Matthew and Apocalypticism
In Mk, ch. 13 is called the "apocalyptic discourse." However, most of Mk does not exhibit the same strongly apocalyptic flavor. This is not the case with Mt. Although Mt 24 corresponds to Mk 13, apocalyptic language and imagery are present throughout Mt's narrative. For example, in the Parable of the Net (13.47-50) we read:
[T]he kingdom of heaven is like a net that was thrown into the sea and caught fish of every kind; when it was full, they drew it ashore, sat down, and put the good into baskets but threw out the bad. So it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come out and separate the evil from the righteous and throw them into the furnace of fire
where there
will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
The phrase, "weeping and gnashing of teeth" occurs six times in Mt (8.12; 13.42, 50; 22.13; 24.51; 25.30). Outside of Mt, this phrase occurs only once (Lk 13.28).
In 22.1-13, we read the Parable of the wedding banquet, in which the kingdom of heaven is likened to a king who wishes to hold a wedding banquet for his son. He sends his slaves to call those who were invited, but the invitees won't come. So he sends his slaves out again, and the people who are invited make light of it and, again, don't come. Some even seize and kill his slaves. So the king sends his troops and destroys the murderers. He burns their city. Then the king says, "The wedding is ready, but those invited are not worthy. Go therefore into the main streets, and invite everyone you find to the wedding banquet." The slaves do as they are told, and they "gathered all whom they found, both good and bad; so the wedding hall was filled with guests."
We then read, "But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing a wedding robe, and he said to him, 'Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding robe?' And he was speechless. Then the king said to the attendants, 'Bind him hand and foot, and throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth' For many are called, but few are chosen" (22.11-14).
This parable probably indicates some of the concerns of Mt's community. As a group of Christians struggling with their relationship to Judaism, one of the problems that this community had to deal with was the rejection of its central message (Jesus' messiahship) by the Jewish establishment. The feud between the Christians and the rabbinic Jewish leaders appears to have turned bitter, with each side claiming that the other had missed the truth of God's revelation and rejected God's true righteousness.