The author responds to Elliot’s critique of a historical–metaphorical reading of Jesus’ apocalyptic language. He asks for concrete examples of the New Testament “diluting” imminent-parousia expectations, noting that some passages (e.g., Matthew’s thief-in-the-night) still address only Jesus’ contemporaries. He argues for two distinct “comings”: one linked to judgment on Jerusalem within that generation, and a later, more distant vindication of the churches amid the pagan world. He maintains that Jesus’ imagery draws almost entirely on Old Testament prophetic language, not Persian or Hellenistic apocalypticism, and that cosmic motifs function metaphorically to describe world-shaking historical events rather than a literal end of history.
It’s a while since I’ve posted anything here. Been a bit too busy. So I thought I’d post this response to Elliot’s recent comment—just to keep the site ticking over. He has some good reflections on my defence of the historical reading of Jesus’ apocalyptic language against criticisms made by Dale Allison in his chapter on “Jesus & the Victory of Apocalyptic” in Jesus & the Restoration of Israel, edited by C. C. Newman (1999). Here’s Elliot’s comment, slightly emended for clarity:
…if your view is correct you need to explain why the new testament authors change the words of an imminent coming as the gospels get later and later, they become on purpose less apocalyptic due to failed expectations. Doesn’t context determine meaning? Jesus was using apocalyptic language that at that time would have been understood literally due to Persian and hellenistic influence on apocalyptic writings. Judaism had incorporated new ideas that were not present in the OT like a ‘cosmos’ and end of history. If Jesus meant it all metaphorically he would be unusual for his time and place but makes no effort to explain to his audience he meant it like the prophets because he would have to or else he would be misunderstood. Which tells me he was like any other apocalyptic Jew of his time. Thoughts?
So two main questions. 1. Does the New Testament correct the expectation of an imminent parousia? 2. Isn’t the interpretive context for Jesus’ apocalyptic teaching a later, more extravagant Jewish apocalypticism, influenced by Persian and Hellenistic thought, rather than the Old Testament? I can’t really do justice to this in a short space, but here are some thoughts.
1. It would help to have a few clear examples of the dilution of apocalyptic expectation in the New Testament to work with. It’s difficult to address a generalisation. Elliot, what did you have in mind?
I discussed Matthew’s inclusion of the thief-in-the-night saying, which could perhaps be read as an admission that Mark 13 had not been fulfilled in the events of AD70. But the exhortation to stay awake is still addressed only to the immediate group of disciples; there is no attempt in the narrative to extend it to subsequent generations—your children and your children’s children.
I would argue that there are, in effect, two “comings” of the Son of Man in the New Testament.
The first has reference to the deliverance and vindication of the disciples in connection with the judgment on Jerusalem. The time-frame for this is determined with some precision—within the lifetime of some of the disciples—because it is the present wicked and adulterous generation of Jews which is being judged. The outcome is not a new creation but the establishment of a “kingdom”—a nobleman goes away to a far country to receive a kingdom and eventually returns to judge and rule over Israel (Lk. 19:11-27).
The second “coming” (the second second coming?) has reference to the deliverance and vindication of the churches in the Greek-Roman world at the time of the conversion of the nations. This second “horizon” is more distant and less sharply defined and was indeed deferred by centuries. This no doubt generated some anxiety about its fulfilment, but it was still their horizon, not ours—a judgment on their world, not on ours.
2. The literary context for Jesus’ “apocalyptic” language is almost exclusively the Jewish scriptures. I see very little evidence of direct Persian or hellenistic influence. What does Jesus say that isn’t anticipated in the Old Testament? So the question is only: how is the “cosmic” language of Isaiah or Joel, for instance, to be read in its biblical context? And I think that it consistently depicts world-shaking historical events.
For that reason, I think it would have been “unusual” for Jesus not to have used the language metaphorically. There’s a fairly widespread popular assumption in the synoptic Gospels that he was one of the prophets—and a good deal of what he says and does suggests that he meant to confirm that impression.
There is nothing in the Gospels that points to the relevance of extra-biblical apocalyptic texts or movements for the interpretation of Jesus’ teaching. Perhaps the prominence of the judgment of Gehenna in his teaching owes something to the wider popularity of the term in apocalyptic thought at the time, but I would still argue that the interpretive background is Jeremiah’s grim warning about the dead being thrown into the Valley of the Son Hinnom during the siege by the Babylonians.
I agree that eventually a Jewish-apocalyptic end-of-history element enters the New Testament that is not there in the Old Testament. But this is not part of Jesus’ Jerusalem-centred prophetic-apocalyptic outlook—and indeed is presented in quite different terms. It only really appears at the end of Revelation after a well-marked sequence of historical events: judgment against unrighteous Israel, judgment against pagan Rome. The witness of the apostles in the Greek-Roman world was that a significant period of “messianic” rule over the nations would precede any final resolution of history.
Thanks Andrew great reply it is something I have been recently struggling with. So in your view what verses in the new testament are still relevant for the future? is there still new creation and ressurection to come? Has the kingdom bin and gone..
