075: Jesus' Friends Think He is Beside Himself: Public Ministry of Jeus from the First Passover to the Second: Gospel Harmony [LivingWeb Library]

075: Jesus' Friends Think He is Beside Himself

Book	Matthew	Mark	Luke	John
Passage	Not in this book	3:19-21	Not in this book	Not in this book
Lectionary		Proper 5B
Text		19 And Judas Iscariot, which also betrayed him: and they went into an house. 20 And the multitude cometh together again, so that they could not so much as eat bread. 21 And when his friends heard of it, they went out to lay hold on him: for they said, He is beside himself.
Manuscripts
Differences
Parallels
Time Frame	Autumn (About Sep-Oct) of 28 A.D. / 780 A.U.C, near the end of his Third Journey, about 1½ years into his public ministry (about half-way through his public minstry).

Quotes

The reason why this report gained any belief was, probably, that our Lord had lived among them as a carpenter; that he was poor, and unknown; and that now, at thirty years of age, he broke off from his occupations, abandoned his common employment, spent much time in the deserts, denied himself the common comforts of life, and set up his claims to be the Messiah, who was expected by all the people to come with great pomp and splendour.

- Barnes, Albert, New Testament Commentary, Mark 3:21

That earnestness in the service of God, and that activity and perseverance in doing good which true religion inspires, appear to many to be indications of insanity, and awaken in them solicitude; while equal earnestness in the pursuit of worldly things awakens no such apprehensions, but is viewed with approbation.

- Family Bible Notes, Mark 3:21

Herod Antipas will later consider Jesus as John the Baptist redivivus, the scribes treat him as under demonic possession, even the family and friends fear a disordered mind as a result of overstrain. It was a crucial moment for Jesus. His family or friends came to take him home, to lay hold of him (kratêsai), forcibly if need be.

- Robertson's Word Pictures, Mark 3:21

They foresaw the conflict with the military authorities and the religious leaders into which the present course of Jesus was leading, and were satisfied that the case called for their interference.

- Four-fold Gospel, Mark 3:21

Beside himself means that his spirit was outside his body, which was being directed by a foreign spirit (a demon).

- Lindsey P. Pherigo., Interpreter's One-Volume Commentary: Mark, p. 651

The people were, as we learn by Matthew 12:23, beginning to call to mind that he was the Son of David, and here was just fear of an insurrection.

- D.D. Whedon, Commentary on the Gospels, Vol. Matthew-Mark, p. 364

There is a deliberate correspondence between the role of Jesus' family and that of the scribes. Both in various ways misunderstand Jesus and his mission. The one party things that he is mad, the other that he is in league with Beelzebul.

- Reginald H. Fuller, Preaching the Lectionary, p. 313

He is beside himself means not that He has lost His reason, but that He is suffering, as we should say, from religious mania and has become eccentric. A similar charge was more than once brought against Paul (Acts 26:24; 2 Corinthians 5:13), and is often made against an earnest Christian.

- C.E. Graham Swift, New Bible Commentary (1954): Mark, p. 813

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