Jesus as the fulfillment of the Temple and its cult in the Gospel of Matthew

Abstract

In the world of antiquity, temples fulfilled the role of providing a home for the deity to live among the people. Thus, temples were the points at which divine power intersected human weakness in order to meet the needs of those who turned to the deity for help. For the ancient nation of Israel, the Temple at Jerusalem was such a place. This was the paradigm of divine presence that existed in Israel for around a thousand years. In the New Testament, however, a new paradigm of divine presence emerges, in which Jesus of Nazareth was now seen by the emerging Christian community as the person in whom God’s presence was fully and finally revealed, thereby fulfilling the role of the Jerusalem Temple. Scholars have long observed that among the New Testament Gospel accounts, the Gospel of John contains the most explicit references to Jesus as the fulfilment of the Jerusalem edifice. However, a careful reading of the Gospel of Matthew likewise reveals that this Gospel also presents Jesus, perhaps to no lesser extent than John, as the fulfilment of the Temple and its associated rituals. This appears to be one of Matthew's main aims, which seem to have been neglected in modern biblical scholarship. Thus, the purpose of this study is to examine Matthew's treatment of his sources in presenting Jesus as the fulfilment of, not only the Temple as the locus of divine presence, but also of the rituals, which had, at their core, the forgiveness of sin and restoration of relationship with God.