Summer Reading: Gospel of Matthew, chapters 3-4
Background: We meet new characters in these chapters: John the Baptizer, Satan, and the first four disciples, Simon Peter, Andrew, James, and John.
The detailed description of what John the Baptizer looks like indicates he might have been a member of the sect called the Essenes, who produced the Dead Sea Scrolls. They were a monastic kind of community who lived in the Judean desert and practiced immersion cleansing as a ritual. John appears rather abruptly in Matthew (Luke tells us the details of his birth, so we expect him later) and begins baptizing people, including Jesus, at the Jordan River. Baptism was not new here; there is long Jewish tradition of ritual baths and cleansing, in either a river, a pool of water, or a mikveh– a tub built for this purpose, found in homes and near the Temple. This ritual cleansing by immersion was to prepare a person to approach God, which takes on new meaning when God has become incarnate and is standing right there. Jesus is baptized by John in Jewish tradition, but Christians have developed our theology about baptism from this event. Baptism is one of two sacraments in Lutheran tradition, because Jesus commands us to do it (Mt. 28).
At the time the Gospel of Matthew is being composed and compiled, the Temple in Jerusalem has been destroyed. The future of Judaism is in question– will it survive, and what will it look like? Groups of Jews are in competition about whose view will prevail: the Pharisees, who want a strict return to Torah observation, or the Jesus followers, who want to incorporate more of Jesus’ teachings in addition to Torah? Since Matthew is of the latter group, the Pharisees are painted as “the bad guys” in this gospel. The tension starts to become evident in this chapter.
Satan is an interesting character, found in both Old and New Testaments. The job of the Satan is “thwarting the ways of God, accusing his children, and wreaking havoc in the community of believers.”1 Jesus is tested after 40 days of fasting, not to find out if he has a weak spot, but to see if he is obedient to God, and if his aspirations and call as Messiah line up with God’s expectations, as spelled out in Torah. Does he want power and control (again, that threat to Rome), or faithfulness?
A map is useful when reading the Bible– see where the regions listed in verse 25 are located, and remember Jesus travels by foot most of the time!
Key Themes:
Belonging to God = observing Torah– what does that look like in Jesus?
The Jesus way of being Jewish is the right way to do it after the destruction of the Temple (Jesus followers making their case over and against the Pharisees)
Questions:
- What do you think John means, that Jesus will baptize “with the Holy Spirit and with fire”? (3:11) What does that mean for the way we practice baptism?
What is the Satan trying to do in the testing/temptation scene?
photo, "St. John the Precursor", icon in the Chapel of the Benedictus, Galilee, taken by Pr. Lori
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