Mark 6:14-29 — He's Back?

Mark 6:14-29
vv.14-16 Now King Herod heard of Him, for His name had become well known.
       And he said, "John the Baptist is risen from the dead, 
                                                   and therefore these powers are at work in him."
       Others said, "It is Elijah."
And others said, "It is the Prophet, or like one of the prophets."
             But when Herod heard, 
            he said, "This is John, whom I beheaded; 
                                    he has been raised from the dead!"

Panoramic view of Herodium, the ruins of Herod's hilltop palace SE of Jerusalem.
Photo by Eitan Ya'aran - Own work, Attribution, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=21498477

Comments:

Today, the ruins of Herodium stand witness to the ruined life of its builder. He had many opportunities to repent at the teaching of John but did not do so. He was all about entertainment but not much on humility before God. 

These three verses above are the only contemporaneous narrative in this section. Verses 17-29 are a parenthetical flashback offered by Mark as an explanation of Herod's paranoia regarding a possible return of John the Baptist.

Why would Herod have thought that Jesus was John the Baptist resurrected? 
Jesus had been teaching before John had been killed, although much of his fame came afterward. John is not reported to have performed any miracles, while Jesus did too many to count. John neither ate nor drank "normal" food nor wine, while Jesus did. John lived in the desert while Jesus ministered in the cities and towns (until the crowds became too large). So what would have made Herod think that Jesus was John raised up from the dead? 

There are three possibilities that cross my mind...

First, and most likely would be that they spoke the same message—repentance. They both urged a sincere return to God on the part of the people. I find that we don't normally think of Jesus preaching repentance, but it was, in fact, a major tenet of his teaching. 

Second, both John and Jesus enjoyed a tremendous amount of popular support and that would have been something of concern to Herod, since he was more than a little insecure about his authority over the people. The loyalty of the followers of Jesus would be tested later, however, at this time Jesus'popularity was very high.

Third, it may be that while John didn't perform miracles during his life (John 10:41), there is an explanation of Herod's statement in verse 14, "John the Baptist is risen from the dead, and therefore these powers are at work in him." Herod might have been referring to the supernatural works he would expect someone who had returned from the dead to do, rather than what John had done during his earthly ministry. If John had been granted the miracle of resurrection, why wouldn't he also have been granted the power to do lesser miracles? In this light, it seems like a more reasonable assumption on Herod's part if it was John. But it wasn't. It was Jesus!

What if we applied this kind of thinking to the resurrected Christ? If Herod could believe that John the Baptist, having been raised from the dead would do many great miracles, why do we have trouble believing that Jesus, having been actually raised from the dead, can do miracles in our lives today?

Up from the grave, He arose,
With a mighty triumph o’er His foes,
He arose a Victor from the dark domain,
And He lives forever, with His saints to reign.
He arose! He arose!
Hallelujah! Christ arose!

(Robert Lowrey, 1874)



The Garden Tomb, Jerusalem