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Matthew 17:11: Difference between revisions
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==What did John the Baptist restore?== | ==What did John the Baptist restore?== | ||
The Greek verb ἀποκαταστήσει, “will restore,” is drawn verbatim from the Septuagint (LXX Mal 3:23, where, however, the object clause is “the heart of the father to the son and the heart of a man to his neighbor” (the Hebrew of Mal 4:6 is only slightly different). | |||
The future tense, therefore, does not suggest that Jesus expects a future return of John the Baptist. The restoration of “everything” (πάντα) must here refer not to the renewal of the present order itself (which would make Elijah the Messiah himself, rather than the forerunner of the Messiah), as, for example, apparently in Acts 1:6 (especially the cognate noun ἀποκατάστασις, “restoration” or “establishing,” in Acts 3:21 in an allusion to the return of Jesus), but to a preparatory work of repentance and renewal (as in the Malachi passage; see especially Luke 1:17). | |||
Only an interpretation of this kind can make possible Jesus’ identification of John the Baptist with Elijah in Matthew 17:12. In short, Jesus responds initially by fully agreeing with the scribes in their understanding of Malachi’s prophecy that Elijah is to come and accomplish his preparatory work. It is only in the astonishing conclusion now to be drawn that Jesus parts company with the scribes.<ref>Donald A. Hagner, Matthew 14–28, vol. 33B, Word Biblical Commentary (Dallas: Word, Incorporated, 1995), 499.</ref> | |||
The idea that Elijah would preach repentance was presumably common and can also be seen in Revelation 11:1–13. | |||
Elijah has in fact already come. But Jesus goes on to observe that Elijah’s mission, to restore the people of God, was met with opposition, and that this same opposition will lead to the death of the Son of man. | |||
<ref>W. D. Davies and Dale C. Allison Jr., A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Gospel according to Saint Matthew, vol. 2, International Critical Commentary (London; New York: T&T Clark International, 2004), 715.</ref> | |||
The account of John’s ministry in Matthew 3 supplies clear links with the prophecy of Mal 4:5–6: John preached the coming of judgment and warned people to repent so that they would escape its terror, and his requirement of baptism as a mark of that repentance and new beginning was a potent symbol of the “restoration” of those of the tribes of Israel who were willing to respond. | |||
But while some of the people had recognized the validity of John’s message, most of those in positions of religious leadership in Jerusalem had not (see Matthew 21:25, 32). If Jesus is carrying on where John left off, he cannot expect to meet with any better treatment at the hands of those who are threatened by their reforming zeal (though in Jesus’ case they will in fact be different hands; the vague “at their hands” leaves the reader with a sense of generalized opposition). So the appearance of Elijah on the mountain, while it has testified to the heavenly glory and authority of the Messiah, is also (through the experience of John, the second Elijah) a pointer to the earthly fate of the Messiah which he has so graphically predicted in Matthew 16:21.<ref>R. T. France, The Gospel of Matthew, The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publication Co., 2007), 654–655.</ref> | |||