A kiss becomes the ultimate betrayal in this powerful examination of Judas Iscariot's treachery against Jesus. We dive deep into Mark 14:42-65, uncovering the layers of this pivotal moment that set in motion the most important weekend in human history.
Discussed in this session is the perplexing question that has troubled believers for centuries—why would Judas betray Jesus? Rather than focusing solely on theories of greed or political disappointment, we examine the deeper character flaws revealed in scripture and conclude that sometimes evil actions stem simply from evil hearts.
This episode illuminates fascinating details often overlooked in this familiar story: Peter's impulsive sword attack, the mysterious naked young man who fled the scene, and the stark contrast between the disciples' bold promises and their frightened abandonment when real danger appeared. Each element adds texture and authenticity to this eyewitness account.
Perhaps most revealing is the examination of Jesus' trial before the Jewish authorities—a mockery of justice that violated at least 22 of their own legal procedures. False witnesses couldn't align their testimonies, leading to growing frustration from the high priest who finally demanded a direct answer about Jesus' identity. The response would seal his fate but fulfill his divine purpose.
Throughout these events, we see Jesus remained silent when falsely accused but spoke precisely when necessary to accomplish his mission. While human betrayal, fear, and injustice swirled around him, Christ maintained perfect control of his destiny.
What does Mark's account of this story reveal about human nature, justice, and divine purpose? Listen now and discover how these events still speak powerfully to our world today. Then join us next time as we continue exploring Jesus' profound response to the high priest's question.
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May God Bless you!! - Glenn and Steve
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
Modern popular music has a great deal of songs about
betrayal, especially betweenlovers.
One person that loves anotherbetrays that trust and that love
and the songs have a lot ofsadness to them and it would
seem, if we took away the songsof betrayal and wrongdoing that
popular music would not havemuch left to sing about.
(00:42):
Well, even the Bible haslessons on betrayal.
Today we're going to find outabout two people who had loved
each other have a great betrayal.
Hi, my name's Glenn.
I'm here with Steve.
This is Reasoning Through theBible.
Today we're going to get to thepassage where Judas betrays
Jesus.
So if you have your copy of theBible, open it to Mark, chapter
(01:06):
14.
When we start at verse 42,we're at the end of the part
where Jesus was in the Garden ofGethsemane.
He had been struggling inprayer and he had finished those
last messages to his disciplesand he is now ready for the
betrayal.
As we open this scene, you canalmost hear the crowd of armed
(01:30):
people coming to arrest Jesus.
Steve, can you jump in at Mark14 and read from verses 42 down
to verse 50?
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Get up, let us be going.
Behold, the one who betrays meis at hand.
Immediately, while he was stillspeaking, judas, one of the
twelve, came up, accompanied bya crowd with swords and clubs
who were from the chief priestsand the scribes and the elders.
Now he who was betraying himhad given them a signal saying
(02:01):
Whomever I kiss, he's the one.
Seize him and lead him awayunder guard.
After coming, judas immediatelywent to him saying Rabbi, and
kissed him.
They laid hands on him andseized him, but one of those who
stood by drew his sword andstruck the slave of the high
priest and cut off his ear.
(02:22):
Jesus said to them have youcome out with swords and clubs
to arrest me, as you wouldagainst a robber?
Every day, I was with you inthe temple teaching, and you did
not seize me, but this hastaken place to fulfill
scriptures.
And they all left him and fled.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
With this we have Judas arriving with a band of
people to arrest Jesus.
In verse 43, Judas comes upwith this group and he kisses
them.
They had found a secluded spotto identify him.
Remember, this is the middle ofthe night, and in those days, a
kiss was a greeting.
Today, we might use a handshakeor a hug.
(03:04):
Oftentimes, in those days, akiss was a greeting.
Today, we might use a handshakeor a hug.
Oftentimes, in those days, akiss on the cheek was an
affectionate greeting.
We have here the ultimate actof betrayal, done with an act of
tenderness, a kiss.
One of the questions that comesup, Steve, always, is why?
Why would Judas betray Jesus?
And there's been a lot ofspeculation and the text doesn't
(03:26):
really tell us why, but there'sthis question before us.
So, Steve, why do you thinkJudas would betray?
Speaker 2 (03:35):
Jesus.
The first thing that I thinkneeds to be said is that Judas
was selected by Jesus.
He was purposely selected.
Jesus knows who he is.
He's also Judas Iscariot.
We mentioned this in one of ourearlier sessions that all the
rest of the disciples are kindof up around that Galilean area,
but Judas is from an areathat's a little bit kind of
(03:59):
southwest of Jerusalem.
He's a little bit not out ofplace, but he's not with one of
those guys.
Now that doesn't have anythingof whether he's good or bad.
I think that he's just a badperson.
What I mean by that is we findout later whenever there was the
protest of the woman that putthe anointing oil on Jesus
(04:24):
earlier, they were complainingand said that money could have
been taken and given to the poor.
Well, one of the other gospelwriters say that Judas was the
one who said that and that hewas taking money from the money
box that they used.
He was the treasurer,apparently, of the group and he
was embezzling money from that.
(04:44):
You can see from that showedhis character.
So I know there's differentspeculations as to why.
Because he wanted Jesus to comeand be the king and overthrow
the Roman government, and Jesuswasn't doing that, so he's
trying to force Jesus's hands.
There's all different types ofspeculations on that, but I
really just think it comes downto this he was not a good person
(05:07):
.
It says that Satan entered him.
Well, if Satan or a demon isentering somebody, that means
that they're inviting them in.
In many cases, I think thatJudas had been conspiring with
them.
We know that for at leastseveral months.
He just wasn't a good person.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
And I would agree.
I mean there's been muchspeculation and you mentioned
several of them.
Was it greed?
He seemed to go and initiatethe betrayal right after at
least in the text right afterthe very expensive perfume was
poured out.
Some speculate it's greed, somepower trying to force Jesus'
hand.
