In the Villages - Mark 6:6b-13,30
Then he went about among the villages teaching. 7He called the twelve and began to send them out two by two, and gave them authority (ἐξουσίαν) over the unclean spirits. 8He ordered them to take nothing for their journey (εἰς ὁδὸν) except a staff; no bread, no bag, no money in their belts; 9but to wear (ὑποδεδεμένους) sandals and not to put on two tunics. 10He said to them, 'Wherever you enter a house, stay there until you leave the place. 11If any place will not welcome you and they refuse to hear you, as you leave, shake off the dust that is on your feet as a testimony against them.' (εἰς μαρτύριον αὐτοῖς) 12So they went out and proclaimed that all should repent. (μετανοῶσιν) 13They cast out many demons, and anointed with oil many who were sick and cured them.
14 King Herod heard of it, for Jesus' [Gk his] name had become known. Some were (καὶ ἔλεγον) [Other ancient authorities read He was] saying, 'John the baptizer has been raised from the dead; and for this reason these powers are at work in him.' 15But others said, 'It is Elijah.' And others said, 'It is a prophet, like one of the prophets of old.' 16But when Herod heard of it, he said, 'John, whom I beheaded, has been raised.'
17For Herod himself had sent men who arrested John, bound him, and put him in prison on account of Herodias, his brother Philip's wife, because Herod [Gk he] had married her. 18For John had been telling Herod, 'It is not lawful for you to have your brother's wife.' 19And Herodias had a grudge against him, and wanted to kill him. But she could not, 20for Herod feared John, knowing that he was a righteous and holy man, and he protected him. When he heard him, he was greatly perplexed; [Other ancient authorities read he did many things] and yet he liked to listen to him.
21But an opportunity came when Herod on his birthday gave a banquet for his courtiers and officers and for the leaders of Galilee. 22When his daughter Herodias [Other ancient authorities read the daughter of Herodias herself] came in and danced, she pleased Herod and his guests; and the king said to the girl, 'Ask me for whatever you wish, and I will give it.' 23And he solemnly swore to her, 'Whatever you ask me, I will give you, even half of my kingdom.' 24She went out and said to her mother, 'What should I ask for?' She replied, 'The head of John the baptizer.' 25Immediately she rushed back to the king and requested, 'I want you to give me at once the head of John the Baptist on a platter.' 26The king was deeply grieved; yet out of regard for his oaths and for the guests, he did not want to refuse her. 27Immediately the king sent a soldier of the guard with orders to bring John's head. He went and beheaded him in the prison, 28brought his head on a platter, and gave it to the girl. Then the girl gave it to her mother. 29When his disciples heard about it, they came and took his body, and laid it in a tomb.
30 The apostles gathered around Jesus, and told him all that they had done and taught.
Notes
1. A Markan Sandwich. Mark draws a rich and terrible contrast between the feast of Herod and the feast of Jesus, and we must respect his connection of the two. (We will deal with this in the next post.) But at the same time, the story of the disciples' mission is wrapped around the story of Herod's feast. What is Mark's purpose here? What do the two stories say about each other. On the briefest of readings one cannot help but see the contrast between the two ways of being. One is to live light, and not become embedded into and dependent upon, the dynamics of a place for survival. This is contrasted with sumptuous consumption which is bound up with, and dependent upon, political obligations.
Where Jesus is demonstrating a radical new way of living—he is the culture of God come near, Herod can only see this new culture in terms of the old: What Jesus and his followers are doing must mean John the Baptist has come back from the dead. The irony his enormous, for Jesus will come back from the dead, but as part of the new way of being. Herod can only imagine the old. He imagines John, and his advisers imagine that, "It is Elijah," that violent representation and understanding of God which Jesus utterly repudiates. Matthew understood this: "I tell you, among those born of women none is greater than John; yet he who is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he." (Matthew 7:11)
2. Two by two (vv7) Two witnesses are required under the Law. This probably gives rise to the "Jewish practice of sending out official representatives in pairs,"1 which fits with the use of the word witness martyrion in vv11. (Also see Eccles 4:9-11)2
3. Authority and Repentance (vv7, 17) Exousian is the same word as in Mark 1:21. Jesus has given the disciples the authority he has been given cf Mark 1:11. The message is the same: repent. (metanoōsin) (cf 1:14 where its cognate metanoeite is used.) I note that the Greek for the journey is eis hodon. Hodon is a word we will see again: Bartimaeus, once he is healed and sees, joins Jesus tē hodō, on the way. In reading Mark, I always ask when he uses hodon, does he mean the Way of Jesus?
