Mark 1.21-22,
Matthew 7.28-29.
Luke 4.31-32.
As Jesus wrapped up his Sermon on the Mount, Matthew includes a comment about the way he taught his lessons, and the way his listeners reacted to it:
- Matthew 7.28-29 KWL
- 28 It happens when Jesus finishes these lessons,
- the masses are amazed at his teaching:
- 29 His teaching isn’t like their scribes,
- but like one who has authority.
It’s much the same way Mark and Luke described it when Jesus first began teaching in synagogue. Even walking-around rabbis like Jesus would teach in synagogue: They’d teach their kids on weekdays, and the general population on Sabbath—meaning Friday night after sundown. (Jewish days go from sundown to sundown, not midnight to midnight.)
Pharisee custom was for the synagogue president to let anyone anyone he recognized as a valid teacher, have the floor. Visiting rabbis and scribes, new guys, or young teachers spoke first. This wasn’t necessarily to honor them. If any of ’em turned out to be wrong, as sometimes they did, the last teacher—usually the synagogue’s senior scribe—would correct them, and get the last word. Synagogues were schools, Pharisees liked to debate, and sometimes they’d spend all night debating. Good thing it was Sabbath; in the morning everyone could sleep in.
Anyway, debates kept synagogue really interesting. But if the synagogue president (and later the Christian ἐπίσκοπος/epískopos, “supervisor”) couldn’t keep order, or when people lack the Spirit’s fruit, it could also become chaos. Some people don’t know how to be civil, and deliberately pick fights, or make personal attacks. Some will nitpick stupid things, defend loopholes, and spread misinformation. The evening could become an unprofitable waste. Happened among the early Christians too. Tt 3.9-11 Which is discouraging.
Into the belly of this beast, Jesus went to teach about God’s kingdom. Mark says this happened after he collected his first students from their boats; Luke puts this story before he collected ’em. Either way.
- Mark 1.21-22 KWL
- 21 Jesus and his students enter Capharnaum.
- Next, on entering synagogue on Sabbath, Jesus is teaching—
- 22 and people are being amazed at Jesus’s teaching.
- For in his teaching, Jesus acts like one who has authority,
- and not like the scribes.
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- Luke 4.31-32 KWL
- 31 Jesus comes down to Capharnaum, a city in the Galilee.
- He’s teaching the citizens on Sabbath.
- 32 People are being amazed at Jesus’s teaching—
- because his word is given with authority.
