MARK 15:21 — KING JAMES VERSION 0 0
“And they compel one Simon a Cyrenian, who passed by, coming out of the country, the father of Alexander and Rufus, to bear his cross.”
A certain man from Cyrene, Simon, the father of Alexander and Rufus, was passing by on his way in from the country, and they forced him to carry the cross — Simon of Cyrene is identified with unusual specificity: his hometown (Cyrene in North Africa), his sons (Alexander and Rufus — apparently known to Mark's Roman community, and the Rufus of Romans 16:13 may be the same person). The forced carrying of the cross is the compelled service of a bystander — not a disciple, not a volunteer, but a passerby conscripted into the most consequential carrying in history.
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