In this chapter on Paul's letter to the church at Rome, Ehrman does a good job of presenting the main issues related to the interpretation of this letter. Erhman does not address the whole issue of the relationship between the Jewish Law and justification by faith in Jesus, because he already covered that topic in his discussion of Galatians. If you are interested in knowing more on the topic of the role of the Jewish Law in the letter to the Romans, I have posted on Course Documents a study on the topic of the Law and Romans that I wrote a few years ago.
Ehrman does a nice job of laying out the theme of this letter, as found in 1:16-17, which is that the "gospel" is the power of God to salvation for all who have faith in Jesus. Paul uses the word "gospel" to refer to the message of the salvation that is available by faith to all who believe in what God has done in the death and resurrection of Jesus. This is explained on pages 253-254. While many scholars through the ages have assumed that Paul's letter to the Romans was written solely for the purpose of stating his mature theological views, that is not necessarily the only reason. There are two other issues worthy of consideration. The first is that Paul is unknown to the Christians of Rome, except by reputation. Just in case Paul's reputation in Rome is based on reports spread by people who either misunderstand Paul's teachings, or intentionally misrepresented him, he wants to set the record straight for the Christian in Rome on what he believes regarding the basic truths of Christianity. Not only that, but also his style of writing makes it clear that he is attempting to persuade the reader to adopt and accept his interpretation of Christianity. He wants the Christians in Rome to look favorably upon him when he arrives there (which is why he is sending this letter ahead of him), in hopes they might also be persuaded to offer him money to finance his planned missionary journey to Spain (15:24). As best we know, Paul never got the opportunity to go to Spain.
Paul wrote Romans while he was in Corinth preparing to embark for Jerusalem with his collection of money from the churches in Greece (Paul uses the names of the Greek provinces of Macedonia and Achaia (15:26). As we learn from Acts, Paul is arrested when he arrives in Jerusalem and is eventually taken to Rome.
While there have been a variety of explanations for what Paul was hoping to accomplish in writing Romans, there are 2 popular theories of the last century, the first being the traditional Protestant idea of Romans as a comprehensive theological treatise on the significance of the death and resurrection of Jesus and how that brings eternal life to humanity. The second popular theory is the one that Ehrman presents, that Paul is introducing himself to the Christians in Rome in hopes of receiving a favorable reception when he arrives there (this theory enjoys widespread support among historical critical scholars). Another theory that gets less attention is the idea that Paul had in mind when writing Romans the question of what kind of reception he would get from the church in Jerusalem, especially as they are still very Jewish and the Christians who will be accompanying Paul on the trip to Jerusalem are Greek converts from paganism. So Paul writes about how Jesus is savior of both (but most scholars think it would be odd for Paul to write to Rome about an issue that concerns Jerusalem without stating it explicitly). Another minor theory is the view that the discussion of moral issues in chapters 12-15 indicates that Paul knows much of what is going on in the church in Rome and has taken it upon himself to offer his solution to their divisions in hope that things will be smoothed over before he arrives in Rome. But this interpretation has not found many supporters as most interpreters believe that chapters 12-15 are intended to provide a general application of the truths expressed in chapters 1-8, and show how the implications of salvation-through-Jesus for living the Christian life in-power-of-the-Holy-Spirit (as in Chap 8), and what it should look like when it is lived out in a community of Christians who come from different backgrounds.
A peculiarity of Romans worth noting is the fact that 3 chapters smack in the middle of the letter to the Romans (chapters 9, 10 & 11) are directly concerned with the fate of Jewish people who have not accepted Jesus as the Jewish Messiah. This makes me think that since we know there was a large group of Jews living in Rome, and if they were the original converts to Christianity in Rome, it may be of great interest to the church leaders in Rome in knowing where Paul, the great evangelist to the non-Jews and pagans, stands on the issue of the role of Jewish people in God's plan for the salvation of humanity, since Paul does not publicly seem concerned about the eternal fate of his Jewish brethren. Paul's answer in chapter's 9, 10 & 11 is that it is his hope that the Jewish people will see all the converts from paganism embracing the fruits of the promises to Abraham coming to reality in salvation-through-Jesus and Not want to miss out on what God is doing in bringing the promises made to his chosen people to their ultimate fulfillment.
If I am correct in my reading of the intent of chapters 9, 10 & 11, then it would make sense why we see so much talk about "justification by faith" in Galatians and Romans, but not the other letters. If my theory is correct, it would seem that the whole business of "justification by faith" is primarily related to the relationship of Christian believers to the Jewish Law. Paul wants to explain how people who were born pagan can claim to inherit the benefits of the promises God made to the Jewish people if they do not adopt a Jewish lifestyle (meaning, following the Jewish Law). Jesus' death and resurrection is the reason. In Romans 1-8, Paul lays down the logic for this belief. There is no reason for Paul to discuss justification by faith with the Corinthians since rather than talking them out of the Jewish Law, his main challenge is talking them into adopting Jewish morality in place of pagan hedonism. Therefore, in my opinion, the topic of "justification by faith" is primarily the way Paul explains the change in the purpose and role of the Jewish Law for godly living in light of Jesus' death and resurrection. As a Christian, the Jewish Law tells how to live a moral and virtuous life, but there is nothing in it that can of its own put a person in a right relationship with God. In Paul's mind, only Jesus can do that based on what he has already done in his death and resurrection, and what Jesus will complete when he returns for the final salvation of believers and final judgment of unbelievers.
On pages 254-259, Ehrman discusses what he calls two different models for salvation that Paul employs in Romans. The one that Ehrman calls the "judicial model" is the one that is most often spoken of in discussions of Paul's interpretation of the death of Jesus. The judicial model focuses on what Jesus did on the cross as paying the penalty for human sinfulness to appease a righteous God. But Ehrman also highlights what he calls the "participatory model." In this model the main impact of Jesus' death is to free humanity from bondage to sin, perceived as a spiritual force that enslaves humanity. That probably strikes you as an odd way to look at sin, but it would seem to be a fair explanation for what Paul is speaking of when he says that all humanity is enslaved to sin (6:17).
My take on this is that while Ehrman uses these labels to explain what Paul is doing in Romans chapters 1-4 and chapters 6-8, I personally see the distinction more in terms of how the death of Jesus affects the salvific possibilities for humanity (chaps 1-3) and what it looks like and feels like when a person becomes a Christian believer and experiences the benefits of that death and resurrection for her or himself (chaps 6-8). Another way of stating it would be to call it the objective and subjective sides of human salvation. On the one hand there is what Jesus did on the cross, and on the other hand, that event has no saving value until it is experienced personally by a human being.
Chapter 8 in Romans is really a model for what Christian life ought to look like, but that assumes that the Holy Spirit has taken over the dominant role in a believer's life, and the Law is irrelevant, because the Holy Spirit (in Paul's opinion) is capable of empowering the believer to live a righteous life, precisely what the Jewish Law was incapable of accomplishing.
Ehrman provides a nice summary of Paul's argument in Romans, and in what he presents on pages 259-261, he is simply repeating the widely accepted views of modern biblical scholarship.
Friday, July 8, 2011
Ehrman, Chapter 15, Galatians, Philippians, Philemon
Ehrman's choice of these three letters of the Apostle Paul as the topic of this chapter might seem like an odd collection. The only thing they have in common is that they are the three shorter letters of Paul that are considered "undisputed" by historical critical scholars. All of the other shorter letters attributed to Paul (Ephesians, Colossians, 2 Thessalonians) are considered "Deutero-Pauline"by Ehrman and many other historical critical scholars. "Deutero-Pauline" may best be described as written by disciples of Paul in Paul's name, presumably well after Paul's death (but more on this in the next Blog entry).
The letters to Timothy and Titus (often called "Pastorals" by scholars since they address pastoral concerns within the churches about whom these letters are written) are believed to be written long after the time of Paul, according to historical critical scholars, usually being placed at the end of the first century. Conservative scholars who believe that Paul actually wrote the letters to Timothy and Titus often postulate that they were written during a time of freedom for Paul after the imprisonment mentioned at the end of Acts, and before and during a second imprisonment in Rome that actually led to his death. This is because there is no indication in Paul's other letters that Timothy and Titus were ever placed in charge of a geographically clustered group of churches in the time frame covered in the book of Acts. Both the setting and the issues are very different in the letters to Timothy and Titus than what we find in any of the other letters of Paul, leading most scholars (liberal and conservative) to recognize that a much different setting lies behind these letters.
The letter to the Hebrews was once believed to have been written by Paul, due to the mention of Timothy and Italy at the end of the letter (Hebrews 13:23-24). But today, few conservative scholars still believe that Paul might have written this letter. Most scholars believe it is truly anonymous, but this has not stopped scholars from concocting theories of authorship. My favorite is that it was written by Paul's colleague in ministry, Apollos, mentioned in 1 Corinthians, for reasons I will mention in a later Blog entry on Hebrews.
Galatians is unique in the situation that has occasioned the writing of this letter. We are not even sure exactly where these Galatians churches were located. Galatia refers to a large Roman province, not a city. We do not know if they were located in the southern part of the province of Galatia (see Figure 15.1 on page 235) which would be the Galatian churches mentioned in Acts (green shaded area), or northern Galatia (shaded in lavender) of which we know nothing, except what we know from this letter, if the letter was actually written to churches in northern Galatia. I prefer the southern Galatia theory, simply because we do know Paul evangelized in this area from what is written in Acts.
The unique situation about the letter to the Galatians is that from Paul's information, he has been led to believe that some of the Christian believers in these churches that he had established have been persuaded by other Christian missionaries to adopt a Jewish lifestyle. They were persuaded to do so my some evangelizing missionaries who believed that Christian converts from paganism still had to live the Jewish lifestyle, because that is the way the Jerusalem Christians live, who live that way because Jesus lived the Jewish lifestyle.
Paul is positively incensed and furious that these believers he converted from paganism are falling prey to a different version of Christianity than what he preached to them. That is why Paul spends the first two chapters giving us some autobiographical information about his beginnings in ministry. The point being that the Apostles in Jerusalem endorsed his version of Christianity, which is that you can claim Jesus as your savior even if you do not live a Jewish lifestyle. And now, many years later, Paul is confronting the fact that Christian missionaries (maybe from Jerusalem) have gone to his churches in Galatia and taught the believers in Galatia that their salvation cannot be assured unless they adopt the Jewish lifestyle.
Be sure to read Ehrman's discussion of Galatians carefully as he does a fine job of explaining the main theological issue, which is the relationship of the Jewish Law and Justification by faith (pages 234-241). The same theological issue comes up again in Paul's letter to the Romans, but Ehrman does not take the time to explain it there, since he already covered the topic in his discussion of Galatians.
