Mark 12:41-44/Luke 21:1-4 – ‘The widow’s mite’

This entry is part 51 of 101 in the series: Tough texts
- Genesis 1:26 – Why a plural name for God?
- Genesis 3 – traditional and revisionist readings
- Genesis 3:16b – ‘Your desire shall be for your husband’
- Genesis 5 – the ages of the antedeluvians
- Genesis 6:1f – ‘The sons of God’
- Genesis 6-8 – A worldwide flood?
- Genesis 12:3 – ‘I will bless those who bless you’
- Genesis 22 – “Abraham, kill your son”
- Exodus – Who hardened Pharaoh’s heart?
- Exodus 12:37 – How many Israelites left Egypt?
- Leviticus 19:18 “Love your neighbour as yourself”
- Joshua 6 – the fall of Jericho
- Joshua 10 – Joshua’s ‘long day’
- Judges 19:11-28 – The priest and the concubine
- 1 Samuel 16:14 – ‘An evil spirit from the Lord’
- 2 Sam 24:1, 1 Chron 21:1 – Who incited David?
- 1 Kings 20:30 – ‘The wall collapsed on 27,000 of them’
- Psalm 105:15 – ‘Touch not my anointed’
- Psalm 137:8f – ‘Happy is he who dashes your infants against the rocks’
- Isaiah 7:14/Matthew 1:23 – “The virgin will conceive”
- Daniel 7:13 – ‘Coming with the clouds of heaven’
- Jonah – history or fiction?
- Mt 1:1-17 and Lk 3:23-38 – the genealogies of Jesus
- Matthew 2:1 – ‘Magi from the east’
- Matthew 2:2 – The star of Bethlehem
- Matthew 2:8f – Can God speak through astrology?
- Matthew 2:23 – ‘Jesus would be called a Nazarene’
- Matthew 5:21f – Did Jesus reject the Old Testament?
- Matthew 7:16,20 – ‘You will recognise them by their fruit’
- Matthew 8:5/Luke 7:3 – Who asked Jesus to help?
- Matthew 8:5/Luke 7:7 – son? servant? male lover?
- Matthew 8:28 – Gadara or Gerasa?
- Matthew 10:23 – ‘Before the Son of Man comes’
- Matthew 11:12 – Forceful entry, or violent opposition, to the kingdom?
- Matthew 12:40 – Three days and three nights
- The Parable of the Sower – return from exile?
- Mt 15:21-28/Mk 7:24-30 – Jesus and the Canaanite woman
- Matthew 18:10 – What about ‘guardian angels’?
- Matthew 18:20 – ‘Where two or three are gathered…’
- Matthew 16:18 – Peter the rock?
- Matthew 21:7 – One animal or two?
- Mt 24:34/Mk 13:30 – ‘This generation will not pass away’
- Matthew 25:40 – ‘These brothers of mine’
- Matthew 27:46/Mark 15:34 – Jesus’ cry of dereliction
- Matthew 27:52f – Many bodies raised?
- Mark 1:41 – ‘Compassion’, or ‘anger/indignation’?
- Mark 2:25f – ‘When Abiathar was high priest’
- Mark 3:29; Luke 12:10 – The unpardonable sin
- Mark 4:31 – ‘The smallest of all the seeds’?
- Mark 6:45 – ‘To Bethsaida’
- Mark 12:41-44/Luke 21:1-4 – ‘The widow’s mite’
- Luke 2:1f – Quirinius and ‘the first registration’
- Luke 2 – Was Joseph from Nazareth, or Bethlehem?
- Luke 2:7 – ‘No room at the inn’
- Luke 2:8 – Shepherds: a despised class?
- Luke 4:16-19 – An incomplete quotation?
- Luke 7:2 – ‘Highly valued servant’ or ‘gay lover’?
- John 1:1 – ‘The Word was God’
- John 2:6 – symbol or history?
- John 2:12 – Did Mary bear other children?
- When did Jesus cleanse the Temple?
- John 3:16f – What is meant by ‘the world’?
- John 4:44 – ‘His own country’
- John 7:40-44 – Did John know about Jesus’ birthplace?
- John 7:53-8:11 – The woman caught in adultery
- John 14:6 – “No one comes to the Father except through me”
- John 14:12 – ‘Greater deeds’
- John 20:21 – “Just as the Father has sent me, I also send you.”
- John 21:11 – One hundred and fifty three fish
- Acts 5:1-11 – Ananias and Sapphira
- Acts 5:34-37 – a (minor) historical inaccuracy?
- Romans 1:5 – ‘The obedience of faith’
- Romans 1:18 – Wrath: personal or impersonal?
- Rom 3:22; Gal 2:16 – faith in, or faithfulness of Christ?
- Romans 5:18 – ‘Life for all?’
- Rom 7:24 – Who is the ‘wretched man’?
- Romans 11:26a – ‘And so all Israel will be saved’
- 1 Corinthians 14:34 – ‘Women should be silent in the churches’
- 1 Corinthians 15:28 – ‘The Son himself will be subjected to [God]’
- 1 Corinthians 15:29 – ‘Baptized for the dead’
- 1 Corinthians 15:44 – ‘Raised a spiritual body’
- 2 Corinthians 5:21 – ‘God made Christ to be sin for us’
- Galatians 3:17 – How much later?
- Galatians 3:28 – ‘Neither male nor female’
- Galatians 6:2 – ‘The law of Christ’
- Galatians 6:16 – The Israel of God
- Ephesians 1:10 – ‘The fullness of the times’
- Philippians 2:10 – ‘The name that is above every name’
- 1 Cor 11:3/Eph 5:23 – ‘Kephale’: ‘head’? ‘source’? ‘foremost’?
