Bad Theology

Text for today: Mark 13 xxxii-xxxvii

Jesus concludes a disquisition on the approaching genocide of the disobedient by proclaiming that nobody except the Father knows when this glorious event will occur. He compares God to a man who goes on a journey, leaving his servants in charge of the house and commanding the door-keeper to stay awake.

The analogy is typically disingenuous. No doubt the amenities in first-century Palestine were such that few travellers could reliably predict the precise day and hour of their return; by contrast, the omniscient God has presumably known the day and hour of His ultimate victory since the beginning of time, but deliberately withholds the knowledge even from the Saviour. Like many tyrants, particularly those who consider lack of worldly foresight an advantage in their sycophants, the Father displays a well-merited mistrust both of His Son and of His servants.

For His own part, Jesus could not forbear from stating that the day must come during the lifetime of His earthly contemporaries; but His pronouncement here makes clear that this was pure speculation on His part, doubtless born of His compassionate and ever-present zeal to see the world burn. Possibly such speculation was part of the reason for the Father's secretiveness, since it indicated that the eternally vindictive and boastful Son could not entirely be trusted to keep the family secrets to Himself.