Maybe it was jealousy,disillusionment there's been all
(05:47):
these things that have beenproposed.
I submit he was an evil man andevil people do evil things.
We don't really understand evilsimply because it is just that
Evil people do evil acts and weare often left scratching our
(06:09):
heads saying why, why wouldsomebody do something like this?
And the only explanation isthat they're evil.
Evil people do evil things andthat's really the end of it.
There's no more justificationthan that.
Why do people go out and tearup other people's property in a
criminal way when it's easierfor them to just go on about
their own business?
Well, it's because they're evilpeople doing evil things.
(06:30):
And evil doesn't really have anexplanation outside of it other
than it tries to steal, killand destroy.
Then, in verse 47, one of thedisciples strikes a servant and
cuts off his ear.
John 18.10 says this was Peterthat did this.
Steve, why would Peter cut offa man's?
Speaker 2 (06:51):
ear.
Peter was the one who was thestrongest protester.
Whenever Jesus said one of youis going to betray me, he was
one of the ones.
Of course, all of them did itsaid no, it's not going to be me
.
But Peter was really strong onit and said I'll go to my death
before I betray you.
So I think that this shows hischaracter from the standpoint
(07:13):
that he was willing to do thatat this particular time to
defend Jesus.
I think it's just as simple asthat.
I think it's impulsive becauseit says that there's a cohort
that is there or at least cameto get them.
There are many people that werethere.
So to do something like thathad to have been an impulsive
act.
Of course, right before that,what had they been doing?
(07:34):
They had been falling asleepwhile Jesus was over there
praying earnestly and actuallyfalling asleep for three times.
So I just think the bottom lineis it was an impulsive act to
try and protect their rabbi,their teacher, the Son of God,
who Peter had confessed that hewas the Messiah, the Son of God.
(07:56):
He was just trying to protecthim.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
Exactly.
Peter was very headstrong.
He was quite serious when hesaid I will go to my death
before I deny you and I thinkpart of what's going on here I
don't think he was trying to cutoff the man's ear.
I think he was trying to cutoff the man's head.
And this is what happens when afisherman picks up a sword is
he didn't really know how to useit, like a true swordsman would
(08:19):
.
He's trying to kill the man andwas just bad at it.
So that's why he cut off hisear.
And, of course, one of theother Gospels tell us that Jesus
healed the man's ear again andsaid put that away.
That's not really what we'retrying to do here.
Peter used the wrong weapon.
He should have been praying ashis weapon and he was sleeping.
(08:40):
So now he picks up a sword,which was the wrong weapon at
the wrong time.
Here.
There might have been times touse a sword in our lives, even
still today to time to use aweapon, but not for God's
purposes.
One point here they arrest him.
Jesus mentions the swords andthe clubs.
Everybody assumes that thesewere Roman soldiers and I tend
(09:05):
to struggle a little bit.
On one hand, it never reallysays they're Roman.
It does use military terms,especially in John 18.12, the
term captain and officers, andit doesn't seem likely that a
fisherman like Peter would beable to pull out a sword against
a whole squad of Roman soldiersand live to tell the story.
(09:28):
On the other hand, the templeguards would be more likely to
recognize who Jesus was and notneed somebody like Judas to
identify him.
We'll follow along, I suppose,with the traditional view.
Steve, you have an opinion on.
Were these truly Roman soldiers?
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Well, I personally think that they were.
Some of the ideas that backthat up is that later on the
next morning they're going totake him to Pilate.
Pilate is the procreator of thearea.
He's the Roman governor ofJerusalem area.
There he's ready and waitingfor Jesus to come, so he knows
he's going to come.
In order for him to be readyand expecting a trial of this
(10:07):
Jesus, you would think thatthere would have been some sort
of a prompting for him to go andarrest him.
Well, the thought is that Judaswas used for this, that he was
taken to Pilate and made anaccusation against Jesus to come
to a trial.
This is all orchestrated.
And made an accusation againstJesus to come to a trial.
This is all orchestrated.
Remember, it says that theleadership had been plotting to
(10:30):
kill Jesus for several months.
Well, the right of capitalpunishment had been taken away
from the Sanhedrin, from thecouncil.
They knew that if they're goingto kill Jesus, no-transcript.
(10:52):
So I think that that's why Itend to think that they were the
Roman cohort that were withthem was because Judas had gone.
They'd used him make a chargeagainst Jesus.
Pilate commissions this cohortto go get him and arrest him,
but, on the other hand, to yourpoint, they don't take him back
directly to Pilate, they takehim over to the high priest's
(11:13):
house.
That doesn't seem likely thatthe Roman soldiers would do that
either.
So I guess, Glenn, we'll justhave to leave it at.
We don't know what we don'tknow.
It could have been the Romancohort, it could have been the
temple guards.
In either case, they wereauthoritarian figures that came
and they actually did arrest him.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
One of those things that when we get to heavenly
Bible class we'll be able to askthat question.
In verse 48, jesus said to themhave you come out with swords
and clubs to arrest me, as youwould against a robber?
Every day I was with you in thetemple teaching, and you did
not seize me.
They came up in the middle ofthe night when he had been there
(11:53):
pretty much all day for severaldays in a row and they didn't
arrest him there.
They wait till the dark ofnight to arrest him.
One of the discussion questionsI have, steve, is how do you
know when you're about to dosomething wrong?
To me, the answer is whenyou're doing it, so nobody will
find out what I'm doing.
If you're sneaking around inthe middle of the night doing
(12:16):
something so nobody will see,then that's one major clue.
That you're sneaking around inthe middle of the night doing
something so nobody will see,then that's one major clue that
you're just about to dosomething wrong, wouldn't you
think?
Speaker 2 (12:23):
Yeah, and what you're actually saying is that Jesus
was confident that he hadn'tdone anything wrong because he
had been out teaching in thetemple area, quite out in the
open.
They had plenty of opportunityto take him and seize him during
the daytime and they didn'twant to do that.
