Deeper Commentary

12:1 And he began to speak to them in parables- The Lord’s hopefulness at their response is remarkable; He makes a continued appeal to those who in other teaching He has stated have gone too far and are even now condemned. His hopefulness for human response is outstanding and a huge encouragement for us.

There are strong similarities between the Lord's parable and the song of the vineyard of Isaiah 5:1-7, especially in the LXX:
"Let me sing for my well beloved a song of my beloved about His vineyard [The genre is significant; what begins as a joyful, idyllic harvest song turns into bitter disappointment and declaration of judgment]. My beloved had a vineyard on a very fruitful hill [The environment was ideal]. He dug it up [to dig was the work of the lowest servant, but God did this], gathered out its stones [the effects of the curse were ameliorated], planted it with the choicest vine ["the men of Judah"], built a tower in its midst, and also cut out a wine press therein. He looked for it to yield grapes, but it yielded wild grapes. Now, inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, please judge between Me and My vineyard. What could have been done more to My vineyard, that I have not done in it? [Absolutely all has been done to enable our fruitfulness. The Father wants fruit above all- in the Mt. 21 parable, the owner seeks the actual fruit, rather than cash payment. This element of unreality serves to show His passionate interest in fruit] Why, when I looked for it to yield grapes, did it yield wild grapes? Now I will tell you what I will do to My vineyard. I will take away its hedge, and it will be eaten up. I will break down its wall of it, and it will be trampled down [The downtreading of the temple at the hands of the Gentiles].  I will lay it a wasteland. It won’t be pruned nor hoed, but it will grow briers and thorns [The language of the curse in Eden. The land was as the Garden of Eden, but Israel sinned "as Adam"]. I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain on it [the language of Elijah, prototype of John the Baptist]. For the vineyard of Yahweh of Armies is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah His pleasant plant: and He looked for justice, but, behold, oppression; for righteousness [the fruit required was justice and righteousness- instead, as Isaiah 5 goes on to explain, there was materialistic selfishness], but, behold, a cry of distress".

A man planted a vineyard- The language of planting a vineyard and eating the fruit of it is used in 1 Cor. 3:6; 9:7 about our work of preaching. Paul was unafraid to interpret the parable on multiple levels. We are to be fruitful; but in our work of sharing the Gospel with others we are also the planters who come seeking fruit on our converts. The suggestion could be that the owner personally did the planting and preparing. I say this because Isaiah 5, upon which the parable is based, includes this feature- of the owner doing so much personally. All has been done so that we can produce spiritual fruit; but so often we excuse our lack of fruitfulness by blaming environment factors. The situation in our country, our town, workplace, marriage, family, health etc. And we can put huge effort into trying to change environment because we consider that we can be more fruitful for God in a different environment. But whilst passivity and fatalism are just as wrong, it must be accepted that our environment in the bigger picture has been uniquely and thoughtfully prepared by God so that we might be fruitful. For it is clear from the parable that our fruitfulness is God’s most passionate desire and intention for us. He would hardly place us in any other environment, therefore, than one ideally prepared by Him in order to enable and enhance our fruitfulness.

And set a hedge about it- The same word is used for the Law of Moses as the "wall of partition" (Eph. 2:14). Although the vineyard was to be given to others, it was itself destroyed and dismantled by the owner; which involved the taking away of the Law of Moses. The vineyard functioned differently, on the basis of fruit being produced in the vine of Christ (Jn. 15).

And dug a pit for the winepress- This was the place where the grapes were trodden to produce wine. It features in all record of this parable. What does it represent? Perhaps the temple, designed to be the means of producing the wine of covenant relationship with God. The targums on Isaiah 5, the song of the vineyard upon which the parable is based, interpret it as a reference to the destruction of the temple. But the Lord only elsewhere uses the term when three times using it as a symbol of God's final judgment of condemnation (Rev. 14:19,20; 19:15). This is typical of the structure of God's plans with men. What is designed for our blessing can also be for our condemnation, just as a cup of wine is used as a symbol of both blessing and condemnation. Time and again we are left with nothing but two choices before us- of acceptance or condemnation. Israel were the vine of God's planting which produced bad fruit (Jer. 2:21; Dt. 32:32,33; Hos. 10:1). The lack of good grapes on the vine was because of Israel's unspirituality (Jer. 8:13) and allowing the wonderful vineyard to become overgrown (Jer. 5:17). The reason why the workers beat and killed the servants was surely because actually they had no fruit to give them, even though the environment was perfect for good wine. The land of Israel was an environment and climate ideally suited to producing good vines (Dt. 8:7). There was supposed to be joy at the gathering of the vine harvest- and that connection is frequently made in the Old Testament. Indeed, the pictures of joy and wine at harvest are the pictures of the Messianic Kingdom. It could have come- but Israel didn't produce the good grapes. Likewise, believe it or not, God has created an ideal environment for each of us to produce spiritual fruit. The song of the Vineyard in Is. 5:1-7 is clearly the basis of the Lord's parable here, and this is the thrust of that story- that all had been done by God for the viticulture to flourish, but it didn't because of Israel's refusal to respond and to work. Isaiah 5 goes on to condemn Israel for drunkenness (Is. 5:11-13,22), as if they had used the vine for their own selfishness, rather like the Jews had made the "feasts of Yahweh" the "feast of the Jews", His house had become "your house", and just as we can use the structure of God's working with men, the body of Christ, the mystical temple, as a social club for our own pleasure. God therefore withheld rain so that in any case, fruit was now impossible for Israel (Is. 5:6); and that is exactly the Lord's message in Mt. 21. The Isaiah 5 passage is in turn developed in Is. 27:2-6, where we find that Yahweh Himself guarded the vineyard, watered and weeded it, such was His almost obsessive interest in this project (Is. 27:3). The fruit hoped for was righteousness and justice (Is. 5:7); human injustice usually arises from passivity, going along with a group situation which hurts individuals and denies them justice. And this was the lack of fruit which led to condemnation. Is. 5:5 and Ps. 80:13 say that the judgment of the vineyard is in terms of having its walls broken down and it being destroyed; the Lord's parable doesn't deny that, but doesn't specifically mention it- rather does He focus upon fruit being produced by different workers. Jn. 15 uses the imagery of the vine to suggest that fruit now comes from being branches within the vine of Christ- which grows with no reference to any vineyard, freestanding in the world.

And built a tower- It may be that the emphasis upon the tower and winepress is simply to show the degree of effort God went to so that the vineyard could produce fruit. The details of the allegory fall away compared to the supreme point- that God did all possible to provide an environment which would produce fruit. And He likewise provides us with an optimal environment for spirituality, much as we are tempted to think He has it wrong on some points.

And rented it to husbandmen. Then he went into another country- Not necessarily the ascension of the Lord Jesus. It could be a reference to God’s entry of covenant with Israel, at which "God came down on mount Sinai" (Ex. 19:20; 20:19) and then "ascended up on high" (Ps. 68:18).  The Greek specifically means to go into a foreign, i.e. Gentile, country. It is used of the prodigal son going into a far country (Lk. 15:13). Let us remember that the Son in the parable represents the Lord Jesus, the owner is clearly God. This going away is not therefore representative of the Lord's ascension to Heaven, although it appears to be used that way in 25:14,15; Mk. 13:34 ["the Son of Man is as a man taking a far journey", s.w.]. This may just be the furniture of the parable, alluding to the common experience of absentee landlords. These were often characterized by being uncaring for their land; but this owner was particular careful for his project to the point of obsession. He wanted the fruit, not money. It therefore may be part of the impression given, that the owner appears to be absent and disinterested- but in reality He is passionately interested. And this is exactly the position with God, who is perceived as somehow distant and passionless about His project on earth. There may also be the hint that even before He considered giving His precious vineyard to the Gentiles, which appears at the end of the parable, He had in fact initially envisaged this, and had in some form gone to the Gentiles right from the start of His project with Israel.

Initially, the parable would've got the hearers on the side of the labourers; because it was a frequent complaint that absentee landlords abused their tenants, who worked hard just to send cash off to the landlord in another country. But the parable twists around, so that after initially identifying with this group, the people came to see that it was they who stood condemned.

