Jesus Remembered: Christianity in the Making, vol. 1

§11.4 Beginning from the Baptism of John
free choice of Abraham was no guarantee of the continuing security of his descendants,
since God could choose again with the same freedom. John stood here
in the tradition of prophetic rebuke to Israel for its presumption of God's favour
in spite of sin. 124 In its own way his was a protest against the factionalism which
disfigured Second Temple Judaism at this time (above §9.4). For the factions
tended to meet the problem of Israel's continuing sin and disloyalty by narrowing
the covenant to those loyal to each particular sect. John met it, however, by recalling
his hearers to the fact that God's election in the first place was an act of
sovereign freedom, and by calling them to repentance in the light of that sovereign
choice. It does not follow that John had Gentiles in mind at this point, since
the decisive category was still 'children of Abraham'. But the rebuke of Amos
9.7 is not so far removed, and later on Paul developed a not dissimilar argument
in Rom. 9-11. At any rate, the fact that John was remembered as rebuking his
hearers' presumption in their birth cannot be without significance when we go on
to look at the Israel-orientation of Jesus' preaching.
Throughout the twentieth century, John's preaching of judgment has been
described as 'eschatokygical'. In other words, it is deduced from the imagery
used by John that John looked for the imminent coming of final judgment. That
certainly seems to be the tenor of John's reference to 'the coming (day of)
wrath', with the accompanying imagery of destruction by fire. 125 But as the echoes
indicate, 126 the imagery utilized in Q 3.7-9, 17 regularly had in view future
calamities on individuals or nations which were not necessarily seen as 'final'. 127
Moreover, the talk of raising up other children to Abraham hardly envisages the
history of Abraham's descendants being brought to an abrupt end. And in the
teaching attested only by Luke (3.10-14) the note of eschatological urgency is
distinctly lacking. 128 So John's warning could equally have been to the current
generation, with the implication that it was a final warning for them, rather than a
warning of universal and temporal finality.
13-14). C. A. Evans, 'Authenticating the Activities of Jesus', in Chilton and Evans, eds., Authenticating
the Activities of Jesus 3-29, wonders whether there is an echo of the Joshua tradition
in Josh. 4.7 (8).
124. See particularly O. H. Steck, Israel und das gewaltsame Geschick der Propheten
(WMANT 23; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1967).
125. The imagery of Q 3.17 may imply that wheat and chaff have already been separated
by John's ministry; all that awaits is to shovel each heap into its appropriate final place (see
n. 118 above).
126. Notes 116, 117, 119 above.
127. Cf. Webb, 'John the Baptist' 203-204.
128. Despite its sole attestation by Luke, the tradition of Luke 3.10-14 accords well
enough with Q 3.8a, 9b and the testimony of Josephus, Ant. 18.117, not to be lightly dismissed;
see particularly Ernst, Johannes der Täufer 93-98. A number of scholars include Luke 3.10-14
in Q (Kloppenborg, Q Parallels 10), but it is not included in The Critical Edition of Q.
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