The Final Judgement as Ritual Purgation of the Cosmos: The Influence of Scapegoat Traditions on Matt 25.31–46

2021 ◽  
Vol 67 (2) ◽  
pp. 241-259
Author(s):  
Hans M. Moscicke

In this article, I argue that Leviticus 16 and early Jewish Day of Atonement traditions have influenced the imagery of the sheep and the goats in Matt 25.31–46. The ritual shading that this judgement scene acquires in light of its use of Yom Kippur imagery fits well into Matthew's overarching interest in moral purity. The drama of moral impurity in the Gospel of Matthew concludes with the Son of Man's eschatological purgation of iniquity from the cosmos in a manner reminiscent of the yearly expulsion of moral impurity from Israel's temple by means of the scapegoat ritual. Building on the insights of scholars who have attempted to demonstrate Matthew's knowledge of Son of Man traditions attested in the Parables of Enoch, this article also contends that Azazel traditions contained in that same Enochic booklet have influenced the portrayal of the goats’ banishment in Matt 25.41, a conclusion that becomes more probable in light of Matthew's unique application of the Asael tradition attested in 1 En. 10.4 at the end of his Parable of the Wedding Feast (Matt 22.13).

Author(s):  
Andries G. Van Aarde

South Africa is experiencing an exceptionally high crime rate and many people, across the various ethnic groups, are beset by poverty. The question is whether the prevalence of violence in South Africa is the result of neocolonialism or postcolonialism, among other complicated sociological factors. The current article suggests how postcolonial hermeneutics can provide access to the diverse complexities of Africa. Postcolonial consciousness means that the experience of the Other is taken seriously from their own perspective. From the perspective of anti-societal language in the Gospel of Matthew, postcolonial theory is presented as a tool for biblical interpretation that assists in identifying colonial intentions that informed and influenced the South African context. Such theory calls for a constructive reading of concerns relating to justice. The article focuses on the Jesus saying, as influenced by Roman imperial policy. It deals with the comparison between the fate of beasts and that of the son of man, who has nowhere to lay his head (Mt 8:20).


Author(s):  
Richard B. Hays

This essay surveys the evangelist Matthew’s reading of Israel’s Scripture. Rather than focusing only on Matthew’s distinctive formula quotations, we must observe the subtler ways that Matthew evokes scriptural images and patterns. The essay highlights four major aspects of Matthew’s reading of Scripture. (1) Matthew reads Israel’s Scripture as a story that highlights election, kingship, exile, and messianic salvation as the end of exile. (2) Matthew reconfigures Torah into a call for radical transformation of the heart. (3) Matthew highlights Scripture’s call for mercy, particularly by emphasizing Hosea 6:6 as the hermeneutical key to Torah. (4) Matthew interprets the mission to the Gentiles as the fulfilment of Israel’s destiny and the active embodiment of the authority of the Son of Man (Dn 7:13-14) over the whole world. Jointly taken, these strategies of interpretation produce a striking reconfiguration of Israel’s Torah.


2007 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 26-29
Author(s):  
mayer kirshenblatt ◽  
barbara kirshenblatt-gimblett

Mayer Kirshenblatt remembers in words and paintings the daily diet of Jews in Poland before the Holocaust. Born in 1916 in Opatóów (Apt in Yiddish), a small Polish city, this self-taught artist describes and paints how women bought chickens from the peasants and brought them to the shoykhet (ritual slaughterer), where they plucked the feathers; the custom of shlogn kapores (transferring one's sins to a chicken) before Yom Kippur; and the role of herring and root vegetables in the diet, especially during the winter. Mayer describes how his family planted and harvested potatoes on leased land, stored them in a root cellar, and the variety of dishes prepared from this important staple, as well as how to make a kratsborsht or scratch borsht from the milt (semen sack) of a herring. In the course of a forty-year conversation with his daughter, Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, who also interviewed Mayer's mother, a picture emerges of the daily, weekly, seasonal, and holiday cuisine of Jews who lived in southeastern Poland before World War II.


2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jordan Stevens ◽  
Douglas Steinley ◽  
Cassandra L. Boness ◽  
Timothy J Trull ◽  
...  

Using complete enumeration (e.g., generating all possible subsets of item combinations) to evaluate clustering problems has the benefit of locating globally optimal solutions automatically without the concern of sampling variability. The proposed method is meant to combine clustering variables in such a way as to create groups that are maximally different on a theoretically sound derivation variable(s). After the population of all unique sets is permuted, optimization on some predefined, user-specific function can occur. We apply this technique to optimizing the diagnosis of Alcohol Use Disorder. This is a unique application, from a clustering point of view, in that the decision rule for clustering observations into the diagnosis group relies on both the set of items being considered and a predefined threshold on the number of items required to be endorsed for the diagnosis to occur. In optimizing diagnostic rules, criteria set sizes can be reduced without a loss of significant information when compared to current and proposed, alternative, diagnostic schemes.


2001 ◽  
Author(s):  
Scott Grunwald ◽  
Mark Perrin
Keyword(s):  

1997 ◽  
Vol 176 (1) ◽  
pp. S115 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. Maymon ◽  
M. Mazor ◽  
R. Romero ◽  
T. Silberstein ◽  
I. Shoham-Vardi^F. ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  

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