Liveblogging the Gospel of Mark IV: Out Stealing Horses

Chapter 11 of the Gospel of Mark must be the oddest I've read so far. This is the one where he drives the moneychangers out of the temple. We've all heard about that one. But it is also the one in which he rebukes a fig tree. He also sends the boys out to steal a horse.

You think I make this stuff up? Here is the fig tree (Mark 11:13-14):

And seeing a fig tree afar off having leaves, he came, if haply he might find any thing thereon: and when he came to it, he found nothing but leaves; for the time of figs was not yet.

And Jesus answered and said unto it, No man eat fruit of thee hereafter for ever. And his disciples heard it.

And the horse. Well, perhaps a "colt," but still (Mark 11:2-6):

...Go your way into the village over against you: and as soon as ye be entered into it, ye shall find a colt tied, whereon never man sat; loose him, and bring him.

And if any man say unto you, Why do ye this? say ye that the Lord hath need of him; and straightway he will send him hither.

And they went their way, and found the colt tied by the door without in a place where two ways met; and they loose him.

And certain of them that stood there said unto them, What do ye, loosing the colt?

And they said unto them even as Jesus had commanded: and they let them go.

Some will say this isn't theft because consensual. I'm not so sure. Imagine only slightly modernized version. Two strangers show up and start untethering your horse.

--Hey, where you goin' with that horse?
--The boss needs him!
--Oh. Okay.

"Christ's coming into Jerusalem" recounts a commentator, "thus remarkably shows that he was not afraid of the power and malice of his enemies." My guess is that the police court judge is going to have a real good laugh over that one.