GREAT THINGS ENTERPRISE
CLAUDE BLACK
Mark 12:22
Epithets
An “epithet” is a word derived from the Greek language that literally means “to put upon.” In English, the word has come to mean an adjective or phrase used to describe a person, place, or thing. For example, Alexander, the son of the Macedonian king Philip II, received the epithet “Alexander the Great.” Some epithets comment upon someone’s terrible behavior, such as the czar of Russia, “Ivan the Terrible.” Some epithets refer to places: “The Eternal City,” Rome; “The Windy City,” Chicago; or “The City That Never Sleeps,” New York City.
Famous epithets fill American history: “The Father of his Country,” George Washington; “Old Hickory,” Andrew Jackson; “Honest Abe,” Abraham Lincoln; or “Give ‘Em Hell Harry,” Harry S. Truman.
Mark wrote about a group of Sadducees who sought to discredit Jesus with a story that seemed to conflict with his teaching about the resurrection of the dead—a fact that they rejected. In their story, seven brothers who lived together each took the woman as his wife; one brother after another married her, and died childless. “And the seven did not leave offspring. Last of all, the woman also died.” (Mark 12:22)
Was this an actual family? Writers speculate one way or another, but the general impression is that the Sadducees fabricated this story to entrap Jesus. There’s nothing in the scenario about the woman except that she was married to seven brothers in succession—nothing about her skill as a homemaker, her personality, her accomplishments, except that she did not have children, then died herself. What epithet might the woman have claimed? “Seven Husbands for One Bride,” “The Bearer of Seven Griefs,” “The Seedless Woman,” or “The Widow of Unending Vows.”
One is never too young or too old to consider one’s own epithet. “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive what is due us for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.” (2 Corinthians 5:10)
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