These are symbolic actions, a kind of prophetic message in and of themselves. Yeshua also engaged in symbolic actions and what I call kingdom enactments.

Symbolic Actions Declaring High Authority

• The Triumphal Entry (Mk 11:1-11; Mt 21:1-11; Lk 19:29-44; Jn 12:12-19) – Riding deliberately into the city as per Zechariah 9 with crowds hailing him, Yeshua is making a claim of messianic identity.
• The Temple Cleansing (Mk 11:15-17; Mt 21:12-13; Lk 19:45-46; Jn 2:13-17) – Perhaps Malachi 3:1 is in the background (after the messenger — Elijah, John the Baptist) the Lord comes suddenly to his Temple. Yeshua quotes Isaiah 56 and Jeremiah 7. This action largely contributed to his arrest and execution.
• Forgiving Sins (Mk 2:5; Mt 9:2; Lk 5:20 and another incident in Lk 7:48) – In even the most skeptical interpretation, Yeshua is claiming to know when God forgives a sinner. Since he says in Mk 2:10; Mt 9:6; Lk 5:24 that the Son of Man has authority to forgive, evidence is strong Yeshua is claiming more. He is claiming to be the divine Son of Man with authority in such matters as per Daniel 7 and the dominion given him by the Ancient of Days.
• Sending the Twelve (Mk 6:7-13; Mt 10:5-42; Lk 9:1-6) and Sending the Seventy (Lk 10:1-16) – Even more so that Yeshua’s own mission of proclaiming the kingdom (Mk 1:15; Mt 4:17), sending disciples to proclaim it suggests starting a renewal movement (a prophetic or even messianic role).

Symbolic Actions as Identity Stories

• The Baptism of Yeshua (Mk 1:9-11; Mt 3:13-17; Lk 3:21-22) – Yeshua’s participation in John’s movement already connects him to the role of prophet. The heavenly voice affirms Yeshua’s identity.
• The Temptation of Yeshua (Mk 1:12-13; Mt 4:1-11; Lk 4:1-13) – Yeshua is tested for worthiness for a role of high authority (prophet, messiah). Satan affirms Yeshua’s identity in an ironic manner.
• The Transfiguration (Mk 9:2-10; Mt 17:1-9; Lk 9:28-36) – Yeshua ascends a mountain with three as witnesses and experiences a prefiguring of coming glory and a visit from Moses and Elijah. A heavenly voice affirms his identity.

Kingdom Enactments
In these Yeshua demonstrates that he has partially brought the kingdom with him (the rest to come later).

• Healings, for in the world to come there will be no illness, disability, or death.
• Exorcisms, for the forces of spiritual evil are due to be defeated by God.
• Banquets, which foreshadow the banquet to come, a messianic promise.

• Water to wine – Jn 2:9
• Catch of fish – Lk 5:6
• Calming the storm – Mk 4:39, Mt 8:26, Lk 8:24
• Feeding five thousand – Mk 6:41, Mt 14:15, Lk 9:12, Jn 6:5
• Walking on water – Mk 6:49, Mt 14:25, Jn 6:19
• Feeding four thousand – Mk 8:8, Mt 15:32
• Coin from the fish – Mt 17:27
• Cursing the fig tree – Mt 21:19
• Second catch of fish – Jn 21:6

A few centuries before Yeshua, some unknown circles of apocalyptic scribes wrote some texts that are now known as part of 1 Enoch (which is really five books written at different times). The early part of 1 Enoch is the Book of the Watchers. Who are the watchers? The answer is found in Daniel 4:10 (4:13 in Christian Bibles; see also 4:14, 20 (4:17, 23)) :

In the vision of my mind in bed, I looked and saw a holy Watcher coming down from heaven.

Watchers are angelic beings who watch the earth, doing God’s bidding. In 1 Enoch 6-10 an elaborate story is told, drawing heavily on Genesis 6:1-4, the account of the “sons of God” who took “daughters of men” as wives. These Watchers saw the beauty of human women and two hundred of them took human wives. They taught their wives sorcery and the children born to them were giants and Nephilim. Eventually God dispatched powerful angelic beings to imprison some of the Watchers.

