In his outstanding book, Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony (Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2d ed. 2017), Richard Bauckham observes that referring to the Jesus disciple who cut off an ear of the servant of the High Priest as “’one of those standing near’ (Mark 14:47) is an odd way to speak of one of the Twelve.”1 In the Gospel of John, we learn that it was Peter who wielded the sword; and Matthew and Luke, without naming Peter, do at least identify him as “one of Jesus’ companions” (Matt. 26:51), or as “one of . . . Jesus’ followers” (Luke 22:49-50). Why is Mark being so cryptic here?
If you’re like me, you barely paused when you read that text for the umpteenth time. But if you stop and think about it, it really does seem puzzling. Who was this fellow who was “standing around?” As John’s readers later find out, it wasn’t just some random stranger who assaulted the High Priest’s servant – it was Peter, for heaven’s sake! Why not say so?
Citing Thiessen2, Bauckham offers a cogent explanation. By assaulting the High Priest’s servant, Peter had placed himself in grave danger of arrest. By withholding the name of the assailant, Mark sought to protect Peter from that danger. This is a case of “protective anonymity.” John could name Peter because John wrote at a time when Peter was beyond the reach of the High Priest (i.e., he had already been killed).
It happens that there are several other important figures in the drama of Christ’s Passion who are also anonymous in Mark. There were the young man who left his robe and fled naked from Gethsemane (Mark 14:51); the woman who anointed Jesus with a jar of expensive perfume (Mark 14:3-9); the owners of the donkey Christ rode into the City (Mark 11:1-3); and the man who led the disciples to the upper room for the Passover meal (Mark 14:12-16). Have you ever stopped to wonder why are all of these are unnamed in Mark? By offering plausible resolutions to these mysteries, Bauckham strengthens our confidence in the accuracy of Mark’s narrative.
Bauckham proposes that in each of these instances Mark was acting to protect Jesus’ followers from reprisal by Christ’s enemies by keeping their identities secret. In the case of the young man who abandoned his garment, presumably he could have retained it had he not been resisting arrest. The owners of the donkey and the upper room also may have justly feared reprisal – it was not much later that a disciple of Jesus was murdered at the instance of the Jewish leaders (Acts 7); James, a leader of the early church, was later martyred (Acts 12:1-2); and an attempt was made on Peter’s life too (Acts 12:3).
But all of this shines a bright light on another mystery in Mark’s Gospel, namely, Peter’s denial of JC (also recorded in all three of the other Gospels). Was this a deliberate betrayal? Peter was now in the courtyard of the High Priest, whose servant Peter had assaulted a very short time earlier. When he was challenged as a disciple of the accused, Peter, thinking only of himself and how he might avoid immediate arrest and possible execution, panicked, and he resorted to the only expedient immediately available to him, namely, concealing his relationship to Jesus. It was only when the cock crew that he remembered his pledge.
It gives every believer immense comfort to know that Peter – even Peter – was later restored in his relationship to Jesus. If that is possible, then there is also hope for me.
But that is not all! As a bonus Bauckham’s insights afford us a means of establishing the early authorship of Mark and the entire New Testament. In John’s Gospel the identities of the assailant and the woman who anointed Jesus are revealed. As mentioned above, there is a cogent explanation for the difference between Mark and John. John did not write until Peter and Mary had died and were thus beyond the reach of Christ’s enemies. When would that have been? Bauckham’s estimate: Mark would have written very early, probably between 30 A.D. and 60 A.D. I would venture to say it would have been very much toward the earlier of those dates, since Paul’s letters were written prior to Mark, and Matthew, Luke, and Acts were all written after Mark but before the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D.
ENDNOTES
1Bauckham, 184.
2Thiessen, The Gospels (186-187; apparently out of print).
Joshualetter 