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Does Acts 1:6–7 Teach the Restoration of the Nation Israel?:
A Comparison of Supersessionist
and Nonsupersessionist Interpretations
by Michael J. Vlach, Ph.D.
Acts 1:6–7 reads: “And so when they had come together, they were asking Him, saying, ‘Lord, is it at this time You are restoring the kingdom to Israel?’ He said to them, ‘It is not for you to know times or epochs which the Father has fixed by His own authority.’”
This text is important in the debate over whether national Israel will undergo a national restoration. Nonsupersessionists, who believe in a restoration of national Israel, claim this text, which describes Jesus’ final interchange with his apostles, affirms the idea of a restoration of the nation Israel.[i] They usually do so by asserting two points: (1) the disciples expected a restoration of national Israel; and (2) this nationalistic expectation of the disciples was correct.
Concerning the first issue, John A. McLean holds that the disciples clearly expected a future restoration of the Davidic kingdom to national Israel:
The terms “Israel” and “Israelite” occur 32 times in Luke-Acts. In each occurrence the terms refer to the people of Israel as a national entity. Therefore it seems correct to understand that the disciples’ question in Acts 1:6 referred to a restoration of a kingdom to the nation of Israel. They were asking Jesus about the timing of the future restoration of the Davidic kingdom of Israel as described and defined in the Old Testament.[ii]
The second issue concerns whether the disciples were correct in having nationalistic views concerning Israel’s restoration. Nonsupersessionists argue that the belief of the disciples was valid and not misguided. Two reasons are given to support this view. First, Acts 1:3 states that Jesus met with the disciples for a period of forty days after his resurrection “speaking of the things concerning the kingdom of God.” To nonsupersessionists, it seems unlikely that the disciples could be misguided in their perceptions of the kingdom for Israel after having received forty days of instruction about the kingdom from the risen Lord. As McLean argues:
These disciples, however, were the same ones to whom Jesus had explained the Scriptures (Luke 24:32), whose minds He had opened to understand the Scriptures (v. 45), and with whom He had spent 40 days speaking about the kingdom of God (Acts 1:3). Therefore it is highly unlikely they would have thought He meant to alter the meaning of the kingdom by excluding its national, political character. Therefore rather than correcting the disciples’ understanding of a kingdom He led them to expect a kingdom at some undisclosed time period.[iii]
Larry Helyer, too, argues against the possibility that the disciples were wrong about their conceptions of the kingdom based on the belief that Jesus had many opportunities to correct any misconceptions they may have had:
The disciples have had the benefit of forty days of postresurrection instruction about the kingdom of God (1:3). Luke specifies that the question about the time of restoration was immediately prior to the ascension. In other words it was their last question. It seems psychologically improbable that the issue of national restoration had not come up for discussion prior to that moment. According to Luke, as late as the last supper the disciples had been quarreling about who was to be the greatest in the kingdom (22:24). This must have involved leadership in the new commonwealth. Therefore if Christ never intended to restore Israel nationally he surely would have addressed that burning issue. Yet we have this question in 1:6. I conclude that the point of the question could hardly have been whether there would be a restoration but, rather, when it would occur.[iv]
According to John Michael Penney, “The disciples’ question here (1.6) is hardly to be construed as a nationalistic misunderstanding. It echoes Gabriel’s language from the opening chapter of the Gospel.”[v]
Nonsupersessionists also believe that the lack of correction from Jesus in Acts 1:7 is validation that the disciples were correct in their beliefs about Israel’s restoration. If the disciples were wrong about their idea of a future restoration of the kingdom to Israel, they assert, Jesus probably would have corrected their misconception like he did on other occasions. But Jesus’ lack of correction is viewed as affirmation of their idea. As McLean asserts:
The ministry of Jesus focused, in part, on correcting false doctrine and rebuking errant teachers. However, it is noteworthy that Jesus did not correct the disciples’ question about the restoration of the kingdom to Israel. Therefore in view of the consistent ministry of Jesus to correct the disciples when they were in error, it seems correct to conclude that in their question in Acts 1:6 they properly anticipated a future restoration of the kingdom for Israel.[vi]
Robert Saucy acknowledges that “the disciples had difficulty with some of the spiritual teaching about the kingdom,”[vii] but he also believes the idea that they were totally wrong about the kingdom’s relationship to national Israel is hard to substantiate:
To charge them with a total misunderstanding of the kingdom hope of Israel based on an alleged reinterpretation of this hope is difficult to substantiate in Scripture. Just before the disciples asked about Israel and the kingdom, Luke records that Jesus had been teaching them “about the kingdom of God” (v. 3). If after all this instruction from Jesus their question had still been wrong-headed, we would certainly expect to find a rebuke and a correction in Jesus’ reply. After all, he was about to leave and send them out as his witnesses. But though some disagree, we find nothing like a rebuke in Jesus’ words.[viii]
According to nonsupersessionists, Jesus refused to address the timing of the kingdom, but he offered no correction to their idea that a restoration of national Israel would take place. As J. Bradley Chance writes, “In short, Jesus’ response challenges the hope for an immediate restoration of Israel. It does not challenge the hope of such a restoration itself.”[ix]
Nonsupersessionists assert that Acts 1:6 shows that the disciples of Jesus correctly expected a future restoration of national Israel, but supersessionists, who deny a restoration of national Israel, disagree. While supersessionists have often acknowledged that the disciples at this point had nationalistic expectations on their minds,[x] they disagree with the idea that Acts 1:6 is evidence for the idea of a future national restoration of Israel. Supersessionists have offered two alternative explanations for the meaning of Acts 1:6. First, some have claimed that the disciples were simply misguided in their understanding of the kingdom or that they had not grasped the true meaning of Jesus’ kingdom message.[xi] Raymond O. Zorn states that Acts 1:6 indicates “the last flicker on the apostles’ part . . . concerning their hope that national Israel would once again be a political theocracy.”[xii]
Second, others like Robertson hold that Israel would indeed be restored, but it would be restored in a way different from the nationalistic expectations of the apostles. As he states, “The kingdom of God would be restored to Israel in the rule of the Messiah, which would be realized by the working of the Holy Spirit through the disciples of Christ as they extended their witness to the ends of the earth.”[xiii] Thus, as the kingdom message was carried to the world through the Holy Spirit, Israel’s kingdom was being restored. To support this view, Robertson ties the question of the disciples in Acts 1:6 with Jesus’ statement in 1:8 that the disciples would receive the power of the Holy Spirit and they would be Jesus’ witnesses throughout the earth: “This statement [in 1:8] should not be regarded as peripheral to the question asked by the disciples. Instead, it is germane to the whole issue of the restoration of the kingdom to Israel.”[xiv]
In spite of these explanations, however, Acts 1:6 seems to be significant evidence for the nonsupersessionist view. The fact that these disciples had immediately experienced forty days of kingdom instruction from the risen Jesus (see Acts 1:3) makes it unlikely they could be so wrong about the nature of the kingdom and national Israel’s relationship to it. Plus, Jesus’ answer, although not an explicit affirmation of their hope, appears to assume the correctness of their expectation. As Scot McKnight states:
Since Jesus was such a good teacher, we have every right to think that the impulsive hopes of his audience were on target. This is not to say that they, at times, drew incorrect references or came to inaccurate conclusions about time or about content, but it is to admit that Jesus believed in an imminent realization of the kingdom to restore Israel and that he taught this with clarity.[xv]
We thus conclude with Paul W. Walaskay that Jesus said nothing that “dampened the hope of his disciples for a national kingdom.”[xvi] Acts 1:6–7, therefore, is evidence for the restoration of the nation Israel.
[i] The following people view this text as affirming a future restoration of national Israel: Scot McKnight, A New Vision for Israel: The Teaching of Jesus in National Context (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1999), 130–01; Paul W. Walaskay, ‘And So We Came to Rome’: The Political Perspective of St Luke (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), 17; John A. McLean, “Did Jesus Correct the Disciples’ View of the Kingdom?” Bibliotheca Sacra 151:602 (1994): 222; Saucy, The Case for Progressive Dispensationalism, 268; Larry Helyer, “Luke and the Restoration of Israel,” 327; John Michael Penny, The Missionary Emphasis of Lukan Pneumatology (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1997), 69; Blaising and Bock, Progressive Dispensationalism, 237;David L. Tiede, “The Exaltation of Jesus and the Restoration of Israel in Acts 1,” Harvard Theological Review 79:1–3 (1986): 278; David Larsen, Jews, Gentiles and the Church: A New Perspective on History and Prophecy (Grand Rapids: Discovery House, 1995), 35; Fruchtenbaum, Israelology, 104–05.