Mark 12: Baiting Jesus

"Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength."

Mark believes this observation about Jesus' enemies: "Then they looked for a way to arrest him because they knew he had spoken the parable against them" (verse 12). The rest of chapter 12 records skirmishes between Jesus and the groups seeking to trap him and erode his popularity.

First, representatives from a political party cynically praise Jesus and then spring on him a loaded question about taxes. If Jesus says the Jews should pay taxes, he may lose popular support, for the Jews despise the Roman occupation forces who control the government. If he says "Don't pay, " he risks arrest for encouraging lawbreaking. Next, a small but powerful religious group tries to stump Jesus theologically. The Sadducees, who do not believe in an afterlife, propose a complicated riddle about life after death.

Finally, Jesus' perennial enemies, the Pharisees, take their turn. Rabbis of the day have detailed 613 commandments in Moses' law, and various splinter groups bicker over which ones are most important. A teacher of the law asks Jesus to select just one as the greatest commandment, knowing his choice will surely offend some of these groups.

Jesus fends off these attacks so impressively that Mark concludes, "And from then on no one dared ask him any more questions." His replies combine brilliance, wit and common sense in a way that turns the tables on his critics and leaves them speechless. In all these skirmishes, Jesus does not try to placate his adversaries. Instead, he uses these conflicts to warn his disciples and the watching crowds against these adversaries, whose fury only increases.