Foundations 85

The new Affinity Theological Magazine Foundations is out. It is an online mag these days. I have an article in it on A red letter day in Bourton on the Water in August 1765.

See here.

New Edition of Foundations Out

The latest edition of Foundations the journal of Affinity is out, Number 81. The bulk of it is taken up with the papers given at the theological conference earlier this year on eschatology. Among the reviews I have two - on The History of Christianity in Britain and Ireland: From the First Century to the Twenty-First by Gerald Bray and John Piper on Providence. The journal can be found here.

The Piper review begins

Piper has now produced over fifty books. Like the others, this latest one is careful and exact, fresh in tone, homiletic in style and eager to present biblical truth. It contains some few recycled older pieces but this is primarily fresh material, even where the themes are familiar. It is, may we suggest, his “Hamlet”.

It is in three parts. Part 1 seeks to define the subject. Typically, Piper makes use of traditional material such as the Westminster Confession but seeks a new spin, here including the idea of our enjoying God. He also tackles the push back that such high views of God’s sovereignty can tend to provoke.

Part 2 looks at the ultimate goal of providence. In three sections, it goes back first to creation and even before that, then looks at the history of Israel from Abraham to the return from the exile. A third section introduces the new covenant.

It is not until Part 3 and the nature and extent of providence that we begin to touch on more expected themes such as earthquakes, the 2004 tsunami and the testimony of Nate Saint and Elizabeth Elliot (379). This final part has nine sections and is very practical. The topics are nature, Satan and demons, kings and nations, life and death, conversion and sanctification, ending with the triumph of Christ and his return. This part of the book is full of helpful statements on living the Christian life in the light of God’s sovereign providence. ...

Book Reviews in Foundations and Banner

My reviews of Dominion and a book on Fuller's ordination sermons can be found here and here. This review also occurs in the current Banner (Do get your copy of the magazine).

Glory to the Three Eternal: Tercentennial Essays on the Life and Writings of Benjamin Beddome (1718-1795) (Monographs in Baptist History, Volume 13)
Michael A. G. Haykin, Roy M. Paul and Jeongmo Yoo (eds.)
Pickwick Publications, 2019
182pp., paperback, £21.00 / $25.00

In the eighteenth century several hundred people were attracted to the Cotswold village of Bourton from the surrounding countryside to hear the faithful preaching of Benjamin Beddome. He was the Baptist pastor in the village for fifty-five years until his death in 1795. Early on in his ministry in 1741 there was a spiritual awakening. By 1766 over two hundred had been baptised and added to

the church.

Beddome was a faithful man who stood firmly in the Puritan and Particular Baptist tradition established by his forefathers. Gary Brady says of him, ‘while never a giant of Particular Baptist history he was certainly a shining light.’ This slim volume containing six essays by six different authors will go a long way toward remedying his relative obscurity. They form the first critical study of Beddome’s writings.

Following a biographical sketch, we have three essays that deal with his convictions regarding the Trinity, the person and work of Christ, and the Holy Spirit. the remaining two essays focus on his hymns and his answers to ‘the Modern Question’ (concerning the free offer of the gospel and whether it is the duty of sinners to repent and believe). It is clear that Beddome was no hyper-Calvinist. There is some repetition in these essays, mostly of a biographical nature - almost inevitable when there are six different authors. Beddome is best remembered today for his hymns, used widely by contemporaries, but not published in their entirety until over twenty years after his death. One of his best known hymns runs:

God in the gospel of his Son,

Makes his eternal counsels known;

’Tis here his richest mercy shines,

And truth is drawn in fairest lines.

Another of his legacies is A Scriptural Catechism (reprinted in 2006). Beddome had been a student in Bristol Baptist Academy, and the use of his catechism there helped the Academy to maintain its Calvinistic theology during the eighteenth century and the first decades of the nineteenth century.

This volume has been a long time coming, but I hope that readers will conclude that it was worth the wait. It deserves a wide readership and is warmly commended.

