What Jesus had to say about John the baptist.

Matthew 11.7-15, Luke 7.24-30.

After John sent two of his students to ask Jesus who he was, Jesus turned to his crowd of listeners and began to say complimentary things about John. (Which is further evidence John wasn’t going through some crisis of faith about who Jesus was, contrary to popular belief.)

Various “historical Jesus” scholars like to pit John and Jesus against one another ’cause their ministry styles were so different, and like to exaggerate their different emphases into full-on contradictions of one another. John was supposedly about wrath and perfectionism; Jesus about grace and peace. Ignoring of course all Jesus’s instructions to behave ourselves, and warnings about wrath; ignoring John’s declaration that Jesus came to take away the world’s sin. Jn 1.29 For “historians,” they sure do skip a lot of history in order to push their theories, but I already ranted about that.

First thing Jesus brought up is what people expected to see when they first heard about John and wanted to check him out. Starting with two things they clearly didn’t expect to see, because John’s reputation was that of an Elijah-style hairy thunderer. Mk 1.6

Matthew 11.7-8 KWL 7 As these students were going, Jesus began to tell the crowd about John the baptist. “What did you go to the wilds to see? A wind-shaken reed? 8 What did you see instead? A person dressed in finery? Look, those who wear finery are in kings’ houses.”

Luke 7.24-25 KWL 24 As John’s messengers went away, Jesus began to talk with the crowd about John the baptist. “What did you go to the wilds to see? A wind-shaken reed? 25 What did you see instead? A person dressed in fancy clothes? Look at the glorious clothes and luxury which is in the king’s palace.”

Certain commentators wanna claim these statements were kind of a knock on the Galilee’s governor, King Antipas Herod, who had imprisoned John at this time. Lk 3.19-20, Mt 11.2 The idea is Herod, as a politician, was the sort of guy who would sway like a papyrus reed in the breeze, and say or do anything to convince the Caesars to leave him in power. And of course he wore fancy clothing, as nobles do.

I don’t know that these statements were necessarily made about Herod. I suspect they’re more about wannabe prophets.

Because it’s precisely the sort of behavior we see in wannabe prophets nowadays. And human nature hasn’t changed any in the past 20 centuries: If somebody was a self-described prophet, they wanted acknowledgement. Respect. Maybe a little bit of fear. After all, they heard from God. They lacked the humility we oughta see in a real prophet, who recognizes they’re just the servant of the Almighty and nothing more; whom God doesn’t always grant the sort of messages that’d make ’em popular. Fake prophets, on the other hand, don’t have enough experience with God to realize their proper place way under him. And they’ve no trouble adjusting their messages to suck up to their audiences, because God didn’t really give them anyway. That whole wind-shaken reed thing? Applies to phony prophets just as much as it does to phony leaders.

Essentially Jesus’s message was, “When you went to check out John, did you expect to find a fake? And that’s not what you found at all.”

John the baptist checks in on Jesus.

Matthew 11.2-6, Luke 7.18-23.

In Jesus’s day there was no such thing as freedom of speech or religion. Your religion was either what the king said it was, or what the king permitted within his borders. Your speech was whatever the powerful couldn’t take offense at, ’cause if they did, they would kill or persecute you. That’s why Jesus taught in metaphors and parables on a frequent basis. It wasn’t just to make people think.

His relative John bar Zechariah, also known as John the baptist, was not so vague. John flat-out said the governor of the Galilee, Antipas Herod (frequently called “king” because he was the son of King Herod 1, but properly a Roman tetrárhis/“ruler of a quarter-province”) was in violation of the Law, ’cause he had married his brother’s ex. Lv 18.16 Plus she was his niece, which generally violates the command against having sex with close relatives. Lv 18.6 Since John wouldn’t shut up about it, Mk 6.17-18 Antipas threw him into prison, and so much for his ministry. John never got out alive.

In both Matthew and Luke, John heard what Jesus was up to, and sent some of his own students to ask Jesus a question. In Matthew we find out why John couldn’t do this personally: It was by this point John was in prison.

Matthew 11.2-3 KWL 2 John the baptist, hearing in prison of Messiah’s works, sending some of his students, 3 told Jesus, “Are you the one to come, or do we look for another?”

Luke 7.18-19 KWL 18 John the baptist’s students informed him about all these things. Calling two particular students of his, John 19 sent them to the Master, saying, “Are you the one to come, or do we look for another?”

And this question really confuses Christians. Because we’ve read the other parts of the gospels, in which John was entirely sure Jesus is the one to come. So it’s a little confusing when John suddenly sends Jesus some students with the question, “So are you the one to come?”

Most of the time, Christians assume John had a massive crisis of faith. After all, he’d been tossed into prison, he was gonna die, and when you ponder your mortality like this, you start to rethink everything. Maybe John didn’t believe anymore. So, to make himself feel better, he send students to Jesus with the unspoken request, “Please tell me my life hasn’t been in vain. Please tell me you’re Messiah.”

