The Gospel according to Matthew
1-2. The ancestry and birth of Jesus the Messiah, the Son of David, the Son of Abraham.
3-4. Jesus’ ministry begins; John’s baptism, Satan’s temptations, first disciples called.,
5-7. A summary of Jesus’ teachings in the Sermon on the Mount, crowds were astounded.
8-9. An account of Jesus’ healings; the authority of Jesus is questioned and defended.
10-12. Jesus sends apostles on a short-term mission; then continues his own ministry.
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The discourse in Chapter 11 was Jesus’ instructions on sending out the disciples, now apostles or missionaries, into the villages to spread Jesus’ message and do his works. Matthew does not follow up to tell us what the apostles did while they were out, or what they said when they got back. For that you would have to go to Luke Chapter 9; but we will stay with Matthew who moves on to a related topic.
11: 1. “Now when Jesus had finished instructing his twelve disciples, he went on from there to teach and proclaim his message in their cities.
Jesus sends the apostles, then moves along to carry out his own ministry in their cities. Looking back, the nearest reference for ‘their’ is the 12 disciples, and perhaps that is what the text means. On the other hand, Matthew has talked a lot about the crowds and the Jews in general, so maybe the reference is more generic.
11: 2-6. When John heard in prison what the Messiah/the Christ was doing, he sent word by his (or two of his) disciples and said to him, “Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?” Jesus answered them, “Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, those with a skin disease are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them. And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me.”
Matthew is still working out the issues of the identity of Jesus and the authority of Jesus. He has answered the disciples’ questions (calmed the storm, cast out demons) and the Jewish leaders’ questions (multiple healings, raised a girl from the dead). Now it is John the Baptist who needs reassurance. He himself has been imprisoned for his critique of Herod Antipas’ sexual misconduct; he has seduced and then married his brother’s wife. John may be depressed in prison because, to him, the movement seems to be faltering.
There is also a theological difference between John and Jesus. John preached the coming judgment, which the prophets did foretell. However, Jesus seems to concentrate more on the salvation side of the equation, emphasizing God’s mercy and grace. John also may have been bothered by Jesus’ practice of feasting with sinners which is different from his disciples’ practice of fasting.
John perhaps wondered if Jesus was someone like the divine messenger described by Malachi in the last book, the last chapter, the next to the last verse of the Old Testament. As far as the Jews were concerned, the last word from God.
However, Jesus does not go there. Jesus instead provides another answer to who he is, an answer that paraphrases his comments in the Nazareth synagogue (Luke 4: 16-19), which itself is a quote from Isaiah 6: 1-2. Isaiah had a vision of Israel as the Servant of God, but after Israel’s failure, Isaiah said that God himself would come in the form of his Servant. Jesus is saying that, by his presence, God has come to Israel as he promised.
There are various ways to take offense at this assertion. One is to be scandalized because Jesus does not live up to the expectations that people had for this Servant. It’s embarrassing to be following this would-be Messiah, then have him act in ways that are not appropriate for a man of God or a powerful warrior. John expected fire and brimstone, but Jesus brought the water and the blood, his blood.
Another way is to just leave. Jesus is a stumbling block, and the one who trips over him stumbles down another road. Finally, a third way might be to pay lip service to Jesus’ claims, but privately ignore what Jesus expects from a follower. Jesus tries to make sure none of these happen.
11: 7-10. As they went away, Jesus began to speak to the crowds about John: “What did you go out into the wilderness to look at? A reed shaken by the wind? What, then, did you go out to see? (To see) Someone dressed in soft robes? Look, those who wear soft robes are in royal palaces. What, then, did you go out to see? (To see) A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. This is the one about whom it is written, ‘See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way before you.’
We have no record of what John’s disciples thought or said to Jesus, nor how John himself responded to this answer. John is soon to be executed, so we can only hope that his faith in Jesus was restored.
In the text, Jesus turns to the ever-present crowd and speaks to them. Jesus is often in very public spaces where even his conversations are overheard. The crowd is now probably thinking about John and who he was compared to Jesus. The following discourse is a prime example of why it is helpful to have cultural and linguistic context for Biblical events.
