a seven stage process of moral decision making: 1) One needs to get the facts of the moral situation straight by open dialogue with all of those concerned, including with those with whom one disagrees and who may disagree with one another. 2) To the extent that one can, one needs to reach a repentant appreciation of the genuine values ingredient in the situation one faces and in all the viewpoints involved. 3) One needs to articulate the religious and moral ideals to which gospel living calls the disciples of Jesus. 4) From gospel ideals, one needs to derive moral principles relevant to the conflicted moral situation one faces. 5) One needs to regret whatever in the situation either contradicts or falls short of the ideal of the kingdom and of the principles it grounds. 6) One then needs to use one’s imagination creatively in faith in order to formulate policies a) which will reverse those factors of the situation which contradict the gospel and b) which will advance the situation the next possible step toward the ideal of the kingdom. 7) In addition, one needs to use one’s creative imagination discerningly and in faith in order to devise strategies which will transform policies into realities. In volume three, I shall reflect further on the ways in which


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commitment to Jesus as the incarnation of God influences imaginative judgments of conscience. In questions of personal morality, one can often dispense with stage six. Policies shape institutional morality but need not function in a significant way in interpersonal moral conflicts. In both personal and public morality, however, a Christian ethics of ideals requires two kinds of choices. One must choose between good and evil when aspects of the situation contradict gospel living. One must, however, also choose between good and better as one struggles concretely to advance a moral situation which falls needlessly short of the ideal of the kingdom the next possible step toward embodying that ideal. In many respects, the choice between good and better poses the more complicated moral challenge because it engages human generosity. The greater the generosity which Christians bring to the moral enterprise the greater their likelihood of embodying something like the gospel ideal to which the kingdom calls us corporately and personally. Moreover, the Jesus of the synoptics promises that greater generosity will yield greater growth and greater reward. 5) The religious character of the Christian ideal of the kingdom and the graced character of all Christian living together demand that the action of God’s Breath suffuse and transform Christian practice. In this chapter I am not only arguing for the inherently practical character of Christological knowing; but I am also attempting to draw upon synoptic narrative Christology in order to endow the idea of Christological knowing with operational specificity and concreteness. We clarify the meaning of any idea when we grasp its operational consequences, whether those consequences engage conceptual activity or practical decision. I have also attempted to show that the idealism inherent in Christological knowing engages the creative imagination and commits one to an ethic of personal and social transformation. I have suggested that when imaginative creativity functions within Christological knowing, it must always transpire in faith. The time has come to attempt to endow the phrase “in faith” with greater operational clarity. The phrase designates not so much what one chooses as the way in which one goes about the process of choosing. One makes moral decisions “in faith” when one seeks the guidance of the Breath of the risen Christ at every stage of the process of utopian, melioristic, moral deliberation. Prayer and ongoing dialogue with a discerning community of faith must shape and guide one’s deliberations and decisions. An ethical decision reached “in faith” transforms natural human prudence into discernment.

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Prudential thinking engages imagination and feeling. So does prudential thinking informed by charismatic docility to the Breath of Christ. The use of the creative moral imagination in order to bridge the gap between ethical ideals and given reality demands that one deal with conflicted ethical situations in all of their concreteness and specific orientations. The moral imagination gropes its way deliberatively to a sense of the fitting moral response demanded by specific moral circumstances. We deliberate when we ponder mutually exclusive interpretative, practical, or moral options. Despite its often nominalistic presuppositions, Christian casuistry exemplifies in its own way how the moral imagination wrestles with concreteness. Casuistry begins with a relatively simple moral situation which it gradually complexifies by adding modifying conditions. The issue of abortion can again serve as an example. A casuist might conclude rather quickly to the immorality of abortion on demand but then ask: what if a woman has been raped? Might the fact of rape justify abortion in a specific instance? What if the raped woman was also mentally deficient and incapable of raising a child? What if childbearing put her own life at risk? How serious must the risk be before it might justify an abortion? And so forth. A Christian ethics of the fitting deals, as we have seen, with more than the choice between good and evil. Because it also deals with human limitation and imperfection, it must also choose between good and good, between good and better, between good and less good. The creative, imaginative, intuitive character of Christian moral reasoning makes it more susceptible to graced transformation in the Breath of Christ. Rational deduction and induction endow human evaluative responses with greater precision; but these forms of reasoning buy precision at the price of tight rational control. One can learn to reason prayerfully, but it takes self-knowledge and considerable familiarity with God. Left to itself, the controlled character of rational thinking encourages natural human self-reliance rather than prayerful docility to the Breath of Christ. Imaginative, intuitive thinking grasps the same realities as the rational mind. The right image may on occasion endow the intuitive grasp of the real with a remarkable precision, although the conceptual precision of an image differs from logical precision. It differs because images mean through connotation and free association rather than through controlled logical definition. Creative thinking never follows logical rules. Even creative rational thinking advances intuitively rather than through rational control. It does so by balancing alternatives prudentially. Logic has no rules for telling the scientific mind how to come up with the right explanatory hypoth-


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esis. Instead, in confronting an unanswered scientific question, the scientific mind needs to play imaginatively with the relevant data and with contrasting explanations of that data in order to leap intuitively to the right hypothetical explanation. The educated scientific mind knows the wisdom of following its best hunches. The fact that imaginative thinking advances without tight rational control entails its openness to novel possibility. As a consequence, imaginative thinking develops in obediential openness to God’s touch and guidance. That openness helps explain the spontaneous affinity between religious insight and intuitive forms of thinking like poetry, prophecy, story, ritual. A Christian morality of ideals engages the human creative imagination in transforming sinful and imperfect human situations into social arrangements which better approximate the ideal of the kingdom. It therefore invokes a kind of thinking which possesses a natural obediential susceptibility to graced transvaluation in faith. The Christian conscience’s transvaluation in faith suffuses it with the discerning enlightenment of the Breath of the risen Christ. 6) Communities grow in Christological knowing through shared faith consciousness; individuals grow in Christological knowing through sharing in and contributing to shared faith. Christological knowing has an inherently practical character, for it conforms one morally and religiously to Jesus. Since Christological knowing exemplifies Christian faith, that faith has an inherently practical character. Personal faith which exemplifies Christological knowing advances under the guidance and charismatic inspiration of the Breath of the risen Christ. All the more, then must the shared faith of the Church exhibit the same two constitutive characteristics of practicality and charismatic inspiration, since the shared faith of the Church nurtures personal faith and is enhanced by it. Communities like the Church grow in consciousness differently from individuals. Individuals grow in consciousness by making distinctions and by grasping relationships among consciously distinguished realities. We experience these basic cognitive activities every day of our waking lives. An example will illustrate what I mean. Once during a camping trip in Kings Canyon, a friend of mine identified the Oregon junco. He made the identification in my presence. When I returned to Berkeley I found it suddenly full of Oregon juncos. The birds had always lived there, of course, but I had not seen them because I could not distinguish them from sparrows. Once I could, I saw them consciously as juncos.

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Once we raise things to consciousness by making distinctions, we can begin to explore their relationship to other realities. That exploration further enhances our conscious grasp of their significance. Having identified the junco as a genus of bird, I began, for example, to explore the analogies between an Oregon junco and other kinds of junco. Communities come to consciousness by much more complex conceptual processes. Small communities like families or groups of friends grow in shared consciousness through directly shared experiences. In large, historical communities, especially in a world-wide, historical community like the Church, its members cannot all share the same experiences directly. As a consequence, larger, enduring communities come to shared consciousness by more complex social processes of interpretation. Large historical communities achieve a sense of self-identity by reaching a consensus about the meaning of the event which founds them. That consensus seeks to interpret both the founding event itself and the history which links the community to it. As in the case of any developing reality, a community’s history defines its “essence,” what it is. The reappropriation of the past creates a shared sense of identity among the community’s members. Communities emerge from a specific past. They also aspire toward a future. As a consequence, communities cannot achieve full shared consciousness until they also reach a consensus about their ultimate and proximate goals. Ultimate goals endow a community’s future with its defining purpose. Proximate goals seek to advance the community toward the realization of that purpose. The achievement of shared consciousness, however, also engages decision. A community remains a mere discussion club until it mobilizes its members practically to advance toward the ultimate goals to which it stands corporately committed. Consensus about the past creates shared memories. Consensus about the future creates shared hopes. The realization of the latter consensus creates shared lives. Natural human communities reach shared consciousness by relying on human insight and by collaboration untouched by religious faith. The Christian community, however, comes into existence as a result of the historical self-revelation of God in Jesus and in His divine Breath. As a consequence, the Christian community can only come to shared consciousness in faith and in response to the Breath’s enlightenment. As a consequence, the sharing of the charisms of the Holy Breath create the shared consciousness of the Christian community. Let us try to understand how this happens. In the Church, conversion to Christ creates faith consciousness. As a consequence, the Church will always need prophets and evangelists to proclaim the gospel to it in a way which summons it to initial and ongo-


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ing conversion. Gifts of prayer and of healing deepen and intensify the Christian community’s sense of standing in a developing, efficacious, historical relationship with the God it proclaims. Through prayer and the experience of healing in faith, we become present to the God who lives present to us. Christian teachers foster shared faith consciousness by recalling to the Christian community its story. To this process of corporate recall, eucharistic worship together with the other sacraments make an important contribution; but the corporate recall of the Christ event and of the history which links the living Church to it also involves the work of both scholarly and pastoral theologians. The work of Christian teachers endows the Christian community with shared memories. The work of prophets and pastoral leaders, ordained or not, endows it with shared hopes. Those endowed with a charism of leadership enable a community of shared faith to reach corporate decisions about the concrete, immediate future to which God is calling it. Not everyone teaches or leads with equal competence. As a consequence, the achievement of a sound consensus about the meaning of the history which defines the Church’s developing historical reality and about the future to which God calls it engages the gift of discernment. The Christian community needs discerners in order to distinguish sound from unsound doctrine, grace-filled from disgraceful practice, a liberating Church order from theologically rationalized ecclesiastical oppression. Finally, the Church will never achieve shared consciousness in faith without practical gifts of action. The Church needs pastors, community organizers, almsgivers, and others inspired in faith by the Breath of God to mobilize the Christian community to live out the gospel ideals to which it stands corporately committed. I have spoken of the dynamics of ecclesial growth in a shared faith context. Here we need to know that it coincides with what I have called Christological knowing. The Christ event defines the Church’s identity initially and fundamentally. The history which links the Church to that event tells the story of the extent to which the Church has developed in fidelity to its founder or in contradiction of what Jesus embodied and proclaimed. As a consequence, the whole of Christian doctrine and practice has a Christological foundation and develops according to Christological norms. Christian theology needs to articulate a doctrine of God, an account of the incarnation, a doctrine of salvation, a sacramental doctrine, a doctrine of the Church, and a moral doctrine. Each of these areas of theology has its own history, but each also must conform to basic Christological norms. A Christian doctrine of God explains the way in which the Christ event stands in historical judgment on other human conceptions of the deity.

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The Christ event—the coming of Jesus, His glorification, and His sending of the divine Breath—reveals the inner social life of the triune God. Christology, therefore, reveals the trinity at the same time that the trinity contextualizes Christology. As a consequence, Christology and trinitarian theology must always develop in tandem; for one judges the orthodoxy of trinitarian doctrine by its ability to advance the process of Christological knowing. Orthodox trinitarian doctrine advances the assimilation of the Christian community to Jesus in the power of His Breath. Heterodox trinitarian doctrine does not. Often by the term “Christology,” theologians mean a purely speculative account of the incarnation. Purely speculative logic, however, mires theological thinking in a serious logical fallacy. It assumes dualistically that thinking has no relationship to decision and to practice. In point of fact, however, one cannot understand any reality, and especially not the reality of God, without interacting with it. Nor can one understand either rationally or intuitively the meaning of any Christian doctrine until one explicitates its practical consequences. One can, then, develop an adequate doctrinal Christology, only if one replaces the a priori, deductive logic which has for so long dominated European theological thinking with a sound pragmatic logic of consequences. When one uses such a logic to construct a Christology, it allows one to invoke practical Christological knowing as the norm of sound Christological doctrine. Those Christological doctrines count as orthodox which advance the practical assimilation of the Christian community to Jesus in the power of His Breath. Those which fail that test count as heterodox. By a doctrine of salvation, one normally means the way in which the action of divine grace transforms human nature and unites it to the living, triune God. In a doctrine of salvation, then, nature and grace function as correlative terms. As a consequence, the interpretation of each of these correlatives can either illumine or distort one another. A sound understanding of human nature engages Christological faith; for the incarnation redefines the meaning of the human by recreating it. As we shall see in greater detail in volume three, sin diminishes, distorts, and destroys the human. Humans do not lose all humanity when they sin; but sinful humanity falls far short of the created perfection for which God has destined it. As a consequence, any sound theological understanding of human nature invokes Christological knowing, which heals, perfects, and elevates the human, as a norm for understanding the full, graced potential of human nature. Soteriology includes eschatology, of course. Eschatology projects the ultimate shape of saved reality on the basis of a present experience of being saved. Eschatological thinking presupposes, therefore, a normative insight into the ultimate teleology of Christological knowing.


