Videos from Fr Claudio Doglio
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Clashes in Jerusalem and the announcement of the grand finale
After Jesus enters Jerusalem, Mark recounts a day when Jesus does almost nothing except for one significant action. The evangelist notes that they were in Bethany, and in the morning, Jesus and his disciples went on foot to Jerusalem. While walking, Jesus sees a fig tree full of leaves, approaches it to pick some fruit, but finds none. Jesus utters a harsh word of condemnation against the fig tree; the disciples hear but do not react.
In the temple, Jesus drives out the vendors selling animals for sacrifices. It is an act of aggression against the temple’s structure. It’s not just about cleaning or condemning corruption. The precise intent is to challenge the temple, which had become a corrupted market. The religious practices had become a matter of buying and selling. Giving something to God to obtain something else from God is the usual commercial religious thought, bargaining for salvation.
Jesus returns to Bethany at night after causing a stir in the temple. In the morning, following the same route, they pass near the same fig tree, which is completely dry. The disciples point it out to him: “Rabbi, look! The fig tree that you cursed has withered.” This is an important symbolic prophetic action. Jesus’ word is effective. It works against the fruitless fig tree. It is a prophetic sign that should make us understand the tragic validity of Jesus’ word against the fruitless temple.
The problem is there. It is a problem with an infertile religious structure that does not bear the good fruits God expected. Arriving at the temple, Jesus is immediately questioned by the authorities: “By what authority are you doing these things? Or who gave you this authority to do them?” They all had authorization to conduct this trade. And here begins a series of dialogues or controversies with the various representatives of the temple’s religious groups.
Regarding authority, Jesus does not answer but asks a counter-question: Why did you not accept John the Baptist? According to you, did his baptism come from God or from men? Those authorities are afraid to commit. They don’t want to say ‘yes’ or ‘no,’ and Jesus, in front of undecided people who cannot take a stand, says he will not answer them either.
And he tells the parable of the murdering tenants. An image cleverly prepared by Jesus because the religious authorities of the Jerusalem temple were wealthy landowners who had many vineyards in Galilee; in those years, there had often been peasant uprisings against their masters. They probably imagine that, with that story, Jesus wants to tell them that it is necessary to be patient with the peasants, that they must help, meet, and forgive them, even if the peasants don’t want to deliver the harvest. And facing the story of a vineyard owner against whom the peasants turned, who had mistreated and killed the servants, and after the owner sent their son, they killed him, Jesus asks them: “What then will the vineyard owner do?” Putting themselves in the place of the owner of the vineyard, they tell him harshly: “Those criminals must be eliminated. The master will have to punish them severely.” And Jesus reveals the cards and reverses the situation by telling them: ‘You have judged well, only that you are not the vineyard’s owner but the rebellious peasants. The Lord is the owner. You are those rebels, and you have shot yourself in the foot; you have formulated your condemnation. You said they deserved serious punishment.’
Then the Pharisees ask him whether it is lawful to pay taxes to Caesar. It is a tricky question. If he says ‘yes,’ he goes against the religious Pharisees; if he says ‘no,’ he goes against those in favor of the government of Rome. And Jesus wisely says neither ‘yes’ nor ‘no.’ After being shown a coin, he returns it, saying to them: “Repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God,” that is, everything. Everything comes from God, and the whole person must be His.
The Sadducees, who did not believe in the resurrection of the dead, asked for his opinion. They told him a parable about a woman who had had seven husbands, each of whom died in turn. To follow the ancient rule of Moses, the brother of the deceased had married the widow, and so on. At this point, they asked him – as if they had created an extraordinary theological story – In the resurrection of the dead, whose wife will she be if the dead are raised? Seven brothers come to see each other, all of whom have had the same wife. What does a family with seven husbands and one wife do? And they smiled as if to say, ‘We have cornered you, Jesus.’ He answered decisively, ‘Are you not misled because you do not know the scriptures or the power of God?’ You have no idea what resurrection is because it will be completely new and different. You think of transposition into another dimension of the same earthly life, but with the resurrection, we will be completely new, and the family relationships will remain the same, yet completely transfigured. And he quoted from Exodus: “God is the God of the living, and not of the dead.” “You are greatly misled.”