- Colossians 1:19f – Universal reconciliation?
- 1 Thessalonians 2:14f – ‘The Jews, who killed Jesus’
- 1 Timothy 2:4 – ‘God wants all people to be saved’
- 1 Timothy 2:11f – ‘I do not allow woman to teach or exercise authority over a man’
- 1 Timothy 4:10 – ‘The Saviour of all people’
- Hebrews 6:4-6 – Who are these people?
- Hebrews 12:1 – Who are these witnesses?
- 1 Peter 3:18-20 – Christ and the spirits in prison
- 2 Peter 3:9 – ‘The Lord wishes all to come to repentance’
- Jude 7 – ‘Unnatural desire’
- Revelation 7:4 – The 144,000
- Revelation 14:11 – ‘No rest day or night’
21:1 Jesus looked up and saw the rich putting their gifts into the offering box. 21:2 He also saw a poor widow put in two small copper coins. 21:3 He said, “I tell you the truth, this poor widow has put in more than all of them. 21:4 For they all offered their gifts out of their wealth. But she, out of her poverty, put in everything she had to live on.”
Not exactly a ‘troublesome text’, this one, but a text which certainly invites a second look.
The usual approach is to understand Jesus as commending sacrificial giving. Edwards, for example, says that the main point is the woman’s modelling of discipleship: ‘No gift, whether of money, time, or talent, is too insignificant to give, if it is given to God. And what is truly given to God, regardless how small and insignificant, is transformed into a pearl of great price. What may look like a great gift, conversely, may in reality be little in comparison with what one could give. The widow’s giving “ ‘all she had’ ” is a true fulfillment of the call to discipleship to follow Jesus by losing one’s life (Mk 8:35). The final Greek words of the chapter might be paraphrased, “she lay down her whole life.” That is what Jesus will do on Golgotha.’
Hurtado takes a similar approach: ‘The virtue of the widow’s gift lies in her giving all she had (v. 44), illustrating for the disciples the wholesale commitment p 207 for which Jesus called (e.g., Mk 8:34–9:1; 10:28–31). Her action exemplifies the complete devotion spoken about in Mk 12:28–34, where it is hinted that commitment to God is not to be measured in the impressiveness of the sacrificial gift one is able to offer (v. 33). The elevation of this simple woman to such an exemplary place captures the essence of Jesus’ words that in God’s judgment “many who are … last [will be] first” (Mk 10:31).’
So also Hooker: ‘The story is a reminder to Mark’s readers that the humblest and poorest of them can make a worthy offering to God.’
Other commentators have suggested an additional layer of meaning.
One such is Wright, who thinks that the additional meaning is that ‘when we read this story in the light of Jesus’ riddle about David’s Lord and David’s son we discover a strange affinity. One might have thought she was ‘merely’ putting in two copper coins, but in fact she was putting in everything she had. One might have thought the Messiah was ‘merely’ David’s son—a human king among other human kings. But in fact, in the Messiah, Israel’s God has given himself totally, given all that he had and was.’
Writing in the Women’s Bible Commentary, Elizabeth Struthers Malbon is perhaps, on to something when she srites: ‘Later interpreters misuse this poor widow by making her the model for a stewardship campaign. She is, rather, an image of the demands and risks of discipleship that Jesus has proclaimed and is, at the moment of his telling of her story, in the midst of enacting—giving his whole life.’
The approach taken in Harper’s Bible Commentary also suggests that this story might be taken in more than one way: ‘The incident provides the bridge between Jesus’ attacks on the Temple and its authorities, Mark 11-12, and the predictions of the destruction of the Temple in Mark 13. It also prepares for the woman who anoints Jesus in Jerusalem who, like the widow, gave “what she had” (Mk 14:8; cf. 12:44) and for the discipleship of other women during the passion narrative (Mk 15:40-41, 47; 16:1-8).’
Garland (NIVAC) is content with understanding this story as an example of sacrificial giving. Yet he agrees that ‘one can give this incident a quite different spin, which laments that this widow gives so sacrificially to this den of thieves. The woman is to be praised, but giving sacrificially to a corrupt, spiritually bankrupt, and oppressive temple is to be lamented. She exhibits unquestioning devotion to the temple, a fruitless cause that exploits her. The high priests live in luxury on their cut from the contributions made by the poor. Hers is a misguided gesture, a case of the poor giving to the rich, the victim lining the pockets of the oppressor. The costs to operate this extravagant temple are therefore one of the things that “devour the resources of the poor.”
Matt Anslow develops this alternative (or complementary) approach. Note the context: this incident in preceded by Jesus’ denunciation of the scribes (vv38-40) and is followed by his prediction of the destruction of the temple (Mk 13:1f). Note also that Jesus does not commend the woman’s giving. It looks, then, as if his teaching is meant not as a celebration, but as a lament. The woman had given all that she had. Quite possibly, she would have nothing to eat for several days to come. Her wealth, such as it was, had been ‘devoured’ (v40) by those responsible for the temple treasury. An institution that should have protected her, exploited her. This interpretation, it has to be said, is consistent with Jesus’ more general critique of the temple and its institutions.
Counting against this interpretation, however, is the observation that ‘The Lukan Jesus is thoroughly in favor of the temple and its worship: as recently as 19:45–46 he has, at least symbolically, put to rights the abuses interfering with temple worship; and for this whole section he is presented as a regular daily temple-teacher.’ (Nolland, WBC)