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Matthew used the Gospel of Mark as a source and model for his story of Jesus. But Matthew has his own story to tell and his own theological perspective. This Gospel was designed to address other readers and lis- teners. But there is a strange tension within the Matthean story that is either resolved—or rendered more complex—by the narrative of Jesus’ passion and resurrection, the concern of this chapter.

As the public life of Jesus opens, he appears to embrace the tradi- tions of late-first-century Judaism, forging a close bond between his fol- lowers and the observance of the Law. He announces:

Think not that I have come to abolish the law and the prophets; I have not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them. For truly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot will pass from the law until all is accomplished. (Matt 5:17–18)

The matter becomes more complex as we read further into the Gospel’s report of Jesus’ ministry. Jesus limits his disciples’ mission to Israel alone. At the beginning of a long discourse that deals with the mission of the Church (10:1—11:1), he instructs his disciples, as he

sends them out: “Go nowhere among the Gentiles, and into no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (10:5–6). A little later in the story he responds to the pleas of a Canaanite woman to heal her daughter: “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (15:24). During his public ministry the Matthean Jesus limits his mission to Israel and exhorts his followers to live and teach with exactitude the Law of Israel (5:17–18). None of this was present in the Gospel of Mark.

But this view is compromised by Matthew’s report of the healing of the Gentile centurion’s servant (8:5–13). Although Jesus cures the servant of a Gentile soldier, the miracle is worked within the context of the lack of belief that Jesus finds in Israel (see 8:1–27). Jesus warns Israel:

Truly, I say to you, not even in Israel have I found such faith. I tell you, many will come from east and west and sit at the table of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob while the sons of the king- dom will be thrown into the outer darkness; there men will weep and gnash their teeth. (vv. 10–12)

Despite Jesus’ personal mission to Israel alone (15:24), he looks to a later time when God’s chosen people will be “thrown into outer dark- ness” while others will “come from east and west.” A regular reader of the Gospel of Matthew senses a tension between the ministry of Jesus, his limitation of mission and ministry to the Gentiles—even though a threat of eventual disappointment hangs over that ministry (8:10–12)— and the final words of the Gospel, where the risen Jesus sends out his disciples to “all nations” (28:16–20).

An important feature of any narrative is the way an author uses various aspects of “time” as the plot of the story unfolds. Matthew exploits this with skill.1_{The events in a narrative normally follow the}

chronological order in which they happen in any human story. This use of time is generally called “narrative time.” But sometimes events from the past are recalled and drawn into the story to enrich the events of “narrative time” as they unfold. Two well-known examples of this are found in the story in the Gospel of John that tells of John the Baptist’s experience at Jesus’ baptism (John 1:32–34) and the fact that a man was born blind (9:1–5). The chronologically determined reporting of events

(narrative time) is enriched by recalling events that took place outside

that chronology, and prior to it. This practice of looking back into a time prior to the “narrative time” of the regular passing of events in a story is called “analepsis.” Matthew, however, tells his story by introducing elements into his story that give a hint of something that will happen in the future. In all the Gospels, Jesus’ predictions of his oncoming pas- sion and resurrection (Mark 8:31; 9:31; 10:32–34; and parallels; John 3:14; 8:28; 12:32) interrupt the day-to-day events to look to Jesus’ future. The technical term used for these interruptions into “narrative time” is “prolepsis.”2

Jesus’ words to his disciples in 5:17–18 come very early in Jesus’ story. They open his Sermon on the Mount. However, these words look beyond the time line of the Sermon on the Mount and point to the future.

Think not that I have come to abolish the law and the prophets; I have come not to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly, I say to you,till heaven and earth pass away,

not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the law until all is accomplished. [italics mine]

Some future “time” will come. There is the “now” of Jesus’ preach- ing during his public ministry, but there is a moment “yet to come” when the present order of things will be changed: heaven and earth will pass away and all will be accomplished (v. 18). There is a time in the future untilwhich every detail of the Mosaic Law must be observed: “till

heaven and earth pass away…untilall is accomplished.”3

When might that future time be? In the light of our understanding of Jesus’ eschato- logical teaching, beginning in the Christian narrative tradition in Mark 13 and strongly affirmed in Matthew 24—25, most scholars read 5:17–18 as a reference to the Jewish notion of the end of all time. For the Matthean Christians, therefore, the Law must be observed in its entirety till the end of all time.4

This understanding of the future events referred to in 5:17–18 strengthens Jesus’ limitation of his disciples’ and his own preaching to the lost sheep of Israel (10:5–6; 15:24) and his hesitation before work- ing two miracles for Gentiles (8:5–13; 15:21–28). All Christians are to observe every detail of the Jewish Law till the end of time.5_{But as we}

turn to a reading of Matthew’s resurrection story, prefaced by the pas- sion narrative, we will find some awkward contradictions within the narrative as Jesus dies (27:45–54), at his resurrection (28:2–4), and in Jesus’ commissioning of the disciples (28:16–20). The risen Jesus’ final words in the Gospel of Matthew send the disciples on a mission to the ends of the earth, promising that he will be with them till the close of the age. If the future time of 5:17–18 referred to the end of all time, the command of Jesus that the Jewish Law be perfectly observed, without changing even the tiniest detail, should still be in force in the post- Easter Matthean community, awaiting Jesus’ final coming.6_{But some-}

thing happens between Jesus’ ministry and his final words that changes the perspective of 5:17–18: the death and resurrection of Jesus.7