The Politics Surrounding the Crucifixion

This week in Come Follow Me we read accounts of the crucifixion.  I am not going to talk about the meaning of the atonement and how it works in our lives in this post.  Instead, I wanted to mention some insights I gained merely by reading these passages so soon after doing a deeper dive into the Old Testament.  Understanding the history of the Jewish nation gave me context for these events that I didn't have before.  Also, my background in Roman History informed my thoughts a little. Bringing all this together helped me understand why the Jewish leaders did what they did, and why the Romans did what they did. 

The Jewish Leaders.  

A couple of weeks ago my husband asked me "Why were the Jewish leaders so threatened by Jesus?" It is a good question.  He obviously was doing miraculous things and his preaching was mostly purposefully vague (Matt 13:11) so as to not cause a stir. Why did this concern Jewish leaders so much they plotted to kill Jesus? I think there are two reasons.  

First, the history of the House of Israel taught the Jews that if they followed the teaching of the Torah, they prospered in the land.  If they departed from the Torah, they had troubles.  The main reason that was given that they were taken into Babylonian captivity was because they had departed from the true worship of Jehovah. (reference, the whole second half of the Old Testament)  By the time Jesus was on the scene, Jehovah worship was mainly centered in the temple. The Jews had lost the Temple twice before, once in the Babylonian captivity, and later during the intertestamental period, in the time of the Maccabeans. Herod's expansion of the temple had only been completed a couple of years before Jesus was born.  The Jewish leaders were protective of their current status quo where they had a working temple and a fully established hierarchy of religious leaders. Their history had taught them how fragile that was.

Second, the Jewish leaders also realized how fragile their relationship with Rome was.  They probably understood better than the common people how easily they could be wiped out if they displeased their Roman overlords.  Rome was in its golden era. They were powerful and expanding in all directions. Israel was like a small mouse in an elephant's stall.  If they got the elephant angry, they would probably be stomped to death. The common people, on the other hand, were raised with stories of great military leaders rising up and freeing Israel from bondage.  They were hoping for a Messiah to come and free them from Roman oppression. The Jewish leaders feared that if the commoners followed an upstart Messiah and came out in open rebellion against Rome, it would mean the end of the relative peace and independence they were currently enjoying.  Their fears were born out around 70 CE when Menahem raised a revolt against Rome that led to the destruction of the temple and the end of Jerusalem as the center of Jewish worship.

Jesus's ministry played into both of these fears.  His teachings were not traditional Jewish theology.  He broke traditional Jewish practice, like "working" on the sabbath, and letting his disciples eat without washing their hands. Later in his ministry he opening reprimanded Jewish leaders, calling them fools and hypocrites. The Jewish leader saw his doctrine as apostate.  If he gathered followers, the whole society risked loosing favor with God, in their opinion, leaving it vulnerable to foreign conquest. Jesus had also amassed a significant following, including thousands as attested by the miracle of of the Loaves and fishes.  Jewish leaders understood that if Jesus were seen by Romans as starting a rebellion, it would bring serious retributions onto the nation as a whole. They knew that could end the fragile peace and access to the Temple they were currently enjoying.

If the Jewish leaders were so afraid of what Jesus was doing, why didn't they just stone him.  They showed earlier in the Gospels that they were willing to take ritual executions into their own hands. (e.g. John 8:5, Luke 4:16 et alii)   Why not wait to get him alone and kill him privately? The scriptures tell us why, "But when they sought to lay hands on him, they feared the multitude, because they took him for a prophet." (Matt 26:46)  They had waited too long, he had gathered too big of a following, and if they killed him they feared it would spark the exact kind of uprising they were trying to avoid.  Rome would blame them for killing someone when they didn't have permission and for causing an uprising. They might march in with their armies and put an end to their temple worship and independence.  Instead they decided to do some careful political maneuvering.  If they could convince the people to turn against Jesus, and Rome to execute Jesus, then they could avoid an uprising of Jesus' followers, and the wrath of Rome. 