So actually, his point is justthat you know that you're fixing
(12:47):
to arrest me for something thatI'm innocent of, because if you
had a good case against me,you'd do it in the open and
you'd do it in the daytime.
You wouldn't be doing it in theevening time.
Speaker 1 (12:57):
Back in verse 31,.
All the disciples had claimedoh, I'll never leave you.
Well, look at verse 50.
What did they actually do whenthe time came?
Well, they all ran away.
Speaker 2 (13:08):
They all scattered whenever they actually took him
into custody.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
Exactly.
When it actually came down to aplace where he needed a friend,
they all left.
They all ran.
They were all weak.
When they were in the upperroom with him, they were real
strong and they could claim oh,I'll never leave you, I'll
always be faithful.
But when it actually came downto the part where he gets
arrested, they all flee, all ofthem left.
(13:34):
He's alone now.
From here on out he's reallyalone till his death.
For the rest of these trials,jesus will face it alone.
Then there's this littlevignette in verses 51 and 52.
It says a young man wasfollowing him, wearing nothing
but a linen sheet over his nakedbody, and they seized him.
(13:54):
But he pulled free of the linensheet and escaped naked.
One of the questions that'salways popped up amongst Bible
teachers is why in the world isthat there?
Who was this young man?
Why does the gospel have thisstory?
Some have speculated that thiswas Mark.
Since only Mark's gospel hasthis account, this little
vignette's, not in any of theother three gospels.
(14:15):
It seems a little unusual toinclude such a detail.
Remember that this was themiddle of the night.
Most of them had been sleeping.
It's entirely possible thatthis young man was just trying
to get some sleep.
This crowd comes up withtorches and lanterns and noise
(14:36):
and he just woke them up.
He also could have been one ofthe followers of Jesus that when
he got woken up, he runs out totry to see if there's anything
he could do to help and thenrealizes it's too late and runs
away.
I'm reminded, steve, there wasa radio personality in our town
once years ago that was a fairlywell-known homosexual man.
(15:00):
He would bring this upperiodically.
This radio personality didn'tknow very much about the Bible,
but he knew the one passage thattalked about a naked man.
That's the one I always thinkof.
So, steve, what are yourthoughts on this little passage?
Speaker 2 (15:14):
I don't have much thoughts on it.
On this little passage, I don'thave much thoughts on it.
I've read the same type ofcommentations that you have,
that it's Mark and he's insertedhimself here in an obscure way,
but when it comes down to it,it really doesn't matter one way
or the other.
Now, what I do want to say is,though, is that it's another
indication that this storythat's being told in this gospel
(15:37):
is an actual account, because,as you mentioned, why would
there be this little two-versearea talking about this one
action that happened of a person?
It doesn't really go with thenarrative.
It's just kind of out of theway, but if you're actually
giving eyewitness accounts ofwhat happened and what happened
that was there then it would besomething that you might include
(15:59):
with the narrative.
I think to me, if anything else, it just gives a little bit
more veracity that these areeyewitness accounts that are
talked about here as to whatactually happened whenever Jesus
was seized Books that arewritten for the purpose of a
religious myth, that are createdfor teaching a spiritual
(16:22):
concept or to create a group fora spiritual cult or something
like that.
Speaker 1 (16:27):
Don't have little factual things like this.
These are the little vignettes,little stories that, as you
said, steve, add to thecredibility of the eyewitness
account.
There's no other real reason toinclude that other than these
were eyewitness accounts.
They arrest Jesus, and nowwe'll pick up in.
Verse 53 says this they ledJesus away to the high priest
(16:51):
and all the chief priest and theelders and the scribes gathered
together.
Peter had followed him at adistance, right into the
courtyard of the high priest,and he was sitting with the
officers and warming himself atthe fire.
Now, the chief priest and thewhole council kept trying to
obtain testimony against Jesus,to put him to death, and they
(17:12):
were not finding any, for manywere giving false testimony
against him, but their testimonywas not consistent.
Some stood up and began to givefalse testimony against him,
saying we heard him say I willdestroy this temple made with
hands and in three days I willbuild another made without hands
.
Not even in this respect wastheir testimony consistent.
(17:35):
Well, steve, they take Jesus tothese religious leaders first,
and this is the start of thetrial.
There was really two parts tothe trial.
The first part consisted ofthree different meetings of
Jewish people and the secondpart consisted of three
different meetings of Romans.
There we have this trial and itstarts here this first story.
(18:00):
We have Jesus taken to wherethe meeting quarters of the high
priest was and it says in verse54, peter follows Jesus into
the courtyard outside of thechief priest place.
What does Peter do?
What does it say he does herein verse 54?
Speaker 2 (18:17):
Well, he says that he was sitting there with the
officers and warming himself atthe fire.
He's sitting there observingwhat's going on.
As far as Jesus himself Now, Ido want to mention here, as we
go through this accounting ofwhat happens as Jesus is passed
amongst these various officials,the council, the Sanhedrin, had
(18:39):
several rules that they weresupposed to adhere to whenever a
person was brought to them andaccused of something.
We're going to see and we'regoing to talk about some of
these rules that they broke.
Several, several.
There's up to 22 rules thatpeople have documented that they
broke.
One of them was that theybrought them to the chief
(19:00):
priest's house here.
They didn't take them to thecouncil itself, meaning the hall
of justice that was at thetemple.
That was one rule they broke.
The second one was they did itat night.
They weren't supposed to haveany of these type of trials
during the nighttime.
They were all supposed to bedoing the daytime.
So that's two things right here, at the very beginning of their
(19:20):
own rules that they're alreadystarting to break in this trial,
and I use that in mockquotations air quotes of Jesus.
Speaker 1 (19:30):
When we went through some of these rules back, when
we were going through some OldTestament passages, god was
always concerned with settingthings up to be fair independent
judges that would be fair andpeople would get a fair witness.
And it says here, even in thispassage that we read that they
were having some issues withthese witnesses.
