Mark 15:29-32 29And those who passed by blasphemed him, shaking their heads and saying, “Ha! The one who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, 30save yourself by coming down from the cross!” 31In the same way, the chief priests with the scribes also mocked among themselves, saying, “He saved others, he cannot save himself. 32Let the Christ, the King of Israel, come down now from the cross so that we may see and believe.” And those who were crucified with him mocked him.
The crowds always seem to be in the background of a lot of events of Jesus’ ministry. During his sojourn to the cross, he walked through busy roads and paths and must have attracted a lot of attention. Rumors of the one hailed the Son of David less than a week before was now handing on a cross. One group of people showed no sympathy but only ridicule. They had missed the Messiah because of their hardened hearts. As they passed by Jesus on the cross, they shouted out the same accusation as the false witnesses of 14:57-58, showing their misunderstanding of what Jesus taught and total disregard for the truth. The same word translated here as blasphemed (eblasphēmoun) is used in reference to the Holy Spirit in 3:29. It is a word that usually has God as its object. The request of these ridiculers was full of sarcasm and accusation as they wanted Jesus to prove his power by coming down from the cross. Only someone with divine power could do such a thing. They were asking for a sign when they had missed every obvious up to this point. They did not know their Bibles since these events fulfilled the words from the messianic Psalm 22.
The leaders of the Sanhedrin also joined in. They had finally won, so they thought. Their mortal enemy was dying on the cross. A different word for mocked (empaizontes) is used here with the sense of ridiculing or making fun to make someone. The same word was used in verse 20 for the mockery of the soldiers. All of these people missed the significance of what was happening. It is amazing that two groups of people, ones with faith and others without, looking at the same situation could see the same situation and end up with opposite outcomes.
The Jewish leaders were laughing among themselves at Jesus and were basically reinforcing the prejudices and hardening their hearts even more to the revelation before them. They know the truth, as is evident by their confession in verse 32: Christ, the King of Israel. They needed to see this miracle to believe when they had many opportunities to see miracles and believe. They had sent representatives throughout Galilee to follow Jesus, and these people could serve as witnesses of Jesus’ power and authority. But the religious leaders chose to define their faith by their own terms. Even the thieves joined in the ridicule, though one seemed to have a change of heart, according to Luke 23:39-43.
The truth of the gospel and the revelation as recorded in the Bible cannot be missed or misinterpreted lest one’s heart become hardened in disbelief. The most significant question we can ever ask is what to do with Jesus. Mark has given the readers of his Gospel a clear choice: will you believe in Jesus or be like those gathered at the cross and ridicule or ignore the clear evidence presented in this book?
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