Summary

I have attempted to further the discussion of Jesus' eschatology by considering his aims in relation to several key elements within Second Temple Jewish restorationism. If Jesus held a partially realized eschatology, it is in principle unlikely that he would have done so in isolation from the concrete, this-worldly expectations of the eschaton which characterized Jewish eschatology in this period. In attempting to specify the degree to which Jesus' eschatology was realized, much scholarship in the last hundred years has assumed that if eschatological reality was present for Jesus it must have been abstract or spiritual. This study represents an advance over such approaches by considering Jesus' intentions in relation to central constitutional features of the eschaton within Jewish restorationism.

The use of Jewish expectations for the eschaton as a measure of the degree to which Jesus' eschatology was realized is complicated enormously if Jesus also announced a coming national judgement. Since the realization of Jewish eschatology was to take the form of national restoration, how can the announcement of national judgement be reconciled with the belief that Israel's restoration had already begun?

If the conclusions of chapters 2–3 are sound, Jesus did proclaim coming national judgement. The point emerges from a consideration of Jesus' use of Israel's sacred traditions, for it appears that Jesus not only drew on sacred traditions which had previously served a message of national judgement but also appropriated sacred traditions in a way that subverted widespread conceptions of national restoration.