The older RSV Bible reads “his friends” and a newer
edition says “his family” went out to seize him, but the Greek phrase translates
as “those around him.” This phrase frequently refers to someone’s envoys or
adherents but sometimes can refer to a person’s relatives. The context adds to
the ambiguity, since the list of the Twelve immediately precedes these verses,
but his mother and “brothers” are specifically mentioned in verse 31. The
question is this: Were his disciples trying to protect him from the people who
thought he was “beside himself,” or was his family coming to seize him, perhaps
to take him away from a compromised reputation? Since “those around him” were
the people who “went out,” and “his mother and his brothers . . . [were]
standing outside,” while the disciples were the people on the inside, it seems
logical to assume that the people who came to “seize” him were his relatives.
The text does not state the place from which they “went out,” which adds to the
ambiguity of this text.
Next, Mark switches attention to a dialogue between Jesus
and the Jerusalem scribes, who were the better educated among the Pharisaic
party (Mk 3:22-30). Some of them from Jerusalem opened up the discussion by
accusing Jesus of being possessed by the “prince of demons.”
Jesus poses the problem that if he were casting out
demons by the power of Satan, then Satan’s kingdom would be divided against
itself and would be self-destructing. This is an argument against the charge
that he casts out demons by the power of demons. Next, he explains his power to
bind the “strong man” demons so that he can “plunder [the] house”—that is, take
the possessed person outside the power of Satan’s kingdom. This argument augments
the first one.
Finally, since the scribes have accused Jesus of having
an unclean spirit, they have blasphemed the Holy Spirit because they attributed
a spiritual good—exorcism—to an evil spirit. Therefore, they are not able to be
forgiven and have put themselves in a most dangerous place spiritually.
The section of our emphasis here is Mark 3:31-35, when Jesus’
mother and “brother” appear “outside” the crowd that is sitting around him. The
text says nothing about trying to seize Jesus, which isn’t in continuity with
Matthew’s version of the event. They simply ask for him and call him. The culmination
of this passage is the saying that his mother and brothers and sisters are
those who do the will of God, as in Matthew 12:50. Note the slight difference of
wording: instead of “the will of my Father in heaven,” here it is simply “the
will of God.” (Mitch Pacwa, Mary, Margin, Mother, and Queen: A Bible Study
for Catholics [Huntington, Ind.: Our Sunday Visitor Publishing Division,
2014], 105-6)