The New Testament generation of Israel was led by the Pharisees and Sadducees and others of the Jewish hierarchy. They continually asked Jesus for signs to show He was the Messiah, but refused to accept the ones they were given. He described them as wicked, adulterous and a ‘generation of vipers’.
The author sets out the reason why that generation thought the way they did. He explains how their lack of belief, and the need for a change of heart among the Jewish hierarchy, underpins the teaching of the Acts of the Apostles, and how the ‘blessed hope’ that was being anticipated, i.e. the immediate return of Christ, did not occur at that time.
