In the course of his teaching Jesus said to the crowds, “Beware of the scribes who like to go around in long robes and accept greetings in the marketplaces, seats of honor in synagogues, and places of honor at banquets. They devour the houses of widows and as a pretext recite lengthy prayers. They will receive a very severe condemnation.” He sat opposite the treasury and observed how the crowd put money into the treasury. Many rich people put in large sums. A poor widow also came and put in two small coins worth a few cents. Calling his disciples to himself, he said to them, ‘Amen, I say to you, this poor widow put in more than all the other contributors to the treasury. For they have all contributed from their surplus wealth, but she, from her poverty, has contributed all she had, her whole livelihood.” (Mark 12.38-44)
As we draw closer to the end of Mark’s gospel, we rightly might conclude that Rabbi Jesus is saving his last and most important teachings for this endpoint. If he offers nothing radically new at the end, surely he offers a summation, much like the conclusion to a book. That notion is proven correct as we study these six verses that we have today, a part of a larger whole of Jesus’ final thoughts as he stands in the Temple of Jerusalem.
Mark has made clear to us in the previous chapters that Jesus had an itinerary. He was on his way to Jerusalem, the capital city of Judah and the religious center of Judaism. The week that he spends in Jerusalem is his final week on earth. At the end of the week, he will be captured, crucified, and his corpse put in a tomb.
However, the start of the week is a busy one, beginning with his entry into the city, crowds gathering around him. And within a short while, he causes a ruckus in the Temple, chasing out the money changers and the commercial vendors, his actions drawing the attention and the condemnation of the religious leaders, that is the scribes, the elders, and the Pharisees who demand an answer from him, asking him by whose authority he has done such a dastardly deed.
As we have seen, there have been three exchanges between him and the scribes in the Temple, two of them hostile, the third less so. Those exchanges provide the segue that we see today when Jesus continues his teaching to the crowds gathered in the Temple, instructing them to “beware of the scribes.” Knowing his long and unhappy history with the scribes, we can expect him to provide a powerful snapshot of their faults in the critique that he offers the crowds. And he does.
Describing these religious leaders as people “who like to go around in long robes and accept greetings in the marketplaces, seats of honor in synagogues, and places of honor at banquets,” he offers a vivid description of their ostentatiousness and self-promotion, one that the crowds surely recognize, having witnessed the behavior of the scribes for themselves.
Furthermore, Rabbi Jesus points out two other actions of the scribes that point to their dishonesty and to their hypocrisy. He says of them, “They devour the houses of widows and as a pretext recite lengthy prayers.” It is amazing, really, how Mark can pack a simple verse with so much meat. In those few words, we learn that that the scribes exploit widows, one of the most vulnerable groups of people in Jewish society, personally profiting from their position as lawyers, and then turn around to pronounce long and pretentious prayers, simply another way to show off, their prayers really intended to impress the people around them rather than to address the Most High God in his heavens.
Frankly, Rabbi Jesus’ words are a scathing indictment of the scribes, leaving no doubt in anyone’s minds about how he feels about their self-promotion, self-interestedness, and self-serving ways. Having received such a harsh criticism of one’s actions, any normal person with a smidgen of shame would scurry for a dark corner. But not the scribes. They scheme to have Jesus put to death, in this way flexing their muscles, shutting up their harshest critic, and proving his characterization of them to be right on.
Actually, by this point in the gospel, we are not surprised by anything that the scribes do. They have, with one exception, showed themselves to be scoundrels. Regularly, Jesus has exposed the ugliness of their ways, regardless of how pose and polished they appear in public. Their behavior is the opposite of what Jesus considers praiseworthy and honorable, particularly for people who present themselves as authorities in religion and in right living.
That teaching that begins with the searing instruction “beware of the scribes” is followed by another teaching, but it is presented not so much in words as in actions. Jesus is still in the Temple and Mark says he is seated opposite the treasury, which apparently consisted of thirteen trumpet-shaped chests that allowed worshippers to deposit coins for various purposes, each chest labeled for a specific expense, such as yearly taxes, or bird offerings, or for one of the other costs.
