The Donkey and the Palm

Palm Sunday seems like such a strange turn of events in the narrative of Jesus’ ministry. Previously, he had worked pretty hard at staying under the radar.  But here, he shifts gears and steps onto center stage…riding a donkey. There are so many interesting things happening in this passage. Jesus pre-arranges transportation into Jerusalem with locals from a nearby village. Not a horse, but a donkey and its colt. Odd. He’s so close to Jerusalem. Why get a donkey at this point…unless he had a message and he wanted to be noticed. As a typical Jewish teacher, he was taking this pivotal moment as a chance to use his every move to teach; everything planned and choreographed.

A donkey was not only a common service animal in first century Israel, it had quite a long history in the Hebrew Bible. Donkeys showed up all over the place in the Torah, the history writings and in the prophets.  

One story that may have come to mind for on-lookers of this scene can be found in 1 Kings 1:33-38 when Solomon uses David’s donkey to ride into Jerusalem as the rightful king while Adonjah, a usurper, tries to impress with a triumphal entry on a war horse.