The Bitter Cup

In Matthew 26:39 Jesus said:

Πάτερ μου, εἰ δυνατόν ἐστιν, παρελθάτω ἀπ’ ἐμοῦ τὸ ποτήριον τοῦτο πλὴν οὐχ ὡς ἐγὼ θέλω ἀλλ’ ὡς σύ.

The King James translation gives this as:

O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt.

Because the cup is mentioned by Jesus, the expression is familiar, but where does the cup come from? Cups do figure into the Passover ceremony but not in such a way that it makes sense in the way that Jesus uses it.

The same term, cup (ποτήριον), shows up in Psalm 74:9 (Psalm 75:8 in the KJV):

ὅτι ποτήριον ἐν χειρὶ κυρίου οἴνου ἀκράτου πλῆρες κεράσματος καὶ ἔκλινεν ἐκ τούτου εἰς τοῦτο πλὴν ὁ τρυγίας αὐτοῦ οὐκ ἐξεκενώθη πίονται πάντες οἱ ἁμαρτωλοὶ τῆς γῆς

For a cup of undiluted wine is in the Lord's hand, full of mixture and he tips it from this to this but its dregs will not be poured out, all the sinners of the earth shall drink them.

So the reference to drinking the cup seems to refer back to the cup that the Psalmist sang about, the cup of the wrath of God directed at sinners.

Feeding the Hungry

The following is not an original insight to me, but I cannot remember where I first heard it.

The human baby is completely helpless. Unlike some mammals, which can walk within hours or days of birth, for almost the first year of its life it cannot walk. It is incapable of fending for itself for several years after birth. If it is to be fed, watered, or clothed, someone else must do it.

Considered in this light, the following scripture provides an interesting light on the work of parenting and how God views it:

31 ¶ When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory:
32 And before him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats:
33 And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left.
34 Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world:
35 For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in:
36 Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me.
37 Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink?
38 When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee?
39 Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee?
40 And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me. (Matthew 25:31–41)

Feeding the Hungry

Sometimes in the midst of ephemeral arguments, a little gem of an argument shows up. Here is one such example, found in this other piece (which may or may not be worth reading):

Cooking is an act of love, an act of service to others.  It is an opportunity to care for others in a very fundamental way, to literally nourish them through the work of your own hands.

 This is another way of putting a scripture (and notice what comes first):

Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world:
35 For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in:
36 Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me.
37 Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink?
38 When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee?
39 Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee?
40 And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me. (Matthew 25:34–40)

Matthew 24:17-18

When the abomination of desolation was to appear, Jesus advised his disciples:

17     ὁ ἐπὶ τοῦ δώματος μὴ καταβάτω ἆραι τὰ ἐκ τῆς οἰκίας αὐτοῦ,
18     καὶ ὁ ἐν τῷ ἀγρῷ μὴ ἐπιστρεψάτω ὀπίσω ἆραι τὸ ἱμάτιον αὐτοῦ.

He who is on the roof, let him not go down to take the things of his house, and he who is in the field, let him to return back to take his clothes. (Matthew 24:17–19)

Two cultural points stick out. The first is the flat roofs (see also 2 Samuel 11:2). The second is the tendency to lay aside outer clothing to work in the fields. In this scenario, quick action is required and when it is time to go, it is time to go immediately. In some emergencies delay is deadly and Jesus says that this is one of them.

Matthew 24:16

Since I have already discussed Matthew 24:15 in two places, I will skip to Matthew 24:16:

τότε οἱ ἐν τῇ Ἰουδαίᾳ φευγέτωσαν εἰς τὰ ὄρη,

Then, let those in Judea flee to the mountains. (Matthew 24:16–17)

As a military strategy, fleeing to the mountains had already been successful on at least two different occasions in Israelite history. Once under Joshua when Israelite settlements were almost always in the hills. The second time was under the Maccabees. The latter seems to be the historical precedent to which Jesus refers.

The idea is to get away from Jerusalem, which was corrupt. The idea partially backfired at Masada. Masada was partially successful because the place was defensible and the Romans had to lay siege for a couple of years. The Romans won in the end but the victory was very costly. One cannot think of what the Romans did at Masada and not think of the words of Tacitus (Agricola 98):

ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant

They make a desert and call it peace.

