Mark 6:1-6

Faith as Criterion of Participation (2) – Negatively Confirmed

Membership in the community of disciples would have its cost, even as it had for Jesus himself. The basis of the new community would be a sharing of vision and a commitment to difference. It would certainly not consist of traditional ties.

Mark 6:1-6 – Jesus is Rejected in His Own Town

¹ Jesus left [where he was] and came to his hometown.

His disciples went along behind him.

² When the Sabbath came,

he began to teach in the synagogue.

All who heard him were deeply affected.

Mention of Sabbath and synagogue were ominous – the traditional bastions of institution and accepted ways. His former compatriots were deeply affected by Jesus. At the end of the incident Jesus would marvel at them.

They were saying, “Where does he get all this from?

this wisdom that has been given to him?

and these powerful deeds done by his hands?

³ Is he not the carpenter,

the son of Mary

and brother of James and Joset and Jude and Simon?

Are not his sisters here with us too?”

And they felt enviously offended by him.

Their envious offence was due to their interpretation of the honour code. Jesus, in their view, was pretentious, not knowing his place, moving beyond the role and expectations appropriate to him. Their offended honour made them deaf to his message.

Mark made no mention of Joseph anywhere in his narrative. Jesus was son of Mary, an unusual identification, since the paternal line was what mattered. It may have been an expression of contempt. Consistent with the patriarchal society of the day, the sisters remained nameless.

The word translated as enviously offended is literally “scandalised” which, as noted earlier (4:14-20) referred to:

a rejection of his wisdom and the meaning of his deeds of power.
an unwillingness to be open to the vision and the way of Jesus,
a reluctance to see that things could change and people’s responses to life be different,
a refusal to allow God to be the God of “enough for all” and of abundance, a rejection of his Kingdom message.

⁴ Jesus said to them,

“A prophet is not without honour

except in his own town,

among his own relatives

and in his own home.”

There was a profound sadness in the observation made by Jesus. These had been his childhood friends and acquaintances. They were his family. He was unable to share with them the vision and the energy that meant so much to him. He could not open them to the God he loved nor to a vision of themselves and others that took account of their dignity.

⁵ He could not perform any powerful work there,

except for placing his hands on a few sick people and healing them.

Their lack of faith virtually paralysed Jesus. Healing was a question of more than physical health. It was the rediscovery of one’s own worth, a renewed sense of God, a response of hope. In the face of people’s reluctance to move and to change, to convert, there was little that Jesus could do. He was willing, but they were not. Yet his compassion led him to respond to the obvious need of some, if not to succeed in saving them, at least to cure their sickness.

⁶ He marvelled at their lack of faith.

Their unbelief and their “being scandalised” were synonymous.

Unbelief would be encountered increasingly as the story proceeded. A variety of answers would be given to the question posited earlier: Who is this? The response of his townspeople and close relations was that he was an upstart unwilling to accept his place within the established honour code.

Jesus had previously suffered the incomprehension of his family (3:19-21); he had just been repulsed by his own townspeople. Before that, various official representatives of the status quo had rejected him, a group of Pharisees even going so far as to begin to plot his execution. He was a man at loose, without roots. But the rejection was not yet universal, nor had the common people abandoned him

Then he went about around the villages teaching.

Next >> Mark 6:7-13