12:2 And at the season- Matthew: "And when the harvest season drew near", a phrase used by Matthew about the drawing near of the Kingdom at Christ's time (3:2; 4:17). But by the end of His ministry, the Lord was warning that false teachers would wrongly claim that "the time draws near" (Lk. 21:8). Clearly He taught that the time had drawn near, but not come. He taught at the end of His ministry how He was as a man who had gone to  a far country for a long time. This invites us to understand that with each appeal of the prophets, and of John as the last prophet, the time potentially could have come. God's purpose is thus open ended. Peter uses the same word to speak of how the end of all things is drawing near (1 Pet. 4:7), and Paul likewise (Rom. 13:12). It could have come in AD70- but again, a great delay, until our last days. This is why setting any date for the second coming is inappropriate- for it is a case of fulfilling preconditions, rather than awaiting a day fixed on a calendar. "The season" for fruit (Mk. 12:2) had indeed come, many times- all was potentially ready for it, but human failure meant there was no harvest.

He sent- The Greek apostello again encourages the apostles to see themselves as the equivalent of the Old Testament 'sent ones'- the prophets.

To the husbandmen a servant, so he might receive from the husbandmen the fruits of the vineyard- The prophets are God's servants (2 Kings 9:7 and often). Note that the prophets were sent from God, as the Lord Jesus was; but this doesn't imply they were in Heaven with God before their sending, and neither was the Lord. But we wonder whether there was one initial prophet in view here? Matthew says there were two groups of servants, and this is perhaps an allusion to the Jewish distinction between the “former prophets” and the “latter prophets”.

12:3 And they took him and beat him, and sent him away empty handed- Paul several times uses the word to express his fear that his preaching and pastoral labour had been "in vain" [s.w. "empty"], e.g. 1 Cor. 15:14. His aim, as our aim, was spiritual fruit in people, to see the fruits of the Spirit revealed in a convert. Where this is lacking we come away empty handed as it were, just like the Old Testament prophets. The parable suggests that the more Israel were asked for spiritual fruit, the more angry and abusive they progressively became towards the servants who required that fruit from them. And so often, those who call others on their real spirituality are hated and finally destroyed by them.

12:4 And again he sent to them another servant- and him they wounded in the head and handled shamefully- When the world reviled him, Paul saw himself as the beaten prophets Jesus had spoken about (2 Cor. 11:24,25 = Mt. 21:35). Mk. 12:4 adds that the last servant was “wounded in the head”, surely a reference to the beheading of John the Baptist and shameful treatment of his severed head. "Handled shamefully" is s.w. Is. 53:3 LXX "despised". The Old Testament prophets suffered aspects of what the Lord suffered at their hands.

12:5 And he sent another- and him they killed; and many others, beating some and killing some- Matthew adds stoning to these insults. There are few accounts of Old Testament prophets being killed or stoned. But beating, stoning and killing are Mosaic punishments for apostasy, and so the idea may be that Israel excused their lack of spiritual fruitfulness by judging as apostate the prophets who demanded this of them. This is typical- the unspiritual transfer their own anger with themselves and awareness of their own coming judgment onto others, whom they condemn as worthy of judgment and punishment.

12:6 He had one other, a beloved son. He sent him last to them, saying: They will reverence my son- The owner comes over as unusually patient and desperately eager for fruit, sending so many servants [Matthew's account says he sent many] and then sending his son. It is noteworthy that the parable of Mk. 12:6 has Jesus describing Himself as both a servant- the last servant- and the only beloved son of the vineyard owner.

Lk. 20:13 adds "It may be that...". The Greek isos is tantalizingly hard to understand. It could mean 'Perhaps'; or equally it could mean 'They will, surely'. Lk. 20:13 adds “My beloved Son”. Thus the joyful harvest song of Is. 5:1, the "song of my beloved”, becomes the tragedy of "My beloved son". The invitation "O inhabitants of Jerusalem… judge, I pray you, between me and my vineyard" (Is. 5:3) is matched by the rhetorical question: "What therefore will the lord of the vineyard do unto them?" (Lk. 20:15). This too was addressed by the Lord to Jerusalem’s inhabitants. We wonder of course how the Father could truly feel like this if He is omniscient. My suggestion is that He limits His omniscience in order to enter fully into our human experience; which means that His expressions of shock and disappointment are legitimate reflections of how He actually feels.

“Surely they will reverence my Son” is the thought imputed to Almighty God in the parable, as He sends His only Son to seek for spiritual response in Israel. The parable frames God as almost naive in believing that although Israel had killed the prophets, they would reverence the Word made flesh, and the speaking of God to them in Him. Yet of course God knew what would happen; but in order to express the extraordinary, unenterable extent of His hopefulness, He is framed in this way. Just as the Father thought that His people “surely” would reverence His Son, so He was ‘certain’ that if His people went to Babylon in captivity, “surely then shalt you be ashamed… for all your wickedness” (Jer. 22:22). But the reality was that they grew to like the soft life of Babylon and refused to obey the command to return to God’s land. Such was and is the hopefulness of God. The Father had the same attitude to Israel in Old Testament times: “I thought that after she had done all this, she would return to me, but she did not” (Jer. 3:7 NIV). The Lord Jesus reflected the Father’s positive spirit in the way He framed the parable of the prodigal son to feature the Heavenly Father as running out to meet the returning son, falling on his neck and kissing him… in exactly the language of Gen. 33:4 about Esau doing this to Jacob. The connection can’t be denied; but what was the Lord’s point? Surely He was willing to see something positive in the otherwise fleshly Esau at that time, He as it were took a snapshot of Esau at that moment… and applied it to God Himself, in His extravagant grace towards an unworthy Jacob. This was how positive minded the Lord was in His reading of even the darkest characters.

12:7 But those husbandmen said among themselves- That is, they conspired. This is quoting the LXX of Gen. 37:18. And the allusion is also to "When they shall see him, there is no beauty that they should desire him" (ls. 53:2)

This is the heir!- The leaders of first century Israel initially recognized Jesus of Nazareth as the Messiah (Mt. 21:38 cp. Gen. 37:20; Jn. 7:28). They saw (i.e. understood, recognized) him, but then they were made blind by Christ (Jn. 9:39). It was because they "saw" Jesus as the Messiah that the sin of rejecting him was counted to them (Jn. 9:41). This explains why the Roman / Italian nation was not held guilty for crucifying Christ, although they did it, whereas the Jewish nation was. And yet there is ample Biblical evidence to suggest that these same people who "saw" / recognized Jesus as the Christ were also ignorant of his Messiahship. "Ye both know me, and ye know whence I am... Ye neither know me, nor my Father... when ye have lifted up the Son of man, then shall ye know that I am he" (Jn. 7:28; 8:19,28) were all addressed to the same group of Jews. Did they know / recognize Jesus as Messiah, or not? As they jeered at him on the cross, and asked Pilate to change the nameplate from "Jesus, King of the Jews", did they see him as their Messiah? It seems to me that they didn't. In ignorance the Jewish leaders and people crucified their Messiah (Acts 3:17 RV). And yet they knew him for who he was, they saw him coming as the heir. I would suggest the resolution to all this is that they did recognize him first of all, but because they didn't want to accept him, their eyes were blinded, so that they honestly thought that he was an impostor, and therefore in ignorance they crucified him. And yet, it must be noted, what they did in this ignorance, they were seriously accountable for before God.

Come, let us kill him and the inheritance shall be ours- Their assumption therefore was that the landlord must have died, for otherwise, killing the son would not have given them the inheritance. They acted, as we can, as if God is dead; although they would never have admitted that. The apparent non-action of God can likewise lead to the wrong impression that He is effectively dead. Seizing a vineyard for personal possession reminds us of Ahab’s actions in 1 Kings 21:15,16- making Naboth a type of Christ, and associating the Jewish religious leadership with wicked Ahab. However, Ahab did repent- and one wonders whether the Lord built in this allusion in reflection of His amazing hopefulness for Israel’s repentance. The allusion to Ahab may have been born in the Lord's Bible-saturated mind by the way that Isaiah 5:6 spoke of rain being withheld from the vineyard, as happened in Ahab and Elijah's time. The confirmation of Israel in their evil way was brought to its climax in the crucifixion of Christ. The leaders of first century Israel initially recognized Jesus of Nazareth as the Messiah (Mt. 21:38 cp. Gen. 37:20; Jn. 7:28). They saw (i.e. understood, recognized) him, but then they were made blind by Christ (Jn. 9:39). It was because they "saw" Jesus as the Messiah that the sin of rejecting him was counted to them (Jn. 9:41). This explains why the Roman / Italian nation was not held guilty for crucifying Christ, although they did it, whereas the Jewish nation was. And yet there is ample Biblical evidence to suggest that these same people who "saw" / recognized Jesus as the Christ were also ignorant of his Messiahship. "Ye both know me, and ye know whence I am... Ye neither know me, nor my Father... when ye have lifted up the Son of man, then shall ye know that I am he" (Jn. 7:28; 8:19,28) were all addressed to the same group of Jews. Did they know / recognize Jesus as Messiah, or not? As they jeered at him on the cross, and asked Pilate to change the nameplate from "Jesus, King of the Jews", did they see him as their Messiah? It seems to me that they didn't. In ignorance the Jewish leaders and people crucified their Messiah (Acts 3:17 RV). And yet they knew him for who he was, they saw him coming as the heir. I would suggest the resolution to all this is that they did recognize him first of all, but because they didn't want to accept him, their eyes were blinded, so that they honestly thought that he was an impostor, and therefore in ignorance they crucified him. And yet, it must be noted, what they did in this ignorance, they were seriously accountable for before God.

