<p>14:23&nbsp;<em>And after he had dismissed the crowds</em>- The phrase is repeated as in :22, probably in recognition of the miracle performed in managing to send these crowds away empty handed, with no visible Messianic Kingdom. At least, the power of personality in the Lord was very great to be able to get Himself out of this situation.</p>
<p><em>He went up the mountain by himself to pray-</em>&nbsp;The term&nbsp;<em>kata idios</em>&nbsp;[&quot;by himself&quot;] is used about 16 times in the Gospels, covering around 12 different occasions. The need to be alone with the Lord or with the Father is therefore a significant theme. The Lord had departed to the deserted place because of this need to be&nbsp;<em>kata idios</em>&nbsp;(:13), but His plans were thwarted by the unexpected tenacity of the crowd in following Him there. In this we see another picture of His humanity. But ultimately, God granted Him the need He felt to be&nbsp;<em>kata idios</em>, to be alone with God. Perhaps one reason He so insistently sent both the crowd and the disciples away was because He knew He simply had to be alone with God. And there can be times like this for us too. No matter how stupid we might appear in secular life, there can be a time when you just have to go and sit in the toilet for 5 minutes in your lunch break and pray. The Lord uses the term in speaking of how we are each given something very personal which we are to use in His service-&nbsp;<em>kata idios</em>, 'alone by ourselves', or as in AV &quot;according to his several ability&quot; (Mt. 25:15). Each sheep is called by the Lord&nbsp;<em>kata idios</em>, AV &quot;by name&quot; (Jn. 10:3). And therefore the judgment of each believer will be&nbsp;<em>kata idios</em>, AV &quot;according to his own labour&quot; (1 Cor. 3:8). There is a very wide range of translations of this phrase. But the idea is that we were each individually called by the Lord and given different callings, and our judgment will be according to this. This is not to say that there is anything other than one basic faith, Gospel, Hope, Lord etc. But in many denominations and fellowships the idea is pushed that each believer must adopt an identical, detailed statement of understanding and calling. Yet in practice, the frames of our calling and the Lord's hopes for our responses vary significantly between individuals.</p>
<p>The fact the Lord Jesus prayed to His Father is one of the profoundest and logically strongest evidences that He was not God in any Trinitarian sense. The basic facts of the Gospel records were simply not given their full weight by the unBiblical politicians who first created the Trinity doctrine. The liberal theologian Hal Taussig observes that other theologians haven&rsquo;t written much about Jesus at prayer- for this very reason, that of itself it contradicts Trinitarian dogma: &ldquo;Because Jesus at prayer confuses theological categories of &ldquo;divine&rdquo; and &ldquo;human&rdquo; (is there any need for a divine Jesus to pray?), theologians have rarely been interested in Jesus at prayer&rdquo; (Hal Taussig,&nbsp;<em>Jesus Before God: The Prayer Life of the Historical Jesus</em>&nbsp;(Santa Rosa, CA: The Polebridge Press, 1999) p. 7). Taussig&rsquo;s question &ldquo;is there any need for a divine Jesus to pray?&rdquo; is ultimately impossible for Trinitarian apologists to answer.</p>
<p><em>When evening came, he was there alone-</em>&nbsp;This is a pointed repetition of the information that the Lord was there&nbsp;<em>kata idios</em>- alone apart, by Himself. His aloneness with God is being brought to our attention. Prayer in one sense has to be a lonely experience. This is all surely why the Lord Himself is frequently pictured by the Gospel writers as making an effort to be alone in prayer to the Father (Mk. 1:35; 3:13; 9:2; Mt. 14:13,23; 17:1; Lk. 6:12; 9:28; 22:39,41). This is all some emphasis. Be it rising in the early hours to go out and find a lonely place to pray, or withdrawing a stone&rsquo;s throw from the disciples in Gethsemane to pray&hellip; He sought to be alone. Jn. 6:15 emphasizes this repeated feature of the Lord&rsquo;s life: &ldquo;He departed again into a mountain himself alone&rdquo;. The fact He often [&ldquo;again&rdquo;] retreated alone like this is emphasized by three words which are effectively saying the same thing- departed, himself, alone. Much as we should participate in communal prayers or in the prayers of our partner or our children, there simply has to be the time for serious personal prayer in our lives. And I have to drive the point home:&nbsp;<em>Are you doing this?</em>&nbsp;Putting it in other terms- are you alone&nbsp;<em>enough.&nbsp;</em>Incident after incident shows the Lord doing something alone, and then the disciples somehow being presented as doing the same. Take the way He departed &ldquo;himself alone&rdquo; when the crowd wanted to make Him king; and then soon afterwards we read that the crowd perceived that the disciples had likewise departed &lsquo;themselves alone&rsquo; [same Greek phrase and construction, Jn. 6:15,22]. The point is that the world is presented as perceiving the disciples in the same terms and way as they did Jesus, even when, in this case, Jesus was not physically with them. And we too are to be &ldquo;in Him&rdquo; in our work of witness for Him.</p>