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Jesus prophecies concerning the future of “this generation”.

As we read the gospels we note that Jesus often spoke of “this generation.”  While Jesus spoke in Aramaic, the gospel writers chose the word, genea, to translate His thought into the Greek language.  The Greeks used this word to refer to a group of people born and living during a specific period of time.  In this sense it is very much like our English word, generation.   For example, we speak of the Baby Boom Generation to refer to those who were born after the Second World War, to the generation we now refer to as, The Greatest Generation.    

But the Greek word carries additional meanings.  It can also refer to a race, a kind or sort of people, a generation of people of a particular kind or race.  Most of the time Jesus used it in this sense, not just as a reference to His generation per se, but to the generation of Israelites to whom He had come and among whom He was ministering.

For example, In Luke 11:50, Jesus prophesied, “The blood of all the prophets, shed since the foundation of the world, may be charged against this generation.”  Clearly Jesus was not speaking of those living in the Hindu-Kush at that time, but to His own people, the Jewish nation.  This prophecy is an echo of John the Baptist’s warning that a baptism of fire was imminent.  

In the prophetic teaching of Jesus we learn not only that judgment was coming, but why.  It begins when Jesus began to express his frustration with the unbelief He found among His people:

“To what then shall I compare the men of this generation, and what are they like?  They are       like children who sit in the market place and call to one another, and they say, ‘We played the            flute for you, and you did not dance; we sang a dirge, and you did not weep.’  For John the         Baptist has come eating no bread and drinking no wine, and you say, ‘He has a demon!’   The       Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, ‘Behold, a gluttonous man and a                 drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’  Yet wisdom is vindicated by all her children.”   — Luke 7:31-35

“And Jesus answered and said, ‘You unbelieving and perverted generation, how long shall I be with you and put up with you?’” – Luke 9:41

Before long Jesus was condemning the nation for its unwillingness to believe in Him:     

“This generation is a wicked generation; it seeks for a sign, and yet no sign will be given to it but  the sign of Jonah.  For just as Jonah became a sign to the Ninevites, so will the Son of Man be to     this generation.  The Queen of the South will rise up with the men of this generation at the               judgment and condemn them, because she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom    of Solomon; and behold something greater than Solomon is here.  The men of Nineveh will       stand up with this generation at the judgment and condemn it, because they repented at the   preaching of Jonah; and behold something greater than Jonah is here. – Luke 11:29-32

Along with the condemnation came frightening prophesies of divine judgment:

 “For this reason also the wisdom of God said, ‘I will send to them prophets and apostles,             and some of them they will kill and some they will persecute, so that the blood of all the     prophets, shed since the foundation of the world, may be charged against this generation, from    the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who was killed between the altar and the house of   God; yes, I tell you, it shall be charged against this generation.” – Luke 11:49-51

In the days leading up to His crucifixion He spoke again of His generation’s unwillingness to receive Him:

 “The days will come when you will long to see one of the days of the Son of Man, and you will   not see it. They will say to you, ‘Look there! Look here!’ Do not go away, and do not run after them.  For just like the lightning, when it flashes out of one part of the sky, shines to the other part of the sky, so will the Son of Man be in His day.  But first He must suffer many things and be rejected by this generation.”

As we examine all of these passages it is clear that Jesus had Israel in mind when He spoke of “this generation.”   But there is one final reference we need to examine, Luke 21:29-33:

“Behold the fig tree and all the trees; as soon as they put forth leaves, you see it and know for yourselves that summer is now near.  So  you also, when you see these things happening, recognize that the kingdom of God is near.  Truly I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all things take place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will not pass away.”

All commentators, from all schools of eschatological thought, acknowledge that “genea” can mean a race, sort or kind of people.  However, almost all insist that we should understand Jesus to be primarily speaking of a group of people born and living during a specific period of time.  However, this produces a number of problems, foremost among them is the fact that Jesus’ generation did not live to see the events He spoke of in the preceding verse.  Most notably, the second coming did not occur in their time.  

Bertrand Russell and others have seized upon this and argued that Jesus was a false prophet.  This charge has given birth to Preterism, the view that the prophesies were fulfilled in the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D.   I think a good case can be made for a partial Preterist view, especially if one confines himself just to Luke’s account of the Olivet Discourse.  However, even Luke’s account contains prophesies that could not possibly have been fulfilled in 70 A.D.  For example, he predicted the destruction of Jerusalem and the scattering of the Jewish people among the nations.  But Jesus also said that this scattering of the Jewish people would not be perpetual, it would only last until “the times of the Gentiles were fulfilled.”  The captivity began in 70 A.D., but the time of the gentiles continues into our own time.

