<p>16:28&nbsp;<i>Truly I say to you: There are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom-</i>&nbsp;Mk. 9:1 records that He also said: &quot;The Kingdom of God come with power&quot;. It is of course argued by many that the Gospel writers are merely summarizing the Lord's words in their own words. After extensive comparison of the Gospel records, I find this explanation unnecessary- because in no case of apparent contradiction do I see that the different forms of words are mutually contradictory. The Lord could easily have said something like: 'Till&nbsp;they see the Son of Man coming in His Kingdom (Mt.)<i>-&nbsp;</i>The Kingdom of God come with power (Mk.)'. Luke's &quot;Till they see the Kingdom of God&quot; (Lk. 9:27) is perfectly in accordance with this- the first part of that clause (&quot;Till they see&quot;) is from Matthew and &quot;the Kingdom of God&quot; is from Mark. It's statistically incredible that there is not a single case that I have come across in comparing the Gospels which is impossible to reconcile in this manner. If the Gospel writers were anything less than Divinely inspired, there would simply have to be contradiction between the accounts. I therefore see no need to assume that the writers were summarizing the Lord's words in their own words. This manner of repeating the same basic truth several times, e.g. 'Till&nbsp;they see the Son of Man coming in His Kingdom (Mt.)<i>-&nbsp;</i>The Kingdom of God come with power (Mk.)', is true to my human experience in preaching the Gospel in public formats to illiterate people. I tend to repeat the same basic idea in slightly different words. And this is exactly what the Lord would've been doing, and the records of His words reflect that.&nbsp;</p>
<p>The preceding verse 27 has clearly used the language of Christ's coming and His Kingdom in the context of the final judgment, when payment will be made to those who have 'lost' in this life that they might gain eternally. It is of course no coincidence that the synoptics each go on to record the transfiguration. But the connection with verse 27 means that the Lord surely was referring to His actual return in glory and final judgment. The language of '<i>Some</i>&nbsp;here will not taste of death' is strange if the Lord has in mind an event which would occur within the next week. Surely He meant that that generation would see His coming in glory. The transfiguration was at best a vision or foretaste of that time, the evident &quot;glory&quot; involved with the situation is to be connected with the &quot;glory&quot; that will be revealed at the Lord's second coming (:27). I note under 17:1 that the Lord may not have been even expecting the transfiguration when He spoke these words in 16:28. What are we to make of this?</p>
<p>One suggestion is that just as it had been possible for Israel to have been prepared by John to accept Jesus as Christ and thus enabled the King of glory to come to Zion and establish His Kingdom, so it was possible that the Kingdom of God could have been established in that generation. But Israel crucified the Son rather than giving Him the fruit of the vineyard, and even afterwards they did not repent&nbsp;<i>en masse</i>, and those who did failed to take the Gospel to the Gentile world to the extent which was then required for the Kingdom to come. &quot;<i>Shall not</i>&nbsp;taste of death&quot; uses the same word as in 10:23: &quot;You&nbsp;<i>shall not</i>&nbsp;have gone over the cities of Israel [in preaching the Gospel] before the Son of Man be come&quot;. But it seems that the disciples did not fulfil the preaching commission as intended, for the Lord's parables of harvest lament the paucity and weakness of the labourers, to the extent that the implication is that the harvest was largely spoilt because of this.&nbsp;</p>
<p>Much hinges around how we understand&nbsp;<i>heos an</i>, translated &quot;until&quot;. &quot;Until&quot; suggests that one state is ended after an event happens. Did the Lord mean 'You will not die until the Kingdom comes, and then you will die'?. That reflection alone suggests we need to think more carefully about the translation of those Greek words. Did the Lord really mean that they would not die until they saw the Kingdom come, and then they would? It could be that&nbsp;<i>heos an</i>&nbsp;is capable of a conditional meaning, as if to say 'Some of you will not taste of death&nbsp;<i>heos an</i>&nbsp;the coming of the Kingdom- i.e. you need not necessarily die, until the Kingdom come'. The problem with that is that every attested usage of&nbsp;<i>heos an</i>&nbsp;means 'until'; hyper examination of a common Greek term and trying to make it mean something else, or hoping such a meaning might be legitimate, is not the way to conduct Bible study.&nbsp;</p>
<p>Which leads me to my preferred suggestion- that the Lord indeed was saying that some of those present would indeed taste of death after they had seen His coming in glory. In this case, those referred to would be the rejected, those who had sought to gain the world for themselves in this life, rather than losing it all now in order to gain the future Kingdom at the day of His coming. The Lord often speaks of the awful position of the condemned in the last day. They will &ldquo;see&rdquo; Him- and&nbsp;<i>eido&nbsp;</i>refers more to understanding and recognition than to physical seeing- but all too late, for after that, they will then die the second death. According to Mt. 23:39, those who condemned Him to death would see Him again, and say &quot;Blessed is He who comes in the Name of the Lord&quot;, they would accept Him as Messiah- but when? At His return, they as persons responsible to judgment will be resurrected and then in that day will wish to welcome Him as Messiah. But too late. This is the basis for the gnashing of teeth at the last day- seeing His coming and Kingdom, recognizing Him as Lord, but then having to die. Rev. 1:7 speaks of this situation- those who pierced Him will see Him at His coming in glory and bitterly weep. So the Lord is foreseeing how some would indeed be resurrected to judgment, see His Kingdom come- and then have to die &quot;the second death&quot;.&nbsp;</p>
<p>However, it seems another meaning is also loaded within the words. John's Gospel speaks of how only those who are born again can &quot;see the Kingdom of God... see life&quot; (Jn. 3:3,36). Later, John records how the Lord spoke of how those who keep His word shall never &quot;see death... never taste of death&quot; (Jn. 8:51,52). The idea would then be that some of them would come to find spiritual life, and see the essence of the Kingdom in their lives- and the following account of the transfiguration would then be proof that this was indeed achieved in embryo by at least three of them. In this case we could also understand &quot;the Kingdom&quot; as a reference to the King of the Kingdom, the 'royal splendour' referring to Christ personally- and the disciples saw this in the transfiguration. The connections with John's Gospel are strong, but it would however seem strange for Matthew to start using language in such symbolic ways in the style of John. For this is generally not his style at all.</p>
<p>It is the &quot;Son of man&quot; who shall 'come'. The Lord will essentially be the same as the Gospels present Him when we see Him again. This is why Jesus even in His earthly life could be called &quot;the Kingdom of God&quot;, so close was the link between the man who walked Palestine and the One who will come again in glory. &ldquo;They see the Kingdom of God come&rdquo; (Mk. 9:1) is paralleled by &ldquo;They see the Son of man coming&rdquo; (Mt. 16:28). Indeed it would seem that the references in the Synoptic Gospels to the &lsquo;coming&rsquo; of the Kingdom are interpreted in the rest of the New Testament as referring to the personal &lsquo;coming&rsquo; of the Lord Jesus (e.g. 1 Cor. 16:22; Rev. 22:20). In that very context of referring to Himself as &quot;the Kingdom of God&quot;, the Lord speaks of His return as 'the days of the Son of man'- the human Jesus. And yet He also speaks in that context of how after His death, men will long to see one of the days of the Son of Man, i.e. how He had been in His mortal life (Lk. 17:20-26). As He was in His mortal days, so He will essentially be in the day of His final glory.</p>