Jesus Remembered: Christianity in the Making, vol. 1

THE MISSION OF JESUS §11.4
be no good enough reason to leave the Q version of John's preaching out of the
reckoning.
b. Judgment on Israel
The note of judgment is clear and unrelenting in Q's language and imagery: 'viper's
brood', 115 'the coming wrath' (Q 3.7), 116 'the ax already laid at the root of
the trees', 'every tree not bearing good fruit cut down and thrown into the fire' (Q
3.9), 117 'the winnowing shovel to clear the threshing floor', 118 the chaff to be
burned 'with unquenchable fire' (Q 3.17). 119
That Israel is in view, whether individuals, Judea's leaders, 120 or Israel as
such, 121 is evident from Q 3.8: 'Do not begin/presume to say to yourselves, "We
have Abraham as our ancestor"; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to
raise up children to Abraham'. The allusion is probably to another Isaiah passage
— Isa. 51.1-2: 'Look to the rock from which you were hewn, and to the quarry
from which you were dug. Look to Abraham your father'. 122 Also likely is a pun
in the original — whether in Hebrew, banim ('sons')/'abanim ('stones'), or in
Aramaic, b e nayya ('sons')/'abnayya ('stones'). 123 The point, then, is that God's
115. The note of condemnation is clear (cf. Ps. 58.4; Matt. 12.34). Echidna ('viper')
could be a variant of aspis ('asp') (Isa. 59.5 Aquila/LXX) and so conjures up such images as
Deut. 32.33 and Ps. 140.3; the asp is also a figure for Satan at Qumran (as in 1QH 11[=3].17
and 13[=5].27).
116. John was no doubt influenced by the prophetic anticipation of God's judgment as a
'day of anger' (particularly Isa. 13.6-16; 34.8; Ezek. 7.19; Zeph. 1.15, 18; 2.2-3; 1QH
11 [=3].28); as also Rom. 2.5 and Rev. 6.17. See further M. Reiser, Jesus and Judgment (Minneapolis:
Fortress, 1997) 26-28, 171.
117. Again the imagery of judgment in these two phrases would be familiar to John's
hearers (Isa. 10.33-34; Ezekiel 31; Daniel 4). Did Jesus echo, and qualify this expectation in
Luke 13.6-9 (Davies and Allison, Matthew 1.309-10)? See also Reiser, Jesus and Judgment
175-76.
118. Webb follows Schürmann, Lukasevangelium 1.177-78, in arguing that it is not the
act of winnowing itself which is in view, but the next stage of cleaning the threshing floor by
heaping the already winnowed grain into the barn and the chaff on to the fire (John the Baptizer
295-300; 'John the Baptist' 202-203); but see Reiser, Jesus and Judgment 177-78.
119. Threshing or winnowing as an image of judgment would be even more familiar
(e.g., Ps. 1.4; Isa. 41.15-16; Jer. 15.7; 51.33; Mic. 4.12-13; Zeph. 2.2; 1Q17 [lQJub a ] 2-4).
120. The most obvious target would be the high priestly aristocracy (Webb, John the
Baptizer 175-78). But Q does not seem to have specified the audience; Matthew's 'many of the
Pharisees and Sadducees' (Matt. 3.7) is usually regarded as redactional.
121. 'AH the people of Israel' (Acts 13.24).
122. As noted already by Chrysostom (Davies and Allison, Matthew 1.308).
123. Black, Aramaic Approach 145. But Casey remains unconvinced (Aramaic Sources
364