John the baptist’s appearance in 𝘔𝘢𝘳𝘬.

Mark 1.2-6, Exodus 23.20, Isaiah 40.1-8, Malachi 3.1.

The very first appearance of John the baptist we see in ancient literature is in the Gospel According to Mark, which was written sometime in the 60s CE. The other synoptic gospels quote Mark, and John is likely a response to Luke and fills in some of its blanks. So since Mark was written first, here’s how he described John.

Mark 1.2-6 KWL

2Just as it was written by the prophet Isaiah—

“Look, I send my messenger before your¹ face,

who will prepare my way” for you.¹ Ex 23.20

3“A voice shouting in the wilderness,

‘Prepare the Lord’s way!

Make his paths straight!’ ” Is 40.3

4—so comes John,

who baptizes in the wilderness

and preaches a baptism of repentance

for the forgiveness of sins.

5All the land of Judea are going out to John,ᴾ

and all the Jerusalemites.

They’re being baptized by him in the river Jordan,

confessing their sins.

6John was wearing camelhair,

a leather moneybelt round his waist,

and eating locusts and undomesticated honey.

7John is preaching,

“One stronger than me,

comes after me.

I’m not worthy

to bend down and loose his sandal strap.

8I baptize you² in water;

he will baptize you² in the Holy Spirit.”

Mark begins his gospel by quoting Exodus and mixing it up with the prophet Isaiah. Yep, it’s a “bible difficulty,” for those who refuse to acknowledge any errors in the bible. But it’s not a bible difficulty for a lot of ’em, because they go with the way the Textus Receptus puts it, and with New Testaments based on the Textus:

Mark 1.2 KWL (from TR)

According to what was written in the Prophets—

“Look, I send my messenger before your¹ face,

who will prepare my way” before you.¹ Ex 23.20

Yep, later generations of Christians corrected Mark’s error. Nice of ’em! But this is one of the many reasons I dismiss the inerrantists’ claim the bible had no errors in the originals. It’s entirely possible there were more errors in the originals.

And in case this idea makes you anxious, I remind you none of the “difficulties” we find in the bible undermine the truth of the gospel. Jesus is still Lord, still the way the truth and the life, still should be followed, still saves us from sin, still returning. Still uses fallible men, like Mark, to share the gospel. Still can use you to do it too—and when you make mistakes, he can easily work around them. Don’t worry about being perfect; just follow Jesus as best you can, and trust him considerably more than your resources.

Okay, mini-sermon over. So the Textus changed the original to “the Prophets” instead of “the prophet Isaiah.” Well that doesn’t look like a difficulty! Except… it still is. To the Jews, “the Prophets” either refers to

• the second batch of Old Testament books written before the Babylonian exile (Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi), or
• the books of prophecy written by the LORD’s prophets (Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, Daniel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi).

Exodus falls into neither of those groups. It’s in the Law, not the Prophets. So, still a difficulty. The inerrantists try to weasel out of it by pretending the quote in Mark 1.2 comes from Malachi 3.1, not Exodus—and Malachi is in the Prophets, no matter which definition of “the Prophets” you go with. But it’s not from Malachi at all, which I’ll show you in the next section.

The Old Testament quotes.

Maybe it’s easiest if I use a chart. Old Testament quotes come from the Septuagint, the Greek Old Testament which was Mark’s bible.

MK 1.2	ἰδοὺ ἀποστέλλω τὸν ἄγγελόν μου πρὸ προσώπου σου… Idú apostéllo ton ángyelón mu pro prosópu su…
EX 23.20	Καὶ ἰδοὺ ἐγὼ ἀποστέλλω τὸν ἄγγελόν μου πρὸ προσώπου σου… Ke idú egó apostéllo ton ángyelón mu pro prosópu su…
ML 3.1	ἰδοὺ ἐγὼ ἐξαποστέλλω τὸν ἄγγελόν μου… Idú egó exapostéllo ton ángyelú mu…

Which one, Exodus or Malachi, is the best match to the scripture Mark quoted? Right you are, Exodus. If you drop the words καὶ/ke “and,” and ἐγὼ̀/egó, “I” (and they’re kinda redundant), it’s word-for-word.

Here’s the whole Exodus verse. Red letters ’cause it’s the LORD talking to Moses individually, which is why every “you” is singular—both here, and in Mark 1.2. It’s to an individual, not the crowd; not Israel; not humanity.

Exodus 23.20 KWL (from LXX)

“And look, I send my angel before your¹ face,

so he might guard you¹ in the way,

that he might bring you¹

to the land I prepare for you.”¹

“Messenger” and “angel” are both valid translations of ἄγγελόν/ángyelón, the same word in Exodus, Malachi, and Mark. In the OT the writers were no doubt thinking of one of the warrior spirits whom the LORD of Armies commands, but Mark clearly meant the very human John bar Zacharias, who fought apathy and evil in his own way.

Malachi puts it thisaway. Red letters ’cause it’s still the LORD talking, through Malachi. But this time every “you” is plural, which does not match the gospel.