I don’t care for this interpretation. Mostly because I think the interpreters are projecting their own doubts upon John. He had no such doubts.

Jesus interrupts a funeral.

Luke 7.11-17.

Whereas Jesus mighta raised the dead before—though he insisted she was only asleep—here it looks like he definitely raised the dead. Only Luke tells this story, and sets it the day after Jesus cured the centurion’s servant.

The location is Nein, which is not pronounced as the Germans do. (The KJV has “Nain.”) It was a tiny village 14km south of Nazareth—and 40km southwest of Kfar Nahum, which is quite a day’s walk; and Jesus must’ve got to this place before sundown, as we’ll see from historical context. As you might recall about Nazareth, people in the region didn’t expect much of Jesus, and certainly never expected him to do anything like this.

Luke 7.11-17 KWL

11 This happened the next day: Jesus went to a village called Nein.

His students, and a large crowd, were traveling with him.

12 As Jesus approached the village gate, look: One who died was being carried out.

He was the only son of his mother, and she was a widow. A large crowd was with her.

13 Seeing her, the Master felt compassion for her and told her, “Don’t cry.”

14 Walking over, Jesus touched the coffin and its carriers stopped.

He said, “Young man, I tell you get up.”

15 And the dead boy got up, and began to talk. Jesus gave him to his mother.

16 In fear, everyone praised God, saying this:

“A great prophet rose among us!” and “God visited his people!”

17 This word about Jesus spread in all Judea and all the region.

Skeptics like to point out this story is similar to pagan stories. Which stands to reason: Back then, people used to bury or cremate you when they thought you were dead. Or at least pretty sure you were dead… and yeah, sometimes if they really wanted you to be dead, and weren’t particular about how you weren’t quite dead yet. But more than once they buried or cremated someone alive. Every once in a while they dramatically discovered they were wrong—someone’d wake up from their coma on the funeral pyre, or after they were stuck in a sepulcher. Standard worst-nightmare stuff. And that’s where our urban legends come from… and of course our old myths.

Anyway the hero of more than one myth would check out the “corpse,” find out they were only mostly dead, and there’s your happy ending. Well, unless they died soon thereafter of whatever made ’em look dead.

For Pharisees it was a little more likely they’d inter someone prematurely: Their custom required them to put a body in the ground before sundown. It was based on God’s command to bury a hanging victim the same day, Dt 21.23 and if you gotta do it for a criminal, you should do it all the more for anyone else. So if it looked like someone had died, you didn’t always have a lot of time before you had to dispose of the body. Plenty of chance people would be mistaken.

But Luke said this boy was dead, so there was no mistake here. Jesus didn’t come across a boy who wasn’t really dead, so it only looked like a miracle. Jesus raised the dead. First time we know of that he did that.

The centurion’s servant—and his surprising faith.

Matthew 8.5-13, Luke 7.1-10.

Luke tells this story after Jesus’s sermon on the plain, and Matthew after his Sermon on the Mount—but curing an infectious man first. Mark doesn’t tell it. And John… tells a whole other story, although certain Christians try to sync it together with this one. But not well.

The story begins with Jesus again returning to his home base of Kfar Nahum, and in Matthew encountering the local centurion; in Luke hearing from local elders about this centurion. Y’might know a centurion was what the Romans called the captain in charge of a century, 100 soldiers. I don’t know whether all 100 were stationed in Kfar Nahum, or spread out over multiple cities in the province; it all depended on how far the Romans felt they needed to clamp down on the people.

What we do know is this particular centurion had a home in town, and an employee who was either suffering greatly, or dying. Luke calls him a slave who was éntimos/“held in high regard.” Ancient slaves were either debtors, convicts, or had lost a war, and were bought and worked as punishment. Attitudes towards them are significantly different than American attitudes when slavery was legal here: Slaves were still considered fellow human beings. The centurion held his slave in high regard either because he was a good guy, a good worker, or had a valuable skillset. We don’t know which. Matthew calls him a servant, and maybe that’s how the Roman thought of him.

So the slave’s illness was enough to bring to the attention of a rabbi well-known for curing the sick.

Matthew 8.5-7 KWL

5 On returning himself to Kfar Nahum,

a centurion came to Jesus and encouraged him to help him,

6 saying, “Master, my servant has been bedridden in my home, paralyzed by terrible suffering.”

7 Jesus told him, “I will come cure him.”

 

Luke 7.1-6 KWL

1 When Jesus finished putting all his words in the people’s ears,

he returned to Kfar Nahum.

2 A certain centurion’s slave who had an illness was near dying.

The slave was highly esteemed by the centurion.

3 Hearing about Jesus, the centurion sent him Judean elders,

asking him, since he’d come, if he might cure his slave.

4 Those who came to Jesus encouraged him earnestly, saying this:

“The one for whom you’ll do this is worthy.