Premillennialists have addressed the problem in a couple of ways.  Covenant Premillennialists have argued that that the term should be understood as referring to a kind or sort of people, believers.  The prophesy, then, is that in spite of the widespread apostasy predicted earlier in the discourse, “believers like the disciples will not pass from the earth before the parousia[i].”

Dispensational Premillennialist have argued that Jesus is referring to the generation who witnesses these things will not pass away before their completion.  They would point to Luke 21:28 and 31:

“But when these things begin to come to take place, straighten up and lift up you heads, because your redemption is drawing near….Even so you, too, when you see these things happening recognize that the kingdom of God is near.”

They would point out that the Parable of the Fig Tree is sandwiched between these two statements and are explanations of it.   The point of the Parable, then, is that when the end time events Jesus’ prophesied begin to happen they will happen quickly.  The generation that sees them start will be the generation that sees them completed.   As for Jesus speaking to the disciples as though they would personally witness these events; they would point to Mark’s account of the Olivet Discourse, and the fact that Jesus specifically said that what He was saying to them He was saying to all.[ii]  In other words, through the apostles Jesus was speaking to all subsequent disciples.

While I think there is some truth in all of these views I do not know why it is concluded that Jesus is not referring to the Jewish people when He speaks of “this generation.”  Since he invariably has Israel in mind when He uses the term in other places, why would Israel not be in view here as well? 

Jesus speaks of a terrible tribulation of unprecedented severity in the days just prior to His coming.[iii]  He went on to say that this awful tribulation would be particularly severe in Judea and on the Jewish Sabbath.  In Luke’s account of the Olivet Discourse, the focus is primarily on the destruction of the temple in 70 A.D. and the subsequent results of that judgment both for Jerusalem and the Jewish people.  Is it a stretch to think that the Jewish disciples who first heard these prophesies would be wondering whether or not the nation would survive the coming baptism of fire?  Is it a stretch to understand Jesus’ prophesy as a word of assurance, that in spite of everything the nation would not perish?

This understanding of Jesus’ words is similar to the interpretation offered by certain Covenant Premillennialist.  Like them, it recognizes that the term is referring to a sort of kind of people.  Unlike them, it posits the theory that the people Jesus has in mind is the same group He has had in mind every other time He used the term, generation, the Jewish people.   The prophesy, then, is a prophesy of the survival of the Jewish people, in spite of all they experience during the time of the gentiles.

The survival of the Jewish people as a people has been one of the anomalies of History.  It should not have happened, but it did.  The survival of the Jewish people has also been a fly in the ointment of all of the schools of prophetic thought which have attempted to write them out of the script.  For example, Dr. Arnold G. Fruchtenbaum has written this critique of the post-millennial theology of Loraine Boettner:

“Boettner still allows for the salvation of Jewish individual salvation, but would prefer that they would disappear as a separate people, preferably by assimilation.  Because the Jews have        stubbornly refused to assimilate, they have brought upon themselves anti-Semitism, and upon   others strife and antagonism and are guilty of maintaining a distinction between Jewish and  Gentiles.  According to Boettner, the Jews are totally to blame for their history of persecution.   The problem is not with the Gentile attitude toward the Jews, but with the Jews failure to  disappear.”[iv]

Boettner’s view has been the historic view of the church, and replacement theology (i.e. the view that God has replaced Old Israel with the Gentile church, which is the New Israel) has been the theological excuse for one of the church’s most persistent sins, the persecution of the Jewish people.

But in spite of almost two thousand years of persecution the Jewish people endure.  I believe their survival can only be explained by the fact that God is not done with His ancient people.   And so the Jewish people have and will endure, and to the chagrin of those who would write them out of the script, this is what Jesus predicted.  

Jesus came unto His own and His own received Him not.  And so the Baptism of Fire predicted by John the Baptist and Jesus came upon the nation.  But the judgment that came upon the nation in 70 A.D. will not be the final word.  Someday,:

“’The Deliverer will come from Zion, He will remove ungodliness from Jacob.  And this is the       covenant I will make with them when I take away their sins.’  From the standpoint of the gospel they [the Jewish people] are enemies for your sake[v].  But from the standpoint of God’s choice they are beloved for the sake of the fathers; for the gifts and calling of God are irrevocable.” [vi] (emphasis added)

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[i] R.C. Sproul.  “The Last Days According to Jesus” .  p. 57

[ii] Mark 13:37a

[iii] Matthew 24:15-22

[iv] Arnold G. Fruchtenbaum, Israelogy: The Missing Link in Systematic Theology, p 49.   (Dr. Fruchtenbaum received his Th.M from Dallas Seminar, and his Ph.D. from New York University.  This book is Dr. Fruchtenbaum’ doctoral dissertation. 

[v] This is not saying that they are our enemies, but that they are opposed to the gospel message we preach.

[vi] Romans 11:25b-29

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