NOTES for Mar 11:1-11

Christ enters the city not at any random moment, but when people are ready to receive Him, when there are people able to provide a donkey simply because the Lord needs it, and when other people go out into the streets to greet the One who comes in the name of the Lord.
Yes, much will change soon. After the first bursts of joy will come confusion, many will want to draw back, and some will become completely disappointed. But Christ is already in the city, and His presence is a living reality.
So He enters the heart as well. He waits humbly for a long time at the door, and it depends on us whether we let Him in. But once He enters, He changes the whole situation. And even when we give in to temptations, doubts, and falls, He grieves, but still does not leave us.

Six days before Passover, Jesus makes His solemn entry into Jerusalem. For the first time during His earthly ministry, He openly appears before the whole people as the King, the Messiah whom everyone had been waiting for. Jesus' preaching was the proclamation of the Kingdom that had drawn near; His miracles and healings were nothing other than signs of this Kingdom. At the same time, Jesus forbade demons to call Him the Son of God, and forbade those healed to proclaim what had happened. Now He not only does not forbid it, but to the Pharisees' demand, "Teacher, rebuke Your disciples," He answers, "I tell you that if these should keep silent, the stones would immediately cry out" (Luke 19:39-40). The Kingdom of God, which had come "without observation," is at last revealed with complete clarity. But why, as He approaches Jerusalem surrounded by the rejoicing crowd, does Jesus weep (Luke 19:41-44)? The reason is that under the oppression of the Roman conquerors, the image of the true King-Messiah (see Isa. 53), formed during the Babylonian captivity under the influence of the preaching of Isaiah and the other prophets, had been forgotten. In its place appeared a much older image, one almost rejected by everyone in Isaiah's time: the image of a militant Messiah, merciless toward the Gentiles, who would restore lost statehood and national power, that is, all those ideals that even now are so dear to many for whom the earthly is above the heavenly. But the King sitting on a donkey is not at all like earthly rulers. From ancient times the donkey was a symbol of peace and meekness. Some evangelists, Matthew and John, even recall the ancient messianic prophecy about the meek King sitting on a donkey (Zech. 9:9). Besides this, at the very beginning of His path Jesus rejected the temptation of earthly dominion when the devil offered Him all the kingdoms of this world. Now what the devil had demanded of Jesus is demanded of Him by His own people. Jesus is now more alone than ever: He alone knows what this jubilation of the crowd is worth, and that in a few days the same crowd will shout, "Crucify, crucify Him!"...

With the same meekness and humility with which Jesus entered Jerusalem, He also comes into our heart and becomes our King, and we become His people. Again and again He conquers us not by force and might, but by love and humility. And we ask Him to preserve our faithfulness to Him, and in hope we cry out: "Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!"

Jesus enters Jerusalem not as a king, but rather as a prophet: He rides into it on a donkey. A king would most likely have entered the city in a chariot or on horseback; in antiquity a horse, and especially a horse-drawn chariot, was the royal means of transportation par excellence.

Prophets, however, either walked or used donkeys, more precisely mules, and in the same way, according to traditional popular messianic ideas, the Messiah was to appear in the city at the very beginning, before He became the King of His messianic Kingdom. Here Jesus meets these traditional ideas, clearly making it clear to the people that He truly is the very Messiah they are waiting for.

This behavior of His plainly contrasts with the desire to hide His messiahship that had characterized Him before. This is understandable: He was not going to start or lead any mass messianic movement, and therefore publicity and wide renown were, in essence, of no use to Him. He became known because of the miracles and healings He performed, but this renown did not help Him at all, and sometimes even hindered Him. His spiritual work required not mass scale but depth, and it was connected not with crowds but with specific people.

The crowds of people who constantly pursued Him, alas, did not at all testify to a large number of people ready for serious spiritual work; they only demonstrated how susceptible a crowd is to miracles. In fact, the Jerusalem crowd that met Jesus as He entered the city was no different in this respect from any other. Now, however, the time had come to call things by their proper names: Jesus finally bears open witness to His messiahship, whatever the people around Him may think.

Now this was possible: too little time remained before His death and resurrection for anyone to try to draw Him into another "messianic" adventure, of which a very great many were being launched in Judea at that time. Such witness was absolutely necessary: the people of God had to know that the Messiah they awaited had come. Each person decided for himself how to respond to this witness, but it was given, and no one in Jerusalem could in good conscience say that he had seen nothing and known nothing.

