Mark 14:2

2 For they said, "Not at the feast, lest there be an uproar by the people."

Mark 14:2 Meaning and Commentary

Mark 14:2

But they said not on the feast day
The feast of the passover, and of unleavened bread, which was nigh at hand, and would be two days hence, when there would be a great concourse of people from all parts to keep it: and therefore they did not choose to seize him, and put him to death at that time,

lest there should be an uproar of the people;
or among them, lest they should rise in his favour, and rescue him out of their hands; (See Gill on Matthew 26:5).

Mark 14:2 In-Context

1 Now after two days it was the Passover and the feast of Unleavened Bread, and the chief priests and the scribes were seeking how, [after] arresting him by stealth, they could kill [him].

2 For they said, "Not at the feast, lest there be an uproar by the people."

3 And [while] he was at Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, [as] he was reclining for a meal, a woman came holding an alabaster flask of very costly perfumed oil of genuine nard. [After] breaking the alabaster flask, she poured [it] out on his head.

4 But some were expressing indignation to one another: "Why has there been this waste of perfumed oil?

5 For this perfumed oil could have been sold for more than three hundred denarii and given to the poor!" And they began to scold her.