Matthew 24:14

Throughout his prophecy of what will happen, Jesus has repeatedly told his disciples that certain things were not a sign of the end. Wars and rumors of wars, for example, are not signs of the end (Matthew 24:6). Plagues, famines and earthquakes are just the beginning (Matthew 24:7-8). Afflictions, offenses, hatred, betrayals, persecutions, false prophets must all be endured before the end (Matthew 24:9-13). Finally, Jesus gives his disciples a sign of the end:

καὶ κηρυχθήσεται τοῦτο τὸ εὐαγγέλιον τῆς βασιλείας ἐν ὅλῃ τῇ οἰκουμένῃ εἰς μαρτύριον πᾶσιν τοῖς ἔθνεσιν, καὶ τότε ἥξει τὸ τέλος.

And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the civilized world for a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come. (Matthew 24:14)

The end comes only after the voice of warning goes to all nations.

Two questions, however, remain unanswered in the passage. What is this gospel that must be preached? The end of what? Each of those questions needs to be considered.

Matthew uses the term gospel four times (Matthew 4:23; 9:35; 24:14; 26:13), three of them in the phrase "the gospel of the kingdom." But for all that, he never tells us what it is, probably because he and his original readers already knew what it was. Probably the closest we get to understanding it is the final charge in Matthew 28:18-20, but that is probably a summary statement.

What end Jesus is referring to also needs to be considered. Many assume that the end is the end of the world. Some assume that it refers to the end of things as we know them. Hugh Nibley, in an unpublished manuscript entitled "The End of What", argued that it was the end of the Church. Another way of looking at the matter is to consider that τὸ τέλος means the end in the sense of the goal. So the goal is to have the gospel preached in all the world. The initial question was about the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem, the appearance of Jesus, and the end of the world. It would appear that if Jesus took those questions in order (and they do not refer to the same thing), that the end in question is the destruction of the Jerusalem temple. This would seem to be supported by the next verse which talks about the abomination of desolation.

Whichever it was, the preaching of the gospel was the key prediction.

The Abomination of Desolation

The English phrase "abomination of desolation" comes from the King James translation of Matthew 24:15. The Greek phrase is τὸ βδέλυγμα τῆς ἐρημώσεως. As Jesus says, it appears in Daniel 9:27 and Daniel 11: 31. It also appears in 1 Maccabees 1:54.

Daniel 9:27 uses the concept after mentioning that it will occur after the Messiah is cut off (yikkaret; Daniel 9:26).

Daniel 11:31 says that it will come after the sanctuary of the temple is polluted and the daily sacrifice is taken away.

The mention in 1 Maccabees 1:54 is perhaps more interesting because the use of the phrase is not a prophecy but rather in a historical text. The situation described is clearly depicted as a fulfillment of the prophecy in Daniel. (Jesus projects it as still in the future.) Prefaced to this use is a description of the actions of Antiochus IV Epiphanes.

Antiochus wanted a unified populous (1 Maccabees 1:41) and wanted his empire to go in a new direction, therefore he commanded "each to abandon his customs" (1 Maccabees 1:42). As a consequence, "many from Israel were happy to serve him and they sacrificed to idols and violated the Sabbath" (1 Maccabees 1:43) and "to follow the customs of the heathen" (1 Maccabees 1:44). They stopped the sacrifices (1 Maccabees 1:45), and "polluted the holy things" (1 Maccabees 1:46). They built altars to idols (1 Maccabees 1:47), "so that they forgot the law and changed all the judgments and whosoever would not do according to the command of the king was put to death" (1 Maccabees 1:49-50). Furthermore, they set up overseers (ἐπισκόπους, "bishops" although "spies" might be a better translation in the context) to insure that everyone followed the new way of thinking. "Everyone who abandoned the law and did evil in the earth" was promoted into positions of responsibility (1 Maccabees 1:52). And then, "on the fifteenth of Chaseleu, in the one hundred and forty-fifth year, an abomination of desolation (βδέλυγμα ἐρημώσεως) was established at the altar" (1 Maccabees 1:54).


This passage shows the processes that led the authors of 1 Maccabees to decide that the prophecy of Daniel had been fulfilled. Polluting the sanctuary and cutting off the daily sacrifices are both mentioned to draw the reader's attention that the conditions had been met. But following the Gentile customs and doing things their way. Covenants and the law were both abandoned. Spies were put in place to report and insure that everyone behaved the way that the new regime wanted them to. And "they burned the books of the law which they found" (1 Maccabees 1:56). It was, after all, important to rewrite the history and make the previous orthodoxy disappear.