This interpretation of Genesis 6, and the notion of unclean spirits in Jewish thought, seems to have been common. The New Testament writers speak of the story of the Watchers in 1 Enoch with acceptance:

And the angels that did not keep their own position but left their proper dwelling have been kept by him in eternal chains in the nether gloom until the judgment of the great day.
-Jude 6

. . . in which he went and preached to the spirits in prison.
-1 Peter 3:19

For if God did not spare the angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to pits of nether gloom to be kept until the judgment . . .
-2 Peter 3:4

Unclean spirits are fallen angels, perhaps not the ones who married human women, but others who similarly existed in rebellion against heaven. In Mark 1:23, a demonic spirit is called “unclean.” We are more used to thinking of spirits as evil than unclean, which is a technical category from Leviticus and Numbers. Of all the causes of impurity in the Torah, what association with uncleanness would fall on demonic spirits? Almost certainly they were associated with death, which rendered unclean (Numbers 19).

In Yeshua in Context, chapter 4, I relate a story from Josephus in which Solomon (allegedly) discovered roots and herbs which could draw demons out through a person’s nose. A few stray tales of exorcism in the time of Yeshua involve performers with an audience doing what looks like a “magic show.” Similarly, in the apocryphal book of Tobit, demons are expelled by a sort of magical incantation involving burning fish parts.

There is no precedent for what Yeshua did: expelling demons by verbal command. No biblical figure before Yeshua did this. No demon spoke in the manner of the demons in the gospels. The clash between Son of God and fallen “sons of God” in the gospels is unique.

The theology behind the gospels and their view of demons is that of a hidden conspiracy of evil. Much of the evil that is in the world has been helped along through the influence of these fallen angels or demons. Just enough is said in the Bible about the Serpent in the Garden, about false deities and lying spirits, to make the idea credible.

New Testament writers agree. As John says, “The Son of God appeared for this purpose, that he might destroy the works of the devil” (1 John 3:8). And as Paul said, “We are not contending against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world rulers of this present darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places” (Ephesians 6:12).

And Yeshua said, “Behold, I cast out demons and perform cures today and tomorrow, and the third day I finish my course” (Luke 13:32). The resurrection, the defeat of death, is the ultimate victory over unclean spirits and all they represent. Satan is fallen. God’s kingdom is overtaking.

Kingdom at Hand?
What did Yeshua mean about the kingdom of God being at hand (soon to appear) in Mark 1:15? He followed this proclamation up by calling disciples, defeating evil spirits, and making people well. In the world to come there will be no evil, people will be well, and all will be as a family in union with each other and God. Yeshua was bringing future realities into the present. Note that many of Yeshua’s kingdom parables (Sower, Mustard Seed) represent present realities and not just future.

Sinners and Mustard Plants
Yeshua came to call sinners (Mark 2:17). The parable of the Mustard Seed is more about the plant than the seed (Mark 4:30-32). The mustard weeds are a gardener’s nightmare. They grow up all over and become nesting places for birds. One reading is that the birds that nest are undesirables, like sinners and gentiles. So the present kingdom grows up unstoppably and attracts those who might not seem like kingdom people.

Binding the Strongman
Yeshua announced his intention to enter the house of evil and plunder its goods, by first binding the strongman (Satan, see Mark 3:27). Some might read the “plunder his goods” in purely conversionary terms (converting lost people and saving them from Satan’s control), but everything in the gospels suggests Yeshua freed people from evil in more holistic ways (wellness, provision, and redemption).

Beatitudes
As I discuss in chapter 10 of Yeshua in Context, the Beatitudes (Matt 5:1-12; Luke 6:20-23) have both a present and future aspect. For example, Matthew 5:2 has a future part (“theirs is the kingdom of heaven”) and a present (“blessed are the poor in spirit”). It is more than implied that disciples hearing Yeshua’s sermon will bless the poor in spirit, comfort mourners, fill the hungry, and so on. Yeshua is calling us to live now in light of what will come in God’s kingdom.

As You Measure, Alms, Do Not Worry
It is the Father’s pleasure to give us the kingdom, says Yeshua (Luke 12:32). So we do not need the treasures of this world. But instead we should sell things and give alms (12:33). This principle is stated without balance, causing many to disregard it completely. It is not an absolute principle. Possessing things is clearly not wrong (a case I can easily demonstrate if challenged). But the balance of owning versus sharing is way off in the lives of nearly all people who have the opportunity to own many things. Treasure in heaven (not in the sky or in the future, but treasure in the heavenly court–as in reward from the one who sits on the heavenly throne) is stored up for the righteous. And Messiah tells us: “Give, and it will be given to you; good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap. For the measure you give will be the measure you get back” (Luke 6:38). So we are not to worry about our life, our food, our clothing (Luke 12:22). The Father knows we need these things. And Matthew records it this way, “When you give alms…” (6:2).

When You Fed These
There are sheep and there are goats, the blessed and the judged. Those blessed fed the least and in so doing fed Yeshua. Those judged, as Keith Green says in his famous song on the Sheep and Goats, were too busy running religious organizations to help (not that I am innocent of this myself). See Matthew 25:31-46.

The Temple State
Yeshua’s protest against the Temple (Mark 11:15-19) was about commerce in the holy precincts, about the violation of the sacred by carrying things through God’s courts, about hypocrisy in the leadership, and a protest against a Temple state that demanded obedience from the masses but which did not obey in turn. Had the Temple state followed Torah as it demanded of the people, the tithes would have been redistributed and the people blessed with abundance. See “Yeshua and the Mishnah on Carrying in the Temple” and “Yeshua and Idolatrous Coins.” Mark 11 contrasts the Yeshua-community with its faith and prayer with the Temple state (see below, “The Disciple Communities as Alternative”).

The Disciple Communities as Insiders
To you (plural, disciples) has been given the secret of the kingdom of God (Mark 4:11). To those outside, all looks like a riddle. But they will know you are my disciples by your love (John 13:35).

The Disciple Communities as Alternative
These are my mother and brothers, said Yeshua (Mark 4:34), those who do the will of God (4:35). The powers of death (some say “gates of hell”) will not be able to stand before this community (Matt 16:18). In Mark 11, Yeshua curses a fig tree right before he protests the Temple state. Afterward, he uses the fig tree as a lesson. His disciple movement will be about prayer that moves mountains and forgiving one another as their Father in heaven forgives their sins. What the Temple state cannot accomplish (bringing the world to come through righteousness), Yeshua’s disciples community will do. For more on this, see “Discipleship and the Fig Tree.”

Mark’s account is the best of all four gospels to help us reconstruct what happened. This incident is of great importance, probably being what sealed Yeshua’s doom in the eyes of the Temple state and Rome. We should read Yeshua’s actions in the giant Temple complex as a commotion, not bringing the whole Temple activity to a standstill. Yeshua acted alone and did not ask his disciples to participate.

In the comments that follow, I will point to some resources for further study, consider the sequence as narrated in Mark, and put this crucial incident in Yeshua’s life in its context.

RESOURCES FOR FURTHER STUDY
Maurice Casey, Jesus of Nazareth is a monumental summary of historical scholarship by an expert in the Aramaic of Yeshua’s time. Casey has written on the Aramaic sources of Mark’s gospel and his work has interested me so much I am working with a rabbi friend and mentor this year to start learning Galilean Aramaic and will work through Casey’s research and read DSS texts and Midrashic texts in Galilean Aramaic over the next few years. Casey covers the Temple protest on pgs 408-415.

Adela Yarbro Collins, Mark: A Commentary, in the Hermeneia series. Collins is excellent at providing examples from the Greco-Roman and Jewish sources to provide historical context. I first learned from her some of the issues surrounding Herod’s expansion of the Temple complex and how it informs Yeshua’s action of protest.

Daniel J. Harrington, The Gospel of Mark, in the Sacra Pagina series. Harrington is a well-informed and balanced commentator who values both tradition and context. I think his comments are a sane balance between mere historical inquiry (like Casey) and traditional understandings of the gospel. I do not think what we can know about Yeshua is limited to what historians can give evidence for. I think a storied epistemology (see my Yeshua in Context and an appreciation for the living presence of Yeshua in the tradition should also inform our knowledge.

COMMENTARY ON MARK 11:15-19
The following sequence from Mark is helpful to restate:
(1) Yeshua enters the Temple, likely the outer courts.
(2) Yeshua begins driving out traders and overturning some tables.
(3) Yeshua preaches against and takes action to prevent people carrying vessels (baskets, bowls, money bags) through the outer courts.
(4) Yeshua preaches from Isaiah 56:7 and Jeremiah 7:11.
(5) Yeshua’s protest becomes known to the chief priests and also the scribes.
(6) Yeshua’s action draws a crowd which prevents his immediate arrest.

