“Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, the brother of James, and Joses, and of Juda, and Simon? and are not his sisters here with us? And they were offended at him.”
Isn't this the carpenter? Isn't this Mary's son and the brother of James, Joseph, Judas and Simon? Aren't his sisters here with us? And they took offense at him — the identification of Jesus as the carpenter and Mary's son is the offense's content: they know exactly who he is by their own categories, and the man who is performing these miracles and teaching with this wisdom does not match the man they knew as a child. The four brothers named (James, Joseph, Judas, Simon) and the sisters confirm that Jesus' family is well known in Nazareth. They took offense at him — the word (skandalizō) is the same word as the rocky-ground people falling away (Mark 4:17). Nazareth is rocky ground.
Church Fathers on Mark 6:3
After the miracles which have been related, the Lord returns into His own country, not that He was ignorant that they would despise Him, but that they might have no reason to say, If Thou hadst come, we had believed Thee.
He means by His country, Nazareth, in which He was brought up. But how great the blindness of the Nazarenes! they despise Him, Who by His words and deeds they might know to be the Christ, solely on account of His kindred.
Matthew indeed says that He was called the son of a carpenter; nor are we to wonder, since both might have been said, for they believed Him to be a carpenter, because He was the son of a carpenter.
Read all 8 entries in the readerCatena Aurea · St. Thomas Aquinas, tr. J. H. Newman · public domain
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