KINGDOM, reign, royal rule — from BASILEUS, king. HE BASILEIA TOU THEOU, 'the kingdom of God,' is the heart of everything Jesus preaches, and his very first announcement: 'the time has been fulfilled, and the kingdom of God HAS DRAWN NEAR' (Mark 1:15). ⚠️ It is less a place than an ACTIVITY — God's active reign breaking into the world — which is why 'kingdom' can mislead (there is no territory, no throne yet). The verb ENGIKEN, 'has drawn near,' is deliberately poised between 'is close at hand' and 'has arrived,' and the whole Gospel lives in that tension: the reign is here in Jesus' acts of authority and healing, and not yet in its fullness. Matthew, writing for Jewish readers wary of the divine name, mostly says 'the kingdom of the HEAVENS' for the same thing — genuinely PLURAL (hē basileia tōn ouranōn, as Hebrew shamayim is plural), about thirty times, where Mark and Luke say 'of God'. ⚠ And the first person to announce it in Matthew is not Jesus but John the Baptist, in the identical sentence Jesus takes up at 4:17: 'Repent, for the kingdom of the heavens has drawn near' (3:2). → first discussed at Mark 1:15