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Sacramental theology applies the doctrine of salvation to Christian worship. As a consequence, it examines the way in which shared worship seeks to advance the process of Christological knowing. Because Christology seeks to offer a sound insight into the experience of Christological knowing, every sacramental theology needs to rest on a sound Christological foundation. It judges as sound any sacramental doctrine which advances Christological knowing and as unsound any sacramental doctrine which does not. In the first instance, Christological knowing engages the entire Christian community. The Breath transforms believers corporately into the image of Jesus through the sharing of the charisms. As a consequence, Christological knowing also judges the orthodoxy or heterodoxy of ecclesiastical institutions. Only those Church institutions can claim legitimacy which advance the process of shared and personal Christological knowing. Those which undermine it count as heterodox. Because ecclesiology engages Christological knowing in normative ways, it too must rest on a sound Christological foundation. Of the three synoptic evangelists, Matthew grasped this truth most profoundly. Finally, a Christology which invokes a logic of consequences also serves as the foundation of Christian moral practice, since the practical, moral consequences of Christological faith clarify its very doctrinal meaning. In other words, the process which I have called Christological knowing coincides with the Christian community’s growth in practical, shared faith consciousness; and practical, shared faith consciousness provides the context within which individual believers also advance in Christological knowing. They experience conscious practical assimilation to Jesus in the power of His Breath to the extent that they allow the shared faith of the Church to nurture in them an ongoing, integral conversion to Christ. That conversion, however, culminates in their own charismatic anointing. When the members of the Church share their charisms with others, they enhance the shared faith consciousness of the Church. The inherently practical character of Christological knowing necessarily entails the inherently practical character of shared and personal Christian faith. The practical character of Christian faith requires the doctrinal theologian to invoke a sound pragmatic logic of consequences which clarifies the relationship between doctrinal belief and Christian practice. The third volume of this study will develop this understanding of doctrinal Christology in a systematic way. Relevance for the RCIA This volume has studied synoptic narrative Christology for the practical light which it throws on the meaning of Christological knowing. The aims of the RCIA and Christological knowing coincide. Those who enter

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the restored catechumenate ought to have already experienced an initial conversion to Christ. They need, in other words, to have grasped and interiorized the basic realistic and moral conditions for growing in the knowledge of Jesus through practical assimilation to Him in the power of His Breath. The catechumenate and the mystagogy which follows initiation both seek to advance such assimilation to the person of Jesus in initially significant ways. In the end, of course, the project of Christological knowing encompasses a lifetime. This volume presents a strategy for introducing catechumens to some of the major Christological insights of the three synoptic gospels. That strategy advances in two stages. First, it invites prayerful meditation on each of the synoptic gospels as narrative wholes by pondering in prayer the dramatic, thematic, and allusive linkages which structure and unify each one as a story. Second, the strategy developed in this volume proposes a dynamic construct of Christian moral deliberation which exemplifies a practical plan for helping catechumens to integrate the intuitive insights of synoptic narrative Christology into their conscientious reflection on the practical demands which gospel living makes upon them. As catechumens interiorize the narrative message of the synoptic gospels and apply it to their lives, they will advance in Christological knowing if they look to the Breath of Christ to teach and inspire growth in faith. Their progress will, moreover, exemplify the analogy of Christological knowing enshrined literarily in the gospels, since the faith development of each convert emerges from a different personal and historical context but converges on the same divine ideal incarnate in Jesus. In the preceding chapters, I have not attempted to write a Christological catechesis for the restored catechumenate but to lay Christological foundations for such a catechesis. Catechetical teams will need to apply pastorally the preceding insights into synoptic narrative Christology and into the practical dynamics of Christian conversion. That application will require catechists to deal selectively with the materials made available in this volume; but a basic mastery of those materials will enable any catechetical team to select wisely and intelligently which narrative insights into the person and ministry of Jesus promise to advance a given catechumen’s integral conversion to Christ. Conclusion In the course of this volume I have attempted to argue that synoptic narrative Christology seeks to advance the process of Christological knowing. I have also attempted to endow the term Christological knowing with greater conceptual precision by explicitating some of its principal operational consequences.


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The story of Jesus, when told from the standpoint of the paschal mystery, advances Christological knowing because it fosters the prayerful openness of both communities and individuals to the sanctifying, charismatic action of the Breath of the risen Christ who transforms them in His image. In so transforming believers the Breath of the risen Jesus teaches humans to know Him in a unique, normative, and unitive way. Any person or community may have the experience; but it only happens in faith, only when one meets the incarnate Son of God on the terms set by the Father. Because the story of Jesus introduces us to an experience of humanity made sinless by its personal union with God, it has the capacity to illumine the sinful corners of both of our personal lives and of the institutions we create, whether secular or ecclesiastical. Contradictions between our own corporate and personal life choices and the moral and religious realities which Jesus’ embodies require repentance. The perfection of Jesus’ sinless obedience to God challenges our pusillanimity and narrow self-preoccupation. As the only historical story of God personally embodied in human experience, Jesus’ story in virtue of its very historical uniqueness and sinlessness makes ultimate and absolute claims on every human conscience. It therefore stands in judgment over every other personal and institutional story. When one understands the dynamics of Christological knowing in the light of synoptic narrative Christology, then sharp distinctions between narrative and doctrinal Christology begin to blur. So does the distinction between doctrinal Christology and Christian moral practice. Synoptic narrative Christology tells the story of Jesus with a focus on Christian practice. It seeks to advance the practical assimilation of believers to Jesus in the power of His Breath; but it also presupposes a doctrinal context as the expression of the realistic conditions for advancing in Christological knowing. In the third and final volume of this study, I shall analyze the gospel of John as narrative Christology transforming itself into doctrinal Christology. In Johannine Christology the narrative focus shifts from practical assimilation to Jesus in the power of His Breath to the doctrinal context which enunciates the realistic conditions for such Christological knowing. As we shall see, however, while the gospel of John uses narrative in order to enhance the importance of doctrine, like the synoptics, the fourth gospel recognizes the importance and normativity of the kind of practical Christological knowing which the synoptic tradition inculcates. The third volume of this work will also reflect on the development of post-Biblical Christological doctrine. I shall argue that rationally formulated doctrinal Christology leads necessarily to practical Christology; for until one un-

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derstand the practical consequences of Christological doctrines one fails finally to understand their very doctrinal meaning. The present volume has, however, attempted enough for one book. Some might judge that it has attempted too much. In any case, the systematic exploration of the relationship between narrative, doctrinal, and practical Christology must await volume three. As I explore these relationships, I shall return to the doctrinal questions which I raised at the beginning of volume one; and I shall lay systematic theological foundations for answering them.

Glossary

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Glossary ABDUCTION: in pragmatic logic, an inference which concludes to a case from a rule and a result; in other words, an inference which gives an initial classification to data in need of explanation on the basis of a law assumed to function in reality; the formulation of an hypothesis ABSOLUTE: unconditioned; as an ethical category, commitment to particular ideals and principles no matter what the circumstance ABSTRACT: lacking concreteness ACCOMMODATION: adjustment; in developmental psychology, adaptive growth ACT: as a technical philosophical term, the determination of a potency ACTUAL: in a metaphysics of experience, factual, or pertaining to the realm of decision ADAPTATION: change with regard to a situation; in developmental psychology, adjustment to an environment through accommodation or assimilation ADOPTIONISM: the heterodox doctrine that Jesus first existed as a human person and only subsequently became the Son of God by an act of divine grace AESTHETICS: in pragmatic logic, the normative study of ideals and of the habitual forms of behavior which appreciate and respond to them AFFECT ATTUNEMENT: in social psychology, the capacity of an adult to share empathetically and symbolically in the emotional experiences of an infant and vice versa AFFECTION: in a metaphysics of experience, the emotive perception or judgment of reality AFFECTIVE CONVERSION: the decision to take adult responsibility for one’s own subsequent emotional development ANALOGY: similarity in difference ANALOGY OF CHRISTOLOGICAL KNOWING, THE: practical assimilation to Jesus in the power of His Breath in different historical situations ANALYTIC: dividing into elemental parts or basic principles ANONYMOUS CHRISTIAN: the questionable theological doctrine that all persons experience an a priori, graced orientation to Jesus Christ prior to the act of faith in Him ANTHROPOLOGY: a more or less organized account of the human APOCALYPTIC: revelatory APOCALYPTIC THEOLOGY: a visionary account of the end time: i.e., of the final stage or salvation and of final judgment APOLLONARIANISM: the heterodox doctrine that in the incarnation Jesus’ divinity and humanity blend into a third theandric reality APOPHATIC THEOLOGY: a doctrine of God which holds that created reality can only reveal what God is not A PRIORI: before the fact; the character of an argument which fallaciously claims validity without evidence to support it ARIANISM: the heterodox theological denial of the divinity of Jesus and of his divine Breath

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ASCETICISM: cultivated physical austerity, often for moral or religious motives ASSIMILATION: in developmental psychology, biological adaptation through ingestion ATHEISM: the denial of the reality of God PRACTICAL: the failure to accept the practical consequences of one’s alleged belief in God ATONEMENT: reconciliation; the restoration of a ruptured relationship by accepting the suffering which reconciliation requires AUTONOMY: in a metaphysics of experience, the bare capacity to initiate activity BEATIFIC VISION: the face-to-face vision of God in the next life BEATITUDES, THE: the eight blessings of the new covenant which open the sermon on the mount in Matthew’s gospel BEAUTY: the intuitive perception of excellence; the simultaneous intuitive grasp of goodness and of truth in some reality BEELZEBUL: the Lord of the Flies; in the Old Testament, the name of the god of the Philistine city of Ekron; in the New Testament, a Hebrew name for the prince of demons BEING: really existing BELIEF: in pragmatic logic, a proposition for whose consequences one stands willing to assume responsibility BENEDICTUS, THE: in Luke’s gospel, the prayer of praise uttered by Zechariah after the birth of his son, John the Baptizer BIBLICAL CHRISTOLOGY: an account of what the New Testament says about Jesus Christ BIGOTRY: rigid stereotyping of the members of an out-group combined with overt hostility toward them BLASPHEMY: insulting God BODY: in a metaphysics of experience, the immediate environment from which a finite self emerges CAPITALISM: an economic system which buys human labor for producing, handling and marketing goods, which promotes a so-called1 free market system as well as the private and corporate ownership of the means of production, and which seeks to maximize the profits of businesses and corporate investors CASE: in pragmatic logic, the classification of data in inferential thinking CATECHUMENATE: an organized period of preparation for receiving the sacraments of Christian initiation CATEGORY: a predicate; an concept used in interpreting reality CELIBACY: the deliberate renunciation of genital sex CERTAIN: beyond the shadow of a doubt CHALCEDONIAN CHRISTOLOGY: the doctrine that the person of Jesus unites His divinity and His humanity without blending them into a third reality 1. The freedom of the capitalistic market varies with one’s economic assets. Wealthy corporations, the rich, and the affluent experience considerable freedom in a capitalistic market. The starving poor tend to find it oppressive rather than liberating.

Glossary

583

CHARISM: a particular manifestation of the gift of salvation accomplished in the missions of Jesus and of His Breath; a supernatural empowerment which renders one docile to the inspirations of the Breath of Jesus CHRISTIAN CONVERSION: the decision to respond to the revelation of God in Jesus Christ and in the mission of His Breath on the terms which that revelation demands CHRISTIAN ORIGINS, CRITERION OF: a norm for authenticating historically words or actions of Jesus which asserts that any historical portrait of Jesus must offer a plausible account of how the movement He headed could have evolved into the Christian Church CHRISTOLOGICAL KNOWING: the knowledge of Jesus Christ which results from practical assimilation to Him in the power of His Breath CHRISTOLOGICAL QUESTION, THE: asking how divinity and humanity relate in the person of Jesus CHRISTOLOGY: a more or less organized account of the person and ministry of Jesus Christ OF HOPE: a foundational theological account of how commitment to Jesus Christ in justifying faith heals, perfects, and elevates natural and sinful human hopes NARRATIVE: a foundational theological account of how commitment to Jesus Christ in justifying faith transforms intuitive perceptions of His person and mission communicated in story form DOCTRINAL: a foundational theological account of how commitment to Jesus Christ in justifying faith transforms inferential perceptions in faith of His person and mission PRACTICAL: a foundational theological account of how commitment to Jesus Christ in justifying faith transforms both personal moral conversion and socio-political conversion CHRISTOPRAXIS: living out the practical consequences of commitment to Jesus Christ in justifying faith CLASSIC: a work of art or literature which from generation to generation makes human life and experience meaningful CLASSISM: the fallacious ideological justification of giving to one or more social groups privileged access to the benefits of a society to the detriment and even oppression of other social groups CLERICALISM: the sinful abuse of ecclesiastical authority through self-serving domination over others CO-EXISTENCE: the simultaneous enjoyment of reality COHERENCE, CRITERION OF: a norm for authenticating as historical words and actions of Jesus on the basis of their compatibility with other words and actions already authenticated by other norms COLONIALISM: a policy which extends and maintains the control of one nation over foreign dependencies COMMON GOOD: a social arrangement which ensures that every member of society has the opportunity to share with reasonable adequacy in that society’s benefits and to contribute to those same benefits

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COMMON SENSE: colloquially, the ability to deal realistically with one’s world; as a technical philosophical term, the power to correlate sense perceptions COMMUNICATIO IDIOMATUM: literally, Latin for “the communication of traits”; in theology, a doctrinal account of the way human and divine traits relate in Jesus Christ COMMUNICATION: in a metaphysics of experience, symbolic activity which expresses to one mind the evaluative perceptions of another about some entity COMMUNICATIONS: a functional theological specialty which uses the results of theological reflection in order to re-establish dialogue among the members of a religious community when lack of conversion causes dialogue to break down COMPLEMENTARITY: the assertion of true propositions about interrelated realities CONCEPT: in a metaphysics of experience, a particular way of responding evaluatively to one’s world CONCUPISCENCE: those corrupting forces in the environment of a baptized person immanent to experience which differ from that person’s own sins but which nevertheless come from sin and lead to sin CONSCIENCE: personal judgment of moral right and wrong CONSCIOUSNESS: awareness PERSONAL: awareness which begins with distinguishing one’s own body from its surrounding environment and which develops by making distinctions and asserting relationships COMMUNAL: the consciousness of a community which results from its shared memories, shared hopes, shared lives, practice of atoning love and degree of conversion CONTRADICTION: the assertion of mutually exclusive propositions about the same reality CONVERGENCE: the assertion of true but different propositions about the same reality CONVERSION: the decision to pass from irresponsible to responsible behavior in some realm of human experience INITIAL: one’s first assumption of adult responsibility in some realm of experience ONGOING: living out the consequences of initial conversion COORDINATION OF CATEGORIES, THE: reflection on the relationship of categories which derive from different disciplines which study the same or related realities CONSUMERISM: an economic system which seeks to persuade buyers to regard luxuries, i.e., possessions which enhance class status, as necessities CORRELATION, METHOD OF: a mode of thinking which interrelates different realities under investigation COUNCIL OF THE CHURCH: a plenary meeting of leaders and teachers of the Christian community in order to decide doctrinal and pastoral questions

Glossary

585

COUNTERDYNAMIC OF CONVERSION: the tendency of the lack of conversion in one realm of experience to undermine the presence of conversion in another realm of experience COVENANT: a mutually binding agreement among persons CREATION: as a divine act, God’s ongoing constitution of the developing universe as a reality; as an object, the developing spatio-temporal universe viewed as a product of divine activity CRITICAL COMMON SENSISM: a doctrine of pragmatic logic which maintains that if one attempts to doubt seriously one’s spontaneous beliefs, one will find some beliefs which one cannot doubt CULTURE: reality mediated and conditioned by human symbolic behavior DECISION: in a metaphysics of experience, an action which makes reality concretely this rather than that; a fact DEDUCTION: in pragmatic logic, an inference which concludes from a case and a rule to a result; in other words, the prediction of facts not yet in evidence but implied by a particular abduction DEISM: a philosophical system which posits the existence of God, the immortality of the soul, and universal moral principles but which denies divine intervention in human history DELIBERATION: in a metaphysics of experience, disjunctive thinking; the weighing of mutually exclusive alternatives for choice AESTHETIC: disjunctive thinking about how best to communicate an intuitive grasp of excellence PRUDENTIAL: disjunctive thinking about ethical choices PRACTICAL: disjunctive thinking about how best to get a job done DEMIURGE: in Platonic philosophy, a quasi-deity who fashions the material universe DEMYTHOLOGIZATION: the substitution of rational explanation for a mythic grasp of reality DE-OBJECTIFICATION: the process of replacing inferential thinking which claims to grasp things as they are in themselves with a mode of thought which recognizes the relational character of all reality and of all knowing DEPRAVITY: moral corruption; as a theological term, the doctrine that sin has so corrupted human nature that it can of itself perform no morally good acts DIALECTIC: a functional theological specialty which compares and contrasts different doctrinal frames of reference in order to assess if and why they agree or disagree DIOHYPOSTATIC THEOLOGY: an early form of heterodox trinitarian theology which focused on the existence of two subsistent realities in the Christian Godhead, the Father and the Son, but which left the Son’s eternal existence and co-equality with the Father vague DI-POLAR NOMINALISM: a philosophical doctrine which reduces human knowing to the subjective interrelation of concrete percepts and abstract concepts DISCERNMENT: a charism of the Holy Breath which renders human deliberation receptive to Her inspirations

586


DISCONTINUITY, CRITERION OF: a principle for authenticating historically words and actions attributed to Jesus which argues that if one cannot trace them either to the milieu in which Jesus lived or to the apostolic Church they probably originated in Jesus Himself DISPENSATIONAL THEOLOGY: a descriptive account of God’s saving action in human history DIVINITY: divine reality; the nature of deity DOCTRINES: a functional theological specialty which distinguishes sound from unsound doctrine by the former’s ability to advance an integral five-fold conversion and by the latter’s tendency to undermine integral five-fold conversion DUALISM: the fallacious conception of two interrelated realities in such a way that their real relationship to one another becomes subsequently unintelligible COSMIC: conceiving time and eternity in such a way that their real relationship to one another becomes subsequently unintelligible MATTER-SPIRIT: the characterization of reality as divided into essentially different realms, one embodied and the other disembodied, with the result that their interrelationship becomes subsequently unintelligible OPERATIONAL: the conception of human powers of activity in such a way that their interaction becomes subsequently unintelligible SUBSTANTIAL: the division of the human person into two essentially different substances whose essential difference makes the unity of the person unthinkable SUBJECT-OBJECT: an interpretation of a cognitive relationship in such a way that the act of knowing becomes subsequently unintelligible DUTY: a moral obligation to respond to the need of some person or persons DYNAMIC OF CONVERSION: the tendency of one kind of conversion to re-enforce another ECCLESIOLOGY: a more or less organized account of the Church ECLECTICISM: the endorsement of beliefs on the basis of taste and without much concern for their mutual compatibility EGO: in psychology, the conscious person EGO DEFLATION: the conflicted, painful psychological state of one whose ego-inflation has led to positing an act with destructive consequences to oneself and/or others EGO INERTIA: in clinical psychology, the human tendency to resist challenges to personal attitudes, beliefs, or commitments EGO INFLATION: a psychological state of exaggerated self-confidence resulting from lack of realistic contact with potentially destructive, unconscious impulses and with one’s own limitations EMBARRASSMENT, CRITERION OF: a norm for authenticating historically words or actions of Jesus which argues that, if a New Testament author records something about Jesus disconcerting either to the one who records it or to the Christian community, then the event in question probably took place EMOTION: in a metaphysics of experience, the affective perception or judgment of reality

Glossary

587

SYMPATHETIC: a benevolent attitudinal response like affection, sympathy, friendship, love which functions as the affective equivalent of a logical “yes” NEGATIVE: an attitudinal response which function as the affective equivalent of a logical “not,” like fear, anger, shame, guilt EMPIRICAL THEOLOGY: a theology which requires that all theological propositions find verification in the historical events which reveal God in space and time ENLIGHTENMENT, THE: an intellectual movement in the eighteenth century which defended the superiority of scientific knowing nominalistically conceived, moral individualism, the purely subjective character of moral and religious judgments, and social contract theory ENLIGHTENMENT FUNDAMENTALISM: the spontaneous and dogmatic endorsement of the untenable aspects of Enlightenment philosophy ENVIRONMENT: in a metaphysics of experience, the physical universe from which the self emerges, most immediately its own body but also the surrounding world from which it derives its physical life EPISTEMOLOGY: a philosophical account of human knowing ESCHATOLOGICAL: pertaining to the eschaton ESCHATOLOGY: a more or less organized account of the final age of salvation inaugurated by the incarnation and by the paschal mystery ESCHATON: the final age of salvation inaugurated by the incarnation and by the paschal mystery ESSENCE: what something is; in a metaphysics of experience, a mode of evaluative perception abstracted from the one perceiving and the reality perceived ESSENCE FALLACY: the indefensible reification of essences as existing in experienced reality instead of regarding them as fallible modes of perception ESSENTIALISM: a philosophy which endorses the essence fallacy ETERNAL OBJECT: in Whiteheadean philosophy, a concept in the conceptual pole of the divine experience ETHICS: a moral code which measures human conduct by norms, principles, and ideals which make absolute and ultimate claims EUCHARIST: thanksgiving; the ritual, sacramental recall of the paschal mystery through the re-enactment of Jesus’ last supper with His disciples EVALUATION: in a metaphysics of experience, a quality of experience viewed as an intentional, cognitive relationship EVALUATIVE CONTINUUM: in a metaphysics of experience, the entire network of intentional, evaluative relationships in human experience which includes, sensation, emotion, memory, intuition, inference, and deliberation EVANGELIST: the author of one of the canonical gospels EXCELLENCE: a reality’s capacity to evoke in another the simultaneous intuitive perception of goodness and of truth EXCEPTIVE CLAUSE: in Matthew’s gospel, the phrase “except for uncleanness (porneia)” which qualifies Jesus’ prohibition of Mosaic divorce practices EXEGESIS: the interpretation of texts EXISTENTIALISM: a phenomenological account of the human subject’s relationship to Being understood as the total pattern of meaning

588


EXORCISM: the ritual driving out of a demon, or evil spirit, which assumes the personality of a human being and controls the person’s bodily movements, including speech EXORCIST: one who performs an exorcism EXPERIENCE: in a metaphysics of experience, a process composed to relational elements called feelings; the higher forms of experience contain three kinds of relational elements: evaluations, decisions, and tendencies REALM OF: an distinctive habitual way of responding evaluatively or decisively FACT: in a metaphysics of experience, a decision, an action which makes reality concretely this rather than that FACULTY PSYCHOLOGY: an account of the human person which explains human activity by grounding it in really and essentially distinct powers with fixed formal objects FAITH: commitment to a self-revealing God on the terms which that self-revelation demands JUSTIFYING: an initial religious conversion which conforms the convert to the divine will and therefore commits one to ongoing religious conversion THEOLOGICAL: the graced transformation of intellectual conversion CHARISM OF: a gift of the Holy Breath which enhances the social visibility of one’s commitment to God by rendering it more prayerful, more docile to the movements of grace, and more willing to take personal risks for the sake of God FALLACY OF UNIVERSAL TEXTUALITY, THE: the false belief that one can characterize every entity as a text FALLIBILISM: in pragmatic logic, the philosophical doctrine that if one admits that one can err in interpreting reality one has a better chance of reaching the truth than if one denies one’s capacity for error FALSE: the characteristic of a belief which contradicts the evidence FEELING: in a metaphysics of experience, a relational element within experience, which in its higher forms manifests three such kinds of relational elements: evaluations, decisions, and tendencies FEMINISM: a movement of social reform with scholarly and theological underpinnings which seeks to vindicate the rights of women to freedom from personal and institutional oppression on the basis of sex FINITUDE: limitation FORMAL OBJECT: the object of a power of operation which defines the essence of that power by specifying the aspect under which it operates on its object FOUNDATIONS: a functional theological specialty which proposes a strictly normative account of the forms, dynamics, and counterdynamics of conversion FREEDOM, ELEMENTARY: the power to act or not or to choose to do this rather than that FUNCTIONAL SPECIALTY: a realm of theological investigation which raises a particular kind of theological question requiring a distinctive method to answer it

Glossary

589

FULFILLMENT: an event which keeps a promise and/or makes a prediction come true GENEALOGY: a family tree GOODNESS: desirability, the exemplification of excellence GOSPEL: a narrative account of Jesus told in the light of the paschal mystery SYNOPTIC: the accounts of Jesus written by Mark, Matthew, of Luke; literally, “at a glance,” a term derived from the practice of reproducing these gospels in parallel columns for the purpose of comparative analysis GRACE: as a theological term, God’s utterly gratuitous intervention in human history in order to undo the consequences of human sinfulness and in order to unite humans to God and to one another HERESIARCH: the principal intransigent propounder of a heresy HERESY: the tenacious defence and propagation of a heterodox belief HERMENEUTICAL CIRCLE, CLOSING THE: a theological method characteristic of liberation theology which beings by investigating a situation of institutional injustice, searches divine revelation for norms which promise to rectify the injustice, and then devises specific strategies for effecting the desired rectification HERMENEUTICS: a theory of interpretation HETERODOX: in theology, the characteristic of a belief which interprets divine revelation incorrectly HIGH CHRISTOLOGY: an account of the person and mission of Jesus which beings with reflection on His divinity and which sometimes sacrifices His humanity to His divinity HISTORICAL-CRITICAL METHOD: the scholarly interpretation of a text in the light of the circumstances which originally inspired its composition HISTORY: developments in space and time; in the metaphysics of experience, the unfolding of spatio-temporal experience; as a functional theological specialty, a scholarly account of a religious community’s development HOLY BREATH: the third person of the trinity conceived as a sanctifying source of divine life HOMOIOUSIOS: similar in being; a technical Greek theological term for asserting that the Son and Holy Breath have a divine reality similar to the Father’s HOMOOUSIOS: one in being; a technical Greek theological term for asserting that the Son and the Holy Breath have identically the same divine reality as the Father HOPE: in a metaphysics of experience, the intuitive perception of a desirable future HUMANITY: the nature possessed by finite, embodied persons HYLEMORPHISM: a philosophical doctrine which asserts that finite substances consist of a potential principle called matter (in Greek, hylê) and an actual principle called form (in Greek morphê) HYPOSTATIC UNION: the uniting of divinity and humanity in the second person of the trinity without their blending into some third reality neither fully divine nor fully human HYPOSTASIS: in theology, the Greek term for a particular, subsistent reality