While it is sometimes hard to follow Paul's logic in Galatians chapters 3 & 4, these chapters are theologically important for the development of Christian religious ideas. Paul ask his readers, what was the point of Jesus' sacrificial death on the cross if you still have to keep the Jewish Law to get right with God? In Paul's mind (and what he believes the risen Jesus personally told him) is that Jesus' death on the cross not only ended the need for ritual sacrifices in the Jewish temple, but also ended the need to keep the other ritualistic parts of the Jewish Law (circumcision, kosher rules, festivals & ceremonies, etc). Paul makes it very clear that in his mind that people get right with God (are "justified") by faith in Jesus, because of what God has done in Jesus' sacrificial death on the cross, which is validated by his resurrection from the dead. Paul finds this whole business in Galatia so unsettling that he rants that he wishes the teachers in Galatia proposing the necessity of male circumcision for all Christians would not only take off their own foreskins, but with a slip of the knife cut too deep and cut off the whole tip (see Galatians 5:12), thereby receiving their just desserts.
PHILIPPIANS is a letter that is the difference between night and day compared to Galatians. In Galatians, Paul is seriously worried that he might lose control of what is being taught in those churches. In Philippians we have a letter written to a congregation (or cluster of house churches) that have always been a source of joy for Paul. We do find some concerns expressed in chapter 3 and warnings about false teachers, but there is no indication that Paul is worried these Christians in the city of Philippi might desert his teaching for another version of Christianity.
It is quite clear that Paul is imprisoned under Roman guard as he writes this letter. It may be house arrest, but Paul is still confined and limited, even if he is not being mistreated or deprived of food. He obviously is able to receive visitors and able to dictate letters. Traditionally this has been understood to have been in Rome, because of the mention of greetings from the Christian believers who are part of "Caesar's household." For reasons of the logistics of travel implied in the letter, some scholars have proposed that maybe the incarceration was in Ephesus, also because the concerns mentioned in Philippians seem to fit better with the (reconstructed) time frame of Paul's work in and around Ephesus. But the mention of "Caesar's household" (4:22) and the mention of the "imperial guard" (in 1:13) would lend credibility to the theory that Philippians was written while Paul was incarcerated in Rome, during the imprisonment mentioned at the end of Acts.
The immediate occasion of this letter would seem to be that the Christian believers in Philippi (whose congregations were established by Paul) have heard that the courier they sent with money for Paul (Epaphroditus by name) became ill and nearly died. By the time Paul is aware of their concerns about Epaphroditus, Epaphroditus' health is much improved and Paul proposes to send him back to Philippi bearing this letter.
In this letter Paul covers a variety of topics, all of which are loosely connected. Even though Paul does not know how his imprisonment will turn out (either release or death), he has lost no opportunity to tell anyone willing to listen - about Jesus as their savior (1:12-14). Paul also thanks the Philippian Christians for the money they sent by way of Epaphroditus (4:10-20). This is important for Paul since in that day and time, there is no guarantee that captors would feed their prisoners. Often the prisoners would have to rely on the generosity of others, most often family. In Paul's case, his church family. Paul says he hopes also to send Timothy their way to check on how things are going in the churches back in Philippi, if his situation looks like he will be allowed to live (2:19).
In chapter 3, it would appear that Paul is worried about false teachers with a Jewish background and a Jewish lifestyle agenda, but these are just warnings about the possibilities of such teachers visiting them. In chapter 2, the section on Christ's humility would seem to be related to some reported discord between two influential women in the congregation(s), Euodia and Syntyche (see 4:2). In any church situation, when influential people disagree, others begin choosing sides and that only makes matters worse. Paul states that they are important workers in the cause of Christ and harmony between them is essential to the well being of the church(es) in Philippi.
The primary purpose of the letter to the Philippians is to encourage and confirm in the faith a group of Christians that has always been both loyal and helpful to Paul, and a model of Christianity for other churches. Paul encourages them to continue in what he had taught them by affirming how much joy Paul has experienced in knowing of their continued faithfulness to Jesus Christ.
Traditionally, PHILEMON was always connected with Colossians, because both letters mention the names of Mark, Aristarchus, Demas and Luke as people with whom Paul has contact while in prison at the time he is dictating these letters, and also both mention Archippus as being on the receiving end of the letter. That being the case, traditionally scholars have placed Philemon and Colossians as being written together and delivered to churches close to each other by the same courier. However, for reasons that Ehrman discusses in chapter 17, many modern historical critical scholars believe Paul did not himself write Colossians, for reasons that Ehrman states in his discussion of Colossians (pages 369-272).
The whole gist of Philemon is that a runaway slave (by the name of Onesimus) who was owned by a man named Philemon (who was converted to Christianity by Paul), that this Onesimus had second thoughts about running away and comes to Paul in prison (either to seek Paul's advice or to ask Paul to smooth the way for his return to Onesimus without receiving brutal punishment). During this time, Paul also converts Onesimus to Christianity. And then, being sufficiently impressed with the usefulness of Onesimus (of course it is a play on words since the name of Onesimus is also the adjective in Greek meaning "useful"), Paul writes this letter letter to Philemon, properly buttering him up to both welcome Onesimus back as a brother in Christ, but also to make him available to Paul to assist Paul in his work as a Christian missionary.
An interesting point that Ehrman makes in his discussion on Philemon is to question the traditional interpretation that Paul is asking Philemon to give Onesimus his freedom from slavery. Rather, thinks Ehrman, all Paul is asking for is that Philemon approve of Onesimus working for Paul, either on loan or signing his ownership over to Paul. I am not sure if I agree with Ehrman, but he does have a point that no where does Paul actually request that Onesimus be released from his slave status. Whereas, Paul certainly makes it very clear he would find Onesimus very useful for his work. Most modern scholars have assumed that implicit in Paul's request for the use of Onesimus is that Onesimus be freed from his slave bondage.
The letters to Timothy and Titus (often called "Pastorals" by scholars since they address pastoral concerns within the churches about whom these letters are written) are believed to be written long after the time of Paul, according to historical critical scholars, usually being placed at the end of the first century. Conservative scholars who believe that Paul actually wrote the letters to Timothy and Titus often postulate that they were written during a time of freedom for Paul after the imprisonment mentioned at the end of Acts, and before and during a second imprisonment in Rome that actually led to his death. This is because there is no indication in Paul's other letters that Timothy and Titus were ever placed in charge of a geographically clustered group of churches in the time frame covered in the book of Acts. Both the setting and the issues are very different in the letters to Timothy and Titus than what we find in any of the other letters of Paul, leading most scholars (liberal and conservative) to recognize that a much different setting lies behind these letters.
The letter to the Hebrews was once believed to have been written by Paul, due to the mention of Timothy and Italy at the end of the letter (Hebrews 13:23-24). But today, few conservative scholars still believe that Paul might have written this letter. Most scholars believe it is truly anonymous, but this has not stopped scholars from concocting theories of authorship. My favorite is that it was written by Paul's colleague in ministry, Apollos, mentioned in 1 Corinthians, for reasons I will mention in a later Blog entry on Hebrews.
Galatians is unique in the situation that has occasioned the writing of this letter. We are not even sure exactly where these Galatians churches were located. Galatia refers to a large Roman province, not a city. We do not know if they were located in the southern part of the province of Galatia (see Figure 15.1 on page 235) which would be the Galatian churches mentioned in Acts (green shaded area), or northern Galatia (shaded in lavender) of which we know nothing, except what we know from this letter, if the letter was actually written to churches in northern Galatia. I prefer the southern Galatia theory, simply because we do know Paul evangelized in this area from what is written in Acts.
The unique situation about the letter to the Galatians is that from Paul's information, he has been led to believe that some of the Christian believers in these churches that he had established have been persuaded by other Christian missionaries to adopt a Jewish lifestyle. They were persuaded to do so my some evangelizing missionaries who believed that Christian converts from paganism still had to live the Jewish lifestyle, because that is the way the Jerusalem Christians live, who live that way because Jesus lived the Jewish lifestyle.
Paul is positively incensed and furious that these believers he converted from paganism are falling prey to a different version of Christianity than what he preached to them. That is why Paul spends the first two chapters giving us some autobiographical information about his beginnings in ministry. The point being that the Apostles in Jerusalem endorsed his version of Christianity, which is that you can claim Jesus as your savior even if you do not live a Jewish lifestyle. And now, many years later, Paul is confronting the fact that Christian missionaries (maybe from Jerusalem) have gone to his churches in Galatia and taught the believers in Galatia that their salvation cannot be assured unless they adopt the Jewish lifestyle.
Be sure to read Ehrman's discussion of Galatians carefully as he does a fine job of explaining the main theological issue, which is the relationship of the Jewish Law and Justification by faith (pages 234-241). The same theological issue comes up again in Paul's letter to the Romans, but Ehrman does not take the time to explain it there, since he already covered the topic in his discussion of Galatians.
While it is sometimes hard to follow Paul's logic in Galatians chapters 3 & 4, these chapters are theologically important for the development of Christian religious ideas. Paul ask his readers, what was the point of Jesus' sacrificial death on the cross if you still have to keep the Jewish Law to get right with God? In Paul's mind (and what he believes the risen Jesus personally told him) is that Jesus' death on the cross not only ended the need for ritual sacrifices in the Jewish temple, but also ended the need to keep the other ritualistic parts of the Jewish Law (circumcision, kosher rules, festivals & ceremonies, etc). Paul makes it very clear that in his mind that people get right with God (are "justified") by faith in Jesus, because of what God has done in Jesus' sacrificial death on the cross, which is validated by his resurrection from the dead. Paul finds this whole business in Galatia so unsettling that he rants that he wishes the teachers in Galatia proposing the necessity of male circumcision for all Christians would not only take off their own foreskins, but with a slip of the knife cut too deep and cut off the whole tip (see Galatians 5:12), thereby receiving their just desserts.
PHILIPPIANS is a letter that is the difference between night and day compared to Galatians. In Galatians, Paul is seriously worried that he might lose control of what is being taught in those churches. In Philippians we have a letter written to a congregation (or cluster of house churches) that have always been a source of joy for Paul. We do find some concerns expressed in chapter 3 and warnings about false teachers, but there is no indication that Paul is worried these Christians in the city of Philippi might desert his teaching for another version of Christianity.
It is quite clear that Paul is imprisoned under Roman guard as he writes this letter. It may be house arrest, but Paul is still confined and limited, even if he is not being mistreated or deprived of food. He obviously is able to receive visitors and able to dictate letters. Traditionally this has been understood to have been in Rome, because of the mention of greetings from the Christian believers who are part of "Caesar's household." For reasons of the logistics of travel implied in the letter, some scholars have proposed that maybe the incarceration was in Ephesus, also because the concerns mentioned in Philippians seem to fit better with the (reconstructed) time frame of Paul's work in and around Ephesus. But the mention of "Caesar's household" (4:22) and the mention of the "imperial guard" (in 1:13) would lend credibility to the theory that Philippians was written while Paul was incarcerated in Rome, during the imprisonment mentioned at the end of Acts.
The immediate occasion of this letter would seem to be that the Christian believers in Philippi (whose congregations were established by Paul) have heard that the courier they sent with money for Paul (Epaphroditus by name) became ill and nearly died. By the time Paul is aware of their concerns about Epaphroditus, Epaphroditus' health is much improved and Paul proposes to send him back to Philippi bearing this letter.
