In a comment on the first of my true-meaning-of-Luke’s-Christmas posts my old friend Rogier asks whether the argument about judgment has not been overstated:
I raise this with you, because in so many of our conversations it seems like you interpret much of the gospel and the Jesus-story through the historical event of the destruction of Jerusalem at the hand of the Romans. Now, I don’t disagree that there are passages in scripture that allude to this — but is it possible you see this coming judgment in too many places in scripture? I, in spite of your writing, don’t actually see it in this passage.
It’s a good question, one that gets to the heart of the dilemma that we currently face as committed interpreters of the New Testament.
My view is that the prospect of coming “judgment” or “wrath” (in the form of military invasion and the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple) is not a marginal theme in the Gospels; it is a crucial premise for understanding the story that is being told. This is apparent in a number of ways throughout the Gospels (for example, the teaching of John the Baptist, the parables of judgment, the vehement denunciations of a hypocritical and corrupt leadership, the apocalyptic passages) and should be taken into account at every point of interpretation.
I would argue that pretty much everything that Jesus says and does has this historical frame directly and urgently in view—the challenges that he presents to the Jewish hierarchy, the supernatural demonstrations of divine action, the formation of an eschatological community, the cursing of the fig tree, the violent protest in the temple, and so on. What Jesus says and does constructively or positively is done in response to the prospect of judgment. To be honest, it puzzles me that we find it so difficult to acknowledge the prevalence and the priority of the argument about a coming judgment in the Gospels.
Hearing the Old Testament in the New Testament
To a large extent the whole message concerning corporate judgment and salvation is constructed by reference—sometimes direct, sometimes indirect—to Old Testament antecedents or prophecies. For example, Jesus interprets his action in the temple by citing Jeremiah 7:11 (“Has this house, which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your eyes?”), which forms part of denunciation of the temple hierarchy and a warning that YHWH would do to the temple in Jerusalem what he did to the sanctuary in Shiloh—that is, destroy it.
There is a major hermeneutical question to address regarding the legitimacy of this approach: To what extent should we allow this reconstructed biblical narrative to determine our understanding of the Gospels? It could be argued that the Gospels are telling a quite distinctive “Christian” story of, say, personal salvation, which draws on Old Testament language and motifs only in a rather loose and insignificant fashion. But my view is that such an approach is historically naïve. What happened to Israel in the first century AD (Roman invasion and destruction) is so like what happened to Israel in the 6th century BC (Babylonian invasion and destruction) or on other occasions (eg. the invasion by Antiochus Epiphanes in the 2nd century BC) that it is inconceivable that the Gospels should use the Old Testament language without invoking these analogous Old Testament narratives.
Given the general pattern of historical parallel, therefore, I think that when the angel tells Zechariah that his son will in some sense perform the function of Malachi’s messenger, who calls people to repentance and reconciliation with YHWH, it is because Israel is understood again to face a coming day of wrath when the arrogant and wicked in Jerusalem will be burnt like stubble in an oven. I strongly recommend reading Malachi 3-4 attentively, as historically realistic prophecy, before reading the angel’s description of John as one who would “turn many the children of Israel to the Lord their God”, who would “go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to make ready for the Lord a people prepared” (Lk. 1:17).
So to make it clear, the theme of judgment is present in this passage insofar as a narrative of impending wrath against Jerusalem is invoked by the angel’s characterization of John as the messenger of Malachi 3-4. But it is also required by Jesus’ central argument that Israel is confronted with a choice between keeping to a broad path leading to destruction or opting for a narrow and extremely difficult path leading to survival and the life of the coming age.
The historical urgency of the good news
The destruction of Jerusalem may seem of only slight interest from our modern Christian perspective, but it must have loomed on the prophetic horizon of people such as Zechariah or Simeon as a catastrophe of unimaginable proportions. In his prophecy regarding the fate of the temple, Jesus is quite unequivocal about the scale and significance of the event:
But when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation has come near. Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains, and let those who are inside the city depart, and let not those who are out in the country enter it, for these are days of vengeance, to fulfill all that is written. Alas for women who are pregnant and for those who are nursing infants in those days! For there will be great distress upon the earth and wrath against this people. They will fall by the edge of the sword and be led captive among all nations, and Jerusalem will be trampled underfoot by the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled. (Lk. 21:20-24)
For in those days there will be such tribulation as has not been from the beginning of the creation that God created until now, and never will be. And if the Lord had not cut short the days, no human being would be saved. But for the sake of the elect, whom he chose, he shortened the days. (Mk. 13:19-20)
This is why good news was needed. The emergence of a redeemed community was made necessary precisely because national Israel faced a judgment of this nature on account of its inveterate wickedness and defiance. Judgment and wrath in scripture are always conceived of in terms of destruction. Ultimately we are all subject to the “final” destruction of death—that is our existential reality. But if we are talking about national or corporate salvation, we also need a way to talk about national or corporate judgment, and in the context of scripture this is determined by such events as the Babylonian invasion and the exile or, as the narrative of Old Testament Israel draws to a close, the Roman invasion and the destruction of the temple.
John did not simply call people to repent and become part of a new community of people of faith in the generalized sense in which we understand that now. He called Jews to repent because wrath was coming, because the axe was already laid to the root of the trees, because every tree that did not bear good fruit was about to be cut down and burned in the fire (Lk. 3:7-9).
A healing community of love and grace… eventually
Now, we can then still talk about God reaching out to mankind through a “healing redemptive community” of love and grace—that is where the story takes us eventually. But it is premature or anachronistic to make this our reading of the Christmas stories. This may just seem pedantic—why shouldn’t people be allowed today to find themselves in the Christmas stories? Well, I think that if we are going to claim to be a people of scripture, we need to interpret scripture with integrity. But the more substantial concern that I have is that by disregarding the narrative-historical shape of New Testament theology we severely restrict our self-understanding as a biblical people. If we are too impatient to get to the personal pay-off, we are likely to miss the corporate, public and political dynamic of our witness as the people of the creator God.
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