During the New Testament period, communities of Jewish believers in Yeshua existed in the Land of Israel, Syria and beyond. They were diverse communities that in many ways represented a microcosm of the wider Jewish world. In 2007, Oskar Skarsaune and Matt Jackson-McCabe published edited volumes that surveyed these communities and raised new questions about their social identity. In this issue of Verge, I would like to make a few comments about Matthew’s community.

In his published dissertation Community, Law and Mission in Matthew’s Gospel, Paul Foster describes an emerging “new consensus” in New Testament studies concerning the social identity of Matthew’s community. An increasing number of scholars are now identifying Matthew’s community as a “deviant movement operating within the orbit of Judaism.” The case for this view is made by Anthony Saldarini, J. Andrew Overman, Daniel Harrington, Joel Willitts, Anders Runesson, Phillip Sigal, among others. Roland Deines, who disagrees with this perspective, nonetheless acknowledges the existence of a new consensus emerging over three points: