The Naked Young Man: a Historian’s Hypothesis on Mark 14,51-52

Mark’s account of the arrest of Jesus in Gethsemane concludes with a mysterious passage.

        Citing it in translation is problematical since on crucial points the words chosen must at once proceed from and determine an understanding of it. To illustrate, the Anchor Bible and the New English Bible may be compared.

AB: A certain young man, dressed only in a linen cloth, followed him. They tried to seize him, but he left the linen cloth behind and ran away naked.

NEB: Among those following was a young man with nothing on but a linen cloth. They tried to seize him; but he slipped out of the linen cloth and ran away naked.

        As will be suggested by the difference between these translations, the principal difficulty in rendering is how to present the young man’s association with Jesus. How to denote him is also a matter of nuance: the Anchor Bible’s "a certain young man" is preferable. To pass from translation to interpretation, while the figure’s manner of dress and the state in which he escaped are exactly rendered in both translations, the significance of the description is open to argument ¹. Further reflection on the problems of understanding the passage may, however, be postponed until the question of the young man’s identity is considered.

        To pose the question of identification at all is to assume that the episode is historical. This premiss seems secure. Only two Old Testament texts have been adduced – Amos 2,16 and Gen 39,12 – which might serve as a basis of scriptural fulfilment in and thus dilute the historicity of the Marcan passage. In neither case is the correspondence convincing ². That is not to say that the episode is without meaning for the evangelist. Vanhoye, suggestively, finds in Mark’s account of the arrest and resurrection of Jesus a counterpoint between the young man of Gethsemane

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and the young man at the tomb, between humiliation and exaltation ³. Fleddermann, also suggestively, sees an antithesis between flight and acceptance. Although, in view of the preceding pericope, a type of the fleeing disciple is perhaps superfluous, the young man, by this reading, represents Mark’s judgement on the events, a "signature" summarising his theology ⁴. Other exegesis would insist on the symbolism of Christian initiation ⁵. Such attempts to make sense of overtly unpromising material may help to explain, if conservatism and an eye for vivid detail are considered insufficient explanation in themselves, why Mark has preserved the episode. However, the rôle that it so reticently plays could hardly warrant its invention, either by Mark or by an intermediate tradition, even if that tradition had glimmerings of the theology that can thus be discerned in his presentation. Vanhoye concludes his own exegesis by making the point explicitly : "Reconnaître celle-ci ne conduit nullement – est-il besoin de le préciser? – à mettre en doute la réalité de l’incident raconté" ⁶.

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        In the aftermath of his account of the raising of Lazarus, John at separate junctures describes the effect of the incident upon Jewish opinion. It resulted in the attachment to Jesus of many who had come out to condole with Martha and Mary, while others reported adversely (John 11,46). It was from this point that the Jewish authorities plotted the death of Jesus (John 11,53). So seriously was the threat taken that Jesus no longer went about publicly in Judaea but left the region temporarily, returning just before Passover (John 11,54; 12,1). At this point, many Jews came to Bethany to see not only Jesus but also Lazarus (John 12,9). The chief priests then resolved to do away with (literally, to kill) Lazarus as well (John 12,10-11). The impression made by the raising of Lazarus is also specifically associated by John with the success – more accurately if less plausibly, in his narration it is presented as the instigation – of the messianic entry to Jerusalem (John 12,12-19).

        The historian who encountered such evidence in the accounts of medieval chroniclers would be obliged to pose an obvious question. Might not the figure who is identified as the target, by implication, of a projected

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arrest and who is recorded – uniquely among the secondary figures present – as the object of an attempted arrest be one and the same? Of course, the Gospels are not chronicles. John’s Gospel is furthest removed from being one. Yet in its highly theological perspective it does contain a considerable underlay of historically concrete information. The statement (John 12,10-11) that the chief priests resolved to do away with Lazarus (presumably by way of legal process, preceded therefore by arrest, rather than wholly extra-judicially) has the merit both of being historically concrete and of definitively rescuing Lazarus as a historical figure. On the one hand, all the theological charge of the raising of Lazarus could stand without John 12,10-11. On the other, the Lazarus who was the object of such a resolution is not the Lazarus of the parable, whatever, if any, may be the literary relation between them. He was a figure who was judged both threatening to public order and palpable. John’s account gives no indication of his age, though it is probably implicit that he was not expected to die in the natural course (John 11,21; 11,32).