In this letter Paul covers a variety of topics, all of which are loosely connected. Even though Paul does not know how his imprisonment will turn out (either release or death), he has lost no opportunity to tell anyone willing to listen - about Jesus as their savior (1:12-14). Paul also thanks the Philippian Christians for the money they sent by way of Epaphroditus (4:10-20). This is important for Paul since in that day and time, there is no guarantee that captors would feed their prisoners. Often the prisoners would have to rely on the generosity of others, most often family. In Paul's case, his church family. Paul says he hopes also to send Timothy their way to check on how things are going in the churches back in Philippi, if his situation looks like he will be allowed to live (2:19).
In chapter 3, it would appear that Paul is worried about false teachers with a Jewish background and a Jewish lifestyle agenda, but these are just warnings about the possibilities of such teachers visiting them. In chapter 2, the section on Christ's humility would seem to be related to some reported discord between two influential women in the congregation(s), Euodia and Syntyche (see 4:2). In any church situation, when influential people disagree, others begin choosing sides and that only makes matters worse. Paul states that they are important workers in the cause of Christ and harmony between them is essential to the well being of the church(es) in Philippi.
The primary purpose of the letter to the Philippians is to encourage and confirm in the faith a group of Christians that has always been both loyal and helpful to Paul, and a model of Christianity for other churches. Paul encourages them to continue in what he had taught them by affirming how much joy Paul has experienced in knowing of their continued faithfulness to Jesus Christ.
Traditionally, PHILEMON was always connected with Colossians, because both letters mention the names of Mark, Aristarchus, Demas and Luke as people with whom Paul has contact while in prison at the time he is dictating these letters, and also both mention Archippus as being on the receiving end of the letter. That being the case, traditionally scholars have placed Philemon and Colossians as being written together and delivered to churches close to each other by the same courier. However, for reasons that Ehrman discusses in chapter 17, many modern historical critical scholars believe Paul did not himself write Colossians, for reasons that Ehrman states in his discussion of Colossians (pages 369-272).
The whole gist of Philemon is that a runaway slave (by the name of Onesimus) who was owned by a man named Philemon (who was converted to Christianity by Paul), that this Onesimus had second thoughts about running away and comes to Paul in prison (either to seek Paul's advice or to ask Paul to smooth the way for his return to Onesimus without receiving brutal punishment). During this time, Paul also converts Onesimus to Christianity. And then, being sufficiently impressed with the usefulness of Onesimus (of course it is a play on words since the name of Onesimus is also the adjective in Greek meaning "useful"), Paul writes this letter letter to Philemon, properly buttering him up to both welcome Onesimus back as a brother in Christ, but also to make him available to Paul to assist Paul in his work as a Christian missionary.
An interesting point that Ehrman makes in his discussion on Philemon is to question the traditional interpretation that Paul is asking Philemon to give Onesimus his freedom from slavery. Rather, thinks Ehrman, all Paul is asking for is that Philemon approve of Onesimus working for Paul, either on loan or signing his ownership over to Paul. I am not sure if I agree with Ehrman, but he does have a point that no where does Paul actually request that Onesimus be released from his slave status. Whereas, Paul certainly makes it very clear he would find Onesimus very useful for his work. Most modern scholars have assumed that implicit in Paul's request for the use of Onesimus is that Onesimus be freed from his slave bondage.
Ehrman, Chapter 14, 1 & 2 Corinthians
Paul's letters to the church at Corinth permit us an interesting look behind the scenes in what may have been going on in that church(es?). We don't really know for sure if the "church in Corinth" was a single congregation or a federation of house churches. It is easy to read Paul's letters as to one congregation, but the scope his intended recipients may not be so limited as just being to one house-church, since he addresses his letters to all the Christian believers in a particular city.
We know that what we call 1 Corinthians is not Paul first letter to this church, because he writes in 1 Corinthians 5:9, "I wrote you in my letter." Therefore 1 Corinthians is probably Paul's second letter to the church at Corinth.
Many historical critical scholars believe that 1 Corinthians especially gives us a glimpse of what may have been going on (or going wrong) in the Corinthian church as Paul deals with specific issues that have been brought to his attention. It would seem that Paul's sources of information are two. The first is "Chloe's people" (1 Cor. 1:11) who bring a report about different factions in the church engaged in jostling for positions of influence. The second source is the letter brought by Stephanas, Fortunatus and Achaicus (1 Cor. 16:15), who also will bring Paul's reply back to Corinth. The following statements are examples of why scholars believe Paul is responding to the verbal and written information he has received about problems among the Christians in Corinth. "It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you" (1 Cor. 5:1); Now concerning matters about which you wrote (1 Cor 7:1). "Now concerning food offered to idols" (1 Cor. 8:1). You get the idea. So what we have in 1 Corinthians is one side of a conversation and scholars love to speculate about what the other half of this conversation might have been, and what did these erroneous Corinthians actually believe?
Ehrman mentions most of the conclusions about the situation in Corinth referred to in 1 Corinthians, for which there is a broad consensus among historical critical scholars. The rule of thumb is this: if Paul says "don't do that" he probably believes there are people in that church doing what he condemns. Now that might be a weak foundation for a historical reconstruction of the situation in Corinth, since we have only one side of it, but that is all we have to go on, and modern scholars won't let that slow them down. The most used verse for this process is 1 Cor. 1:26. "Not many of you were wise by human standards," translated: a few were well educated, but most had no formal education. "Not many were powerful," a few were influential in the city, but most not at all. "Not many were of noble birth," translated, a few belonged to the upper class, but most were of the working or servant class.
Using this type of reasoning many scholars speculate that the problems with the Lord's Supper (mentioned in 1 Cor. 11:17-22) might have a sociological dimension to it - in that the wealthy upper class are coming early hogging the food and drink (which they provide out of their abundance) but fail to leave enough food for the servant class Christians to eat who can't come until their work is done. This is just an example of the ways that scholars try to reconstruct what was going wrong in the Corinthian church and make sense of why does Paul say what he says? Ehrman goes into more detail on this on page 218.
I believe that Ehrman gets to the crux of the problem in Corinth on pages 219 to 220 (bottom to top). That problem is the sense of personal exaltation on the part of the Corinthian believers, supposing they share in the glories of Christ's resurrection in this life. I suspect this feeling was energized by ecstatic experiences of the Holy Spirit, since Paul speaks in similar terms about the proper role of the gifts of the Holy Spirit, since some of the Corinthian believers seem to think that speaking in tongues makes them better Christians than those who don't speak in tongues (1 Cor 14:13-19).
This mindset among the Corinthian believers is also evident in the discussions about "power" and "wisdom" in that Paul seems to think these people are focusing on worldly power and wisdom and not spiritual power and wisdom, or if they do, they have completely misunderstood power and wisdom from a Christian perspective, as if the Corinthians see it as an endowment that commends them highly, whereas Paul sees power and wisdom as what God has done in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ for the salvation of the world, that makes no logical sense by worldly standards (see Ehrman, page 223, bot.)
Of course the answer that Paul gives to this situation is that these people need a healthy dose of humility and recognition that in this life - Christians should aspire to imitate the suffering Christ, so that in the next life they can enjoy the blessings of the glorious Christ. This is evident in the number of times that Paul refers to the importance of knowing "Christ crucified" (1 Cor. 1:18, 1:23, 2:2).
Overall I would say that Ehrman's take on 1 Corinthians is mainstream historical critical scholarship. He seems to emphasize the apocalyptic dimension of Paul's religious thinking more than most scholars. But that only stands to reason since Ehrman is of the opinion that apocalyptic expectations were the driving force in much of early Christianity, and especially so with Paul and Jesus.
Concerning 2 Corinthians, we face a whole new set of issues and problems. One major issue is whether this letter is all one letter or two or more letters jammed together (see especially Box 14.3 on page 229). Most conservative scholars believe the letter is all part of the same piece, but that Paul stopped dictating and then picked it up again later, thereby creating a sense of lost continuity. What seems most obvious is a distinct break between chapters 9 and 10. Chapters 10-13 go off in a very different direction than Chapters 1-9, and the tone in chapters 10-13 is markedly strained by comparison with the more collegial tone of chapters 1-6 especially. As Ehrman says on pages 228-229, it makes most sense to place 2 Cor. 10-13 as the "tearful" or "painful" letter that followed the painful visit mentioned in 2 Cor. 2:1-4. Therefore, 2 Cor 1-7 was written after 2 Cor 10-13 by this reconstruction of events. I notice that Ehrman places "Paul's second visit," the "painful" visit, before the arrival of the super-apostles. Whereas other scholars would locate the second visit (the painful visit) and after the arrival of the super apostles in the chronology of events.
The main problem addressed in 2 Corinthians is the emphasis of these super-apostles (see 2 Cor. 12:11) on worldly standards of oratorical skills. Paul as a preacher does not measure up by comparison (2 Cor. 10:10). But these super-apostles come bearing great qualifications (so they believe, see 2 Cor. 11:21-23). But Paul see qualifications for ministry as being what one is willing to suffer and endure for promoting the cause of Christ, and pulpit prima donas are not seeking to glorify Christ but only bring glory to themselves. One of the principles implicit in Paul's reasoning in 2 Cor 10-13 is that God can only use people effectively who have little confidence in their own abilities, but boundless confidence in the power of God to work through them.
Following this line of reconstruction, we find in 2 Cor 1-7 that the Corinthian Christians are properly humbled and reaffirm their confidence in Paul as their primary teacher in all things Christian. But problems do not disappear in the Corinthian church, less than 40 years later the bishop of Rome, Clement, is writing to the church in Corinth reminding them of all the truths that Paul had written to them previously.
A NOTE on 2 Cor. 8-9. This may be two separate pieces of instruction about a collection for the poor Christians in Jerusalem. Apparently, Paul was eager to take up a substantial monetary collection for the poor Christians in Jerusalem and then personally accompany this money to Jerusalem as an act of Christian solidarity, hopefully cementing a bond between the Jerusalem church (of whom the majority were converts from Judaism) and the churches that Paul had established (of whom the majority were converts from paganism). Paul even uses reference to the generosity of the poor Christians in Macedonia (Thessalonica and Philippi) to spur on the Corinthians to be generous in their contributions (2 Cor 8:2). And then using the ploy of saying to the Corinthians that he had been bragging to the Macedonians about the Corinthians' generosity to spur them to give more so they don't embarrass themselves (2 Cor. 9:2). We know that the destination of this collection is Jerusalem from what Paul says about the collection in 1 Corinthians 16:1-4.
It would seem that the story in Acts about Paul's arrest in Jerusalem would have taken place on the visit to Jerusalem intended to deliver this offering to the Christians there. Acts does not mention the offering, but it does find mention several times in Paul's letters.
We know that what we call 1 Corinthians is not Paul first letter to this church, because he writes in 1 Corinthians 5:9, "I wrote you in my letter." Therefore 1 Corinthians is probably Paul's second letter to the church at Corinth.
