Matthew 2.1-2: In the time of King Herod, after Jesus
was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, asking,
“Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his
star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage.”
Matthew
27.37: Over
his head they put the charge against him, which read, “This is Jesus, the King
of the Jews.”
At his birth
and at his death, Jesus is given the name King of the Jews. The first
interesting thing to note is that it is a title only given to Jesus by people
who were not Jews: the Magi, Pilate and the Roman soldiers gave him this title.
He was
worshipped as king by the Magi at his birth and is presented with prophetic gifts
which signified his roles as King, Priest and Sacrifice (Gold, Frankincense and
Myrrh).
At his death,
his kingly crown was made from thorns, his throne was a cross and his kingship
was mocked. And a sign in three languages was written above his head; John’s
account tells us the languages were Greek, Latin and Hebrew. His accusers from
the Jewish establishment – Caiaphas the High Priest and his courtiers – asked Pilate
not to put ‘Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews’, but rather ‘He said he was King of the Jews’. But
Pilate refused, saying: ‘What I have written, I have written.’
The truth is
Jesus never said he was King of the Jews. He also never called himself Messiah
or King. Mostly, the only name he gave himself was Son of Man, an enigmatic
Aramaic description for a human being. He never wanted to have the title of
Messiah either: for, as we know, in those days the expectation was that a
Messiah would lead the overthrow of the Romans and initiate the birth of a pure
Jewish state.
Jesus’ calling
was neither to be political revolutionary or dynastic ruler – though his life and
witness was utterly revolutionary and his ancestral line was from the House of David. The
truth is that between his birth and death he lived as a Servant King who did
not seek earthly power, even if some of his disciples had hoped and expected
this. By direct contrast, Jesus’ authority and clarity of purpose seemed to threaten utterly all who held power in both the political and the
religious realms.
We
live in an era of powerful men who seek to lord it over this world with dreams
of ‘taking back control’ and ‘returning to the greatness of Mother Russia’ or ‘making
America great again’.
It
is one of the many paradoxes of the witness of Jesus that the one who did not
want to take control of others, but give self-sacrificially of himself, that
the name of Jesus most commonly attached to him by those who believed in him is in fact ‘Lord’ and ‘Messiah’ (otherwise known as Christ). And Jesus’ lordship knows no
bounds. He is not king of a country but Lord of the Kingdom; a kingdom without border controls, a kingdom for all nations and all time and eternity; a kingdom which started to turn the world upside down at his birth
and which remains a threat to the powerful even today.
As Paul points out in the main blog, Jesus never described himself as the ‘king of the Jews’, this was a name given to him at his birth and execution by non-Jews. But he was asked the question once, by Pilate after his arrest and during his interrogation, “Are you the king of the Jews?”. There is a difference between the gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke, which share a common source, and that of John which did not. In John (18, 20), Jesus does not say yes or no, but returns the question to Pilate “Is it your idea, or have others prompted you?”. The other gospels (Matt 27,11; Mark 15,2; Luke 23,3) share a common response from Jesus. But what was it? I met a problem.
ReplyDeleteA cautionary digression - I was looking up Jesus’ responses in my New International Version Study Bible (Published 1985, by Zondervan Corp), which has lots of useful footnotes, and I have used it for twenty-five years. In each of the gospels it gives the reply as, “Yes, it is as you say”. Clearly, Jesus is agreeing with Pilate and accepting the title. That woke me up! That was not the response I remembered. I am getting on in years, it was the King James version I first read, and I would not have said from memory that Jesus never claimed to be king of the Jews, but replied something like “You say so”, which I take to be non-committal. I turned to the universal source of all knowledge, and ‘Googled’ Luke 23, 3. Of the fifteen translations I looked at on Bible Gateway, three (Living Bible, Tree of Life, and Voice) have expressions that suggest agreement with Pilate. The remainder are non-committal, ranging from “Thou sayest it” (Geneva Bible of 1599) to “You say so” (The Message). Even their quotation from the 2011 edition of the New International version reads, “You have said so”! The moral of the story: be very careful of the Bible translation you use, particularly at critical points like Jesus’ answers to pointed questions.