AUSTIN WALKER
(See link here)

A helpful book reviewed - Can we trust the Gospels?

I have recently reviewed two books in Foundations 76 now available here.

Here is the first

Can we trust the Gospels?

Peter J Williams, Crossway, 2018, 160pp, £6.35 (Amazon) / £6.03 (Kindle)

Dr Peter Williams is the Principal of Tyndale House, Cambridge, which describes itself as a research institute “housing one of the world’s most advanced libraries for biblical scholarship”. As a leading centre for biblical scholarship, its in-house academic programmes facilitate the research of the history, language and context of the Bible.

This new publication seeks to look at evidence for the trustworthiness of the biblical Gospels. It is deceptively brief and punches well above its weight. In short compass Dr Williams tackles some eight questions of an apologetic nature. He is brief but wide-ranging.

The opening chapter looks at three writers outside the Bible, namely Tacitus, Pliny and Josephus. This chapter not only serves to show that these sources do not necessarily contradict anything in Scripture but sets the tone for the rest of the book – a serious, historical approach that is neverthless accessible to the layman who truly wants to get at the truth about these much-discussed matters.

We then move on to a brief introduction to the four biblical Gospels, followed by a chapter headed “Did the Gospel writers know their stuff?” This fascinating chapter pursues lines of argument that were previously unfamiliar to me and maybe to you. It helpfully highlights the way the geographical references and the nomenclature that we find in the Gospels strongly suggest that these people are reporting real events, events that they knew plenty about rather than some invented world of their own devising, as is sometimes suggested. Similar points are made more briefly with regard to finance, language and customs.

Chapter 4 is on the subject of “undesigned coincidences”, a rather forgotten line of argument pioneered by John James Blunt in the 19th Century and that has been revived in more recent years by Lydia McGrew in her 2018 book Hidden in plain view. Williams takes up the cudgels here, giving just four examples of coincidences in the Gospels that must surely be there because the authors are writing of what is true rather than because of some sort of conspiracy they have devised.

Next comes a useful discussion of why we can be sure that the Gospel writers give accurate – if not verbatim – reports of what Jesus said, and then a brief survey of textual criticism and a reassurance that the text we have in our Bibles is a text that can be trusted.

Chapter 7 is another fascinating chapter that deals with the question of whether there are contradictions in the Gospels. Counter-intuitively, this is approached by pointing out six places where John’s Gospel deliberately contains apparent contradictions. Yes, there are apparent contradictions but none that cannot be reasonably explained.

The final chapter, “Who would make all this up?”, touching on miracles and the resurrection, boldly argues for the reasonable supposition that all of history hangs on Jesus.

This attractively produced paperback from Crossway is enhanced by a general and a scriptural index at the end of the book. Can we trust the Gospels? Yes, we can. We recommend this little stick of dynamite to pastors and church members alike. As the blurb suggests, “Everyone from the sceptic to the scholar will find powerful arguments in favour of trusting the Gospels as trustworthy accounts of Jesus’ earthly life.”

Gary Brady Pastor, Childs Hill Baptist Church, London

The dizzy heights

Elvis, Madonna, Beyonce, Oprah, Bono. Some celebrities become so famous that one name is enough. It even happens among ministers. I noticed at the Banner Conference this year people simply said Sinclair there was no need to add more. Well, surprisingly, I discover that I too have reached that dizzy height if the latest edition of Foundations (74) is to be believed. See here.

Foundations 72

The new edition of the theological journal Foundations is now availabe online. See here. It contains five articles (mostly on the theme of church planting) adn 10 bokk revviews including this one by yours truly.

I shall not die, but live: facing death with gospel hope

Douglas Taylor, Banner of Truth, 2017, HB, 360pp, £13.00

We live in the age of the blog (or weblog). A popular form of website, all sorts of things, good and bad, get blogged on the worldwide web. When Douglas Taylor was told in 2011 that he had incurable cancer he began a blog. You can still access it today (http://worksworthdeclaring.blogspot.co.uk).

Douglas worked as an assistant editor for the Banner of Truth Trust from 1997 until 2011. Following his death in June 2014 his Banner colleagues felt it worth disseminating Douglas’s blogs in printed form and so have assembled a large number of them (about 250) with a brief foreword by Walter Chantry and a short autobiographical entry penned by Douglas himself in 2013.

This beautifully-produced hardback book would make an excellent present for any Christian, especially one facing something similar to the author. Each entry has a heading and date and is somewhere between 300 and 600 words. It is especially useful for someone unable to read for long.

You may get the flavour from these quotes. One entry begins with a reference to the “Diary of Kenneth MacRae”:

Mr MacRae is described, during his last illness, as dreading the night, with its sleeplessness and loneliness. “Oh, the night, the night”, he said wearily on one occasion. His wife Cathie tried to comfort him: “There are songs for the night, too, my dear. He will compass you about with songs of deliverance”. I can very much identify with this. During sleepless periods lately, I have dreaded the night too. I think Mrs MacRae must have had in mind such scriptures as Psalm 42:8: “In the night his song shall be with me.” Or perhaps Psalm 77:6, or Job 35:10…

He goes on to recommend songs of gratitude, confidence and praise for salvation for those in such a position.

Elsewhere he writes,

It would be interesting to know when the expression, “the intermediate state”, was introduced, and by whom. It certainly seems inadequate to express the ideas of paradise (Luke 23:43), of being with Christ, which is far better (Philippians 1:23), of being absent from the body and present [or, “at home”] with the Lord (2 Corinthians 5:6), or of being received to glory (Psalm 73:25). Not to mention the very clear testimony of Calvin, of the Reformed confessions and the Shorter Catechism, and of some of the best Reformed writers, like Rutherford and Boston, which are far removed from the concept we are considering.

Gary Brady
Pastor, Childs Hill Baptist Church, London

Foundations Book Review

The new edition of Affinity's Foundations is available here. It  includes a book review I have done on Colin Hamer's book on Marital Imagery in the Bible. See here.

Marital Imagery in the Bible

Colin Hamer,

Apostolos Old Testament Studies, 2016, 258pp, £19.99

If you want to do your bit towards undermining Christian unity then simply try to get a discussion going among fellow pastors and other believers on the subject of marriage, divorce and remarriage. It is sometimes surprising to see what a range of, often trenchantly held, views exist, even among those who may appear to be on exactly the same page otherwise. We need all the help we can get in this area.

Colin Hamer has already produced popular books on being a husband and on divorce (he has also written short biographies of Thomas Cranmer and Anne Boleyn whose stories very much touch on this area). This present title, which seeks to explore Genesis 2:24 and its significance for the understanding of New Testament divorce and remarriage teaching, is Dr Hamer’s 2015 Ph.D. thesis awarded by the University of Chester. It therefore contains much that would probably be omitted from a more popular volume – most of the 771 footnotes, for example, and the constant quoting of other scholars, the discussions of methodology and most of the extra-biblical material essential in any rigorous study of the subject.

Having said that, this is a beautifully produced book written in very clear English, with regular summary statements and set out in meticulously numbered sections that enable the reader to know exactly where he is going, enabling him both to keep up and to find the material later on with ease.

The first three chapters are introductory and deal with “cross-domain mapping”, with previous material on the same subject and the methodology used in looking at the Scriptures quoted. The other chapters take a generally chronological direction. First, we have a background chapter on betrothal, marriage, divorce, adultery and remarriage in the Ancient Near East (the laws of Hammurabi, from Ur and the Nuzi archive, etc). Chapters 7 and 8 are two short excursions into the literature of the Second Temple period (Pseudepigrapha, Apocrypha, Qumran documents, Rabbinic writings, Philo and Josephus, Judean desert documents and Graeco-Roman documents). Chapters 5 and 6 look at the Old Testament material and Chapters 9 and 10 look at the New Testament material.

