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Discernment of Revelation in the Gospel of Matthew

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Discernment of Revelation in the Gospel of Matthew Religions and Discourse 30 Discernment of Revelation in the Gospel of Matthew von Frances Shaw 1. Auflage Discernment of Revelation in the Gospel of Matthew – Shaw schnell und portofrei erhältlich bei beck-shop.de DIE FACHBUCHHANDLUNG Peter Lang Bern 2007 Verlag C.H. Beck im Internet: www.beck.de ISBN 978 3 03910 564 9 Inhaltsverzeichnis: Discernment of Revelation in the Gospel of Matthew – Shaw Chapter One Introduction Discernment of Revelation in Matthew’s Gospel: Historical Background Then if any one says to you, ‘Lo, here is the Christ!’ or ‘There he is!’ do not believe it. For false Christs and false prophets will arise and show great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect.1 These verses from Matthew’s gospel draw attention to an aspect of religious belief characteristic of Judaism and Christianity: that for religions grounded in claims to revelation, discernment between true and false messiahs and prophets is a critical issue with eternal con- sequences. The aim of this study is to demonstrate and explain the importance of discernment of revelation as a significant motif in Mat- thew’s gospel.2 ‘Christianity’ and ‘Judaism’ were not sufficiently well defined to form separate entities in the first century AD, especially after the des- truction of the temple when formative Judaism was taking shape.3 1 Matt. 24.23,24; also in Mark (13.21,22), but Matthew emphasises this theme by his own redactional insertions concerning false Christs and prophets: Matt. 24.5,11,26; cf. 7.15,21–23. 2 ‘While most of 24.1–36 is description, much of it is paraenesis [moral exhort- ation]. So the lesson in eschatology does not simply console: it also demands discernment and adherence to Jesus’ commands.’ Davies and Allison, Matthew III, 369 (my italics). In discussing Mark 13.22, Marcus, ‘Epistemology’, 572, notes, ‘The qualifying phrase [if possible] indicates that by the grace of God the elect may escape deception; but their discernment will certainly be tested to the very limit’ (my italics). 3 Bockmuehl, Revelation, 19, suggests that ‘the pillars of “mainstream” Jewish belief might be summarized as a) exclusive monotheism, b) “revelation” and orthopraxis, and c) election and redemption’. Groups, parties and ‘sects’ of differing persuasions were plentiful, including those with identifiable leaders.4 The records we have con- cerning these various leaders are not unbiased; they reflect a certain assessment of events and the claims of the persons concerned from the perspective of their authors. They also contain recognisable elements of polemic, reflecting attempts by marginalised groups to justify their positions, and dominant groups to exercise a form of social control.5 Segal, for example, has demonstrated how charges of magic are likely to be made by one religious group against another, of whom it disapproved: Thus, the charge of ‘magic’ helps distinguish between various groups of people from the perspective of the speaker but does not necessarily imply any essential difference in the actions of the participants.6 Similarly, Stanton7 has shown that one way to denigrate oppon- ents was to attribute their claim to power to demons or the devil, and to accuse an individual of being a magician, a sorcerer, a deceiver, or a false prophet (magos, goês, planos, pseudoprophêtês). Thus Jews accused Jesus of being a magician,8 and Christians accused Simon and Elymas of being magicians.9 4 See Horsley and Hanson, Bandits, Prophets; Acts 5.33–39 refers to Theudas and Judas the Galilean. 5 Alexander, ‘Sixtieth Part’, explores the scribal marginalisation of prophets and charismatics. Rowland, ‘Apocalyptic Literature’, 184: ‘The claim to direct reve- lation is used just as much by those who control the levers of religious power as those who do not.’ 6 Segal, Other Judaisms, 100. 7 ‘Jesus of Nazareth’ and Gospel, 169–180. 8 b.Sanh. 43a; b.Sanh. 107b; both cited by Stanton, who also notes similar terms in Philostratus Life 5.12. Goodman, Mission, 158, refers to Mani from Mani- chaean mythology who claimed his own revelation was definitive and final. 9 Acts 8.9f., 13.6–12, where Bar-Jesus/Elymas is described as a ‘magician, a Jewish false prophet’, and Paul is ‘filled with the Holy Spirit’. See also John- son, ‘Anti-Jewish Slander’; and Matt. 12.22–32 where, according to Matthew, those who deny that Jesus’ power is from God’s Spirit are committing un- forgivable blasphemy. 