Many historical critical scholars believe that 1 Corinthians especially gives us a glimpse of what may have been going on (or going wrong) in the Corinthian church as Paul deals with specific issues that have been brought to his attention. It would seem that Paul's sources of information are two. The first is "Chloe's people" (1 Cor. 1:11) who bring a report about different factions in the church engaged in jostling for positions of influence. The second source is the letter brought by Stephanas, Fortunatus and Achaicus (1 Cor. 16:15), who also will bring Paul's reply back to Corinth. The following statements are examples of why scholars believe Paul is responding to the verbal and written information he has received about problems among the Christians in Corinth. "It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you" (1 Cor. 5:1); Now concerning matters about which you wrote (1 Cor 7:1). "Now concerning food offered to idols" (1 Cor. 8:1). You get the idea. So what we have in 1 Corinthians is one side of a conversation and scholars love to speculate about what the other half of this conversation might have been, and what did these erroneous Corinthians actually believe?
Ehrman mentions most of the conclusions about the situation in Corinth referred to in 1 Corinthians, for which there is a broad consensus among historical critical scholars. The rule of thumb is this: if Paul says "don't do that" he probably believes there are people in that church doing what he condemns. Now that might be a weak foundation for a historical reconstruction of the situation in Corinth, since we have only one side of it, but that is all we have to go on, and modern scholars won't let that slow them down. The most used verse for this process is 1 Cor. 1:26. "Not many of you were wise by human standards," translated: a few were well educated, but most had no formal education. "Not many were powerful," a few were influential in the city, but most not at all. "Not many were of noble birth," translated, a few belonged to the upper class, but most were of the working or servant class.
Using this type of reasoning many scholars speculate that the problems with the Lord's Supper (mentioned in 1 Cor. 11:17-22) might have a sociological dimension to it - in that the wealthy upper class are coming early hogging the food and drink (which they provide out of their abundance) but fail to leave enough food for the servant class Christians to eat who can't come until their work is done. This is just an example of the ways that scholars try to reconstruct what was going wrong in the Corinthian church and make sense of why does Paul say what he says? Ehrman goes into more detail on this on page 218.
I believe that Ehrman gets to the crux of the problem in Corinth on pages 219 to 220 (bottom to top). That problem is the sense of personal exaltation on the part of the Corinthian believers, supposing they share in the glories of Christ's resurrection in this life. I suspect this feeling was energized by ecstatic experiences of the Holy Spirit, since Paul speaks in similar terms about the proper role of the gifts of the Holy Spirit, since some of the Corinthian believers seem to think that speaking in tongues makes them better Christians than those who don't speak in tongues (1 Cor 14:13-19).
This mindset among the Corinthian believers is also evident in the discussions about "power" and "wisdom" in that Paul seems to think these people are focusing on worldly power and wisdom and not spiritual power and wisdom, or if they do, they have completely misunderstood power and wisdom from a Christian perspective, as if the Corinthians see it as an endowment that commends them highly, whereas Paul sees power and wisdom as what God has done in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ for the salvation of the world, that makes no logical sense by worldly standards (see Ehrman, page 223, bot.)
Of course the answer that Paul gives to this situation is that these people need a healthy dose of humility and recognition that in this life - Christians should aspire to imitate the suffering Christ, so that in the next life they can enjoy the blessings of the glorious Christ. This is evident in the number of times that Paul refers to the importance of knowing "Christ crucified" (1 Cor. 1:18, 1:23, 2:2).
Overall I would say that Ehrman's take on 1 Corinthians is mainstream historical critical scholarship. He seems to emphasize the apocalyptic dimension of Paul's religious thinking more than most scholars. But that only stands to reason since Ehrman is of the opinion that apocalyptic expectations were the driving force in much of early Christianity, and especially so with Paul and Jesus.
Concerning 2 Corinthians, we face a whole new set of issues and problems. One major issue is whether this letter is all one letter or two or more letters jammed together (see especially Box 14.3 on page 229). Most conservative scholars believe the letter is all part of the same piece, but that Paul stopped dictating and then picked it up again later, thereby creating a sense of lost continuity. What seems most obvious is a distinct break between chapters 9 and 10. Chapters 10-13 go off in a very different direction than Chapters 1-9, and the tone in chapters 10-13 is markedly strained by comparison with the more collegial tone of chapters 1-6 especially. As Ehrman says on pages 228-229, it makes most sense to place 2 Cor. 10-13 as the "tearful" or "painful" letter that followed the painful visit mentioned in 2 Cor. 2:1-4. Therefore, 2 Cor 1-7 was written after 2 Cor 10-13 by this reconstruction of events. I notice that Ehrman places "Paul's second visit," the "painful" visit, before the arrival of the super-apostles. Whereas other scholars would locate the second visit (the painful visit) and after the arrival of the super apostles in the chronology of events.
The main problem addressed in 2 Corinthians is the emphasis of these super-apostles (see 2 Cor. 12:11) on worldly standards of oratorical skills. Paul as a preacher does not measure up by comparison (2 Cor. 10:10). But these super-apostles come bearing great qualifications (so they believe, see 2 Cor. 11:21-23). But Paul see qualifications for ministry as being what one is willing to suffer and endure for promoting the cause of Christ, and pulpit prima donas are not seeking to glorify Christ but only bring glory to themselves. One of the principles implicit in Paul's reasoning in 2 Cor 10-13 is that God can only use people effectively who have little confidence in their own abilities, but boundless confidence in the power of God to work through them.
Following this line of reconstruction, we find in 2 Cor 1-7 that the Corinthian Christians are properly humbled and reaffirm their confidence in Paul as their primary teacher in all things Christian. But problems do not disappear in the Corinthian church, less than 40 years later the bishop of Rome, Clement, is writing to the church in Corinth reminding them of all the truths that Paul had written to them previously.
A NOTE on 2 Cor. 8-9. This may be two separate pieces of instruction about a collection for the poor Christians in Jerusalem. Apparently, Paul was eager to take up a substantial monetary collection for the poor Christians in Jerusalem and then personally accompany this money to Jerusalem as an act of Christian solidarity, hopefully cementing a bond between the Jerusalem church (of whom the majority were converts from Judaism) and the churches that Paul had established (of whom the majority were converts from paganism). Paul even uses reference to the generosity of the poor Christians in Macedonia (Thessalonica and Philippi) to spur on the Corinthians to be generous in their contributions (2 Cor 8:2). And then using the ploy of saying to the Corinthians that he had been bragging to the Macedonians about the Corinthians' generosity to spur them to give more so they don't embarrass themselves (2 Cor. 9:2). We know that the destination of this collection is Jerusalem from what Paul says about the collection in 1 Corinthians 16:1-4.
It would seem that the story in Acts about Paul's arrest in Jerusalem would have taken place on the visit to Jerusalem intended to deliver this offering to the Christians there. Acts does not mention the offering, but it does find mention several times in Paul's letters.
Thursday, July 7, 2011
Ehrman, Chapter 13, 1 Thessalonians
In 1 Thessalonians we have the oldest surviving Christian document. The original no longer exists (the oldest existing copy was probably made 300 years after Paul first wrote the letter). However, no one questions the authenticity of this letter or the fact that it was probably written about 49-50 CE. This letter provides us with a snapshot of Paul's evangelistic missionary work in the city of Thessalonica.
Scholars debate how long Paul went about his missionary work in Thessalonica before being forced to leave town. Some say several weeks, others say a number of months. Which ever it was, it would seem clear that Paul felt it necessary to leave town before his work there was complete in establishing a group of Christians as a solid local house-church. Even though Paul lists two co-writers (Timothy and Silvanus, who most scholars believe is the same as the Silas mentioned elsewhere), every scholar I know of assumes Paul dictated the entire letter himself (we know from Romans 16:22 that Paul dictated his letters, since the scribe inserts himself into the final greetings). The mention of Timothy and Silvanus does indicate the fact that Paul always had co-workers with him and he was not a lone ranger evangelist. Paul does not mention if there would have been others in the entourage, but there may well have been volunteer personal assistants.
Ehrman is quite sure that Paul mainly used his place of business as the locus of his evangelizing. Ehrman does not consider the Acts of the Apostles historically accurate. However, I think there may be merit in the model that Luke attributes to Paul in Acts - in which he preaches in a synagogue hoping to convert a few Jewish people and especially hoping to convert the non-Jews who attend synagogue services that Acts refers to as "God-fearers." These are people who are impressed by Jewish morality and monotheism, but not willing to undergo circumcision or follow the Kosher dietary rules. Such people would seem to be ideal candidates for Paul's message of receiving the blessings of the Jewish God without living like a Jew. The only requirement is recognizing this Jesus as the Jewish Messiah. Another tactic of Paul's from Acts that makes good sense to me is Paul's practice in Acts of converting a wealthy individual who would provide both a place to stay for Paul and especially a place to gather people for meetings instructing them on the ways of Christianity. Only a wealthy person's home would afford sufficient room to gather more than a dozen people comfortably.
Ehrman does a fine job of explaining the content of Paul's message that he would have preached to the Thessalonians (page 205-207). And Ehrman also does a good job of explaining the circumstances of the letter and the main issue that had occasioned the letter (the death of some Christian believers) (pages 210-213), so there is no need for me to duplicate that. As Ehrman mentions in Box 13.1 (page209), private voluntary associations were a common means of socializing in the Greco-Roman world (which would include all the areas evangelized by Paul) and it is likely that many early Christians understood their participation in a Christian house-church as being within that socio-religious model of a voluntary association. However, for the Christians, their affiliation with other Christians may have taken on a more significant role in their lives if these Christians were ostracized by friends and family for adopting this strange new religion. Other Christians may often have been the only real friends they had. Indeed, the importance of "fellowship" among many early Christians may be due to the fact that their local fellow Christian believers may have served as a surrogate family, since joining a strange religious group could easily lead to loss of job, being disowned by one's family, and being socially ostracized. Thus the significance of calling other Christians brother or sister, or referring to a church as the "household of God" (Ephesians 2:19). In other words, the close camaraderie of early Christians may be as much from emotional necessity as a way of living out the faith.
Scholars debate how long Paul went about his missionary work in Thessalonica before being forced to leave town. Some say several weeks, others say a number of months. Which ever it was, it would seem clear that Paul felt it necessary to leave town before his work there was complete in establishing a group of Christians as a solid local house-church. Even though Paul lists two co-writers (Timothy and Silvanus, who most scholars believe is the same as the Silas mentioned elsewhere), every scholar I know of assumes Paul dictated the entire letter himself (we know from Romans 16:22 that Paul dictated his letters, since the scribe inserts himself into the final greetings). The mention of Timothy and Silvanus does indicate the fact that Paul always had co-workers with him and he was not a lone ranger evangelist. Paul does not mention if there would have been others in the entourage, but there may well have been volunteer personal assistants.
