Matthew 24

The Olivet discourse is the fifth and last of Matthew's great discourses and the gospel's most sustained eschatological speech. Its interpretation has been divided between those who read it primarily as referring to the events of 66-70 CE — the Jewish revolt and the destruction of the temple — and those who read it primarily as referring to a final eschatological judgment at the end of history. Most contemporary scholarship reads it as addressing both: the destruction of the temple is the near-term sign whose coming gives the discourse its urgency, and the Son of Man's coming in power is the final horizon toward which the whole discourse points. The two are not confused; the discourse explicitly distinguishes the tribulation associated with the temple's fall from the cosmic signs of the parousia.

The statement that about that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels or the Son, only the Father has been among the most theologically discussed verses in the gospel. In the context of the discourse, its function is hortatory: the ignorance of the hour is the reason for constant watchfulness. The following parables — the servant who does or does not care for the household while the master is away, the ten virgins who do or do not have oil for their lamps, the talents distributed and used or buried — all turn on the same hinge: the master's return is certain but its timing is unknown, and the only reasonable response to that combination is to be found doing what one ought when he arrives. The discourse closes, in chapter 25, with the parable of the sheep and the goats, the final criterion of the judgment.