The basic argument of the book concerns Genesis 2:24: “Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” Whereas Genesis 2:23 (“Then the man said, ‘This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.’”) speaks of a miraculous couple in a literal one-flesh union formed, not voluntarily or on a covenantal basis, but by God, Genesis 2:24 restates what the marriage union is to be using a metaphor. In this case a naturally born couple, by means of a covenant, voluntarily choose to be formed into what they were not before, a (metaphorical) one-flesh family union. The argument is that whereas many have taken Genesis 2:23 as the model of marriage or conflated the two verses, it should rather be Genesis 2:24 that is our model. That is the way earthly marriage should be understood and the way both that the Old Testament understands the covenant relationship between the LORD and Israel and the New Testament understands the covenant relationship between Christ and his church. In the technical jargon of the book, which he carefully and helpfully explains throughout, Genesis 2:24 “is the source domain which is cross-mapped to the target domain (God ‘married’ to his people) in the marital imagery of both the Jewish and Christian Scriptures.”

The book contains several helpful diagrams or maps found in the text and in an appendix. The two most interesting are the ones that show consequent Old and New Testament analogies from the biblical understanding of marriage. First, we have five consequent Old Testament analogies, namely marital obligations for God, adultery forbidden, divorce certificate required, remarriage to God forbidden but a future betrothal followed by remarriage promised (see Ps 132:13-16; Ez 23:1-9; Jer 3:6-8 [twice over]; and Hos 2:19, 20; Is 54:4-8). The references to a new covenant in Jeremiah 31 are also brought in here. Secondly, we have nine consequent New Testament analogies, namely betrothal, wedding feast, invitations, Jesus prepares a place for the church, he pays the mohar (purchase price for a wife) for the church, Christ cares for the church, the church waits for Jesus, Jesus comes for the church, Jesus takes the church to his own home (see 2 Cor 11:2; Mat 22:1-14; Jn 4:5-29; 1 Cor 6:1, 20; Eph 5:22-29; 2 Tim 2:10-13; Mat 25:1-13; Rev 21:1-4).

The book argues that it is on this basis that we should understand the concepts of marriage, divorce and remarriage. Hamer argues that the New Testament affirms his thesis that the pattern for earthly marriage is to be found in Genesis 2:24 but scholars and the churches alike down the years have conflated Genesis 2:24 marriage with that of Adam and Eve as described in the previous verse so teaching that earthly marriage is to be modelled on the first couple. This leads to the restrictive views on divorce and remarriage that we all know about and perhaps hold. He blames the confusion on the influence of Neoplatonism and of Augustine. Hamer argues that the New Testament writers would not employ an imagery when speaking of Christ and his church that they then repudiated when it came to earthly marriages.

The bottom line, then, is a more liberal view of divorce and remarriage than many are comfortable with: “A divorce can be legitimately initiated by either spouse when the other fails to fulfil their own specific covenantal responsibilities”. However, the case is very thoroughly and carefully argued and does raise the higher and ultimately more important question of the nature of the relationship between God and his people.

Even if one does not accept every argument or piece of exegesis employed or even the thesis itself (and some may well not), this is nevertheless an erudite, well thought-out and tenable approach that yields many insights along the way. This reviewer found references such as that to the Exodus in terms of divorce and remarriage and the briefer allusions to how we understand the minor prophets (a set of books that begins in Hosea with marriage and divorce and that ends in Malachi with a reference to divorce) and the opening chapters of John (where there is not only a wedding in Cana but also a meeting at a well) most stimulating and thought-provoking. His understanding of God divorcing his people, as in Isaiah and elsewhere, was also very well handled.