(19:51):
What does it tell us here aboutthe accounts that these
witnesses were doing?
Speaker 2 (19:56):
In the accounts here.
Part of the ruling to get aguilty verdict was you had to
have two witnesses.
You couldn't just have onewitness.
Both of the witnesses'testimonies had to match each
other exactly.
Mark records one of thewitnesses here in verse 58 that
(20:16):
says I will destroy this templemade with hands and in three
days I'll build up another tomake it without hands.
Matthew records the otherwitness and the other witness
says I am able to destroy this.
Mark doesn't give both of themhere, but he says that not even
in this respect in verse 59 werethey able to get their stories
(20:40):
straight.
We have that from bothaccounting of Mark and Matthew.
We can put together that.
The difference is that one issaying Jesus has the ability to
do it and the other one saysthat Jesus would do it.
But both of those accountsreally wasn't even what Jesus
said.
He didn't even say that at all.
(21:01):
What they're referring to is atime whenever he said if you
destroy this temple, I willrebuild it in three days.
So the witnesses that they'rebringing to this chief priest to
start this trial they're nottogether and Mark is just using
this as one example that all thewitnesses are going to bring.
(21:22):
They can't get two to agreetogether as to what the
accusation is against him.
Speaker 1 (21:28):
If we remember earlier in the Gospel of Mark,
the priest had been plotting tokill Jesus for a while now.
They were just looking for anopportunity.
Well, now's their chance.
They were just looking for anopportunity.
Well, now's their chance.
They've already made up theirmind what the conclusion of the
trial is going.
So these witnesses were shamwitnesses, that they were just
going through the motions of thetrial, and even that it says
(21:49):
there were many people thatcould not agree.
There were many giving falsetestimony.
Yet the leaders just kepttrying.
They kept pushing Again.
They had already made up theirmind.
They couldn't get the witnessesto agree.
This is an illegal trial fromstart to finish.
Keep in mind who these peoplewere.
(22:10):
These were supposed to be themost spiritually mature people
in the country.
They were supposed to be olderand wiser and having a level
head to look at things.
They weren't.
They had already made up theirmind to kill Jesus and they're
just going through the motionsto do that, even when it was
(22:31):
obviously false testimony.
Let's pick up now when they area little frustrated because all
the witnesses don't agree.
So in verse 60, they approachJesus and say this the high
priest stood up and came forwardand questioned Jesus, saying do
you not answer?
What is it that these men aretestifying against you?
(22:53):
But he kept silent and did notanswer Again.
The high priest was questioninghim and saying to him Are you
the Christ, the Son of theBlessed One?
Jesus said I am, and you shallsee the Son of man sitting at
the right hand of power andcoming with the clouds of heaven
Tearing his clothes.
(23:14):
The high priest said whatfurther need do we have of
witnesses?
You have heard the blasphemy.
How does it seem to you?
And they all condemned him tobe deserving of death.
Some began to spit at him, toblindfold him and to beat him
with their fists and to say tohim Prophesy.
And the officers received himwith slaps in the face.
(23:36):
First question, steve why wouldJesus remain silent and not
defend himself?
This was a trial where it wasvery important he was in front
of the most senior people in thecountry, very serious
accusations Most people whenthat situation would be giving
this very quick, long list ofreasons why I'm innocent, but
(23:59):
Jesus remains silent.
Why would he be silent as part?
Speaker 2 (24:03):
of the rules of the council was that a witness
didn't have to testify.
Jesus, I think, is saying manytimes, even in our day, the
defense might not even bring anywitnesses if they don't think
that the prosecution has madetheir case.
I think that that's part ofwhat's going on here.
(24:23):
So far, the witnesses that havebeen brought against him
haven't matched and haven't beenable to agree with each other.
Why should Jesus even have tooffer up anything in his defense
?
Speaker 1 (24:35):
Well, I submit that one of the reasons Jesus didn't
defend himself was because hewanted to be crucified.
His purpose was to come and dieon the cross.
Jesus' purpose was to go to thecross and so when it came to
the part where he's accused ofsomething that he could be
executed for, he doesn't defendhimself.
(24:57):
Remember, jesus has been incontrol of the timing this
entire time.
Right here is the part where heis submitting to these men to
be executed.
His purpose is to die on thecross.
Then the priest the chiefpriest here is getting
increasingly frustrated.
You can almost hear thefrustration in his voice when
(25:18):
you read this.
In verse 61, the high priest,as a representative of Israel,
like the highest representativeof Israel, asks him directly are
you the Christ, the Son of theBlessed One?
The priest wants to hearplainly from Jesus and of course
, jesus had been claiming to beGod Almighty from the beginning
(25:39):
of his ministry, which is whythey arrested him.
You can find that over in John10, 33.
He said it flat out and he hadmade it very plain to them all
along.
Verse 61 has yet another one ofthese minor clues as to the
authenticity of the gospelwriters.
In verse 61, the question thatthe high priest says are you the
(26:06):
Christ, the son of the blessedone?
He doesn't use the word God, hedoesn't use the name for God,
he uses son of the Blessed One.
It's one of these very Jewishthings that people outside of
Judaism would not have realized.
We saw this before, but we nowhave a very, very Jewish
(26:29):
response, a question from thishigh priest.
The statement he makes has thelanguage that has the texture
and flavor of Judaism thatsomebody outside of Judaism
wouldn't know.
Later, when we get to Pilate,we have a response from a Roman
that's very Roman, that peoplethat weren't familiar with
(26:50):
Romans wouldn't know.
So we have here reduced down tothe only people that could
really write this were peoplethat were eyewitnesses at the
time, which is what actuallyhappens.
We have this question are youthe Christ, the Son of the
Blessed One?
And we've pointed this out manytimes Many modern readers don't
(27:12):
get the meaning of the term sonof.
Well, saying son of means havingthe same nature as Remember.
Jesus referred to James andJohn as sons of thunder because
they had a thunderous nature.
So when saying he was the sonof God is to claim deity.