This description from Maccabees supplies an understanding of what Jesus was predicting for the future of Christianity before his death.

Matthew 24:13

After listing the various bad things that will happen, Jesus says:

ὁ δὲ ὑπομείνας εἰς τέλος οὗτος σωθήσεται.

He who endures to the end, that one will be saved (Matthew 24:13).

It is the one who endures, or remains steadfast, to the end, through the suffering, the famines, the earthquakes, the plagues, the wars, the afflictions, the false prophets, the false Christs, the hatred, the persecutions, the betrayals, the assassinations, who will be saved. Jesus tells his followers that they can expect rather dreadful times and rather dreadful treatment. And yet, at the end they will be saved.

Matthew 24:12

So, continuing with the prophecy, what happens after all of the betrayal and hatred?

καὶ διὰ τὸ πληθυνθῆναι τὴν ἀνομίαν ψυγήσεται ἡ ἀγάπη τῶν πολλῶν.

And because of the spread of iniquity, the love of many will grow cold (Matthew 24:12)

The increase in iniquity correlates directly with the freezing of love. The betrayal, hatred and deception all feed into the iniquity and to the lessening of love.

Betrayal certainly saps the love that might be extended as it is difficult to love someone who has stabbed one in the back.

Hatred, particularly open displays of it, does not foster love.

Deception, causing others to err because they have been given false information, also does not engender love.

In general, the spread of iniquity does not foster love. It reminds one of the tautology of the "hate crime." How often does one commit a crime against someone because they love them? The mere fact that someone was willing to commit a crime against someone is evidence that the perpetrator hates the victim. Someone who has been made a victim is usually not well-disposed to the perpetrator.

So, it really is not much of a surprise that iniquity does not foster love.

Matthew 24:11

Following the betrayals of Matthew 24:10, Jesus adds:

καὶ πολλοὶ ψευδοπροφῆται ἐγερθήσονται καὶ πλανήσουσιν πολλούς·

and many false prophets shall arise and shall deceive many (Matthew 24:11)

False Christs were mentioned earlier. False prophets would be individuals who claimed to speak for God but did so falsely. Many would be deceived by their claims. So the argument from popularity (i.e. that something is good because it is popular) is not necessarily a valid argument. These prophets also follow and supplant the disciples who are killed in the previous verse.

Earlier in Matthew, Jesus talks about false prophets:

Προσέχετε ἀπὸ τῶν ψευδοπροφητῶν, οἵτινες ἔρχονται πρὸς ὑμᾶς ἐν ἐνδύμασιν προβάτων, ἔσωθεν δέ εἰσιν λύκοι ἅρπαγες. ἀπὸ τῶν καρπῶν αὐτῶν ἐπιγνώσεσθε αὐτούς· μήτι συλλέγουσιν ἀπὸ ἀκανθῶν σταφυλὰς ἢ ἀπὸ τριβόλων σῦκα;

Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing  but inwardly are rapacious wolves. You will recognize them by their fruits: They did not gather grapes from thorns or figs from thistles. (Matthew 7:15–16)

This whole section follows from Jesus castigating the Pharisees because they said one thing and did something else. Those who do not bring forth good fruits are false prophets and do not speak for God. They should not be followed. Nevertheless, many will be deceived by them and follow them in spite of their never producing good fruits or good works.

Matthew 24:10

Jesus, discussing future events, says:

καὶ τότε σκανδαλισθήσονται πολλοὶ καὶ ἀλλήλους παραδώσουσιν καὶ μισήσουσιν ἀλλήλους·

And then many will be offended and they shall betray each other and shall hate each other. (Matthew 24:10)

The Greek term σκανδαλισθήσονται means not only to be offended, but is the source of our English term to be scandalizedm and is actually stronger than merely taking offense. This taking offense, whether or not offense was intended, will serve as an excuse for people to betray and hate each other. Offense, hatred and betrayal often go together.

In Jesus's prophesy, these events follow the betray and murder of the disciples. The implication is that first they betray the disciples because they hate them (because they hate the Lord of the disciples) but the hatred and betrayal does not stop there. Having betrayed the disciples, they then proceed to betray each other proceeding in a vicious cycle. This cycle can be seen throughout human history. It is a sure sign of ill times.

