Definition and Bibliography for the "Kingdom of God"

Assembling statements of Jesus Christ scattered throughout the Gospels creates the opportunity to present a coherent picture of the concept of the "Kingdom of God" that he preached:

1.The verse "I must proclaim the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns also because that is why I was sent" (Luke 4:43) informs us that Jesus's mission is the Gospel of the Kingdom of God.

2.The verse "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them" (Matthew 5:17) informs us that Jesus's mission is to fulfill the Commandments (14).

Treating these two verses as the premises of a syllogism and establishing that the middle term is "mission," an unprecedented conclusion arises:

- If Jesus's mission is the Gospel of the Kingdom of God;

- If Jesus's mission is to fulfill the Commandments;

- Then the Gospel of the Kingdom of God consists of the Fulfillment of the Commandments (assuming Jesus does not declare any other mission).

The conclusion provides a definition for the "Kingdom of God" on the one hand and, on the other, points to the bibliography of the concept: the Commandments.

In this conceptual context, it is possible that the "fulfillment of the Commandments" does not only mean the factual observance of the Commandments but, before that, configuring them into a system that hierarchically organizes them functionally.

It follows that the task of constructing the concept of the "Kingdom of God" consists of assembling the Commandments into a functional system guided by the rigor of ensuring the values promoted in the Bible.

The placement, in the Commandments of the Old Testament, of the bibliography for the concept of the "Kingdom of God" becomes a plausible explanation for why Jesus's Gospel is not detailed in the New Testament; what might have been lost is the systematic structure (which may not have been retained), but not its documentary basis, which made no sense to replicate in the canonical Gospels.

Despite the preaching of the Kingdom of God by Jesus Christ, attested by the canonical Gospels across Palestine - Galilee, Samaria, Judea, Perea, and Jerusalem - the systematic concept (if it existed) may have remained an esoteric teaching:

"He said, 'To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God, but for others, they are in parables so that seeing, they may not see, and hearing, they may not understand'" (Luke 8:10).

It is sufficient that the Old Testament was not eliminated from the Christian canon (as attempted by Marcion).

F. Authenticity of the Documentary Body - The Commandments

The concept of the "Kingdom of God" will be configured by the systematic nature of the divine Commandments, which, being so numerous, likely cover important aspects of social, economic, political life, as well as inner life.

Just as the authenticity of pottery shards must be attested before the ancient pitcher is reassembled, so too must the Commandments be evaluated - to what extent do they originate from revelation, and how much have they undergone human intervention?

Despite the claim that the Commandments have been transferred intact from Moses to the dawn of the first millennium and beyond, sacred texts record that they have undergone interpretations and explanatory transformations in increasingly comprehensive and profound waves (15), especially when disasters such as the loss and recovery of some or the entire Book occurred, or when they were deliberately ignored, and people worshiped other gods.

The vicissitudes they went through cast doubt on the divine authenticity of the multitude of Commandments.

Jesus Christ dispels this doubt: "18. For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished."

Jesus validates the Law. Jesus confirms the validity of the Commandments in the form they had during his time (but is not responsible for what happened to them afterward). For example, Apostle Paul's question "Why the Law?" (16) goes against the intentions of Jesus Christ.

This is precisely the kind of deviation Jesus refers to when he declares, "19. Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven" (though, here, he referred to Hillel).

However, as Hillel's doctrine prevailed in Judaism, so too did Paul's doctrine prevail in Christianity, followed by the majority of believers.

The same topic of respecting the Commandments is found in the one listed under number eight in Maimonides' (17) Mishneh Torah:

"8. Imitate His good and upright ways, as it is written, 'and walk in His ways'" (Deuteronomy 28:9).

But the verse from which Maimonides claims to generate this "meta-Commandment" is not an imperative sentence but a conditional one:

"May the Lord your God make you a holy people to Himself, as He has sworn to you, if you keep the commandments of the Lord your God and walk in His ways."

Does the relatively forced nature of deriving the Commandment in Maimonides' List invalidate it?

The artifice of Maimonides' list of Commandments (Rambam) is undeniable, not least because they number 613: there is no reason for the numeric value of 613, obtained by gematria for the word "Torah," to refer to the number of divine Commandments.

The only merit of this idea is that, attributed to Simlai (who lived in the second century), the Talmud somewhat endorsed it, and taken as information that answers everyone's confusion, it has been widely accepted, despite its feeble justification.

Maimonides' list was immediately criticized. For example, in "Hasagot ha-Ramban" (Observations of Ramban), Nahmanides rejects several dozen Commandments, both affirmative and negative, from Maimonides' list and introduces others (without being an equal number to those rejected), claiming that Maimonides forgot them.

Nahmanides' changes may have their significance, but what is truly important is that, in the end, he admits that Maimonides' list has become very influential, that the majority of the Jewish community accepts and follows it, and therefore, he agrees to use Maimonides' list as a general reference point, despite his personal reservations.

Sometimes, the opinion that gathers the majority gains a social quality by relating the multitude to that reference point, surpassing the importance of objections (even if they are well-founded), if the objections do not radically overturn the opinion.

Nahmanides understands this.

I took the list of Commandments compiled by Maimonides as the documentary basis for configuring the "Kingdom of God." I considered the risk of alteration to be low in relation to the Commandments validated by Jesus, as the concept to be constructed here is developed without integrating the Commandments that do not pertain to the system of social and individual life (Commandments related to rituals, purity, etc., are not integrated). Anyway, the biblical text, assumed to be unchanged from the time of Jesus, serves as a control witness.

(To be continued)

Notes

(14) "The Law or the Prophets" refers to the biblical material available at the time of Jesus, in which most of the Commandments are found.

(15) See "The Imprint of God"/MAKE/BURSA/17.04.2023

(16) "Why the Law?"/MAKE/BURSA/18.04.2023

(17) The list of Commandments accepted in Judaism is the one drawn up by Maimonides in the "Mishneh Torah" (written between 1170-1180), which is obviously a human work with a sought-after result.