This coming Sunday is the 10th Sunday in Ordinary Time. In yesterday’s post we considered the reaction of those close to him (hoi par’ autou) – presumably his family. They think “He is out of his mind.” What the Scribes, representing the Jerusalem authorities, think is clear: “He is possessed by Beelzebul,” and “By the prince of demons he drives out demons.” (v.22)

The earlier conviction that he is “out of his mind” finds a more serious charge in v.22 that is repeated in v.30: “He has an unclean spirit.” William Lane (The Gospel of Mark) offers: “The arrival of a delegation of legal specialists from Jerusalem suggests that the Galilean mission of Jesus had attracted the critical attention of the Sanhedrin. The scribes know that Jesus has a considerable following and that he possesses the power to expel demons. It is possible that they were official emissaries from the Great Sanhedrin who came to examine Jesus’ miracles and to determine whether Capernaum should be declared a ‘seduced city,’ the prey of an apostate preacher. Such a declaration required a thorough investigation made on the spot by official envoys in order to determine the extent of the defection and to distinguish between the instigators, the apostates and the innocent.”

The Scribes levied two charges: (1) Jesus is possessed by a demon [v.22,30] and (2) he is in league with the “prince of demons.” Each quite serious charges and not just as a means to discredit Jesus, but as a means to formally charge him with blasphemy.

Lane notes that the word/name “Beelzebul” occurs in no Jewish writing, which leads scholars to wonder if the name is a passing colloquialism for a local Galilean demon-prince or more broadly Satan (which modern readers equate with “the devil”.) Alone or together, their accusations categorize Jesus’ work as unlawful, and classify him as a sorcerer or magician, a charge of growing concern in first century Jewish writing. But however wrong-headed, their pronouncement, that Jesus is a satanic agent and not a divine one, recognizes power at work in him.

Image credit: “Mocking of Christ” by Ciambue | 1280 |Louvre, Paris | PD-US