He Loved Us

By Fr. Bob Williams

The long narrative of Jesus' last hours is both familiar and haunting. Lost in the numbing length of the story may be the fact that each evangelist tells the account of Jesus' suffering and death and in a distinct way. The passion narrative is the summit of each gospel, catching up themes that weave their way through the evangelist's entire portrayal of Jesus and bringing them to a dramatic completion. It is on that unique portrayal we will focus, drawing in this instance on the sober and taut narrative of Mark's passion story.

Mark begins the passion with three stories of brooding, shameful betrayal and tender fidelity. The enemies of Jesus, often the Pharisees and now the Jerusalem-based priests and elders, never step out of character. They had hounded Jesus during his ministry in Galilee and intensify their opposition to his teaching when he had arrived in Jerusalem. Now their implacable hostility is sealed with a plot to take his life.

A chilling new element is added, however: Judas, one of Jesus' own disciples - chosen and loved and entrusted with a share in the mission of Jesus - goes to the leaders and offers to betray Jesus to them. They are pleased and pay him for his service.

In between these stories, with a dramatic touch typical of his gospel, Mark inserts a story of exquisite fidelity. While Jesus visits Simon the Leper in Bethany on the eastern slopes of the Mount of Olives, an anonymous women approaches him. She breaks open her alabaster jar of costly perfumed oil, and anoints the head of Jesus. In Scripture, kings and prophets were anointed on the head and Mark plays on that memory here. As the fragrance of the oil fills the room, those with Jesus are shocked at the woman's extravagant gesture. But Jesus defends her. She had performed an act of true fidelity and love. For this she would be remembered wherever the gospel would be preached, the only one so honoured in all of the New Testament.

These three sharply contrasting scenes thrust the reader into the heart of Mark's message. Two major themes run through the entire passion story - one focusing on Jesus, some withering in the crucible of suffering, some exemplifying faith and courage. The passion exposes the terrible intent of Judas and the leaders, but it also gives a glimpse of authentic discipleship in the anonymous woman of Bethany. She, like Jesus, understands both who he is and what his destiny entails, and without hesitation acts on that intuition. And therefore she anoints him for his burial and acclaims his royal dignity. For such love she would never be forgotten.

Mark's gospel is noted for its manner of framing a key scene with two other related stories. This has taken place in the portion of the passion story related above. The words of Jesus over the bread and the wine are framed by his predictions of the betrayal of Judas and Peter as well as the failure or the rest of the disciples. Once again Mark's dual focus on Christology and discipleship - so characteristic of his gospel - are in evidence. Celebration of the Passover is the setting for all of these stories. Israel's great pilgrimage feast commemorated the exodus from Egypt, God's act of liberating love that was the basis of Israel's hope. So the gospel highlights the fact that Jesus' encounter with death, a death that would liberate others, was entwined with Passover.

Mark uses the bare ritual of the Passover meal to proclaim in Jesus' own words the meaning of the passion. Jesus takes bread, gives thanks, breaks it, gives it to his disciples saying, "This is my body", then he takes a cup, once again offers thanks, gives it to the disciples, "This is my blood of the covenant, which will be shed for many...." Here was the inner meaning of every act of the ministry of Jesus: his compassionate healing, his befriending of those left on the margins, his forceful teaching, his confrontations with evil; his feeding of the hungry crowds. All of this was a life given for others, all of this was "bread broken" and "blood shed for many."

Such was the spirit of his mission that would ultimately end in triumph and such was the mission the disciples were called to carry out. But there was a long road ahead and much pain and conversion of heart before they would be ready. And so the solemn words of Jesus and eloquent gestures at the supper are framed with his predictions that Judas Iscariot would fail tragically and the rest of his disciples would abandon him. Even Simon Peter, the first disciple to be called and their leader, would publicly disown Jesus, out of fear and abandon his Master.

Mark's gospel never hesitates to underscore the cost of discipleship.

