170 Essays in Anarchism and Religion: Volume 1
- Indicated by such sayings as: “Once Jesus was asked by the
Pharisees when the kingdom of God was coming, and he answered,
‘The kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed;
21 nor will they say, “Look, here it is!” or “There it is!” For, in fact,
the kingdom of God is among you.’” (Luke 17.20–21; cf. Thomas 3,
113); “But if it is by the Spirit [finger] of God that I cast out the de-
mons, then the kingdom of God has come to you” (Matthew 12:28;
Luke 11.20.); and “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. 12 From the days of John the
Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence, and
the violent take it by force”(Matthew 11.11–12; Luke 5.28, 16.16;
Thomas 46.). - For useful surveys of the problem see Heinz Giesen, Herrschaft
Gottes, heute oder morgen?: Zur Heilsbotschaft Jesu und der
Synoptischen Evangelien (Regensburg: Pustet, 1995). - Bruce J. Malina, ‘Christ and Time: Swiss or Mediterranean?’,
Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 51 (1989), 1–31. However, contra
Malina, there is evidence that some people in the early empire were
quite literal and linear (or “Swiss” as Malina puts it) in their interpre-
tation of future-oriented language. See, for example, 1 Thessalonians
4.13–18; 2 Peter 3.4; Cook, The Interpretation of New Testament,
p. 192. - See Benedict Viviano, ‘Eschatology and the Quest for the
Historical Jesus’, in Oxford Handbook of Eschatology, ed. by Jerry
L. Walls (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008), pp. 73–90. - Contrary to the position of, for example, Crossan, The Historical
Jesus; Borg, Jesus, pp. 47–96; Stephen J. Patterson, The God of Jesus:
The Historical Jesus and the Search for Meaning (Valley Forge: Trinity
Press International, 1998). For a helpful analysis of the question see
The Apocalyptic Jesus: A Debate, ed. by Robert J. Miller (Santa Rosa,
California: Polebridge Press, 2001). - The degree of imminence can, for instance, affect both the
character and content of the ethical demands of Jesus. For example,
Albert Schweitzer claimed that Jesus’ ethic was an “interim-ethik”,
temporary and transitory; “completely negative [...] not so much
an ethic as a penitential discipline” undertaken in preparation for