Smoodock's Blog

We have now come to the end of what we can call Matthew’s first book of his Gospel. Earlier in this study, I mentioned that Matthew divided his Gospel into five themes, similar to Moses’ five books of the Law, which shows him to be the Prophet, like Moses, who was to come (Deuteronomy 18:15-19). Each of Jesus’ five themes ends with a large block of teaching about the current theme, wherein he labored to both instruct and give his disciples an example to follow (John 13:15; cp. 1Peter 2:21).

Our current theme has to do with Jesus offering the Kingdom of Heaven to the Jews (Matthew 4:17), to whom Jesus was sent (cp. Matthew 15:24). Nevertheless, the Kingdom wasn’t what was expected. Although the people were looking for the coming of the Kingdom of God and his Messiah (Luke 2:39; 23:51; 24:21) during Jesus’ lifetime, which would have been a fulfillment of Daniel’s timetable (Daniel 9:24-27), they were not expecting anyone like Jesus, nor a kingdom like the one he presented (cp. Luke 17:20-21).

Thus, the people were astonished at Jesus’ teaching, when he finally finished speaking on that day (Matthew 7:28). He had spoken, first to his disciples on the mount (Matthew 5:1-2), and afterward to the crowds who were standing by in the plain (Luke 6:17-19). The term, astonished (G1605) has to do with striking one out of one’s senses.[1] In other words, they were in shock. They had no means for defining what they heard. Jesus presented them with a mind-boggling worldview that caused them to question all they believed to be true.

The text describes the reason behind the people’s astonishment, namely, that Jesus taught with authority (G1849), vis-à-vis he taught as one who had the right to speak as he did, because he represented God in the same manner that Moses did. Moses had supreme authority to present the covenant to the people (Exodus 24:8; 34:27-28), and Jesus had that same authority, and, as the promised Messiah, he presented the expected new covenant to the people (Jeremiah 31:31; cp. Luke 4:18; 10:16; John 1:12-13; 8:26; 12:44).

On the other hand, whenever the scribes (rabbis) taught the people in the synagogues, they quoted from one another, and this is how they derived their authority. Their authority was dependent upon the authority/fame of the other men, whom they quoted. The rabbis pointed to the scholarship of respected men, their good names and their influence over the people. In other words, their authority was derived from a school of thought.[2] As long as they taught according to that principle or worldview, they were understood by those who listened and believed.

Nevertheless, Jesus claimed to have come out from God (John 16:27), and presented his testimony about God (John 1:18), saying it was not of himself but concerned, what he saw God doing (John 5:19). Jesus claimed an intimacy with his Father, saying he revealed himself to him in such a manner that Jesus was able to reproduce, what God revealed to him in the form of mighty works, or miracles (John 5:20-23). Thus, Jesus’ authority was not derived from men, but from God (understood in the miracles no man could do), just as it was so for Moses. The Jews understood that Moses’ authority came directly from God, and they should have understood that the Prophet who was like Moses, should have come, having that same authority.

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[1] See Vincent’s Word Studies

[2] One of the most recent examples of this type of authority was the Jesus Seminar. It was composed of about 50 scholars and 100 lay people (not particularly qualified to perform the task required). The scholars, who made up the 50, became members of the seminar, and nearly all of them were skeptics. Therefore, from the very beginning the seminar was composed of only a certain type of scholar and with them and almost twice their number were lay people who weren’t particularly qualified to undertake the study at hand. In theory, this group of men and women sought to discover the historical Jesus, but in reality, they sought to produce a Jesus that the Bible does not present. Nevertheless, these folks became accepted authorities in what was assumed by many to be Biblical truths, because they published works, quoting one another. Their authority was derived from one another, and soon their readers began to recognize their names, whether or not the “authorities” were qualified to offer expert opinion and whether or not they held biased views about the historical Jesus or Biblical authority.