Ehrman is quite sure that Paul mainly used his place of business as the locus of his evangelizing. Ehrman does not consider the Acts of the Apostles historically accurate. However, I think there may be merit in the model that Luke attributes to Paul in Acts - in which he preaches in a synagogue hoping to convert a few Jewish people and especially hoping to convert the non-Jews who attend synagogue services that Acts refers to as "God-fearers." These are people who are impressed by Jewish morality and monotheism, but not willing to undergo circumcision or follow the Kosher dietary rules. Such people would seem to be ideal candidates for Paul's message of receiving the blessings of the Jewish God without living like a Jew. The only requirement is recognizing this Jesus as the Jewish Messiah. Another tactic of Paul's from Acts that makes good sense to me is Paul's practice in Acts of converting a wealthy individual who would provide both a place to stay for Paul and especially a place to gather people for meetings instructing them on the ways of Christianity. Only a wealthy person's home would afford sufficient room to gather more than a dozen people comfortably.
Ehrman does a fine job of explaining the content of Paul's message that he would have preached to the Thessalonians (page 205-207). And Ehrman also does a good job of explaining the circumstances of the letter and the main issue that had occasioned the letter (the death of some Christian believers) (pages 210-213), so there is no need for me to duplicate that. As Ehrman mentions in Box 13.1 (page209), private voluntary associations were a common means of socializing in the Greco-Roman world (which would include all the areas evangelized by Paul) and it is likely that many early Christians understood their participation in a Christian house-church as being within that socio-religious model of a voluntary association. However, for the Christians, their affiliation with other Christians may have taken on a more significant role in their lives if these Christians were ostracized by friends and family for adopting this strange new religion. Other Christians may often have been the only real friends they had. Indeed, the importance of "fellowship" among many early Christians may be due to the fact that their local fellow Christian believers may have served as a surrogate family, since joining a strange religious group could easily lead to loss of job, being disowned by one's family, and being socially ostracized. Thus the significance of calling other Christians brother or sister, or referring to a church as the "household of God" (Ephesians 2:19). In other words, the close camaraderie of early Christians may be as much from emotional necessity as a way of living out the faith.
Ehrman, Chapter 12, Paul the Apostle
In this chapter Ehrman gives, what I think is, a very good overall introduction to the man and mission of the Apostle Paul, according to the current standards of historical critical biblical scholarship. The Greek word that is translated disciple (mathetes, pronounced mah-thay-tays) means learner. The word Apostle is the Greek word meaning someone "who is sent out" (on a mission to deliver information). In the Gospels the followers of Jesus were learners (Greek has a different word for student so I won't use that word here). After the resurrection, many of the followers believed they had been "sent out" by the risen Jesus to spread the message of salvation through Jesus. Therefore, they are called Apostles. In the books of Acts, it seems that only the original "12" (with Matthias replacing Judas) could be counted as "Apostles" because they had been with Jesus during his earthly ministry (see Acts 1:21-22). But PAUL has a much different view of what constitutes an apostle.
Paul finds his validation for considering himself an apostle of Jesus in the fact that he had seen the risen Jesus, and he had received his mission directly from the risen Jesus. Especially to the point is 1 Corinthians 9:1 where Paul defends his status as an apostle with: "Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen the Lord?" Then in Galatians Paul defends his version of the message of salvation in Jesus by indicating he received it directly from the risen Jesus (Gal. 1:16-17 & 2:2), and implies that he did not seek an endorsement from the apostles in Jerusalem for validation, but rather only wants their endorsement as confirmation of Christian unity. Paul's mission is to the non-Jews, to the "uncircumcised" as he puts it (see Gal. 2:7-8). But the novelty of Paul's mission is his insistence that converted pagans do not have to adopt a Jewish lifestyle in order to be Christian believers.
If the Cornelius story in Acts 10 is historically true, it was probably seen by the church leaders in Jerusalem as an exception to the rule. We find in Acts that Paul was charged (by detractors) with teaching that Christians born Jewish no longer have to keep the Jewish Law. It would seem that there is good reason to believe there is strong historical basis for this. Paul says: "I have become all things to all people that I might by all means save some" (1 Corinthians 9:22). In the passage this is taken from it is clear Paul set aside the kosher lifestyle while among pagans in order to convert them. In Galatians Paul accuses Peter of hypocrisy because while in Antioch he eats with converts from paganism until the arrival from Jerusalem of representatives of James. Then Peter and the others who were born Jewish reverted to their kosher exclusivism (see Galatians 2:11-14). (This James is not Zebedee but the James whom Paul refers to as "the Lord's brother" and who clearly preferred that all Christians follow the Jewish Law). There is no indication whether Peter accepted Paul rebuke at this time and upholds Paul's view. By inference Peter would have later fraternized with converts from paganism because he travels extensively in areas in which the majority of Christians were converts from paganism (see 1 Corinthians 1:12 & 9:5; the fact that Peter's name [Cephas] is mentioned in the same verse [Corinthians 1:12] as the other apostles who had influenced the Corinthian church seems to imply that Peter must have spent enough time in Corinth to garner a local following).
Paul seems to have had an easier time overcoming the exclusivistic tenets of his Jewish upbringing than did James (the Lord's brother). They were both Pharisees before becoming Christians. But James does not seem to have had any desire to break free from the Jewish lifestyle. Peter (it would appear) eventually does break free from the Jewish lifestyle).
What Ehrman says about the division of the letters attributed to Paul into the three groups (on page 182) is in line with modern scholarship. I personally believe such scholars tend to be unnecessarily skeptical about the letters placed in the category "Deutero-Pauline" meaning written by a disciple of Paul (see Box 12.1 on page 182). In my mind they could easily have been written by Paul. The letters written to Timothy and Titus are noticeably different from the other letters, and their authenticity has been questioned since the 1700's. However, many conservative scholars still consider them authentically Pauline, but no historical critical scholars believe Paul wrote them. As we will find out in subsequent weeks, some scholars even believe some of the undisputed letters may be composite letters, made up of pieces of various letters Paul wrote to a particular church.
On pages 184-186 Ehrman engages in an exercise popular among historical critical scholars which is demonstrating how the Paul in Acts teaches a Christianity very different from that in Paul's letters. I personally believe Ehrman over dramatizes the differences and discrepancies, but there is no doubt that the emphasis of Paul in Acts and Paul in his letters is quite different. What is really most noticeable to me is the lack of any reference in Acts to the major themes of Paul's letters, especially the doctrine of justification by faith, the expectation that Jesus may return in the near future, and also any discussion of the Jewish Law in light of the coming of Jesus.
The discussion of Paul's letters as "occasional" (see pages 186-188) is very instructive. Modern Christians often like to read the Bible to know what to believe and do not always take into account the circumstances in which a particular writing was originally composed. This makes a big difference in understanding the point of Paul's letters. With the possible exception of Romans, Paul's letters were written to address specific issues at specific churches. This is quite distinct from other New Testament letters like 1 Peter, James and 1 John, which are largely religious tracts, promoting certain teachings on various topics that apply equally well to all Christians. As we shall see, for the most part, Paul's letters are written to address specific problems that have arisen in a particular church.
Ehrman's discussion of Paul as a Pharisee (see pages 189-191) is very instructive on the Jewish background from which Paul emerges. Even though Paul says he counts it all rubbish (Philippians 3:8), the depth of his education in biblical studies and his ability to reason in a manner showing intellectual astuteness must certainly be a credit to his training as a Pharisee.
Paul's conversion has been a topic of intense debate in the last three decades of the 20th century. Ehrman points out that the once popular notion that Paul was a guilt ridden legalist before his conversion is clearly contradicted by what he says of his life as a Pharisee in Philippians 3:4-6 (see page 191). And even the common assumption, based on Acts 9, that this conversion was a single dramatic event taking place in a very short time span is questionable, because this interpretation may not be supported by the letters of Paul himself. In Galatians 1:17 we find there is a three year period after his conversion that Paul does not account for, but says he spent it in Arabia doing we know not what. This would seem to be prior to any effort on his part as an evangelist. This would also seem to contradict what we find in Acts 9:19-22, where Paul immediately becomes the evangelist. But Acts omits the three years before he goes to Jerusalem for the first time as a Christian (Acts 9:26). But it may also be that the author of Acts did not know of the three years between the time of his conversion and his next trip to Jerusalem.
The picture of Paul's conversion gets even more complicated when we consider how Paul worked out its implications for his own views on religion. It was not a case that he decided to become a Christian and some nice evangelist told him everything he needed to know about Christianity. Christian doctrine as we know it today had largely not yet been developed. Indeed, it is fair to say that Christian doctrine as we know it today is mightily dependent upon the writings of this Paul. So, Paul was working from his own religious experience and his understanding of Judaism, and in the process of trying to make sense of how this Jesus could be the Jewish messiah - Paul arrived at a means of interpreting the Jewish scriptures in light of the coming of Jesus and establishing the significance of Jesus' death and resurrection. It might seem obvious to us how this works, we read it in the New Testament. But before Paul there is little evidence of any sustained thought by anyone on the implications of Jesus as the Jewish messiah. Paul's letters may represent the first efforts of a Christian to try to think this through, and the only letter that can at all be said to represent a systematic consideration of this topic was one of his last letters, Romans. So, as Paul wrote his letters, Paul was theologizing as needed to address the questions and concerns that popped up along the way.
Ehrman's summary of the important points of Paul's re-evaluation of the Jewish faith based on the coming of Jesus as the Jewish messiah is very well written (see pages 193-196). What is provided in these pages is really good background information to have for reading Paul's letters, because without understanding Paul's post-conversion re-evaluation of Judaism, there is much in his letters that will be overlooked or seem puzzling. You may find it useful to return to these pages in the future when reading Paul's letters and the passages that touch on these topics.
Paul finds his validation for considering himself an apostle of Jesus in the fact that he had seen the risen Jesus, and he had received his mission directly from the risen Jesus. Especially to the point is 1 Corinthians 9:1 where Paul defends his status as an apostle with: "Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen the Lord?" Then in Galatians Paul defends his version of the message of salvation in Jesus by indicating he received it directly from the risen Jesus (Gal. 1:16-17 & 2:2), and implies that he did not seek an endorsement from the apostles in Jerusalem for validation, but rather only wants their endorsement as confirmation of Christian unity. Paul's mission is to the non-Jews, to the "uncircumcised" as he puts it (see Gal. 2:7-8). But the novelty of Paul's mission is his insistence that converted pagans do not have to adopt a Jewish lifestyle in order to be Christian believers.
If the Cornelius story in Acts 10 is historically true, it was probably seen by the church leaders in Jerusalem as an exception to the rule. We find in Acts that Paul was charged (by detractors) with teaching that Christians born Jewish no longer have to keep the Jewish Law. It would seem that there is good reason to believe there is strong historical basis for this. Paul says: "I have become all things to all people that I might by all means save some" (1 Corinthians 9:22). In the passage this is taken from it is clear Paul set aside the kosher lifestyle while among pagans in order to convert them. In Galatians Paul accuses Peter of hypocrisy because while in Antioch he eats with converts from paganism until the arrival from Jerusalem of representatives of James. Then Peter and the others who were born Jewish reverted to their kosher exclusivism (see Galatians 2:11-14). (This James is not Zebedee but the James whom Paul refers to as "the Lord's brother" and who clearly preferred that all Christians follow the Jewish Law). There is no indication whether Peter accepted Paul rebuke at this time and upholds Paul's view. By inference Peter would have later fraternized with converts from paganism because he travels extensively in areas in which the majority of Christians were converts from paganism (see 1 Corinthians 1:12 & 9:5; the fact that Peter's name [Cephas] is mentioned in the same verse [Corinthians 1:12] as the other apostles who had influenced the Corinthian church seems to imply that Peter must have spent enough time in Corinth to garner a local following).
