Biblical scholar

SPCK, 2007
ISBN 9780281058464
 

The Hidden Tradition of the Kingdom, London: SPCK, 2007 describes the roots of the idea of the Kingdom of God. Barker locates the original Kingdom ideas in the holy of holies, the place of the throne, and shows how the ideals of the holy of holies were the inspiration for the various later beliefs about the Kingdom. She shows how fashions in scholarship have obscured much of the ancient evidence, and then reconstructs the traditions of the high priesthood - Enoch and Melchizedek as well as Aaron - before reading the gospel evidence with this new paradigm.  

} We live in a time when politics, and also geopolitics, are enormously affected by passionate arguments over what it would mean to establish the 'Kingdom of God' on earth. Anybody with an interest in the outcome of those arguments should pay close attention to Margaret Barker’s insightful and thought-provoking investigation of the background and context in which the first Christians spoke of the Kingdom.~

Bruce Clark, Religious Affairs Correspondent, The Economist