In today's gospel, the writer Mark was trying to stir the deep memories of the Jews with his use of the image of a Shepherd. In the very long history of the Jews, they had always tended sheep. In fact, we can recall the story of long before the Jews had been Israel, when Abraham and his wife Sarah left their homeland for the Promised Land and took their many sheep along with them. You may recall that at one time even Moses tended the sheep of his father-in-law. The great King of Israel, David himself, was a shepherd. In fact, David was called from the fields when he was tending sheep to be anointed by Samuel to be King of Israel. Sheep and shepherds are in the memory DNA of the Jews at the time Mark is composing his gospel.