Crowd: The word is indefinite on number, but sometimes it must mean a comparatively large body of people. The following covers some of the instances.
Now Jesus began to go all over Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom, and healing every[j] disease and sickness[k] among the people. Then the news about him spread throughout Syria. So they brought to him all those who were afflicted, those suffering from various diseases and intense pains, the demon-possessed, the epileptics, and the paralytics. And he healed them. Large crowds followed him from Galilee, the Decapolis, Jerusalem, Judea, and beyond the Jordan. When he saw the crowds, he went up on the mountain, and after he sat down, his disciples came to him (Matthew 4:23-5:1 CSB). Wherever Jesus went, the crowds went with him. How do you envisage that?
I note that the demographic of the crowds above is very broad. People came from every part of the "Jewish" territory, crossing the political divisions of the Roman era. (Syria, above, would refer to the Roman Province, though I doubt the news was widely heard in the population of the extended Province. According to Matthew in the above, Jesus' healing and teaching ("good-newsing") was taking place all over Galilee. Galilee was part of the Province; removed from Jerusalem, Judea and beyond the Jordan. Nonetheless, even so, we are specifically told Jesus attracted people from those same parts.
The Gospels identify some locations of Jesus' activity. We certainly hear of Capernaum, Tiberius, Magdala, Cana, Nazareth, Bethsaida, but not major centres such as Sepphoris and Ptolemais. Did Jesus visit the major centres? Did he visit regardless of dominant religious allegiances? (Note his involvement in the Decapolis - that may be a clue.) In what follows I am following Matthew's sequence, without necessarily thinking there is a chronology here.
Background: Jesus had a considerable amount to say. People, many people, wanted to hear Jesus.
When Jesus finished speaking, the crowds were surprised at his teaching. He taught them like someone with authority, and not like their teachers of the Law of Moses (Matthew 7:28-29 CEV). That seems to be a general comment on what Jesus was doing. The immediately preceding context in Matthew is a collection of Jesus' teachings, in which he endorsed and strengthened the understanding of God's Law. Mark & Luke attach this comment as response in the Capernaum synagogue. No doubt surprise was a frequent and common reaction to the Man from Galilee.
Crowds continued, but supplicants were not deterred. As Jesus came down the mountain, he was followed by large crowds. Suddenly a man with leprosy[a] came and knelt in front of Jesus. He said, “Lord, you have the power to make me well, if only you wanted to.”(Matthew 8:1-2 CEV). I think we can assume that these large crowds were attracted by what they were hearing - which may not always have been direct from Jesus himself.
Sometimes Jesus needed space! Now when Jesus saw a crowd around him, he gave orders to go over to the other side. And a scribe came up and said to him, “Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go” (Matthew 8:18-19 ESV). I wonder if he did? At this point in the account, Jesus crossed to the Decapolis and gave life-changing help to a couple of very troubled men.
Encouraged to go back across to his own town (Capernaum), it did not take long before many people were assembling with Jesus. (Did they remain in his vicinity, or come and go?) A paralysed man was brought from somewhere. And he got up and [fn]went home. But when the crowds saw this, they were [fn]awestruck, and they glorified God, who had given such authority to men (Matthew 9:7-8 NASB20). In fact Jesus had forgiven the man as well as healed him. Was that the day which marked the emergence of serious concern about Jesus on the part of the religious authorities?
Not that every official had problems with Jesus. This synagogue leader had come seeking Jesus’ help for his critically ill child. (Did the man come from the Caperaum synagogue?) When Jesus entered the synagogue leader’s house and saw the noisy crowd and people playing pipes, he said, “Go away. The girl is not dead but asleep.” But they laughed at him. After the crowd had been put outside, he went in and took the girl by the hand, and she got up (Matthew 9:23-25 NIV). That crowd may perhaps have filled a house, but, unless there was a lot of overflow, it was surely a more modest group. (The other Synoptics do not call them a crowd.)
