October 16, 2009
Sunday Scripture
Twenty-ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time
BY FATHER DONALD DILGER
In Mark’s careful arrangement of the gospel, he included three warnings of Jesus to the disciples about his suffering, death and resurrection. In all three episodes the disciples remain clueless. After each warning. Mark inserts a dim-witted reaction from the disciples. After the first warning, Mark 8:31-33, Simon Peter takes Jesus aside and rebukes him. Jesus vehemently corrects Peter. After the second warning of Jesus’ passion and death, Mark 9:30-32, the disciples argue about who is #1 among them. Jesus corrects the group more gently than he corrected Simon Peter. Today’s gospel is the sequel or reaction to the third warning of Jesus’ passion and death.
James and John approach Jesus to ask him a favor, “We want you to do for us whatever we ask.” Jesus replied, “Like what?” James and John: “Grant that in your glory we may sit one at your right and the other at your left.” These were the recognized places of honor next to a king or other V.I.P. Jesus says, “You don’t know what you are asking. Can you drink the cup that I drink or be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?” They answered, “We can!” Jesus assures them that they will drink that cup and will be baptized with his baptism, but the places of honor are for those for whom they have already been prepared.” A strange dialogue! What are they talking about?
It is clear throughout Mark’s gospel that Jesus’ disciples had no idea what Jesus meant by his kingdom, or as James and John phrased it, “in your glory.” To them it was an earthly kingdom. They would be the most powerful officials. Jesus humors their childish requests and tries to lead them to a better understanding. One gets the impression he did not succeed with them at this time. The “cup” he was about to drink, which they said they could drink, was the bitter and tragic experience of his suffering and death. To them it must have meant the delights of the best wine at the table of Jesus, their earthly king. This “cup” will later be symbolized and realized at the Last Supper, when Jesus shares the cup of his blood with them, a foretaste of his blood soon to be shed on the cross. James and John are here promised martyrdom in due time, but they are still happily unaware of it.
As to the baptism with which Jesus is to be baptized, it is the baptism or bath of blood which Jesus will endure in his suffering and death. One suspects that the eagerness of James and John to be baptized with the same baptism with which Jesus is about to be baptized meant to them some kind of washing in preparation for a banquet as was the custom among Jews of the time of Jesus. Jesus agrees that they will be baptized with his baptism. This is the second assurance of their martyrdom. We know that in 42 A.D. James was the first of the apostles to suffer martyrdom. Of John’s eventual martyrdom we know nothing. The legend of his being boiled in oil without ill effect has no historical value. The same should be said of his very long life and peaceful death many years later. We can conclude with certainty from this gospel story that Mark, who writes about 70 A.D., is aware of the martyrdom of both James and John.
Mark notes that the other ten disciples of Jesus were angry at James and John for this attempted coup to gain power. They were no smarter than James and John. Jesus again has to remind them that anyone who wants to be first must be the slave of all. Mark presents Jesus as the ultimate example of this teaching, ‘The Son of Man (Jesus) did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.” To which Paul adds in Philippians 2, ”. . . although he was in the form of God did not consider this dignity a thing to be clung to, but emptied himself, taking on the form of a slave. . .”
This reading is part of the fourth of four poems. The poems describe the dignity, mission, suffering, death and eventual triumph of a “servant of the Lord.” Sometimes that servant is recognizable as the whole people of Israel. At other times the servant is an individual whose vicarious death, his dying for others, leads to their “justification.” Meaning: his death will influence those for whom he died and he will share his goodness with them. Today’s reading speaks not only of the vicarious death of the servant of the Lord, but also his eventual vindication and triumph, “If he gives his life as an offering for sin, he shall see his descendants in a long life . . .” The reading was chosen for today because from earliest times Christian teachers and writers understood these ancient oracles as a preview of the “cup” and “baptism” of Jesus spoken of in today’s gospel.
The author encourages readers to be patient with the sufferings they endure as Christians and with their own weaknesses. There is someone who understands, our “high priest, (Jesus), who can sympathize with our weaknesses, because he was tested in every way (as we are), but without sin.” We can therefore approach “the throne of grace” with confidence . . .” “Nobody knows de trouble I’ve seen. Nobody knows but Jesus.”