What should be obvious is that Yeshua reveres the Temple and protests the Temple state. Any interpretation which assumes Yeshua wanted the Temple to be destroyed is incorrect. The proper running of the Temple would involve redistributing tithes to the poor and make it a place of God’s Presence, of shared resources, and of joy. The Temple state has made it a place of taxation without redistribution and a source of power and position for the elite.

What does Yeshua specifically oppose here? He opposes trading in the Temple courts, carrying vessels through, and filling the place of prayer in such a way as to prevent the main activity which should be here: prayer.

Collins explains that the idea of commerce in the Temple courts began with Herod enlarging the Temple area and including a Portico, like the Greco-Roman markets on their temples. Prior to this, tradition says the necessary trade (selling animals, changing money) happened on the Mount of Olives.

Maurice Casey (Jesus of Nazareth) explains Yeshua’s very plausible prohibition of carrying vessels through holy space, which is similar to the later rabbinic law, “one should not enter the Temple mount with . . . his moneybag” (m. Berakhot 9:5, see also Harrington).

Isaiah 56 is about foreigners and eunuchs in the Temple, but also describes its courts as a place for prayer. Yeshua’s main objection seems to have nothing to do with gentiles (the outer courts were used by Jews and non-Jews for prayer, as numerous New Testament texts and other sources confirm). The commerce here at Passover crowded the courts and prevented prayer. Instead of worship, the Temple was a market. This is also the point of the Jeremiah 7 text, where the prophet complains that the leadership have made of the Temple a source of personal power and enrichment instead of a place of prayer and worship.

An additional issue in the money-changing is that the Temple state required the Tyrian shekel, which was more pure in its metal content, but which had an image of Baal Melkart on it (the Syrian Hercules) and was therefore idolatrous (Collins, Casey).

The Temple state’s priority was not holiness, but commerce, power, and wealth. Yeshua’s protest action did not stop Temple commerce and was symbolic. But it drew the attention of the Temple state and also a large crowd. By the time Yeshua completed it, his arrest was certain and the chief priests had what they would need to convince Rome to execute him.

After the commentary, I will suggest a few points of application for discipleship in our time.

MARK 11:12-14, 20-25
Yeshua curses a fig tree (vss. 12-14).
In between is Yeshua’s Temple protest action (vss. 15-19).
The next morning’s lesson from the fig tree (vss. 20-25).

This whole section in vss. 14-25 is a classic example of what some have called the Markan sandwich technique. He begins to tell a story, follows with another scene which may not seem to be related, and then returns to the story. So, here, Yeshua curses a fig tree and then the story of his Temple protest action is related. But the next morning, the story comes back to the fig tree.

The episode raises a number of questions. Is Yeshua’s cursing a fig tree rational or irrational? Does the fig tree symbolize something specific and should we try to find the exact reference? Which mountain does Yeshua have in mind for being moved by prayer? How does the fig tree lesson relate to the Temple protest action?

To begin, we need to understand the seasons for figs in Israel. By Passover (April) there would usually be leaves, but no figs. By Shavuot (June), the same time as the wheat harvest, would be the early crop of figs (there are two fig crops a year in Israel’s climate). Therefore, and as Mark is careful to point out, it is irrational for Yeshua to expect figs at Passover. This means his action with the fig tree is purely symbolic. His curious action, a prophetic enactment, is meant to make the disciples curious.

The next morning, after the Temple protest action, Peter remembers the fig tree as they pass it, now brown and withered. Does Yeshua now launch into a lesson about Israel being fruitless and unworthy, as we might expect? Not at all. He launches into a lesson about the power of prayer. What could it all mean?

First, it is helpful to know that the fig comes up as a symbol in the prophets several times for Israel’s faith and fruitfulness. Micah speaks of God’s disappointment at finding no fig to eat in Israel (7:1). Hosea describes Israel as a withered fig tree without fruit (9:10). Yet the promise of a great age of peace is that every man will sit under his vine and fig tree (Isa 36:16; Mic 4:4).

Second, we should forget about some specific symbolic meaning, since Yeshua gives no such clues. Neither should we read the mountain of vs. 23 with some specific reference (as if this is about the Mount of Olives and the Zechariah 14 imagery, as some interpreters do). Yeshua does not take the lesson in this direction. Note that Yeshua’s words about faith moving a mountain come up again in Paul in 1 Cor 13:2 (“faith so as to move mountains”).

