Hi stuckinarut2, do you think that cultural attitudes may change over the centuries?
Maybe what we read about in Mark 14:51,52(NIV) was not an unusual occurrence in the Mediterranean culture of 2000 years ago.
Those verses read:
"51 A young man, wearing nothing but a linen garment, was following Jesus. When they seized him, 52 he fled naked, leaving his garment behind."
My point simply is, that while we would be embarrassed to be seen naked in public, public nudity was not a thing to be embarrassed about in those times. This was reflected in the many statues that have survived from Greek and Roman times. Like this one:
Known as "the dying Gaul", it is a sample of the art of that era. Do a search on the web, and you'll find many more.
In the ancient games of the era, the athletes competed naked, and even in the gymnasiums that the sons of the elites of the time attended, the young men would compete naked.
Its interesting to read in Maccabees of the Hellenisation of the Jews, after Alexander the Great conquered Palestine: (See 1 Maccabees ch. 1)
"10 The wicked ruler Antiochus Epiphanes, son of King Antiochus the Third of Syria, was a descendant of one of Alexander's generals. Antiochus Epiphanes had been a hostage in Rome before he became king of Syria in the year 137.[a]11 At that time there appeared in the land of Israel a group of traitorous Jews who had no regard for the Law and who had a bad influence on many of our people. They said,
Let's come to terms with the Gentiles, for our refusal to associate with them has brought us nothing but trouble. 12 This proposal appealed to many people, 13 and some of them became so enthusiastic about it that they went to the king and received from him permission to follow Gentile customs. 14 They built in Jerusalem a stadium like those in the Greek cities. 15 They had surgery performed to hide their circumcision, abandoned the holy covenant, started associating with[b] Gentiles, and did all sorts of other evil things."
So with many Greek colonies established in Palestine, many Jews wanted to "get with it" and compete in games like other people were doing. Of course, they competed naked, and this led to a cultural problem.
For Greeks it was OK to be seen naked, but they thought it shameful and suggestive to expose the glans (the head or tip) of the penis. In fact a greek athlete would pull his foreskin down and tie a ribbon around it to make sure that his foreskin would not retract during his gym or athletic practise.
If we saw that, we'd think it very strange, but that's the cultural difference. They would think that we were weird. In fact the Greeks thought the Jews were weird for exposing the glans of their penises.
Anyway the Jews that Maccabees speaks of, were embarrassed because their foreskins had been removed, and they tried it says, to have, "surgery performed to hide their circumcision."
(And no, I don't know for sure what they actually did). But we should never assume that any other group of people think the way we may think.