5 For he loves our people, and built us our synagogue.”

6A Jesus went with them.

In both cases Jesus had no problem with going to the centurion’s house to cure the slave. Now, compare our Lord’s attitude with that of Simon Peter, who admitted he still thought of gentiles as unclean when the centurion Cornelius called him to Caesarea. Ac 10.28 Jesus was happy to go; Peter had to first see a vision about butchering unclean animals. Ac 10.9-16 Why Peter hadn’t adopted his Master’s attitude about gentiles, I’m not sure. My guess is he had some very old prejudices, and they took a while to break off him. Paul still had to fight him on it, some 20 years later. Ga 2.11-14 But I digress.

Notice how Matthew describes the centurion and Jesus having a personal conversation, but Luke has the centurion send some of the presvytérus/“elders” to Jesus with a recommendation. These’d be the mature believers in the religious community, the Pharisees who probably founded their synagogue, ’cause synagogues are a Pharisee thing. They told Jesus this guy had built their synagogue—so we’re talking a believer who was willing to put his money into his faith. Worthy by their standards; maybe by Jesus’s too. In any event, off they went.

The ministry of John the baptist.

Mark 1.2-6, Matthew 3.1-6, Luke 3.1-6, John 1.6-8.

John 1.6-8 KWL

6 A person came who’d been sent by God, named John, 7 who came to testify.

When he testified about the light, everyone might believe because of him.

8 He wasn’t the light, but he’d testify about the light.

9 The actual light, who lights every person, was coming into the world.

Luke 3.1-3 KWL

1 In the 15th year of Tiberius Caesar’s governance, Pontius Pilatus governing Judea,

Antipas Herod as governor over the Galilee, Philip Herod his brother as governor over Ituría and Trachonítis provinces,

Lysanias as governor over Abiliní, 2 Annas and Joseph Kahiáfa as head priests,

God’s message came through John bar Zechariah, in the countryside.

3 He went into all the land round the Jordan,

preaching a baptism of repentance—to have one’s sins forgiven—

 

Mark 1.2-3 KWL

2 Like it’s written in the prophet Isaiah:

“Look, I send my agent to your face, who’ll prepare your road.” Ml 3.1

3 “A voice shouting out in the countryside:

‘Prepare the Lord’s road! Make him a straight path!’” Is 40.3

 

Matthew 3.1-3 KWL

1 In those days John the baptist appeared, preaching in the Judean countryside,

2 saying, “Repent! For heaven’s kingdom has come near.”

3 For this is the word through the prophet Isaiah. Quote:

“A voice shouting out in the countryside:

‘Prepare the Lord’s road! Make him a straight path!’” Is 40.3

 

Luke 3.4-6 KWL

4 like the prophet Isaiah’s sayings, written in the bible:

“A voice shouting out in the countryside:

‘Prepare the Lord’s road! Make him a straight path!’

5 All ravines will be filled; all roads and hills knocked down.

The crooked will be straightened; the rough into smooth roads.

6 All flesh will see God’s rescue.” Is 40.3-5

Jesus’s story begins with John bar Zachariah, “the baptist.” (As opposed to “the Baptist,” meaning someone from the Baptist movement, which takes its customs of believer-baptism and full immersion from John’s practice.)

John doesn’t come first just ’cause of the chronology—John was prophesied to his father before Jesus was to his mother; John was born before Jesus; John’s ministry began before Jesus’s. The chronology was kinda irrelevant, because as John himself pointed out, Jesus existed before he did. Jn 1.30 And as the gospel of John points out, the word of God, the light of the world: John came to testify about that light, and point people to him.

That was John’s job. He was Jesus’s opening act.

Yeah, Christians tend to call him Jesus’s forerunner. Which he kinda was. But a “forerunner” in antiquity was simply the guy who ran way in front of the caravan—whether a visiting lord or invading army—and announce they’re coming. Again, John kinda was that. But he didn’t just proclaim Messiah, or God’s kingdom, was coming. He got people ready for the coming, by getting ’em to repent, by washing them clean first.

Christians also tend to call him Jesus’s herald. He was kinda that too. But a herald came instead of the person whose message he brought. You know, like prophets tell us what God’s saying, instead of (or in addition to) God telling us what he’s saying. John wasn’t a substitute for the Messiah he preceded; he said his superior was coming right behind him, and he considered himself unworthy to take Messiah’s shoes off. Mk 1.7 But Jesus would soon speak for himself.

John’s ministry began, as Luke pins it down, in the year 28, when both he and Jesus (figuring they were born in 7BC or so) were about 34 years old. He’s described as being in the erímo/“countryside,” which the KJV and many translations render “wilderness”—but erímos means undeveloped, unfarmed land; places people didn’t live or work, and couldn’t drive John off as a nuisance. There, he announced the kingdom was coming—so people, get ready.