COMMENTARY on Matthew 11:12 and MOVEMENT

Expositor's Greek Testament
Matthew 11:12.
The statement just commented on had to be made in the interests of truth and the Kingdom of God, but having made it Jesus reverts with pleasure to a tone of eulogy. This verse has created much diversity of opinion, which it would take long to recount.
I find in it two thoughts: one expressed, the other implied.
(1) There has been a powerful movement since John’s time towards the Kingdom of God.
(2) The movement derived its initial impetus from John.
The latter thought is latent in ἀπὸ δὲ τῶν ἡμ. Ιωάν.
The movement dates from John; he has the credit of starting it.
This thought is essential to the connection.
It is the ultimate justification of the περισσότερον (Matthew 11:9).
The apostle Paul adduced as one argument for his apostleship, called in question by Judaists, success, which in his view was not an accident but God-given, and due to fitness for the work (2 Corinthians 2:14; 2 Corinthians 3:1-18).
So Christ here in effect proves John’s fitness for the position of forerunner by the success of his ministry.
He had actually made the kingdom come.
That was the true basis of his title to the honourable appellation, “preparer of the way”; without that it had been an empty title, though based on any number of prophecies.
That success proved fitness, adequate endowment with moral force, and power to impress and move men. This being seen to be Christ’s meaning, there is no room for doubt as to the animus of the words βιάζεται, βιασταὶ. They contain a favourable, benignant estimate of the movement going on not an unfavourable, as, among others, Weiss thinks, taking the words to point to a premature attempt to bring in the kingdom by a false way as a political creation (Weiss-Meyer). Of course there were many defects, obvious, glaring, in the movement, as there always are. Jesus knew them well, but He was not in the mood just then to remark on them, but rather, taking a broad, generous view, to point to the movement as a whole as convincing proof of John’s moral force and high prophetic endowment.
The two words βιαζ., βιασ. signalise the vigour of the movement.
The kingdom was being seized, captured by a storming party. The verb might be middle voice, and is so taken by Beng., “sese vi quasi obtrudit,” true to fact, but the passive is demanded by the noun following.
The kingdom is forcefully taken (βιαίως κρατεῖται, Hesychius) by the βιασταὶ. There is probably a tacit reference to the kind of people who were storming the kingdom, from the point of view, not so much of Jesus, as of those who deemed themselves the rightful citizens of the kingdom. “Publicans and sinners” (Matthew 9:9-12), the ignorant (Matthew 11:25).
What a rabble! thought Scribes and Pharisees. Cause of profound satisfaction to Jesus (Matthew 11:25).

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