590


HYPOTHESIS: an abduction IDEAL: a desirable possibility which makes normative claims IDEOLOGY: the false and deceptive rationalization of a situation of injustice IMAGINATION: the capacity to interpret reality through the use of images IMMATERIAL: purely spiritual, devoid of matter IMMORALITY: the decisive violation of ethical ideals and principles IMMUTABILITY: the inability to change IMPASSIBILITY: the inability to suffer IMPOSSIBLE: what cannot or could not have happened; the character of a belief which defies verification under any circumstances IMPLAUSIBLE: the character of a belief which the preponderance of the evidence calls into question without, however, ruling it out altogether as false or impossible IMPROBABLE: the characteristic of a belief which the evidence calls seriously into question but without establishing the likelihood of another interpretation INCARNATION: embodiment; as a theological term, the embodiment of the second person of the trinity INCULTURATION: evangelization or theological thinking which uses the symbols of a particular culture, which invokes the gospel to challenge that culture’s sinfulness, and which establishes a dialogue between a particular culture and the Church universal INDIVIDUALISM: the ideological belief that society consists of atomic individuals with only accidental and artificial relations to one another EXPRESSIVE: the self-isolating ideological belief that one must defend one’s “core self” from the incursions of others UTILITARIAN: the ideological belief that one can justifiably do anything necessary to advance one’s own interests and to succeed THERAPEUTIC: psychological theories and healing practices which inculcate the ideological belief in oneself as an atomic individual with only accidental and artificial relationships with others, relations which one can sacrifice as needed in order to insure personal self-fulfillment INDIVIDUALITY: the results of individuation; the traits which make one individual differ qualitatively from another INDIVIDUATION: the process of becoming an individual qualitatively distinct from other individuals INDUCTION: in pragmatic logic, an inference which concludes from a result and a case to a rule; the verification of a deductively clarified abduction which establishes the reality of the rule which a prior abduction presumed to obtain in reality INFANCY NARRATIVE: an account of the birth of Jesus in the light of the paschal mystery INFERENCE: in pragmatic logic, an argument which interrelates a rule, a case, and a result INFINITE: that which encompasses every other thing and is encompassed by nothing INFUSED KNOWLEDGE: preternaturally communicated perceptions of reality

Glossary

591

INSTITUTION: a group of persons acting in socially sanctioned ways INTELLECT: in philosophy, the spiritual power which grasps Being cognitively as true AGENT: in scholastic philosophy, the spiritual power of the human soul which uses an image in the imagination as an instrument for imprinting an idea on the passive intellect PASSIVE: in scholastic philosophy, the spiritual power of the soul which the active intellect enables to grasp sensible being as true INTELLECTUAL CONVERSION: the decision to take adult responsibility for the truth or falsity of one’s beliefs and for the adequacy or inadequacy of the frames of reference in which one fixes one’s beliefs INTELLIGIBILITY: something possessing significance or meaning INTERPLAY OF CATEGORIES: the interpretation of categories derived from one intellectual discipline by categories derived from another intellectual discipline INTERPRETATION: a meaningful account of symbolic significance; as a functional theological specialty, exegesis, or a scholarly account of the significance of religious texts and artifacts INTUITION: in a metaphysics of experience, knowledge mediated by images and affections JESUSOLOGY: a rational account of Jesus’ humanity and mortal ministry JOURNEY DISCOURSE: Lk 10:51-19:27; Luke’s account of Jesus’ final pilgrimage to Jerusalem in which He instructs His followers about the demands of discipleship JUBILEE: an English term for the law enunciated in Lv 25:8-17, 29-31, which called for the periodic rectification of injustice in Israel JUDGMENT: in pragmatic logic, the fixation of a belief JUSTIFICATION: in theology, passage from a state of sin to the obedience of faith KENOSIS: the Son of God’s free self-emptying in becoming human and suffering crucifixion KENOTIC CHRISTOLOGY: a Christology which interprets the meaning of the divine self-emptying which occurred in the incarnation KINGDOM OF GOD: Jesus’ central message; Jesus’ egalitarian vision of a new Israel founded 1) on unconditioned trust in God; 2) on the free sharing of the physical supports of life, especially with the poor, the marginal, and the expendable; 3) on prayer; 4) on mutual forgiveness even of one’s enemies; and 5) on non-violence LAW: in the metaphysics of experience, a general tendency LIBERATION THEOLOGY: a theology which takes as its starting point social, economic, and political injustice and which invokes gospel values to overcome such injustice LIBERTY: in a metaphysics of experience, responsible human freedom; freedom to live for the beautiful, the good, and the true LINKAGE: a literary device employed by an evangelist in order to unify into a coherent narrative anecdotes about Jesus

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ALLUSIVE: the literary use of repetition in order to interrelate different parts of a gospel DRAMATIC: the way in which Jesus relates to identifiable constituencies in a gospel narrative THEMATIC: the development of a theological idea through different incidents in a gospel LOGIC: a normative account of the way the human mind ought to think KANTIAN: transcendental logic, which recognizes only deductive inference and which offers an a priori account of the structure of human subjectivity LOGICAL: inferentially self-consistent; lacking internal contradictions in meaning LOGICAL ADEQUACY: in pragmatic logic, the ability of a theory to interpret all relevant data LOGICAL APPLICABILITY: in pragmatic logic, the ability of a theory to interpret some relevant data LOGICAL COHERENCE: the characteristic of a theory whose key terms remain unintelligible apart from one another LOGOS: the Greek term for word; as a Christological term, a title of the incarnate second person of the trinity which portrays Him as a divine communication LOGOS-ANTHROPOS CHRISTOLOGY: a Christology which claims that the incarnate Son of God possesses a complete humanity which consists of both a body and a soul LOGOS-SARX CHRISTOLOGY: a heterodox Christology which claims that in the incarnation the divine Logos replaces the human soul in Jesus’ humanity with the result that the second person of the trinity in becoming incarnate possesses a human body but not a human soul LOW CHRISTOLOGY: a Christology which begins by reflecting on Jesus’ humanity but which sometimes fails to offer an adequate account of His divinity MAGNIFICAT: Mary’s prayer of praise to God in Luke’s infancy narrative MATTER: physical reality; in Aristotelian philosophy, the pure potency for substantial change MEANING: in a metaphysics of experience, evaluation viewed as the intentional grasp of significance MEDIATION: the establishment of a relationship between or among distinct realities MELIORISM: an ethical system which sanctions those choices which best approximate a moral ideal MEMORY: the ability of recall past experiences MESSIAH: the anointed one; in Jewish apocalyptic theology one anointed by God to effect the deliverance and salvation of Israel MESSIANIC AGE: in apocalyptic theology, the era of peace and prosperity resulting from the victory of a messiah MESSIANIC SECRET: in Mark’s gospel, Jesus’ unsuccessful attempt to conceal his messianic identity MESSIANISM: belief in the coming of a messiah

Glossary

593

METAPHOR: the intuitive grasp of analogy through the verbal identification of two partially similar realities METAPHYSICS: an organized account of reality in general; a theory of the whole of reality which develops systematically a root metaphor for Being METAPHYSICS OF EXPERIENCE: a theory of the whole which takes experience as a root metaphor for the whole of reality METHOD: a set of recurrent and related operations yielding cumulative and progressive results MIAHYPOSTATIC THEOLOGY: an early heterodox form of theology which discovers only one subsistent reality in the Christian deity MIA PHYSIS: the Greek phrase meaning “one nature”; as a Christological term, Cyril of Alexandria’s unusual term for the person of the incarnate Word MODEL: a representation of some reality MONOPHYSITISM: Apollonarianism; the heterodox Christological doctrine which taught that the divinity and humanity of the incarnate Word blend into a third nature neither fully divine nor fully human MORALITY: a code of conduct which measures choices by ideals, principles, and realities which make ultimate and absolute claims on the human conscience PERSONAL: a code of conduct which invokes rights and duties in resolving interpersonal conflicts PUBLIC: a code of conduct which measures institutional justice by the common good MULTIPLE ATTESTATION, CRITERION OF: a principle for validating historically words and actions of Jesus which claims that, when different New Testament authors bear witness to the fact that Jesus said or did something, He probably did, especially if the authors in question represent independent historical traditions about Jesus MYSTERY: whatever eludes explanation or cognitive comprehension MYSTAGOGY: the last phase of the catechumenate which instructs newly baptized Christians in the demands of Christian living MYTH: a story which creates an adult world of value and reality NARCISSISM: morbid self-preoccupation NARRATIVE: a tale told by a story-teller to an audience about a world NATURAL: in a metaphysics of experience, the character of an experience which responds legitimately to created value only and which ignores the historical self-revelation of God NATURAL LAW: a tendency operative in the cosmos NATURE: in philosophy, a reality’s essence viewed as the source of its activity; in theology, created reality untransformed by saving, supernatural grace NATIONAL SECURITY: an ideology which claims that a government has the right to do anything at all which secures its own interests NEO-ARIANISM: the heterodox tendency in contemporary Christology to portray Jesus as a graced human person NEO-ORTHODOXY: a movement in Protestant theology which rejects metaphysical thinking and which recognizes only the analogy of faith as a legitimate theological method

594


NEO-PLATONISM: a school of Platonism which fused middle Platonic philosophy and contemplative religious impulses NESTORIANISM: the heterodox denial that Mary is the mother of God NOMINALISM: the philosophical denial of real generality CLASSICAL: the reduction of universal concepts to mere spoken words and of reality to concrete sensibles CONCEPTUAL: the restriction of real generality to conceptual universals which exist only in human subjectivity NORM: that which measures something else NORMATIVE SCIENCES: philosophical disciplines which reflect on the way in which one ought to respond to reality aesthetically, ethically, and logically NOTE: in theology, a category which assigns to a particular belief a degree of verifiability NUNC DIMITTIS: in Luke’s infancy narrative, the prayer of Simeon in response to his seeing the messiah OBJECTIFICATION: the attempt to portray reality as it exists in itself instead of portraying it as inherently relational ONTOLOGICAL: metaphysical; pertaining to a theory of the whole ONTOLOGISM: the philosophical doctrine which claims that created minds have immediate access to the ideas in the mind of God OPERATIONAL: pertaining to activity OPTIMISM: the tendency to focus on good and pleasant realities rather than on evil and unpleasant realities ORALITY: the characteristic of a culture which communicates through the spoken rather than through the written word PRIMARY: the way language functions in purely oral cultures SECONDARY: the way orality functions in literate cultures ORIGINAL SIN: the totality of human sinfulness minus one’s own personal sins ORTHOPRAXIS: decisive behavior which conforms to appropriate norms ORTHODOXY: shared religious beliefs which conform to the norms of truth and adequacy in interpreting the historical self-revelation of God OUSIA: a Greek term for being; as a technical trinitarian term, the reality common to the three members of the trinity PARABLE: a comparison, which, when expressed in narrative form, usually seeks to subvert a familiar world in order to open its audience to an alternative way of viewing reality PARADIGM: in grammar, a list of inflectional forms; in the philosophy of science, an organized way of asking and answering questions which invokes an appropriate method, appropriate instrumentation, appropriate models, and appropriate concepts for dealing with a problem PARADIGM SHIFT: the abandonment of one organized rational way of asking and answering questions for another PAROUSIA: Jesus’ second coming in divine judgment in order to vindicate those who believe in Him PASCHAL MYSTERY: Jesus’ death, resurrection, and mission of the divine Breath PASSION: the affective perception of interpersonal relationships

Glossary

595

PENTECOST: literally, the fiftieth day; a Jewish harvest festival during which the Breath of the risen Christ created the Church through an outpouring of Her charisms PERCEPT: a concrete, sensible reality viewed as an object of knowledge PERFECTIONISM: the moral doctrine that one ought always to choose the more perfect option PERSON: an autonomous, subsistent reality enjoying continuity of life and capable of entering into responsible social relationships with other realities like itself PERSONAL MORAL CONVERSION: the decision to take adult responsibility for respecting the rights and duties of others PESSIMISM: the tendency to focus on evil and suffering rather than on good, pleasant, beneficial realities PHANTASM: in scholastic philosophy, a term for an image in the imagination PHARISEE: the member of a Jewish sect which resisted the Hellenization of Jewish religious faith by requiring that Jews observe not only the Torah but pious oral traditions as well PHENOMENOLOGY: the organized description of what appears in experience without attempting to distinguish between reality and illusion PHILOSOPHY: critical reflection on lived human experience PHYSIS: the Greek term for nature PLATONISM: the school of philosophy founded by Plato in the fourth century b.c. which divides reality into an unchanging, spiritual realm of ideas and ideals and a material realm of constant change and illusion MIDDLE: a school of Platonism which located ideas and ideals in a quasi-divine intellect PLAUSIBLE: the character of a belief supported by some evidence without that evidence ruling out other possible or even probable interpretations PLURALISM: the characteristic or a situation which permits of a variety of interpretative approaches and evaluations PNEUMATOLOGY: a more or less organized account of the Holy Breath, the third person of the trinity POLICY: an institutionally sanctioned practice POSSESSION, DEMONIC: the seizure of a human person by an evil spirit which thereafter controls that person’s bodily movements, including speech POSSIBLE: the character of a belief which could conceivably enjoy verifiability despite the fact that little evidence supports it POSSIBILITY: that which could occur; an idea or ideal capable of real or actual exemplification POST-MODERNISM: a vaguely organized movement in contemporary western thought which seeks to advance beyond the presuppositions of modern culture, sometimes characterized by the denial of any subject of discourse and by extreme skepticism concerning linguistic meaning POTENCY: as a technical philosophical term, the capacity for actualization PRAGMATIC LOGIC: a theory of inference which holds that the deductive operational consequences of any abduction define the whole of its meaning

596


PRAXIS: decisive activity which seeks to transform reality, especially oppressive social institutions PRE-CATECHUMENATE: the first phase in the instruction of candidates for Christian baptism which seeks to introduce them to the Christian community and to evoke from them an initial Christian conversion PRECONSCIOUS: capable of recall PRE-EXISTENCE: a technical Christological term for the mode of being enjoyed by the second person of the trinity prior to the incarnation PREFERENTIAL OPTION FOR THE POOR: a principle of Christian ethics which insists that in the resolution of disputed questions of public morality the needs of the socially, economically, and politically disadvantaged take precedence over those of the advantaged and affluent PREHENSION: in Whiteheadean philosophy, a concrete fact of relatedness which includes a subject, its initial datum (or what it prehends at the beginning of its processing), the subject’s objective datum (or perspective on the universe), its negative prehensions (which distinguish it from other prehensions), and its subjective form (or way of prehending the universe) PREJUDICE: an opinion formed without sufficient attention to the facts PRE-OPERATIONAL: in developmental psychology, a characteristic of the cognitive behavior of children who have yet to develop the capacity for abstract rational thought PRESENTATIONAL IMMEDIACY: in a metaphysics of experience, the way in which an evaluative response makes the mind present to its world and the world to it PRETERNATURAL: beyond the powers of created nature PRIEST: one who mediates between God and humanity PRINCIPLE: a rule of conduct derived from an ideal PRINCIPLE OF ALTERNATION: in logic, a rule which asserts that the mind should focus by turns on the investigation of particular problems and the readjustment of its metaphysical theory of the whole in the light of the results of a focused investigation PROBABLE: the character of a belief which the preponderance of the evidence favors without, however, establishing its certitude PROCESS THEOLOGY: an account of God which equates all reality with change and development PROPHET: one who speaks for God in summoning a community to repentance and to hope PROSÔPON: a Greek term for the mask worn by an actor in classical Greek theater; as a theological term, prosôpon has many different meanings, some orthodox, some heterodox PRUDENCE: deliberation ruled by sound moral principles PSYCHIC CONVERSION: Robert Doran’s term for the kind of conversion which transforms human affectivity; ordering disordered affectivity in the light of sound insights generated by intellectual conversion PSYCHOLOGY: the scientific study of human behavior EMPIRICAL: the scientific study of human behavior which measures its hypotheses against the behavior of control groups

Glossary

597

DEVELOPMENTAL: a branch of empirical psychology which argues that human behavior develops in predictable stages SOCIAL: the scientific study of how individual persons and institutions interact QUALITY: in a metaphysics of experience, an instance of particular suchness QUESTS FOR THE HISTORICAL JESUS: the rational attempt to validate words and actions of Jesus (the new quest) and to situate them in the historical context in which He lived (the third quest) RACISM: prejudice and bigotry directed toward the members of a particular race RCIA: The Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults; the restored catechumenate REACTION: a way of dealing with an impinging reality CIRCULAR: in developmental psychology, an activity whose pleasurable character tends to motivate its repetition PRIMARY: in developmental psychology, an infantile circular reaction which focuses on the infant’s own body SECONDARY: in developmental psychology, an infantile circular reaction which focuses on object other than the infant’s own body TERTIARY: in developmental psychology, an infantile circular reaction which explores the child’s environment REAL: in a metaphysics of experience, pertaining to the mode of existence of a tendency REALISM: in philosophy, a defense of the mind’s ability to grasp reality in opposition to subjectivism, or a defence of the existence of real generality in opposition to nominalism, or the simultaneous defence of both positions REDACTION CRITICISM: the interpretation of a text in the light of its editing REDEMPTION: reacquisition; as a theological term, salvation viewed as the divine reacquisition of a religious backslider REFORMED SUBJECTIVIST PRINCIPLE: an axiom of Whiteheadean philosophy which asserts that apart from the experiencing of subjects there is nothing, nothing, nothing, bare nothingness REJECTION AND EXECUTION, CRITERION OF: a norm for authenticating historically words and actions of Jesus which asserts that any historical portrait of Jesus must offer a plausible account of why He suffered condemnation and crucifixion RELATIVISM: the philosophical denial of binding, universal norms for human behavior and cognition RELIGION: an organized way of relating to God REPENTANCE: the conscious repudiation of one’s former sinfulness RESEARCH: in theology, a functional specialty which provides other theologians with the tools which they need in order to think theologically RESPONSIBILITY: accountability to oneself, to others, and ultimately to God RESPONSIBLE, PERSONAL FREEDOM: the liberty to choose the beautiful, the true and the good which results from an integral five-fold conversion RESULT: in pragmatic logic, the descriptive identification of data in need of explanation RESURRECTION: total transformation in God after death REVELATION: in theology, God’s historical self-disclosure

598


REVERSION: a technical term in Whiteheadean philosophy for the experience of novel possibility by prehending an eternal object in the mind of God RHETORIC: the study and practice of the art of persuasion RIGHT: a personal need which makes legitimate claims on another person or persons ROOT METAPHOR: in philosophy, an intuitive grasp of analogy which serves as a conceptual model for Being in general RUAH: the Hebrew word for breath or wind in motion; in Christian theology a Hebrew term for the third person of the trinity RULE: in pragmatic logic, the conceptual formulation of a real law or tendency SACRAMENT: most broadly, an event which simultaneously reveals and conceals the reality of God; in sacramental theology, an official act of new covenant worship which expresses the shared faith of the Christian community, which therefore requires a minister sanctioned by that same community, and which challenges Christians assembled in worship to committed faith in the paschal mystery and in the triune God which the paschal mystery reveals SADDUCEES: a religious sect in Judaism which fostered obedience to the Torah but which, in contrast to the Pharisees, denied bodily resurrection, the existence of angels, and did not regard unwritten Jewish religious practices as binding SALVATION: in theology, the state of standing in a life-giving relationship with the triune God SAMARITAN: an inhabitant of Samaria, a province of first-century Palestine between Galilee and Judea; in the first century, orthodox Jews tended to regard Samaritans as heretics, enemies, and Roman collaborators SANHEDRIN: the supreme governing council of Palestinian Jews, composed of elders, priests, and scribes SATAN: the Biblical personification of all those forces which oppose God and put those who believe in God to the test; in the New Testament, the personification of anti-Christ SAVIOR: one who puts another in a life-giving relationship with the triune God SCHEMA: in developmental psychology, a technical psychological term for an acquired cognitive habit SCHOLARSHIP: systematic study which eschews the technological instrumentation and precise mathematical measurement of the empirical sciences SCIENTIA BEATA: in theology, a Latin term for the special transformation of Jesus’ human self-awareness effected by the incarnation SCRIBE: in the ancient world, a member of the literate class charged with making and keeping records SECOND COMING, THE: the parousia, Jesus’ return in divine judgment in order to vindicate those who believe in Him SECULARISM: an ethos which either subordinates religious values and realities to values and realities which have nothing to do with religion or which replaces religious realities and values with non religious ones SELF: in the metaphysics of experience, an autonomously functioning tendency

Glossary

599

SEPTUAGINT: literally, “seventy”; the name of the Greek translation of the Old Testament made in Alexandria, allegedly by seventy-two scribes, before the Christian era, probably in the third century b.c. SENSATION: initial perception of environmental impact on a conscious animal SEXISM: discrimination and oppression for reasons of gender SIGNIFICANCE: in the metaphysics of experience, the intelligibility of events and of symbolic communications SIN: a deliberate violation of the will of God SINLESSNESS: perfect obedience to the divine will SOCIO-POLITICAL CONVERSION: the decision to take responsibility for seeking to end institutional oppression through commitment to some just cause of universal human significance SOUL: an animating principle SOTERIOLOGY: a more or less organized account of God’s saving activity in human history SPIRIT: in philosophy, immaterial reality SPIRIT CHRISTOLOGY: an explanation of the person and ministry of Jesus which focuses on His relationship to the divine Breath STRATEGY: a concrete plan for implementing a policy or principle STRICTLY NORMATIVE THINKING: critical reflection of one’s own behavior in the light of ideals and principles which one has appropriated and interiorized SUBJECT: in a metaphysics of experience, an emerging, experiencing self; in substance philosophy, an underlying reality SUBJECTIVISM: the philosophical belief that one can experience only one’s own subjectivity SUBJECTIVITY: the evaluative responses of an experiencing self contrasted with the realities that self experiences SUBSISTENCE: in a metaphysics of experience, autonomous functioning SUBSTANCE: in philosophy, that which exists in itself and not in anything else as a subject of inhesion SUPERNATURAL: that which exceeds the power of created nature; in theology, pertaining to the realm of saving grace SUPERNATURAL EXISTENTIAL: an alleged a priori, graced expansion of the formal object of the agent intellect which endows it with a spontaneous longing for the beatific vision and for the God revealed in Jesus Christ SYMBOL: in the metaphysics of experience, whatever mediates the symbolic grasp of significance COMMUNICATION: an evaluative response expressed by one mind to another through decisive activity EXPRESSIVE: a significant event INTERPRETATIVE: an unexpressed evaluative response SYNECHISM: the philosophical assertion of continuity in development SYNTHETIC: pertaining to the perception of relationship and of unified wholes SYSTEMATICS: in theology, a functional specialty which examines relationships among sound theological doctrines

600


TENDENCY: in a metaphysics of experience, a general law in reality; a habitual orientation to decide or evaluate in a particular way THEANDRIC: combining divine and human traits THEISM: belief in the reality of God THEOLOGY: a more or less organized account of God MEDIATING: the theological retrieval of a religious tradition; the functional specialties of research, interpretation, history, and dialectics MEDIATED: the theological reformulation of a religious tradition; the functional specialties of foundations, doctrines, systematics, and communications THEOTOKOS: a Greek term meaning “mother of God”; in theology, the doctrine that Mary is the mother of the second person of the trinity THERAPEUTIC CHRISTOLOGY: an interpretation of the person and mission of Jesus in the light of the psychological study of human behavior THOMISM: philosophical and theological ways of thinking inspired by the thought Thomas Aquinas TIME: the present transformation of a past into a future CLOCK: measured motion REAL: in a metaphysics of experience, the present movement of experience from a past toward a future TRANSACTION: decisions which put autonomous selves into social relationship TRANSCENDENTAL THOMISM: the reformulation of the thought of Thomas Aquinas in the light of Kantian logic and the turn to the subject TRANSDUCTIVE: in developmental psychology, pre-rational, intuitive thinking TRANSMUTATION: change relationally, aesthetically, and organically conceived TRANSVALUATION: the re-evaluation of a reality, actuality, or possibility by transposing it from one frame of reference to another TRINITY: three persons in one God; the Christian deity TRIUMPHALISM: a view of the Catholic Church which presents it alone as the one, true Church and which de-emphasizes or denies its flaws and sinfulness TRUTH: the correct interpretation of reality TURN TO COMMUNITY, THE: a methodological shift from preoccupation with the individual subject to concern with the way in which persons interrelate socially and institutionally TURN TO EXPERIENCE, THE: the systematic use of “experience” as a central category in one’s account of reality TURN TO THE SUBJECT, THE: critical reflection on human intentionality which typically invokes Kantian logic ULTIMATE: final; in ethics, the characteristic of some reality or value worth not only living for but, if necessary, worth dying for; in Whiteheadean philosophy, universally predicable UNCERTAIN: in logic, unsupported by evidence which would force a judgment one way or the other UNCONSCIOUS: lacking awareness

Glossary

601

UTOPIA: the title of a book by Saint Thomas Moore describing an ideal society; an unrealizable ideal world VAGUE: the character of a belief which one can neither verify or falsify until one first clarifies its meaning VALIDITY: in logic, the characteristic of thinking which follows sound methodological principles VALUE: desirability; in a metaphysics of experience, a particular mode of perception VIRTUAL INFINITY: the alleged ability of a finite power of operation to aspire to infinite satisfaction VULGATE, THE: the Latin translation of the Bible made by St. Jerome WILL: in philosophy, a spiritual power to make decisions WOMANIST THEOLOGY: a strain in feminism usually promoted by women of color which criticizes the ethnic and class bias of white feminists WORLD RELIGION: an organized way of relating to God professed by a large number of people of different racial, national, and cultural backgrounds WORLD SOUL: in philosophy, the animating principle of the universe

602

Donald L. Gelpi: The Firstborn of Many INDEX OF PERICOPES THE GOSPEL OF MARK

The Preface: Mk 1:1, 26-27, 73-74 The Ministry of John the Baptizer: Mk 2-8, 28-30, 50, 73,138 The Baptism of Jesus: Mk 9-11, 30-31, 37-38, 41, 50, 125, 135, 138, 141, 144, 146, 160, 172-173, 190-191 Jesus’ Temptations: Mk 1:12-13, 32, 51, 53-54, 138, 174-175, 191, 194, 382 Jesus’ Message: Mk 1:14-15, 32. 38, 87-88, 125, 276 The Call of the First Disciples: Mk 1:16-20,51. 54, 88-89, 118, 125, 138, 145, 200, 245 Preaching and Exorcism in Capernaum: Mk 1:21-28, 38, 51, 54-55, 84, 89, 125, 132, 136, 138, 199, 400, 446 The Healing of Simon’s Mother-in law: Mk 1:29-31, 88-89, 118, 132, 143144, 146 Evening Cures and Exorcisms: Mk l:32-34, 55, 132, 136, 138, 237, 400-401 Jesus Tours Galilee: Mk 1:35-39, 88-89, 118, 125, 138, 363, 436-437, 510 The Cure of a Leper: Mk 1:40-45, 33, 82-84, 134, 136-137, 237, 510-511, 515 The Cure of a Paralytic: Mk 2:1-12, 38-39, 60-61, 63, 130, 137, 145, 205, 363, 406 The Call of Levi: Mk 2:13-14, 61, 63, 89, 137, 250 Table Fellowship with Sinners: Mk 2:15-17, 61-63, 89-90, 130, 137, 145, 205 The Controversy over Fasting: Mk 2:18-22, 33-34, 62-63, 90, 137, 145, 163164, 206, 355, 406 Picking Corn on the Sabbath: Mk 2:23-28,62-63, 69-70, 90, 130, 132, 137 The Sabbath Cure of a Man with a Withered Hand: Mk 3:1-6, 63-64, 66, 134, 137, 145, 208, 311, 405, 407, 417, 511 Jesus and the Crowds: Mk 3:7-12, 84-85, 90, 125, 132, 138, 311, 434, 511 The Call of the Twelve: Mk 3:13-19, 55, 88, 90-91,118, 132, 138, 250 Jesus’ Family: Mk 3:20-21, 39-40, 131, 137-138, 183, 454 The Controversy over Beelzebul: Mk 3:22-30, 51, 59, 64, 137, 191-192, 196, 369, 403, 530 Jesus’ True Family: Mk 3:31-35, 39-40, 84, 125, 137, 364, 454 The Sermon on the Lake: Mk 4:1-34, 91, 107, 126, 138, 453-454 The Parable of the Sower: Mk 4:1-9, 59, 91-91, 126-127 Speaking in Parables: Mk 4:10-12, 84-85, 95, 239, 290, 292, 438 The Allegory of the Sower: Mk 4:13-20, 84-85, 95, 126, 276 The Parable of the Lamp: Mk 4:21-23, 92-93, 126 The Parable of the Measure: Mk 4: 24-25, 92-94, 126, 321, 454 The Parable of the Growing Seed: Mk 4:26-29, 92, 126-127, 199, 453 The Parable of the Mustard Seed: Mk 4:30-34, 85, 92, 126-127, 453 Jesus Calms a Storm: Mk 4:35-41, 55-57, 134, 141, 201, 513 The Gerasene Demoniac: Mk 5:1-20, 55, 58-59, 132, 134, 136, 141, 201-202, 320, 401, 513 A Woman Cured, A Young Girl Raised: Mk 5:21-43, 88, 118, 132-134, 136, 142-143, 146, 247, 321

Index

603

Rejection at Nazareth: Mk 6:1-6, 94,125 The Mission of the Twelve: Mk 6:7-13, 91, 94, 132, 138, 401, 456, 465 Jesus and Herod: Mk 6:14-16, 34, 68, 356, 416 John the Baptizer Beheaded: Mk 6:17-29, 35-36, 68, 100, 145, 169-170 The First Multiplication of the Loaves: Mk 6:30-44, 86, 94-95, 125, 134-135, 138, 140-142, 254, 311, 320, 438, 456-513 Jesus Walks on Water and Invokes the Divine Name: Mk 6:45-56, 55-57, 75, 86, 129, 141, 320-321, 363, 437, 455, 515 The Traditions of the Pharisees: Mk 7:1-13, 41-42, 64, 95, 137, 145, 210, 222 What Makes One Unclean: Mk 7:14-23, 95-96, 130, 210-211, 154, 456 The Syrophoenician Woman’s Daughter: Mk 7:24-30, 86, 113, 210-211, 254, 456 A Deaf and Dumb Man Healed: Mk 7:31-37,135, 144, 321, 456 The Second Multiplication of the Loaves: Mk 8:1-10, 86, 134-135, 254, 311 Pharisees Seek a Sign: Mk 8:11-13, 65, 145, 439 The Leaven of the Pharisees and of Herod: Mk 8:14-21, 65, 68-69, 84, 96-97, 129, 145, 226, 320 A Blind Man Cured in Stages: Mk 8:22-26, 135-136, 457 Peter’s Confession: Mk 8:27-33, 35, 41, 59-60, 73, 75, 136-138, 141, 366 The First Prophecy of the Passion: Mk 8:31-33, 65, 69, 129, 137, 257, 457, 471 The Way of the Cross: Mk 8:34-9:1, 41-43, 73, 88, 99, 103, 118, 129, 136, 138, 370, 458 The Transfiguration: Mk 9:2-8, 42-43, 73, 88, 99, 103, 118, 129, 136, 138139, 141, 144, 247,258 The Discussion about Elijah: Mk 9:9-13, 65, 99-100, 129, 136 The Epileptic Demoniac Boy: Mk 9:14-29, 65-66, 100-101, 129, 132, 135, 137, 143-144, 146, 202, 321 The Second Prophecy of the Passion: Mk 9:30-34, 101, 137, 294 Ambition Rebuked: Mk 9:35-37, 101-102, 129, 137, 222, 462, 513 The Strange Exorcist: Mk 9:38-40, 84, 101-102, 129, 132, 462 Charity’s Reward: Mk 9:41, 102, 129 Avoiding Scandal: Mk 9:42-50, 101-103, 130, 295 Marriage and Divorce: Mk 10:1-12, 42, 66, 101, 103, 130, 184, 212 Jesus and the Children: Mk 10:13-16, 104, 130, 478 The Call of the Rich Young Man: Mk 10:17-22, 44, 130, 378 The Peril of Riches: Mk 10:23-27, 44, 130 Renunciation Rewarded: Mk 10:28-34,65, 69, 118, 139 The Third Prophecy of the Passion: Mk 10:28-31, 104, 137, 379-480 The Ambition of James and John: Mk 10:35-40, 104-105, 130, 137 Leadership in Service: Mk 10:41-45, 77, 105, 130-131, 137, 222, 232, 381 The Cured Blind Man Follows on the Way: Mk 10:46-52, 105-106, 135, 321 The Triumphal Entry: Mk 11:1-11, 70, 87, 106, 139, 146, 414, 442 The Fig Tree Cursed: Mk 11:12-14, 44-45, 70, 106-107, 134, 227, 428 The Cleansing of the Temple: Mk 11:15-19, 44-45, 66, 70-71, 87, 106-107, 137, 227-228, 423 The Withered Fig Tree: Mk 11:20-25, 44-45, 70, 107, 118, 134, 227, 477 Jesus’ Authority: Mk 11:27-33, 66, 71, 87, 137, 214, 358

604


The Parable of the Evil Tenants: Mk 12:1-12, 71-72, 422 Paying Caesar’s Taxes: Mk 12:13-17, 45-46, 66, 131, 216, 389, 422 The Controversy over Resurrection: Mk 12:18-27, 46-47, 72, 137, 380-381, 423 The Greatest Commandment: Mk 12:28-34, 47-48, 67, 131, 186, 367 David’s Lord: Mk 12:35-37, 51, 66-67, 87, 192, 423 Scribal Hypocrisy: Mk 12:38-40, 67, 131, 222 The Widow’s Coin: Mk 12:41-44, 67 The Eschatological Discourse: Mk 13:1-37, 47-48, 107-112, 118, 126, 128, 145 Introduction: Mk 13:1-4, 88, 107, 145, 443 The Beginning of Sorrows: Mk 13:5-13, 51, 108, 443 The Fall of Jerusalem: Mk 13:14-23, 108-110 The Coming of the Son of Man: Mk 13:24-32, 110 Eschatological Watchfulness: Mk 13:33-37, 110-112 The Priests Conspire Against Jesus: Mk 14:1-2, 87,112, 115, 137 Jesus Anointed: Mk 14:3-9, 112-113, 139 Judas the Traitor: Mk 14:10-11, 72. 113. 115. 229. 424 The Preparations for Passover: Mk 14:12-16, 113, 119, 139, 482 Judas’s Treachery Foretold: Mk 14:17-21, 113-115, 488 The Eucharist: Mk 14:22-25, 114-115, 119, 139, 141-142, 320, 363 Peter’s Denial Foretold: Mk 14:26-31, 116 The Agony in the Garden: Mk 14:32-42, 48, 88, 116-117, 144, 187, 247, 363 Jesus Arrested: Mk 14:43-52, 67, 72, 115-117, 119-120, 146, 188, 321, 425, 489 Jesus Before the Sanhedrin: Mk 14:53-65, 68, 72-76, 137, 139, 141, 229, 321, 384, 425 Peter Denies Jesus: Mk 14:66-72, 118 Jesus Tried by Pilate: Mk 15:1-15, 68, 76, 78-79, 87, 137, 233, 242, 426 Scourging and Mockery: Mk 15:16-20, 79, 137 The Way to Calvary: Mk 15:21-22, 120, 270, 431 The Crucifixion: Mk 15:23-27, 79, 137-138, 234 Jesus Mocked: Mk 15:28-32, 76, 137, 234 Jesus Dies: Mk 15:33-39, 48-49, 73, 79-80, 137-138, 146, 189, 234-235, 432, 510 The Women Witnesses: Mk 15:40-41, 121 Joseph Buries Jesus: Mk 15:41-47,121, 235, 270, 433, 490 The Young Man in the Tomb: Mk 16:1-8, 120-122, 139-140, 144, 146, 321, 491 Other Apparitions: Mk 16: 9-20, 118, 122, 132 THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW Jesus’ Genealogy: Mt 1:1-17, 154-155, 314 Jesus Immanuel: Mt 1:18-22, 152, 155-156, 171-172, 189, 193, 336, 359 The Coming of the Magi: Mt 2:1-12, 152,157-158, 324-325

Index

605

The Flight to Egypt and Massacre of the Innocents: Mt 2:13-18, 152, 158-159, 205, 314-315 The Return from Egypt: Mt 2:19-23, 152, 158-159, 315, 319 The Ministry of John the Baptizer: Mt 3:1-12, 161-162, 167, 171-173, 189, 193, 204, 226, 314, 316, 322, 325, 350, 352, 382 Jesus Baptized: Mt 3:13-17, 162-163, 191, 194-196, 316-318, 321-322, 361363, 397-398, 400, 482 Jesus Tempted: Mt 4:1-17, 173-175, 191, 194-196, 316-318, 321-322, 361363, 397-398, 400, 482 The Call of the First Disciples: Mt 4:18-22, 245-246 An Outpouring of Miracles: Mt 4:23-25, 200, 237, 247, 306, 511 The Sermon on the Mount: Mt 5:1-7:29, 152, 247, 276, 277-287, 322 The Beatitudes: Mt 5:1-10, 176, 220, 237, 277-279, 322 The Parables of Salt and Light: Mt 5:11-16, 280 Jesus and the Law: Mt 5:17-19, 149-150, 186, 204, 254, 281, 313-314 The New Morality: Mt 5:20-48, 177, 213-214, 254, 281-284, 195 Secret Almsgiving: Mt 6:1-4, 177, 284-285 Secret Prayer: Mt 6:5-6, 177, 284 The Lord’s Prayer: Mt 6:7-15, 177-180, 187, 196, 286, 363-367 Secret Fasting: Mt 6:16-18, 284, 372 Treasure in Heaven: Mt 6:19-21, 285, 372 The Parable about the Eye: Mt 6:22-23, 285-286, 273 God and Money: Mt 6:24, 285, 473 The Parable about the Lilies of the Field: Mt 6:25-34, 184, 246, 285 Do Not Judge: Mt 7:1-5, 286, 451 Pearls and Swine: Mt 7:6, 286 Confident Prayer: Mt 7:7-11, 181 The Golden Rule: Mt 7:12, 285 The Two Gates: Mt 7:13-14, 285 The Fruits of Prophecy: Mt 7:15-20, 286 True Discipleship: Mt 7:21-29, 181, 202, 286-287, 452 The Cure of a Leper: Mt 8:1-4, 237, 306-307, 322 The Centurion’s Servant Healed: Mt 8:5-13, 307, 511-512 The Cure of Peter’s Mother-in-law: Mt 8:14-15, 200, 307-308, 318, 321 Many Cures and Exorcisms: Mt 8:16-17, 200-201, 237, 308 The Wandering Messiah: Mt 8:18-22, 204-205, 238, 246, 464 Jesus Calms the Sea: Mt 8:23-27, 201-202, 238, 347-348, 308, 513, 455 The Demoniacs of Gadara: Mt 8:28-34, 201, 350, 308-309, 320, 510, 513 The Cure of a Paralytic: Mt 9:1-8, 205, 309, 363, 406 Matthew Called: Mt 9:9, 250 Table Fellowship with Sinners: Mt 9:10-13, 205-208, 250, 406 The Debate over Fasting: Mt 9:14-17, 163-165, 206, 355, 406 A Woman Cured, a Girl Raised: Mt 9:18-26, 247, 309-310, 321 Two Blind Men Healed: Mt 9:27-31, 310 A Dumb Demoniac Exorcized: Mt 9:32-34, 196-197, 251, 310, 403 The Ripe Harvest: Mt 9:35-37, 250, 465 The Missionary Discourse: Mt 10:1-11:1, 152, 238, 276, 287-290, 401

606


The Sending of the Twelve: Mt 10:1-16, 246, 250-251, 287-288, 465 Missionaries Persecuted: Mt 10:17-25, 180, 191, 196-197, 251, 257, 288289, 482 Fearless Proclamation: Mt 10:26-33, 180-181, 251, 288-289, 370 Final Teachings: Mt 10:34-11:1, 238, 252-253, 289-290, 345, 471, 485 The Baptizer’s Question: Mt 11:2-5, 165, 311, 356 Jesus Praises John: Mt 11:6-15, 166-168, 238, 357 The Fickle Children: Mt 11:16-19, 168-169, 197, 238, 356 The Unbelief of the Lake Towns: Mt 11:20-24, 238 Jesus Reveals the Father: Mt 11:25-30, 182-183, 239, 314, 325, 389, 507 Picking Corn on the Sabbath: Mt 12:1-8, 206-208 A Man with a Withered Hand Cured: Mt 12:9-14, 205, 208, 3111, 405, 407 Jesus the Servant Heals: Mt 12:15-21, 191-192, 311, 318 The Controversy over Beelzebul: Mt 12:22-32, 191-192, 196-198, 209, 251, 311, 369, 390, 403 Speech Discloses the Heart: Mt 12:33-37, 192 The Sign of Jonah: Mt 12:38-42, 208-210, 226 The Unclean Spirit Returns: Mt 12:43-45, 198, 209, 507 Jesus’ True Family: Mt 12:46-50, 183, 239, 252, 364, 454 The Parabolic Discourse: Mt 13:1-52, 152, 239, 276, 290-293 Introduction: Mt 13:1-3, 291 The Parable of the Sower: Mt 13:4-9, 291 Speaking in Parables: Mt 13:10-17, 239-240, 252, 286, 291, 318, 438 The Allegory of the Sower: Mt 13:18-23, 291-292 The Parable About Weeds in the Wheat: Mt 13:24-30, 291-292 The Parable of the Mustard Seed: Mt 13:31-32, 291 The Parable of the Leaven: Mt 13:33, 291 Teaching in Parables: Mt 13:34-35, 239, 291, 319 The Allegory of the Weeds in the Wheat: Mt 13:36-43, 198-199, 253, 292 The Parables of the Treasure and the Pearl: Mt 13:44-46, 253, 292-293 The Parable about the Net Full of Fish: Mt 13:47-50, 253, 292 The Ideal Scribe: Mt 13:51-52, 150, 253-254, 293 Rejection at Nazareth: Mt 13:53-58, 240, 435 Jesus and Herod: Mt 14:1-2, 225, 416 The Death of the Baptizer: Mt 14:3-12, 169-170, 205, 225-226 The First Multiplication of the Loaves: Mt 14:13-21, 240-241, 254, 3111, 438, 451, 484, 513 Jesus and Peter Walk on the Water: Mt 14:22-33, 248-250, 320, 322, 324 Many Cures at Gennesaret: Mt 14:34-36, 437 The Traditions of the Pharisees: Mt 15:1-9, 183, 210, 254 What Makes One Unclean: Mt 15:10-20, 183-184, 205, 210-211, 241, 254 The Canaanite Woman’s Daughter Delivered: Mt 15:21-28, 202, 205, 312, 325 Many Cures Near the Lake: Mt 15:29-31, 241, 325 The Second Multiplication of the Loaves: Mt 15:32-39, 241, 254, 311-312, 325 Reading the Signs of the Times: Mt 16:1-4, 226, 229

