“The next day” was the day after Jesus had arrived at Bethany, about 2 miles from Jerusalem to visit and dine with Lazarus whom he had raised from the dead. The year was probably AD 30 and this report from John’s first century account of the life, death and rising again of Jesus proceeds to record the build-up of opposition against him.
However, there was a “large crowd” in Jerusalem at their Passover festival. Passover, rather like Jersey’s annual festival marking the liberation of Jersey from Nazi occupation in 1945, marked the anniversary of the peoples release from Egyptian slavery by their LORD God around BC 1350.
This crowd, welcoming Jesus, shouts its welcome using sayings recorded centuries earlier in the nation’s Book of Psalms (Psalm 118). This man Jesus is welcomed because he as come to them in the name of the LORD as promised to them by the LORD.
In fact Jesus, having found a young donkey, sat upon it, just as it is written, “Fear not, daughter of Zion! Look! Your king comes, sitting upon a foal of a donkey!”
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| Jesus now confirms the truth of what the crowd has been shouting. He does this by finding a young donkey and carrying on his journey into Jerusalem sitting on it. He does this because a prophet named Zechariah, writing around 520 BC, meticulously recorded the promise of the LORD God (to Zion, aka Jerusalem) that the LORD God would, one day, enter Jerusalem in that way.
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‘Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is he, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.’ (Zechariah, Jerusalem, c. 520BC)
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His disciples did not know these things at the first, but, when Jesus was glorified, they then remembered that it was these things about him having been written, and these things they did to him.
Not even Jesus’ disciples knew at the time what it all meant.
So this crowd - being with him when he called Lazarus from the tomb and raised him up from the dead ones - was testifying. And through this the crowd met him - because they heard this thing to have been done to him, this sign.
One “crowd” was testifying as to who Jesus really was – the one which had seen Lazarus raised from the dead, in fact after four days in the grave. Another “crowd” had joined them – those who had listened to their testimony. Both “went out to meet” him. The Greek word which the biographer originally used and which is translated “went out to meet” is hypantesis. It was used in connection with official royal welcomes.
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So the Pharisees said towards themselves, “You observe that you are accomplishing nothing. Look! The world came away behind him.”
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‘For this I was born and for this purpose I came into the world—to testify to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.’ (Jesus to Pontius Pilate, AD 30)
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| For the religious Pharisees, this arrival in Jerusalem was an (almost) overwhelming blow to plans to rid themselves (and the earth) of Jesus. And of Lazarus. Only almost. They did succeed in the end to rid the earth of him. But not the heaven. |
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