Mark 15:31 — Community Reflections

MARK 15:31 — KING JAMES VERSION 0

“Likewise also the chief priests mocking said among themselves with the scribes, He saved others; himself he cannot save.”

In the same way the chief priests and the teachers of the law mocked him among themselves. He saved others, they said, but he can't save himself — the chief priests' mockery contains the Gospel's central irony: he saved others but can't save himself. They are stating the truth as a proof of failure — the accurate description of substitutionary atonement read as evidence of impotence. He saved others by refusing to save himself — the pattern of Mark 8:35 (whoever loses their life for my sake will save it) enacted at the cross.

Church Fathers on Mark 15:31

The foal of Judah has been tied to the vine, and his clothes dyed in the blood of the grape, [Gen 49:11] and the kids tear the vine, blaspheming Christ, and wagging their heads.
Pseudo-Jerome · 5th century

For the passers by blasphemed Christ, reproaching Him as a seducer. But the devil moved them to bid Him come down from the Cross; for he knew that salvation was being won by the Cross, therefore he again proceeded to tempt Christ, so that if He came down from the Cross, he might be certain that He is not truly the Son of God, and so the salvation, which is by the Cross, might be done away. But He being truly the Son of God, did not come down; for if He ought to have come…
Theophylact · 11th century

Thus also they confess, though against their will, that He saved many. Therefore your words condemn you, for He who saved others could have saved Himself.
Bede · 8th century

Read all 6 entries in the readerCatena Aurea · St. Thomas Aquinas, tr. J. H. Newman · public domain

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