Book Recommendation: A New Vision for Israel

In Scot McKnight’s book, A New Vision for Israel: the Teaching of Jesus in National Context, he seeks to articulate an understanding of Jesus by integrating him the in context of the redemption of Israel. McKnight sees Jesus as an eschatological prophet, whose mission was to warn Israel of the impending judgment of God (70.A.D.) which would usher in God’s final judgment and consummate his kingdom (pg.12). From this idea, McKnight builds and refines his understanding of Jesus through three major themes: a) the God of Jesus (Ch. 2), b) the kingdom of God (present aspect – Ch. 3 and future aspect Ch.4) and c) the ethics of God (Ch. 5 and 6).

I really enjoyed this book. It’s written clearly and builds a great exegetical case for understanding Jesus and his mission to Israel which I believe is the key in realizing who Jesus was in the gospels.

McKnight on 70AD and God's Consummated Kingdom

One of the most difficult passages in the Bible for me to understand is Mark 13 and it's parallels: Matthew 24:1-51 and Luke 21:5-36. Some interpreters see this passage as Jesus foretelling the destruction of the temple (70 A.D.) and the final judgment which would usher in God's final kingdom in the near future that is within one generation (Mark 13:30), while other see Jesus as only predicting the temple's destruction as imminent and not God's final judgment/kingdom and yet others see Jesus only talking about fall of the temple, saying nothing about God's final judgment/kingdom.

Albert Schweitzer is probably the best known promoter of seeing Jesus predicting the nearness of both the temple's destruction and God's final judgment/kingdom, thus when God's final kingdom did not come about, he was wrong.

Scot Mcknight has a similar view to Schweitzer but challenges the notion that Jesus was in error based on his understanding of biblical prophets and how prophecy normally works. He writes:


"In his vision of human history, Jesus saw no further than A.D. 70, and to this date he attached visions of the final salvation, the final judgment, and the consummation of the kingdom of God in all its glory. That history took another course does not at all mean that Jesus was in error; rather, like the Hebrew prophets before him, he saw the next event as the end event and predicted events accordingly. This perspective was typical of Jewish prophecy from of old; the next event was seen as the end event, but that next event resulted in a series of unfolding events. Prophecy carried with it an innate poetic ambiguity. It might be that Jesus made a distinction between the climatic events pertaining to the nation and to Jerusalem, on the one hand, and to the final events of history, on the other; that is, that Jesus distinguished the events of A.D. 70 from the final events (judgment, kingdom, etc.) This would be very difficult to prove and need not be proved, since Jesus' method was so typical of Jewish prophecy:the next event, an event that God had enabled a prophet to see, would take shape as the last event that would wrap up God's plan for history". - pg 12, A New Vision For Israel: The Teaching of Jesus in National Context


Very interesting stuff. I need to think about this more.

Jesus and Restoration of Israel

About a year ago, I started to focus my reading on the gospels (currently, I am reading Bock's Luke Commentary) and the historical Jesus instead of Pauline stuff, especially as it relates to justification and New Paul Perceptive. And so far, I found that the key in unlocking the gospels is the understanding of Jesus' mission and relationship with Israel[1].

Here's a good quote from Scot Mcknight describing Jesus connection with Israel:

"It follows, then that Jesus cannot be understood if the described exclusively, ore even primarily , in the category of a spiritual master, or as one who was primarily concerned with the inner religious life and its disciplines for the individual. First and foremost, Jesus was a Jew whose vision of the proper religious life centered on the restoration of the Jewish nation and on the fulfillment of the covenants that God had made with the nation. The most important context in which modern interpreters should situate Jesus is that of ancient Jewish national disaster. Jesus' hope was not so much the "Church" as the restoration of the twelve tribes (cf. Matt.8:11-12;10:23;and19:28), the fulfillment of the promises of Moses to national Israel, and the hope of God's kingdom (focused on and through Israel) on earth. Thus, when Jesus sent out the Twelve (cf. Matt. 9:35-11:1), the "disciples were not evangelistic preachers sent out to save individual souls for some unearthly paradise. They were couriers proclaiming a national emergency and conducting a referendum on a question of national survival." [2]

[1] For a great lecture on understanding Jesus, check out Rikki Watt's talk dated "January 14, 2001)


[2] Mcknight, A New Vision for Israel: The Teaching of Jesus in National Context, see pp. 10-11