On Palm Sunday, we often think of Jesus Christ entering Jerusalem on a donkey with the Jewish crowds cheering, “Hosanna!” Yet, this story as frequently told, does not do justice to the prophetic power of this story.
This entrance into Jerusalem has been prophesied in the Old Testament, hundreds of years before Christ.
Zechariah 9:9 says, “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is he, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey” (ESV).
The King of Zion was supposed to come as other kings of his time did, with their war horses and chariots; yet, Zechariah prophesies of someone ‘humble and mounted on a donkey.’
Culturally, donkeys were seen as cheap, everyday work animals. If horses symbolized conquest and status, donkeys were precisely the opposite. But Jesus did not ride into Jerusalem on any donkey, but a ‘colt, the foal of a donkey,’ or a young, unbroken male donkey. In fact, Matthew 21:7 provides added context that the disciples “brought the donkey and the colt and put on them their cloaks, and he [Christ] sat on them.” The young colt had never been ridden before and was probably restless, so the disciples brought the mother donkey with them and put their own cloaks on the young donkey as a cover for Jesus to sit on. In short, Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a donkey, which is humbling (or humiliating) enough already, but more specifically, a young donkey that had never been ridden before, sitting on his disciple’s sweaty cloaks.
The one who comes as King chooses not only humility, but the lowest form of it. Christ’s entrance displays a humility intensified to the point of discomfort, even humiliation. In doing so, the Son of Man (the title that Jesus most often referred to himself as), reveals what true humanity looks like. Humanity, as we live it, strives upward, toward recognition, power, control. But Christ, in restoring humanity, moves downward.
Palm Sunday, then, is not simply the celebration of a coming king. It is the unveiling of a different kind of kingship and a different vision of humanity that we are invited to live into. This Palm Sunday, let us remember the humble king, not as a contrast to power, but as its redefinition.
Penn Epistle 