Mark - Chapter 12
12:1-12
Parable of the Wicked Tenants:
This passage is closely linked to the preceding story in 11:27-33 in which the question of authority is put to Jesus by a hostile group of chief priests, scribes,and elders. Now Jesus takes the offensive against them. He acknowledges their authority but charges them with abuse of it and warns them that as a result their authority will be stripped from them and given to others. (This teaching was a similar retelling of the OT story of Ezekiel 34).
The characters of the parable are:
Owner of the vineyard - God
Vineyard - Israel
Tenants - Religious Leaders
Servants - Prophets
Son - Jesus
The story unfolds in four stages:
In the first stage the tenants rebel against the owner by rejecting, beating, and killing a series of servants sent to gain some fruit of the vineyard.
The second stage depicts God's initiative of grace in Jesus Christ. It is not the normal response to a rebellion, nor is it the normally expected action of a property owner who has been wronged.
The third stage shows the rejection of God's grace in Jesus Christ by Israel's leaders. The reasoning of the tenants about gaining the inheritance by killing the Son is less logical than the first stage action by them.
The fourth stage tells of God's rejection of Israel's leaders and of God's giving the vineyard to others. Israel (the vineyard) is not rejected in this story but it's leaders are.
The positive thrust of the parable is to call religious leaders and all Christians away from their behavior as wicked tenants to that of good stewards.
12:13-17
Paying Taxes to Caesar:
Pharisees (whose name means “separated ones”) were a party within Judaism known for their strict observance of the law and they also insisted in the same strict observance of the oral traditions of the Temple. They pose a question to Jesus concerning the paying of taxes to Caesar, “Is is lawful?”. The issue is whether or not one ought to obey a law imposed by an army or government of occupation. Jesus asks for a coin which would be a Roman coin for that is the currency of the land at that time. The picture on it was of Caesar and Jesus instructs to give to Caesar the things that are his and to give to God those things that are His.
The object lesson was to use an everyday item to teach a lesson of life. While we owe some duty to the state (even to an oppressive one), our primary loyalty is to be to God.
12:18-27
Question About the Resurrection:
The opponents in this story are the Sadducees, an aristocratic group of priestly families from whom the high priest of the Temple was normally chosen. They accepted as scriptural authority only the first five books (known as the Books of Moses) and did not view the writings of prophets or other books as scripture. They also rejected the entire area of oral law. Further they did not believe in either angels or in any resurrection.
The pose a question to Jesus about a woman who was childless, and who became a widow, then marrying her husband's brothers one by one as each also died while she always remained childless. The question was “... in the resurrection whose wife will she be...”? They knew the OT (first five books) very well. They knew that Exodus 3:6 teaches that God is God of the living, not the dead. So in one sentence Jesus corrects both their strongly held, but false, beliefs, and teaches that in the next life none are given in marriage but are likened to the angels.
12:28-34
The Great Commandment:
Jesus is asked which of the commandments is most important of all. He replies by combining Deut. 6:4-5 & Lev. 19:18. Only the writing by Mark contains His inclusion of the daily confession of all Jews, known as the Shema, prayed morning and evening from Deut. 6. The answer given by Jesus to the scribe establishes love as the greatest command. He says we are to love God with all our being, and to love our neighbor as ourself. His challenge reply is disturbing because none of us measures up to His standard of love. Only as we see the gift of His life and how He loved us to give Himself for us in His obedience to His father, can we begin to understand this teaching.
12:35-44
Scribes and Widows:
Jesus is now teaching a crowd at the Temple. On the home ground of the scribes, He challenges their understanding of the Messiah as found in scripture. All Jews believed the Messiah would be a son of David. Jesus points out that David calls one of his own descendants his Lord (Psalm 110) and Jesus is asking these learned men how can the Messiah be a son to David as well as his Lord? The crowd He taught heard Him gladly but Jesus then warns them to beware of scribes who pretend to know much but actually know very little about the plan of God, and who devour the houses of widows. Jesus then provides one of His greatest teachings on hell, stating that these false ones will receive “greater damnation” showing there is greater punishment for those who commit greater sin. Next Jesus continues when a poor widow came to make an offering and gave two mites, a small amount but all she had. Jesus said that in the eyes of God, she had given more than all others who gave more in money but not in faith.