Index

607

The Leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees: Mt 16:5-12, 211-212, 226, 254, 322 Peter’s Profession: Mt 16:13-20, 150, 240, 246, 254-256, 320, 366, 412, 457 The First Prophecy of the Passion: Mt 16:21-23, 187, 227, 256-257, 324 The Demands of Discipleship: Mt 16:24-28, 257, 270 The Transfiguration: Mt 17:1-8, 257-258, 322 The Discussion about Elijah: Mt 17:9-13, 258 The Moonstruck Boy: Mt17: 14-21, 202, 240, 258-259, 312, 321, 477 The Second Prophecy of the Passion: Mt 17:22-23, 227, 259 Peter and the Tax: Mt 17:24-27, 218-220, 324 The Ecclesial Discourse: Mt 17:24-18:35, 152, 259, 276, 293-298 Becoming a Child: Mt 18:1-4, 294 Avoiding Scandal: Mt 18:5-11, 184, 294-295 The Lost Sheep: Mt 18:12-14, 295-296, 375 Mutual Correction: Mt 18:15-18, 296, 477 Prayer in Common: Mt 18:19-20, 181, 296-297 The Unforgiving Servant: Mt 18:23-35, 179-180, 197-198 Marriage and Divorce: Mt 19:1-12, 184, 212-214, 241, 259-260 Jesus and the Children: Mt 19:13-15, 260, 363, 478 The Call of the Rich Man: Mt 19:16-26, 185, 260-261, 378 The Reward of Renunciation: Mt 19:27-30, 261-262, 381 The Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard: Mt 20:1-16, 262-263 The Third Prophecy of the Passion: Mt 20:17-19, 227, 480 The Mother of James and John: Mt 20:21-23, 263-264 Leadership in Service: Mt 20:24-28, 232, 264 Two Blind Men Healed: Mt 20:29-34, 310 The Triumphal Entry: Mt 21:1-11, 207, 241-242, 264, 318-319, 442 The Cleansing of the Temple: Mt 21:12-17, 228-229, 242 The Barren Fig Tree: Mt 21:18-22, 227, 264-265, 314, 428 Jesus’ Authority: Mt 21:21-27, 229 The Parable of the Two Sons: Mt 21:28-32, 214-215 The Parable of the Wicked Tenants: Mt 21:33-46, 215, 228, 242, 422 The Parable of the Wedding Feast: Mt 22:1-14, 216-217, 265-266 Paying Caesar’s Taxes: Mt 22:15-22, 185-186, 216, 380, 422 The Debate over Resurrection: Mt 22:23-33, 186-212, 226, 229, 423, 485 The Greatest Commandment: Mt 22:34-40, 186, 367 David’s Lord: Mt 22:41-46, 192 Pharisaical Hypocrisy and Christian Clericalism: Mt 23:1-12, 217-218 The Woes: Mt 23:13-36, 220-222 The Lament over Jerusalem: Mt 23:37-39, 222-223, 260 The Eschatological Discourse: Mt 24:1-25:46, 153, 266, 276, 298-304 Introduction: Mt 24:1-3, 298, 443 The Beginning of Tribulations: Mt 24:4-14, 298-299, 443 The Destruction of Jerusalem: Mt 24:15-25, 299-300, 469 The Second Coming: Mt 24:26-36, 300-301, 469 Eschatological Readiness: Mt 24:37-44, 300-302, 469, 471 True Stewardship: Mt 24:45-51, 302

608


The Parable of the Bridesmaids: Mt 25:1-13, 302-303 The Parable of the Talents: Mt 25:14-30, 303 The Parable of the Sheep and the Goats: Mt 25:31-46, 187, 303-304, 324 The Priests Conspire Against Jesus: Mt 26:1-5, 225, 242, 424 The Anointing at Bethany: Mt 26:6-13, 266 Judas Betrays Jesus: Mt 26:14-16, 229, 324 Passover Preparations: Mt 26: 17-19, 267 The Last Supper: Mt 26:20-25, 267, 324, 484, 488 The Eucharist: Mt 26:26-29, 153, 161, 187, 267, 320 Peter’s Denial Predicted: Mt 26:30-35, 267-268, 324 The Agony in the Garden: Mt 26:36-46, 187, 268, 363 The Arrest: Mt 26:47-56, 153, 188, 269, 319, 324, 425, 489 Jesus Faces the Sanhedrin: Mt 26:57-68, 153, 267 Peter Denies Jesus: Mt 26:69-75, 153, 267 Judas Despairs: Mt 27:1-10, 229-231, 270, 324, 484 Jesus Before Pilate: Mt 27:11-26, 231, 233, 242-243, 322, 426 Jesus Scourged and Mocked: Mt 27:27-31, 233-234, 243, 322 The Crucifixion: Mt 27: 32-38, 233-234, 243, 322 The Crucified Jesus Mocked: Mt 27:39-44, 231, 244, 321, 482 Jesus Dies: Mt 27:45-56, 153, 189, 234-235, 247, 325 Joseph Buries Jesus: Mt 27:57-61, 235, 270-271, 324, 433, 490 The Guards at the Tomb: Mt 27:62-66, 235 The Empty Tomb: Mt 28:1-8, 153, 247, 271, 322, 324, 491 Jesus Appears to the Women: Mt 28:9-10, 153, 271-272, 324 Lies about Jesus’ Resurrection: Mt 28:11-15, 223, 236 The Great Commission: Mt 28:16-20, 171-172, 189, 193, 244, 247, 272-273, 307, 319, 322-325, 493-494 THE GOSPEL OF LUKE Prologue: Lk:1-4, 329-330, 540 John’s Birth Foretold: Lk 1:5-25, 334-337, 359, 433, 541 The Annunciation: Lk 1:26-38, 334,337, 359, 541 The Visitation, The Magnificat: Lk 1:39-56, 334, 338-340, 346, 359, 439 The Birth and Circumcision of John: Lk 1:57-66, 335, 340, 359 The Benedictus: Lk 1:67-79, 334, 340-341, 359-360, 540 John’s Boyhood: Lk 1:80, 341 Jesus’ Birth: Lk 2:1-20, 334, 341-344, 360, 414, 464, 516 The Circumcision and Presentation: Lk 2:21-38, 344-347, 360, 494, 540-541 Jesus’ Hidden Life: Lk 2:39-40, 347, 360, 540 The Finding in the Temple: Lk 2:41-52, 333-334, 347-348, 360 John the Baptizer Preaches: Lk 3:1-18, 349-353, 360, 387, 391, 416, 420, 427, 434, 445, 541 John Imprisoned: Lk 19-20, 352-353, 416 Jesus Baptized: Lk 3:21-22, 353-354, 361, 387-388, 526, 540, 544 Jesus’ Genealogy: Lk 3:23-38, 360-361, 422

Index

609

Jesus Tempted: Lk 4:1-13, 342, 361-363, 382, 397-400, 430, 439, 464, 495, 541 Jesus at Nazareth: Lk 4:14-30, 345, 388-389, 420, 435-436, 504, 541 The Exorcism at Capernaum: Lk 4:31-37, 400, 446, 510, 515 Simon’s Mother-in-law Healed: Lk 4:38-39, 446- 510 Evening Cures: Lk 4: 40-41, 400-401, 510 Jesus Tours Judea: Lk 4:42-44, 436-437, 510 The Call of the First Disciples: Lk 5:1-11, 363, 446-447, 515 A Leper Cured: Lk 5:12-16, 511, 515, 538 A Paralytic Cured: Lk 5:17-26, 363, 406, 511, 543 The Call of Levi and Table Fellowship with Sinners: Lk 5:27-32, 354, 406, 447 The Debate over Fasting: Lk 5:33-39, 354-355, 406-407 Picking Grain on the Sabbath: Lk 61-65, 407 A Withered Hand Healed: Lk 6:6-11, 407, 511 The Call of the Twelve: Lk 6:12-16, 448, 494 The Crowds Seek Jesus: Lk 6:17-19, 437, 511, 538 The Sermon on the Plain: Lk 6:20-49, 44-452, 498-499, 543 The Beatitudes and Woes: Lk 6:20-26, 448-450 Love of Enemies: Lk 6:27-35, 450-451 Compassion and Generosity: Lk 6:36-38, 451 Avoiding Judgment: Lk 6:39-45, 451 True Discipleship: Lk 6:45-49, 451-452 The Centurion’s Servant Healed: Lk 7:1-10, 511-512 The Raising of the Widow’s Son: Lk 7:11-17, 365, 452, 512, 538, 543 The Baptizer’s Question: Lk 7:18-22, 355-356, 512 Jesus Praises John: Lk 7:23-30, 356, 365, 438, 512, 538 The Fickle Children: Lk 7:31-35, 356 The Sinful Woman: Lk 7:36-50, 407-409 Women Disciples with Jesus: Lk 8:1-3, 416, 453 The Parabolic Discourse: Lk 8:4-18, 363, 453-454, 499 The Parable of the Sower: Lk 8: 4-10, 438‘ 453 Teaching in Parables: Lk 8:9-10, 438 The Allegory of the Sower: Lk 8:11-15, 401, 453-454 The Parable of the Lamp: Lk 8:16-18, 440-441, 453-454 Jesus’ True Family: Lk 8:19-21, 364, 455 Jesus Calms a Storm: Lk 8:22-25, 401, 455, 513 The Gerasene Demoniac: Lk 8:26-39, 365, 401, 455, 513 A Woman Cured, A Girl Raised: Lk 8:40-56, 455-456, 513 The Missionary Discourse: Lk 9:1-6, 401-402, 456, 487, 499-500 Jesus and Herod: Lk 9:7-9, 356-357, 416-417, 457 The Multiplication of the Loaves: 9:10-17, 437-438, 456, 492, 513, 515-516, 543 Peter’s Profession: Lk 9:18-21, 366, 417, 437, 456-457 The First Prophecy of the Passion: Lk 9:22, 420, 457-459 The Way of the Cross: Lk 9:23-26, 458-459, 490 The Transfiguration: Lk 9:28-36, 401, 417, 459-460, 494-495, 543 The Epileptic Demoniac Boy: Lk 9:37-43, 365, 402, 461

610


The Second Prophecy of the Passion: Lk 9:44-45, 463 Avoiding Ambition: Lk 9:46-48, 461-462 The Strange Exorcist: Lk 9:49-50, 462 The Journey Discourse: Lk 9:51-19:27, 463-480, 500-508 The Inhospitable Samaritans: Lk 9:51-56, 463-464, 501 The Demands of Discipleship Lk 9:57-62, 464, 501 The Mission of the Seventy-Two: Lk 10: 1-16, 402-403, 454, 465-466 The Seventy-Two Return: The Fall of Satan like Lightning: Lk 10:17-20, 403, 466-467, 487-488, 503, 513 Jesus Reveals the Father: Lk 10:21-22, 366-367, 389-390, 503 The Privileges of Discipleship: Lk 10:23-24, 240-467, 503 The Great Commandment: Lk 10:25-28, 367-368 The Parable of the Good Samaritan: Lk 10:29-37, 368, 502 Martha and Mary: Lk 10: 38-42, 468, 503 The Father Prayer: Lk 11:1-4, 363-364, 468, 505 The Parable of the Persistent Friend: Lk 11:5-8, 378, 468 Persistent Prayer: Lk 11:9-13, 389-390, 468, 505 The Controversy About Beelzebul: Lk 11:14-23, 369, 403-404, 507, 541 The Unclean Spirit Returns: Lk 11:24-26, 507 A Woman Blesses Jesus: Lk 11: 27-28, 27-28, The Sign of Jonah: Lk 11:29-32, 439-440, 505, 543 The Parable of the Lamp Revisited: Lk 11:33-36, 440-441, 505 Woes to the Pharisees and Lawyers: Lk 11:37-54, 222, 409-411, 507 The Leaven of the Pharisees: Lk 12: 1-3, 412-413, 441, 515 Facing Persecution: Lk 12:4-12, 369-370, 390-391, 398, 403, 412, 439, 482, 503 Against Hoarding: The Rich Fool: Lk 12:13-21, 370, 439, 469, 503, 530 The Parable of the Ravens and the Flowers: Lk 12:22-32, 372-372, 469, 504 Almsgiving: Lk 12:33-34, 469 Eschatological Readiness: Lk 12:35-48, 372-373, 469, 472-473, 506 Jesus’ Second Baptism: Lk 12:49-50, 357, 391, 506 Reading the Signs of the Times: Lk 12:54-59, 441-442, 506 Pilate’s Violence: Lk 13:1-5, 428 The Parable of the Barren Fig Tree: Lk 13:6-9, 428-430 A Woman Healed on the Sabbath: Lk 13:10-17, 365, 404, 507, 514 The Parable of the Mustard Seed: Lk 13: 18-19, 453 The Parable of the Yeast: Lk 13:20-21, 506 Who Will Find Salvation: Lk 13:22-30, 506-507 Herod the Fox: Lk 13:31-33, 405, 412, 417 The Lament over Jerusalem: Lk 13:34-35, 328, 417-418, 502, 516 A Dropsical Man Healed on the Sabbath: Lk 14:1-6, 407, 514 On Cultivating Humility: Lk 14:7-11, 436 Hospitality to the Marginal: Lk 14:12-14, 504 The Parable of the Wedding Feast: Lk 14:15–24, 507 The Kingdom and Family Relationships: Lk 14:25-27, 501 Renouncing Possessions: Lk 14:28-33, 501 Against Tepidity: Lk 14:34-35, 501-502

