1. Mark 2:20 (ESV)
  2. Exposition

When will the bridegroom be taken away from the guests?

Mark 2:20 (ESV)

20 The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in that day.

At the beginning of the quotation it says that days (plural) will come when he is taken away. This makes it difficult to regard the taking away as referring exclusively to Jesus’ suffering and death. It also says that he will be taken away “from them” and that suggests a reference to the time in which Jesus is not with his disciples (on earth). The verb taking away points, in combination with “from them,” not directly to Jesus’ death, but to his being taken away from the “sons of the bridal chamber.”1