The Lord was from Galilee, where the zealot movement was popular amongst the landless tenant farmers. Viticulture was profitable as demand for quality wine grew amongst the elite, especially in Rome. The workers were those who had lost their land and were now working on the plantations, with the wine exported and only receiving low pay. To kill the young owner of a vineyard when the father had died overseas, declare it ownerless and take possession of it, was not unknown. It was seen as a heroic thing to do, putting land in the hands of the people who had originally owned and farmed it. But the Lord's parable is reversing this. Actually this was a shameful thing to do in this case because it is associated with the murder of God's Son their Messiah. The owner has all the external appearance of the typically awful, uncaring absentee owner- just as God may appear. Until more careful thought and reflection shows him to be actually very different and passionate for fruit.

12:8 And they took him and killed him, and threw him out of the vineyard- Surely a reference to the Lord being crucified outside Jerusalem. In this case, the vineyard specifically speaks of Jerusalem and the temple. Mk. 12:8 appears in English to suggest a different order to Matthew: Took, killed, cast out of the vineyard. But the Greek text doesn’t have to be read strictly chronologically. Strictly, they “took Him, killed and cast out of the vineyard”. The killed-and-cast-out need not be chronological. Or it could be that the Lord is teaching that effectively, they had killed Him before casting Him out and crucifying; the essence of the cross was ongoing in His life. That is clear enough in a number of Gospel passages.

"Cast Him out" has obvious connection to the way in which the Lord was crucified outside the city limits of Jerusalem. But 'cast him out' is parallel with the stone being "rejected" by the builders (:10). The 'casting out' therefore speaks of religious rejection from the community. The same word is used of how the Lord was cast out of Nazareth (Lk. 4:29), and how believers would be cast out from Judaism (Lk. 6:22) and the synagogue (Jn. 9:34); and even from the legalistic church (3 Jn. 10 "casts them out of the church"). Any who experience being cast out of the visible body of God's people are thereby fellowshipping the Lord's crucifixion sufferings. Yet sadly the experience destroys many- when it can be taken as a share in His sufferings, knowing that if we suffer with Him, we shall also reign with Him. It is the same word used for the casting out of the rejected from the Kingdom to final condemnation (8:12; 22:13; 25:30; Lk. 13:28); those who cast out of the vineyard, the Kingdom (Mt. 21:43) will themselves be cast out of the Kingdom at the last day.

12:9- see on Mk. 8:34-37.

What therefore will the lord of the vineyard do?- This is typical of how men are invited in this life to work out their own condemnation. So that it is man who is self condemned rather than being condemned by a vindictive God. "Out of your own mouth will I judge you, you wicked servant. You thought that I am a hard man, demanding back what I did not deposit, and reaping that which I did not sow?" (Lk. 19:22). And we think of how Nathan led David to self judgment. We are therefore to infer that the following words "He will come..." were said by the audience in response to the Lord's question. The Lord’s parable of the vineyard is shot through with allusions to the vineyard parable of Is. 5. When the Lord asks “What will the lord of the vineyard do?”, those who picked up the Isaiah 5 allusions would have found the answer in Is. 5:4,5: “What… to do… what I will do”.

He will come- The Lord Jesus said this with the cry still echoing in His ears concerning Himself: "Blessed is He that comes in the name of the Lord" (Mt. 21:9). He clearly has Himself in view, 'coming' in behalf of His Father. His parody of a triumphal entry into Jerusalem was really an entering of Jerusalem in judgment upon them. His entry into Jerusalem and the temple was in essence the Lord of the vineyard coming. He certainly uses the language of the Lord coming with reference to Himself (23:39; 24:42,46,48; 25:19; Lk. 12:36). 

And destroy the husbandmen, and will give the vineyard to others- The Lord spoke of how the owner Himself would “come and destroy the husbandmen”. This is a shocking change in tempo- the owner has appeared impotent, distant and naive, to the point that the husbandmen considered He was effectively dead.  They reasoned that if they killed the Son, then the vineyard would be theirs. But this is exactly the nature of Divine judgment. The God who appears effectively dead, at least impotent, distant and naïve, will suddenly reveal Himself in direct judgment. We believe that now by faith, but it shall surely happen.

12:10 Have you not read in the scripture- They spent their whole lives reading Scripture, and Ps. 118 was a well known Passover Hallel. But we can read and yet never really read as God intends.

The stone which the builders rejected- The Lord would be "rejected of the elders, chief priests and scribes" (Mk. 8:31 s.w.); indeed, "rejected by this generation" (Lk. 17:25). In the metaphor, the builders were supposed to use the stone, to manipulate it and use it as important material; and build a temple upon it. But they rejected the cornerstone, and so they didn't build a temple. That is what the metaphor implies. The Jews considered that the building of a temple was the work of Messiah; but they refused to build it, because they rejected Jesus as Christ. And so the Messianic Kingdom didn't come; there was no Messianic temple built by them, because they rejected the cornerstone.

The same was made the head of the corner?- If the builders rejected this stone, the implication is that another set of builders used it in another building, which became the temple of God. This is precisely the situation with the vineyard being taken away from the Jewish tenants and another group of workers being taken on. The quotation is seamlessly in context with the parable.

12:11 This was from the Lord and it is marvellous in our eyes?- In whose eyes would the elevation and acceptance of the stone [a similar Hebrew and Aramaic word to "son"] be marvellous or miraculous / praiseworthy? The quotation is from Ps. 118:23. This Psalm is a dialogue between the speaker, who is in suffering and rejection and yet has hope of resurrection and glorious acceptance, and another group of people who sing or speak their response. This is why there are statements in the first person e.g. "The Lord is my strength... I will praise you", and then responses of the group: "It is marvellous in our eyes... we will rejoice and be glad... we have blessed you... the Lord has showed us light". Who is this group? The Psalm opens with instruction to "The house of Aaron... Israel... them that fear the Lord" to respond to the Messiah figure in praise (Ps. 118:2-4). The priesthood are often paralleled with all Israel, because it was God's intention that eventually all Israel should be a priestly nation. The significance of the quotation is that it was to be the intended response of the "house of Aaron", Israel's religious leaders, to the acceptance of the rejected stone / son of God. But it was the Lord's disciples who would make this response. They, therefore were the new "house of Aaron"- yet another hint that the Lord was creating a new Israel with another priesthood.

12:12 And they sought to arrest him; but they feared the crowd. For they perceived that he had spoken that parable against them; and they left him and went away- The connection with Isaiah 5 was so clear, and that song of the vineyard was a well known passage understood as the justification for the destruction of the first temple. Their "seeking" to arrest Him is the very language of Herod seeking to destroy God's son (Mt. 2:13,20). They were no better than the despised Herod. The Greek for "Lay hands on / arrest" is likewise used for what Herod did to John the Baptist (Mt. 14:3). The Lord uses the same word soon afterwards to describe how His servants will likewise suffer (Mt. 22:6 "The remnant took his servants, and entreated them spitefully and killed them"). The Lord intends us to see all our sufferings as part of His. Matthew repeatedly uses the word to describe how the Jews laid hands on the Lord to arrest and kill Him (Mt. 26:4,48,50,55,57). We see the fickleness of the crowd. They were soon crying for the Lord's blood. 

12:13 And they sent to him certain of the Pharisees and of the Herodians, that they might catch him out in his teaching- The same word used of how they were to be entangled or caught up in condemnation (Lk. 21:35; Rom. 11:9). As they treated the Lord, so they were treated. Our attitude to Him is in a way our attitude to ourselves and our eternal destiny. The Pharisees and Herodians were sworn enemies. Herod was anathema to the Pharisees, who saw him as a false Jew and some kind of antiChrist figure. But a theme of the Lord's judgment and death was that His enemies were united together by a common hatred of Him.