In his conclusion he has a series of observations that, if all correct, might transform the way we read Scripture. The pattern in the Old Testament is marriage (in Eden), divorce (expulsion from Eden), remarriage (to Satan), divorce (from the gods of Egypt), remarriage (at Sinai), divorce (the Assyrian exile thought not the Babylonian). In the New Testament he sees a marriage proposal in John 4, divorce from Satan at the cross, divorce from the “Israel cult” in 70 AD and a glorious remarriage at the eschaton.

This book has undoubtedly made great strides in analysing and presenting a biblical understanding of these matters. It will not convince every reader but it is no surprise to read Craig L Blomberg’s appraisal of it as “The best and most thorough treatment of this topic now available…”. Hamer acknowledges that no attempt is made to deal with any of the pastoral issues that arise from his view and certainly there is room for lengthy discussion on those. This is certainly a book that anyone with an interest in this matter can and ought to read and ponder. We are grateful to the publishers for having decided to publish and promote it

Gary Brady Pastor, Childs Hill Baptist Church, London

Foundations Archive

You may be interested to know that the archive of the theological journal Foundations is now up on the Affinity website. See here. Would it be wrong to point out that I have six articles in these pages?

See

26 Exegesis The barren fig tree 

30 Infant salvation

34 What is the conscience?

36 A candle in the wind (more on conscience)

51/52 Shakespeare of the Puritans - aspects of piety in the preaching of Thomas Adams, Part 1/2

New Foundations Journal

We note that issue 61 of the Affinity journal Foundations is now out. See here.  It features the substance of Dan Strange’s paper at the Affinity Theological Studies Conference in February 2011. John Legg provides a provocative exegesis of the parable of The Good Samaritan. Thorsten Prill identifies key issues in world mission today and challenges churches, missions and missionaries to be caught up in a missionary movement with God. Ralph Cunnington provides a critique of the views of Francis Turretin on the authority of Scripture. Eryl Davies provides a detailed review of a number of recent books dealing with the doctrine of the Trinity. There are also a number of other book reviews.

The new edior is Ralph Cunnington, a fresh faced young man with a previous background in law and with a keen theological mind. We wish Ralph every blessing in this new venture and in his work as assistant minister in Aigburth.

Foundations online

Those who have not yet seen will be interested to know that the Affinity journal Foundations is now available online. See here. This edition contains the papers given at the last Affinity conference and rather inadequately reported here at the time.

I remember getting my first copies of Foundations personally from the then editor Eryl Davies. It was made up of sheets of paper bound with a plastic clip along the spine. I was a student in Aberystwyth at the time. Things move on.

Glad to commend it (except the cover which seems to me out of keeping with the name of the journal though it looks very nice! ;-)).