Pilate

Of course Pilate was not as easily manipulated as they had hoped.  He tried several times to get out of being the "bad guy" in Jesus' execution. In the end the Jewish leaders forced his hand, convincing him that if he didn't execute Jesus he would be disloyal to Caesar. Competition for top leadership posts in the Roman Empire was fierce. Pilate knew he could easily be replaced if he was seen as unable to maintain the famous "Pax Romana".  He caved into pressure and the Jewish leaders got their way.  They were able to continue worshiping at their temple for another 35 years or so.  Pilate avoided an ugly uprising and was able to stay in power for another 10 years.  Everyone acted in their best interest politically, and Jesus was crucified. 

I remember a statement once that the Jews were the only people who would crucify their God, suggesting that they were the most wicked of all nations.  I hope this explanation will show that the Jewish leaders were not much different than other political leaders.  They acted out of real fear and were doing what they thought they must to protect their nation and maintain their way of life. A lot of national leaders have made moral compromises to accomplish what they thought was the greater good.  We will leave it to God to judge them for their actions.   

Peter's Denial

 This week in the Come Follow Me we are studying the events that occurred Thursday night of the last week of Jesus' life.  Of course, the most important thing that happened that night was the Jesus took upon himself our sins while praying in the Garden of Gethsemane, but I that is too big of a topic for a blog post. Instead, I want to explore Peter's betrayal.  There are two main views of Peter's betrayal among members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The most prevalent view is the one held by most Christians, that Peter had a moment of weakness, and fearing for his own life betrayed Jesus.  Then afterward he felt terrible about it and "wept bitterly" (Matt 26:69).  The other is one set forth by then Elder Spencer W Kimball (later president of the church) in a talk given at BYU on July 13, 1971.  In that talk Elder Kimball hypothesized that Jesus not only prophesied that Peter would deny him, (Matt 26:24) but also commanded Peter to deny him so that Peter would not at that time suffer his fate.

The issue here is the lack of video recordings of the event.  There is no way to know what facial expressions, what gestures, what pregnant pauses occurred as the lines were being spoken. Even a few emoji's could have helped:  "this very night, before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times" (;-)) would have cleared up a lot. But there is not video recording and there are no emoji's so we have to go by the evidence in the text.  I am generally of the opinion that Peter did have a moment of weakness.  Who can judge him?  He was watching Jesus be tortured by the mob.  Many of us can face death with courage, but fewer of us can face torture. Survival instinct kicks in and we are no longer in control of what we are saying or doing.  If this is the true interpretation, then the story of Peter's life after this event is inspiring.  He goes from denying Christ to being is most staunch and courageous advocate. He becomes the example of Jesus' love and long suffering for us, and a role model of how each of us can overcome weakness and become stronger. 

As I was studying these passages this week, I did see, however, more evidence than I had noticed before of Elder Kimball's version. Here are a few of them:

In Matthew 16:21 and Mark 8:31 Jesus clearly states that he was about to be betrayed and killed and then resurrected. I am not sure if Peter understood why this must happen, but he understood that it would happen.  Therefore, when he says, "If I must die with you, I will not deny you.” it was not a hypothetical boast.  He really believed that people would be dying and he could be one of them and he seemed to have steeled himself to that possibility.

Later, when Jesus is about to leave the upper room, Jesus says "When I sent you out without purse or bag or sandals, did you lack anything?” “Nothing,” they answered. “Now, however,” He told them, “The one with a purse should take it, and likewise a bag; and the one without a sword should sell his cloak and buy one."  (Luke 22:25-26).  In hindsight we understand that he said this because he knew that the Christians would be persecuted after his death, but the disciples thought he was asking them to arm themselves to defend him that evening.  Who was the one most eager to use force to defend Jesus?  It was Peter, of course.  He used one of the swords to cut off Malchus' ear (John 22:50).  Jesus knew Peter had misunderstood him, so his rebuke was gentle.  He healed Malchus' ear and then said to Peter, "shall I not drink the cup which the Father has given me?"  Could he have been reminding Peter of his command to stay safe and out of harm’s way as Jesus did what he knew he had to do?

 If Jesus knew that Peter would jump into the fray on his behalf and maybe get himself killed, he might have suggested to Peter that he should, instead, deny Jesus to save his own life.  Having to do so would have, I believe, also made Peter go out and weep bitterly afterward because he could not save Jesus when he so wanted to.  Or, Peter may have had a moment of weakness.  As he watched Jesus be mistreated by the Jews and the Romans, he could have lost his courage and that is why he denied Jesus.  We will all have to wait until the next life and ask Peter himself which it was. Could it have been a mixture of both?  The main take-a-way is that even though Peter denied Jesus that night, he was able to get over it, regain the respect of his brothers, and move forward to become the “Rock” Jesus had foretold he would.  

Washing Feet

 In John 13 we have an account of when Jesus washed the feet of his disciples as part of the last supper narrative. The scriptures suggest that Jesus did this act as a symbol of how the disciples should humble themselves and serve each other "For I have given you an example, that ye should do as I have done to you. Verily Verily, I say unto you, The servant is not greater than the lord; neither he that is sent greater than he that sent him."  (v15-16).  This has always been my take-a-way from this scene until this week.  Two of my podcasts, "Follow Him" and "Unshaken" gave me new insight about the washing of the feet.

In "Follow Him" the guest speaker, Camille Olson, talked about a time when she decided to give some friends pedicures as a surprise.  Her friends were all pleased with the pedicure, but each one went away first and washed their feet before presenting them to Ms Olson for a pedicure.  She talked about how we want to hide our imperfections from the Lord, not wanting him to smell our dirty feet, as it were, just like Peter did (v. 8).  Jesus tells Peter that he must wash his feet, or "thou has no part with me."  Unless we own up to our dirty feet, and let Jesus wash them we cannot be saved.  It was, I am embarrassed to say, the first time I thought of this story in terms of repentance.  Jesus must wash us clean, even our stinky feet, or we have no part with him.

In "Unshaken" Jared Halverson elaborated on this idea.  He pointed out that when Jesus washed the feet of his disciples, he did so with a towel with which he was girded (v. 5).  As he washed their feet, their feet would have become cleaner, but the towel would have become more dirty. Mr Halverson saw this as a symbol of the atonement, Jesus taking upon himself our sins that we might become clean.  I think John includes this detail here, right before the great intercessory prayer (John 17) to give us a visual lesson about what the atonement means.

As a temple worker, every week I recite prayers about ritualistic cleaning.  This passage helped me understand and appreciate the idea of becoming clean through Jesus Christ more than I had before.

Spikenard

 In both Mark 14, and John 12 there is a story of a woman who took an ointment called Spikenard and used it to anoint Jesus.  In Mark the woman is unnamed, but in John we learn that is is Mary, sister to Lazarus, that anointed Jesus.  In John, Mary anoints Jesus' feet but in Mark, the woman anoints Jesus' head.  In both cases the apostles are indignant at the service rendered by the woman because Spikenard was very expensive, and it seemed a waste to pour it on Jesus when it could have been sold for a lot of money, and the money given to the poor.  Mark adds the price it could have been sold for, 300 pence, which was roughly a years’ worth of wages for a manual worker. Jesus tells the apostles that the woman has "wrought a good work on me" (Mark 14:6) and not to chastise her.  

I find this a very fascinating story.  It raises so many questions.  I must admit I was a little obsessed with it this week and even ordered some spikenard on Amazon so I could discover how it smells.  It is a pleasant perfume-like smell, nicer, in my opinion, than Frankincense. 

Usually, in these posts, I try to stick to the text and analyze without too much speculation.  But this week I indulged in speculations, trying to guess answers to a bunch of "what" and "why" questions.  Here are some of the things I was thinking.

1. Jesus is called Christ, which means "anointed one".  In the Old Testament men were anointed when they became priests, (Exodus 30:30) and when they became kings, (e.g. 1 Sam 16).  Jesus was definitely ordained to become and priest and a king, but when was he anointed?  Maybe he was anointed by God on the mount of transfiguration.  Maybe he was anointed before his birth to perform the atonement, or maybe the bloodshed in Gethsemane and Golgotha is what anointed him.  This, however, is the only written account of Jesus being anointed.  Could this be the anointing of Jesus that gave him the title of "Christ"? If so, it is interesting that he is not anointed at the temple by a priest, but in a home by a female friend and disciple. 