As Jesus sits, he observes “rich people putting in large sums” followed by “a poor widow who puts in two small coins worth a few cents.” We might wonder how Jesus knew the specifics of what people were giving. Apparently, the wealthy deposited into the containers large copper coins that were worth more and that made a lot of noise when they landed inside treasury chests, much the same as the clanking of tokens that a slot machine makes when there is a winning number, the noise drawing the attention of bystanders.
The poor widow, by contrast, dropped two small copper coins of far lesser value into the containers, the coins making little to no noise as they fell into the chest. No one would hear it and no one would pay attention to it, the amount considered inconsequential, much the same as the widow whose status in Jewish society was lower-rung and the least important in the hierarchy. By the nature of the laws of the time, widows had no source of income, relying either on their children or on charity for their livelihood. They were nobodies.
Jesus takes the occasion to offer another important teaching, calling his disciples close to him and pointing to the woman, says to them, “Amen, I say to you, this poor widow put in more than all the other contributors to the treasury. For they have all contributed from their surplus wealth, but she, from her poverty, has contributed all she had, her whole livelihood.”
Oddly, most people tend to read these two teachings as separate and apart from one another. In fact, the lectionary supports the separation, allowing for a longer version that contains the two but also a shorter version that contains only the story of the widow. But it is very clear that Mark intends them to be heard as two parts of the same instruction. In other words, the statement by Jesus about the scribes and the statement by him about the widow are best understood together. Both the scribes and the woman are present in the Temple, within his line of sight, and their actions allow him to draw a sharp contrast between the two.
The clue that Mark wants the two understood as one is provided in the criticism of the scribes as exploiters who “devour the houses of widows.” The subsequent appearance of the widow allows a visual contrast between the actions of the scribes and the actions of the widow, one group made up of individuals who are hypocrites and con artists and the other a person of true piety and big-heartedness.
While the scribes prance and dance about in their high-dollar, name-brand clothes, drawing attention to themselves, the widow walks into the Temple unnoticed by anyone because she is a nobody. The scribes draw attention and the widow draws no attention. The scribes take everything they can for themselves and the widow gives away everything she has. The scribes are masters of affectation and pretension while the widow exemplifies modesty and humility.
As we can easily see, so long as we keep these two stories in tandem, there is much more at work here than the generosity of the widow. Rabbi Jesus’ intention is to present her as a clear contrast to the behavior of the scribes. She is their polar opposite, although both she and the scribes are in the Temple supposedly because they are religious people. Her religion is real; theirs is fake.
As Jesus nears his end, his teachings take on more urgency. He wants to make one more try at getting his followers to understand what they should aspire to. It is not greatness, but lowliness. As we have seen, on their way to Jerusalem the disciples argued among themselves about who was the greatest. Later, the brothers James and John made a special request that they hold the positions of greatness in Jesus’ kingdom. Each time, Jesus had to remind them that true greatness is not found in bombasity and in special privileges, but in putting oneself last and in serving others.
This episode in the Temple affords him one last shot at getting his followers to see that the ways of the world are not his way, and that being at the front of the line does not mean being the first to enter the Kingdom of God. The question that stands before us is whether we have finally understood what Jesus is teaching, having heard him repeat the lesson over and over again, or do we turn a deaf ear to his words, continuing to put ourselves first and put other people last.
Sadly, we live in a world where the loud-mouths and the big pockets bombard the airwaves, putting themselves out front and, like the scribes, want everyone to know how important they are. Meanwhile, those with little and who are of little consequence, like the widow in the story, are exploited and exported, stepped upon and looked down upon.
This is not only the world in which we live on an everyday basis; it is the world that we have constructed by our actions and by our decisions. All of which leads to one conclusion–we have not taken to heart the teachings of Rabbi Jesus, preferring instead the teachings of dishonest hucksters and disingenuous self-promoters. We have imitated their ways, not the ways of Jesus who said, “If anyone wants to be first, he shall be last of all, and servant of all.”
We fool ourselves if we believe that the Lord Jesus does not see our deception, calling ourselves religious people, as did the scribes, but showing little to none of the humility and honesty that the widow in this story showed. He still sits in the courtyard of the Temple and watches as the people pass in front of him. And, unless we’re fooling ourselves, there is little doubt as to what he is thinking.
–Jeremy Myers
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