Archive 10b Barren Fig Tree

Last part of the article

In order to do true justice to the passage one has to accept the following three propositions:
1. It was not possible for edible fruit to be on the tree regardless of how much foliage it had put forth
There are two crops for the fig tree, one early and one late. The first is in May or June and the second is in August or later still (consensus of the commentaries and dictionaries consulted). The incident occurs, of course, in April or even March, when, as Mark points out, ‘it was not the season for figs’. It was too soon for the early crop to be ready and too late for anything edible to he remaining from the previous year. ‘There was then no reason to expect fruit upon this tree beyond the promise of its leaves’ (H B Swete, Greek Testament with notes and indices Gospel according to Mark, 1902, 254)
2. Jesus knew that this was the case
Kenneth Wuest suggests that Jesus 'at least hoped to find figs on the tree' and stresses the 'self-imposed human limitations' of the incarnation, while warning against any denial of Christ's basic omniscience. (West, Word Studies Mark, 1950, 219). However, here common sense, a knowledge of his own land, would have been enough to convince Jesus that, regardless of appearances, there could be no fruit on the tree. Gould says ara is illiative here (ie denoting motion into) (Ezra Gould, ICC St Mark's Gospel, 1896, 211) and R Alan Cole states ‘The Greek particle ara suggests that the finding of figs was an unlikely possibility contemplated by the Lord; he was thus in no sense surprised the tree's unfruitfulness as he would have been had it been the time of the regular fruit crop.' (R Alan Cole, Tyndale NTC Mark, 1971, 177).
3. Jesus’ hunger was nevertheless real
J A Alexander fulminates, ‘That this was a simulated hunger, is not only unworthy and irreverent but a perfectly gratuitous assumption as our Lord, by his incarnation, shared in all the innocent infirmities of human nature’ (Alexander, Mark, 1858, reprint 1960, 303). This is where the Lord’s humanity appears, in his hunger not in his supposed ignorance.
An important Scripture for unravelling the remaining difficulties is one apparently ignored by everyone except Calvin. (Harmony of the synoptics Vol 3, Baker ed, 18). That is John 4:31-34. On that occasion Jesus dealt with his hunger by doing the work of God. It is the same here.
After spending the night in Bethany Jesus and his disciples set off for Jerusalem early in the morning. Had he skipped breakfast as Henry suggests? (Commentary Vol 5, MacDonald ed, 526). Being an area rich in figs, dates and olives it was reasonable for him to think of getting something on the way.
Jesus them looks up and sees a leafy fig tree in the distance, ‘a derelict perhaps of some old garden or vineyard’. Perhaps it was in some sheltered hollow and so was more leafy, more precocious (Alford's word in his Greek Testament Vol 1, 1849, 275). Jesus is aware, however, that it is not the season for figs. Immediately, his mind is turned from the natural to the spiritual. A number of Scriptures may have come to mind. Micah 7:1, 2 seems the most likely suggestion.

(Cf Lane, 401, 402. Following Bird he argues that the final clause of v 13 should translate 'and the significant thing about this is that it was not the season for figs'. Such passages come where 'Jesus alludes to the Scriptures without explicitly quoting them.')
What misery is mine!

I am like one who gathers summer fruit

at the gleaning of the vineyard;

there is no cluster of grapes to eat,

none of the early figs that I crave.
The godly have been swept from the land;

not one upright man remains.

All men lie in wait to shed blood;

each hunts his brother with a net.
Christ weeping over Jerusalem is vividly brought to mind (Mt 23:37; Lk 13:13:34). Seeing the beautiful foliage and knowing it all means nothing reminds him of the judgement about to fall on his own people. Cranfield is one of many commentators who notice the careful way Mark has woven the clearing of the Temple into the narrative, 'The best commentary on vv 12-14 and 20f is found in the narrative these verse enframe' (Cranfield, 357).
Many other Old Testament references identify God's people with the fig tree (see list, Lane, 400). Hosea 9, and especially verses 10 and 16, echoes the sentiments found here. Israel was not short of 'foliage' – the Temple and it spiritual, outward and legalistic acts of virtue, a form of godliness. But what was lacking was actual fruit, the fruit of righteousness. Like the fig tree they were 'louder than all the rest in profession, yet behind in performance' (Glover, 208). This was the very thing that John the Baptist had warned about (Mt 3:7-10) and that Jesus too had spoken of (Mk 7:6). Israel's sin was not just the sin of barrenness but of barrenness with the appearance of fruitfulness.