Paul seems to have had an easier time overcoming the exclusivistic tenets of his Jewish upbringing than did James (the Lord's brother). They were both Pharisees before becoming Christians. But James does not seem to have had any desire to break free from the Jewish lifestyle. Peter (it would appear) eventually does break free from the Jewish lifestyle).
What Ehrman says about the division of the letters attributed to Paul into the three groups (on page 182) is in line with modern scholarship. I personally believe such scholars tend to be unnecessarily skeptical about the letters placed in the category "Deutero-Pauline" meaning written by a disciple of Paul (see Box 12.1 on page 182). In my mind they could easily have been written by Paul. The letters written to Timothy and Titus are noticeably different from the other letters, and their authenticity has been questioned since the 1700's. However, many conservative scholars still consider them authentically Pauline, but no historical critical scholars believe Paul wrote them. As we will find out in subsequent weeks, some scholars even believe some of the undisputed letters may be composite letters, made up of pieces of various letters Paul wrote to a particular church.
On pages 184-186 Ehrman engages in an exercise popular among historical critical scholars which is demonstrating how the Paul in Acts teaches a Christianity very different from that in Paul's letters. I personally believe Ehrman over dramatizes the differences and discrepancies, but there is no doubt that the emphasis of Paul in Acts and Paul in his letters is quite different. What is really most noticeable to me is the lack of any reference in Acts to the major themes of Paul's letters, especially the doctrine of justification by faith, the expectation that Jesus may return in the near future, and also any discussion of the Jewish Law in light of the coming of Jesus.
The discussion of Paul's letters as "occasional" (see pages 186-188) is very instructive. Modern Christians often like to read the Bible to know what to believe and do not always take into account the circumstances in which a particular writing was originally composed. This makes a big difference in understanding the point of Paul's letters. With the possible exception of Romans, Paul's letters were written to address specific issues at specific churches. This is quite distinct from other New Testament letters like 1 Peter, James and 1 John, which are largely religious tracts, promoting certain teachings on various topics that apply equally well to all Christians. As we shall see, for the most part, Paul's letters are written to address specific problems that have arisen in a particular church.
Ehrman's discussion of Paul as a Pharisee (see pages 189-191) is very instructive on the Jewish background from which Paul emerges. Even though Paul says he counts it all rubbish (Philippians 3:8), the depth of his education in biblical studies and his ability to reason in a manner showing intellectual astuteness must certainly be a credit to his training as a Pharisee.
Paul's conversion has been a topic of intense debate in the last three decades of the 20th century. Ehrman points out that the once popular notion that Paul was a guilt ridden legalist before his conversion is clearly contradicted by what he says of his life as a Pharisee in Philippians 3:4-6 (see page 191). And even the common assumption, based on Acts 9, that this conversion was a single dramatic event taking place in a very short time span is questionable, because this interpretation may not be supported by the letters of Paul himself. In Galatians 1:17 we find there is a three year period after his conversion that Paul does not account for, but says he spent it in Arabia doing we know not what. This would seem to be prior to any effort on his part as an evangelist. This would also seem to contradict what we find in Acts 9:19-22, where Paul immediately becomes the evangelist. But Acts omits the three years before he goes to Jerusalem for the first time as a Christian (Acts 9:26). But it may also be that the author of Acts did not know of the three years between the time of his conversion and his next trip to Jerusalem.
The picture of Paul's conversion gets even more complicated when we consider how Paul worked out its implications for his own views on religion. It was not a case that he decided to become a Christian and some nice evangelist told him everything he needed to know about Christianity. Christian doctrine as we know it today had largely not yet been developed. Indeed, it is fair to say that Christian doctrine as we know it today is mightily dependent upon the writings of this Paul. So, Paul was working from his own religious experience and his understanding of Judaism, and in the process of trying to make sense of how this Jesus could be the Jewish messiah - Paul arrived at a means of interpreting the Jewish scriptures in light of the coming of Jesus and establishing the significance of Jesus' death and resurrection. It might seem obvious to us how this works, we read it in the New Testament. But before Paul there is little evidence of any sustained thought by anyone on the implications of Jesus as the Jewish messiah. Paul's letters may represent the first efforts of a Christian to try to think this through, and the only letter that can at all be said to represent a systematic consideration of this topic was one of his last letters, Romans. So, as Paul wrote his letters, Paul was theologizing as needed to address the questions and concerns that popped up along the way.
Ehrman's summary of the important points of Paul's re-evaluation of the Jewish faith based on the coming of Jesus as the Jewish messiah is very well written (see pages 193-196). What is provided in these pages is really good background information to have for reading Paul's letters, because without understanding Paul's post-conversion re-evaluation of Judaism, there is much in his letters that will be overlooked or seem puzzling. You may find it useful to return to these pages in the future when reading Paul's letters and the passages that touch on these topics.
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Ehrman, Chapter 11, Acts of the Apostles
The Acts of the Apostles is the second part of a two part work which began with the Gospel of Luke. Together the two books comprise 25% of the content of the New Testament, the largest contribution of any one author. The Apostle Paul wrote more individual writings that were included in the New Testament, but all together they are still less than 25% of the New Testament.
Without doubt, the book of Acts is composed along the lines of an ancient history, as Ehrman indicates. I have often wondered if the idea that it follows the model of pagan history writing really fits Acts, even though Ehrman seems sure that it does. In the ancient world, writing was often done according to appropriate models. In the case of Acts, it would seem to me that the most likely model would be similar writings about the history of God's dealings with humanity in the Jewish tradition, of which the books 1 & 2 Samuel and 1 & 2 Kings in the Old Testament would be the best examples. Luke 1:1-4 demonstrates that this author is capable of composing in literary Greek, but the remainder of Luke is written in rather simplified prose. Acts contains more occurrences of literary features than the Gospel, but the closest parallel to the style of writing we find in Acts is the Greek version of the Old Testament history books.
The book of Acts is the story of the beginning of the Christian movement as it emerged following Jesus' resurrection. Of course, any history tells its story from a particular slant and Acts is no different. Peter and Paul were not the only major players in early Christianity, but they get the primary attention in Acts. The fact that the New Testament also includes numerous letters by Paul, means that his theological viewpoint became the dominant perspective in the church in the next 100-200 years, and a history of the early church in which he is a major player would be appropriately included. We have no idea if there were other Gospels or other histories of Christianity besides the canonical four plus Acts written in the same time frame (some scholars believe the Gospel of Thomas is old enough to be counted as a competing option), but except for maybe Thomas, the canonical four plus Acts are the oldest surviving historical record we have of Jesus and the early church.
There may be dozens of significant Apostles that were active in early Christianity that we know nothing about. Indeed, we know by inference that in the early years the Jerusalem church played a major role in early Christianity. But that came to an end with the destruction of the temple and upheaval caused by the Jewish revolt against Rome, 66-70 CE. The church in Jerusalem ceased to have a major role in Christianity until almost 100 years later. By that point the church was a Greek speaking church and Aramaic speaking Christianity had ceased to exist (at least as a language used in worship), even in Jerusalem.
In the opening section of Acts, chapter 1 verses 7 & 8 present the theme of this book, spreading the message about Jesus first in Judea, then in Samaria and then to the ends of the earth (which in this case means Rome, as that is where the story concludes). The book of Acts is about the spread of Christianity in its early years, primarily as this occurred through the Apostles Peter and Paul. The opening pages show the initial growth of the church via the Apostles' preaching (Acts chap. 2) and the resistance they encountered (Acts chap. 5).
In Acts chap. 6 we see a tension that was indicative of the difficulties of a church growing rapidly and in ways the original members had not anticipated. The church was attracting numerous converts from Greek speaking Judaism (Hellenists) in addition to Aramaic speaking Judaism (Hebrews), and the coexistence was testy because of the language issue. But things only get more complicated as the message of Jesus spreads. With the persecution that arose after the death of Stephen (a Greek speaking Jewish Christian evangelist), some of the Greek speaking Jewish Christians get run out of town and preach in Samaria and make numerous converts there (see Acts chap. 8). But this seems questionable to the church leaders in Jerusalem(since Samaritans were despised by most Jews), so representatives from the Jerusalem church go to Samaria to validate the mission to the Samaritans. Here we have the first instance of Christianity stepping outside of Judaism since most Jews did not consider Samaritans to be Jews, even though the Samaritans believed their religion faithfully followed the Law of Moses.
Christianity in Acts then spreads next to non-Jews (pagans or Gentiles, take your pick as to what you wish to call non-Jews) when Peter is summoned to preach to a Roman army officer named Cornelius who is presented a someone very sympathetic to Judaism (Acts 10). Peter then is told to justify to the other Apostles in Jerusalem his reaching out to pagans with the Christian message(Acts 11), in particular Peter must justify the fact that he violated the kosher rules by eating with non-Jews. While Acts presents this story in retrospect as a matter on whether Peter was justified in breaking the kosher rules, this really whitewashes the major issue which is much more starkly stated in Galatians 2 and politely put in Acts 15, and that is what must have been a heated debate within Jerusalem Christianity whether or not to recognize as being Christian - believers who did not follow the Jewish lifestyle. At first, for pagans to become Jewish Christians, that would mean being circumcised and adopting Jewish kosher and Sabbath rules. It is never reported that Cornelius is told he must do so. Paul in Galatians 2 considers it a hard won battle that his Christian mission to pagans (without imposing the Jewish Law) was endorsed by the Apostles in Jerusalem (presumably referring to the event mentioned in Acts 15), but in Galatians that hard won concession seems in jeopardy many years later.
It is worth noting that at every important juncture in Acts when the Christian evangelistic mission expands into new areas, it seems necessary to get the approval of the Apostles in Jerusalem. But even if this is true for the author of Acts, at the time of writing it is also a bit of nostalgia, since the Jerusalem church had largely been dispersed by the Jewish-Roman war only a decade before. And it is also worth noting, that when Acts is written, most (maybe all) of the early Apostles have died, the Jerusalem church is small to non-existent and Aramaic speaking Jewish Christianity has largely disappeared. By the time Acts is written (about 80-85 CE), the majority of Christians are converts from paganism and the whole matter of whether or not Christians should keep the Jewish Law is a debate that is in the past. Paul's version of Christianity is the version endorsed by Acts, and that is the direction in which Christianity continued to move.
In Acts chap. 13, "Saul, also known as Paul" becomes the focal point of the narrative. Some people have supposed a connection between Paul's conversion and a name change. But this is most certainly (in my opinion) not the case. Paul was bilingual. He was equally capable of speaking in both Greek and Aramaic. When in Jerusalem (no doubt) he spoke in Aramaic. The best evidence for this is that Paul almost always refers to Peter as Cephas (pronounced Kay-phas, which in Aramaic means - Rocky, the same as Petros means in Greek) (see 1 Corinthians 3:22, 9:5, 15:5; Galatians 1:18, 2:9, 2:11, 2:14). The only place that Paul refers to Peter as Peter is Galatians 2:7-8 in which he refers to the agreement they had. Which means that whenever Paul spoke to Peter face to face he called him by his Aramaic nickname Cephas. So, if Paul uses both Peter's Greek name (Peter) and his Aramaic name (Cephas), which is obviously a matter of working within two different languages, it would seem that the presence in Acts of both a Hebrew (Saul) and a Greek (Paul) name for Paul would also be representative of the need to operate bilingually. What seems the strongest support for this interpretation of the Saul/Paul names is that Paul says he was born a Roman citizen (see Acts 22:28). If so, he would have had to be registered as a child with a Latin name (thus Paulus, which he writes in Greek as Paulos). The introduction of the name Paul in Acts 13:9 makes sense as it is at this point that Paul has begun his missionary work among the pagans (primarily) which will be the focus of the remainder of Acts.
Even though Paul has been commissioned as the Apostle to the nations (Gentiles, pagans, non-Jews, use whatever term you like) he still often begins his evangelistic work in a particular city by first preaching to whatever Jews might be there. That narrative piece (which may have historical merit to it) is employed as a narrative device in Acts to show over and over again that the attempt to proclaim the message of Jesus to Jews is met with rejection, but embraced by the pagans. The best example of this is found in Acts 13:46.
This brings me to a note about the speeches in Acts. One hundred years ago, even the historical skeptics believed the speeches/sermons in Acts represented excerpted examples of early Christian preaching (conservative scholars still believe this). Then a German scholar by the name of Martin Dibelius noticed that regardless of whether the speech was attributed to Peter or Paul it had very similar features and organization. This led Dibelius to postulate that it was the author of Acts who composed these speeches and that they did not represent historical remembrances. The best example of this is to compare Peter's Pentecost speech (Acts 2) and Paul's speech in Pisidian Antioch (Acts 13). Both are preached to predominantly Jewish audiences and there are four interesting similarities that led Dibelius (and most historical critical scholars after him) to conclude the author of Acts is the author of the speeches. First there is a reference to God's activity with his people of long ago (taken from scripture) (compare Acts 2:17-21 & Acts 13:17-22). Secondly there is a reference to the historical situation of Jesus and his rejection by the Jewish people (compare Acts 2:22-24 and Acts 13:23-31). Thirdly there are references to Jewish scripture that are interpreted as prophecy foretelling the coming of Jesus and the events that happened with him (compare Acts 2:25-28, 31, 34-35 and Acts 13:33-35). And fourthly, a call to conversion (compare Acts 2:38-38 and Acts 13:38-40). These similarities have lead most historical critical scholars to focus on these speeches as Lukan inventions and Ehrman is no different in this regard.
A note on the authorship of Acts. Until the 20th century, most scholars believed the author of Acts was a companion of the Apostle Paul. This is based on the so-called "we" passages in which the narrator uses the first person plural in his narration. This first plural narration begins at Acts 16:11 but ends abruptly at 16:16, only to be picked up again at 20:6. This might seem strange, but on closer examination it fits together because the first plural narration stops abruptly in Philippi and then picks up again in Philippi indicating that maybe this does represent an actual first person account of Paul's travels, as the first plural narration is mostly associated with sea travel to Philippi and then from Philippi to Jerusalem. Modern scholars debate whether this is an actual first person account (which I am inclined to accept) or an interesting narrative device contrived by the author. Traditionally the source has been attributed to the Luke mentioned in Colossians 4:14 and by inference to say that this Luke is the author of both the Gospel and Acts. Modern historical scholars do not believe there is any validity to this tradition. And if the "we" passages in Acts are an actual first person account, there is no way to determine who is the author of these passages from the information we have now. It would all be speculation.
Without doubt, the book of Acts is composed along the lines of an ancient history, as Ehrman indicates. I have often wondered if the idea that it follows the model of pagan history writing really fits Acts, even though Ehrman seems sure that it does. In the ancient world, writing was often done according to appropriate models. In the case of Acts, it would seem to me that the most likely model would be similar writings about the history of God's dealings with humanity in the Jewish tradition, of which the books 1 & 2 Samuel and 1 & 2 Kings in the Old Testament would be the best examples. Luke 1:1-4 demonstrates that this author is capable of composing in literary Greek, but the remainder of Luke is written in rather simplified prose. Acts contains more occurrences of literary features than the Gospel, but the closest parallel to the style of writing we find in Acts is the Greek version of the Old Testament history books.
The book of Acts is the story of the beginning of the Christian movement as it emerged following Jesus' resurrection. Of course, any history tells its story from a particular slant and Acts is no different. Peter and Paul were not the only major players in early Christianity, but they get the primary attention in Acts. The fact that the New Testament also includes numerous letters by Paul, means that his theological viewpoint became the dominant perspective in the church in the next 100-200 years, and a history of the early church in which he is a major player would be appropriately included. We have no idea if there were other Gospels or other histories of Christianity besides the canonical four plus Acts written in the same time frame (some scholars believe the Gospel of Thomas is old enough to be counted as a competing option), but except for maybe Thomas, the canonical four plus Acts are the oldest surviving historical record we have of Jesus and the early church.
There may be dozens of significant Apostles that were active in early Christianity that we know nothing about. Indeed, we know by inference that in the early years the Jerusalem church played a major role in early Christianity. But that came to an end with the destruction of the temple and upheaval caused by the Jewish revolt against Rome, 66-70 CE. The church in Jerusalem ceased to have a major role in Christianity until almost 100 years later. By that point the church was a Greek speaking church and Aramaic speaking Christianity had ceased to exist (at least as a language used in worship), even in Jerusalem.
In the opening section of Acts, chapter 1 verses 7 & 8 present the theme of this book, spreading the message about Jesus first in Judea, then in Samaria and then to the ends of the earth (which in this case means Rome, as that is where the story concludes). The book of Acts is about the spread of Christianity in its early years, primarily as this occurred through the Apostles Peter and Paul. The opening pages show the initial growth of the church via the Apostles' preaching (Acts chap. 2) and the resistance they encountered (Acts chap. 5).
In Acts chap. 6 we see a tension that was indicative of the difficulties of a church growing rapidly and in ways the original members had not anticipated. The church was attracting numerous converts from Greek speaking Judaism (Hellenists) in addition to Aramaic speaking Judaism (Hebrews), and the coexistence was testy because of the language issue. But things only get more complicated as the message of Jesus spreads. With the persecution that arose after the death of Stephen (a Greek speaking Jewish Christian evangelist), some of the Greek speaking Jewish Christians get run out of town and preach in Samaria and make numerous converts there (see Acts chap. 8). But this seems questionable to the church leaders in Jerusalem(since Samaritans were despised by most Jews), so representatives from the Jerusalem church go to Samaria to validate the mission to the Samaritans. Here we have the first instance of Christianity stepping outside of Judaism since most Jews did not consider Samaritans to be Jews, even though the Samaritans believed their religion faithfully followed the Law of Moses.
Christianity in Acts then spreads next to non-Jews (pagans or Gentiles, take your pick as to what you wish to call non-Jews) when Peter is summoned to preach to a Roman army officer named Cornelius who is presented a someone very sympathetic to Judaism (Acts 10). Peter then is told to justify to the other Apostles in Jerusalem his reaching out to pagans with the Christian message(Acts 11), in particular Peter must justify the fact that he violated the kosher rules by eating with non-Jews. While Acts presents this story in retrospect as a matter on whether Peter was justified in breaking the kosher rules, this really whitewashes the major issue which is much more starkly stated in Galatians 2 and politely put in Acts 15, and that is what must have been a heated debate within Jerusalem Christianity whether or not to recognize as being Christian - believers who did not follow the Jewish lifestyle. At first, for pagans to become Jewish Christians, that would mean being circumcised and adopting Jewish kosher and Sabbath rules. It is never reported that Cornelius is told he must do so. Paul in Galatians 2 considers it a hard won battle that his Christian mission to pagans (without imposing the Jewish Law) was endorsed by the Apostles in Jerusalem (presumably referring to the event mentioned in Acts 15), but in Galatians that hard won concession seems in jeopardy many years later.
It is worth noting that at every important juncture in Acts when the Christian evangelistic mission expands into new areas, it seems necessary to get the approval of the Apostles in Jerusalem. But even if this is true for the author of Acts, at the time of writing it is also a bit of nostalgia, since the Jerusalem church had largely been dispersed by the Jewish-Roman war only a decade before. And it is also worth noting, that when Acts is written, most (maybe all) of the early Apostles have died, the Jerusalem church is small to non-existent and Aramaic speaking Jewish Christianity has largely disappeared. By the time Acts is written (about 80-85 CE), the majority of Christians are converts from paganism and the whole matter of whether or not Christians should keep the Jewish Law is a debate that is in the past. Paul's version of Christianity is the version endorsed by Acts, and that is the direction in which Christianity continued to move.
In Acts chap. 13, "Saul, also known as Paul" becomes the focal point of the narrative. Some people have supposed a connection between Paul's conversion and a name change. But this is most certainly (in my opinion) not the case. Paul was bilingual. He was equally capable of speaking in both Greek and Aramaic. When in Jerusalem (no doubt) he spoke in Aramaic. The best evidence for this is that Paul almost always refers to Peter as Cephas (pronounced Kay-phas, which in Aramaic means - Rocky, the same as Petros means in Greek) (see 1 Corinthians 3:22, 9:5, 15:5; Galatians 1:18, 2:9, 2:11, 2:14). The only place that Paul refers to Peter as Peter is Galatians 2:7-8 in which he refers to the agreement they had. Which means that whenever Paul spoke to Peter face to face he called him by his Aramaic nickname Cephas. So, if Paul uses both Peter's Greek name (Peter) and his Aramaic name (Cephas), which is obviously a matter of working within two different languages, it would seem that the presence in Acts of both a Hebrew (Saul) and a Greek (Paul) name for Paul would also be representative of the need to operate bilingually. What seems the strongest support for this interpretation of the Saul/Paul names is that Paul says he was born a Roman citizen (see Acts 22:28). If so, he would have had to be registered as a child with a Latin name (thus Paulus, which he writes in Greek as Paulos). The introduction of the name Paul in Acts 13:9 makes sense as it is at this point that Paul has begun his missionary work among the pagans (primarily) which will be the focus of the remainder of Acts.
Even though Paul has been commissioned as the Apostle to the nations (Gentiles, pagans, non-Jews, use whatever term you like) he still often begins his evangelistic work in a particular city by first preaching to whatever Jews might be there. That narrative piece (which may have historical merit to it) is employed as a narrative device in Acts to show over and over again that the attempt to proclaim the message of Jesus to Jews is met with rejection, but embraced by the pagans. The best example of this is found in Acts 13:46.
