Jesus

by James Martin

  11. Murphy-O’Connor, Holy Land, 54.

  12. I’m reminded of one of my favorite quotes about the Gospel of Mark from an unlikely source, Nick Cave, a rock star, who wrote a moving introduction to The Gospel of Mark published by Grove Press in 1999: “Scenes of deep tragedy are treated with such a matter-of-factness and raw economy they become almost palpable in their unprotected sorrowfulness.”

  13. Lk 23:28.

  14. Pixner, With Jesus in Jerusalem, 125. Murphy-O’Connor is more blunt: “The present Way of the Cross has little chance of corresponding to historical reality” (Holy Land, 38).

  15. Mk 15:21.

  16. Rom. 16:13.

  17. As did those in first-century Palestine. Josephus, the Jewish historian, writes that after the death of Herod the Great, one Roman general, to quell the ensuing unrest, lined the roads of Galilee with two thousand crosses (Antiquities of the Jews, 17.10.10).

  18. There is a lengthy description of the Roman practice of crucifixion in the book The Day Christ Died, a popular but thorough treatment by Jim Bishop. Brown’s The Death of the Messiah also includes an exhaustive and more scholarly account.

  19. Donahue and Harrington, Gospel of Mark, 443.

  20. Donahue and Harrington, Gospel of Mark, 447.

  21. More precisely, both Mark and Matthew transcribe Jesus’s words using a curious mix of Aramaic and Hebrew. In Matthew Jesus cries out, “Ēli, Ēli, lema sabachthani. Mark’s Elōi is closer to Aramaic, Matthew’s Ēli to Hebrew; but Mark’s lama is closer to Hebrew, Matthew’s lema to Aramaic.

  22. Brown, Death of the Messiah, 2:1043–58.

  23. Brown, Death of the Messiah, 2:1051.

  24. Mother Teresa, Come Be My Light, 192–93.

  25. O’Collins, Jesus, 174.

  26. Donahue and Harrington, Gospel of Mark, 448.

  27. Mk 1:10, schizomenous.

  28. Mk 10:32.

  29. A Jesuit Off-Broadway (Chicago: Loyola Press, 2007) is a look at the development of the play “The Last Days of Judas Iscariot,” by Stephen Adly Guirgis, which places Judas on trial for his betrayal of Jesus and examines the possible reasons for his actions. The book includes a lengthy examination of the possible motivations behind Judas’s betrayal, some of which are included here in an abbreviated form.

  30. Rom 4:24–25.

  31. Barclay, Gospel of Matthew, 2:388.

  32. Mk 2:7; Mt 9:3; Lk 5:21.

  33. Mk 14:26–72; Lk 22:34–62.

  34. Pixner, in With Jesus in Jerusalem, believes that Byzantine-era crosses roughly carved into the rock support this tradition, and the Benedictine scholar lists a series of documents dating as far back as the fourth century that put the location of Caiaphas’s house where the church stands today. In the 1990s, mosaics were discovered at the site, lending further credence to the tradition. Some of the stone columns in the caves were also discovered with iron rings affixed to them, suggesting that a prisoner could have been chained here—but again this is speculative (102–3). Others are not as sure about the authenticity of the place. Murphy-O’Connor is doubtful: “It is much more likely that the house of the high priest was at the top of the hill” (119).

  35. Mt 16:13–19.

  36. Jn 2:19.

  37. Heb 4:15–16.

  Chapter Twenty-Two: Risen

  1. Jews in Jesus’s time calculated a day beginning at sunup and ending at sundown. In this case, Friday is the first day (since Jesus died before sundown, Friday counts as one day), Saturday is the second, and Sunday (since it is already dawn) is the third.

  2. Mk 16:1; Mt 28:1; Lk 24:10.

  3. Johnson, Gospel of Luke, 388.

  4. Lohfink, Jesus of Nazareth, 89.

  5. Lk 8:2.

  6. See Lk 7:36–50; 8:1–3.

  7. Mt 26:7; Mk 14:3, “a woman.” Also, Elizabeth Johnson reminded me that the unnamed woman in Mark anoints Jesus’s head, not his feet. That is a key point in Schüssler Fiorenza’s book, she said. “It is vital,” Johnson told me, “because anointing the head is a prophetic act—this woman commissions Jesus to his messianic destiny—while anointing the feet is a sign of repentance or affection.” Schüssler Fiorenza points out that only Mark includes the story in this form. “Later on Matthew and Luke switched to feet,” said Johnson, “but head is the earlier remembrance.”