12:14 And when they arrived, they said to him: Teacher, we know you are truthful and do not care about anyone's opinion. For you are not swayed by appearances, but truly teach the way of God- See on Jn. 10:13. Lk. 20:21 adds that they also said at this point: "You say and teach rightly", Gk. orthos, from whence 'orthodox'. They were thereby trying to lead Him to make a right wing, conservative answer, namely, that tribute should be given to God and not Caesar. And then the Herodians could legally swoop upon Him and have Him arrested for disloyalty to the empire. John the Baptist had attempted to prepare the way or path over which God's glory in Messiah could come to Zion. The only other occurrence of "the way of God" is when we read that Apollos, who knew only John's teaching, had to have "the way of God", i.e. John's message about the way, explained more fully to him (Acts 18:26). It may be that John had been so unworldly that he had not paid tribute to Caesar, or at least, he had been interpretted that way; and so now the Pharisees were commenting that if the Lord truly upheld John's teaching, then what was his answer about paying the tribute money? Because it was perceived, at very least, that John had advocated not paying it.

Not caring about others' opinion was an appeal to Jewish orthodoxy, whereby the righteous Jew was supposed to be obedient to God regardless of what others thought. They were trying to lead the Lord into a position whereby He said 'No' to the question about giving the tribute money. And the Herodians were ready to pounce on Him if He did. We can reconstruct how the Pharisees and Herodians worked together in this; the Pharisees were trying to lead the Lord by a path of theology and logic to a position whereby He denied the need to pay tribute- and then Herod's supporters could pounce on Him. The verisimilitude and internal agreement of the record is again strong encouragement to accept this as the inspired word of God, recording he actual words spoken rather than giving a mere summary or imagination of them from a distance of time and space.

Is it lawful- This was purposefully vague, because they didn't clarify whether they meant the law of Moses or that of Rome. This was part of the trap. If the Lord said it was lawful according to Roman law, then they could accuse Him of breaking the law of Moses. If He said it was lawful according to the Law of Moses, and therefore that law must surely be obeyed, then He was breaking the law of Rome. But the Lord majestically rises above the trap, by (as usual) taking the whole issue to a far higher level.

To give tribute to Caesar, or not?- The word translated "tribute" was used by the Jews for the poll tax of Ex. 30:12-16; the argument was that this should be paid to the temple and not to Gentiles. By pushing the Lord for a yes / no answer, they thought they would force Him into an untenable position. Judas of Galilee had agitated about not paying the tribute money to the Romans (Acts 5:37) and had been executed for this in around AD6, in recent memory. The Lord as always appealed to higher principle- if it has Caesar's image, then give it to him; but what has God's image, your own body, then give it to God. The giving of our entire person to God made paying an annual tax to the temple seem cheap and irrelevant.

12:15 Shall we give, or shall we not give? But he, knowing their hypocrisy, said to them: Why do you test me?- Matthew has "their wickedness". The wickedness could be their hypocrisy, which the Lord goes on to comment upon. But their "wickedness" could refer to their personal sins, and because in that moment the Lord perceived those sins, He thereby perceived their hypocrisy and therefore challenged them about their hypocrisy. He may have been given that perception of their sins by some flash of Divine insight, or it could be that His supreme sensitivity to people led Him to imagine correctly the kind of stuff going on in their secret lives. In what were they hypocritical in this matter? Perhaps they quietly paid the tribute money? Or perhaps it was because in order to answer the question, the Lord made them bring the coin through the temple courts, thus breaking their own laws. They should've been more concerned about the huge gap between their professions and their practice, rather than focusing upon finding error in another. And so it is to this day- fault finding in others over religious matters typically hides serious hypocrisy, the concern with personal sin is transferred into concern about others' sin. Our sense we ought to be self-examining is converted into an examination of others.

Bring me a denarius, that I may look at it- The Pharisees claimed that pagan coinage should not be brought into the temple courts. This is why the coin had to be brought to the Lord. By so doing, the Lord was purposefully provoking the Pharisees; likely the Herodians brought it, not the Pharisees. In any case, we see yet another powerful evidence that the historical records of the Gospels are true to the very smallest detail.

The tribute money had the inscription Tiberius Caesar Divi Augusti Filius Augustus Pontifex Maximus- “Tiberius Caesar, august son of the divine Augustus, High Priest”. Pedants would’ve quickly assumed that such blasphemous language and appropriation of titles appropriate to the Lord Jesus would mean that such coinage should not be used, nor should such tribute be paid to any man on this basis. But the Lord saw a bigger picture. He was quite OK with such token behaviours, but the far bigger issue was giving to God our own bodies and lives which bear His image.

The coin bore an image which strict Jews considered blasphemous, denoting Tiberius as son of God, the divine Augustus. The Lord doesn’t react to this as they expected – He makes no comment upon the blasphemy. He lets it go, but insists upon a higher principle. ‘If this is what Caesar demands, well give it to him; but give what has the image of God, i.e. yourself, to God’. He didn’t say ‘Don’t touch the coins, they bear false doctrine, to pay the tax could make it appear you are going along with a blasphemous claim’. Yet some would say that we must avoid touching anything that might appear to be false or lead to a false implication [our endless arguments over Bible versions and words of hymns are all proof of this]. The Lord wasn’t like that. He lived life as it is and as it was, and re-focused the attention of men upon that which is essential, and away from the minutiae. Staring each of us in the face is our own body, fashioned in God’s image – and thereby the most powerful imperative, to give it over to God. Yet instead God’s people preferred to ignore this and argue over the possible implication of giving a coin to Caesar because there was a false message on it. Morally and dialectically the Lord had defeated His questioners; and yet still they would not see the bigger and altogether more vital picture which He presented them with.

12:16 And they brought it. And he said to them: Whose is this image and inscription? And they said to him: Caesar's- He was setting them up for His point that whatever bears God's image and superscription is to be given to Him; and that refers to our body and whole lives. We have His signature on us; perhaps the Lord had in mind by this the idea that Israel were God's covenant people, His servants bearing His marks.

12:17 And Jesus said to them: Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's. And they marvelled greatly at him- The Jews were looking for immediate deliverance from Caesar. The Lord's parody of a triumphal entry into Jerusalem was designed to show that He was not bringing that kind of a Kingdom, that sort of salvation. By saying that tribute must indeed be rendered to Caesar, He was further dashing their Messianic hopes concerning Him, and further demonstrating that He was not the Messiah they were looking for. Thus He was consciously bringing about a situation whereby His popularity was turned into hatred, because of the whole psychology of dashed expectations making love turn to hate. The accusation that "We found this fellow... forbidding to give tribute to Caesar" (Lk. 23:2) was so utterly untrue.

What bears God's image, which is our whole body and mind (Gen. 1:26), is to be given to God. We have God's superscription written upon us, moreso if we are in Christ (Rev. 3:12; 7:3; 14:1). "It is he that hath made us, and [therefore] we are his" (Ps. 100 RV). We must be His in practice because He is our creator. So it is not that we merely believe in creation rather than evolution; more than this, such belief in creation must elicit a life given over to that creator.

The things which are God's are to be 'rendered' to Him. The Greek word means to pay back, to return; even giving our very bodies only giving back what He has given us.  The same word had been used recently by the Lord in teaching that we have a huge debt to God which must be 'rendered' or paid back to Him (Mt. 18:25,26,28). We can read the Lord's words here as meaning that concerns about pedantic issues relating to coinage are irrelevant compared to the paramount issue- that we owe God everything. This would explain why the Lord says this after having accused them of being hypocrites, having perceived the sin they were involved with. Because we are created in God's image, the structure of our very bodies is an imperative to give ourselves totally to His cause (Mt. 22:19-21). Whatever bears God's image- i.e. our very bodies- must be given to Him. "It is he that hath made us, and [therefore] we are his" (Ps. 100:3 RV). We must be His in practice because He is our creator. So it is not that we merely believe in creation rather than evolution; more than this, such belief in creation must elicit a life given over to that creator.

12:18 And there came to him Sadducees (these say that there is no resurrection)- The obvious response to a question from such people about the resurrection would be ‘But you don’t believe in a resurrection!’. Lk. 20:27 says that they antilego, spoke against publically, the resurrection. Mark’s record adds that they also said that “In the resurrection therefore, when they shall rise…” (Mk. 12:23). But the Lord was not so primitive as to point out their obvious untruth. He took their position as they stated it, and worked to demonstrate that even given that position, they were woefully ignorant of Divine truth. Long term, His approach stood a chance of working. If He had simply denounced them as liars and self-contradictory, there was no chance He would’ve ever contributed towards their possible repentance and change of heart. This approach needs to be take to heart by us. For there are large numbers of believers who seem to think that their service to God involves cruising internet forums or endlessly arguing with their neighbours in order to prove them wrong and self-contradictory about doctrinal matters. This may give a slight ego rush for a moment, but it is not in fact any real victory. For the victory we seek is not to tie another up in mental knots, but to lead them to repentance, to the Lord Jesus, and to His Kingdom. We also need to note that recently the Lord had resurrected Lazarus, with the result that He appeared to have won over many who had previously supported the Jewish leadership. They were now trying to prove that resurrection doesn’t happen. The Lord could’ve called many witnesses to the resurrection of Lazarus, but instead He takes their argument and works from it.

