The Gospels

by Sarah Ruden

  *102 Literally “veiled” and “unveiled,” the latter being the image of “apocalypse.”

  *103 See “hell” in the Glossary.

  *104 A tiny unit of Roman coinage. The sparrows would probably be for a Temple sacrifice; small birds are cited in the Torah as acceptable substitutes for the larger offerings the poor cannot afford.

  *105 See Psalms 40:12 and 69:4.

  *106 This passage may reflect the early Christian cult of celibacy—notice the direction of the relationships. Parental control over children (even as adults), including their marriages, was for all practical purposes absolute, and the refusal of children with a new religion to marry and to stay settled was a major social disruption, sometimes met with violence.

  *107 Isaiah 35:6–7.

  *108 Isaiah 40:3.

  *109 That is, John is the second coming of this prophet of miracles and religious purification and restoration.

  *110 This may have been a singsong taunt or part of a game.

  *111 Fagos is extremely rare and literally just indicates that someone eats: it may be a virtually made-up insult here. This is even more likely for the second criticism, launched with another rare and literally descriptive word: almost no one abstained from alcohol altogether in the ancient world; wine was the default drink at meals, and much safer than the bacteria-ridden water generally available. Again, tax collectors were predatory Imperial contractors. This might be the personified Wisdom found in Proverbs and in certain noncanonical books of Jewish scripture.

  *112 The idea of infidels who are more susceptible to the truth than God’s chosen people has a long history stretching back into Hebrew scripture. See especially Jonah 3:5–9. Tyre and Sidon were Phoenician cities known for idolatry, including child sacrifice. See Genesis 19 concerning Sodom.

  *113 Jesus sounds sarcastic here, using the jingle ekrupsas (“you have hidden away”) and apekalupsas (“you have put on display”).

  *114 The father “recognizing” his son is suggestive: in the Greek and Roman social systems, a son’s acknowledged legitimacy was key to family standing and inheritance. Newborn infants with suspect paternity were “exposed,” or cast aside to die or be picked up by slave traders.

  *115 Compare Mark 2:23–28, and see the footnote. The regular and special sacrifices the priests must make on the Sabbath (Numbers 28:9–10) are of course permitted work. Hosea 6:6 is quoted here.

  *116 Permission to do work on the Sabbath in order to save life does not extend to livestock. Notice that the hypothetical person in this example is poor and in danger of losing what may be his only capital: strict Sabbath observance was easier for the wealthy.

  *117 Isaiah 42:1–4. Most probably, this “Servant Song” (see this page of the Introduction) refers to Israel itself and the example it can set despite, or because of, its own oppression. But the passage was later taken both to allude to the Messiah and to explain Jesus’ obscurity in life.

  *118 This would be the Messiah, as David was the original divinely chosen and anointed king.

  *119 See the Glossary for “Satan,” the archetypal “opponent.” The “sons” in Verse 27 must refer to miracle workers favored by the religious authorities.

  *120 See “S/spirit” in the Glossary.

  *121 In standard translations, “adulterous,” referring to Israel’s straying from her metaphoric marriage to God.

  *122 The most extreme expression of inclusive reckoning: Jesus is in fact interred only for two nights and one full day.

  *123 Jonah survives in the sea monster, repents, and is disgorged (Jonah 1:17–2:10). The citizens of pagan Nineveh—here respectfully called andres (See “man” in the Glossary)—are immediately ready to convert at the prophet’s proclamation (Jonah 3:1–5).

  *124 The wealthy pagan Queen of Sheba (1 Kings 10, 2 Chronicles 9) pays a respectful visit to Solomon.

  *125 See “evil” and “S/spirit” in the Glossary.

  *126 Again, a key question about this strikingly untraditional attitude is whether Jesus is keeping relatives out of their own house while it is full of his followers.

  *127 See the note at Mark 4:11 on “mystery.”

  *128 Isaiah 6:9–10. Notice the wide differences from the version in Mark 4:12. The Septuagint text was highly fluid.

  *129 A typical accusation in peasant societies. Livestock diseases, soured milk, and crop mildew have also historically often been blamed on malign neighbors. In reality, darnel seed is hard to tell from wheat seed (and nearly impossible to separate before the invention of special devices) and was often sown with it unwittingly.

  *130 The saton is a dry measure of around three gallons.

  *131 See Psalms 78:2; the Hebrew, however, refers to a “proverb” and “riddles.”

  *132 See “evil” in the Glossary.

  *133 Pearls were the most celebrated and expensive jewels of the ancient world, sometimes fetching legendary prices.

  *134 The discards would include not only garbage but any creatures without fins and scales, forbidden food for Jews (Leviticus 11:9–12).

