In parts one and two of our study on the kingdom of Heaven, we outlined Jewish hopes of redemption in the first century and the various ideas how it would be achieved. We looked at the phrase and idea of the kingdom of Heaven within ancient Judaism, which belonged to the thought of redemptive activism and appears most clearly in the sayings of Israel’s sages. They viewed the kingdom of Heaven as presently realized by obedience to God’s commandments, but in the future, God’s reign would appear throughout the world. One could presently live in the kingdom of Heaven by accepting God’s reign and obeying his commands. Because it depended upon human action, the kingdom was passive in the view of Israel’s Sages. Today, we conclude by looking at Jesus’ view of the kingdom of Heaven.
Jesus belonged to those who saw repentance and acts of piety as the path to redemption. Obedience acknowledged God’s reign. But, for Jesus, the kingdom does not passively wait, it was breaking forth: “From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven breaks forth and those who break through, take it in possession. For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John; and if you are willing to accept it, he is Elijah who is to come. Let anyone with ears listen!” (Matthew 11:12-13). Jesus connected God’s reign with a period, a time, in which a transition occurred from the previous era to the period of the inauguration of God’s reign and redemption of his people. The previous period, which Jesus identified as the biblical period; the present period, which he identified as the kingdom of Heaven and began to break forth with John, and then a future period, which will be inaugurated by the coming of the Son of Man (Luke 21:25-28)—a tripartite redemptive history in which the intermediate period Jesus identified as “the kingdom of Heaven.” [1] Jesus pointed to his healings and exorcisms as announcing that God’s reign has dawned (see Matt. 11:4-6; Luke 11:14-23; see also Psalm 146; Isaiah 61; and 4Q521).
Jesus belonged to those who saw repentance and acts of piety as the path to redemption.
For the sages, God’s reign existed either from the time of Adam or Abraham waiting for human acknowledgement and acceptance. For Jesus, the kingdom had broken forth since the days of John the Baptist; its active advancement from the previous period to the period of God’s reign centered on Jesus’ own self-awareness and his unique role as a figure utilized by God. For this reason, the kingdom could not be static and passive for Jesus.
A letter from Judas Maccabaeus preserved in 2 Maccabees written to the Jews in Egypt parallels the active sense of the kingdom expressed by Jesus. It also reflects a similar three-part division of redemptive history. Judas encouraged the Egyptian Jews to observe the Hasmonean celebration of the purification of the Jerusalem Temple. In the letter, Judas expresses that his purification of the Temple caused a shift to a new period in Israel’s history, which he expected would lead to the final eschatological period. He describes this intermediate period as the kingdom.
“Since, therefore, we are about to celebrate the purification, we write to you. Will you therefore please keep the days? It is God who has saved all his people, and has returned the inheritance to all, and the kingdom and the priesthood and the consecration, as he promised through the law. We have hope in God that he will soon have mercy on us and will gather us from everywhere under heaven into his holy place, for he has rescued us from great evils and has purified the place” (2 Maccabees 2:16-18).
Judas saw the Temple purification as separating the current period from the previous era. God has saved his people. He described the intermediate period by allusion to Exodus 15:17 and Exodus 19:6, identifying it as the kingdom. He further anticipates the ingathering of the exiles into Jerusalem, which was the most primitive eschatological expectation within Judaism. Three periods, with the intermediate period identified as the “kingdom.” For Judas, like Jesus, the era of the kingdom had a chronological aspect to it connected to Judas’ understanding of God’s redemption of His people and Judas’ role in effecting it. The kingdom was present and dynamic; it did not passively wait. Judas’ actions as God’s agent of salvation meant the kingdom was now. Judas’ view of his role in God’s redemptive actions towards Israel prohibited him from seeing the kingdom as anything other than active.
This tripartite schema found in the Gospels and in the epistle of Judas parallels what appears among the expectations of some of the sages: “All the prophets prophesied only about the Days of the Messiah (לימות המשיח),[2] but with regard to the World to Come…’No eye has seen it, God, aside from you (Isa. 64:3)’” (b. Ber. 34b; b. Shabb. 63a; b. San. 99a).[3]Jesus and Judas both accepted their unique roles in inaugurating the intermediate period, which both identified as the kingdom, which parallels the intermediate “Days of the Messiah” within the rabbinic saying. Their perception of how their roles played within God’s redemption of Israel meant that they viewed the kingdom in a more dynamic manner than what appears within the rabbinic idea of the kingdom, which waits passively for human action.
