Faith

Condemnation or commendation? – Sunday- 32nd Week in Ordinary time – Mark 12:38-44

Perhaps what causes all the conflicts while reading this pericope, is that in the Bible, this pericope is separated by a title, making it seem like two pericopes rather than one. The Bible has verse 38 to 40 with the title, “Jesus denounces the scribes” which amounts to a condemnation and then verses 41 to 44 are titled, “the widow’s offering” which makes it a commendation. So what really is this pericope all about?

To better understand the point being made, we need to read this text in its larger context of Mark chapter 12, in which Jesus is having a battle royal with the Jewish authorities and in particular, with the scribes. After having fended off the traps and wily ways of the Jewish leaders, Jesus goes into attack mode.

It would be a mistake to think that the point of this pericope is the charity of the widow, for Jesus was presenting the widow as a contrast to the ostentatious and hypocritical scribes who search for honour and prestige. Beneath the folds of their religious robes were hidden their desire and lust for power and position. Couple this with their greed, which did not even spare the widows who were presented in antiquity as persons worthy of protection by the community.

The scribes who were interpreters of the religious law also provided legal services because of their learning. This dual role perhaps created an impression in the minds of hapless widows who assumed that the services rendered, would be honest. Why would an unsuspecting widow think less of a lawyer with a reputation for piety?

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A’scribe’-ing to Jesus- 9th week in ordinary time- Thursday – Mark 12: 28-32

The fourth round of attacks on Jesus was led by the Sadducees who, as we are told have been shut down and shut up. Now that the big guns have been silenced, it seems there is no one left to question Jesus; but there was!

The man in question was a scribe; a copyist and an interpreter of the law. The scribes were professionals at spelling out the letter of the Law while often ignoring the spirit behind it, bringing them in sharp conflict with Jesus. But they studied and interpreted the books with unwavering devotion. This is why the Jews and Semitic religions are often referred to as ‘people of the book’.

The scribe in our pericope seems to be one with a mind of his own. He has been hovering in the temple, listening to the Jesus haters who came in attack formation, wave after wave. He stands in admiration of Jesus for His ability to ‘answer them well’.

His admiration could have stemmed from the fact that he was part of the Pharisee party and if that was so, Jesus has just shut up the scribe’s rivals, the Sadducees, with a brilliant answer. Perhaps his admiration may have been intellectual; he himself being a man of letter, found in this simple carpenter intelligence par excellence.

Whatever be his motivation, there is no doubt that a curiosity to get to know Jesus had crept in. He directs his question not to trap Jesus but to get to know what he stands for. In asking Jesus ‘which is the greatest commandment’, he was throwing Jesus a question that was often asked to all Jewish religious leaders.

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Entrapment 4.0 – 9th Week in ordinary time-Wednesday – Mark 12:18-27

By now Jesus had just about ticked off most of the Jewish groups in the temple. He has effectively become enemy number one and after three failed attempts to trap Him, a fourth attempt is made. The big guns are brought out to tackle him and the Sadducees were a force to reckon with.

Politically, the Sadducees were aligned with Roman rule in a ‘while they reign, let us gain’ alliance. In doing so, their position as authorities in the Jewish ruling council (the Sanhedrin), were secure. They formed the upper social and economic echelon of Judean society.

But it is their rejection of the oral law that saw them caught up in constant inter-Jewish disputes between the Pharisees, who unlike them, accepted the belief in the resurrection, the immortality of the soul and the existence of angels. For the Sadducees, the ‘go to book’ was the Torah or as we know, the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible. They did not accept the historical books or the prophets. The Sadducees based their rejection of the resurrection on the silence of the Pentateuch which they strictly followed.

So when entrapment in all its forms fails, the Sadducees were sent in with a different strategy. Jesus is not asked a political question that could land Him in trouble, if answered wrongly. This time it’s a religious doctrinal question entwined in a hypothetical situation with a clear attempt to reduce the doctrine of the resurrection to absurdity.

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Show me the money – 9th week in Ordinary time- Tuesday- Mark 12:13-17

Lather and shave, that’s what the late Fr Larry Pereira, my former parish priest, often called the method employed by some to obscure the knives drawn out before the kill. Disarm the victim with flummery and when the unsuspecting victim finds comfort in the barber’s chair, pull out the razor.

Flummery, the Jewish authorities did apply, albeit futilely with Jesus. If Jesus did not fall for the wily ways of satan’s temptatious offers, He most certainly would not fall for the puffery of the Pharisees and Herodians. So when they approached Him, heaping ‘certificates of character’ like ‘you are a sincere man’ ‘you show no deference to any one’ ‘you teach the way of God in accordance with truth’, it has no effect on the Lord.

Jesus confronts their hypocrisy. “Why” he asks them, “are you putting me to the test?” They thought they had an ingenious plan; butter Him up like a croissant before posing a seemingly unanswerable query. But tried their luck and failed, they did!

Politics makes strange bed fellows. The Herodians could barely stand the Pharisees. The former were politicians aligned to King Herod and by extension to the hated Romans; the latter were religious lawmakers. Independently, they had knives drawn at each other’s throats. Together they struck a deal to lock Jesus in the horns of a dilemma. Should Jesus consent to paying the hated Poll tax?

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‘Mark’ this week
On Monday we switch back to the liturgical cycle in Ordinary time. Just for one week, the ninth week in ordinary time, we will dwell on the twelfth chapter of the Gospel of Mark. It’s St. Mark all week long before we switch to St. Matthew in the tenth week in ordinary time. Chapter twelve of the gospel of Mark consists of passages, often called the ‘interrogation passages’, highlighting the plot by the Jewish authorities to trap Jesus.

Sandwiched between the triumphant entry into Jerusalem (chapter 11) and the last supper, (chapter 14) the passages of chapter 12 and 13 contain the last of Jesus’ interactions before His passion and death. The stage is the temple of Jerusalem, the protagonist is Jesus and the villains are played by the Jewish authorities.

The game plan of the Jewish leaders, seen in the readings of this week, is the same. Get Jesus by hook or by crook even if one has to play ‘good cop and bad cop’. That is exactly what they did. First they sent in the big guns (11:27) the chief priests, scribes and the elders. When that failed, they sent to Him the legal eagles in the guise of the Pharisees and Herodians (12:13), who ironically could never get along for they hated each other.

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