John, The greatest

Upon hearing of their masters death, his disciples come and take the body and bury it in a tomb. And an important chapter is closed. Somewhere else Jesus says that you don't get men any better than John (I tell you, among those born of women no one is greater than John; yet the least in the kngdom of God is greater than he- Lk 7:28). This verse draws particular attention to the closing of one chapter and the inaugeration of the next. John was the forerunner standing firmly in a long tradition of men of Yahweh- a prophet in the classical mode- a good man- the best of fallen men; and yet now as God's rule entered into this fallen realm in a new and previously unexperienced way, the very least of people under or in this rule, would be greater than John- new creatures- children of God, brothers and sisters (and mums and dads?) of Jesus.