Matthew 24:9

Approaching this verse, Jesus has just warned his disciples that famines and plagues will only be the beginning of their problems:

τότε παραδώσουσιν ὑμᾶς εἰς θλῖψιν καὶ ἀποκτενοῦσιν ὑμᾶς, καὶ ἔσεσθε μισούμενοι ὑπὸ πάντων τῶν ἐθνῶν διὰ τὸ ὄνομά μου.

Then they will betray you to suffering and will kill you, and you will be hated by all the nations because of my name. (Matthew 24:9)

Disciples should expect betrayal and to be hated. While the individuals hating the disciples is clearly "all the nations" or "all the Gentiles" the antecedent to the verbs for betraying and killing is less clear. The last previous plural personal noun mentioned in the chapter is back in verse 5: the πολλοὶ  ἐλεύσονται ἐπὶ τῷ ὀνόματί μου "many who will come in my name" (Matthew 24:5). It would appear that those who claim to represent Jesus will be those who will betray the disciples and attempt to kill them. This is not a pleasant prospect.

Translating Matthew 28:1

A reader asks about the translation of Matthew 28:1 and what it implies for the arrival of the two Marys at the tomb.The question comes because Tyndale translated it:

The sabbath day at even which dawneth the morrow after the saboth, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to see the sepulchre.

The Greek text in question is:

Ὀψὲ δὲ σαββάτων, τῇ ἐπιφωσκούσῃ εἰς μίαν σαββάτων, ἦλθεν Μαρία ἡ Μαγδαληνὴ καὶ ἡ ἄλλη Μαρία θεωρῆσαι τὸν τάφον. (Matthew 28:1)

My translation (at least for today) is:

Long after the Sabbath, at the dawn of the first of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to look at the tomb.

To me the text seems pretty clear that the two Marys came at dawn on the first day of the week.

I can actually see where Tyndale comes up with his translation. The text has ὀψέ which looks a lot like ὀψία which was used just a few verses before in Matthew 27:57. The Greek term ὀψία does mean evening, and ὀψέ is related to it both terms referring to lateness, but they are not the same term and do not mean the same thing. It is an easy mistake to make.

I think William Tyndale was a phenomenal translator. It is perhaps too easy to take a few hundred years of hindsight and nit-pick the work of someone else. This passage simply has a nit. Even when he was wrong, his prose is beautiful, much better than mine.

Matthew 24:7-8.

Continuing the theme of wars and rumors of wars, Jesus adds:

ἐγερθήσεται γὰρ ἔθνος ἐπὶ ἔθνος καὶ βασιλεία ἐπὶ βασιλείαν, καὶ ἔσονται λιμοὶ καὶ λοιμοὶ καὶ σεισμοὶ κατὰ τόπους· πάντα δὲ ταῦτα ἀρχὴ ὠδίνων.

For nation shall rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and plagues, and earthquakes from place to place, but all of these are only the beginning of sorrows. (Matthew 24:7–8)

An interesting sidelight on these verses is that within two hundred years of this being written the words λιμοὶ and λοιμοὶ were no longer distinguished in pronunciation. Someone listening (and scriptures, indeed all writings at the time, were read aloud) would not be able to distinguish the two. This and the similarity in spelling (there is only one letter difference between the two) explains why manuscripts like Sinaiticus, Vaticanus, and a number of others drop out the explicit mention of plagues. They were all written after the shift in pronunciation. Interestingly, many of the modern editors (such as the Alands and the United Bible Society) have failed to recognize what is going on and have followed the incorrect reading.

Matthew 24:6

Jesus continues his sermon by warning his disciples that not only would they have to face false prophets but:

μελλήσετε δὲ ἀκούειν πολέμους καὶ ἀκοὰς πολέμων· ὁρᾶτε, μὴ θροεῖσθε· δεῖ γὰρ πάντα γενέσθαι, ἀλλ’ οὔπω ἐστὶν τὸ τέλος.

Ye shall hear wars and rumors of wars. See that ye do not worry for all these things must occur, but the end is not yet. (Matthew 24:6)

While the disciples should worry about false Christs (Matthew 24:4-5), they should not worry about wars or reports of wars (and there were a lot of wars during the Roman Empire). Wars do not signify the end. One might lose one's life in war, but not one's soul. A false Christ, however, could cause one to lose one's soul. They are the greater danger.

Note that the perspective already presumes a life after death, even a resurrection of the dead, although the first instance of a resurrection is not for another week.