4. Staff and sandals (vv8) The disciples are to trust God, not their provisions, not even a spare tunic for warmth at night. Matthew's treatment of this text (Matt 10:9) allows neither staff nor sandals, and that fits with the logic of the passage, suggesting Mark's purpose was in another direction. Is there a hint of needing to be ready for rejection? Do we read hypodedemenous simply as the idiom for wearing sandals, or did Mark expect people to hear the underlying etymology of the word, which is something like "to bind under one's self?" Marcus' translation of the text is "have your sandals strapped up,"3 reflecting a sense of "be ready to move." The word reminds us of what will be clear in the next verses: Like Jesus himself, the disciples will often be misunderstood and rejected. Indeed, they are nobodies, poor, and defenceless, and yet, oddly, now with nothing to lose.
5. The dust off your feet. (vv10-11) Is the correct translation here that shaking the dust off of our feet is a witness against people, or a witness to or for them. We see in Mark 1:44 that the healed leper showing themselves to the priest is εἰς μαρτύριον αὐτοῖς; that is, a testimony to them. That phrase is exactly the same Greek expression used here in verse 11, but most English translations say as "a witness against them." Marcus supports this, saying that "marturion + dative" normally has a negative connotation, and that the narrative is negative towards those who are inhospitable. 4
By contrast, Davis says
I think translating the εἰς as "to" or "against" is an interpretive issue, and not strictly a translation issue, which goes to the heart of what Jesus is telling the twelve to do. If Jesus were intending "against," the instruction sounds like a demonstrative way of saying, "You reject me, I'll reject you." But that seems contrary to how Jesus typically operates. If this were a way of providing a testimony 'to' them, it would fit the spirit of not taking anything along for the journey. The twelve are not being sent out to benefit or exploit. They go out with authority over unclean spirits and receptive to hospitality. If there is no offer of hospitality, they demonstrate that they are not there to take anything – not even the dust – that is not freely given.5
"You reject me, I'll reject you," epitomises the culture of empire.
In eschewing violence, and in his vision of the Kingdom of God, Jesus completely upends our notions of power. The disciples are quite powerless when viewed from the perspective of empire. They have no resources. They don't even take the dust of a place on their feet if it is not freely given. Despite this apparent lack of power, they are full of power, healing those communities which step a little out of the thrall of empire, and which offer them hospitality and a hearing.
I agree with Davis' interpretation after reflection on my own experience of rejection: On our last trip out of town as we left a congregation where I had been badly injured and rejected, I parked off the road where the town disappears from view, took off my shoes, and beat them together, shaking off the dust in the direction of the town. "You reject me, I'll reject you," is actually a revenge. It's a "so, there!" My actions were a counterfactual claim to power and a good name... Shaking the dust off my feet against my congregation was an attempt to carry my good name with me by rejecting them just as they had rejected me. By doing that, I had stumbled over them just as much as they had stumbled over me. I had to do that because I had "brought my name with me"; I had come, unconsciously, desiring to be someone, seeing the placement as something of a promotion. I had linked my being to having a "successful" ministry. Which meant I had to win, and which meant that when I could not be heard by people, their problem became mine. Since that time, it seems to me that my power to communicate gospel has increased by about the same amount that I have ceased to worry about being a somebody.6
"Being a somebody" is, of course, driven by envy of those around us, which is part of the scandal of empire. It is the desire to insulate ourselves from death just that little bit more which, in the culture of empire, scales up into the desire to conquer. Yet look how much winning trickles its way down into so much of our social interaction. Although there was some serious pathology being worked out in that congregation, it only touched me because I insisted on connecting my being to having status in a culture of empire.
And the Markan sandwich? Empire is the attempt to forestall death. But empire brings death. The culture of God rises above death. In this pericope, in their poverty and lack of attachment, the disciples have nothing left to lose. Their life is given to them. The exist not because of their name, but because God gives them being. Fittingly, in Kevin Hart's poem The Last Day,
It will be morning
For the first time, and the long night
Will be seen for what it is,
A black flag trembling in the sunlight.
On the last day...
But then, at the end, all our pretentions to being someone are stripped away when the "the books flower in flames"
everything is stripped from us,
Even our names.
And here we will be human because, at last, we can live in the realised culture of God able simply to accept the gift of life, rather than seeking to gain it it by being a someone.
Footnotes
1. Marcus, Joel, Mark 1-7, and Mark 8-16, (The Anchor Yale Bible) pp 383
2. Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. 10For if they fall, one will lift up the other; but woe to one who is alone and falls and does not have another to help. 11Again, if two lie together, they keep warm; but how can one keep warm alone? 12And though one might prevail against another, two will withstand one. A threefold cord is not quickly broken. Ecclesiastes 4:9-12
3. Marcus pp382. See also Mounce: https://www.billmounce.com/greek-dictionary/hypodeo where the NT usage seems to be about being 'on the move.'
4. Marcus pp 384
5. Davis: http://leftbehindandlovingit.blogspot.com/2012/07/mission-grounded-in-rejection.html
6. Prior: https://www.onemansweb.org/do-not-even-carry-your-name-mark-61-13.html, edited
