We know that Jesus fell foul of several groups of people. The Pharisees showed their opposition as early in Mark’s story as in 3:6. The Sadducees who represented the aristocratic establishment centered on the temple and the sanhedrin also plotted his downfall. There were the Romans whose soldiers carried out the grim sentence of death by crucifixion. The question underlying these factual details is one that congregations often are too timid to