Reading Matthew as the Climactic Fulfillment of the Hebrew Story

Publisher Description

This book is a reading of Matthew's Gospel as though it were written to integrate with, advance, and conclude the existing body of Scriptures. Matthew is read as though John was the last prophet of God and Israel's last chance for repentance, and that Jesus was YHWH who had come to judge the Temple, priesthood, and covenant nation according to the terms of the covenant God made with Moses at Sinai. Through this lens, new interpretations are given to the infancy narrative, the Sermon on the Mount, the mission, the parables, and Jesus' arrival in Jerusalem along with the events that followed. By reading Matthew this way, a greater appreciation can be gained for its necessary place in the canon, and many of Matthew's well-known conundrums can be meaningfully addressed. As a Hebrew document, Matthew understood the necessity to record the crimes against YHWH/Jesus in Israel and Jerusalem as the ultimate cause for the termination of the ethnically and geographically bound covenant, which could then be replaced by the cross-cultural and international covenant that Christians now enjoy.