It has been observed that the Sadducees were generally hedonistic- and this surely was a result of their denial of the future resurrection and judgment. Their belief was that only the Torah was inspired, and it was Israel’s duty to live according to it in this life. They were a parade example of the effect of doctrine in practice.

And they asked him- Over 100 times we read in the Gospels of various people coming to Jesus- His enemies, the crowds, His disciples, people in need. Each came with their various motivations, agendas and pre-understandings of Him. His invitation to ‘come to Him’ was to come in faith. The repeated repetition of the phrase ‘came to Him’ is perhaps to invite us to see ourselves likewise as amongst those who ‘come to Him’ as we read or hear the Gospel record, ensuring that we are truly coming to Him and not merely on a surface level as so many did.

12:19 Teacher, Moses wrote to us- The Lord picks this up in His answer in Mt. 22:31: “Have you not read that which was spoken unto you by God”. He is telling them that God and not Moses was the ultimate speaker to them; and that the word was not merely written but is a living word, actively speaking unto them. For all their much vaunted belief in Divine inspiration of the Scriptures, these men had failed to perceive that God was speaking to them personally through the human authors. And that criticism needs to be remembered today by those equally wedded to a declared belief in Divine inspiration of the Bible. It is to be to us a word spoken and not a dead letter written on paper.

If a man's brother dies and leaves a wife behind him and leaves no children, then his brother should take his wife and raise up seed to his brother- The Lord could have replied that if they read the entire passage in Dt. 25:5-7, they would see that God actually made a concession in this matter; and the whole principle only applied to “brethren dwelling together”. A man did not have to marry his brother’s wife. In any case, as most adult men were married, it would have usually been a case of polygamy. But again, the Lord didn’t point out that expositional error, but goes on to develop a far greater and higher principle concerning the nature of His Kingdom, in which such casuistry about marriage will be simply irrelevant. And again, He sets an example to those who have spent their religious lives arguing about divorce and remarriage and fellowship issues. Their arguments could be demonstrated to be expositionally faulty. But the higher principle is that such issues shall be irrelevant in God’s Kingdom; and we are to live the essence of the Kingdom life now as far as we can, in spirit at least. The Sadducees made a big deal of the fact that the word translated “raise up seed” is that used generally in the Septuagint for resurrection. Their idea was that resurrection is not of the body but through family life. To die childless was therefore tragic indeed. The same error is made by many today who effectively believe that family life is the ultimate form of spirituality. It is not, and God seeks to build a personal relationship with each of us, He is the personal God of Abraham, Isaac etc., and we shall experience a personal bodily resurrection at which we shall appear before God stripped of our family, and relate to Him as a single individual.

12:20 There were seven brothers; and the first took a wife and died leaving no seed- This must have been a most unfortunate family. The Old Testament speaks of the failure to build up a house / family and the death of men in youth as being a curse from God for disobedience (Job 18:19; Ps. 107:38,39). Again, the Lord could have made capital of this- but He didn’t. There was no element of personal attack, but rather an appeal to higher principle.

12:21 And the second took her, and died leaving no seed behind him, and the third likewise- As noted on :20, this was clearly not a true story.

12:22 And the seven left no seed. Last of all the woman also died- She would have been judged to be a most unfortunate woman, likely under God’s judgment (see on :20). But the Lord doesn’t question the very unlikely story nor the contradictions within it- instead He works from what was presented to Him.

12:23 In the resurrection, whose wife shall she be? For the seven had her as wife- The Lord could’ve pointed out that they were well known for denying / speaking against the resurrection. But He doesn’t make that obvious point, instead focusing on the higher principles rather than point scoring.

12:24 Jesus said to them: Is not the reason you err that you do not know the scriptures, nor the power of God?- Time and again the Lord assaults their pride in knowing the text of Scripture. “Have you never read” is commonly on His lips. We can read, and yet never really read; know, but never know. Familiarity with Bible phrases is simply not the same as understanding them correctly. The scriptures and God's power are paralleled, with every relevance for the Sadducees who denied the Old Testament’s inspiration apart from the Torah. Likewise in their audience the Lord pointed out that David in the Psalms spoke “in Spirit” (Mt. 22:43)- the Psalms were inspired as much as the Torah.

12:25 For when they shall rise from the dead- Why does the Lord speak of the Kingdom of God as “the resurrection” (Mt.)? Perhaps it is to pave the way for His teaching that “all live unto Him”, in the sense that here He is likewise raising the idea that time will have a different dimension then. The joy and freshness of resurrection will last eternally. The Kingdom will be as it were an eternal moment of resurrection, an eternal now, with no fading thrill but an “everlasting joy upon [our] heads” that will not fade and morph with familiarity and the passage of time.

They neither marry, nor are given in marriage- Note the present tenses. They are more striking in Lk. 20:36: “Neither can they die… they are equal unto the Angels: and are the children of God, being the children of the resurrection”. Greek tenses, unlike Hebrew tenses, are precise. We would expect ‘They shall not die… shall be equal… shall be…’. But the present tenses are striking. The Lord is building up to His point that the question about marriage is inappropriate because God is outside of our kind of time; He sees the believers in Him as even now immortal, a point made more strongly in John’s Gospel. This is not the same as having an immortal soul, nor does it imply conscious survival of death. Rather is it a reflection of how God from His perspective outside of time sees His children. Jn. 3:3-5 makes the same point, that we are born again of water and spirit even in this life, and thereby are living the life eternal. But that is from God’s standpoint outside of time as we experience it. Lk. 20:37 says that Moses “calls” [present tense] God “the God of Abraham…”. Not only does this imply a living word which speaks to us today, but again the point is made throughout the passage that God is outside of time. This choice of tenses in this passage is purposeful, for elsewhere we read of how Moses said or commanded things in the past tense (e.g. Mt. 8:4 “things which Moses commanded”, “Moses wrote”, Lk. 20:28; “Moses gave you…”, Jn. 6:32).

But are as the angels in heaven-

The Sadducees denied their existence (Acts 23:8). The Lord’s teaching that Angels do not marry was surely additionally an attack on the Jewish myths becoming popular at the time concerning the supposed marriage of Heavenly Angels with the daughters of men in Gen. 6. These myths are deconstructed in Jude and 2 Peter, but the Lord here is also correcting them. We marvel at how apparently ‘off the cuff’ He could speak in such a multi-faceted and profound way, addressing various issues simultaneously. Although His intellectual and spiritual ability was doubtless capable of such instant responses, I prefer to imagine the Lord reflecting deeply upon God’s word and preparing His ideas throughout the years of spiritual mindedness that preceded His ministry.

Lk. 20:36 adds that we shall be as “the children of God”, thereby answering the Sadducees idea that it is a human duty to have children and thereby continue the race, for therein do we have our ‘resurrection’. Again the Lord is lifting the whole question to a far higher level. Luke adds that the Lord first said that “the children of this world marry…”. The Sadducees were assuming that the Kingdom of God would be a kind of continuation of this present life, just with eternity of nature. Whilst there are similarities and aspects of continuity between who we are and who we shall eternally be, we are mistaken in imagining the future Kingdom of God as some kind of ideal earthly situation, a tropical paradise holiday, which shall last eternally. This is the same mistake as thinking that we shall eternally be doing what “the children of this world” currently do. Instead of criticizing and exposing the faults in the argument presented, the Lord makes the point that the Kingdom of God will not be about marriage nor about casuistic arguments about the definition of marriage- the very arguments which have occupied the minds of far too many of His children. Paul uses the same logic in reasoning that arguments about food are irrelevant because the Kingdom of God will not be about such behaviour, but about love, peace and joy (Rom. 14:17). Paul, like the Lord here, could have exposed the fallacies of exposition being engaged with, but instead reasons on a higher level- that seeing we shall not be arguing about such things eternally, let us not do it now.

12:26 But concerning the dead, that they are raised, have you not read in the book of Moses- Of course they had, but the Lord is yet again making the point that we can read Scripture many times but not really read it as intended.

