Daily Bible Reading: Baruch 6:1-39 and Mark 3:20-35

Baruch 6:1-39  (thought to be a Letter of Jeremiah) – Jeremiah tells them what to expect in exile.  He asks them to beware of becoming like the foreigners or “of letting fear for [their strange] gods possess you when you see the multitude before and behind them worshiping them.  But say in your heart,’ It is you, O Lord, whom we must worship.’ For my angel is with you, and he is watching over your lives.” (6:5-6) The gods of Chaldea are false gods; they “cannot speak” (6:8). No one should be afraid of these “gods” – they have “no breath of life in them” (6:23); “they cannot move on their own” (6:26); they “give nothing to the poor or to the helpless” (6:27). 

Mark 3:20-35 – Jesus returns to his home, Nazareth, and there were so many people, the disciples are overwhelmed.  His relatives come “to restrain him” because people are saying he is crazy (2:21). And the scribes or “teachers” from Jerusalem think he is possessed too (3:22). Jesus counters them by saying that he could not have “Beelzebul in him” (3:22) because that would mean Satan would be casting out Satan and if Satan’s kingdom is divided against itself it would not continue to stand (3:25).  A lot of what Jesus says here lacks sufficient context to really make me (the reader) feel confident that I am understanding what is being said. I get it that “a house divided against itself cannot stand” – Lincoln helped me get that, but exactly how that applies to Jesus’ situation is not so clear.

When Jesus’ mother and brothers come to get him, he seems to put them down by saying that his true family is made up of the family of believers, not his biological relatives: “‘Who are my mother and my brothers?’ And looking at those who sat around him, he said, ‘Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother” (3:33-35). 

Daily Bible Reading: Baruch 4-5 and Mark 3:1-19

Baruch 4 – What God has given to the people, the commandments of the Law, a knowledge of “what pleases God” will stand forever, Baruch tells us. “Turn back, Jacob, seize her, in her radiance make your way to light” (4:2-4). He urges them to “take courage,” for “I have put my hope in the Everlasting to save you, and joy has come to me from the Holy One, because of the mercy that will soon come to you from your everlasting savior” (4:23). “Look toward the east, O Jerusalem, and see the joy that is coming to you from God” (4:36).

Baruch 5 – “Jerusalem, take off your dress of sorrow and distress, put on the beauty of the glory of God for ever, wrap the cloak of God’s integrity around you” (5:1-2). God will bring you back in glory.  “For God has ordered that every high mountain and the everlasting hills be made low and the valleys filled up, to make level ground, so that Israel may walk safely in the glory of God” (5:7). Isaiah 40:4 is echoed here.

The use of gender pronouns in Scripture is very interesting to me. Here, in Baruch, the “wisdom” tradition appears in his use of the feminine to describe the “radiant” light of God embedded in the cosmos AND in the “Law” given through Moses to God’s people. It is to this that we are invited to join ourselves.

Mark 3:1-19 – Another healing, this one on the Sabbath.  Jesus asks the Pharisees if it is wrong to do good on the Sabbath.  He is annoyed with them for not answering him spontaneously, from what they know would be God’s intent.  Instead they are mentally involved in just trying to “catch” him doing something unlawful.  He heals the man with the withered hand, and this impels them to seek his ruin (3:6).

Again, great multitudes follow him from Judea, Jerusalem, Idumea and in the region around Tyre and Sidon (this covers the entire country from just west of the Dead Sea to all the way up the coast to the north).  He even worries about being “crushed” by the crowds (3:9). Unclean spirits continue to recognize him.  He calls his followers up the mountain where he appoints the twelve apostles (3:14).  They will “be sent out to proclaim the message, and [will] have authority to cast out demons” (3:14-15): Peter, James and John (sons of Zebedee), Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James (son of Alphaeus), Thaddaeus, Simon the Zealot, and Judas Iscariot.  

Daily Bible Reading: Baruch 3 and Mark 2

Baruch 3 – “[T]he soul in anguish and the wearied spirit cry out to you” (3:1). “Learn where there is wisdom, where there is strength, where there is understanding, so that you may at the same time discern where there is length of days and life, where there is light for the eyes and peace” (3:14). This begins to sound a lot like the wisdom literature. There is even a touch of environmentalism here as in the following:

“Where are the rulers of the nations, and those who lorded it over the animals on earth; those who made sport of the birds of the air, and who hoarded up silver and gold in which people trust, and there is no end to the getting; those who schemed to get silver, and were anxious, but there is no trace of the works?” (3:16-18)

“Who has ever climbed the sky and caught her to bring her down from the clouds? Who has ever crossed the ocean and found her to bring her back in exchange for the finest gold?” (3:29-30).

