The sixth passage of the Sefer Yeshua is based on Mk 8:11, Mt 12:38, Lk 11:16 (about demanding a sign), Lk 12:54-56, Th 91:1-2a (the signs of the earth and the sky).
6. 1A man shouted out to Yeshua`, saying, ‘How will we know what you say is true? Give us a sign from the heavens!’ 2So Yeshua` said to the people, ‘When you see a cloud rising in the west, you say at once, “A shower’s coming,” and so it happens. And when you see the south wind blowing, you say, “There’ll be a scorching heat,” and so it happens. 3How is it you know how to read the signs of the earth and the sky, yet you can’t read the signs of our times?’
Just like passage 5, in the gospels of Mark and Matthew it is the Pharisees who ask for a sign, but notably in the gospels of Luke and Thomas, it is simply someone in the crowd. In my personal view, I think the Pharisees are simply a fictitious scapegoat, a literary device to represent wilful doubt. I have therefore gone with Luke and Thomas – the questioner is simply someone in the crowd.
In passage 5, the metaphor was delivered even-handedly, but in this response, Yeshua’s words are more indignant, almost delivered in the form of a rebuke – this is especially obvious in the Lucan version. He criticises those who take pride in being able to read the signs of the earth and the sky, but when it comes to reading the signs of the present times, they display no such skill. Their self-pride in their own skills is misplaced.
The idea is that the signs of God’s actions in the events going on around them are obvious, yet they cannot discern them. By failing to see the power of God in what is going on around them, and so act appropriately, they leave themselves open to danger. In failing to accept the signs of the present times, they are in danger of being swept away in what is to come.
In Luke, he addresses the people he is speaking to as ‘hypocrites’; in the way Yeshua used the term elsewhere, he used the word to mean ‘religious people who faked their piety’. As religious people, they should be able to discern the active intervention of God in the events around them, but they cannot.
The signs of God among them
In passage 5, the fault was simply not being able to read the signs in the troubles of the times. In this passage 6, the fault is in not being able or being unwilling to see the concerned actions of God, and God’s righteous purpose for us.
God calls prophets when things are going seriously wrong. The presence of prophets among them should therefore have been an automatic warning sign to people. Some people heed the call to repentance and change their lives for the better, but others want a sign before they will change heart. It is almost as if they refuse to change their wrongful actions and harmful outlook, needing a miraculous sign before they will acknowledge their actions as wrongful. They fail to realise that their present course is not what God wants.
My personal opinion is that he was rebuking people who failed to realise any of this. The very fact that God had called two prophets to warn them (Yochanan the Immerser and himself) should be concerning to them – especially prophets who were essentially saying the same thing.
When people are able to predict the weather from natural signs, they know to take appropriate action; an outcome naturally follows an empirically observable sign. When they figure out that rain is coming, they take extra clothing, or don’t travel at all. If there will be a scorching heat, they will leave their travel to later in the day. However, God has called prophets to warn them of dangers which are imminent, and yet they don’t have any similar willingness to make preparations for what is coming (transform their lives, and amend their outlook and behaviour).
Pastoral application
In our day, the warning signs are in the fact of how religion is being used for oppressing people, wilfully disabling those of us who are trying to make things better for others. Around the world, religion is even being used for committing violence against innocent people. Yeshua’s core ethics are also being falsified – for example, the ‘prosperity gospel’ is saying the opposite of what Yeshua actually taught, and there is a lack of willingness to recognise where God’s will truly lies – in being a decent and compassionate human being, not in using religion to cause division and hatred in society. There is a widespread refusal to realise where God’s honourable design and righteous purpose for us truly lies.
I also believe that the resurrection of the faith of the Jewish followers of Yeshua in modern times is also no accident – it is a sign of God acting among us in a positive way. I believe that God has called us – those of us whose hearts have been awakened to Yeshua’s original message – to remind people of what religion should be about, and what it is not.