Malachi 3.1 KWL (from LXX)

“Look, I send out my angel.

It will pay attention to the way before my face,

and the Lord, who seeks you,²

and the angels of the covenant, who want you,²

will suddenly come into the temple.

Look at them come!”

says the Almighty Lord.

It ultimately doesn’t matter if Mark got the address wrong, nor the way his bible quote is a mashup of multiple quotes. The important thing is the LORD wants his way straightened, and John is the prophet he sent to help straighten it.

On to Isaiah, and I’m gonna quote more of it than Mark does, partly ’cause context, and partly ’cause the other gospels quote it.

Isaiah 40.1-8 KWL (from LXX)

1“Encourage, encourage my people,” God says.

2“Priests, speak from the heart.

Jerusalem: Encourage her,

so her humiliation can be fulfilled.

Her sin was released

for she took double from the Lord’s hand

for all her sins.”

3A voice shouting out in the wilderness:

“Prepare the Lord’s way!

Make a straight path for our God!

4Every valley will be filled

and every hill and high place will be humbled.

Everything crooked will be made straight

and rough places made level.

5The Lord’s glory will be seen,

and all flesh will see God’s salvation,

for the Lord will speak so.

6A voice is saying, “Shout!”

I say, “What will I shout?”

“All flesh is grass.

All human glory is like a grass blossom.

7Grass dries up.

Its blossom falls off.

8God’s word to us remains

into the age to come.”

John elsewhere identifies himself as that voice in the wilderness, Jn 1.23 and nothing more. His job was to get people ready for the LORD. He was also preparing ’em for Messiah, although “Messiah” is a politically loaded term which John wasn’t willing to say in public, and didn’t use. He simply referred to Jesus as ὁ ὀπίσω μου ἐρχόμενος/o opíso mu erhómenos, “the [one] coming after me,” whom John emphasizes is far, far greater than he. The “one coming after me” is a prophet too—and substantially more.

The Old Testament imagery.

Next, the weirdness. John was Levite, like his parents, but whereas Levites customarily tried to stay ritually clean all the time so they could perform priestly duties wherever they were situated, John wore camelhair. Mk 1.6

Camels are ritually unclean animals. Lv 11.4 Can’t eat ’em. Can own them, ride them, raise herds of ’em, and base your wealth on them, but after you rode them to your destination, you needed to baptize yourself and wait till sundown before you could go to synagogue or temple. Wearing clothes made from their hair was fine for everyday attire, but a legalistic Israeli would strongly object to you wearing it to worship.

There are two kinds of camelhair. There’s the guard hair, the scruffy stuff we’re used to seeing on the outside of a camel, which is stiff and coarse and inflexible. Makes good tents and carpets. Then there’s the undercoat fur, which we still use for clothing; it’s soft and makes really good insulation. John obviously wore clothes made of the undercoat. Unfortunately preachers find out people sometimes used the guard hair to make hairshirts, a deliberately abrasive article of clothing meant to make one suffer, either because they were in mourning and wanted to be miserable, or because they felt they should suffer for their sins. So they presume John was wearing camelhair as a type of sackcloth—and not as a comfortable fabric which’d keep him warm at night.

But why would John be in mourning? Why would he feel he needed to suffer for his own sins? Why would he feel the need to wear clothes which made his skin itchy and scratched and raw? And some of the interpreters have some pretty messed-up ideas about why John might feel that way… and none of them sound consistent with John’s mission. Makes more sense that he’d wear clothes made of proper camelhair yarn.

Ancient Israelis wore fabric as a belt round their waists, not to hold their pants up (they didn’t wear pants yet), but as pockets. They stuck tools or food or silver in them. John’s wasn’t fabric but leather; an uncommon thing to make a belt of because it wasn’t as flexible as fabric, but if you’re not carrying much it won’t matter. Plus it was reminiscent of the prophet Elijah of Tishbe, who was also known for wearing a leather belt. 2Ki 1.8

Since John lived in the wilderness, this meant he didn’t come near enough to civilization to get food from the Levite storehouse, or glean anything. He had to hunt and gather, and John didn’t want to spend any time on that, so he chose to live off insects. Locusts are kosher, Lv 11.22 and a decent source of protein. Undomesticated honey means it definitely wasn’t the more common date syrup the Israelis called honey; it was made by actual bees. It’s also likely people brought John food when they came to him, in gratitude or devotion, but John’s reliable, regular source of food came from bugs.

Since John is the second coming of Elijah, this appearance Mark describes would definitely have given people Elijah vibes. Here’s this wild man dressed in camelhair and a leather belt, saying you gotta show your repentance by getting clean, saying someone mightier than him is coming. Israelis who’d grown up with Pharisee interpretations of the End Times would think, “Is this Elijah? This sounds like Elijah. Is Messiah this ‘mightier one’ he’s talking about?” and would go to the Jordan to see for themselves… and end up repenting, and getting baptized.

And this is how John did prepare the way of the Lord.