Mark 14:43-52--Betrayal and Arrest of Jesus

Mark 14:43-52
English Standard Version

Betrayal and Arrest of Jesus
43 And immediately, while he was still speaking, Judas came, one of the twelve, and with him a crowd with swords and clubs, from the chief priests and the scribes and the elders. 44 Now the betrayer had given them a sign, saying, “The one I will kiss is the man. Seize him and lead him away under guard.” 45 And when he came, he went up to him at once and said, “Rabbi!” And he kissed him. 46 And they laid hands on him and seized him. 47 But one of those who stood by drew his sword and struck the servant of the high priest and cut off his ear. 48 And Jesus said to them, “Have you come out as against a robber, with swords and clubs to capture me? 49 Day after day I was with you in the temple teaching, and you did not seize me. But let the Scriptures be fulfilled.” 50 And they all left him and fled.

A Young Man Flees
51 And a young man followed him, with nothing but a linen cloth about his body. And they seized him, 52 but he left the linen cloth and ran away naked.

---

Recall that Jesus was the one who told Peter, James and John, "It is enough; the hour has come. The Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise, let us be going; see, my betrayer is at hand.” (41b-42).  As soon as Jesus said this (and while He was still speaking), Judas Iscariot came with a crowd (mob) armed with swords and clubs.  They had come from the chief priests and scribes and elders, meaning they were not the regular "army" of Israel but probably members of the Temple guard and we know there were some servants of the chief priests mixed in as well, as we'll see in just a minute.

Judas had arranged a sign with the mob that he would greet Jesus and kiss Him in order to identify Him.  It's hard to believe at this point that any of these men wouldn't recognize Jesus, but perhaps there were still people that didn't know Jesus's face and needed to have Judas identify Him.  Judas goes up to Him and calls Him, "Rabbi" which means teacher, but would also have meant that Judas put himself under the authority of Jesus and His teaching, which is clearly a lie, and once Judas had kissed Him, the crowd put their hands on Jesus to try to take Him by force.

Peter, doing what he thought Jesus had commanded and still trying to prove that he would not betray Jesus and would even be willing to die for him, reaches for his sword and must have started swinging it wildly and ended up cutting off the ear of the servant of the high priest.  It's not recorded here, but Jesus tells Peter to put His sword away and that if He needed it, He could call on twelve legions of angels to defend them.  If only Peter had been listening to Jesus's prayer, he'd understand that Jesus as surrendering not to these men so much as to the will of the Father.  Jesus also heals the man whose ear had been cut off which should have been a sign to them that He was not the criminal that they had been told He was.

Then Jesus asks why they waited to form this mob to come out and arrest Him at night when day after day, He had been in the Temple preaching where the Temple guards would have had authority to arrest Him (it's highly questionable whether they had any authority or jurisdiction to arrest Him outside the Temple grounds).  We know the answer to this because the Bible tells us.  They tried to order the Temple guard to arrest Him while He was in the Temple and they refused to do so, and then they became afraid of the crowd and would not touch Him while the crowds were around.  They are going to try to keep the arrest and trial secret and under the cover of darkness (not legal under the Mosaic Law).  However, Jesus made the point that all this had been done to fulfill the Scriptures (that the Messiah would be betrayed by someone close to Him).

At this, all the disciples fled to try to save themselves from also being arrested.  Likely the crowd would have tried to arrest and execute all of them if they could have.  Sure, they really wanted Jesus, but if they had the chance to take out all the other apostles, they probably would have tried.  We also see mention here of a young man who had been following and watching and when the mob tried to seize him, he left the linen cloth that he was covered in and ran away naked.  That fact is not recorded in any other gospel, so there is some assumption that this was John Mark telling us in his own way that he was an eyewitness to these events (he would have been young compared to the others that were there).