Texts in Conversation
Job 39 shows birds of prey gathering at a carcass, and Matthew 24 uses the same picture of vultures around a corpse. Both reflect a common saying drawn from nature and use it to show how some events unfold with inevitability.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
LXX Job 39:30
Septuagint
26 And does the hawk remain steady by your wisdom, having spread out her wings unmoved, looking toward the region of the south? 27 And does the eagle rise at your command, and the vulture remain sitting over his nest, 28 on a crag of a rock, and in a secret place? 29 From there he seeks food, his eyes observe from far. 30 And his young ones roll themselves in blood, and wherever the carcasses may be, immediately they are found.
Date: 100–1 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
Matthew 24:28
New Testament
26 So then, if someone says to you, ‘Look, he is in the wilderness,’ do not go out, or ‘Look, he is in the inner rooms,’ do not believe him. 27 For just like the lightning comes from the east and flashes to the west, so the coming of the Son of Man will be. 28 Wherever the corpse is, there the vultures will gather. 29 “Immediately after the suffering of those days, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of heaven will be shaken. 30 Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and all the tribes of the earth will mourn. They will see the Son of Man arriving on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.
Date: 70–90 CE (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... Matthew's equivalent to verse 37 comes immediately after his equivalent to verse 24, and this is generally considered to be the positioning in the shared tradition. The introductory question looks like a Lukan formulation (despite the historic present) designed to assist with his relocation of the maxim to the climactic position in his unit. The small wording differences are likely to be Luke's. The disciples' question is most easily understood to be asking where the people of verses 34-35 were to be taken. Luke's climax is graphic, but obscure. Though the image is rather gruesome, in the present setting it is likely to represent the gathering to the Son of Man of those to be delivered (see 21:28; compare verse 27): they will be gathered to him like eagles / vultures to the prey upon which they will feast. For this, Luke may have been more comfortable with ("body," than with "corpse," which is found in Matthew (though it often enough used of a corpse in Hellenistic Greek and is so used by Luke [23:52, 55; 24:3, 23; Acts 9:40]). Aetos is normally "eagle," but because in the Matthew parallel (24:28) the corpse represents food for the birds (compare Job 39:30 LXX), the reference in this maxim is more likely to be to vultures ..."
John Nolland, Word Biblical Commentary: Luke 9:21 - 18:34 (Dallas: Word, 2008), 862–863.
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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