In the passage about the bush, how God spoke to him- Comparing with Matthew's record, surely the Lord said something like ‘He spoke unto Moses, unto you, saying…’. What was spoken to Moses was spoken to them personally, just as the living word speaks to every generation. The Lord was equating each secular Jew with none less than Moses himself. This was unthinkable blasphemy in Judaistic thought, to see oneself as receiving God’s words, having God reveal Himself directly to us, just as He did to Moses. God of course had wanted to reveal Himself like this to Israel, but they asked not to hear His voice directly, wanting Moses as a mediator. But the Lord says that now, through the medium of God’s word, the voice of God comes directly to us too. In the new Israel and the new Judaism of the new covenant, in this sense we are each as Moses.

Saying: I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob?- If the Lord was looking merely for a reference to God being the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, He had many places He could have quoted from. I suggest He chose Ex. 3:6 partly to show that the supremely intimate, personal revelation of God to Moses was just the same now to all individuals within Israel. It was a living word spoken to them personally. But also because the Lord wants to make the point that God is outside of time- and that passage goes on to climax in the revelation of that same God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as the “I am that I am” (Ex. 3:14). The God outside of time, witnessed by the way the tetragrammaton somehow straddles past, present and future tenses, therefore sees the dead as alive “unto Him”. The question put to the Lord was very much rooted in the assumption that time as we now know it is going to continue in the Kingdom of God, and the Lord is making the point that this is an immature way of looking at it; and therefore the question was irrelevant. The Exodus 3 passage also contains repeated assurance that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob will receive what God has promised- which requires bodily resurrection for them. We need to ever remember that the Lord was not merely demonstrating intellectual prowess in all this reasoning and allusion. He considered them as the sheep who erred / were astray, and through all His teaching here He was merely seeking to steer them to Him and ultimate salvation.

12:27 He is not the God of the dead but of the living- This Greek construction could mean ‘Not only the God of the dead, but also of the living’. But the context is the Lord demonstrating that the understanding of the Sadducees was very much a dead religion and their God was effectively dead. They denied the resurrection and considered that we have reward only in this life. In this case, God was the God of Abraham only in the past. The Greek phrase could literally mean ‘Not the God the dead, but the living [God]’, alluding to the well known phrase “the living God”. If God only acted for Abraham etc. in the past, then the God Abraham knew effectively died when Abraham died. But the living God seeks to impart life to the faithful.

Lk. 20:38 adds: “For all live unto Him”. The Lord is critiquing their division between this life and the life to come- by saying that the faithful live on now in God’s memory as they will eternally; He speaks of things which are not as though they are (Rom.  4:17), and in this sense whether we live or die we are the Lord’s (Rom. 14:8). Although the soul is mortal, the spirit returns to God and will be eternally “saved” at the last day. And the spirit refers to who a man essentially is, his thinking and character. This is preserved by God in His memory, and in that sense the faithful dead “live” before Him now. John’s Gospel puts this in so many words by saying that we can live the eternal life right now. Whilst bodily resurrection is so significant from our point of view, the God who is outside of our kind of time sees the dead as effectively living as He extends forwards into eternity from the present- in a way we cannot now do. I made the point above that recently the Lord had resurrected Lazarus, with the result that He appeared to have won over many who had previously supported the Jewish leadership. They were now trying to prove that resurrection doesn’t happen. The Lord at that time had emphasized that the resurrection of Lazarus was a visual reminder of the new life which those who believed in Him could experience right now: “Whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die” (Jn. 11:26). Luke’s comment that “all live unto Him” is saying roughly the same thing. If our spirit is focused upon living and thinking the Kingdom life now, then this spirit is preserved by God upon death. And it is this which God sees after our death, and the sense in which we live unto Him.

 

You do err greatly- The same word used by the Lord in describing how He as the good shepherd was searching for the sheep of Israel who had “gone astray” (Mt. 18:12,13). Exactly because He was searching for them with a view to saving them, He did not indulge in point scoring or exposing the numerous errors in their claims. The fact the Lord even tried with these types is a huge inspiration to us all to never give up with any group of people.

12:28 And one of the scribes came and heard them arguing; and knowing that he had answered them well, he asked him: What commandment is the first of all?- It is often claimed that this means ‘Which type of commandment?’. But the Lord’s answer suggests that He saw it as meaning ‘Which specific commandment’.  Mk. 12:28 records them asking which is the greatest commandment “of all”, which requires that they wanted Him to name one specific one. Again, the Lord lifted the question to a higher level, quoting two commandments and speaking of them as one single commandment; and demonstrating that the unity of God is a command rather than a mere piece of fundamental but dead theology (see on Mt. 22:37).

12:29 Jesus answered: The first is, Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one- The Lord Jesus taught that the command that God was one and therefore we must love God included the second command: to love our neighbour as ourselves. The first and second commands were in fact one command; they were inseparably part of the first commandment (Mk. 12:29-31). This is why the 'two' commandments, to love God and neighbour, are spoken of in the singular in Lk. 10:28: "this do…". See on Mt. 22:40.
The Lord was asked which was the first (i.e. the most important) commandment; we would expect Him to just recite one of them, and to say 'Well, there you are, that's my answer; that's the first one, either numerically, or in terms of importance'. But in reply to this request to name just one of the ten commandments, He actually quotes two of them. There is no greater command (singular) than these two. So the Lord saw those two commands as one, the greatest, most important principle of our life before God. Yet He begins by speaking of the unity of God as expressed in His memorial Name, Yahweh your elohim, and says that this is what will lead to us loving God with all we have, and also to our loving our neighbour as ourselves. The Lord is saying that if we really appreciate this idea of the unity of God, that Yahweh is our God, then we will therefore love God, and also our neighbour. So what does it mean, to love our neighbour as ourselves? In the context of the Decalogue, the neighbour of the Israelite would have been his fellow Israelite, not the Gentile who lived next door to him. The command to love our neighbour as ourselves is elsewhere given an equivalent under the new Covenant: to love our brother or sister in the ecclesia as ourselves. Gal. 5:14 and James 2:8 quote this command in the context of ecclesial life.

The Lord said that the first, the most important, of the commandments was that God is one Yahweh. He didn't see this as an abstract doctrine. He saw the doctrine of the unity of God as a command, it demands behaviour in response to it. He saw the unity of God as part and parcel of the command to love our neighbour as ourselves. Why? Surely He saw that the facts that God's Name is one, and all His people are in some way in His Name, mean that we must love others in that Name as much as we love ourselves and as much as we love God. Now apply this to the phenomena of Christian disillusion with the church. We are in God, and God is one. So we are all one with each other. Loving our neighbour in Christ as ourselves is placed parallel with loving God with all our heart, strength etc. This means that the main drive of our service to God should be devoted to loving our brother, our neighbour. All those who are baptized into the Name must be loved as we love ourselves. This in itself sinks the possibility of a 'desert island' existence. We just can't live alone. We can't quit on the brotherhood if we want to love God. And this tough, far reaching conclusion comes from knowing that God is one, and all in Him are therefore one.  

12:30 And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength- See on 1 Thess. 1:2. That God is one is a command, an imperative to action. It underlies the whole law and prophets (Mt. 22:40)- it's that fundamental. If there were two Gods, Yahweh would only demand half our energies. Nothing can be given to anything else; for there is nothing else to give to. There's only one God. There can be no idolatry in our lives, because there is only one God (2 Kings 19:18,19). Because "there is none else, you shall keep therefore his statutes" (Dt. 4:39,40). The Hebrew text of Dt. 6:4 suggests: "The Lord is our God, the Lord is one", thereby linking Yahweh's unity with His being our God, the sole Lord and unrivalled Master of His people. It also links the first principle of the unity of God with that of the covenant to Abraham; for “I will be their God" was one of the features of the covenant. The one God has only one people; not all religious systems can lead to the one Hope of Israel.

12:31 The second is this: You shall love your neighbour as yourself- This is indeed a challenge; not only to love ourselves, but to relate to our neighbour as to ourselves. It suggests a unique unity between us and our neighbour within the Israel of God. That humanly impossible unity is only achievable by loving the one God. To love God and our brother is all part of the same thing. It is indivisible; the two commandments are in fact one commandment in practice. To claim to love God but not love or even be involved with our brother means, therefore, that we don’t actually love God. John makes this explicit in 1 Jn. 4:1, and much of the Lord’s teaching does likewise. Yet our tendency is to isolate them, claiming to love God whilst ignoring our brother, and maintaining a strong sense of separation from him.

There is no other commandment greater than these- Again, the Lord makes the point. They wanted one commandment isolated as the greatest, and He gave them two, with the further comment that “all the law”, all the others, hung equally upon those two. The spiritual way of life is not a case of isolating one or two commandments and keeping them, but rather living a spirit of life and thinking. Loving God and our neighbour are seamlessly united, although so many try to do one without the other. On the one extreme is the person who sits at home in splendid isolation with their love for God, on the other is the person who thinks that love for neighbour- some neighbours, anyway- is quite enough, and needs no underpinning in a love for God, which involves keeping His commandments.

