Jesus of Nazareth: What He Wanted, Who He Was

There are also judgment sayings from Jesus’ lips in which witnesses appear against Israel. These include first of all a saying directed to the Twelve whom Jesus had appointed. They are to be not only a sign of the gathering of the eschatological Israel. In addition, they will function as witnesses at the final judgment: “You… will… sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel” (Matt 19:28; cf. Luke 22:30). The twelve are here probably to be regarded as observers at the judgment. The background is Daniel 7:9. That vision in Daniel 7 played a major role for Jesus, and it is the only passage in which thrones for a committee of judges are set up at the last judgment.⁸ But that is not so important. More significant is the question: how will the Twelve judge their own people? They will do so simply by following Jesus and remaining with him (Matt 19:27; cf. Luke 22:28). Their discipleship and fidelity become a counter-witness to all the lack of faith and all the infidelity in the people of God. In other words, there is no further need for a solemn final sentence from a judge: the discipleship of some becomes the judgment of others.

The same is true of the double saying about the queen of the South and the Ninevites, which can easily be reconstructed from the Sayings Source:

The queen of the South will rise up at the judgment together with this generation and condemn it. For she came from the ends of the earth to hear Solomon’s wisdom—and behold, here is something greater than Solomon.

The men of Nineveh will rise up at the judgment together with this generation and condemn it. For they repented at the preaching of Jonah—and behold, here is something greater than Jonah. (cf. Luke 11:31-32 // Matt 12:41-42)

The two parts of the double saying are precisely matched and so strictly planned that later tradents were able to remember it easily. Here again Jesus took his illustrative material from Sacred Scripture: the first book of Kings (1 Kgs 5:14 [English, 4:34]; 10:1-13) tells of the Queen of Sheba, and the book of Jonah (chap. 3) has the story of the Ninevites. Despite the almost complete agreement of the two parts of the saying, there is an escalation present as well: the queen of the South only listens to Solomon, but the Ninevites repent.

But the issue in our context is something different. We have here a clear scene of judgment. The judgment of the world has begun. The accused stand before the judge. Those accused are “this generation,” that is, the generation that has heard Jesus’ preaching and seen his miracles. During the judicial process witnesses arise from their places. The queen of Sheba stands up and testifies against Israel with her longing for Solomon’s wisdom; then the Ninevites get up and witness against Israel with their repentance.

There is a shocking provocation in this double saying as well. It consists in the fact that the witnesses against Israel in both cases are Gentiles. Here we have come upon something that is characteristic of Jesus: he is amazed at the faith of the Gentile centurion (Matt 8:10). He heals the daughter of the Syrophoenician woman (Mark 7:29). He makes a man of Samaria the positive protagonist of a parable (Luke 10:25-37). He says that it will be better for the Gentile cities of Tyre and Sidon at the judgment than for the Jewish villages of Chorazin and Bethsaida (Matt 11:22), and adds that if the mighty deeds done in Capernaum had occurred in Sodom, that city would still be standing (Matt 11:23).

This is precisely the place for the observation that Jesus’ proclamations of judgment are all directed against Israel. There are no words of judgment against the Gentiles. That is crucial, for in the Old Testament nearly all the prophetic books contain speeches about God’s judgment on the nations. Simply read in Ezekiel 25-32 the threatening discourses against Ammon, Moab, Edom, Egypt, the Philistines, and especially Tyre and Sidon. There is nothing like these in Jesus’ words. How should we evaluate this phenomenon?

In my opinion it is inadequate to answer that Jesus had a special openness to and lack of prejudice about Gentiles. He may well have had such an astonishing openness. But the fact that his judgment discourses are all directed to Israel can be explained only by the fact that Jesus concentrated his whole proclamation and work on Israel. Obviously, he was familiar with the promises of the pilgrimage of the nations to Zion. But those very promises presuppose that Israel will open itself to God’s eschatological action and return to God. Therefore the path of the nations ultimately depends on the faith of Israel. And that faith is what is crucial for Jesus now, in this hour of decision.

The Presence of Judgment