Catholic Commentary
The Beginning of Jesus's Preaching Ministry
17From that time, Jesus began to preach, and to say, “Repent! For the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand.”
Matthew 4:17 records Jesus's opening proclamation, in which he calls people to repent because the Kingdom of Heaven has arrived. This verse marks a structural turning point in Matthew's Gospel, inaugurating Jesus's public ministry with the same essential message John the Baptist announced—but now fulfilled in Jesus's own person and presence.
The Kingdom is not waiting for us to be ready—it has drawn near, and we are the ones who must turn.
The phrase "is at hand" (ēngiken) has been the subject of immense scholarly debate: is Jesus announcing something purely future (apocalyptic imminence) or something already present (realized eschatology)? Catholic tradition, rooted in the Fathers and confirmed by the Catechism, holds both together: the Kingdom is genuinely present in the person of Jesus himself — "the Kingdom of God is at hand" because Jesus is at hand — while awaiting its full consummation at the Parousia. The Kingdom comes in stages: in Jesus's earthly ministry, in the Church, in the sacraments, and finally in glory.
It is also significant that Jesus's proclamation is identical to John the Baptist's in Matthew 3:2 ("Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand"). This verbal parallel is deliberate: Jesus takes up and fulfills John's preparatory announcement. Where John pointed forward, Jesus is the fulfillment he pointed to. The baton has been passed — and the runner is not merely faster, but of an entirely different order.
Catholic tradition illuminates this verse with particular depth on three fronts.
The Kingdom as Person. Origen of Alexandria coined the term autobasileia — Jesus is himself "the Kingdom in person." This insight, retrieved and confirmed by the Catechism of the Catholic Church (§2816), means that to encounter Jesus is to encounter the Kingdom. This is why Matthew immediately follows the proclamation with the calling of disciples (4:18–22) and a ministry of healing (4:23–25): the Kingdom is not an abstraction but the concrete reign of God active in the body of Christ, healing, gathering, and transforming.
Repentance as Sacramental Foundation. The Church Fathers, including St. John Chrysostom (Homilies on Matthew, 14.1), read metanoeite as the necessary disposition for baptism and, after sin, for the Sacrament of Penance. The Catechism teaches that "Interior repentance is a radical reorientation of our whole life" (§1431). Jesus's opening word is not incidental: the entire sacramental economy presupposes and cultivates ongoing metanoia.
Eschatological Tension. The Second Vatican Council (Lumen Gentium, §5) affirmed that the Church on earth is the "seed and beginning" of the Kingdom — already present but not yet fully realized. This "already/not yet" dynamic, grounded precisely in ēngiken, shapes Catholic moral and social teaching: because the Kingdom is at hand, every act of justice, mercy, and love is not wishful idealism but cooperation with what God is already doing in history. Pope Benedict XVI in Deus Caritas Est (§31) draws on this very dynamic to ground the Church's social mission.
For a contemporary Catholic, this verse poses a question that cuts through religious routine: Have I actually repented, or have I merely adjusted? The consumerist culture we inhabit trains us to optimize and upgrade — not to turn around. Metanoia is more radical than New Year's resolutions or Lenten disciplines undertaken out of habit. It is the recognition that I have been oriented toward something other than God — comfort, status, approval, autonomy — and that the Kingdom's nearness makes that orientation untenable.
Practically, this verse invites three concrete practices. First, a regular, honest examination of conscience — not a performance review but a genuine asking: "In what direction has my life been pointed this week?" Second, frequent use of the Sacrament of Confession, which the Church presents as the privileged locus of the metanoia Jesus commands here. Third, a renewed attentiveness to where the Kingdom is "at hand" in daily life — in the poor person at the door, in the fractured relationship that awaits reconciliation, in the quiet moment of prayer that we postpone. The Kingdom is not waiting for us to be ready. It has drawn near. We are the ones who must turn.
Commentary
"From that time, Jesus began to preach" (v. 17a)
The Greek phrase Ἀπὸ τότε ἤρξατο ("from that time he began") is one of Matthew's structural pivots. It appears only twice more in the Gospel with comparable weight — at 16:21, when Jesus begins to speak openly of his Passion, and implicitly at 26:16, moving toward betrayal. Matthew uses it deliberately: this verse does not record a random sermon but the formal opening of a new dispensation. The verb κηρύσσειν ("to preach") is the same word used for a herald's proclamation — a public, authoritative announcement of what a king has decreed. Jesus does not merely teach a lesson; he announces an event that is already occurring.
This moment is set immediately after Jesus withdraws to Galilee following John's arrest (v. 12) and establishes himself in Capernaum (vv. 13–16). Matthew has just quoted Isaiah 9:1–2 ("the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light"), so when Jesus opens his mouth in verse 17, we are meant to understand: this is the light. The preaching itself is the luminous event Isaiah foresaw.
"Repent!" (Μετανοεῖτε)
The Greek metanoeite is a present imperative — not a one-time act but an ongoing stance. Metanoia literally means a change of nous (mind, understanding, orientation), but in the Hebraic thought-world Matthew inhabits it draws equally on the Hebrew shûb — a turning back, a return to the LORD. This is not mere regret or moral self-improvement. It is a total reorientation of the self: intellect, will, memory, and affection all turned toward God. The word carries the prophetic urgency of Ezekiel 18:30 ("Turn back! Turn back from your evil ways!") and Joel 2:12 ("Return to me with your whole heart").
That Jesus opens his ministry with metanoeite rather than a doctrinal proposition tells us something irreplaceable: the Kingdom cannot be merely known or admired — it must be entered, and entry requires the honest acknowledgment that we have been facing the wrong direction.
"For the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand" (ἤγγικεν ἡ βασιλεία τῶν οὐρανῶν)
The phrase ἤγγικεν (perfect tense of engizō) is crucial. The perfect tense in Greek denotes an action completed in the past whose effects are present and ongoing: the Kingdom has drawn near and remains near. This is not a future promise alone but a present reality already breaking in. Matthew characteristically uses "Kingdom of Heaven" (βασιλεία τῶν οὐρανῶν) where the other Synoptics say "Kingdom of God" — a reverential Jewish circumlocution for the divine name, signaling Matthew's Jewish-Christian audience — but the referent is identical.