Tuesday, March 14, 2006

First Pass at This Weekend's Bible Lesson: Mark 14:3-9

This weekend's Bible lesson at the congregation I serve as pastor, Friendship Lutheran Church, coming during the third weekend in Lent and in our Forty Days to Servanthood emphasis is part of the Gospel of Mark's passion narative.

Passion is the English-ized version of a Greek word that denotes a loving commitment so strong that one is willing to die for the beloved. The passion of Jesus Christ refers to all those events surrounding His crucifixion, from Palm Sunday, the occasion of His tumultuous welcome to Jerusalem through His death on the following Friday.

The New Testament's four Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John) contain the four major accounts of Jesus' passion. These four books are not biographies, either in the understanding of that term in the ancient world or today. They are, as some scholar has put it, "extended passion narratives."

These notes are designed to help the people of our congregation to prepare for worship. If others find them useful, that's great!

The Bible Lesson:
3 While he was at Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, as he sat at the table, a woman came with an alabaster jar of very costly ointment of nard, and she broke open the jar and poured the ointment on his head. 4But some were there who said to one another in anger, ‘Why was the ointment wasted in this way? 5For this ointment could have been sold for more than three hundred denarii, and the money given to the poor.’ And they scolded her. 6But Jesus said, ‘Let her alone; why do you trouble her? She has performed a good service for me. 7For you always have the poor with you, and you can show kindness to them whenever you wish; but you will not always have me. 8She has done what she could; she has anointed my body beforehand for its burial. 9Truly I tell you, wherever the good news is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in remembrance of her.’

General Comments:
(1) This dinner took place two days before "the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread." (Mark 14:1-2) It was on "the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread" that Jesus had the Passover meal with His disciples, where He instituted the Lord's Supper.

(2) Commentator Hugh Anderson points out that because this account falls within the Gospel's story of Jesus' passion, the woman's action detailed here is deemed important by Mark, but not her name.

(3) Anderson also says that this incident's occurrence between mention of the plot to kill Jesus (Mark 14:1-2) and the arrangements with Judas to betray Jesus (Mark 14:10-11) "effectively shows how despite all hostile powers arrayed against him, the one who goes the way of the cross constrains the love of the faithful."

Verse-by-verse comments:
v. 3: (1) The village of Bethany set on the eastern slope of the Mount of Olives. It was about two-miles from Jerusalem. Bethany was a place Jesus visited often apparently, as it was the home of his friends, the siblings Mary, Martha, and Lazarus.

(2) as he sat at the table: The word in the original Greek of the New Testament is katakeimenou, which literally means as he reclined. This was the standard manner for people to dine in the first-century Judean Mediterranean world. It would have been in this same posture that Jesus and the disciples ate at the Last Supper.

(3) We don't really know who Simon the Leper was.

(4) alabaster jar: This was a flask with a long neck, sealed until the neck was broken and the contents poured out. The flask once broken, of course, couldn't be reused.

(5) nard: This was an oil made from the root of an Indian plant. The plant is a perennial herb. The oil was exceedingly expensive.

According to the recently-published Archaeological Study Bible, perfumes and anointing oils played an important role in ancient life:
  • As is true today, perfumes had a cosmetic function. But some were also at times thought to be aphrodisiacs. In addition, "there was also a kind of sacred perfume formula that was to be used only on Israel's priests and sanctuary objects..." (Exodus 30:22-33)
  • Oils were often used as soaps and shampoos are today.
  • Oils were also used for medicinal purposes.
  • Perfumes and spices were used for the embalming of the dead, a function related to what happens in our Bible lesson.
(6) Similar accounts to this one appear in all three of the other Gospels. Matthew 26:6-13 is most like Mark's account. Here, Jesus' head is anointed and not His feet.

Anderson points out that while the woman's action would have been "somewhat suprising," such anointing of guests after a long trip was "customary." Her action then, isn't marked by impropriety, but by extravagance.

v. 4: some were there: In the analogous account in John's Gospel, Judas is earmarked as the indignant one. Here, the term is more general.

v. 5: (1) three hundred denarii: A denarius was the wage paid to a laborer for a day's worth of work. Accounting then for sabbath days and holy days, the value of the ointment was the equivalent of a yearly salary.

(2) It was customary for people to give charitable donations (alms) to the poor just before the Passover began. The indignant observers of this woman's extravagant anointing of Jesus therefore might have been deemed correct from a religious perspective.

vv. 6-8: Jesus' words must have come as a shock. Anderson points out that in verse 8, Jesus connects the woman's action to His own passion. It seems to compensate for Jesus' body later not being anointed for burial, as was the custom. This omission would be made necessary because Jesus' death occurred on the brink of the Passover sabbath day. To have come in contact with Jesus' body before the sabbath began with sunset, before an opportunity for purification could happen, would have rendered those who touched Him ritually impure and therefore unable to participate in the Passover. This is why on the third day following Jesus' death, a group went to the tomb to anoint His body. It was there that they discovered His resurrection.

v. 9: Here, we see the intrinsic connection between Jesus' passion and the Christian good news. Jesus' sacrificial death is good news for a human race whose sin is atoned for in this way. This is the good news (Gospel) that we share with the world!

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