A
Asyncritus
Guest
THE YOUNG MAN (Mark 14.51.52)
52 And he left the linen cloth, and fled from them naked.
This is a very curious inclusion in the account of the Lord’s arrest.
There seems to be no reason why it should be here, and the sparseness of the information we’re given leaves the whole thing hanging in the air.
Much in this article is therefore speculation, and the reader must judge and balance the probabilities.
The Greek word ‘neaniskos’ is used in two separate contexts in the gospels, and both of the ‘young men’ involved are possible candidates. Of course, there must have been innumerable other ‘young men’ but perhaps these two deserve some special consideration.
Candidate #1
Lk.7.14 And he came and touched the bier: and they that bare him stood still. And he said, Young man (neaniskos), I say unto thee, Arise.
He arose, and was returned to his mother – and the two of them were immediately and forevermore in the Lord’s debt.
They must have become His disciples, and at the Passover when He was killed, they too had gone up to Jerusalem.
The young man, as young men do, may have listened to Him in the temple, and followed Him around diligently, listening, learning, and perhaps fearing for what was going to happen to Him as he heard words like:
Mk 12.7 But those husbandmen said among themselves, This is the heir; come, let us kill him, and the inheritance shall be ours. 8 And they took him, and killed him, and cast him out of the vineyard.
There is also the possibility that he was one of those in the upper room that night. There were others in that room as is suggested by these words of the Lord:
He had earlier spoken generally:
Mk 14.18 And as they sat and did eat, Jesus said, Verily I say unto you, One of you which eateth with me shall betray me.
But here, becomes more specific:
Mk 14.20 And he answered and said unto them, It is one of the twelve, that dippeth with me in the dish.
He might have said ‘It is one of you twelve’ if they were the only ones there, but ‘one of the twelve’ suggests that the twelve were being singled out for special mention from those in the room.
That is speculative, I concede, but may merit some consideration.
If we assume that to be the case, then the young man knew that they were leaving, but may not have known that they were headed for Gethsemane, and so, followed later on.
There are two suggestive facts which come into play now.
1 The cloth wrapped about him was of linen – and linen is a very expensive fabric even today. Where would he get such an expensive thing? In a wealthy household, such as that of Joseph of Arimathea, who provided the linen burial clothes for the Lord’s body to be wrapped in.
It certainly wasn’t a big piece of cloth, or it would have been wrapped round him too many times (like a sari) for anyone to grab and take away from him, as did happen.
2 He was naked under it – and that suggests that he grabbed it in haste on his way out – but that doesn’t explain why he was naked in the first place. He may, therefore, been washing himself when he heard Jesus and the disciples going out, and simply grabbed what was nearest to hand in his haste to keep up with them.
But it remains a strange thing to have done, even so.
Why wasn’t he named?
To protect him.
There shortly followed Saul’s savage onslaught on the disciples of the Lord, and Saul was unlikely to have been the only such persecutor of the disciples. It is entirely possible that the better-known disciples, such as Joseph of Arimathea, Nicodemus, Mary, Martha and Lazarus were slain in the not too distant future.
This young man was therefore in extreme danger, having risked arrest as a follower of Christ. In the general darkness of Gethsemane, his face was not recognised, and he escaped vengeance, temporarily at least. Naming him would have surely resulted in his death in the persecutions.
A Digression
If the surmise is correct, then this raises the point that the gospels were written at an extremely early date, far earlier than the ‘scholars’ generally care to acknowledge. A little research soon reveals the reason why they all with one voice date them as post-AD 70.
The reason for that is their complete unwillingness to accept the fact that the Olivet prophecy was or could have been spoken in AD33 or thereabouts by the Lord. Since the idea that a prophet could possibly have foretold the event with such graphic precision is anathema to them, then they land themselves in considerable dating difficulties, and have to produce ludicrous theories as to why they were written so late – as they think.
The ludicrousness is emphasised if we imagine that the events of the Second World War which ended in 1945 only began to be written down in 1975!
That those earth-shattering events of the Lord’s life, ministry and resurrection should not have been written as they happened – at least in diary form – is plainly nonsensical in the extreme.
Matthew Mark and John could write, since the gospels bear their name, so is it not foolish to suppose that they didn’t record the events as they happened?
I here venture the suggestion that Matthew, Mark and John were written during the 40 days after the Lord’s resurrection. Luke was written shortly after the events of the Acts had begun, and the ‘many who have taken in hand to draw up a narrative’… (Lk 1.1) are in fact the other three gospel writers.
The ones attesting the truth of John’s gospel (Jn 21.24 This is the disciple which testifieth of these things, and wrote these things: and we know that his testimony is true) are now clearly the other disciples who knew exactly what had happened, and whose testimony is that of eye-witnesses.
If the supposition is correct, then there is enormously good reason for us to see that the extensive common ground in the first three gospels is due to the supervision that the Lord exerted over their composition.
He knew that these writings were going to be the most powerful agents for the propagation of the gospel down the centuries, and made certain that they contained exactly what He wanted them to embody.
The copying processes began then too, and as the persecution and scattering took place the copies went with the disciples into the four corners of the earth.
Candidate #2
Is the rich young man who came to Jesus.
The same arguments apply to him as to Candidate #1 , but his being rich, may explain the ‘linen’ cloth.
Conclusion
The extreme gratitude shown by this youth (if the identification is correct) is an example to us.
Christ died so we might have life – and there is nothing too great for us to do in thankfulness for the salvation He has bought us with his life.
He will save us from death, and the least we can do is obey His commandments, no matter where they may lead us.
This youth was prepared to risk arrest, imprisonment and maybe even death.
We can do no less.
