Update on the "Realm of Heaven"

[Charles Wilson]

I found something that gets part of the way to seeing that the "Realm of Heaven" or "Kingdom of Heaven" was a real, physical place, probably in Antonia. It was a meeting place for the Priests and figures greatly in, as I see it, the Story which was stolen, dismembered and rewritten as the story of a savior-god.

Why would we have reason to think of the Realm of Heaven as a real place?

Matthew 5: 20 (RSV):

[20] For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

Here is a passage that apparently points to "Beyond the Sky" and yet, if you look at it plainly (Intentionality again), it could be easily seen as a Criterion for a Type of Membership. People with a certain level of "Righteousness" can get into the Realm of Heaven while the Scribes and Pharisees, lacking this "Righteousness" cannot. A Mishmarot Priest, for example, might have this Righteousness.

If the Realm of Heaven is a real place, it would help in the understanding of something that happened to a Priest, who might have been trapped outside of the Temple area or outside of Antonia, when a Conflagration of some Type occurred - The Temple Slaughter of 4 BCE, f'rinstance:

Luke 13: 23 - 24 (RSV):

[23] And some one said to him, "Lord, will those who are saved be few?" And he said to them,
[24] "Strive to enter by the narrow door; for many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able..."

Matthew 18: 1 - 4 (RSV):

[1] At that time the disciples came to Jesus, saying, "Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?"
[2] And calling to him a child, he put him in the midst of them,
[3] and said, "Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
[4] Whoever humbles himself like this child, he is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.

https://books.google.com/books?id=JLlLA ... en&f=false

George Buchanan quotes Klausner, and states:

"He [Klausner] identified the Kingdom of Heaven with the Hasmonean rule."

Klausner: "The Hasmoneans were inflamed by a strong faith that the hour had come for the "kingdom of heaven", that is, the kingdom of God of heaven, to be revealed to the world and for the Kingdom of Greece to fall."

"Klausner said further,

"The house, in all the present narratives, is Jerusalem (the Temple is the tower, which is in the house); thus, we have here before us "the heavenly Jerusalem"which comes in the Messianic age in place of the earthly Jerusalem..."

Lacking a Blueprint of Antonia on file at the Hasmonean Office of Records, this might be as close as external sources might allow. It does seem, however, that a Priestly Realm of Heaven did exist, probably in Antonia.

CW

[arnoldo]

Jesus replied, “The kingdom of God will not come with observable signs. Nor will people say, ‘Look, here it is,’ or ‘There it is.’ For you see, the kingdom of God is in your midst.”
http://biblehub.com/luke/17-21.htm

[Charles Wilson]

Thank you, Arnoldo.
I left out this one, although it is as much a direct statement as any of the others:

Mathew 23: 13 (RSV):

[13] "But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because you shut the kingdom of heaven against men; for you neither enter yourselves, nor allow those who would enter to go in.