The Gospel reading for the third Sunday in Advent is Matthew 11:2-15. Verses 2-10 are understandable, 11-15, however, are consternating me.
11:11
After talking about John’s role as preparing messenger Jesus says, “Truly, I say to you, among those born of women there has arisen no one greater than John the Baptist. Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.”
Who is “the one who is least in the kingdom of heaven”?
One commentary I read said this, “he (Jesus) had no poor thought about John, but rather great thoughts about the kingdom. Do we understand that this is the climatic line? That blank page between the N.T. and the O.T. is a mountain ridge that divides time. It is a great act of God, a new creation. People who live on one side, even though they are as noble as John, even though they foretell the new age as did John, are not as ‘great’ in favor and understanding as the lowliest who, trusting Christ, have entered the new land.”
Is this right? Or is Jesus referring to something completely different?
11:12
Then Jesus says, “From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence, and the violent take it by force.”
What is Jesus talking about? Is this a veiled reference to John’s imprisonment and suffering for the sake of the kingdom? Or is it something completely different?
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1 comment:
Two takes on 11:11 are possible.
The first, which I prefer, is that this is a crafty way of Jesus to refer to himself: He is "the least" in the kingdom, the servant of all.
The second, which was quite popular in the imperial church (better than "early church" - but that's another story) was that it referred to the Harrowing of Hades. That is, that folks in the OT (including John here) had to go to Sheol, while after Jesus descended and emptied the place of the blessed, folks in the NT get to skip that for Paradise. Thus, those least in the NT Kingdom are greater than John.
+HRC
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