GREAT THINGS ENTERPRISE
CLAUDE BLACK
Mark 13:32
I Don’t Know
It would be interesting to count how many times during the day I use the phrase “I don’t know,” whether spoken or merely thought. The ancient Greek storyteller Aesop told a parable about Zeus creating man with two bags. One large bag, worn on the back, is filled with his own faults; the other small bag, worn on the chest, is filled with everyone else’s faults. Man sees and criticizes the one small bag on the chest—that is, everyone else’s faults—but not the huge sack worn on the back, his own faults.
I borrow Aesop’s parable: The small sack worn on my chest is filled with what I know. The huge sack worn on the back is filled with what I don’t know. A wit once said that a person is ignorant of his own ignorance—he doesn’t know what he doesn’t know. Another wit said that ignorance is curable, but the cure—learning—is often painful.
When Jesus taught his disciples, he said, “But concerning that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, except the Father.” (Mark 13:32) The word Mark used in this instance for “knows” is not the usual word. This word (οἶδα, eido) means to “see with physical eyes”; it’s akin to the expressions “I see what you mean” or “I see what you are saying.” Scholars have various opinions about Jesus’ statement that the Son does not know the “day or hour” when his prophecy will be fulfilled—that is, whether Jesus referred to the destruction of the Jerusalem temple or the Second Advent. Many think that Jesus was speaking about himself as the incarnate, human Son in this instance. This is the only place where Mark uses the “unadorned” ὁ υἱός (ho huios, “the son”) as a title for Jesus.
Leaving the scholarly discussion aside for a moment, for the believer, faith fills the space between what I presently know or experience, on the one hand, and what the Father knows, on the other; hence, believers “walk by faith.” (2 Cor. 5:7)
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