Jesus And Jewish Leaders

A few days before His crucifixion, Jesus had a series of confrontations with the leaders of the Jewish people. Mark 11:27-12:40 records five confrontations with those who led God's people. Jesus always showed Himself and His teachings to be superior to anything offered by these men, and He showed how the spiritual leaders of Israel were failing. This passage explains why Jesus had to use such strong teaching against them. After the leaders murdered Jesus, they would be destroyed and replaced by Him as the eternal leader of God's true people.

First Incident: Mark 11:27-33. The chief priests, scribes, and elders confronted Jesus first. They asked Him where He got the authority to teach what He did. However, Jesus had already proven that He had authority from God by the miracles which He had performed (see Nicodemus, John 3:2). These men wanted to show that He did not have their approval. They also were upset by His cleansing of the temple in 11:15. They had no justification to ask; they did not have authority for their own practices ("chief priests" were an addition to the Law), let alone for supervising Jesus' teaching.

Jesus knew that these people were not asking Him a legitimate question, so He responded by asking whether John's baptism was approved by God or man. The rulers never considered the truth in answering. They were hypocrites if they said the baptism was from God and in physical danger if they claimed John was not a prophet, so they claimed that they did not know. This was ridiculous, because as the spiritual leaders of Israel they had to know whether a prophet was true or not. Not to know was to ignore their responsibility to Israel's souls. Jesus showed they were dishonest and had no moral authority, but that He was approved of God.

Second Incident: Mark 12:1-12. Jesus addressed all of Israel's rulers in this parable about the vinedressers. The vineyard represented God's people, Israel, who were to bear spiritual fruit. The vinedressers were Israel's leaders, who were to help the people grow. The owner of the vineyard represented God, the servants were His prophets, and the son was Jesus. Jesus illustrated how the leaders had abused their privilege and were leading everyone to destruction, killing the prophets and Son of God. The Jewish leaders understood Jesus and responded, fulfiilling the parable by killing Jesus. The rest of the parable,the destruction of the leaders and much of the nation,would be fulfilled by Rome in AD 70.

Third Incident: Mark 12:13-17. The Herodians and the Pharisees tried to trick Jesus with a question about taxes. The Herodians were extreme loyalists, supporting the kingdom set up by Rome. The Pharisees were extreme nationalists, hating Roman control. The only thing these parties agreed on was stopping Jesus. If He supported paying taxes, the Pharisees could denounce Him in front of the Jews. If He discouraged paying taxes, the Herodians could rightly accuse Him. Jesus saw through their plot and got to the heart of the matter: the government that coined the money had a right to collect it in taxes, but God could not be neglected. The hypocrisy and dishonesty of the two parties were exposed.

Fourth Incident: Mark 12:18-27. The Sadducees tried to trick Jesus next. They gave an example of a woman who had been married to seven different men. They thought that the problem of who would be her husband showed that the resurrection was not true. Jesus avoided arguing about details and got to the core problem: the Sadduccees had little religious knowledge. They had a great deal of power and claimed they followed God, but they really did not believe. Understanding the resurrection was difficult (the Old Testament has little to say about it), but the Sadduccees did not even believe God's word enough to accept angels as real (Acts 22:8). Jesus exposed their lack of knowledge by quoting one of the best-known passages in the Old Testament (Exodus 3).

Fifth Incident: Mark 12:28-37. A lawyer asked Jesus what the greatest commandment of the Law was. Jesus summarized all of the Old Testament in two points: loving God and loving man. Jesus had shown His mastery of the Old Testament and His superiority over the religious and political establishment of His day. No one could question or challenge Him. Jesus then brought up a new question: How could King David call his son "Lord"? This would only be appropriate if David's son were more than just a man. Jesus used this passage to show that He, the Christ, is God. The lesson was over.

Summary: Jesus took on six different groups of Jewish leaders and bested them all, proving Himself to be divine. The leaders responded by killing Him, rejecting the church He started and bringing destruction upon themselves and the nation they led. It is easier to understand Jesus' hard words when you see how these people were ruining a people made for God's own possession. Let us learn from Jesus in defending truth and handling critics.