This coming Sunday is the 10th Sunday in Ordinary Time. Jesus is in the midst of his first public ministry in Galilee. The news of his miracles has spread. When his relatives heard of this they set out to seize him, for they said, “He is out of his mind.” This is the only place in the gospels that provides this pericope. It is not clear whether Jesus’s family is involved at all. The Greek phrase, hoi par’ autou, is not very specific. The literal meaning is “those who are close to him, alongside him, beside him.” Certainly the text of v.32 referring to “mothers and brothers” would naturally lead one to the inference that v.21 should be translated as “family”, but many English translations follow the 1611 King James Version and translate this expression as “his friends” instead. Continue reading →