2. Why did John include this story?  John's gospel, even more than the other gospels, is very carefully written.  Every story, almost every word, is chosen carefully because it has special meaning. What meaning did John want us to understand by recording this event, and why did he particularly note that the oil Mary used to anoint Jesus was Spikenard? Here are some ideas:

   a. John included the story as a way of motivating Judas' betrayal.  Everyone in John's day would have known how expensive Spikenard was.  It is part of his case against Judas, justifying his claim that Judas was a thief and betrayed Jesus for monetary gain.  

  b. John uses this to foreshadow Jesus' death.  "Let her alone: against the day of my burying hath she kept this." (John 12:7) This idea is supported with the fact that the next verse mentions Lazarus, whose revival from death John uses to foreshadow Jesus' death and resurrection. 

  c. John uses it to depict Jesus as the Bridegroom of the church:  Spikenard is only mentioned in one book of the Old Testament, the Song of Solomon, where it is associated with marital intimacy.  (S of S 1:12, 4:13-14) If Jesus is the Bridegroom, then it would make sense that he would be anointed with Spikenard before his atonement which symbolizes his marriage to the church. This idea is further supported by the fact John starts his gospel with the story of the marriage of Cana, balancing his narrative with an actual marriage at the beginning of his gospel foreshadowing a symbolic marriage that ends his gospel.  

Another train of thought I had this week about this story is why Mary would have such an expensive ointment, and what does it say about Mary and Jesus relationship that Mary would use all of the ointment she had, literally breaking its container, to anoint Jesus? The scriptures suggest that Mary was saving the Spikenard specifically for Jesus' death. "against the day of my burying hath she kept this" (John 12:7).  If that is the case, when did she buy it?  How long had she known that Jesus would soon die, and where did she come up with a year's worth of pay to purchase it? Here are some possibilities I considered this week: 

  a. It is possible that Mary was pretty well off.  She did act as hostess several times for Jesus and his disciples.  It is totally possible when she realized that Jesus was prophesying his own imminent death she went out and bought the Spikenard just so she could do one last act of service for him before he died.  This is the simplest explanation in some ways, but it is hard to understand how a woman in that culture would have had access to that much ready cash. Also, was Spikenard available for purchase in the markets of Jerusalem, or is it something you would have to special order?  Maybe or maybe not. Spikenard comes from India and has to be imported. 

  b. What if Mary had the Spikenard as part of a dowry?  Since Spikenard is associated with marital intimacy, it would make sense for a woman to have acquired, maybe from wealthy family members, a supply of Spikenard as part of a dowry.  If that is the case, it is even a bigger sacrifice for Mary to have used the oil to anoint Jesus, thus spending assets that could have helped her achieve an advantageous marriage arrangement. 

  c. What if Mary was, as some have speculated, either betrothed or married to Jesus.  If that is the case, this whole scene takes on an even more poignant dimension.  What if she had received the Spikenard as part of a dowry or as a wedding gift, to be used as part of intimacy throughout years of marriage.  Mark states that the woman used a whole pound of ointment on Jesus.  Judging from the little .3 oz bottle of Spikenard that I purchased, a pound of Spikenard would have lasted a long time, even for years, if used carefully.  If the Spikenard was supposed to be used to enhance intimacy over years of marriage, the fact that Mary pours out the whole amount could be an expression of mourning. She was, perhaps, thinking of the years of closeness they may have enjoyed which were now impossible. She, bereft, decided to use all the Spikenard understanding it would be her last chance. If this is the case, Jesus' rebuke of the Apostles criticism is very touching. "Let her alone."  He acknowledges the tenderness of her feelings on the occasion, letting her grieve her impending loss. 

As I said, these are just speculations.  There is no support for most of these ideas, but I found them interesting and thinking of them helped make the scriptures more personal to me this week.