(27:32):
It was to claim to be God claimdeity.
It was to claim to be God.
Verse 62,.
Jesus's response is veryprofound.
Three times in this response heclaims something very important
.
Steve, what do you get out ofJesus's response In verse 61,?
Are you the Christ, the Son ofthe Blessed One?
How does Jesus reply?
(27:54):
It's a very pregnant question.
We're going to have to waittill next time because Jesus's
answer is quite profound andwe're out of time for today.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
That's what happens when you go verse by verse.
You get to these parts whereyou just have to pause a little
bit.
So we're going to do that.
We thank you so much forwatching and listening to us and
we ask that you'll be back withus to hear what I've got to say
about that in our next sessionof Reasoning Through the Bible.
Thank you so much for watchingand listening.
May God bless you.
Modern popular music has a great deal of songs about
betrayal, especially betweenlovers.
One person that loves anotherbetrays that trust and that love
and the songs have a lot ofsadness to them and it would
seem, if we took away the songsof betrayal and wrongdoing that
popular music would not havemuch left to sing about.
(00:42):
Well, even the Bible haslessons on betrayal.
Today we're going to find outabout two people who had loved
each other have a great betrayal.
Hi, my name's Glenn.
I'm here with Steve.
This is Reasoning Through theBible.
Today we're going to get to thepassage where Judas betrays
Jesus.
So if you have your copy of theBible, open it to Mark, chapter
(01:06):
14.
When we start at verse 42,we're at the end of the part
where Jesus was in the Garden ofGethsemane.
He had been struggling inprayer and he had finished those
last messages to his disciplesand he is now ready for the
betrayal.
As we open this scene, you canalmost hear the crowd of armed
(01:30):
people coming to arrest Jesus.
Steve, can you jump in at Mark14 and read from verses 42 down
to verse 50?
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Get up, let us be going.
Behold, the one who betrays meis at hand.
Immediately, while he was stillspeaking, judas, one of the
twelve, came up, accompanied bya crowd with swords and clubs
who were from the chief priestsand the scribes and the elders.
Now he who was betraying himhad given them a signal saying
(02:01):
Whomever I kiss, he's the one.
Seize him and lead him awayunder guard.
After coming, judas immediatelywent to him saying Rabbi, and
kissed him.
They laid hands on him andseized him, but one of those who
stood by drew his sword andstruck the slave of the high
priest and cut off his ear.
(02:22):
Jesus said to them have youcome out with swords and clubs
to arrest me, as you wouldagainst a robber?
Every day, I was with you inthe temple teaching, and you did
not seize me, but this hastaken place to fulfill
scriptures.
And they all left him and fled.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
With this we have Judas arriving with a band of
people to arrest Jesus.
In verse 43, Judas comes upwith this group and he kisses
them.
They had found a secluded spotto identify him.
Remember, this is the middle ofthe night, and in those days, a
kiss was a greeting.
Today, we might use a handshakeor a hug.
(03:04):
Oftentimes, in those days, akiss was a greeting.
Today, we might use a handshakeor a hug.
Oftentimes, in those days, akiss on the cheek was an
affectionate greeting.
We have here the ultimate actof betrayal, done with an act of
tenderness, a kiss.
One of the questions that comesup, Steve, always, is why?
Why would Judas betray Jesus?
And there's been a lot ofspeculation and the text doesn't
(03:26):
really tell us why, but there'sthis question before us.
So, Steve, why do you thinkJudas would betray?
Speaker 2 (03:35):
Jesus.
The first thing that I thinkneeds to be said is that Judas
was selected by Jesus.
He was purposely selected.
Jesus knows who he is.
He's also Judas Iscariot.
We mentioned this in one of ourearlier sessions that all the
rest of the disciples are kindof up around that Galilean area,
but Judas is from an areathat's a little bit kind of
(03:59):
southwest of Jerusalem.
He's a little bit not out ofplace, but he's not with one of
those guys.
Now that doesn't have anythingof whether he's good or bad.
I think that he's just a badperson.
What I mean by that is we findout later whenever there was the
protest of the woman that putthe anointing oil on Jesus
(04:24):
earlier, they were complainingand said that money could have
been taken and given to the poor.
Well, one of the other gospelwriters say that Judas was the
one who said that and that hewas taking money from the money
box that they used.
He was the treasurer,apparently, of the group and he
was embezzling money from that.
(04:44):
You can see from that showedhis character.
So I know there's differentspeculations as to why.
Because he wanted Jesus to comeand be the king and overthrow
the Roman government, and Jesuswasn't doing that, so he's
trying to force Jesus's hands.
There's all different types ofspeculations on that, but I
really just think it comes downto this he was not a good person
(05:07):
.
It says that Satan entered him.
Well, if Satan or a demon isentering somebody, that means
that they're inviting them in.
In many cases, I think thatJudas had been conspiring with
them.
We know that for at leastseveral months.
He just wasn't a good person.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
And I would agree.
I mean there's been muchspeculation and you mentioned
several of them.
Was it greed?
He seemed to go and initiatethe betrayal right after at
least in the text right afterthe very expensive perfume was
poured out.
Some speculate it's greed, somepower trying to force Jesus'
hand.
Maybe it was jealousy,disillusionment there's been all
(05:47):
these things that have beenproposed.
I submit he was an evil man andevil people do evil things.
We don't really understand evilsimply because it is just that
Evil people do evil acts and weare often left scratching our
(06:09):
heads saying why, why wouldsomebody do something like this?
And the only explanation isthat they're evil.
Evil people do evil things andthat's really the end of it.
There's no more justificationthan that.
Why do people go out and tearup other people's property in a
criminal way when it's easierfor them to just go on about
their own business?
Well, it's because they're evilpeople doing evil things.
(06:30):
And evil doesn't really have anexplanation outside of it other
than it tries to steal, killand destroy.
Then, in verse 47, one of thedisciples strikes a servant and
cuts off his ear.
John 18.10 says this was Peterthat did this.
