§8. THE DAY OF THE SON OF MAN

G But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall be falling from heaven, and the powers that are in the heavens shall be shaken. And then shall they see the Son of man coming in clouds with great power and glory. And then shall he send forth the angels, and shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from the uttermost part of the earth to the uttermost part of heaven.

For as the lightning, when it lighteneth out of the one part under the heaven, shineth unto the other part under heaven; so shall the Son of man be in his day. And as it came to pass in the days of Noah, even so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. They ate, they drank, they married, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and the flood came, and destroyed them all. Likewise even as it came to pass in the days of Lot; they ate, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded; but in the day that Lot went out from Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all: after the same manner shall it be in the day that the Son of man is revealed. In that day, he which shall be on the housetop, and his goods in the house, let him not go down to take them away: and let him that is in the field likewise not return back. Remember Lot's wife. I say unto you, In that night there shall be two men on one bed; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left. There shall be two women grinding together; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left.

89. AN INTERRUPTION BY THE DISCIPLES

And they answering say unto him,
Where, Lord? And he said unto them,
Where the body is, thither will the eagles
also be gathered together.

$10. TIME OF DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM

Now from the fig tree learn her parable: when her branch is now become tender, and putteth forth its leaves, ye know that the summer is nigh; even so ye also, when ye see these things coming to pass, know ye that it is nigh, even at the doors. Verily say unto you, This generation shall not pass away, until all these things be accomplished. Heaven and earth shall pass away: but my words shall not pass away.

I

$11. TIME OF the Day of tHE SON OF MAN

But of that day [[or that hour]] knoweth no one, not even the angels in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father.

In the above exhibit there is shown consecutively all of the material in our present document MK 13:1-32, both that which is accepted and that which is not accepted as original. The accepted portions occupy the central of the three columns. To the left there are set those portions of document MK in the place of which other documentary testimony is substituted; to the right there are set those portions which are believed to be additions to the discourse as uttered by Jesus. Within brackets in §§3, 4, 11 there are placed certain phrases, not conveniently detachable, which also are regarded as accretions. In the central column of $87-9 the material is drawn from document P §60. In 85 the equivalent of the portion B, which is set aside, is drawn from the Lukan record at that point, Luke 21:18, 19.

Of the portions of document MK set to the left, the portion C appears later as a part of the document P account of the day of the Son of man in §8; the portion E has substantially a verbal parallel in the document P record of $7. Of the portions of document MK set to the right, the portion F statements are substantially covered by the preceding forecast of document P, itself paralleled by the portion E of document MK, the latter set to the left only because of the purer and better introduced parallel of document P in §7. By this review it will be seen at a glance that the amount of the proposed disturbance in the document MK record is not considerable.

Additional justification for the proposed reconstruction may be had by bringing into view certain considerations which could not emerge so clearly earlier in the examination. Thus it is possible now to raise the question as to the relative intelligibility and appropriateness of the portion B and the proposed Lukan substitute. If Jesus did not promise that the day of the Son of man would certainly follow upon the destruction of Jerusalem at no great distance, what meaning can there be in the Markan portion B? "The end" which is referred to there is either the destruction of Jerusalem or the day of the Son of man, probably the latter, though the same phrase from Jesus in §4 does not necessarily mean more than the destruction of Jerusalem. But to whichever event it was applied by the disciples in portion B, that event brought salvation to him who endured persecution until it came. It will hardly be held that Jesus thought the destruction of Jerusalem the time of salvation; and he would surely not exhort to endurance and define salvation in terms of endurance until the time of an event of which he did not know the time, but which he impliedly, if not explicitly, set beyond that generation. On the other hand, the present Markan portion B is normally explainable, in the light of the hopes of the apostolic age, as a modification of the earlier document MK saying still preserved in Luke.

An additional argument for the exclusion of the portion F and the bracketed portion in §3, on the ground of the implicit claim of Jesus to be the true Christ, may now be seen by a comparison of the Markan portion E with its document P parallel, the former bearing the phrase, "the Christ." It is not without considerable confirmatory significance that in three of the portions which, on wholly independent grounds,

have been set aside there occurs that striking designation for the community, "the elect," portions D, F, and G, a designation that occurs nowhere else in the discourse. It will be recalled that it is the idea of election which constitutes the eschatological addition to the document M report of the parable of the Great Supper or Marriage Feast, closing with "for many are called, but few elected."