I seems clear that Jesus, himself, did not claim to be king of the Jews, as John confirms. Jesus continues in John’s version, “My kingdom is not of this world” and points out that, otherwise his followers, all Jewish, would be fighting to protect him. This is the one name we should not be applying to Jesus because it has political overtones that he did not accept. His was not a kingdom like the others of the Roman Empire with puppet kings and rulers. It is a kingdom outside time and space, no boundaries, no five-year plans, no need to conquer and expand, no need for trade barriers or walls, no immigration challenges, no common market, no alliances to be kept or broken, no Trident to protect or destroy, no nuclear button, no exploitation of the land or the poor. Who in their right mind would want to be a king or a leader of all that? Only a power-junky!
Jesus does not offer an earthly kingship, but one of a different dimension. His kingship is of the heart and the spirit. That is where he should be ruling. Once you are part of that kingdom, you can turn your attention properly to the earthly one around you. Jesus’ kingdom may not be of this world, but it should at work changing the worldly kingdom we live in. You and I are the ones to bring his kingdom to bear on the world. There are a few issues in the previous paragraph to start with.
So is ‘King of the Jews’ a name to apply to Jesus? No, of course not! He may have been a Jew, and, in the heavenly sense, a king, but he was not ‘King of the Jews’, his kingdom is much bigger than that, universal. That’s a name applied to him by others who did not understand him or his mission. We surely know better?
"At the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow".
DeleteThe name "King of the Jews", however, does not draw me into worship. It is not a name I would use in my prayers. It does not lift my heart into praise. It does not inspire me to bow down in adoration. And all for the reasons already written about by contributors. It's a name that limits Jesus' kingship. It is earth bound. It was the excuse for his innocent death. Yet the title nailed to the cross did not have the last word for we know that Jesus is the Saviour of all, his Kingdom is not of this world, his reign is for all and for all eternity.
This name is different from the others we have been reflecting on. In some ways it points to death not to the abundant life that Jesus brings.
I wonder how the words we choose to use in prayer and worship, or the words we write and speak, can point each other and ourselves to the living Saviour. When we speak of Jesus to others do we reflect his life giving love. Do our lives reflect the values of his eternal Kingdom?
ReplyDeleteRole of kings ( from reference.com)
Historically, kings were solely responsible for the well-being of their kingdoms. Although they had a court with whom they consort on occasion, the king held the ultimate power and little could be done or said to question his authority. Most nations that were formerly ruled by kings, however, now have some sort of constitution in place that prescribes a more democratic approach to government. The role of royals, in such cases, is now more to serve as the face of their kingdoms. The royalty maintains formal titles and acts as heads of their nation but have little, if any, political power. In the case of commonwealths, such as that of Great Britain, the king or queen is also a uniting force for all of the member nations and territories. Kings also represent traditional rites that no longer have much political significance but are important to national pride and maintain important roles within respective cultures.
As I read this description of the role of present day kings, I thought it fitted well with what contemporary ideas of religion are perceived to be . Religion has to take the back seat, not influence our professional judgement and not take the precedence in seemingly any manner, lest it cause offence to anyone. I recollect a time in training when it was mentioned that a particular GP surgery had Christian chaplains attached to it. The chaplains supported, in an informal role, people of any faith. The greatest opponents of this idea , I noticed, were Christians themselves. People of other faiths were proponents of the idea, and some non Christians who had observed it, said it worked very well!
As the main blog notes, although Jesus was called "King of the Jews", he was only king to non Jews. At a time when religion is so divisive, what role should it have in our lives? What kind of king should we be following? Do our actions show whom we follow? Let us use our faith as a uniting force, not a divisive one.