  8. Schüssler Fiorenza, In Memory of Her, xiv.

  9. Schüssler Fiorenza, In Memory of Her, xiv.

  10. Pope Francis, General Audience, April 3, 2013.

  11. Sheed suggests that the stone is removed not to let Jesus out, but to let the disciples in (To Know Christ Jesus, 358).

  12. Marrow, Gospel of John, 356.

  13. Quoted in Franco Mormando, “Christ in the Garden,” America, April 20–27, 2009, 27–28.

  14. Moloney says: “The name Jesus calls Mary and her response are Greek transliterations of Aramaic, though the narrator explains that it is Hebrew. There is a level of intimacy implied by the recourse to an original language in both the naming and the response” (Gospel of John, 528). Earlier in the text the Greek Maria is used.

  15. Jn 10:11–16.

  16. Lk 24:39.

  17. Jn 20:24–29.

  18. Jn 20:20.

  19. Jn 20:27.

  20. Marrow, Gospel of John, 360.

  21. Mt 16:24–28; Mk 8:34–9:1; Lk 9:23–27.

  22. Jn 2:19.

  23. Merton, Run to the Mountain, 346.

  24. Lk 10:21; Lk 13:17; Jn 16:22; 16:24; Lk 24:41; Jn 20:20.

  25. Lk 2:36–38.

  Chapter Twenty-Three: Emmaus

  1. Murphy-O’Connor, Holy Land, 363.

  2. Lk 23:32–43.

  3. Or his wife, or his son, or his daughter. Luke says only “two of them.”

  4. Johnson, Gospel of Luke, 393.

  5. This may be Luke’s subtle way of highlighting Peter’s authority.

  6. Johnson points out the emphasis on the deep emotions of the story in Gospel of Luke, 398–99.

  7. Jn 19:25.

  8. Lk 24:41.

  9. Jn 20:27.

  10. Jn 21:1–19.

  11. Not to mention some seemingly contradictory actions by the Risen Christ—for example, asking Mary not to touch him, but inviting Thomas to do just that.

  12. Barclay, Gospel of Luke, 350.

  13. Some scholars suggest that since Cleopas and his companion are traveling to “the village to which they were going,” it is more likely that the story is set in one of their houses, not an inn. So here my prayer was not as scholarly as it might have been.

  14. Johnson, Gospel of Luke, 393.

  15. For the Christian community, Luke’s story also tells us that Christ is always waiting to be met, and waiting for us to meet him, especially in Scripture and the Eucharist.

  Chapter Twenty-Four: Tiberias

  1. The appearance to Mary Magdalene is apparently not “counted,” perhaps because John is referring to appearances to “the disciples” as a group.

  2. Moloney, Gospel of John, 549.

  3. Some scholars suggest that this is the same story as Lk 5:1–11 (the Miraculous Catch of Fish), and that Luke has placed what is actually a post-Resurrection story earlier in his narrative. Others surmise that John has blended two stories—an earlier call narrative and a post-Resurrection appearance.

  4. Moloney, Gospel of John, 549.

  5. Another interpretation is that the number represents the Ten Commandments plus the seven sacraments multiplied by the three persons of the Trinity twice: 153.

  6. Peter denies Jesus during the Passion while warming himself by an anthrakia (charcoal fire) in Jn 18:18; and he is now rehabilitated by Jesus beside another anthrakia in Jn 21:9.

  7. O’Collins, Jesus, 195.

  8. Lk 5:1–11.

  9. Marrow, Gospel of John, 373.

  10. Thanks to James Carr, SJ, for this insight.

  11. Or re-establish him. In Matthew (16:16) Peter identifies Jesus as the Messiah after the question “Who do you say that I am?” Jesus
then declares, “You are Peter (Petros) and on this rock (petra) I will build my church.” Jesus’s interchange with Peter on the shore that day may also have been for the benefit of the other disciples, as if to say, “I still trust this man.”

  12. Jn 20:30. St. Paul, in his First Letter to the Corinthians, also recounts Resurrection appearances (1 Cor 15:3–11).

  13. Mk 16:19; Lk 24:50–53.

  14. Acts 1:9–12.

  15. Ignatius, A Pilgrim’s Testament, 63–65.

  16. Lk 19:41–44.

  17. Ignatius, A Pilgrim’s Testament, 64.

  Chapter Twenty-Five: Amen

  1. And I did.

  2. Acts 12:12 identifies Mark’s mother as the owner of what historians call a “house church.” “As soon as he realized this, he [Peter] went to the house of Mary, the mother of John whose other name was Mark, where many had gathered and were praying.”

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