Steve, why would Peter cut offa man's?
Speaker 2 (06:51):
ear.
Peter was the one who was thestrongest protester.
Whenever Jesus said one of youis going to betray me, he was
one of the ones.
Of course, all of them did itsaid no, it's not going to be me
.
But Peter was really strong onit and said I'll go to my death
before I betray you.
So I think that this shows hischaracter from the standpoint
(07:13):
that he was willing to do thatat this particular time to
defend Jesus.
I think it's just as simple asthat.
I think it's impulsive becauseit says that there's a cohort
that is there or at least cameto get them.
There are many people that werethere.
So to do something like thathad to have been an impulsive
act.
Of course, right before that,what had they been doing?
(07:34):
They had been falling asleepwhile Jesus was over there
praying earnestly and actuallyfalling asleep for three times.
So I just think the bottom lineis it was an impulsive act to
try and protect their rabbi,their teacher, the Son of God,
who Peter had confessed that hewas the Messiah, the Son of God.
(07:56):
He was just trying to protecthim.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
Exactly.
Peter was very headstrong.
He was quite serious when hesaid I will go to my death
before I deny you and I thinkpart of what's going on here I
don't think he was trying to cutoff the man's ear.
I think he was trying to cutoff the man's head.
And this is what happens when afisherman picks up a sword is
he didn't really know how to useit, like a true swordsman would
(08:19):
.
He's trying to kill the man andwas just bad at it.
So that's why he cut off hisear.
And, of course, one of theother Gospels tell us that Jesus
healed the man's ear again andsaid put that away.
That's not really what we'retrying to do here.
Peter used the wrong weapon.
He should have been praying ashis weapon and he was sleeping.
(08:40):
So now he picks up a sword,which was the wrong weapon at
the wrong time.
Here.
There might have been times touse a sword in our lives, even
still today to time to use aweapon, but not for God's
purposes.
One point here they arrest him.
Jesus mentions the swords andthe clubs.
Everybody assumes that thesewere Roman soldiers and I tend
(09:05):
to struggle a little bit.
On one hand, it never reallysays they're Roman.
It does use military terms,especially in John 18.12, the
term captain and officers, andit doesn't seem likely that a
fisherman like Peter would beable to pull out a sword against
a whole squad of Roman soldiersand live to tell the story.
(09:28):
On the other hand, the templeguards would be more likely to
recognize who Jesus was and notneed somebody like Judas to
identify him.
We'll follow along, I suppose,with the traditional view.
Steve, you have an opinion on.
Were these truly Roman soldiers?
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Well, I personally think that they were.
Some of the ideas that backthat up is that later on the
next morning they're going totake him to Pilate.
Pilate is the procreator of thearea.
He's the Roman governor ofJerusalem area.
There he's ready and waitingfor Jesus to come, so he knows
he's going to come.
In order for him to be readyand expecting a trial of this
(10:07):
Jesus, you would think thatthere would have been some sort
of a prompting for him to go andarrest him.
Well, the thought is that Judaswas used for this, that he was
taken to Pilate and made anaccusation against Jesus to come
to a trial.
This is all orchestrated.
And made an accusation againstJesus to come to a trial.
This is all orchestrated.
Remember, it says that theleadership had been plotting to
(10:30):
kill Jesus for several months.
Well, the right of capitalpunishment had been taken away
from the Sanhedrin, from thecouncil.
They knew that if they're goingto kill Jesus, no-transcript.
(10:52):
So I think that that's why Itend to think that they were the
Roman cohort that were withthem was because Judas had gone.
They'd used him make a chargeagainst Jesus.
Pilate commissions this cohortto go get him and arrest him,
but, on the other hand, to yourpoint, they don't take him back
directly to Pilate, they takehim over to the high priest's
(11:13):
house.
That doesn't seem likely thatthe Roman soldiers would do that
either.
So I guess, Glenn, we'll justhave to leave it at.
We don't know what we don'tknow.
It could have been the Romancohort, it could have been the
temple guards.
In either case, they wereauthoritarian figures that came
and they actually did arrest him.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
One of those things that when we get to heavenly
Bible class we'll be able to askthat question.
In verse 48, jesus said to themhave you come out with swords
and clubs to arrest me, as youwould against a robber?
Every day I was with you in thetemple teaching, and you did
not seize me.
They came up in the middle ofthe night when he had been there
(11:53):
pretty much all day for severaldays in a row and they didn't
arrest him there.
They wait till the dark ofnight to arrest him.
One of the discussion questionsI have, steve, is how do you
know when you're about to dosomething wrong?
To me, the answer is whenyou're doing it, so nobody will
find out what I'm doing.
If you're sneaking around inthe middle of the night doing
(12:16):
something so nobody will see,then that's one major clue.
That you're sneaking around inthe middle of the night doing
something so nobody will see,then that's one major clue that
you're just about to dosomething wrong, wouldn't you
think?
Speaker 2 (12:23):
Yeah, and what you're actually saying is that Jesus
was confident that he hadn'tdone anything wrong because he
had been out teaching in thetemple area, quite out in the
open.
They had plenty of opportunityto take him and seize him during
the daytime and they didn'twant to do that.
So actually, his point is justthat you know that you're fixing
(12:47):
to arrest me for something thatI'm innocent of, because if you
had a good case against me,you'd do it in the open and
you'd do it in the daytime.
You wouldn't be doing it in theevening time.
Speaker 1 (12:57):
Back in verse 31,.
All the disciples had claimedoh, I'll never leave you.
Well, look at verse 50.
What did they actually do whenthe time came?
Well, they all ran away.
Speaker 2 (13:08):
They all scattered whenever they actually took him
into custody.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
Exactly.
When it actually came down to aplace where he needed a friend,
they all left.
They all ran.
They were all weak.
When they were in the upperroom with him, they were real
strong and they could claim oh,I'll never leave you, I'll
always be faithful.
But when it actually came downto the part where he gets
arrested, they all flee, all ofthem left.