Now the setting shifts from the upper room to Gethsemane; an olive grove on the outskirts of the city, and here in two major scenes the, pace of the passion story quickens. The spectre of violent death hovers over Jesus and torments him. As he had done several times in the passion according to Mark Jesus gathers his strength in prayer. It is not a polite or heroic prayer but one that echoes the raw expressions of faith found in the psalms: "Abba, Father, all things are possible to you. Take this cup away from me, but not what I will but what you will." (14:36). So much of the spirit of Jesus is here; his tenacious and intimate devotion to God, his "Abba", the fierce struggles with the power of evil and death that marked his ministry in Galilee.

Mark informs his readers early in the gospel that Jesus is the Son of God, one in whom the Spirit abides and one whose name God speaks at the Jordan and on the mount of Transfiguration. But Jesus is also genuinely human, war of death and crushed by the thought that his mission was running aground. So Mark dares to present us with this scene, one that would be fixed in Christian memory forever; a wrenching prayer of faith and fear from the lips of Jesus.

Mark continues his method of presenting the disciples in stark counterpoint with Jesus. Three times he comes to find support in their presence, only to find them sleeping. The gospel had already made clear that this "sleep" is not mere fatigue at the end of a long celebration. This brand of sleep could be deadly, it was the spiritual torpor of those who do not recognize the moment of crisis in history and do not prepare themselves to face it. Jesus had warned the disciples about this type of "sleep". "Watch therefore, you do not know when the lord of the house is coming, whether in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or in the morning. May he not come suddenly and find you sleeping. What I say to you, I say to all: 'Watch!'' (13:35-37).

That moment of crisis comes swiftly. Judas and an armed crowd break into the stillness of Gethsemane to arrest Jesus, the apostate disciple identifying Jesus with a treacherous kiss. Mayhem breaks out: They seize Jesus and arrest him, meanwhile a bystander (one of the crowd? one of Jesus' followers?) lashes out with a sword and wounds a servant of the high priest. Jesus faces that wall of violence and condemns it. "Have you come out as against a robber, with swords and clubs, to seize me? Day after day I was with you teaching in the temple area, yet you did not arrest me; but that the scriptures may be fulfilled." (14:49). How often has this scene been repeated in the centuries since Mark wrote: a nighttime arrest; the forces of violence seeking to destroy the voice of justice; violence breeding more violence; the long heroic stance of the martyr who refuses to betray the spirit of God.

Again, Mark contrasts the response of the disciples with that of Jesus. The crisis has come and they cannot endure it. All of them flee, abandoning Jesus, one of them so panic stricken that he tears away from the grip of his captor and flees naked. The disciples have left behind their dignity, their calling, and the one who gave them life.

The scene shifts once more: from Gethsemane to the residence of the high priest where Jesus will be interrogated by the leaders. Mark's masterful narrative style is again in evidence. He frames the interrogation scene with that of Peter's denials, clearly contrasting the disciple's fears with Jesus' courage.

A parade of false witnesses is brought forward against Jesus, but their accusations are contradictory. Some, however, bring up a charge that jogs the memory of the reader of the gospel: "I will destroy this temple made with hands and within three days I will build another not made with hands." Earlier in the gospel, Mark had presented Jesus as a prophet on fire with zeal, purging the temple and predicting its demise (11:15-19; 13:1-2). Indeed the Risen Christ would be the new temple of God, the "rejected stone" would become the cornerstone of a new sacred people in whom God would dwell (12:10-11). This accusation of the trial would be remembered when the veil of the sanctuary would tear apart at the moment of Jesus' death (15: 38).

Frustrated by the flawed testimony of his witnesses, the high priest poses the question to Jesus: "Are you the Messiah, the son of the Blessed One?" There is no hesitation in Jesus' reply: "I am." And he adds a challenge to his opponents: they would on day see their prisoner coming as the "Son of Man," that haunting figure who would experience humiliation and rejection, but then would be lifted up in exaltation by God and return in triumph at the end of the world. Jesus' bold declaration of his identity is rejected as blasphemous by his opponents; they condemn him to death and begin to abuse him. The reader who knows who Jesus is can only marvel in deep sadness at how spiritually blind we are all capable of becoming.

