When Mark wrote his gospel, the kerygma had long since conquered the world. Paul had overcome a religion of the law limited to Israel and to a few proselytes who were courageous enough to pledge themselves to a total obedience to the law. Colossians, Ephesians, the hymn in I Tim. iii. 16 and the post-Pauline doxology Rom. xvi. 25–7 show how enthusiastically the triumphal journey of Christ through the world was praised. A most imposing ‘theology of the kerygma’ was arising. However, what had all this to do with Jesus? Was not the theology of grace, the emphasis on justification without the works of law all that was needed? Palestine was far away, and very few would have known about that remote corner of the earth with its strange population and its superstitious habits. Thus, Jesus was a mere name without much meaning, a symbol, maybe, for the kerygma, but not more. Why, therefore, not connect the kerygma with Hermes or Attis or any other saviour? The Gnostics were about to draw this consequence

Die Versuche, auf Grund von Apok. xvii. 9–12 über die Abfassung der Schrift Klarheit zu gewinnen, sind überaus zahlreich. Viele Ausleger haben an diesem Text ihren Scharfsinn erprobt. Trotzdem ist man über plausible und vorzuziehende Lösungen nicht hinausgekommen.1 Die Schwierigkeit liegt bekanntlich darin, daß die Reihenfolge der römischen Kaiser nur mit Mühe den einzelnen Aussagen angepaßt werden kann. Sie lauten:

Why does the tide ‘Son of David’ occur more frequently in Matthew than in the other Gospels? Do these more numerous references serve any real purpose in Matthew? It is not enough merely to say that they occur because the First Gospel was written by a Jewish Christian (or Christians), for the Fourth Gospel does not have the phrase at all. Other than the discussion of Christ's Davidic sonship which is to be found in all three of the Synoptic Gospels (Matt. xxii. 41–5; Mark xii. 35–37a; Luke xx. 41–4), Mark, followed by Luke-Acts, has the phrase ‘Son of David’ only in the twofold appeal to Jesus for healing by a single blind beggar (Mark x. 47, 48; Luke xviii. 37, 39). Matthew, on the other hand, calls Jesus the Son of David in his opening sentence (i. I), follows it up with a genealogy to prove it (i. 2–16), alludes to it at least twice more in the infancy narrative (i. 20 ii. 6), and records the title as related to Jesus during his ministry seven times in the mouths of others on five separate occasions (ix. 27; xii. 23; xv. 22; xx. 30, 31; xxi. 9, 15) where, as will be shown, it is used messianically.