One of Jesus’ striking acts, hard to imagine in this culture today, caused a great stir. In fact Matthew wrote of crowds in the plural. (Perhaps I might imagine one throng passing the news on to one or more other mobs.) So Jesus cast out the demon, and then the man began to speak. The crowds were amazed. “Nothing like this has ever happened in Israel!” they exclaimed.
But the Pharisees said, “He can cast out demons because he is empowered by the prince of demons.” Jesus traveled through all the towns and villages of that area, teaching in the synagogues and announcing the Good News about the Kingdom. And he healed every kind of disease and illness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them because they were confused and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. (Matthew 9:33-36, NLT). Again Matthew has the plural. Jesus' impact was repeated and widespread.
Jesus answered a serious inquiry from the famous John (the baptist). When John’s messengers had gone, Jesus[a] began to speak to the crowds about John:[b] “What did you go out into the wilderness to look at? A reed shaken by the wind? (Luke 7:22-24 NRSVUE). Unless the plural is meant to convey very large numbers, perhaps it conveys different groupings gathering around Jesus, just as they had around John.
Jesus had a message for his people. Again he began to teach by the sea, and a very large crowd gathered around him. So he got into a boat on the sea and sat down, while the whole crowd was by the sea on the shore (Mark 4:1 CSB). The people wanted to hear what Jesus was saying to them. He was pressed by the crowding (note the initial “very large”) and needed more space and a secure “platform”, a floating one! [Matthew and Luke describe here large crowd/crowds.] I imagine streams of people converging on Jesus, and gathering together, as near to him as they could get.
The time came when listening crowds had a deliberate change of pace. Jesus told the crowds all these things in parables, and he did not tell them anything without a parable, so that what was spoken through the prophet might be fulfilled:
I will open my mouth in parables;
I will declare things kept secret
from the foundation of the world.[a][b]
Then he left the crowds and went into the house. His disciples approached him and said, “Explain to us the parable of the weeds in the field” (Matthew 13:34-36, CSB). Surely the story content was memorable and could be recalled and even believed later. Had a new point been reached in Jesus’ relation to his community? He now spoke in parables to crowds, and still they came. (He also taught in synagogues and had conversations.)
On at least one day the account indicates that “crowds” (plural) might convey a large crowd in total. The focus here seems to shift between the total group and possible smaller components. After Jesus heard about John, he crossed Lake Galilee to go to some place where he could be alone. But the crowds found out and followed him on foot from the towns. When Jesus got out of the boat, he saw the large crowd. He felt sorry for them and healed everyone who was sick. That evening the disciples came to Jesus and said, “This place is like a desert, and it's already late. Let the crowds leave, so they can go to the villages and buy some food.”
Jesus replied, “They don't have to leave. Why don't you give them something to eat?”
But they said, “We have only five small loaves of bread and two fish.” Jesus asked his disciples to bring the food to him, and he told the crowd to sit down on the grass. Jesus took the five loaves and the two fish. He looked up toward heaven and blessed the food. Then he broke the bread and handed it to his disciples, and they gave it to the people.
After everyone had eaten all they wanted, Jesus' disciples picked up twelve large baskets of leftovers. There were about 5,000 men who ate, not counting the women and children.
At once, Jesus made his disciples get into a boat and start back across the lake. But he stayed until he had sent the crowds away. Then he went up on a mountain where he could be alone and pray. Later in the evening, he was still there (Matthew 14:13-23, CEV). It was “the crowds” that Jesus had dismissed in some way.
Reading on further in Matthew: Jesus went on from there and walked beside the Sea of Galilee. And he went up on the mountain and sat down there. And great crowds came to him, bringing with them the lame, the blind, the crippled, the mute, and many others, and they put them at his feet, and he healed them, so that the crowd wondered, when they saw the mute speaking, the crippled healthy, the lame walking, and the blind seeing. And they glorified the God of Israel.
Then Jesus called his disciples to him and said, “I have compassion on the crowd because they have been with me now three days and have nothing to eat. And I am unwilling to send them away hungry, lest they faint on the way.” And the disciples said to him, “Where are we to get enough bread in such a desolate place to feed so great a crowd?” And Jesus said to them, “How many loaves do you have?” They said, “Seven, and a few small fish.” And directing the crowd to sit down on the ground, he took the seven loaves and the fish, and having given thanks he broke them and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. And they all ate and were satisfied. And they took up seven baskets full of the broken pieces left over. Those who ate were four thousand men, besides women and children. And after sending away the crowds, he got into the boat and went to the region of Magadan (Matthew 15:29-39 ESV). Again the plural, and the singular, and the “great”. How do you envisage the gathering? Are the numbers estimates or are they accepted terms for assemblies? (I am aware of even more ancient numbered precedents in far off Athens, and closer Rome, for their voting procedures.)
And yet another example with “great crowd”, “whole crowd”, and “the crowd”, each expression referring to the same people, in full or part. When they came to the disciples, they saw a great crowd around them and some scribes arguing with them. When the whole crowd saw him, they were immediately overcome with awe, and they ran forward to greet him. He asked them, “What are you arguing about with them?” Someone from the crowd answered him, “Teacher, I brought you my son; he has a spirit that makes him unable to speak (Mark 9:14-17 NRSVUE). Do you get the impression of thronging people? But thronging people who formed a coherent body.
Even when Jesus moved to a different part of the country the text makes the same note of crowds coming - multiple large crowds… When Jesus had finished saying these things, he left Galilee and went down to the region of Judea east of the Jordan River. Large crowds followed him there, and he healed their sick (Matthew 19:1-2 NLT). The emphasis is simply that Jesus was continuing to encounter lots of people - though not necessarily still from Galilee, nor the same people.
Possibly the large crowd in this following example was functioning in separate groups? (Did all of them want the men to be quiet?) As they were leaving Jericho, a large crowd followed him. There were two blind men sitting by the roadside. When they heard that Jesus was passing by, they shouted, “Lord,[a] have mercy on us, Son of David!” The crowd sternly ordered them to be quiet, but they shouted even more loudly, “Have mercy on us, Lord, Son of David!” (Matthew 20:29-31 NRSVUE). To shout down a crowd was no mean feat, but they needed help. If a large body of people were “tagging along” behind, some would be closer to the “front” and able to try to intervene.
As the story of Jesus proceeds to its familiar end there is still crowding to notice. A very large crowd spread their clothes on the road; others were cutting branches from the trees and spreading them on the road. Then the crowds who went ahead of him and those who followed shouted:
Hosanna to the Son of David!
Blessed is he who comes in the name
of the Lord![a]
Hosanna in the highest heaven!
When he entered Jerusalem, the whole city was in an uproar, saying, “Who is this?” The crowds were saying, “This is the prophet Jesus from Nazareth in Galilee” (Matthew 21:8-11 CSB). Crowds in front and crowds behind. Were they essentially groups on their way to the City? The “city” had its questions; the “large crowd” or “crowds” had an answer.
The crowd phenomenon of course had to influence the opponents, and even give them pause. When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables, they perceived that he was speaking about them. And although they were seeking to arrest him, they feared the crowds, because they held him to be a prophet (Matthew 21:45-46 ESV). The rejecting elite were not in the crowd(!), but they were fully aware of the crowd.
We arrive at the time of increasing confrontation. Jesus did not refuse to speak to the elite, even the answers he gave were not what they wanted to hear. And when the crowd heard it, they were astonished at his teaching (Matthew 22:33 CEV). Even at that time large numbers of people were being influenced by Jesus.
The religious elite did not like Jesus' questions of them. And so to the text at the start of this post. David himself calls him ‘Lord.’ How then can he be his son?” The large crowd listened to him with delight (Mark 12:37 NIV). What exactly was so delightful that day? Was it simply that “their Jesus” had stumped that elite?
