TRANSLATION MATTHEW 20 : 17

As Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, he took the twelve aside by themselves on the way, and told them, “See this! we are going up to Jerusalem and the Son of Man will be handed over to the chief priests and the legal experts, who will condemn him to death; and they will hand him over to Gentiles to be ridiculed and scourged and hung on the execution stake; and on the third day God will awaken him.”

The Son of Man is the representative of the Rule of heaven. Sometimes it may refer to a group of people; but here in this prophecy the reference is singular. to Jesus alone. The magic leader, the owner of the vineyard, will be rejected by his people and die a shameful death. We can see the use to which Matthew puts the successive prophecies of Jesus’ death, without doubting that Jesus’ foresight of his death is a fact of history..Given that Jesus held the common belief in the resurrection of the dead, we need not dismiss his prophecy of “third day awakening” as a reading back from the event. The third day is a Jewish expression meaning “the final turn in a sequence of events” rather than an arithmetical expression indicating Friday – Sunday.

Why have I not used the word crucified? Because it has become almost a religious term, as if nobody was crucified except Jesus. It was a combination of torture and killing reserved for foreigners and slaves. Why have I used the word “awaken” where people expect ‘raised’ ? Because the root meaning is “to arouse, to waken up”.

Although I consider that Jesus foresaw his death, the wording of this and the other prophecies is wholly from the gospel tradition. Matthew continues here to use Mark who has a brief introduction most of which he cuts:

“they were on the road, going up to Jerusalem. Jesus was walking in front of them; they were struck with awe; and those who followed were fearful.”

Certainly Matthew often excluded detail which seemed merely vivid, whereas in fact the detail here shows Jesus’ disciplined leadership, and the beginning of the ‘supernatural’ fear that afflicts the twelve in Mark’s account. Matthew avoids these as distraction from his theme ( he also leaves out the detail of the gentiles ‘spitting on him’): Jesus’ acceptance of his humiliation contrasted with the Zebedees’ desire for pre-eminence in the Rule of heaven, which he recounts, as does Mark, in the next passage. Matthew softens criticism of the two pupils by making their mother the one who pleads with Jesus on their behalf. Both writers use the material well but they do so differently.