  *135 That is, even for the learned among Jesus’ followers, this new, apocalyptic knowledge must be acquired in addition to a mastery of older scripture.

  *136 See Mark 6:1–6, and the note and the note.

  *137 See the note at Mark 6:18.

  *138 See the note at Mark 6:22 for some background and implications of this episode.

  *139 See the note at Mark 6:40 for a comparison.

  *140 A stade is around six hundred feet—but these are not quite the same as modern feet.

  *141 Since there were only four watches during the night, this must be near dawn.

  *142 A town on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee, not far south of Capernaum.

  *143 Isaiah 29:13. Torah, the name for the five “Books of the Law,” means “teaching.”

  *144 See Mark 7:1–15 and the note, the note, the note, the note, and the note.

  *145 This may seem a shockingly sweeping rejection of Jewish law and custom, but like much rabbinic writing, it stresses the importance of innocent intentions over physical purity.

  *146 Compare the version of this witty passage to its counterpart at Mark 7:24–30, and see the note, the note, and the note there on ethnicity, ideas of the covenant, and humorous vocabulary.

  *147 Associated with “Magdala,” possibly the hometown of Mary Magdalene, this is about halfway down the western coast of the Sea of Galilee.

  *148 The disquisition on weather is thought to be interpolated, or added later, to the text.

  *149 Jonah was visited with a terrible storm when he fled from his prophetic mission. He was thrown overboard and put in the way of the “big fish,” inside which he repented.

  *150 Passover bread is rendered ritually impure by even tiny amounts of yeast.

  *151 Compare the probable wit in the Mark 8:14–21 version.

  *152 See the note at Mark 8:27.

  *153 Jeremiah was a prophet known particularly for his prediction of the fall of Jerusalem in 587 B.C.E., during the Babylonian conquest of Judah, and for his denunciatory and mournful writings.

  *154 “Simon Son of Jonah” in Aramaic.

  *155 See the second note at Mark 3:16. This is the only passage giving a clear rationale for why this disciple is called Petros, meaning “Rock.” See also “church” in the Glossary.

  *156 City gates, generally symbolic of national and royal power in the Hebrew Bible, here likely have to do with the apocalypse and a dualistic idea of heaven and hell at war.

  *157 Aside from Peter’s later associations with the
papacy, and as simply understood as possible, the keeper of the keys controlled the household, including its slaves and servants (subject to harsh discipline) and the vital storeroom. Peter is hence pictured as the divinely authorized organizer of Jesus’ followers, whose arrangements will endure through the apocalypse and into eternity.

  *158 Literally “three days.” But Jesus is buried on the evening before the Sabbath and rises on the morning after it.

  *159 Concerning Jesus’ connection to Elijah through John the Baptist, See the note at Mark 9:13 on the earlier version of this passage.

  *160 Again, perhaps echoing a famous question of the Roman orator Cicero concerning the rebellious Catiline as well as Psalms 13:1–2.

  *161 Note the different explanation given about the same disease, epilepsy, in the parallel passage Mark 9:14–29.

  *162 Verse 21, reading “However, this one does not go out except by prayer and fasting,” has been removed from the standard Greek text as spurious.

  *163 The phrase is in the Hebraic sense, meaning only “their own people.”

  *164 The Temple tax collected from each adult Jewish male was half a shekel, equal to half a stater, or two drachmas: a drachma or a denarius was a standard daily wage for a laborer. The Temple hierarchy is purportedly taxing Jews as if they were in a subdued and occupied country, though it was of course the Romans who did this. But the Gospels’ attitude toward taxpaying is always conformist.

  *165 See “receive” in the Glossary. Children were not considered full members of society, so these strictures are unusual.

  *166 See “hell” in the Glossary.

  *167 Verse 11, which has been translated as “The Son of Man came to save the lost,” is left out of the standard edition of the Greek text.

  *168 The forensic standard of the Hebrew Bible and the rabbinic writings.

  *169 See “church” in the Glossary.

  *170 See “Gentiles” in the Glossary. This exclusion is termed as if Jesus’ followers were all Jews of the Judean province, but long before the appearance of the Gospel of Matthew, this was not the case.

  *171 See 16:17–19 above, and the notes.

  *172 A talent weight could be as much as a hundred and thirty pounds of silver or gold, a value unimaginable to ordinary people. (There may be some authorial confusion between minas and talents—minas figure in a parallel story at Luke 19:12–27—as local names of the currencies differed.) In any case, the size of the first debt seems fabulous for a private person; that and the initial indication of royalty (though the New Testament can be loose with that term) give the story a fairy-tale air. The monarchs of the East might refer to their managers as “slaves,” but it is still hard to imagine personal loans on this scale to dependents of any kind.

  *173 Household dissolution through “debt slavery” was possible for all those without some special status that conferred immunity. Only a tiny fraction of this debt, however, could have been satisfied in such a way; slaves were too plentiful and too cheap.

  *174 Equivalent only to several months’ wages for a laborer.

  *175 Slaves had no standing in Roman law, so it would probably have puzzled those living under this law (or a provincial transplant of it) that one “slave” can enforce a debt against another.

  *176 The Transjordan, to the east.

  *177 See the note and the note on this passage in Mark (10:2–12). Also See “fornication” in the Glossary.

  *178 A practice not only of Near Eastern royal courts: Roman authors report that catamites might be castrated to prolong a prepubescent appearance, and that eunuch slaves might guard wives and courtesans.

  *179 Few passages show a wider gap between indigenous Palestinian culture and the ways early Christianity was quickly developing in the Roman Empire at large. There is no sign that marriage was, in any normal circumstances, optional for free Jews in their homeland; a choice to be married would not even have been discussed, only the time and the person to marry. But Christians rapidly made celibacy a cult.

  *180 See the note at Mark 9:37.

  *181 There may be a subtle reference to the Shema at Deuteronomy 6:4 (“Hear O Israel, the Lord your God is one God…”), associated with the Ten Commandments, which are about to be cited here. In Verse 16, the man is literally “one” (I translate “someone”), a locution that does occur in the Gospels, but not often.

  *182 See Exodus 20:12–16, Deuteronomy 5:16–20, and Leviticus 19:18.

  *183 See the note at Mark 10:24.

  *184 The wording is playful, but not so much as in the Mark version (10:30).

  *185 This parable is often cited as revealing what an acceptable wage was for manual labor in first-century Palestine. But there is later evidence about the standards that may have prevailed: rabbinic literature is concerned in detail with just pay and employment conditions.

  *186 The hours are measured from dawn, so the times (always approximate) depend on the season.

  *187 Economic and religious perspectives combine here. Resources adequate to support life were literally called “life,” and fate at the apocalypse was binary: eternal life or eternal death. The employer’s last statement alludes to the “evil eye” of destructive envy.

  *188 By our reckoning, only two nights and one full day.

  *189 James and John.

  *190 See the note at Mark 10:40.

  *191 Two verbs with kata (“down”) in them emphasize the arrogance of these rulers.

  *192 See the note at Mark 10:45.

  *193 A village associated with the modern village al-Eizariya, on the far side of the Mount of Olives from Jerusalem.

  *194 As in Mark and Luke, there is a play on words, as kurios means both “master” in a general sense and “owner.”

  *195 Mount Zion in Jerusalem, site of a fortress conquered by King David, could stand by metonymy for the whole of Israel, and the “daughter(s) of Zion” (the Greek here does not reflect the “construct chain” by which Hebrew expresses possession) is (and are) repeatedly addressed in the Bible as embodying the fate of the nation. This chant apparently owes phrasing to Zechariah 2:10 and 9:9 and Zephaniah 3:14. A donkey was humbler than a horse, but ordinary people did not ride at all.

  *196 See Psalms 118:25–26. Hōsanna means “Rescue, please” in Hebrew.

  *197 At the time of the Passover pilgrimage festival, Jerusalem (whose permanent establishment is here called “the whole city”) is thronged with those the leaders would call “people of the land,” rustics from outside the city.

  *198 Compare the version in Mark 11:15–17, and see the note there. The verses quoted are Isaiah 56:7 and Jeremiah 7:11.

  *199 See above at Verse 9.

  *200 Psalms 8:2.

  *201 See the note at Mark 11:14.

  *202 Archaeologically excavated wine presses have been found hollowed out of solid rock.

  *203 The Jewish inheritance, their covenant, will go to Gentiles at the critical time of the apocalyptic harvest, because the Jews have abused and killed both their prophets and God’s own son.

  *204 Psalms 118:22–23 has, literally, “for the head of the corner.” Again, this is not a coherent architectural image, but the sense is clear: one stone stabilizes a whole building.

  *205 The feast (following a public procession), and not any ceremony with vows, was central to an ancient wedding, as the whole community was supposed to witness the union and be assured of the families’ standing and means.

  *206 “Committed outrage against them,” probably meaning rape.

  *207 The traditional English “Many are called, but few are chosen” ignores jingly wordplay. The Jews deliberately skip a
wedding banquet—the epitome of enjoyment, here standing for the unending heavenly feast to follow the apocalypse—and insult and infuriate the host, God. The slaves stand for the prophets ignored or martyred throughout Jewish history. One of the substitute (that is, Gentile) guests does not know how to behave either, likely meaning that he offends against Jewish custom and ethics, important to the author of Matthew.