12:32 And the scribe said to him: Well said, Teacher. You have spoken the truth, that He is one and there is no other but He-  In the same way as we cannot choose to live in isolation from the Father and Son, so we cannot separate ourselves from others who bear the same Name. The Scribe well understood all this: "There is one God... and to love him... and to love his neighbour as himself, is more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices" (Mk. 12:32,33). Those whole offerings represented the whole body of Israel (Lev. 4:7-15). The Scribe understood that those offerings taught that all Israel were unified together on account of their bearing the same Name of Yahweh. We must love others who bear that Name "as ourselves", so intense is the unity between us. In some ways, we should lose the sense of our own self interest; we should somehow be able to have the same spiritual interest in others (for this is true love) as we do for ourselves. So this sense of true selflessness which we would dearly desire is connected with an appreciation of the doctrine of the intense unity of God and of His Name, and of the glorious principle of God manifestation. By sharing the one Name, we are one together. See on Jn. 5:23.

12:33 And to love Him with all the heart and with all the understanding and with all the strength, and to love his neighbour as himself, is much more than all whole burnt-offerings and sacrifices- The Scribe said that the most important commandment to love God “with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the soul, and with all the strength, and to love his neighbour as himself, is more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices. And when Jesus saw that he answered discreetly (Gk. ‘in an intellect-having way’), He said unto him, Thou art not far from the Kingdom”. Notice how ‘understanding’ with the intellect is put higher in the list than loving one’s neighbour. The fundamental thing is to correctly understand, and this will naturally lead to a life of practical love. Our surrounding ‘Christian’ world has inverted this order; love of neighbour has been placed above correct understanding of God. Because the Scribe answered in an intellect-having way, the Saviour said that He was near to the Kingdom. To reach the Kingdom therefore involves correct understanding. The words of Mk. 12:33 allude to a number of OT passages which likewise show the superiority of knowledge and practical service over sacrifices (1 Sam. 15:22; Hos. 6:6; Mic. 6:6-8). Putting them together we find the following parallels:

Understanding God, hearing His word, knowing God (all acts of the intellect) are therefore paralleled with practical things like loving out neighbour, showing mercy, justice etc. These practical things are an outcome of our correct knowledge of God.  

12:34 And when Jesus saw that he answered wisely, he said to him: You are not far from the kingdom of God. And after that no one dared to ask him any more questions- A correct understanding of the Law and the sacrifices meant that a man was near the Kingdom (Mk. 12:34). The principles of the Lord's Kingdom, His rulership over men, were taught throughout the Old Testament. These very words about asking no more questions are used of how the disciples after the resurrection dared not ask who Jesus was (Jn. 21:12), which is the very context here. The connection is clearly to show that they too through their being too influenced by Jewish thinking found themselves in the same category as the unbelieving Jews- the difference being that they repented of it. Matthew was appealing to Jews to accept Jesus and repent of their willful misunderstanding, and he and John are holding themselves up as a role model, just as we should in our appeals for repentance. The Greek for “questions” isn’t in the original; they dared not ask Him again. The implication from the context could be that they dared not ask Him ‘Who are You?’, for the answer was clear in their consciences. They knew, on one level, that He was Messiah, that He was the heir to the vineyard, whom they knowingly sought to murder.

12:35 And Jesus asked, as he taught in the temple: Why do the scribes say that the Christ is the son of David?- They were surely aware that Jesus was a son of David, on both the sides of Mary and Joseph. For they would’ve done their homework as to His [apparent] family of origin. Lk. 20:41 records that the Lord addressed a question to the wider audience: “How say they that Christ is David’s son?”. But Matthew says He asked the Pharisees. Having let the Pharisees give the answer, He then asks others how this can be the case. Again, the Lord’s dialogues with the Pharisees was not simply to try to convert them, but in order that the audience would learn. Mk. 12:37 concludes the section by observing that “the common people heard Him gladly”, so again we see how the records seamlessly complement each other.

12:36 David himself said in the Holy Spirit: The Lord said- Clearly Yahweh. If the Divine Name was to be used in the New Testament, surely this would be the place for it. The fact it is not, when some Hebrew words are used (e.g. ‘Sabaoth’), shows clearly enough that the literal usage of the tetragrammaton is not something God sees as important or even required.

To my Lord- Biblically and historically, David’s immediate ‘Lord’ was Saul. Ps. 110 was originally a revelation to David of the potential possible for Saul, who was an anointed ‘Messiah’ figure. But Saul failed, and so the fulfillment of the prophecy was rescheduled and reapplied to the Lord Jesus.

Sit on My right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet- The Lord’s enemies stood around Him as He applied this Psalm to Himself. 

12:37 David himself calls him Lord; and how is he therefore his son? And the common people heard him gladly- Judaism’s concept of Messiah has always been vague and not commonly agreed, but there was and is the idea that the likes of Abraham, Moses and David are greater than Messiah. The Lord is pointing out that David considered Messiah to be his “Lord”, just as Messiah was greater than Abraham (Jn. 8:58). The “how” doesn’t imply that David’s Lord is not his son, but rather is a rhetorical question. How is the Messianic son of David, David’s “Lord”, to be his son or descendant? The Lord reinforced the question by asking “From whence is He his son?” (AV). The answer had to be: ‘Through a woman in David’s direct line giving birth to Him’. And the questioners were fully aware that Jesus was in the direct line of Mary

 

12:38 And in his teaching he said: Beware of the scribes, who desire to walk in long robes and to have salutations in the marketplaces- The Lord’s reason for going to the market was to invite men to work in the vineyard and receive the penny of salvation (Mt. 20:3); and His people sitting in the markets sought to persuade others of the need to respond to the Gospel (Mt. 11:16). The Pharisees went to the markets to simply flaunt their external spirituality. Again, note how their behaviour was the very inversion of true spirituality.

12:39 And the chief seats in the synagogues and chief places at feasts- They wanted to be publically seen as spiritually superior. The whole structure of church life, whereby some must have public roles, is such that people can fall so easily into a love of publicity. The Lord realizes this, and often removes His beloved from such temptations. This explains the otherwise inexplicable way in which the Lord allows some of His most talented and capable servants to be removed from the public eye to serve Him in human obscurity. Note that the Lord here is repeating almost word for word what He has previously said about the Pharisees in Luke 11. To repeat so much text twice in the Gospel records, and for the Lord to give identical word-for-word teaching on two occasions, shows how important these warnings are for all readers. This consideration alone suggests that we each have the same tendency as the Pharisees; they are but epitomes of our own deepest tendencies and desires.

12:40 They that devour widows' houses- The language used here about the behaviour of the Scribes and Pharisees is elsewhere used about the righteous behaviour of the Lord and His followers; the Jewish leaders were living a religious life, but it was but a parody of true spirituality. The same words for “devour” and “house” are used of how the Lord Jesus was ‘eaten up’ or ‘devoured’ with zeal for His Father’s “house”. But by contrast the Scribes thought only of how they could devour the houses of widows, scheming how to get the house of a vulnerable single old woman left to them, and how they could devour that wealth upon themselves. We note that Mark and Luke conclude this section with the account of the widow who gave her entire wealth to the temple coffers (Mk. 12:42; Lk. 21:1). This was surely to add assurance that although her donation was misused, it was carefully noted by God to her eternal credit.

And for a pretence make long prayers- They were hypocrites. The word was used about an actor’s cloak, and thus connects with the theatrical term ‘hypocrites’, play-actors. The Lord uses the same word in Jn. 15:22: “If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin; but now they have no cloak for their sin”. When did He come and speak unto the Jews about their hypocrisy? Surely here in Mark 12. Although they did have a cloak for their sin before men, the Lord is saying in John 15 that they have no such cloak before Him.  

These shall receive greater condemnation- There will be degrees of punishment, although it will be self-inflicted.

12:41 And he sat down over against the treasury- There was no seating in the temple. It was not like a church building today, with benches and seating. The Rabbis made a great deal of the fact that God alone was seated in the temple, and in line with their targum on 2 Sam. 7:18, only Messiah would sit there in the same way as His ancestor David had sat in the temple in gratitude for the Messianic promises ("David the king went in and sat before Yahweh; and he said, Who am I, Lord Yahweh, and what is my house, that You have brought me thus far?"). The Lord sitting in the temple, and sitting in judgment, was therefore a Messianic claim. But His judgment is shown for what it really is- a searching of hearts and motives, and a positive noticing of obscure people and their obscure acts of devotion.