Jesus expected his movement, the kingdom of Heaven, to represent those who submitted to God’s reign, to repent and live in obedience to the Torah, loving God and neighbor (see Sifre Deuteronomy on Deut. 32:29; Matt. 4:17; Luke 10:9). Acts of piety for him expressed redemptive activism. Jesus’ idea of the kingdom also retained the present and future reality as found in the rabbinic idea of the kingdom of Heaven. The kingdom presently breaks forth (Matt. 11:2-15), it is present among the people (Luke 11:20-21), a time when righteous and sinner coexist (Matt. 13:26-30, 47-50), yet this present, intermediate period, would culminate with the appearance of God’s reign (Luke 21:31), the redemption of Israel (Luke 21:28), the coming of the Son of Man as judge (Luke 21:25-27), the final judgement and separation of righteous and sinner (Matt. 25:31-46), which gives way to the eschaton and eternal life: “No one who has left his home…for the sake of the kingdom of God, will fail to receive many times more in this age, and in the age to come, eternal life” (Luke 18:29-30).[4]
Jesus expected his movement, the kingdom of Heaven, to represent those who submitted to God’s reign, to repent and live in obedience to the Torah, loving God and neighbor.
The role piety played within redemptive activism, in terms of actualizing the present realization of the kingdom of Heaven and acting as a catalyst to hasten Israel’s redemption and the end, explains the intersection of the kingdom of Heaven and the call to piety, especially charity, within the words of Jesus. Because the kingdom was breaking forth, adherence to the Torah, loving God and neighbor (Sifre Deuteronomy on Deut. 32:29; Matt. 22:34-40; Mark 12:28-34), would hasten Israel’s redemption, which would enable them to worship God as he desired and bring the eschatological end, when God’s reign universally appeared. The connection between Jewish ideas of liberty and the kingdom of Heaven indicates that Jesus shared the redemptive aspirations of his countrymen,[5] as well as seeing his movement as uniquely poised to bring it about: “’If they were wise, they would understand this’ (Deut. 32:29): If Israel would but look closely at the words of the Torah which I have given them, no nation or kingdom could rule over them” (Sifre Deuteronomy on Deut. 32:29; see also Targum to Ezekiel 2:10; Sifre Zuta on Numbers 15:40).
When we are sensitive to the contours of ancient Jewish thought, we can detect where Jesus fit within ancient Judaism. Too often, however, this is not the approach taken. The distance between the faith of Jesus and Jesus within modern presentations of Jesus reflects our distance from his faith, and not his. Once we understand the origin of the idea of the kingdom of Heaven within Judaism—it belonged to the redemptive stream we termed redemptive activism—we can place Jesus within the landscape of ancient Jewish thought. Jesus was not a militant activist, nor was he an apocalyptic passivist. For him, God’s reign was breaking forth and he stood at the center of this movement. He viewed acts of piety, especially charity, as ultimately bringing about Israel’s redemption—Israel’s freedom, which would enable the people to worship God as He desired. And from this realization, it opens new possibilities in understanding the words of Jesus, his faith, and his unique personality.
[1] David Flusser, Jesus (Magness Pres: Jerusalem, 2001), 258-275.
[2] The rabbinic “Days of the Messiah” in this saying parallels the kingdom of Heaven in Jesus’ saying in Matthew 11:12-13, which both the sages and Jesus marked as the intermediate stage in redemptive history.
[3] Flusser, ibid.; the antiquity of the idea expressed in the rabbinic can be seen by the words of Peter in Acts 3:24: “And all the prophets from Samuel on proclaimed these days.”
