In the gospel of Matthew, the Rejection at Nazareth servers as a conclusion to the parables of the Kingdom of God but also as a transition to the next section of the gospel. When Jesus’s hometown of Nazareth rejects Jesus as the Messiah, the village falls under the judgment promised to the Pharisees at the end of Matthew 12. Nineveh in the Queen of the South will rise in judgment over Nazareth because they have rejected Jesus as the Messiah. In addition, this is the last time Matthew portrays Jesus as teaching in a synagogue.
In Matthew 12:46-50 Jesus’s family came to see him, but Jesus declares the ones who follow the will of the Father are his brothers and sisters. After the parables of the kingdom (Matt 13), Jesus’s hometown (and extended family) rejects him (13:53-58). This story concludes a frame around the parables of the Kingdom.
Is the Rejection at Nazareth a Synoptic Problem?
Perhaps more than other stories in Matthew, I need to comment briefly on the parallels to this story in Mark and Luke. In Matthew and Mark 6:1-6a, this final summary of the crowd’s reaction to Jesus’ teaching. In Mark, the incident in Nazareth takes place well into Jesus’ ministry, as in Matthew. It is a dramatic turning point in Mark as it is in Matthew, when Jesus seems to be rejected by both religious Jews and the common people of the village of Nazareth. In Luke 4:16-30, however, the incident occurs at the beginning of his ministry. In Luke Jesus reads from a scroll of Isaiah on the Sabbath in the synagogue in Nazareth and announces the prophecy of the Messiah from Isaiah is fulfilled that day in their hearing, claiming that he is the Messiah.
Several Solutions to the Problem
First, the rejection at Nazareth may have occurred twice, once at the beginning of Jesus’s ministry and a second time after Jesus teaches the parables of the Kingdom of God (Mark 4 / Matthew 13; Wilkins, Matthew, 509; Carson, “Matthew,” 335; Morris, Matthew, 364).
The second possibility is Mark place the rejection at Nazareth at the end of the Parables of the kingdom so that the rejection by his family introduces the parables and the rejection at Nazareth ends the section. Matthew followed Mark and toned down the stories, omitted that his family thought Jesus lost his mind (Mark 3:21) and that Jesus could not do miracles in Nazareth (Mark 6:5; cf. Matt 13:58, “he did not do many miracles”).
However, “There is no reason to think that Mt 13:53–8 is anything other than a revised and abbreviated version of Mk 6:1–6a” (Davies and Allison, Matthew, 2:452; cf., Nolland, Matthew, 574). Davies and Allison also argue Luke 4 “more likely preserves an independent narrative,” implying there were two sources for the rejection at Nazareth. Along with several references to synagogue rejections in John, they consider this historically reliable (three sources), in addition to the criterion of embarrassment (what Christian scribe would create a story where Jesus could not do any miracles!)
The rejection at Nazareth also serves to introduce several stories in which Jesus withdraws from Capernaum and no longer teaches in the villages of Galilee He goes into the wilderness (14:13-21) and then moves back and forth around the Sea of Galilee and heads toward Jerusalem (Gennesaret, 14:34; Tyre, and Sidon, 15:21; the “other side” of the sea, 15:29, Magadan, 15:39; Capernaum 17:24 the regions of Judea, 19:1; Jericho, 20:19).
On the idea that the rejection of Nazareth may have occurred twice… If it did, we are not told that in any of the gospel accounts. So maybe we should not think that it did happen twice.
The gospels were inspired and written as stand-alone accounts to their original audience. Shouldn’t we read them that way? I do not believe that they were meant to be read into one another, but that we should let each of the inspired writers tell the story they want to tell. We should not be coming up with meanings and truths based on reading one gospel story into another.
For example, no gospel tells us that Jesus was rejected at Nazareth twice. So when someone talks about the compassion of Jesus to give Nazareth a second chance in Mark and Mathew after he has been threatened with death in the previous visit in Luke, this is a meaning that is not taught in any account. It is only gleaned by reading the accounts as if they have to be reconciled chronologically. It is ironic that those who feel the need to have the accounts reconciled chronologically believe that they are protecting the truth of the gospels. Yet they end up teaching something that is nowhere taught in the gospels.
This also applies to the miraculous catch of fish at the end of the gospel of John. People are constantly teaching that this catch reminds Peter of the earlier catch of fish when he is called to follow Jesus. But John is not teaching that in his gospel because he has no account of a miraculous catch of fish when Peter first chooses to follow Jesus. You only get this as a part of the restoration encounter between Jesus and Peter by reading other gospel accounts into John and including something in your reading of John that John does not include in his account. So you end up reading the gospel of John in a way that John does not intend. Since John is the inspired author, this seems to be a problem for arriving at Biblical truth.
Thanks for the excellent comment on this problem. You said “The gospels were inspired and written as stand-alone accounts to their original audience. Shouldn’t we read them that way?” Yes, we absolutely can read the story Matthew told by reading by reading only Matthew (or Mark, or Luke). Think of this as rearing vertically, focused only on one of the Gospels.
In this particular post, I am not doing that. I intentionally enter into the so-called Synoptic Problem by comparing two stories that seem like unique events in Jesus’s life that are told in three separate contexts in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. That is also a legitimate way to study the Gospels; think of this as reading horizontally, across the four gospels and trying to determine how the individual writers used the traditions they had before them (written or oral). This is known as source criticism, form criticism, and redaction criticism. I have posts on each of those methods of gospel study.
For me, the vertical reading is far better for preaching and teaching, most people are not as interested in how the Gospels were formed (source or form criticism don’t really “preach” well!)
Notice that the scholars I listed as examples of “it happened twice” are more conservative scholars committed to inspiration and inerrancy of Scripture. The two I used as examples of Matthew retelling and reshaping Mark are less conservative and less committed to inerrancy (although are not really liberals; I think would still have a high view of the authority of Scripture.
The catch of fish is a good example, but in that case I usually say that the even in John happened a second time to remind Peter of the first time he met Jesus. A better (and more difficult example) is the clearing of the Temple. Matt?Mark/Luke agree it is at the end of Jesus’s life, John puts it almost at the very beginning of the story. More conservative commentators think it happened twice, others think John moved it to the beginning for his theological reasons, and a few think John got it right and the synoptics moved to to the end of his life.
On John 2: https://readingacts.com/2012/11/30/john-213-25-the-temple-incident-2/
Thank you for clearing this up for me as I am preparing to preach this section of Scripture soon. I heard several pastors preach as if this were two occasions, but I always felt it was one occasion told in a way to fit the process of teachings within each writer’s purposes.