“But the One who knows all knows her, he has grasped her with his own intellect, he has set the earth firm for ever and filled it with four-footed beasts, he sends the light—and trembling it obeys; the stars shine joyfully at their set times. . .It is he who is our God, no other can compare with him. He has grasped the whole way of knowledge, and confined it to his servant Jacob, to Israel his well-beloved; so causing her to appear on earth and move among men” (3:32-38). These words certainly refer to His presence in “His people,” the Jews, but as a Christian I cannot but see these words as also prophetic of Christ as well who is "our God. . . on earth . . . among men." 

Mark 2 – Back at Capernaum, word gets out that Jesus is home. The writer emphasizes the crowds that came to him to hear him speak.  They were so great, when people brought a paralyzed man for him to heal, they could not get to him.  The man had to be lowered down through the roof! (2:4). Jesus responds to the people’s great faith in his powers. He tells the paralyzed man that his “sins are forgiven” (2:5). When the “teachers of the Law” challenge this statement as blasphemy, Jesus responds by saying, “is it easier to say to this paralyzed man, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Get up, pick up your mat, and walk’?” (2:9). 

Again, there is so much “mystery” the Jesus’ words, it is hard to comprehend even now exactly what Jesus was getting at here. Is he implying that there is some relationship between the man’s sins and his paralysis? I don’t think so. Is he simply saying that his powers as “Son of Man” (2:10) not only permit him to do miracles but to forgive sin? I’m more drawn to that explanation.

Jesus speaks to people as if the words in their hearts were as audible to him as the words of their mouths. Then, so that they may have proof that he (Jesus) does have authority to forgive sins, he tells the man to get up and walk.

Beside the sea, crowds gather to hear him teach.  He asks Levi, the tax collector, to come with him (2:14). Then, he goes to his house to eat with him and other “sinners."  The scribes question his disciples about why he consorts with such people.  So far Jesus has shown interest in the lame and the disreputable (tax collectors), but not much interest in the affluent or well-positioned. He says, “People who are well do not need a doctor, but only those who are sick. I have not come to call respectable people, but outcasts” (2:17).

People ask him why his disciples do not fast (like those of John the Baptist and the Pharisees).  He tells them they will not fast while “the bridegroom” is with them, but when he is gone, they will fast (2:20). He alludes to two things, which imply that new things cannot be patched on to old; new wine cannot be poured into old skins. He and his disciples also pick grain on the Sabbath.  When challenged with disrespecting the Sabbath, he compares what he is doing with what David and his companions did when they were in conflict with Saul—how they ate the bread of the presence in the temple once.  

Jesus actually mistakes the High Priest in the OT allusion—it was Ahimelech, not Abiathar, his son. The story is at 1 Sam. 21:1, and the story there is a little different: they do not eat “the bread of the Presence,” but holy bread or consecrated bread. The Jerusalem Bible is less clear that there is a distinction, and in a note, it also says that there were exceptions to the rule that only priests could eat of it—if the men were ritually unpolluted. The dispute with the Pharisees in Mark is somewhat different.  It isn’t about the privileges of the priesthood, but what is appropriate for the Sabbath; and Jesus says, the Sabbath rules were made for man, not to frustrate the needs of men.

Daily Bible Reading: Baruch 2 and Mark 1:29-45

Baruch 2 – The Lord is true to his threats as he is to his promises—both of which are the legacy of Moses to his people (the blessings and the curses). An interesting passage seems to ask the Lord to save his people because only the living can offer God the glory and praise appropriate to God. “Incline your ear, O Lord, and hear; open your eyes, O Lord, and see, for the dead who are in Hades, whose spirit has been taken from their bodies, will not ascribe glory or justice to the Lord; but the person who is deeply grieved, who walks bowed and feeble, with failing eyes and famished soul, will declare your glory and righteousness, O Lord” (2:16-18).

Blessed the humble, the meek, the poor in spirit—does Christ not evoke the same image for those who are blessed according to his gospel? He is also asking them to “serve” their enemies.  If they do these things, the Lord will restore them. “I will bring them again into the land that I swore to give to their ancestors, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and they will rule over it . . .” (2:34).

Mark 1:29-45 – Jesus is in Capernaum, on the northern coast of the Sea of Galilee, teaching in the local synagogues and performing miracles aimed mostly at helping people who are sick or possessed by what are described as “demons.” The weird thing about these demons is they are the only “ones” who seem to have a knowledge of Jesus’ “authority.” If anyone has some insights as to why this might have been the case, I'd be interested to hear what you think. I have no clue, except maybe it is just that "demons" - accepted in some way by Jewish thinkers as part of the spirit world - might have been somehow more part of the "world" Jesus comes from. 