[4] The principal act of piety for Jesus was the practice of charity, the giving of alms (see Matt. 6:1-18; 19:16-30; and Luke 18:29-30). Jesus spoke of almsgiving as the key for entry into the kingdom of Heaven on several occasions (Matt. 5:20; 13:44-46; 19:23; Luke 18:24; see also Matt. 5:3 [Luke 6:20], 10; Luke 12:31-34). Among those who embraced the ideology of redemptive activism acts of piety had redemptive potential; the giving of alms carried such potential for Jesus (Luke 4:16-30; 8:4-15; 12:31-32; 19:41-44; see below). So too, Jesus accepted the idea that had emerged within ancient Judaism that giving alms “laid up treasure” in heaven (Matt. 6:19-24; 25:34-46; Luke 12:13-21, 33-34; 16:19-31; 19:1-9), providing safety against the day of death or judgment (see Dan. 4:27; Tobit 4:6-11; 12:7-9; Ben Sira 29:11-13; Psalms of Solomon 9:5; t. Peah 4:18-19, 21). Almsgiving, then, for Jesus, offered the principal means of entry into his movement, the kingdom of Heaven, and as such, it could serve as a catalyst to effect God’s redemption of Israel; it also provided safety against the day of judgment.
[5] Attempts within New Testament scholarship to reinterpret Jesus’ use of the kingdom of Heaven divorced from Jewish ideas of national redemption display a lack of understanding of the kingdom of Heaven within ancient Judaism, as well as a bias towards anachronistically fashioning Jesus as “Christian.”
This is so perfect! I'm so thankful for you and your research on this series. In my view, it is what's missing of the understanding people need to have concerning the kingdom. Although, it is a physical place where God reigns and Jesus sits on the right hand of the Father, the sovereign rule and reign where we are is no less attainable, active, and present to us. Isaiah said that it is a highway of holiness where there is no roaring lion or wild beasts, that therein who travel the path thereof, abides in peace and righteousness in a place of safety from the reaches of peril or opposition. John said, the kingdom of heaven is at hand, and the axe is even against the root to be cut down. The end of the old covenant, and the beginning of the new, through Christ, brought the kingdom forth, where men do break through and take it by force. As it is on earth as it is in heaven is a direct correlation to what will be of the future of the kingdom. The forces of Satan as seen in spiritual cities of Egypt, Sodom, Babylon, are these strongholds that will be obliterated by God. His kingdom will rule and reign, as John said, the world is passing away. Little by little, precept by precept, the truths of the word and who God is, can deliver us to a place of spiritual and physical safety by staying on the pathway of righteousness on a highway of holiness. That's why I think Jesus is and was so misunderstood in his speaking of the kingdom, because in his parables, he constantly discusses the capacity to have spiritual eyes and ears, which was part of the promise of the spirit brought forth made to Abraham. He also talked about giving up all that you had to acquire it and invest in it. In other words, leave all that you hold dear in your heart and spend all of your time searching out righteousness and his kingdom, and you will find it and dwell there as a purchased treasure. It is only by the Spirit that we have been able to understand the precepts that Jesus taught. He said the kingdom of heaven is within you. It is not here nor there that you should go look for it. He said to open the door and he and the Father would come in and make their abode with you and sup with you. This is both a spiritual kingdom, and a physical one. When the Israelites asked Samuel to make Saul a king over them, God was displeased, and said, give them what they ask for. Since the time of Ham, and his disobedience, and the kingdoms of Cush, Egypt, Canaan, there has been a battle going on against God in the spiritual and physical kingdoms of Egypt, Canaan, and Babylon. Ultimately, when the end points back to the beginning, when Satan told Eve she could be like God, until people realize that they too have believed the lie of the devil, that we are kings of our own worlds, then the troubles on earth will continue. God will rule and reign. Jesus brought forth the Spirit to reign in us. The kingdom is present now and accessible to us through the power and authority of the one who overcame, and to whom all power and authority was given. The Pharisees and Saducees weren't too happy about their power and authority that they had in the physical realm, where what Jesus called Satan's kingdom, or the seat of Satan, being taken away. Even the Roman empire felt threatened by his kingship. The apostles, likewise, were disheartened and disappointed that they were going to continue to operate under captivity through Roman rule. The kingdom was not what they thought it was, but Jesus knew, and you know also, exactly what he meant by it. Thank you for your in-depth work and teaching on this. I wish everyone could benefit from learning about what you have taught in this series. It's very important for people to know that we don't have to wait on what Jesus has already provided to us in the spiritual realm that manifests and brings to fruition the written truths in God's words into the physical realm. On earth as it is in heaven, ruling and reigning.