Scripture Daily

Context No. 47 of 4322 · Mark

Context · Reflection

Mark 8:6-12: in context

6He commanded the multitude to sit down on the ground, and he took the seven loaves. Having given thanks, he broke them and gave them to his disciples to serve, and they served the multitude. 7They also had a few small fish. Having blessed them, he said to serve these also. 8They ate and were filled. They took up seven baskets of broken pieces that were left over. 9Those who had eaten were about four thousand. Then he sent them away. 10Immediately he entered into the boat with his disciples and came into the region of Dalmanutha. 11The Pharisees came out and began to question him, seeking from him a sign from heaven and testing him. 12He sighed deeply in his spirit and said, “Why does this generation seek a sign? Most certainly I tell you, no sign will be given to this generation.”

Jesus has been teaching a crowd of four thousand in Gentile territory for three days, and they have nothing left to eat. He takes seven loaves and a few small fish, gives thanks, and has the disciples pass them out. Everyone eats, and seven baskets of scraps are gathered afterward. This is the second such feeding in Mark, the first having fed five thousand Jews with five loaves.

Then he crosses the lake to Dalmanutha, and the Pharisees come out and ask him for a sign from heaven. The timing is the whole point. He has just fed thousands of people from a handful of bread, and they want something else, something unambiguous and from the sky. Mark says Jesus sighed deeply in his spirit, and his answer is flat. No sign will be given to this generation.

A sign was already given, and it did not count, because it came in the wrong form. Bread multiplying in ordinary hands on ordinary ground is easier to explain away than fire from heaven. What am I asking to be shown, that I have been shown already in a shape I did not accept?

Sources