Mark 14:1

1 It was now two days before the Festival of Passover and Unleavened Bread. The chief priests and the teachers of the Law were looking for a way to arrest Jesus secretly and put him to death. ¹

Mark 14:1 Meaning and Commentary

Mark 14:1

After two days was [the feast of] the passover
That is, two days after Christ had delivered the foregoing discourse concerning the destruction of the temple at Jerusalem, was the feast of the passover; which was kept in commemoration of God's passing over the houses of the Israelites, when he destroyed the firstborn of Egypt, and made way for the deliverance of the children of Israel from thence: and which was kept by eating the passover lamb; and which, properly speaking, is the feast of the passover:

and of unleavened bread;
which was the same feast with the other, called so from the unleavened bread which was then eaten; though with this difference, the passover lamb was only eaten on the first night, but unleavened bread was eaten for seven days together. The Syriac, Persic, and Ethiopic versions render it, "the passover of unleavened bread", leaving out the copulative "and".

And the chief priests and Scribes sought how they might take him by
craft;
that is, Jesus,

and put him to death:
for which purpose they assembled together in Caiaphas the high priest's palace, and there took counsel together how to accomplish it; see ( Matthew 26:2-4 ) .

Mark 14:1 In-Context

1 It was now two days before the Festival of Passover and Unleavened Bread. The chief priests and the teachers of the Law were looking for a way to arrest Jesus secretly and put him to death.

2 "We must not do it during the festival," they said, "or the people might riot."

3 Jesus was in Bethany at the house of Simon, a man who had suffered from a dreaded skin disease. While Jesus was eating, a woman came in with an alabaster jar full of a very expensive perfume made of pure nard. She broke the jar and poured the perfume on Jesus' head.

4 Some of the people there became angry and said to one another, "What was the use of wasting the perfume?

5 It could have been sold for more than three hundred silver coins and the money given to the poor!" And they criticized her harshly.

Cross References

• 1. 14.1Exodus 12.1-27.