What we have here is a potent contrast between the powerful Temple state and the humble disciple group. The Temple, though holy, has become corrupt through its leadership. It is a religious institution of vast wealth and power. But it is not effective at making Israel holy and fruitful. So, Yeshua, powerless and alone, makes an ineffective protest action, an irrational act which cannot succeed (like his irrational expectation of a fig tree to have early fruit). But while Yeshua’s protest does not bring the Temple to its knees, his curse does wither a fig tree.

This leads to a lesson about prayer. The humble disciple group has more power than all the Temple state. If they do God’s will and pray, nothing is beyond their ability. God will move mountains, shake empires, and change the world through them. Their power is not in wealth or position, but in prayer, forgiveness, and faith.

DISCIPLESHIP LESSONS:
… The power of the Yeshua community is never going to be in money, position, and power over people to govern or coerce.
… The power of the Yeshua community comes from God and is based on faith and prayer.
… We should not read that we have the power to move mountains, but that God does. Thus we have no “blank check” from God here, but rather the promise that as we serve him he will move mountains and use us along the way.
… The Temple state and its leaders made the error of setting goals based on personal power and trying to make them come to pass.
… Yeshua, who has real power, does not use it to coerce. He could have smitten the Temple completely, but instead made a protest action which changed nothing. He stands for right even if his actions do not overthrow evil. So the Yeshua community stands for right even though we cannot change evil.
… Unlike the Temple state Yeshua protested, our calling as a disciple community is to understand and discern God’s purposes in healing people and the world and to stand praying for mountains to move as God wills. Our power is in togetherness, faith, and prayer centered on our wise understanding of God’s purposes, not agendas created to manipulate the process or establish power structures.
… The Jewish tradition of prayer with additional prayers and teachings by Yeshua is a good tradition which accomplishes these purposes for the disciple community as Yeshua taught us (note that Mark 11:25 is the closest Mark comes to echoing Yeshua’s prayer recorded in Matthew and Luke).

But it is impossible to exaggerate the importance of the idea that Yeshua was a prophet of the kingdom from within the story, from within the experience the disciples and crowds had of Yeshua. For them Yeshua was a potential prophet, a healer, an exorcist. How does Yeshua come across as a prophet in Mark? What sorts of things do we learn from this?

Rather than go through a boring list of passages in which Yeshua plays a prophet role, I thought I’d look more deeply into one story and reflect on the others from within it.

The classical story is, of course, Mark 8:27-38. The disciples’ answer to Yeshua’s question is, “John the Baptist; and others say, Elijah; and others one of the prophets.” Only one disciple goes further, Peter, and we wonder if all of the Twelve would have gotten this or if Peter had better insight than the others. (Yes, I know that in another gospel, John, we have Andrew telling Peter, “We have found the Messiah” (1:41)).

The popular notions of Yeshua’s identity all had to do with the role of prophet. John the Baptist and Elijah, of course, were prophets. If Yeshua wasn’t one of them returned to life, then who was he? He must be one of the other prophets (Malachi? Isaiah? It’s hard to know who else people might have imagined).

It’s curious that in Mark’s wording, it did not occur to anyone that he was simply “Yeshua the prophet,” but that he was “Yeshua with the spirit of one of the prophets upon him.” That is, we might wonder if people resisted the idea of a new prophet and thought that God might bring back one of the hallowed prophets in a kind of spiritual endowment on a contemporary person.

And what sort of prophet was Yeshua. What “prophetic” topics did he address? Leaving aside for the moment his healings and feedings, which put him in an Elijah-Elisha category, we would have to say that Yeshua was a prophet of the kingdom.

The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe in the gospel (Mark 1:15).

I will make you fishers of men (1:17) said Yeshua, meaning either “catching people in kingdom faith” or “catching and judging those who prevent the kingdom” (Jeremiah 16 uses the image of fishing for people as judgment).

I came not to call the righteous, but sinners (2:17), said Yeshua. He was calling them to a realization of the kingdom.

The days will come, when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in that day (2:20), which is a futuristic pronouncement of coming sorrow (a very prophet-like thing to say).

In 3:13; 6:46; and 9:2 he goes up on “the mountain” or “a high mountain” and gives revelation. It is a very Moses-like thing to do. In one of these instances, he said he would show those standing with him the kingdom (9:1).

To you has been given the secret of the kingdom, but to those outside everything is in parables (4:11), says Yeshua and then cites Isaiah as a precedent of a prophet, like himself, called to preach in a way that will bring judgment to the many but reward to disciples who hear and follow.