The warning of the enacted parable, for such it was, is still needed today. J C Ryle, in his Expository Thoughts on the Gospels applies it admirably (Mark, 1856, reprint 1973, 234)
There was a voice in it for the JEWISH CHURCH. Rich in the leaves of a formal religion, but barren of all fruits of the Spirit, that Church was in fearful danger, at the very time when this withering took place. Well would it have been for the Jewish Church if it had had eyes to see its peril!
There was a voice in the fig tree for all the branches of Christ's VISIBLE CHURCH in every age, and every part of the world. There was a warning against an empty profession of Christianity unaccompanied by sound doctrine and holy living, which some of those branches would have done well to lay to heart.
But above all there was a voice in that withered fig tree for all CARNAL, HYPOCRITICAL, AND FALSE-HEARTED CHRISTIANS. Well would it be for all who are content with a name to live while in reality they are dead, if they would only see their own faces in the glass of this passage.
Let us take care that we each individually learn the lesson that this fig tree conveys. Let us always remember, that baptism, and church-membership, and reception of the Lord's Supper, and a diligent use of the outward forms of Christianity, are not sufficient to save our souls. They are leaves, nothing but leaves, and without fruit will add to our condemnation. Like the fig leaves of which Adam and Eve made themselves garments, they will not hide the nakedness of our souls from the eye of an all-seeing God, or give us boldness when we stand before Him at the last day. No! we must bear fruit, or be lost forever. There must be fruit in our hearts and fruit in our lives, the fruit of repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ, and true holiness in our conversation. Without such fruits as these a profession of Christianity will only sink us lower into hell.

Archive 10a Barren Fig Tree

It's an age since we've had anything from the archive. In 1991 an article of mine appeared in Foundations (Issue 26) in their exegesis series. It looks at Mark 11:12-14. It had 29 footnotes. I have incorporated these into the text.

The one thing that all the commentators do agree about regarding Mark 11:12-14 is that it is difficult. ‘This narrative bristles with difficulties’, says Cranfield. (Cambridge NT Commentary St Mark 1972, 354) ‘One of the most perplexing in the Gospels’, wrote A M Hunter. (Torch Bible Commentary St Mark, 1949, 110)
For many exegetes problems arise from their approach to Scripture. For Hunter and others like him the story is ‘frankly incredible’. (Hunter, 110) They have two main problems the incident. They find it both 'irrational and revolting' (Bundy, quoted in Nineham, Pelican Commentary St Mark, 1963, 225). Revolting, because the story ‘does not ring true’ (Barclay, Daily Study Bible mark's Gospel, 1975, 314) with their ideas on Jesus’ character. William Barclay speaks of his ‘petulance’ and J B Phillips of Jesus ‘venting his feeling of frustration and despair upon the fig tree.‘ (Peter's portrait of Jesus, 1976, 104). But there is need neither to accuse Jesus of sin nor to see the story as a legendary concretising’ of Luke 13:6-9 for aetiological purposes. (Cf A W Blunt, Clarendon Bible St Mark, 1939, 226 & Hugh Anderson, New Century Bible Commentary, 263f). As Bengel asserts ‘Whatever does not serve Jesus Christ is unworthy to serve any one of mortals.’ (Gnomon Vol 1, 553).
Then there is verse 13 which, for some, makes Jesus’ behaviour irrational. Certainly there is a problem. ‘The juxtaposition of the two seemingly contradicting assertions heightens the difficulties, for the explicit statement that it was not the season for figs appears to make Jesus’ action arbitrary and meaningless’ (William Lane, NICNT Gospel of Mark, 1974, 399). Of course, some are willing to cut the Gordian knot and remove verse 13, even though it is typical of Mark’s asides. (Cf eg 3:30; 5:42; 7:3,4, etc). Surely the better path is to take comfort in the belief the problem is one ‘which evidently the Evangelist did not feel as he deliberately makes it for us.’ (Richard Glover, A Teacher's Commentary on the Gospel of St Mark, 1957, 208). But what is the solution to this apparent difficulty?
A number of evangelical commentators want to find the solution in the possibility of very late or very early figs. (Eg Barnes, Bengel, Cole, Hendriksen, Ryle and Swift in the New Bible Commentary Revised). However, the idea that Jesus would not have looked for figs without some hope of there being any ‘assumes too much’. Vincent Taylor is scathing about such a line of argument and says it has ‘nothing to commend it’. (Gospel according to Mark, 1952, 458). Bengel’s idea that Jesus may have been looking for inedible figs to miraculously transform is fanciful and bizarre (Bengel, 553).