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Who Is This, Then?
The storm obeys (Mark 4:35–41)
7 min read
Who is like You?
the questiontis ara houtos estin"who is this, then?"
Mark 4:41the disciples, among themselves in the boat
Yet that Name is now sitting in the boat, on a cushion, in wet clothes, and He has just done what only that Name can do.
It is evening on the Sea of Galilee, and the sea has a bad reputation. It lies low, hemmed in by hills, and without warning the wind can drop down through the ravines and whip the water into walls within minutes. The men in the boat know this; most of them were born here, they have fished this sea their whole lives. Yet these seasoned fishermen are terrified when the storm breaks, the waves slap over the side and the boat starts filling. They bail, they haul on the ropes, they shout to each other over the wind. In the stern of the boat, on the rower's cushion, their Master lies asleep.
Asleep. While the water rises and the men fight for their lives, He sleeps, exhausted, His head on a cushion, like a child who knows nothing of danger. That is the first riddle of this scene. Throughout the Old Testament the sea was the ancient enemy, the roaring chaos that only YHWH could tame. Now that sea is doing everything it can to swallow the Man who once made it, and He notices nothing. They shake Him awake, and what comes out of their mouths is more a rebuke than a prayer, raw and human: Teacher, don't You care that we're dying? Are You lying there asleep while we drown?
He gets up. No panic, no hurried prayer flung heavenward for help. He speaks straight to the storm, the way you speak to an animal that has gone too far. Quiet, He says to the wind. Be still. The word Mark uses there means, literally, shut your mouth. Stand still, lie down. The wind drops away, all at once, the water goes smooth as a mirror, and there is dead silence. That is not how a storm lies down when it has blown itself out. That is how an animal lies down when it hears its master. The sea, which a moment ago was behaving like a god, obeys a tired man who has just told it off.
After the storm the men are more afraid than during it. When the wind was blowing, they were afraid of the water. Now that it is calm, they are afraid of Him. They feared with great fear, Mark writes, and they whisper to each other the question this whole book turns on: who is this, then, that even the wind and the sea obey Him? They have watched Him eat and sleep and grow tired; they know where He comes from, they know His mother. Now He does the one thing that, in all their sacred songs, belonged to One alone.
They already had the key. They had grown up on the psalms, and those psalms knew who tames the sea. You rule the raging of the sea, they sang; when its waves rise, You still them. He stills the storm, so that its waves are silent. Thus far and no farther, God had said to the proud waves; here your pride will break. One Name belongs in those sentences, and it is not the name of a carpenter from Nazareth. Yet that Name is now sitting in the boat, on a cushion, in wet clothes, and He has just done what only that Name can do. The question "who is like YHWH?" has echoed through all of Scripture; in one night on the water it has become another question, with the same answer: who is this, then?
They did not yet dare say it aloud, and that is understandable, for the answer is too large for a fishing boat. The God who created the sea and set her boundaries, who once split a path through her to free slaves and who comforted the psalmist in his sleepless night with the memory of that path, had been on board with them the whole time: tired enough to sleep, close enough to touch. They had thought they had to survive a storm with a sleeping teacher. Now they row across the still water to the other side with the Lord of the sea on board. There will be other storms. But whoever is in that boat knows from now on Who is lying on the cushion in the stern.
ExpertThe sea, and Who tames her
In the Old Testament, taming the sea belongs to YHWH alone (Ps 89:9; 93:3–4; 107:29; Job 38:11). In the ancient Near East the sea is the chaos-power par excellence; the confession that YHWH quiets her with a word is a confession of His incomparability.
Jesus addresses the sea as an opponent: siōpa, pephimōso (Mark 4:39), "be quiet, be muzzled," with the same verb He uses to silence an unclean spirit (Mark 1:25). The disciples' fear shifts: during the storm they are "afraid" (deiloi, 4:40); after the calm "they feared with great fear" (4:41), an awe that now belongs to Him. Their question tis ara houtos estin ("who is this, then?") is the New Testament form of mi kamocha. Whether Mark builds in that echo deliberately cannot be proven; that the psalms ascribe this authority to YHWH alone is in the text.
ExcursusThe God who sleeps
The psalms know the complaint of one who experiences God as asleep: "Wake up! Why do You sleep, Lord? Rouse Yourself, do not reject us forever!" (Ps 44:23). In almost the same scene, someone else is asleep. Jonah lay sleeping in the hold, while the pagan sailors prayed for their lives and the storm threatened to break the ship apart. There the parallel stops, and the difference says everything. Jonah had to go overboard before the sea grew calm; the storm did not settle until the disobedient prophet vanished into the waves. Jesus stills the sea with a single word, on His own authority, without anyone having to go overboard. Yet a day would come when He too, as a second and greater Jonah, would be thrown into the deep to still a greater storm than the one on the Sea of Galilee: the storm between God and humanity. On the sea He stilled the water with a word. On the cross He stilled it by drowning in it.
HeartDon't You care?
"Teacher, don't You care that we're dying?" It is one of the most honest lines in the gospel, and many have prayed it in their own words. It is the accusation of someone caught in the storm while God seems to be asleep: the feeling that He is there, somewhere, but not awake, not involved, not moved by what is happening to you. If you recognize that line, you are in good company. The disciples prayed it out loud, in the middle of the water. Jesus did later ask them why they were so afraid, but first He stood up and silenced the storm.
It was true that He was sleeping. It was not true that He didn't care. Elsewhere Mark shows what goes on in Him when He sees people in need: "When He saw the great crowd, He was moved with compassion for them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd" (Mark 6:34). On the lake He was not on the shore, or in some safe harbor miles away. He was in the same boat the whole time, in the same water, with the same waves breaking over Him, and His sleep was the rest of Someone who trusts His Father. Even when He seems to be sleeping, He has never stepped out of the boat. And when He gets up and speaks, even the sea lies down.
*A note on the source text. The storm on the sea: Mark 4:35–41 (cf. Matthew 8:23–27; Luke 8:22–25). The sleeping Jesus on the cushion: 4:38; "be quiet, be still" (pephimōso): 4:39; cf. 1:25; "who is this, then?": 4:41. YHWH as the only one who tames the sea: Psalm 89:9; 93:3–4; 107:29; Job 38:11. The sleeping Jonah: Jonah 1:5–6. The complaint "why do You sleep?": Psalm 44:23. The compassion of Jesus: Mark 6:34. The divine Name as YHWH.*