The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed upon the ground (4:26). Yeshua’s parables, even when not put into a form of “the kingdom is like” were generally understood to be about the kingdom.

The Pharisees and scribes sought a sign (8:11-13) from the prophet, perhaps not satisfied for some reason with the signs they already saw.

Yeshua made many other prophet-like pronouncements, including enactments with a fig tree and a long discourse on signs and coming events in Mark 13.

No wonder Schweitzer long ago depicted Yeshua historically in the category of a apocalyptic prophet. Likewise, Maurice Casey in his new and monumental historical Jesus book, Jesus of Nazareth, sees apocalyptic prophet as the main category for Yeshua.

In an upcoming series (“Messianism and Yeshua in Mark”) we will consider the further claim that Yeshua is Messiah. But from within the story, few could see that. Such a realization came mainly after the resurrection.

Even stories in which it seems people either hoped or actively pushed for Yeshua to take on some revolutionary role (deliverer from Rome), they may still have had prophet in mind more so that “king” or “one like David” or “Messiah.”

Ched Myers in Binding the Strongman summarizes well the ideas of resistance to Rome with the involvement of a prophet as the leader. Theudas (see Acts 5:36) promised to lead a group to the Jordan and part the waters, like Moses, Joshua, and Elijah. An action like this had military overtones, with Rome being like Egypt. In Acts 21:38 we have a reference to the Egyptian, a prophet coming from Egypt (but Jewish) who called followers to gather in the desert and come with an unarmed attack on Jerusalem. He said they would stand on the Mount of Olives and the walls of Jerusalem would crumble. This calls to mind not only Joshua, but also Zechariah’s words (chapter 14) about the Mount of Olives and the last battle. John the Baptist repeatedly denied he would lead any resistance movement, but he drew many followers out into the desert. His movement was packed with revolutionary potential.

The idea that many people regarded Yeshua as a prophet who might lead a popular resistance movement against Rome is not far-fetched. But Yeshua kept putting down such expectations. And as a prophet he gave off mixed signals, saying things about suffering, a cross, and being raised after three days.

What are we, as Yeshua’s followers now, to make of Yeshua as the prophet and even apocalyptic prophet?

It is in forgetting Yeshua’s role as a prophet that much modern religion has missed the mark. Prophets brought change in the present as well as cryptic foretastes of the future. Yeshua’s kingdom talk mysteriously is about future and present. Is the kingdom here now or coming? Many of Yeshua’s sayings can be read either way.

But when we combine Yeshua’s sayings and his actions, we find a pattern. He based present actions on the future realities of the kingdom. So, the kingdom now of Yeshua the prophet looks like the things he did and taught (healing, defeating evil, teaching love and service). The kingdom future will look like a world where everyone is healed, evil defeated, and love and service will be the norm.

So, if we take Yeshua as Messiah-for-the-future-only, as does so much modern religion, we miss the prophetic movement of Yeshua. It is about literal things, not spiritual realities to be realized in the future. Yeshua the prophet has a lot to say about how you relate to people now, to possessions, and to life itself.

Zechariah’s prophecy of the king coming on a donkey is a critical view of kingship looking ahead to the messianic age when the ideas of dominion change into peace. In the early part of Zechariah 9, the warring peoples of the Mediterranean coast will become peaceful and submit to God’s authority in the messianic era. Then, in 9:9, Daughter Zion’s king (Jerusalem in the age when promises are fulfilled) comes not as a war-maker, but bringing peace, not on a warhorse, but a donkey like the Davidic kings of old.

Yeshua deliberately evokes this scene, so those who say this is about a prophecy fulfilled miss the point. Yeshua acts out the scene, proclaiming by his action that he is this different kind of king.

The scene creates excitement and tension in Jerusalem. Yeshua is not a Judean, so the people in Jerusalem thinking about the triumphal entry limit their understanding to the idea of a prophet from Galilee. They do not entertain the idea of a messiah from Galilee. But the crowds who are in the know, those who have followed Yeshua around, they proclaim him in clear messianic terms as Son of David. Yet the fact remains that not one in the crowd truly understood. Yeshua is not to be the vanquisher of Rome, but Rome’s redeemer. The theme of Zechariah 9 stands as a witness against revolutionary notions. Yeshua is the one who makes Philistines as if they are part of the people of Israel (Zech 9:7). Yeshua declares here exactly the sort of kingship he is bringing and until the resurrection, none comprehend it.