But even when it is conceded that Jesus in some places in the gospels did undoubtedly contemplate the coming of the Kingdom in the future, it remains a problem, which has as yet attracted too little attention, whether he identified the eschatological phenomena attending its coming with the reign of the anointed scion of the house of David, or with the end of this age and the inauguration of the Age to Come. In general it seems to me far more likely that he looked for the Age to Come rather than for the reign of the Son of David, though the evidence is {26} admittedly not very full or entirely satisfactory. It is, however, at least clear that in his answer to the young man who asked Jesus what he should do,[14] eternal life is treated as synonymous with the Kingdom of God. The young man asked what was necessary to inherit eternal life, and when Jesus told him that he should observe the commandments, sell all that he had and give to the poor, he was grieved. Jesus then said, "How hardly will those that have riches enter into the Kingdom of God." Obviously eternal life and the Kingdom of God are here identical, and there is no doubt that the Jews expected eternal life in the Age to Come, not in the Days of the Messiah. Moreover, the continuation of the narrative--the implied question of Peter, "Lo, we have left all and followed thee"--introduces the statement of Jesus, "There is no one who has left home, or brothers, or sisters, or mother, or father, or children, or lands, for my sake and for the good news, who shall not receive a hundredfold now in this time--houses, and brothers, and sisters, and mothers, and children, and lands, with persecutions, and in the Age to Come life everlasting." The distinction here between "this time" and the Age to Come is entirely Jewish, and shows that in the previous paragraph the Kingdom of God and eternal life were associated in the mind of Jesus with the Age to Come. But, it may be said, did not Jesus identify himself {27} with the Davidic Messiah? Undoubtedly his disciples did so in the circles represented by Matthew and Luke, but it is doubtful whether the gospel of Mark represents this point of view, and the question of Jesus to the Pharisees, how David in the Scriptures could call the Messiah Lord if he were his son, is pointless, except on the assumption that Jesus did not regard himself as the Son of David.[15] On the other hand, the identification of Jesus with the Son of Man, whether by himself or by his disciples, can in no case affect the question, because the figure of the Son of Man in Jewish literature is an integral part of the inauguration of the Age to Come, not of the reign of the Davidic king.