- 35 And Jesus answered and said, while he taught in the temple, How say the scribes that Christ is the son of David? 36 For David himself said by the Holy Ghost, The LORD said to my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand, till I make thine enemies thy footstool. 37 David therefore himself calleth him Lord; and whence is he then his son? And the common people heard him gladly.
- Compare: Matthew 22:41-46; Luke 20:41-44
Jesus on the Christ
Jesus continues his disputations in the Temple, but no longer waits to be questioned or baited by the authorities; now, he takes the initiative and teaches on his own accord, telling people things they obviously enjoy hearing but which are designed to undermine the authority of Temple priests and elders.
Here, Jesus lectures people on the nature and identity of the Messiah. Mark’s audience, of course, thought of Jesus as the Messiah, so they would have seen more levels of meaning to this. Traditionally Jews believed that the Messiah had to be a son of David — someone born from the lineage of David’s family. Jesus, however, appears to be arguing that this makes no sense because the scriptures describe David as referring to the Messiah as “Lord” rather than “son.”
What would be the point of such an argument? If Jesus sees himself as the Messiah, but isn’t telling anyone that, why does he need to insist that the Messiah doesn’t need to come from David’s family? If Mark’s audience thinks of Jesus as Messiah, what is the purpose in telling them a story about Jesus saying that the Messiah need not be a son of David?
Scholars today often argue that this passage makes most sense if we treat it as coming well after the death of Jesus and has having been constructed to answer charges that because Jesus wasn’t the son of David, he therefore couldn’t have been the Messiah. Scholars also note that Jesus is making use of Psalm 110:1 here to refer the Messiah, something that was common in the early Christian church but otherwise unknown in pre-Christian Judaism.
Arguing that the Messiah didn’t have to be descended from David would also have helped early Christians reject other traditional assumptions about the Messiah — for example, that he would use force to expel foreigners and reestablish an earthly Jewish kingdom. Achievements like this would have been appropriate for the son of David, once king of the Jews, but obviously Jesus accomplished none of it.
For most Jews, it would have been inconceivable that someone executed by the Romans in such a manner could have been their Messiah. Disconnecting the Messiah from David, however, may have served an important role in getting Jews to move away from their assumptions.
Why is it, though, that “the common people heard him gladly”? There’s nothing obvious about this that would appeal to the common people. It’s not as if he’s telling them about the corruption of their leaders or the importance of love.