And watched how the crowd threw money into the treasury; and many that were rich threw in a lot- The many small coins they threw in make a loud clanging noise in the collection trumpets. They were literally trumpeting their good deeds before men in God's house. The widow threw in the same kind of coins which they threw in in abundance. What she threw in was scarcely audible to men; but the Lord noticed. The only other references to the Lord sitting are to Him sitting in judgment. And that judgment was ongoing even then; it does and will finally take into account the things not audible to men.

We must be ever aware of our tendency to come to the Biblical text with our mind already made up about what it means, viewing it through the lens of our pre-existing images of what we are going to read. The incident of the poor widow is a classic case. We tend to imagine the Lord "sitting opposite the treasury" as meaning He sat opposite the 'trumpet' into which people poured their coins. But the Lord taught the people "in the treasury" (Jn. 8:20 cp. 2 Kings 23:11; Ezra 10:6; Neh. 10:38,39), so the reference is to the chamber called "the treasury". And we too easily assume that she was an old, wizzened woman, leaning heavily on a cane. But seeing male life expectancy in Palestine was so low, the image of a "widow" would more likely refer to a woman around 30 years old, with dirty children in tow, looking malnourished. Likewise we assume an overall positive image, in spiritual terms: 'What a wonderful example of poor people being generous!'. And that cannot be denied. But there is also a strongly negative image evoked by the incident, when we bear in mind that the Gospel records have just noted that the Jews were covetous and avaricious; and built their wealth through "devouring widows' houses" (Mk. 12:40). The image, in this case, is negative; we are intended to contrast her with the wealthy, public donors- and be incensed that she had been so spiritually abused and mentally manipulated that she believed that giving her two coins to those men was in fact serving God. We leave the incident lamenting spiritual abuse, rather than simply being inspired to generosity. And yet without doubt, the image of total sacrifice must be given its due weight. Mark's record appears to use this incident to unite the two halves of his Gospel; Mark 1-12 concern the Lord's public ministry, and Mark 13-16 focus upon the events in the last week or His life. But those sections are linked with this picture of total sacrifice, as if to preface what we will go on to read about the Lord's total sacrifice. We note that we are provided with the context about how the religious leaders were "devouring widows' houses" (Mk. 12:40). It could even be that we are to conclude that this woman's poverty was because she had been financially abused by the scribes. The Lord condemns the temple as a den of robbers (Mk. 11:17), with specific reference to the treasury. And yet she returns to the temple to give her pennies to them. In this case, she is being held up as an example of a woman who still served God despite spiritual abuse, and didn't allow her bad experience with church to stop her serving God. And we see too how despite her loyalty to and membership of a corrupt system, the Lord still noticed her sincerity and did not at all reject her for the sake of any kind of guilt by association. This is ultimate comfort for many who laboured beneath spiritual abuse and corrupt systems. The incident is the prelude to the Olivet prophecy- of destruction of the temple and all its wealth. Criticism of the temple cult is therefore a big factor in the story.

From what we know of the second temple, there were several 'trumpets' for financial offerings. The offerer told the priest what the offering was for; and there are records of the offerer being told that their offering couldn't be accepted as it was too small for the purpose stated. What is noteworthy, therefore, is that the priests allowed the woman to make such a tiny offering. Perhaps we are to imagine the priest not noticing her as she crept up to one of the "freewill" offering trumpets and threw in her coins; but the Lord did notice her. The sound of the coins in the trumpets apparently indicated to the priest the size of the gift. Her coins would have made no recognizable noise; but the Lord noticed, and the Gospel records immortalized the otherwise imperceptible sound of her offering. As the Lord taught, our giving is to be by its nature unnoticed by men, in order for it to be noticed by God. And we must examine ourselves as to when we last did this. The record goes straight on to mention that the temple was adorned with costly gifts (Lk. 21:5)- which were all to soon be destroyed. Exactly because of the systemic abuse of people like that widow. We note that her giving was at Passover time- which was the time for almsgiving to the poor and widow. The clear irony is that she gave what little she had, and got nothing from the temple cult.

Mark's record stresses how the focus of the record zooms in upon the widow; from the crowd casting in money, to the rich doing so, and then to the poor widow. His use of tenses assists the effect. Literally 'the crowd are throwing money [present tense]... the many rich were throwing [imperfect tense]... the widow threw [aorist tense, a completed, once and for all action]' (Mk. 12:41). The idea may be that the rich were regularly throwing money into the trumpets; but the widow made just her one offering at one point in time, because she was not accustomed to go there and make offerings. The suggestion, therefore, is that their 'giving' was a regular religious observance; but her giving was of all that she had, and so by nature could only occur once. Likewise the focus upon the woman is achieved by speaking of "the crowd" (Mk.), then the "many that were rich"- whereas the woman comes alone, literally "one widow, a poor one" (Mk. 12:42). Her giving was not therefore inspired by any crowd mentality or herd psychology, giving because others give. Just as our giving must be a totally personal response to God's grace in Jesus, inspired by Him alone.

The two lepta ["small coins"] were the smallest coinage in the Roman system. They amounted to 1/64 of a denarius, the "penny" paid for a day's work in harvest time. They could buy a handful of flour, seen as the measure of a meagre meal. Eight lepta made one ass, and inscriptions from Pompeii show that daily bread for four people cost around four asses or 32 lepta coins. Cheese for four people for one meal cost one ass or eight lepta. Remember that as a "widow" she may well have had young children to provide for as well. Her gift, which is held up as our pattern, was ultimately insignificant in secular terms. And this is the point. Our giving is of itself insignificant, but the spirit behind it is eternally important. The woman likely thought that she may as well not offer her tiny gift. But she did so. Exactly because she understood that she was giving of her spirit, giving her all, symbolized in sacrificing at best a day's food. The Lord understood that she who gave least actually gave most- because His scale of measurement is of the spirit and not of the external. He commends her for giving all- in that going to the effort to give that tiny amount reflected how she wanted to give her all. She likely had a few material things somewhere and a place where she slept. But she is not recorded as giving these. But her attitude of giving is seen as reflective of a desire to give, and a total surrender of herself to God.

The impression we get is that these were her last coins, all that she had. The same idea is found in Lk. 12:59, where the man who will not settle things with his brother must pay all that he had, down to the last lepton. That is a picture of condemnation. The man will pay his last "mite" / lepton, but still not be saved. The woman gave her last mite to the Lord now. It's bankruptcy, giving all, right now, for His sake- or the loss of all things at the day of judgment. There is an absolute logic to the path of total devotion.    

 12:42 And there came a poor widow, and she threw in two small copper coins, which make a penny- The Lord taught that one must forsake all that he has in order to truly be His disciple (Mt. 13:44; Lk. 14:33). But at the end of His ministry, He as it were chose to exemplify this aspect of discipleship by drawing attention to a woman who gave to God “all the living that she had” (Lk. 21:3). Putting the passages together, the Lord is saying that she is to be the model for us all in this aspect of devotion. She could have kept one of the coins; but she threw both of them in.

12:43 And he gathered his disciples, and said to them: Truly I say to you, this poor widow threw in more than all they that are throwing money into the treasury- See on 2 Cor. 8:11,12. They were needed to be gathered together to hear this teaching; they had not noticed it, or not been impressed by what the woman did. So clearly, God accounts not as man does. We are judged according to our possibilities and not according to volume of achievement. She threw in "more", literally she 'exceeded', that the others had thrown in. The same word is used of how our righteousness must exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees (Mt. 5:20). She is again presented as the model disciple. The word has just been used  in :33 of how love of God and neighbour is "more" than all sacrifices. She achieved that love not by volume of achievement but in her attitude.

12:44 For they threw in money they didn't need, but she though needy threw in all that she had- all her livelihood- The Lord condemned the Pharisees for devouring widow’s houses (Mk. 12:40), but then goes on to show how the widow who threw in all her wealth to the treasuries of the corrupt Pharisees had actually gained great approval in God’s eyes by doing so (Mk. 12:44). Out of evil, good came. The Lord didn’t just lament the cruel selfishness of the Jewish leadership. He pointed out how God worked through even this to enable a poor woman to please Him immensely. There is a wondrous ecology in all this; nothing is lost. Nothing, in the final end, can be done against the Truth, only for the Truth.

The Lord pointed out to the disciples how the extreme generosity of the widow, giving the two pennies of her business capital, her "living", to the Lord, was worth far more than the ostentatious giving of the wealthy Jewish leadership (Mk. 12:44); but the next incident recorded by Mark is the disciples marvelling at the ostentatious buildings of the temple, and the Lord explaining that all this needed to be thrown down (Mk. 13:1,2). Their slowness to perceive is such a theme of the gospel records.