12 Another and related way of claiming an authoritative position was by appeal to inspiration or revelation. Hengel10 draws attention to the motif of ‘higher wisdom through revelation’ found in many reli- gious traditions during the NT era. Josephus regarded all Jewish prophetic figures as imposters:11 Imposters and demagogues, under the guise of divine inspiration, provoked revolutionary actions and impelled the masses to act like madmen. They led them out into the wilderness so that there God would show them signs of imminent liberation.12 The prophetic figures mentioned by Josephus from the period 44–70 AD are all said to have promised signs, and Hooker,13 in her discussion of Jesus’ prophetic actions, notes that it is possible that Matthew had some of them in mind in his warning against false Christs and false prophets (24.24). The NT writings reflect aspects of these disputes, and, since they are written from a Christian per- spective, their authors wished to persuade their readers of the truth of their claim about Jesus. Paul’s letters show that the identity of Jesus as crucified Messiah was a current question, and he argues for this from scripture and the work of the Spirit (1 Cor. 1–2). The evangelists also use their writings to make claims about the identity of Jesus and part of their literary style is to show, through their presentation of char- acters, how readers may understand, i.e. ‘discern’, the truth about Jesus. 10 Judaism and Hellenism, 210–18. 11 He refers to them as, goês, pseudoprophêtês, planos; Ant. 20.97–99; Ant. 20. 169–72/J.W. 2.261–63; J.W. 6.283–87, 437–41. 12 J.W. 2.259; the parallel in Ant. 20.168 adds, ‘For they said that they would display unmistakable signs and wonders done according to God’s plan’. 13 Signs, 14; 107, n.73. 13 Why Matthew? We are here in the world of claims and counter-claims, and one that is not easy to assess and ‘penetrate’. In order to narrow the focus of study, I shall examine the way in which the author of Matthew’s gos- pel shaped his work by appeals to revelation in order to persuade his readers of the truth of his claims about Jesus. Matthew’s gospel is particularly appropriate for several reasons. First, Matthew has long been considered the most ‘Jewish’ of the four canonical gospels and thus reflects an engagement with both the scriptures and the on-going interpretation of that tradition. Judaism is a religion based on claims to revelation, mediated through gifted indi- viduals, and throughout its history there were people claiming to be such mediators. In the scriptures, Moses, the prophets and wisdom teachers claimed such authority; in the later writings, Daniel, the Enoch traditions and the Teacher of Righteousness at Qumran made similar claims. Matthew was thus located within a tradition of revelation and claims to revelation. There was an existing tension within Judaism between Torah as once given revelation and claims to fresh revelation; between the law of God and case law; between scripture and tradition; and, as part of the Jewish/Christian debate, between the OT/scriptures and Jesus’ teaching.14 As I shall demonstrate, one of Matthew’s pur- poses in writing his gospel was to anchor Jesus within the received traditions and, at the same time, to demonstrate and legitimate his claims that Jesus was God’s final and authoritative revelation. An apologetic that would have any hope of persuading Jews that Jesus really was Israel’s Messiah would have to explain both the religious rejection and the apparent political defeat. This apologetic, moreover, would have to be scrip- turally grounded, if it were to make any significant headway against the ob- jections of the synagogue’s teachers of Scripture.15 14 Dunn, Partings, 252. This tension is ‘constituitive of the human attempt to recognize and respond to divine revelation’. 15 Evans, ‘Root Causes’, 32. He also quotes Justin Martyr’s Trypho requesting a proof ‘by the Scriptures’ that the Messiah ‘must also be crucified and die such a 14 Second, claims by Christians that Jesus was the Son of God were plentiful and formed the main, and arguably crucial, area of dispute in the Jewish/Christian debate.16 Matthew’s main, but not exclusive, des- ignation for Jesus is ‘Son of God’,17 and he claims for Jesus an auth- ority equal to that of God.18 The designation ‘Son of God’ was not of itself unusual, but Matthew’s attribution of it to Jesus crucified, and his claim that the rejection of Jesus is the rejection of God (11.20–24; 10.33), make it highly significant.19 Third, of the four canonical gospels, Matthew has the strongest apocalyptic orientation, and this recognition is part of a growing ap- preciation that ‘apocalyptic’ does not only relate to and is not only found in ‘apocalypses’.20 Fiorenza21 describes apocalyptic motifs and motif-clusters in many NT writings including: the situation of per- secution and trial of the community; a concern with opponent figures of demonic powers, false prophets and antichrists; the expectation of the parousia and the coming of the Son of Man for judgement; the time of salvation where motifs of, for instance, kingdom, resurrection and the eschatological banquet are especially developed.
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