Index

611

The Parable of the Lost Sheep: Lk 15:1-7, 374-375, 412-413 The Parable of the Lost Coin: Lk 15:8-10, 374-375, 412-413 The Prodigal Son and the Dutiful Son: Lk 15:11-32, 375-376, 413-414, 475, 508 The Crafty Steward: Lk 16:1-8, 373, 504 Using Money: Lk 16:9-13, 373-374. 504 Pharisaical Greed: Lk 16:14-15, 373. 474-475 Storming the Kingdom: Lk 16:16, 357, 476 The Law Remains: Lk 16:17, 357, 476 Marriage and Divorce: Lk 16:18, 476 The Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus: Lk 16:19-31, 475, 504 Avoiding Scandal: Lk 17:1-3a, 502 Mutual Forgiveness: Lk 17:3b-4, 477, 502 Increasing Faith: Lk 17:5-6, 477, 505 Unprofitable Servants: Lk 17:7-10, 477-478, 503 Ten Lepers Cured: Lk 17:11-19, 365, 514 The Coming of the Kingdom: Lk 17:20-37, 469-471 The Widow and the Unjust Judge: Lk 18:1-8, 377, 471-472, 505 The Pharisee and the Publican: Lk 18:9-14, 376-377 Jesus and the Little Infants: Lk 18:15-17, 478 The Call of the Rich Ruler: Lk 18:18-27, 3778-379, 504 The Reward of Renunciation: Lk 18:28-30, 471, 480, 516 The Third Prophecy of the Passion: Lk 18:31-34, 471, 480, 516 A Blind Man Cured: Lk 18:35-43, 417. 505, 514 Jesus and Zacchaeus: Lk 19:1-10, 504 The Parable of the Pounds: Lk 19: 11 4-27, 479, 486, 502 The Entry into Jerusalem: Lk 19:28-40, 365. 414-415, 442, 482-481, 486 The Lament over Jerusalem: Lk 19:41-44, 412, 414-415 The Purification of the Temple: Lk 19:45-48, 421 The Source of Jesus’ Authority: Lk 20:1-8, 358, 442, 523 The Parable of the Wicked Tenants: Lk 20:9-19, 421-422, 442 Paying Caesar’s Taxes: Lk 20:20-26, 380, 422 The Controversy over Resurrection: Lk 20:17-40, 380-381, 422-423, 541 David’s Lord: Lk 20:41-44, 423 Scribal Hypocrisy: Lk 20:45-47, 222, 423, 442 The Widow’s Coin: Lk 21:1-4, 421,482 The Eschatological Discourse: Lk 21-38, 441-444, 508 Introduction: Lk 21:5-7, 442 The First Tribulations: Lk 21:8-19, 443, 482 Jerusalem Destroyed: Lk 21:21-24, 443 The Coming of the Son of Man: Lk 21:25-28, 443-444, 495 Eschatological Readiness: Lk 21:29-38, 444 The Conspiracy against Jesus: Lk 22:1-6, 424, 442, 482 The Preparation of Passover: Lk 22:7-13, 483 The Last Supper: Lk 22:14-18, 483 The Eucharist: Lk 22:19-20, 483-484, 515-516, 543 The Last Discourse: Lk 22:21-38, 363, 381-382, 465, 469, 484-487, 508, 538

612


Jesus Prays in the Garden: Lk 22:39-46, 382-383, 391, 488-489, 538 The Arrest: Lk 22:47-53, 424-425, 489, 514, 516, 541 Peter Denies Jesus: Lk 22:54-65, 425, 290 The Morning Trial: Lk 22:66-23:1, 383-384, 425-426, 542 Jesus Before Pilate, I: Lk 23:2-7, 426-428 Jesus Before Herod: Lk 23:8-12, 418-419, 426, 428, 430 Jesus Before Pilate, II: Lk 23:13-25, 426, 430, 521 The Way to Calvary: Lk 23:26-32, 412, 431-432, 490, 513 The Crucifixion: Lk 23:33-34, 384, 426-427, 432, 513, 522, 530, 542 Jesus Mocked: The Good Thief: Lk 23:35-43, 534, 384-385, 427, 432, 530 Jesus Dies: Lk 23:44-46, 385, 432 The Centurion and the Crowds: Lk 23:47-49, 427, 432, 434, 445 Joseph Buries Jesus: Lk 23:50-56, 433, 490 The Empty Tomb: Lk 24:1-12, 463, 491, 516, 544 The Way to Emmaus: Lk 24:13-35, 359, 438, 492-493, 513, 543-544 Jesus Appears to the Disciples in Jerusalem: Lk 24:36-49, 351, 385-386, 493, 526, 541 The Ascension: Lk 24:50-54, 494, 540 THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES Prologue: Act 1:1-5, 331, 351, 390, 491, 526, 540-541, 543 The Ascension: Act 1:6-11, 471, 495, 540, 544 The Disciples in the Upper Room: Act 1:12-14, 346, 391-392, 5117-518, 541 Replacing Judas: Act 1:15-26, 2:1-13, 346, 484, 517-518 Pentecost: Act 2: 1-13, 352, 382, 388, 390, 391-394, 468, 493, 517 Peter’s Pentecost Sermon: Act 2:14-36, 346, 382, 394, 487, 493, 517-520, 539, 543 The First Baptisms: Act 2:37-41, 346, 382, 394-395, 493-494, 541 The Jerusalem Community: Act 2:42-47, 395, 521 The Cure at the Beautiful Gate: Act 3:1-10, 521, 538-539, 541 Peter’s Temple Discourse: Act 3:11-26, 521-522, 539 The Apostles before the Sanhedrin: Act 4:1-22, 522-524, 541-542 The Little Pentecost: Act 4:23-31, 523-524 Ananias and Sapphira: Act 5:1-11, 382, 398-399, 486, 541 Arrest and Deliverance: Act 5:17-21a, 524, 538, 542 The Second Appearance before the Sanhedrin: Act 5:21b-33, 524-525, 542 Gamaliel’s Intervention: Act 5:34-42, 524-525 The Seven Deacons: Act 6:1-15, 425 Stephen’s Arrest and Speech: Act 7:1-54, 521, 527-530, 543 The Death of Stephen: Act 7:55-8:3, 530, 538, 542, 544 Philip in Samaria: Act 8:4-8, 525 Simon the Magician: Act 8:9-25, 382, 539 Philip Baptizes a Eunuch: Act 8:26-40, 525 The Conversion of Saul: Act 9:1-19, 493, 531-533, 538, 544 Paul in Damascus: Act 9:20-25, 533, 539 Paul in Jerusalem: Act 9:26-31, 533, 539

Index

613

Peter Cures a Paralytic: Act 9:32-35, 538, 543 Peter Raises a Woman: Act 9:36-43, 538-539 Peter Comes to the Household of Cornelius: Act 10:1-33, 487, 525, 539 Peter’s Speech in the House of Cornelius: Act 10:34-43, 512, 526, 539 Peter Baptizes the Household of Cornelius: Acts 10:44-48, 526 Peter Defends His Baptism of the Household of Cornelius: Act 11:1-18a, 525 The Foundation of the Church at Antioch: Act 11:18b-30, 534 Peter’s Arrest and Miraculous Deliverance: Act 12:1-19, 487, 536, 538-539 Paul and Elymus: Act 13:4-12, 539 Paul at Antioch in Pisidia: Act 13:13-43,534-535, 539 Paul and Barnabas Turn to the Pagans: Act 13:44-52, 534-535 Paul Heals a Cripple: Act 14:8-18, 487, 538-539, 543 The Convocation in Jerusalem, Act 15:1-21, 527, 539 The Apostolic Letter: Act 15:22-29, 382, 486 Paul Sent by Vision to Macedonia: Act 16:9-10, 539 Paul and Silas Imprisoned and Delivered: Act 16:16-40, 538-539 Paul in Athens: Act 17:16-22a, 536-537 Paul’s Speech before the Areopagus: Act 16:22b-34, 537 The Disciples at Ephesus: Act 19:1-7, 539-540 The Jewish Exorcists: Act 19:11-20, 538-539 Paul Raises a Dead Man: Act20:7-12, 538-539 Paul’s Farewell to the Elders of Ephesus: Act 20:17-38, 382, 537, 539 Paul’s Address in Jerusalem: Act 22:1-21, 531-533, 536, 538, 539 Paul before the Sanhedrin: Act 22:30-23:11, 487, 541-542 Paul Appeals to Caesar, Act 25:1-12, 539 Paul’s Speech before King Agrippa: Act 26:1-23, 346, 531-533, 538 Paul in Rome: Act 28:30-31, 328, 524

Marquette Studies in Philosophy Andrew Tallon, Editor Standing orders accepted All books available as eBook Harry Klocker, S.J. William of Ockham and the Divine Freedom. ISBN 0-87462-001-5. 141 pages, pp., index. $15. Second edition, reviewed, corrected and with a new Introduction. Margaret Monahan Hogan. Finality and Marriage. ISBN 0-87462-600-5. 122 pp. Paper. $15. Gerald A. McCool, S.J. The Neo-Thomists. ISBN 0-87462-601-1. 175 pp. Paper. $20. Max Scheler. Ressentiment. ISBN 0-87462-602-1. 172 pp. Paper. $20. New Introduction by Manfred S. Frings. Knud Løgstrup. Metaphysics. Translated by Dr. Russell Dees ISBN 0-87462-603-X. Volume I, 342 pp. Paper. $35. ISBN 0-67462-607-2. Volume II, 402 pp. Paper. $40. Two volume set priced at $70. Howard P. Kainz. Democracy and the “Kingdom of God” . ISBN 0-87462-610-2. 250 pp. Paper. $25. Manfred Frings. Max Scheler. A Concise Introduction into the World of a Great Thinker ISBN 0-87462-605-6. 200 pp. Paper. $20. Second ed., rev. New Foreword by the author. G. Heath King. Existence Thought Style: Perspectives of a Primary Relation, portrayed through the work of Søren Kierkegaard. English edition by Timothy Kircher. ISBN 087462-606-4. 187 pp., index. Paper. $20. Augustine Shutte. Philosophy for Africa. ISBN 0-87462-608-0. 184 pp. Paper. $20. Paul Ricoeur. Key to Husserl’s Ideas I. Translated by Bond Harris and Jacqueline Bouchard Spurlock.With a Foreword by Pol Vandevelde. ISBN 0-87462-609-9. 176 pp., index. Paper. $20. Karl Jaspers. Reason and Existenz. Afterword by Pol Vandevelde. ISBN 0-87462-611-0. 180 pp. Paper. $20. Gregory R. Beabout. Freedom and Its Misuses: Kierkegaard on Anxiety and Despair ISBN 0-87462-612-9. 192 pp., index. Paper. $20. Manfred S. Frings. The Mind of Max Scheler. The First Comprehensive Guide Based on the Complete Works ISBN 0-87462-613-7. 328 pp. Paper. $35. Claude Pavur. Nietzsche Humanist. ISBN 0-87462-614-5. 214 pp., index. Paper. $25. Pierre Rousselot. Intelligence: Sense of Being, Faculty of God. Translation of L’Intellectualismse de saint Thomas with a Foreword and Notes by Andrew Tallon. ISBN 0-87462-6153. 236 pp., index. Paper. $25. Immanuel Kant. Critique of Practical Reason. Translation by H.W. Cassirer. Edited by G. Heath King and Ronald Weitzman and with an Introduction by D.M. MacKinnon. ISBN 0-87462-616-1. Paper. 218 pp. $20. Gabriel Marcel’s Perspectives on The Broken World. Translated by Katharine Rose Hanley. The Broken World, A Four-Act Play followed by “Concrete Approaches to Investigating the Ontological Mystery.” Six orignal illustrations by Stephen Healy. Commentaries by Henri Gouhier and Marcel Belay. Eight Appendices. Introduction by Ralph McInerny. Bibliographies. ISBN 0-87462-617-X. paperbound. 242 pp. $25. Karl-Otto Apel. Towards a Transformation of Philosophy. New Fore-word by Pol Vandevelde.ISBN 0-87462-619-6. Paper. 308 pp. $35. Gene Fendt. Is Hamlet a Religious Drama? As Essay on a Question in Kierkegaard. ISBN 087462-620-X. Paper. 264 pp. $30.

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