The World Is Always Ending II

The Apocalyptic Outlook of Jesus of Nazareth

In a recent post, I examined the apocalyptic outlook of Paul of Tarsus and considered the implications of such a worldview on our understanding of the early Jesus Movement. Today, I want to look the Synoptic Gospels¹ to see how prominent this way of thinking was for Jesus of Nazareth.

Jesus' Apocalyptic Outlook in the Synoptic Gospels

It should be noted straight away that our sources for the words and deeds of Jesus are quite a bit different than those we have for Paul. As far as we currently know, Jesus did not write anything himself that has survived and the Gospels which record his life are written by anonymous authors several decades after his life. That doesn’t mean they do not give us anything of historical value, only that we have to use some caution and critical thought when analyzing these texts. Scholars have long debated which sayings in the Gospels might actually go back to the historical Jesus with varying conclusions. When considering Jesus’ apocalyptic outlook, it is helpful to start with our earliest Gospel, the Gospel of Mark.

-The Last Judgment by Georgios Klontzas, c. 1580 CE. Source: http://eib.xanthi.ilsp.gr/gr/icons.asp, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=43222606

-Gospel of Mark-

Most scholars date the writing of the Gospel of Mark to sometime shortly after 70 CE. Jesus is believed to have died around the year 30 CE, so this account is a generation removed from Jesus’ lifetime but may still contain historical approximations to his words. Historical approximations are the best we can hope for when trying to obtain the words of Jesus, or any ancient figure for that matter. No one was standing around copying everything he said word for word, but the gist of his sayings may be preserved. So, when reading the Gospels a historical critical² mind should be asking, “Did Jesus say something like this?”.

Roughly 1/5 of Mark is devoted to Jesus’ words, where he is portrayed as a person of action more than someone who gives long sermons or teachings. But a few of these sayings may be noteworthy for our present inquiry.

“The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.”³

These are the first recorded words of Jesus in the Gospel of Mark, capturing what many believe to be the essence of Jesus’ message. The kingdom of God, a divine reign on earth, is arriving imminently and Jesus calls for urgent responses from the faithful.

“Truly I tell you, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see that the kingdom of God has come with power.”⁴

In this passage, Jesus is speaking to his disciples and a crowd about the end of the age when earth is brought fully under God’s reign. A similar sentiment is found a few chapters later:

“Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place.”⁵

This saying comes near the end of a fairly long speech where Jesus is describing the tumultuous, cataclysmic events that will precede the end of days.

-Gospel of Matthew-

The Gospel of Matthew is much longer and has more sayings of Jesus than Mark does. Many of these are not found in Mark, but there are some overlaps which maintain apocalyptic themes.

“Truly I tell you, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.”⁶

This is very similar to the passage in Mark 9:1. The “Son of Man” is a rather complicated and debated term which draws on passages from the Book of Daniel and at times appears to be used by Jesus to refer to someone who will usher in God’s kingdom during the end of days, and at other times appears to be a term Jesus uses to refer to himself.

“Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place.”⁷

This saying is in verbatim agreement with Mark 13:30 and is also found amid a long speech about the calamities of the end times.

-Gospel of Luke-

The Gospel of Luke is arguably the most literarily complex of the Synoptic Gospels and further develops previous stories or adds completely new ones to Jesus’ life. Yet again, however, there are hints of apocalyptic views attributed to Jesus.

“Indeed, truly I tell you, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the kingdom of God.”⁸

This saying is very similar to those of Mark 9:1 and Matthew 16:28.

“Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place.”⁹

Again, there is verbatim agreement here with Mark 13:30 and Matthew 24:34.

What Do We Make of This?

I have sometimes heard explanations for these sayings which try to spiritualize Jesus’ words and suggest that he was saying something symbolic. If we only had the Gospels to consider this might be a more compelling perspective, but we must take note of the similarities between these sayings and those we examined from Paul of Tarsus where he too believes he will live to see the end of the age. The Gospel authors attributed beliefs to Jesus concerning the imminent, near-term end of the world and claimed that he ensured some of his audience they would not die until these things occurred.

You may be wondering where the Gospel of John fits into all of this. I haven’t included apocalyptic sayings of Jesus from the Gospel of John because they are virtually absent. John is considered to be the latest of the canonical Gospels and the apocalyptic sayings and themes are extremely muted, if present at all. One simple explanation for this, in my opinion, is that the first generation of Jesus followers had all died by the time John was written¹⁰ which made including verses about them being alive for the end of days a little difficult.

There has long been a growing understanding of Jesus as an apocalyptic prophet, a view made prominent by Albert Schweitzer¹¹ in the early 20th century but further developed by contemporary scholarship. Scholars now have some level of confidence that these types of apocalyptic sayings go back to the historical Jesus due to a convergence of other evidence. Some of this comes from observing the apocalyptic perspectives of the Qumran Community who produced the Dead Sea Scrolls, John the Baptizer’s connection to the Qumran Community¹² and his likely connection to Jesus, as well as a widespread apocalyptic psyche within first century Judaism. As Bart Ehrman wrote, Jesus “didn’t stand out as a sore thumb…scores of other people—teachers, prophets, and just regular ole folk—thought something similar.”¹³

Apocalyptic worldviews didn’t end in the first century. Similar ways of thinking persisted throughout the Middle Ages, into the 19th century with groups like the Millerites, and into our own day with radio hosts,¹⁴ televangelists, and my old friend Greg predicting the end. If there is one thing that all of these movements have had in common it is that they have all been wrong about one thing: the end has not come.

So, was Jesus simply wrong about this element of his message? Do these sayings not actually go back to the historical Jesus? Does any of it matter all that much to religious devotion or historical inquiry? I have my own answers to those questions, but perhaps you will find them worth pondering.

Reading Suggestions:

-The Synoptic Gospels

-Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium by Bart Ehrman

-The Quest of the Historical Jesus: A Critical Study of its Progress from Reimarus to Wrede by Albert Schweitzer.

1. The Synoptic Gospels are Mark, Matthew, and Luke. “Synoptic” means something like “seen together”, referring to the fact that these three texts share many textual similarities.

2. This simply refers to a way of analyzing texts and history which considers historical, social, and literary contexts. It is not “critical” in a condemning or disapproving way.

3. Mark 1:15

4. Mark 9:1

5. Mark 13:30

6. Matthew 16:28

7. Matthew 24:34

8. Luke 9:27

9. Luke 21:32

10. Most critical scholars, including myself, do not think the Gospel of John was written by the John who was supposedly one of Jesus’ disciples.

11. See, The Quest of the Historical Jesus: A Critical Study of its Progress from Reimarus to Wrede. London: Adam & Charles Black, 1910.

12. See, for example, John Pryke. “JOHN THE BAPTIST AND THE QUMRAN COMMUNITY.” Revue de Qumrân 4, no. 4 (16) (1964): 483–96.

13. Bart Ehrman. Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999, 135.

14. See, for example, the many failed predictions of the Christian radio personality Harold Camping.