At the time Christ gave this sermon, Pilate was sitting in his palace; he would be more concerned about an uprising, a rumor of war, than sorting out true and false Christs. Barabbas was probably sitting in his cell, a false Messiah awaiting trial for inciting an uprising unaware that soon he would be set at liberty by the true one.

War is a terrible thing, a wicked thing, an evil thing. It is not, however, the worst thing. It may legitimately claim our attention, but there are other things that deserve more attention.

Matthew 24:5

Matthew 24:4-5 are really one long sentence:

Βλέπετε μή τις ὑμᾶς πλανήσῃ· πολλοὶ γὰρ ἐλεύσονται ἐπὶ τῷ ὀνόματί μου λέγοντες, Ἐγώ εἰμι ὁ Χριστός, καὶ πολλοὺς πλανήσουσιν.

Watch lest someone deceive you, for many shall come in my name saying: I am the Christ, and many will be deceived. (Matthew 24:4–5)

Two things interest me about this passage for the moment. The first is that Jesus is saying that those who claim to be Christ are taking his name. He is therefore claiming to be the Christ.

The second thing is that many will be led astray by individuals claiming (falsely) to be Christ. They will claim to be him and claim his prerogatives, but they will do so illegitimately. They will lead individuals astray. Jesus warns his followers not to be led astray.

For Christians this creates a balancing act between faith and skepticism. Setting aside those who actually claim to be Christ, there are those who claim to be Christ's and yet are not. They also can lead someone astray. In the end, Christ will tell those who falsely claim to be his that he does not recognize them or their deeds (Matthew 7:21-23). So the dilemma that leaves the Christians is: How does one know when one who claims to act for Christ is actually authorized by him?

Matthew 24:4

Jesus begins his eschatological oration by saying:

Watch that none of you err. (Matthew 24:4)

The term that he uses for erring is πλανήσῃ. This verb is used in the Book of Enoch to describe the erring messengers. It is also the same root where the term planet comes from; a planet is a wandering star. The warning is against wandering away from what Jesus lays down.

In looking at the last days, it is not uncommon for individuals to wander off the right way, and Jesus does not want his disciples to stray from the path. Why they might wander is related in the next verse.

Matthew 24:3

In the twenty-fourth chapter of Matthew, Jesus tells his disciples about future events. What provokes the discourse are three questions:

When Jesus sat down upon the Mount of Olives, his disciples came to him privately saying: Tell us:

•  When shall these things [the destruction of the Jerusalem temple] be?
•  And what is the sign of thy appearance?
•  And of the end of the world?

The chapter reads very differently depending on whether one takes the questions as three separate questions (as I have here) or combines them some way (such as considering the appearance of Christ as the end of the world). What signs one looks for depends on how one reads the question or questions.

Today's Maxwell Quote

From Sermons Not Spoken (1985), 65-66:

We should recognize that certain scriptures commingle prophecies which bear upon different time periods. The classic example is chapter 24 of Matthew, in which Jesus prophesying both about events which were to happen soon and events then quite distant.

The destruction of the temple (see Matthew 24:1-12) occurred within a few decades, but the foreseen calamities preceding the Second Coming (see, for instance, Matthew 24:21, 22) were still centuries away.

Seven Grooms for One Sister

One of the more famous passages in the book of Tobit occurs in the third chapter:

In that day it happened to the daughter of Ragouel, Sarah in Ecbatana of the Medes and she was rebuked by the maid-servants of her father because she was given to seven husbands and Asmodeus, the evil demon, killed them before she could be with them as a wife, and they said to her: Don't you understand that you have strangled your husbands; you have already had seven and never taken the name of any of them. (Tobit 3:7-8).

The comparison is usually with Matthew 22:25-28, a puzzle set to Jesus by the Sadducees.

There were among us seven brothers and the first, having married, died and not having seed, left his wife to his brother. Likewise the second and the third until the seventh. Last of all the wife died. In the resurrection, therefore, of whom of the seven is she the wife, for all were married to her.

The difference is that in the puzzle set by the Sadducees, the husbands are brothers. That is not said in Tobit, where there are simply seven husbands. In Tobit, the marriages were never consummated. In Matthew nothing is said about that and the presumption is that they were all consummated. So, while there are similarities between Tobit and Matthew, they do not go very deep. Tobit may serve as a backdrop to the Sadducees' question, but the differences should not be ignored.