        That the sources, in narrating the prelude to the crucifixion and its aftermath, mention only one figure other than Jesus who was targeted for action and only one figure on whom, in fact, an arrest was attempted is as suggestive as it is surprising. If the sources are compounded one might even deduce that after the common flight of Jesus’ followers from the Garden there was some recovery of spirit. One disciple is represented as boldly entering the courtyard of the high priest, where admittedly he may have expected to enjoy some measure of protection in virtue of whatever degree of acquaintance he possessed ¹³, and as securing the admission of Simon Peter (John 18,15-16) who had followed at a distance (Matt 26,58; Mark 14,54; Luke 22,54). Had it in the aftermath become clearer that the authorities in the Garden had not been interested in arresting everybody? Neither Simon Peter’s initial discretion in maintaining a distance nor his subsequent denials can be confidently pleaded against the supposition, since he may have had particular cause for anxiety ¹⁴. Nor can the only explicit statement on the point in the canonical Gospels (John 20,19) be safely read with retrospective import. By then the disciples might well have seen in the empty tomb new cause to fear action against them (cf. Matt 28,13-14). Brown, after thorough consideration, concludes: "Historically there is no recorded early Christian memory of an attempt to have Jesus’ followers put to death with him" ¹⁵. That is, except for the implication of John 12,10 and the possible implication of Mark 14,51-52.

        It is time to ask whether there is anything to forbid the collation of John 12,10 and Mark 14,51-52. From a topographical viewpoint, certainly, there is nothing implausible about Lazarus’ presence in Gethsemane, on the route between Bethany and Jerusalem. Evidently, there would be some risk to him: though no more than to Jesus himself and perhaps in the circumstance of a

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resolution by the authorities Bethany itself might not be altogether safe for continuous residence ¹⁶. Even if there were no particular purpose in his being in the Garden that night, Lazarus might well have been disposed to share the Master’s danger (cf. John 11,16). Though not one of the twelve, he was a friend (John 11,3; 11,11) and one, surely, with a special debt. That his nerve should have failed in the end (if his escape is to be so interpreted) would simply place him on a footing in that respect with all the rest. It may be observed too that Lazarus would serve well the function of "missing witness" to Jesus’ prayer in the Garden that prompted B. Saunderson’s inquiry ¹⁷. However, if the suggested identification need occasion no surprise on general considerations, there are some obvious problems about it and these must be addressed even if they can be answered only speculatively.

        The most serious problem is why if the figure was Lazarus he is not named. This can be no more confidently answered than the larger question why the synoptics have no mention either of his raising or of the supposed impact on Jerusalem opinion of the reports of his raising. In default of a confident answer a hypothesis may be advanced which would cater for both defects. During the period in which the synoptic tradition was in formation there may have been need for reticence on the subject of Lazarus, either because, as suggested by John, he had been the object of some proceeding or a fortiori because, on the above identification, he was a fugitive ¹⁸. John says of Jesus, in the aftermath of his raising of Lazarus but before the report of the resolution concerning Lazarus himself, that the Jewish authorities issued orders that anyone who knew of his whereabouts should give information (John 11,57). A similar order may have been made about Lazarus and, if made, it is perhaps unlikely that it was revoked. This would not be the only point at which reticence of the kind might be suspected in the sources. While all the Gospels have a reference to an attack by one of Jesus’ party upon the servant of the high priest (Matt 26,51; Mark 14,47; Luke 22,50; John 18,10-11), only John names the assailant. It would be difficult to suppose – if John’s information were accurate – that there would not have been a general awareness within the community, at least in the early period, that he was Simon Peter ¹⁹. Whether in respect of Mark

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14,51-52, it would have been necessary to preserve discretion in the immediate context of the writing of his Gospel may be doubted, but the consideration is not decisive. Discretion might still have been advisable if the Gospel was written before the fall of Jerusalem and there was a supposition that it might circulate there. To adapt an observation of Best "that those who are ‘on the run’ do not write Gospels" ²⁰, one may surmise that those "on the run" do not get written about in Gospels. It is just possible too that, if the tradition by which the detail was transmitted to Mark had suppressed the name of the young man, the identification might have been lost by the time that the evangelist received the story.

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        In referring to the young man’s dress as emblematic, I do not mean to imply that its reference is only on the level of symbolism (potent as that would be). On the historical level the young man comes wrapped up, as it were, in his peculiar dress. It is his naked escape that has been held above to guarantee his historicity and his naked escape is the result of his spare garb. If the figure is to be identified as Lazarus, one would have to accept that Lazarus in the Garden was actually dressed for conscious effect ²³.

        Lazarus dressed in that manner could in context only advertise his remarkable personal history, which was causing such excitement in the city. In the account of Jesus’ reaction to the message about Lazarus’ illness, he promised that its purpose was "the glory of God, to bring glory to the Son of God" (John 11,4). While this may well be a Johannine theological intrusion into a more primitive account ²⁴ it hardly does violence to the likely interpretation in context. The question must arise whether the manifestation of this glory was to be confined to Bethany and to those who came out to Bethany or whether it was contemplated presenting Lazarus, dramatically and dressed so that he would instantly proclaim the miracle, in Jerusalem itself. Alternatively or concurrently, if, as the Gospels insist, Jesus was reconciled to or intent upon his own sacrifice, the prospect that Lazarus would be presented in Jerusalem as a sign of God’s power might have been a central part of the mechanism by which the Jewish authorities were utterly drawn to act.

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