Did Jesus himself talk about his return?

Answer 1

AnswerAccording to the gospels, yes, Jesus did talk about his return.

Having given the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple as a sign of his imminent return, Mark 13:24-26 continues, "But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light and the stars of heaven shall fall, and the powers that are in heaven shall be shaken and then shall they see the Son of man coming in the clouds with great power and glory." He concluded by saying that he would return within the lifetimes of some of his own generation: "Verily I say unto you, that this generation shall not pass, till all these things be done." An oblique reference to the Book of Daniel implies that his return would be within about four years of the destruction of the Temple.

By the 80s of the first century, the return predicted in Mark's Gospel was becoming unlikely - the generation had already passed - and the author of Matthew had to change the emphasis away from an impending end of the world. He changed the position of the sentence about "this generation", relative to the destruction of the great buildings, so that it referred to something else altogether. He added, and emphasised, material where Jesus told the disciples that the end is not yet, and that no man knows when the end of the world will occur. Then he added, in chapter 25, an elaborate description of the last judgement. Verse 31, reflecting verse 13:26 of Mark, begins a pericope in which Jesus comes in his glory and judges the people of all nations, setting the 'sheep' on the left and the 'goats' on the right, for eternal punishment or reward.

Writing even late than Matthew, Luke 21:25-26 gave an more emotionally powerful summary of the final signs in Mark 13:24-25, but had to alter the material to suit the times. By the end of the first century, it was no longer plausible that the world would end before Jesus' generation shall pass - the generation had long passed. So Jesus no longer says, "Verily I say unto you, that this generation shall not pass, till all these things be done." The destruction of the Temple and the civil war and carnage of the Roman-Jewish War still presage an imminent end of the world, but the emphasis has shifted subtly so that even if the end will be very soon, no one can know when.