The Five Gospels: The Search for the Authentic Words of Jesus by Robert W. Funk, Roy W. Hoover, and The Jesus Seminar, includes topic essays amidst the text of the gospels. I thought this particular essay might be of interest to some folks here, since we came from a religion that saw the kingdom as future.
Ginny
GOD’S IMPERIAL RULE:
PRESENT OR FUTURE?
John the Baptist
You spawn of Satan! Who warned you to flee from the impending doom? . . . Even now the axe is aimed at the root of the trees. So every tree not producing choice fruit gets cut down and tossed into the fire. (Matt 3:7, 10)
Jesus: God’s rule as future
But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give off her glow, and the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly forces will be shaken! And then they will see the son of Adam coming on the clouds with great power and splendor. And then he will send out messengers and will gather the chosen people from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the edge of the sky! . . . I swear to you, this generation certainly won’t pass into oblivion before all these things take place! (Mark 13:24-27, 30)I swear to you: Some of those standing here won’t ever taste death before they see God’s imperial rule set in with power! (Mark 9:1)
Jesus: God’s rule as present
You won’t be able to observe the coming of God’s imperial rule. People are not going to be able to say, “Look, here it is!” or “Over there!” On the contrary, God’s imperial rule is right there in your presence. (Luke 17:20-21)It will not come by watching for it. It will not be said, “Look, here!’ or “Look, there!’ Rather, (the Father’s) imperial rule is spread out upon the earth, and people don’t see it. (Thomas 113)
But if by God’s finger I drive out demons, then for you God’s imperial rule has arrived. (Luke 11:20)
Father, your name be revered. Impose your imperial rule. (Luke 11:2)
[Matthew interprets the second petition of the Lord’s Prayer (Luke 11:2 above) as:]
Enact your will on earth as you have in heaven. (Matt 6:10)
Paul of Tarsus
Those of us who are still alive when the Lord comes will have no advantage over those who have died; when the command is given, when the head angel’s voice is heard, when God’s trumpet sounds, then the Lord himself will descend from heaven; first the Christian dead will rise, then we who are still alive will join them, caught up in clouds to meet the Lord in the air. As a result, we will always be with the Lord. (1 Thess 4:15-17)
Scholars are agreed that Jesus spoke frequently about God’s imperial rule, or, in traditional language, about the kingdom of God. Does this phrase refer to God’s direct intervention in the future, something connected with the end of the world and the last judgment, or did Jesus employ the phrase to indicate something already present and of more elusive nature?
The first of these options is usually termed apocalyptic, a view fully expressed in the book of Revelation, which is an apocalypse.
The texts cited in this cameo essay can be used to support either view. One thing is clear: John the Baptist and the early Christian community espoused the first view: they believed the age was about to come to an abrupt end. Did Jesus share this view, or was his vision more subtle, less bombastic and threatening?
The Fellows of the Jesus Seminar are inclined to the second option: Jesus conceived of God’s rule as all around him but difficult to discern. God was so real for him that he could not distinguish God’s present activity from any future activity. He had a poetic sense of time in which the future and the present merged, simply melted together, in the intensity of his vision. But Jesus’ uncommon views were obfuscated by the more pedestrian conceptions of John, on the one side, and by the equally pedestrian views of early Christian community, on the other.
The views of John the Baptist and Paul are apocalyptically oriented. The early church aside from Paul shares Paul’s view. The only question is whether the set of texts that represent God’s rule as present were obfuscated by the pessimistic apocalyptic notions of Jesus’ immediate predecessors, contemporaries, and successors. If Jesus merely adopted the popular views, how did such sayings as Luke 17:20-21 and Luke 11:20 arise? The best explanation is that they originated with Jesus, since they go against the dominant trend of the unfolding tradition. Fellows of the Jesus Seminar are convinced that the subtlety of Jesus’ sense of time—the simultaneity of present and future—was almost lost on his followers, many of whom, after all, started as disciples of John the Baptist, and are represented, in the gospels, as understanding Jesus poorly.
The confirming evidence for this conclusion lies in the major parables of Jesus: they do not reflect an apocalyptic view of history. Among his major parables are: Samaritan; prodigal son; dinner party; vineyard laborers; shrewd manager; unforgiving slave; corrupt judge; leaven; mustard seed; pearl; treasure.
The Jesus Seminar awarded a pink designation [Jesus probably said something like this] to all the sayings and parables in which the kingdom is represented as present; the remaining sayings, in which the rule of God is depicted as future, were voted black [Jesus did not say this; it represents the perspective or content of a later or different tradition].