Mark shifts our attention from Jesus standing before his captors back to the courtyard below where Peter warily edges near a group of servants huddling around a warm fire. As if in slow motion, we watch the power of fear break down a disciple's resolve. Three times Peter denies he even knows Jesus, finally cursing and swearing as panic takes hold. A cock crows and Peter remembers Jesus' warning at the supper. The terrible realization of his failure surges over him and be begins to weep.

The story is so familiar we may not be able to recapture its incredible shock. The full measure of the disciples' failure can be taken in this single tragic story: The leader of those whom Jesus called publicly renounces his allegiance to his master. The leaders take Jesus to Pilate to have him condemned to crucifixion. Mark rivets our attention on a single issue -- Jesus' identity as "king" - as for the first time the power of Rome enters the passion story. The scene is full of irony. Pilate, the representative of imperial power, confronts this battered Jewish prisoner and questions him on his supposed pretensions to be "king of the Jews." While Jesus' own people reject their true king, and choose Barabbas, a murderer, Pilate, a gentile and a Roman, appears convinced of Jesus' innocence and seeks to have him released.

Underneath all this is the issue of kingship, the most forceful expression of human political power known to Mark's readers. Pilate and Jesus' opponents agree on one thing: Jesus is no king. In Pilate's mind he is a harmless victim of the leader's envy; to the leaders he is a false and dangerous claimant to religious authority. So ultimately Jesus is mocked for his pretensions to kingship; a clock of purple, a crown of thorns, a reed sceptre, and a parody of homage that turns violent. But the reader of Mark's passion story knows that it is not Jesus but those symbols of imperial and abusive power that are being mocked. Jesus is a king but one whose power is expressed not in exploiting or "lording it over others" but "in giving them life" (10: 42 - 45). The passion story stands in judgement over all forms of abusive power.

The end comes swiftly in Mark's account; the story is told in few words, as if it were too painful to say more. Pilate gives up his attempts to free Jesus and condemns him to crucifixion. An execution detail brings Jesus to Golgotha where he is offered a narcotic (which he refuses), stripped of his garments and nailed to the cross. Two rebels are crucified with Jesus one on each side of him - a sad entourage. The sign over the cross acclaims derision: "The King of the Jews". During the deathwatch, a parade of mockery dredges up the issues of the trial and hurls them at the man on the cross: his treats to the temple; his power to save others and now is inability to save himself. Mark casts this last taunt in strongly ironic tones: "Let the messiah, the King of Israel, come down now from the cross that we may see and believe" (15:32). But the reader knows that Jesus' power is demonstrated not in shedding the cross but in carrying it, in giving his life for others.

Darkness envelops Golgotha and out of that darkness comes Jesus' final lament: "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" It is the first verse of Psalm 22, the great Jewish prayer of suffering faith. Mark's passion story has been described as a "dark passage" -- Jesus stripped of his disciples, his freedom, his dignity, his life as he gives every fibre of his being for the sake of the world.

And so in Mark's account, Jesus dies with a wordless scream that echoes from the dread hill, splitting the veil of the temple and igniting faith in the centurion's heart. This unlikely witness sees in the manner of Jesus' death for others the true revelation of God. The sight of the crucified Jesus triggers its first confession of faith: "Truly this man was the Son of God!" (15:39). A startling revelation -- God's power revealed not through staggering prodigies but in a death out of love.

Mark has an eye for the unlikely. The chosen disciples had long fled. But standing at a distance were other faithful followers, the women who had been drawn to Jesus in Galilee and had come to Jerusalem with him. They would stay with him now through death and burial never abandoning him. Two of them, Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Jesus, would keep vigil at his burial and would be the first to discover the tomb empty and to know that Jesus was victorious over death. These "unlikely disciples" who proved true, where others more prominent had failed, would be the ones to bring the risen Christ's message of joy and reconciliation to the disciples who had failed. Now the Easter story could begin.

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