From the evidence of this discourse it seems that there are in the Synoptic Gospels three strata of thought about the time of the day of the Son of man. There is the thought of Jesus that no one but the Father knows the time of that day. There is the thought of the early apostolic age that the day is to follow closely upon the destruction of Jerusalem, recorded in the above portion G of document MK and elsewhere. There is the thought of the later apostolic age that before that day the gospel must be preached in the whole inhabited earth, recorded in the above portion A of document MK and elsewhere. At a previous point it was seen that there are apparently three similar strata concerning the extent of the mission of the disciples, an idea itself determined in large part by chronological considerations.

D

$10. EXHORTATION IN THE FINAL DISCOURSE

GOSPEL MT 24:42

Watch therefore: for ye know not on what day your Lord cometh.

A Take ye heed, watch: for ye A But take heed to yourselves, know not when the time is.

Nowhere else in the Synoptic Gospels can there be found, in the details of the relation of gospels MT and LK to document MK, such phenomena as are seen in the above important paragraph with which the document MK account of the final discourse closes. Nowhere else, from first to last, do the later evangelists treat their source with such striking freedom. Nowhere else is there a twofold paragraph of material, derived from document MK, which clearly holds to the theme of the document yet re-expresses it with so little regard to the verbal content of the document. This impression of singularity in the treatment of this hortatory paragraph by Matthew and Luke is deepened when it is observed with what faithfulness the evangelists, especially Matthew, have taken over the immediately preceding paragraph on the time of the events. The altogether isolated character of the evangelists' action at this point in the handling of their document indicates the need for an especially close scrutiny of their work, with the object of determining, if possible, the active factors in this unusual procedure.

The verbal indebtedness of Luke to document MK does not extend much beyond the hortatory words of portions A and D, "Take ye heed," "Watch ye." In portion B there is the thought that "that day" will come "suddenly (aiqvídios)," which is allied to the figure of "the lord of the house," in portion E, who may come "suddenly (èçaíþvns)." That in portion D the evangelist Luke is returning to the "Watch ye" of portion A of his document, after having expanded the "Take ye heed" of A by portion B, seems indicated by his use of ἀγρυπνεῖτε in D against the γρηγορεῖτε of his document in D. The portion F apparently constitutes the corresponding expansion of the "Watch ye" of his document. In brief, the evangelist Luke has taken, it seems, the double exhortation of his document MK, "Take ye heed: Watch ye," together with the reason for the exhortation, "For ye know not when the time is," and has reasonably and impressively elaborated these most weighty thoughts in his portions B and F.

But why did not Luke accept the elaborations of those thoughts in the form in which they were presented to him by his document MK in the portions C and E? Omissions by Luke from his document MK can be explained generally by his literary principle not to repeat 1 Even here Luke has poσéxere for the ẞλéwere of his document MK.

from document MK that which is already supplied to him by his other documents, especially by document P. Does document P contain anything which may have been taken by Luke as the parallel to the portions C and E? Those portions, it will be observed, read like fragments of two parables. That the portions C-E as they now stand do not convey as a whole one single continuous thought seems indicated by the fact that in C one only is set to the special duty of watching, while in E the supposition is that the whole body of servants are watching. In view of the method of Luke in the use of his documents observed elsewhere, it seems reasonable to conclude that Luke omitted the portion C because he had reported the parable more fully from document P §64B; and that he omitted the portion E because he had been able to supply that parable in more complete form from his document P $27. In the case of this hortatory paragraph Luke was confronted by a more difficult problem of adjustment between documents MK and P than at previous points in this discourse. Thus he could omit MK 13:21-23 entirely because in document P §60 he had precisely the wording of document MK, and had already taken from document MK 13:5, 6 one statement of the thought. Since MK 13:11 had appeared from document P§22, Luke would not again use it, but being an integral part of the paragraph in MK he gave it place in rewritten form as Luke 21:14, 15. Something like the latter he does in the present paragraph; but because that which he must rewrite is parabolic in form, portions C and E, his substitutionary portions B and F are exceptionally unlike the original in his document, in other words, he has retained substance only, not form.

Does this suggested explanation of the procedure of Luke find any support in the method of Matthew at this point? After using the paragraph on the time of the events from document MK, Matt. 24:3236, Matthew inserted those portions of document P §60 which he had not already employed as Matt. 24:26-28, namely, what makes up our present Matt. 24:37-41. Then he inserted his equivalent for the Markan hortatory paragraph, Matt. 24:42. Turning again to document P, he inserted the parables P§§28, 29B; and followed them at once by two parables from document M §§24, 25, the latter being the equivalent of document P §64B, the former apparently the equivalent of P §27. It would seem, therefore, that not only Luke but Matthew