Jesus asks questions; Jesus always asks questions, sometimes he even answers a question with another question. This tells us a lot about Jesus the Anthropologist who is always trying to draw people out, to find what they are really thinking, and then encourage them to consider new options.
This time it is: “What did you go out into the wilderness to look at?” Jesus suggests a possible answer: “A reed shaken by the wind?” That seems appropriate because reeds grew around the Jordan River where John was baptizing people, and the wind does sway them, sometimes even break them. Does Jesus imply that John is weak or in danger, or is this going to be a negative example; that is, John is not like that?
Second question: “What then did you go out to see? Someone dressed in soft robes?” Perhaps Jesus is contrasting John, who wore a camel-hair cloak, which was very rough, with rich people who live in luxury. Jesus implies this in the next statement. Is that where Jesus is going with this?
Third question: “What then did you go out to see?” Same as # 2. Jesus suggests an answer again, “To see a prophet?” Still no answer from the crowd. What’s happening? Are they afraid or do they just not know?
At this point in time, John is in prison, put there by Herod Antipas the tetrarch, a ruler over a ‘quarter’ of the territory in the Israel-Syria area, under the auspices of the Romans. Herod’s dominion included both Galilee and Judea. According to the historian, Josephus, John was imprisoned at Machaerus, which is in Judea but on the east side of the Dead Sea, across from Jerusalem. Josephus calls John “a good man, (who) commanded the Jews to exercise virtue, both as to righteousness toward one another, and piety towards God….” (The Antiquities of the Jews, Book 18, Chapter 5, paragraph 2).
Here is a historical fact. Herod Antipas issued coins, and his emblem on the back of the coin was a reed (Walton and Keener, The NRSV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, Page 1646; see also Witherington, Matthew, page 232). So there are multiple layers here, like an ogre. What looks like a reference to the Jordan in the wilderness is, at another level, a reference to Herod Antipas. It clearly is not a positive statement, but rather a critique of a person who followed political trends, to his own destruction. Herod picked a fight with the king of Syria, his former father-in-law. Herod lost the war. Josephus says that the Jews believed he lost because he executed John the Baptist.
So, both the reed and the soft robes are jabs at Herod, and Herod compares rather poorly with John the Baptist.
11: 11-15. “Truly I tell you, among those born of women no one has arisen greater than John the Baptist, yet the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence, (or has been coming violently) and violent people take it by force. For all the Prophets and the Law prophesied until John came, and if you are willing to accept it, he is Elijah who is to come. Let anyone with ears (to hear) listen!
Who did you go out to see? Someone like Herod the Tetrarch? No, someone greater still. Now Jesus identifies John the Baptist as the messenger who is predicted in Malachi.
“See, I am sending my messenger to prepare the way before me, and the LORD whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple. The messenger of the covenant in whom you delight–indeed, he is coming, says the LORD of hosts. But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears?” (Malachi 3: 1-2).
This figure is identified as Elijah in Malachi 4: 5. In the above quote, ‘the messenger’ or John the Baptist, is not the same person as ‘the LORD whom you seek’. It was Jesus who seemed to appear suddenly in the temple (see Matthew 21).
There is another subtle contrast here. Herod Antipas has dominion over a ‘kingdom’, though technically he is not a king like his father Herod Antipater (died in 4 B.C.). By the time of Jesus, the Romans were exerting more control over their puppet states. That is why Herod Antipas is more like a governor; he has dominion only because the Romans gave him control. In time, the Roman authorities grew dissatisfied with Herod Antipas and took that control away. Josephus says that this happened in 39 A.D. when the demented emperor Caligula exiled Herod to Gaul (France and central Europe). Herod died there in obscurity, and so he did not endure ‘the coming of the Lord’.
Perhaps people like Herod, or even his enemies the Zealots who rebelled against Roman rule, are those whom Jesus is talking about as trying to take ‘dominion’ by force. However, another interpretation of Jesus’ saying is that sinners and tax-collectors are storming into the kingdom. It is difficult to tell since there is no explanation in the text. But, one thing is clear: Even a great person such as the last of God’s prophets in the Old Testament line, that is, John the Baptist, is not greater than the least of those who will enter into the ‘dominion’ or ‘kingdom’ of heaven. By God’s grace, what a privilege we have.