"Make Disciples"--Matthew on Evangelism (Theology Studies‪)‬

Matthew's Gospel reflects a new situation in the early church when compared to Paul--and that for a number of reasons. Paul wrote his letters in the decade from 51-61 C.E.; Matthew writes a biblical generation later, about 90 C.E., a half generation after the destruction of the Jerusalem temple. One motivating factor for Paul's ministry had been to evangelize the Gentiles as a way of persuading his fellow Jewish people to accept Jesus as the Messiah. But the aftermath of the Jewish-Roman War (66-73 C.E.) led Jews to rethink what defined Judaism after the destruction of the temple. There was a crisis of identity in both emerging Judaism and in Jewish Christianity. (1) After all, the temple was the center to which all Jews looked, the symbol of the presence of God among his people. This redefinition made Judaism a religion of the book, with the Torah moving into the center of its self-definition. The post-war Jewish community questioned the Judaism of the Matthean Christians. (2) This marginalized and then excluded Jewish Christians, which also led to a rethinking of Jewish Christian self-identity. (3) Some Jews questioned the Jewish identity of Matthew's Jewish Christians community that did not keep the Torah as the Jewish community now stressed it. They accused this community of misinterpreting the Jewish Scriptures in support of Jesus' messiahship. The Matthean church's identity crisis raised issues that had to be addressed. If Jesus really was the expected messianic king, why did the majority of Jews not believe? Were they misreading the Jewish Scriptures? Did they really possess the identity markers of Judaism?