A Pharisee asks him what the first commandment is, and Jesus calmly shows the coherence between the love of God and the love of neighbor, bringing them together by quoting Deuteronomy and Leviticus, indicating that this is the right way. In turn, Jesus asks a question about Psalm 109, which begins: “Oracle of the Lord God to my Lord the Messiah.”Tradition attributes the ancient poem to David. King David presents an oracle of God addressed to the Messiah, yet David calls him ‘Lord, the Messiah.’ Jesus then asks why the scribes say that he is the Son of David when David calls him Lord. This means that the Messiah exists before David and is the Lord of David. It is an important exegetical reflection on a biblical text through which Jesus shows not only his messianic conviction but also that the Messiah is the Lord of David, not simply an inferior descendant.
“The great crowd heard this with delight.” Jesus sits in front of the temple treasury and warns the disciples: “Beware of the scribes, who like to go around in long robes and accept greetings in the marketplaces, seats of honor in synagogues, and places of honor at banquets. They devour the houses of widows and, as a pretext, recite lengthy prayers.” It is a firm rebuke against these Jewish temple authorities. And a serious accusation that Jesus makes: devouring the widows’ goods, that is, using systems by those who seize the goods of the poor, for example, the goods of a widowed woman, who, therefore, is without social protections and defenses and is exploited by this religious structure.
And just as he speaks, he sees a woman throwing pennies into the temple treasury. Preachers praise this widow and say that Jesus compliments the woman. In fact, the text doesn’t seem to offer praise. Jesus does not compliment the woman for giving money to the temple. The overall context contradicts this idea. Jesus is not absolutely in favor of giving money to maintain the structure of the Jerusalem temple. He shows how this woman gave more than all the others who were rich, who put in from their surplus; instead, she put in everything. That is a concrete case in which the scribes devoured the houses of the widows. If that woman put everything she had to live on, she did not eat that evening because she gave the money to the temple. Jesus does not compliment her for that; he does not even scold her. Instead, he expresses a complaint about a religious structure that is like a fig tree full of leaves but without fruit. The harsh word of Jesus, which sounds like a curse, brings out that reality dry.
Immediately after, he leaves the temple. The disciples point out the temple’s beautiful stones to him; Jesus loses patience. For the umpteenth time, the disciples do not understand Jesus’ mindset. They are proud that the temple is beautiful, and one says, “Look, teacher, what stones and what buildings!” Jesus says to him, ‘Do you see these great buildings? There will not be one stone left upon another that will not be thrown down,” a formula similar to the one he used about the fig tree.
It announces the destruction of the temple and marks the beginning of the eschatological discourse that occupies the entire chapter 13, a complex text written in apocalyptic language, that is, revelatory, but with a particular genre in which catastrophic situations are shown. In Greek, ‘catastrophe’ means reversal, changing things from this to this, and Jesus prophetically announces the end, the quintessential catastrophic event. Which one? He does not say it is the end of the world. Jesus is not announcing what will happen millennia later; he is announcing what will happen in a few days: his death and resurrection.
The absolute catastrophe is the death of Jesus and his resurrection. There is a radical inversion of everything. The Son of God is killed, but the Son of God is risen. It is the destruction that gives rise to novelty. Everything begins again. Above all, the eschatological discourse refers to the passion, death, and resurrection of Jesus. From a more distant perspective, there is the announcement of the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem. It will happen 40 years later. The episode dates back to the year 30, and in the year 70, the Roman troops under Titus conquered Jerusalem and effectively destroyed the temple, leaving no stone unturned. Forty years later, the words Jesus spoke have been fulfilled. If Mark wrote in the early sixties, the Christians of Rome had the first announcements of that revolt that would culminate in the Jewish war and end with the destruction of the temple. The Arch of Titus in Jerusalem and the Arch of Titus in Rome also represent the spoils from the temple in Jerusalem, with the Roman soldiers carrying the great seven-armed candelabra. It was built while Mark was in Rome, shortly after Peter’s death. The drafting of the gospel became a contemporary fact for the Christian community to which it is addressed.
The third perspective is that of the end of the world. It is the final, complete catastrophe. Jesus announces his death, the death of Jerusalem, and the death of the world, but he also announces his resurrection, the transformation of Jerusalem, and the eschatological novelty of the new world. The announcement of the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven is the announcement of the Passover, of the resurrection. After that tribulation, which is the passion of Jesus, the sun will darken. It is what will happen at the death of Jesus. Then they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven.
The last part of the discourse is an invitation to vigilance: “Watch, therefore; you do not know when the lord of the house is coming.” He then presents four times: “whether in the evening, or at midnight, or cockcrow, or in the morning. May he not come suddenly and find you sleeping. What I say to you, I say to all: ‘Watch!’” These four times: in the evening, at midnight, at cockcrow, or in the morning outline the plot of the story of passion, which begins immediately after chapter 14 and fulfills the great story of the evangelist Mark.