@Elliot:
Thank you. I would say that the kingdom as the rule of Christ over the nations embraced by the New Testament apostolic mission has been and gone. We are not in Christendom anymore, Toto. We have to deal with that reality. Jesus still reigns over the church in the midst of his enemies, and there will be a final judgment of all the dead and remaking of heaven and earth as envisaged in Revelation 20-22. In the meantime, though, there is a lot of history to be getting on with.
@Andrew Perriman:
Thanks. Just off the cuff how do you see gentiles in relation to sin in light of these passages… Whoever commits sin ,transgresses THE LAW, for SIN IS TRANSGRESSION of the LAW”;
“you know he was manifested to take away OUR sins, and in him is no sin”
“Therefore by the Deeds of THE LAW shall no flesh be justified, for by the law is the KNOWLEDGE of sin”
“For until the law, sin was in the world, but sun is NOT IMPUTED where there IS NO LAW”. It has been suggested gentiles are not imputed with sin…
@Elliot:
I haven’t tracked down those verses—the ESV doesn’t even have the word “imputed” in the New Testament. But I would say that they likely do not apply to gentiles. It’s about the Jewish Law and Jewish sins.
The leading or primary argument in the New Testament is that Jesus died because of Israel’s sins and for the redemption of Israel.
That is Paul’s contention in Romans 3, for example: the Law makes it clear that Jews are no less subject to sin than the Greeks; the Law holds Israel accountable so that God may legitimately judge the Greek world; but God has demonstrated his “covenant faithfulness” to Abraham, etc., apart from the Law by putting Jesus forward as a propitiation for the persistent, historical transgressions of his people as a people.
The argument has to be understood in corporate or national terms: the thought behind the Old Testament quotations in Romans 3:10-18 is that the powerful wicked in Israel sin against the weak righteous in Israel. In that respect, redemption is sociologically rather than anthropologically determined.
Gentiles then benefit somewhat incidentally from the judgment and salvation of unrighteous Israel. The redemption of Israel apart from the Law opens the door to the inclusion of unclean gentiles in the eschatological community solely on the basis of their belief in the future rule of Jesus (cf. Rom. 15:8-13).
@Andrew Perriman:
So do you see a final judgement and reassure of the dead in Paul’s letters or the gospel’s or other NT texts or is it just the book of revelation? also does jesus return to earth physically in revelation to judge? Thanks.
@Elliot:
It’s a good question. I’m inclined to take a fairly rigorous approach and say that Paul’s eschatology lands finally on the moment of the conversion of the nations of the Greek-Roman world and the vindication of the saints, living and dead. I don’t think he references a final judgment of all the dead and absolute renewal of creation.
The most we might say is that it is implied in Romans 8:18-23 or 1 Corinthians 15:50-57, but these texts are not about a new heavens and new earth; they are about the moment when the “sons of God” will inherit the kingdom, which is a very different thing.
@Andrew Perriman:
So would you say we only get a final judgement and new creation primarily based on texts outside the new testament like Jewish apocalyptic..
@Elliot:
It’s debatable whether it’s that common outside the Bible. There are texts which envisage some sort of climactic “political” event followed eventually by what may be read as a cosmic transformation, and I think that this is more or less what we have at the end of Revelation: the triumph of Christ and the church over Rome in the guise of Babylon the great, a long period of time (a thousand years) during which Christ rules from heaven with the martyrs, and then a final judgment of all the dead and the remaking of heaven and earth, etc.
@Andrew Perriman:
If I pushed back and said theologically alot of this is based on the world view of genesis and 70 nations that symbolises the known world? So as Mike heiser would say it all extends to us? Because God knows there are more nations under foreign gods Deuteronomy 32, including us today. Thoughts 💭
@Elliot:
That’s certainly not how I arrived at these conclusions. It’s based on a reading of the prophets through to Daniel in particular, Jewish apocalyptic responses to Hellenistic and Roman dominance, Qumran’s obsession with the forces of Belial, and what is frankly the commonsense view that Jesus and his followers drew extensively on the prophets in order to make sense of the overwhelmingly present historical circumstances with which they were confronted. In other words, it reflects the worldview and outlook of late second temple Judaism.
@Andrew Perriman:
Thanks Andrew. Sometimes the idea of the catholic church as a historic representative of the earliest Christians is the only thing that can give us a future. Every tom dick and harry being allowed to interpret the scriptures as they please leads to so much confusion and.. in my opinion darkness.
@Elliot:
Ironically, though, it’s historical and historical-critical scholarship, not any church tradition that has reconnected us with the thinking and experience of the earliest Christians. That seems to me to be beyond doubt, and I would argue that in good time it will give us a future.
Thank you, Andrew, for “keeping the engine warm”, so to speak. And this topic seems to me the single most important one.
Re: your comment immediately above this, I wonder whether it might be possible in future generations for the bewildering variety of Jesus-oriented movements to find a measure of unity by working out implications of the precept that “sound theology starts with sound history.” It might be easier to agree about “what happened” than about “what ‘what happened’ means for us now”, and the former is essential to the latter.
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