Have you ever read The Tale of Two Cities?
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way – in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.”
What about Ice Cube’s interview in his NWA days? When the reporters asked him, why is your music so violent? He responds with a sentence so simple yet so deep.
“Our art is a reflection of our reality”
In just a line in Ice Cube’s case and a few lines in Charles Dickens case they sum up the culture they live in. I think this is what Mark does in our passage today. He says,
In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. (Mark 1:9 ESV)
Mark writes “In Those Days”, in what days?
In the immediate context it was the days of John the Baptist, when people where coming to the wilderness to get baptized. But is that all he means here?
I think Mark may be summing up what his culture was like in the times leading up to John the Baptist & Jesus. Do you know the last recorded event in Old Testament History? It was after Nehemiah led God’s people to build the walls of the city, they found the Torah, the first 5 books of our Old Testament and read them in an assembly and the people decided to follow God and renew the covenant. After this event Nehemiah went back to Persia, where he worked as a cup-bearer for the king. After some time away he returned to Jerusalem for a visit, you know what he found on his return? The people of God breaking God’s laws again, desecrating the Sabbath, desecrating the house of God, desecrating God’s servants. Nehemiah 13:15 says “in those days” describing the culture of the day. After Nehemiah 13, what we see is the silence of heaven. After Nehemiah there are no prophets speaking for God, we have no scripture being written. The heavens are silent for 400 years.
We also have an extreme correction by Israel in this time period we see the rise of the Pharisees which is an extreme reaction to their forefathers. What the Pharisees did was take the 613 commandments and added more laws to the laws of God. The original intent of these additions was to clarify the law, but it ended up adding many layers of complicated regulations. This Midrash was already lengthy in Jesus’ day and continues to grow to this day. So for the Pharisees, they not only tried to follow the 613 commandments of the Mosaic Law, but the literally thousands of new commandments that were created to clarify the original 613 commandments.
For example, in the Mosaic Law, one of the commandments is to keep the Sabbath holy, which means that Jews were not supposed to work on Saturdays. But to clarify this, the Jewish scholars created 39 separate categories of what “work” means, and within those 39 categories there are many sub-categories. So to follow the rule of not working on the Sabbath, there are literally thousands of sub-rules to follow, including how many steps you can take, and how many letters you can write on the Sabbath. These laws where so outrageous to the point they were burdening and taking advantage of God’s people. The Pharisees in Jesus day were preaching a message do as I say not as I do.
So when Mark says “in those days” i think he is referring to …
- the days when we the people of Israel were looking for the messiah to come and save us
- the days when heaven was silent
- the days of corrupt religion
- the days the nation of Israel was being lorded over by the oppressive government of Rome
It was “in those days” we see hope, we see a man looking like the prophet Elijah in camel hair preaching repentance and preparing for one greater than him. Now do you see why the people were flocking to John and ultimately Jesus, because in those days….Hope has arrived and his name is Jesus!
Until Next Time
Soli Deo Gloria
Josue Aguilar 