The arrest and detention of Jesus was also marked by crowds? While he was still speaking, Judas came, one of the twelve, and with him a great crowd with swords and clubs, from the chief priests and the elders of the people. (Matthew 26:47 ESV). The crowd here was one delegated by the powerful. Mark and Luke similarly report a crowd. Hardly can this be the same people, feared by the elite, who were members of the crowd listening avidly to Jesus..... At that hour Jesus said to the crowds, “Have you come out with swords and clubs to arrest me as though I were a rebel? Day after day I sat in the temple teaching, and you did not arrest me (Matthew 26:55 NRSVUE). Curiously, Matthew again has the plural. It might be stretching it a bit far to suggest mixed attitudes even here in this (surely smaller) mob? Luke’s report strikingly indicates members of the elite were present. They would be distinct from any rabble!
And there is a very marked change in the crowd occurrences from that point. At the festival the governor’s custom was to release to the crowd a prisoner they wanted. At that time they had a notorious prisoner called Barabbas.[a] So when they had gathered together, Pilate said to them, “Who is it you want me to release for you—Barabbas, or Jesus who is called Christ?” For he knew it was because of envy that they had handed him over.
While he was sitting on the judge’s bench, his wife sent word to him, “Have nothing to do with that righteous man, for today I’ve suffered terribly in a dream because of him.”
The chief priests and the elders, however, persuaded the crowds to ask for Barabbas and to execute Jesus. The governor asked them, “Which of the two do you want me to release for you?”
“Barabbas!” they answered.
Pilate asked them, “What should I do then with Jesus, who is called Christ?”
They all answered, “Crucify him!”
Then he said, “Why? What has he done wrong?”
But they kept shouting all the more, “Crucify him!”
When Pilate saw that he was getting nowhere, but that a riot was starting instead, he took some water, washed his hands in front of the crowd, and said, “I am innocent of this man’s blood.[b] See to it yourselves!” (Matthew 27:15-24 CSB). The elite had worked on those crowds. The gathered crowd Pilate sees here seems to be single-minded. Their mind is so unlike that of the previous crowds.
Mark makes it plain that Pilate had the antagonistic crowd in his focus - they were there and then! Wanting to satisfy the crowd, Pilate released Barabbas to them. He had Jesus flogged, and handed him over to be crucified (Mark 15:15 CEV). The authority belonged to Pilate. The authors make it clear that he had no specific charge against Jesus to order that he be executed.
I wonder -
did Pilate in time come to regret giving the mob that choice?
did Pilate wish he had released Jesus?
did Barabbas become an obedient subject?
Note the clear contrast between the crowds in the presence of Pilate and the crowds that came before the final Jerusalem visit. (I considered the death-demanding crowds, versus the cheering crowds, in a previous post.) It surely seems very unlikely these were the “same” people. John did report a specific indication of earlier critical and condemnatory crowd attitude amongst some in touch with Jesus (see above). Do you think the climate changed and (some of) the earlier crowds saw that Jesus was not after all a “winner”. Did those who were not really committed to him simply “melt away” and leave the field to the people aligned with the elite opposition? We do know that even Jesus’ close followers eventually “took to their heels”.
Change? You may be aware of the impact of the "swinging voter"? (Elections may be decided by very few voters.) Our media tells of politicians abandoning their party/platform.
We see lifelong unions disintegrated by failure.
Any of us may come to "think better" on an issue.
Can people decide to oppose the facts?
Did people who heard Jesus speak end their involvement by demanding his death? (Heard Jesus? He, himself, gave the explanation of that - See Matthew 13/Mark 4/Luke 8) for the fate of his words.)
So what to make of it all? What do you think?
The crowd phenomenon is a marked part of the account.
Crowds may be manipulated?
Crowds may be fickle?
Crowds may be wrong?
Crowd members need to use their brains?
Popularity contests do not count?
Being popular with God is what matters?
Without being less evil, evil designs may, in fact, serve God’s good purposes?
Two alternative crowds to belong to?
People (we) have to make a choice, for, or, against. Then we stand out from the other crowd, whichever that is.
Previous post: https://jesussaviour4unme.blogspot.com/2024/03/jesus-and-crowds.html
Image: Photo by Matthew Spiteri on Unsplash
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