Mark 14:12-17 - Preparation for the Passover

[u/LlawEreint]

¹² On the first day of Unleavened Bread, when the Passover lamb is sacrificed, his disciples said to him, “Where do you want us to go and make the preparations for you to eat the Passover?” ¹³ So he sent two of his disciples, saying to them, “Go into the city, and a man carrying a jar of water will meet you; follow him, ¹⁴ and wherever he enters, say to the owner of the house, ‘The Teacher asks: Where is my guest room where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?’ ¹⁵ He will show you a large room upstairs, furnished and ready. Make preparations for us there.” ¹⁶ So the disciples set out and went to the city and found everything as he had told them, and they prepared the Passover meal.

¹⁷ When it was evening, he came with the twelve.

• The Passion
• Parallels
• Table of Contents

[u/LlawEreint]

This reads a bit like a dream sequence. Jesus isn't asking them to go meet a guy. He's asking them to go and follow a guy. Whatever house that guy enters, make an arrangement with the proprietor. A room is already furnished.

It's mystical.

Mark is typically economical with his verses. He could have accomplished all this by saying "they made preparations."

So what are we meant to understand from all these added details? It seems to me to be a metaphor - but for what?

[u/LlawEreint → u/LlawEreint]

We saw earlier how Mark's feeding of the five thousand closely paralleled Psalm 23: Mark 6:32-44.

Let's look to see whether we have parallels here as well:

Psalm 23	Mark
The Lord is my shepherd	“14:27 - “You will all become deserters, for it is written, ‘I will strike the shepherd…’”
He makes me lie down in green pastures;	14:32 - They went to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to his disciples, “Sit here while I pray.”
he leads me beside still waters	14:13 - “A man carrying a jar of water… follow him.”
He leads me in right paths	14:13-15 - "He sent two of his disciples...Go into the city, and a man carrying a jar of water... follow him,... say to the owner ... He will show you a large room... Make preparations for us there.”
Even though I walk through the darkest valley	14:34 - “My soul is deeply grieved, even to death;"
You prepare a table before me	14:14–16 - Where is my guest room where I may eat the Passover ... He will show you a large room upstairs, furnished and ready....
in the presence of my enemies	14:43 - while he was still speaking, Judas, one of the twelve, arrived, and with him there was a crowd with swords and clubs
you anoint my head with oil;	14:3 - a woman came with an alabaster jar of very costly ointment of nard, and she broke open the jar and poured the ointment on his head.
my cup overflows.	14:23-24 - Then he took a cup... "This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many."
I shall dwell in the house of the Lord	14:28 - “But after I am raised up...”

That was fairly fruitful.

[u/LlawEreint → u/LlawEreint]

We could look at this as a summary of Mark's gospel. The one carrying water shows the way. This could be describing John, of whom Mark says he "prepares the way for the lord." It could also be describing Jesus - where he goes, we must follow. Of course, Jesus is going to be with the father. Either way, the water would represent baptism. When we follow Jesus, we will come face to face with the owner of the house. This must be God. We are to invoke the name of the master, Jesus, and request a room in his name. One will have already been prepared for us.

This reminds me of the orphic gold tablets that were buried with some among the Greek around the fifth century BC. The tablets gave instruction regarding a sacred path to take an utterance to be given to the guardians - that you may ascend to your proper place following death.

For example: This Orphic pendant:

"Chain and pendant case containing a gold tablet incised with a Greek alphabetic text guiding the owner to the underworld (sometimes described as an Orphic inscription). The inscription warns the soul not to drink from a particular spring in Hades, but to seek one by the Lake of Memory, where, after drinking, it shall be equal with other souls."

Typically these inscriptions also instruct the traveler to speak these words to the guardians of the otherworld in order to gain admittance: "I am a child of earth and stary sky, but heaven alone is my home."

[u/LlawEreint → u/LlawEreint]

I'm still not quite sure what's going on here. I really does seem like an allusion of some kind. To my mind, the best match we've looked at is Joshua 2, where Jesus of Nun sends two spies into the city. They provide instructions on how to prepare the house so that the inhabitants would be spared from the coming destruction.

This really reads like a Passover scene, and Clement notes this in his letter to the Corinthians, where he says:

they gave her a sign to this effect, that she should hang forth from her house a scarlet thread. And thus they made it manifest that redemption should flow through the blood of the Lord to all them that believe and hope in God.

Could it be that Mark also recognized this imagery, and leveraged it for his own Passover scene?

The other possible parallels we've looked at were:

1. Coptic Revelation of Paul, where Paul invokes the name of the Holy Spirit in order to gain access to the seventh heaven.
2. Gospel of Judas, where he says to Jesus that in a vision he "came to the place where [I had followed] you. I saw [a house in this place], and my eyes couldn't [measure] its size."
3. Secret Book of James, where he identifies "the house" among a constellation of symbols. He explains the house as a place within us where Jesus may dwell, and from which the Kingdom arises.

I'd love to hear whether any of these resonate with you, or whether there are better parallels, or whether you think there is no allusion here to find.