Jesus’ powers of healing make him a big draw. He seeks to be alone at times, and is seemingly worried about word getting out about him; still, he is entering the period of his public ministry. Rumors of his powers spread and “people came to him from everywhere” (1:45)

Daily Bible Reading: Baruch 1 and Mark 1:1-28

Baruch Background: This deutero-canonical book that comes Lamentation and Ezekiel is not in the Hebrew Bible.  In the Greek Bible, it appears between Jeremiah and Lamentations; in the Vulgate it comes after Lamentations.  It says it was written in Babylon by Baruch, Jeremiah’s scribe, and sent to Jerusalem to be read at liturgical gatherings.  It gives us valuable information on how the religious life of those in exile was maintained. Lawrence Boadt, author of Reading the Old Testament: An Introduction (1984), places it between third and first centuries BC,  “a work of encouragement to those Jews being forced to adopt Greek ways” (503). The sixth chapter (going by Vulgate) appears in the NRSV as a separate book called The Letter of Jeremiah. In the Septuagint, the Letter is separated from Baruch by Lamentations. The first and last chapters are in prose (probably from the Hebrew). The middle chapters are in verse (probably from Greek only).

Baruch 1 – The book or letter was read on the fifth anniversary of the fall of Jerusalem (582 BC). When it was read to all who lived in Babylon, they “wept, fasted, and prayed before the Lord.” They collected money to send back to Jerusalem and they returned some of the Temple treasures along with these.  They beg the people back in Jerusalem to pray for King Nebuchadnezzar and his son and to read the scroll they are sending them.

In this book as in so many, the prophetic voice is dominant. Israel has come to this pass in their history because of the unfaithfulness of the people, the priests, the rulers, and many of the prophets. “We did not listen to the voice of the Lord our God in all the words of the prophets whom he sent to us, but all of us followed the intent of our own wicked hearts by serving other gods and doing what is evil in the sight of the Lord our God” (NRSV 1:21).

Mark: Background Information – The Gospel of Mark is most likely the first of the gospels to have been written down.  Ascribed to John Mark, a disciple whose house was open to Christians and a cousin of Barnabas, who accompanied Paul on one of his missionary journeys, the book is traditionally thought to have been written around 70 AD in Rome. The audience probably was mostly Gentile. It stresses Jesus’ message of the coming of the kingdom, the call to repentance and faith. The content of Jesus’ teaching is rarely gone into. He exorcises, heals, preaches and feeds crowds. The disciples here are dense—one will betray him, one will deny him, the rest will desert him.  He goes only rarely into Gentile territory, but the centurion at the cross presages Jesus’ appeal to them.

The Christology of the gospel is apparent: He is the Messiah, anointed Davidic king, Christos, Son of Man.  Mark emphasizes the “mystery” of Jesus’ identity.  Mark also shares with Paul a focus on “election,”

The Jerusalem Bible introduction emphasizes the “scandal” of man’s (even the disciples’) failure to recognize or receive the Messiah. This is something Peter dwells on in his speech to the people of Jerusalem. “Men of Israel . . . Jesus the Nazarene was a man commended to you by God by the miracles and portents and signs that God worked through him when he was among you. . .This man, who was put into your power by the deliberate intention and foreknowledge of God, you took and had crucified by men outside the Law.  You killed him, but God raised him to life, freeing him from the pangs of Hades. . .” (Acts 2: 14-24).

Mark 1:1-28 – The “good news” of Jesus Christ, Son of God, starts with a quote from Isaiah (but actually Malachi 3:1 and Isaiah 40:4), alluding to John the Baptist. People everywhere—from the Judean countryside and from Jerusalem flocked to John to be baptized. Here even before Jesus, Mark lets us feel the hunger in people for his coming. Jesus comes too. 

At his baptism, a dove comes down and a voice proclaims him God’s Son, [His] Beloved (1:11). Then the Spirit “drives” him into the wilderness where he is “tempted by Satan” for 40 days.  After John’s arrest, Jesus comes to Galilee with his good news. He seems here to take the place of John.  His message is virtually the same.

He selects his first four disciples: Simon and Andrew (fishermen), James and John (sons of Zebedee, also fishermen). He impresses them with the authority in his demeanor (1:22). A possessed man approaches him, saying, “’I know who you are, the Holy One of God"”(1:24). But Jesus silences him and exorcises the “unclean spirit” (that possesses him (1:26). His fame spreads.