(13:34):
He's alone now.
From here on out he's reallyalone till his death.
For the rest of these trials,jesus will face it alone.
Then there's this littlevignette in verses 51 and 52.
It says a young man wasfollowing him, wearing nothing
but a linen sheet over his nakedbody, and they seized him.
(13:54):
But he pulled free of the linensheet and escaped naked.
One of the questions that'salways popped up amongst Bible
teachers is why in the world isthat there?
Who was this young man?
Why does the gospel have thisstory?
Some have speculated that thiswas Mark.
Since only Mark's gospel hasthis account, this little
vignette's, not in any of theother three gospels.
(14:15):
It seems a little unusual toinclude such a detail.
Remember that this was themiddle of the night.
Most of them had been sleeping.
It's entirely possible thatthis young man was just trying
to get some sleep.
This crowd comes up withtorches and lanterns and noise
(14:36):
and he just woke them up.
He also could have been one ofthe followers of Jesus that when
he got woken up, he runs out totry to see if there's anything
he could do to help and thenrealizes it's too late and runs
away.
I'm reminded, steve, there wasa radio personality in our town
once years ago that was a fairlywell-known homosexual man.
(15:00):
He would bring this upperiodically.
This radio personality didn'tknow very much about the Bible,
but he knew the one passage thattalked about a naked man.
That's the one I always thinkof.
So, steve, what are yourthoughts on this little passage?
Speaker 2 (15:14):
I don't have much thoughts on it.
On this little passage, I don'thave much thoughts on it.
I've read the same type ofcommentations that you have,
that it's Mark and he's insertedhimself here in an obscure way,
but when it comes down to it,it really doesn't matter one way
or the other.
Now, what I do want to say is,though, is that it's another
indication that this storythat's being told in this gospel
(15:37):
is an actual account, because,as you mentioned, why would
there be this little two-versearea talking about this one
action that happened of a person?
It doesn't really go with thenarrative.
It's just kind of out of theway, but if you're actually
giving eyewitness accounts ofwhat happened and what happened
that was there then it would besomething that you might include
(15:59):
with the narrative.
I think to me, if anything else, it just gives a little bit
more veracity that these areeyewitness accounts that are
talked about here as to whatactually happened whenever Jesus
was seized Books that arewritten for the purpose of a
religious myth, that are createdfor teaching a spiritual
(16:22):
concept or to create a group fora spiritual cult or something
like that.
Speaker 1 (16:27):
Don't have little factual things like this.
These are the little vignettes,little stories that, as you
said, steve, add to thecredibility of the eyewitness
account.
There's no other real reason toinclude that other than these
were eyewitness accounts.
They arrest Jesus, and nowwe'll pick up in.
Verse 53 says this they ledJesus away to the high priest
(16:51):
and all the chief priest and theelders and the scribes gathered
together.
Peter had followed him at adistance, right into the
courtyard of the high priest,and he was sitting with the
officers and warming himself atthe fire.
Now, the chief priest and thewhole council kept trying to
obtain testimony against Jesus,to put him to death, and they
(17:12):
were not finding any, for manywere giving false testimony
against him, but their testimonywas not consistent.
Some stood up and began to givefalse testimony against him,
saying we heard him say I willdestroy this temple made with
hands and in three days I willbuild another made without hands
.
Not even in this respect wastheir testimony consistent.
(17:35):
Well, steve, they take Jesus tothese religious leaders first,
and this is the start of thetrial.
There was really two parts tothe trial.
The first part consisted ofthree different meetings of
Jewish people and the secondpart consisted of three
different meetings of Romans.
There we have this trial and itstarts here this first story.
(18:00):
We have Jesus taken to wherethe meeting quarters of the high
priest was and it says in verse54, peter follows Jesus into
the courtyard outside of thechief priest place.
What does Peter do?
What does it say he does herein verse 54?
Speaker 2 (18:17):
Well, he says that he was sitting there with the
officers and warming himself atthe fire.
He's sitting there observingwhat's going on.
As far as Jesus himself Now, Ido want to mention here, as we
go through this accounting ofwhat happens as Jesus is passed
amongst these various officials,the council, the Sanhedrin, had
(18:39):
several rules that they weresupposed to adhere to whenever a
person was brought to them andaccused of something.
We're going to see and we'regoing to talk about some of
these rules that they broke.
Several, several.
There's up to 22 rules thatpeople have documented that they
broke.
One of them was that theybrought them to the chief
(19:00):
priest's house here.
They didn't take them to thecouncil itself, meaning the hall
of justice that was at thetemple.
That was one rule they broke.
The second one was they did itat night.
They weren't supposed to haveany of these type of trials
during the nighttime.
They were all supposed to bedoing the daytime.
So that's two things right here, at the very beginning of their
(19:20):
own rules that they're alreadystarting to break in this trial,
and I use that in mockquotations air quotes of Jesus.
Speaker 1 (19:30):
When we went through some of these rules back, when
we were going through some OldTestament passages, god was
always concerned with settingthings up to be fair independent
judges that would be fair andpeople would get a fair witness.
And it says here, even in thispassage that we read that they
were having some issues withthese witnesses.
(19:51):
What does it tell us here aboutthe accounts that these
witnesses were doing?
Speaker 2 (19:56):
In the accounts here.
Part of the ruling to get aguilty verdict was you had to
have two witnesses.
You couldn't just have onewitness.
Both of the witnesses'testimonies had to match each
other exactly.
Mark records one of thewitnesses here in verse 58 that
(20:16):
says I will destroy this templemade with hands and in three
days I'll build up another tomake it without hands.
Matthew records the otherwitness and the other witness
says I am able to destroy this.
Mark doesn't give both of themhere, but he says that not even
in this respect in verse 59 werethey able to get their stories
(20:40):
straight.
We have that from bothaccounting of Mark and Matthew.
We can put together that.
The difference is that one issaying Jesus has the ability to
do it and the other one saysthat Jesus would do it.
But both of those accountsreally wasn't even what Jesus
said.
He didn't even say that at all.
(21:01):
What they're referring to is atime whenever he said if you
destroy this temple, I willrebuild it in three days.
So the witnesses that they'rebringing to this chief priest to
start this trial they're nottogether and Mark is just using
this as one example that all thewitnesses are going to bring.
(21:22):
They can't get two to agreetogether as to what the
accusation is against him.
Speaker 1 (21:28):
If we remember earlier in the Gospel of Mark,
the priest had been plotting tokill Jesus for a while now.
They were just looking for anopportunity.
Well, now's their chance.
They were just looking for anopportunity.
Well, now's their chance.
They've already made up theirmind what the conclusion of the
trial is going.
So these witnesses were shamwitnesses, that they were just
going through the motions of thetrial, and even that it says
(21:49):
there were many people thatcould not agree.
There were many giving falsetestimony.
Yet the leaders just kepttrying.
They kept pushing Again.
They had already made up theirmind.
They couldn't get the witnessesto agree.
This is an illegal trial fromstart to finish.
Keep in mind who these peoplewere.
(22:10):
These were supposed to be themost spiritually mature people
in the country.
They were supposed to be olderand wiser and having a level
head to look at things.
They weren't.
They had already made up theirmind to kill Jesus and they're
just going through the motionsto do that, even when it was
(22:31):
obviously false testimony.
Let's pick up now when they area little frustrated because all
the witnesses don't agree.
So in verse 60, they approachJesus and say this the high
priest stood up and came forwardand questioned Jesus, saying do
you not answer?
What is it that these men aretestifying against you?
(22:53):
But he kept silent and did notanswer Again.
The high priest was questioninghim and saying to him Are you
the Christ, the Son of theBlessed One?
Jesus said I am, and you shallsee the Son of man sitting at
the right hand of power andcoming with the clouds of heaven
Tearing his clothes.
(23:14):
The high priest said whatfurther need do we have of
witnesses?
You have heard the blasphemy.
How does it seem to you?
And they all condemned him tobe deserving of death.
Some began to spit at him, toblindfold him and to beat him
with their fists and to say tohim Prophesy.
And the officers received himwith slaps in the face.
(23:36):
First question, steve why wouldJesus remain silent and not
defend himself?
This was a trial where it wasvery important he was in front
of the most senior people in thecountry, very serious
accusations Most people whenthat situation would be giving
this very quick, long list ofreasons why I'm innocent, but
(23:59):
Jesus remains silent.
Why would he be silent as part?
Speaker 2 (24:03):
of the rules of the council was that a witness
didn't have to testify.
Jesus, I think, is saying manytimes, even in our day, the
defense might not even bring anywitnesses if they don't think
that the prosecution has madetheir case.
I think that that's part ofwhat's going on here.
(24:23):
So far, the witnesses that havebeen brought against him
haven't matched and haven't beenable to agree with each other.
Why should Jesus even have tooffer up anything in his defense
?
Speaker 1 (24:35):
Well, I submit that one of the reasons Jesus didn't
defend himself was because hewanted to be crucified.
His purpose was to come and dieon the cross.
Jesus' purpose was to go to thecross and so when it came to
the part where he's accused ofsomething that he could be
executed for, he doesn't defendhimself.
(24:57):
Remember, jesus has been incontrol of the timing this
entire time.
Right here is the part where heis submitting to these men to
be executed.
His purpose is to die on thecross.
Then the priest the chiefpriest here is getting
increasingly frustrated.
You can almost hear thefrustration in his voice when
(25:18):
you read this.
In verse 61, the high priest,as a representative of Israel,
like the highest representativeof Israel, asks him directly are
you the Christ, the Son of theBlessed One?
The priest wants to hearplainly from Jesus and of course
, jesus had been claiming to beGod Almighty from the beginning
(25:39):
of his ministry, which is whythey arrested him.
You can find that over in John10, 33.
He said it flat out and he hadmade it very plain to them all
along.
Verse 61 has yet another one ofthese minor clues as to the
authenticity of the gospelwriters.
In verse 61, the question thatthe high priest says are you the
(26:06):
Christ, the son of the blessedone?
He doesn't use the word God, hedoesn't use the name for God,
he uses son of the Blessed One.
It's one of these very Jewishthings that people outside of
Judaism would not have realized.
We saw this before, but we nowhave a very, very Jewish
(26:29):
response, a question from thishigh priest.
The statement he makes has thelanguage that has the texture
and flavor of Judaism thatsomebody outside of Judaism
wouldn't know.
Later, when we get to Pilate,we have a response from a Roman
that's very Roman, that peoplethat weren't familiar with
(26:50):
Romans wouldn't know.
So we have here reduced down tothe only people that could
really write this were peoplethat were eyewitnesses at the
time, which is what actuallyhappens.
We have this question are youthe Christ, the Son of the
Blessed One?
And we've pointed this out manytimes Many modern readers don't
(27:12):
get the meaning of the term sonof.
Well, saying son of means havingthe same nature as Remember.
Jesus referred to James andJohn as sons of thunder because
they had a thunderous nature.
So when saying he was the sonof God is to claim deity.
(27:32):
It was to claim to be God claimdeity.
It was to claim to be God.
Verse 62,.
Jesus's response is veryprofound.
Three times in this response heclaims something very important
.
Steve, what do you get out ofJesus's response In verse 61,?
Are you the Christ, the Son ofthe Blessed One?
How does Jesus reply?
(27:54):
It's a very pregnant question.
We're going to have to waittill next time because Jesus's
answer is quite profound andwe're out of time for today.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
That's what happens when you go verse by verse.
You get to these parts whereyou just have to pause a little
bit.
So we're going to do that.
We thank you so much forwatching and listening to us and
we ask that you'll be back withus to hear what I've got to say
about that in our next sessionof Reasoning Through the Bible.
Thank you so much for watchingand listening.
May God bless you.
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