Jesus' disciples knew well that the Teacher was under close watch by the Pharisees and elders. What He preached did not fit in any way into the usual framework of their religious ideas. It was simply dangerous for Him to approach Jerusalem. The apostles repeatedly tried to dissuade the Teacher from coming to this city. Their fears were truly serious, since they considered going with Him to Jerusalem equivalent to death.

That is why it is so surprising that they so willingly and obediently go at Jesus' request for the donkey on which He is to enter the city. Most likely this is connected with the faith in Him as Messiah that spread after the raising of Lazarus, who had been four days dead. Evidently it seemed to them that the very time had finally come when their Teacher would show His true power and reveal the promised Kingdom. And then it is understandable why they justify themselves before the owners of the donkey without a shadow of doubt, saying simply that the animal is needed by the Teacher. One can justify oneself this way only if one's mentor is, at the very least, nearly a great ruler. And their expectations were justified, but not at all in the way they thought. Because His Kingdom turned out to be not of this world at all.

When reading the Gospel story, many people ask: why did Jesus treat the poor tree so unfairly? After all, it was none other than God Himself who established the very laws of nature according to which every tree bears fruit in its proper season. That is how it was, is, and will be; that is how it ought to be. But there are, of course, exceptions to the existing order of things. In fact, such exceptions are what we call miracles. The Kingdom entering the world is a miracle by definition. That is why miracle accompanies the Savior everywhere: He is the One who brought the Kingdom into the world. But what if He is near and no miracle takes place? Is that possible? Of course it is; in fact, it happened often, because not everyone who met Jesus became a witness to or participant in miraculous events. One can pass by the Kingdom without noticing it, at least as long as it has not yet been revealed in all its fullness, transforming our world completely. But to pass by the Kingdom means to lose the fullness of life contained in it. That is why the fig tree dried up: it did not become part of the Kingdom, and now we can hardly answer the question of why that happened. But through the example of the fig tree we can understand what awaits us if, like it, we remain without any share in the life of the Kingdom. It is a stern example, but a spiritually useful one.

The parable of the fig tree puzzles many readers: why, in fact, did it have to wither, since the time for it to bear fruit had not yet come? At the same time, the story of the withered fig tree is usually not connected with the cleansing of the Temple, the account of which it frames. Meanwhile both stories form a single whole, and the key to them is the Savior's words about faith that moves mountains. What is faith here? Confidence in God's existence? Certainly, but that is only the foundation. Trust? Yes, of course: without trust in God one cannot speak of spiritual life at all. Yet both the one and the other are only preliminary conditions for the action called faith. The action itself is connected with recognizing the Kingdom as an undoubted and unconditional reality present here and now.

If any technical terminology were appropriate in this case, it would be most accurate to speak of a person's "switching" to perception of that reality which is called the Kingdom and which is always present in him. It is almost impossible to do this by oneself, or more precisely, almost impossible to remain in the state called the Kingdom, but with Jesus everything is possible. So it was with Peter, for whom the Kingdom remains reality as long as he looks at Jesus. And not only a purely inner reality: beginning to perceive it within ourselves, we very soon learn to perceive the Kingdom outside as well. Then everything listed becomes possible, including mountains that move. This is no surprise, because nature in the Kingdom is absolutely obedient to man. So too the fig tree: it withered not because it failed to bear fruit, and not as punishment for disrespect toward the Messiah, but because it did not become part of the Kingdom.

It proved useless for the Kingdom there and then, where and when fruit was expected from it. Contact with the Kingdom never passes without consequences. The one who does not acquire the fullness of life offered to him may well lose even the small part of it that he has. The only question is whether this will happen as quickly as it did with the fig tree. And the surest road to not entering the Kingdom is trading in the Temple. In every sense of that expression, from the literal to the most symbolic of all possible senses. Not because a person does not need money, since while we have a relation to this world we will need some amount of it, but because money has no place in the Kingdom. One can and should thank God for a successful deal if trade is our profession, but our gratitude must not become a deal. Otherwise the Kingdom closes itself to us, with all the consequences that follow.