This brings me to a note about the speeches in Acts. One hundred years ago, even the historical skeptics believed the speeches/sermons in Acts represented excerpted examples of early Christian preaching (conservative scholars still believe this). Then a German scholar by the name of Martin Dibelius noticed that regardless of whether the speech was attributed to Peter or Paul it had very similar features and organization. This led Dibelius to postulate that it was the author of Acts who composed these speeches and that they did not represent historical remembrances. The best example of this is to compare Peter's Pentecost speech (Acts 2) and Paul's speech in Pisidian Antioch (Acts 13). Both are preached to predominantly Jewish audiences and there are four interesting similarities that led Dibelius (and most historical critical scholars after him) to conclude the author of Acts is the author of the speeches. First there is a reference to God's activity with his people of long ago (taken from scripture) (compare Acts 2:17-21 & Acts 13:17-22). Secondly there is a reference to the historical situation of Jesus and his rejection by the Jewish people (compare Acts 2:22-24 and Acts 13:23-31). Thirdly there are references to Jewish scripture that are interpreted as prophecy foretelling the coming of Jesus and the events that happened with him (compare Acts 2:25-28, 31, 34-35 and Acts 13:33-35). And fourthly, a call to conversion (compare Acts 2:38-38 and Acts 13:38-40). These similarities have lead most historical critical scholars to focus on these speeches as Lukan inventions and Ehrman is no different in this regard.
A note on the authorship of Acts. Until the 20th century, most scholars believed the author of Acts was a companion of the Apostle Paul. This is based on the so-called "we" passages in which the narrator uses the first person plural in his narration. This first plural narration begins at Acts 16:11 but ends abruptly at 16:16, only to be picked up again at 20:6. This might seem strange, but on closer examination it fits together because the first plural narration stops abruptly in Philippi and then picks up again in Philippi indicating that maybe this does represent an actual first person account of Paul's travels, as the first plural narration is mostly associated with sea travel to Philippi and then from Philippi to Jerusalem. Modern scholars debate whether this is an actual first person account (which I am inclined to accept) or an interesting narrative device contrived by the author. Traditionally the source has been attributed to the Luke mentioned in Colossians 4:14 and by inference to say that this Luke is the author of both the Gospel and Acts. Modern historical scholars do not believe there is any validity to this tradition. And if the "we" passages in Acts are an actual first person account, there is no way to determine who is the author of these passages from the information we have now. It would all be speculation.
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Ehrman, Chapter 8, John
The Gospel of John is decidedly different from the other three, which we call the Synoptics. The Gospel of John is different both in terms of its content and the style of writing. As I have mentioned before, most historical critical scholars believe the Gospel of John has no historical value and only makes sense when seen as a theological treatise in narrative form. Indeed, concerns for doctrine can be seen right from the beginning with the introduction, which most scholars call the Prologue (1:1-18). This introduction sets the scene for the entire Gospel because it straightforwardly provides Jesus with pre-existent divine status before becoming human, but also affirms that Jesus is both divine and human (1:1 & 1:14) (Christian theology later used this passage as the basis of the doctrine that Jesus is both fully human and fully divine).
This represents a much more "developed" view of the divine nature of Jesus. The other Gospels may present Jesus as having divine status (some scholars question whether or not the authors of the Synoptic Gospels really believed Jesus was fully divine during his time on earth but maybe only became divine after his resurrection), but John's Gospel insists on an essentially divine nature to the person of Jesus. With this in mind, we will see over and over again how the stories of Jesus in this Gospel reinforce this understanding of the divine nature of Jesus.
An Aside on Ehrman's Method - Once again Ehrman offers us a particular nuance on his methodological approach to a Gospel, this time calling it "Literary-Historical Perspective." But his approach in analyzing John is really only different in degree from the others. Calling it "historical" is a misleading label, since we know Ehrman believes there is no historical value in the Gospel of John. It will definitely be a literary approach, but one that is attune to the theological nuances of the narrative. What we find in the Gospel of John is a narrative presentation of the divine nature of Jesus in human form. The purpose of the Gospel is blatantly evangelistic: "That you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah the Son of God . . . " (John 20:31). So the purpose of this Gospel is not so much to tell a story or provide a biography as to effect a conversion upon the reader/hearer.
There is also a curiosity about this Gospel concerning its style of Greek. It is extremely easy to read. The Gospel of John and the Letters of John are the only writings in the New Testament in which the word order would seem to us to follow what we would consider the sense order of the sentence. In most Greek writings, the word order is based on order of importance of thought, in which the most important clause might be placed first in the sentence, but contain neither the subject nor verb, but rather a subordinate clause containing the thought or idea the author wishes to emphasize. In Greek, the endings on the words tell you what is the subject, the object and the indirect object, and the verbs can be used in ways much more nuanced than is possible in English. But in John, the sentences read a lot like what what we would expect in English, which means that simplicity is emphasized for purposes of clarity and getting the basic point across to the reader.
Of particular interest in John is the emphasis on the miracles that Jesus performs, but they are always called "Signs." Which is a blatant way of saying that the miracle itself is not what is most important, but rather how that miracle points to a greater truth about Jesus. In most cases that "great truth" is in some way related to the divine nature of Jesus and his role as Messiah and the Divine Son of God.
The big scheme of the divine plan of salvation in John is that the the divine son comes down from heaven and returns to heaven. This is well illustrated in the subsequent story that follows the feeding of the 5,000 in chapter 6. Jesus uses that occasion to say that the true bread from heaven is not the manna that Moses provided, but Jesus himself (6:35-38 & 6:51). It is a little curious that Jesus refers to himself here as the "Son of Man" (John 6:27 & 6:62), and it is difficult to know exactly how John intends this title to be understood. The apocalyptic Jesus is not a major part of John's Gospel, perhaps just the opposite. John 5:25 makes it sound like the eternal life begins when a person believes in Jesus, and John 3:18 makes it sound like the divine judgment is pronounced when a person refuses to believe in Jesus. But John 5:26-29 refers to a future judgment for unbelievers, and John 6:39-40 speaks of a future resurrection for believers.
Many historical critical scholars believe the conflicting views on judgment and resurrection can be explained by saying that an original version of the Gospel did not have any future eschatology in it, but was added in a later addition. It is hard to know for sure. But many scholars are also quite sure that the Gospel of John as we have it now is not the only version that ever existed.
Ehrman's discussion on the "sources in John" (see pages 115-118) is a fine presentation of this theory. No historical critical scholar today questions that there are awkward transitions in the narrative in numerous places, that scholars like to refer to as "literary seams" (see page 116). However, there is another approach to this issue that postulates an evolutionary model for the development of this Gospel, on the supposition that the Gospel of John is the product of an evolving tradition about Jesus that developed over decades in a particular (otherwise unknown) faith community, in which the views about Jesus changed (developed, were refined) over time and additions were made to the Gospel that reflect those changes/development of belief and perspective. For instance, on page 117 at the bottom, Ehrman proposes that (within the very lengthy "Farewell Discourse" chapters 13-14 and 18 come from one source and chapters 15-17 come from another source. The developmental theory of the Gospel's composition (what I call an evolutionary model) says that chapters 15-17 represent a later addition to the Gospel. According to this theory, the reason for the literary awkwardness is that the tradition about Jesus in chapters 13-14 and 18 were already revered by the community and could not be altered without doing violence to the community's accepted story about Jesus. Therefore, chapters 15-17 are added as a lump of material rather than woven into the already existing text. If chapters 15-17 represent an addition to an existing Gospel tradition, were these chapters seen by their faith community as a "lost" piece of tradition? Were they a new revelation? We really do not know. However, there is some reason (in my personal opinion) for going with the latter (new revelation, given the emphasis on the Holy Spirit providing missing information in chapter 14:26 & 16:13).
If we look carefully at the Gospel of John, we find a very obvious peculiarity (in comparison with the synoptics), which is the long theological discourses that Jesus engages in. We find these in almost every chapter. Indeed, chapters 13, 14, 15, 16, & 17 are all part of one long extended speech which scholars refer to as the "Farewell Discourse" where Jesus is preparing his disciples for his departure and what to expect after that. The question is, what degree of historical truth was ascribed to these discourses by the faith community that produced this Gospel? Undoubtedly, they were embraced as theologically true. But if they cannot be traced back to the historical Jesus, where did they come from? Some New Testament scholars are of the opinion that for the people who produced John's Gospel these discourses arose from prophetic pronouncements in which "prophets" within that faith community claimed to speak for the risen Jesus and brought to their fellow Christians the truths that Jesus, now the Risen Jesus, was teaching them. The basis for this is taken from John 14:26, "But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything and remind you of all that I have said to you." It would seem that these Christians believed that the Risen Jesus still spoke to the faith community just as clearly as he spoke to his disciples during his time on earth.
Ehrman mentions the primary proponent of the evolutionary theory of the Gospel in his "Suggestions for Further Reading," which is Raymond Brown and his, The Community of the Beloved Disciple. Curiously, Ehrman does not even mention the primary proponent of the multiple sources theory (Robert Fortna). Perhaps that is because Ehrman wants to present it as his own approach.
Be sure to read over "Jesus and the 'I Am' Sayings" discussion in Box 8.5 (page 123). This is a feature that is unique to John but very clearly emphasizes the divine nature of Jesus. The frequency of these sayings in John makes it clear that this is a literary device intended to emphasize a theological point that is central to John's portrayal of Jesus in this Gospel.
There is one more peculiarity of the Gospel of John I wish to mention. The death of Jesus is never straightforwardly presented as an atoning sacrifice for sins. However, the combination of the statement of John the Baptist at the beginning, "Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world" (1:29) and the fact that in John Jesus is crucified at the same time as the Passover lambs are being slaughtered makes an implicit connection between the two. However, there is a nuance to this we easily overlook. When John the Baptist makes that pronouncement in 1:29, the word sin is in the singular. There is only one sin that Jesus comes to take away: the sin of unbelief. Just as the Gospel of Matthew is never about believing, the Gospel of John is only and always about believing. Which means that maybe for the author(s) of John's Gospel, Jesus' death on the cross might not be an atoning sacrifice after all? But the death of Jesus may be for the author of the Gospel of John a submission to the will and plan of the father in which Jesus knows that his glorification and exaltation are already assured. There is no wavering on the part of John's Jesus. In a strange way, his lifting up on the cross for crucifixion is also his exaltation because the one guarantees the other. This is quite clear in John 12:27-28 and 12:32, in which there is a direct connection between the plan of God, the crucifixion of Jesus and the glorious exaltation of Jesus after his resurrection. The "lifting up" always has a double meaning in John for both crucifixion and exaltation (so as in John 3:14-15).
Overall, Ehrman's chapter on the Gospel of John is an excellent presentation of the basic features of the Gospel of John in terms of the accepted interpretation of most historical critical scholars.
This represents a much more "developed" view of the divine nature of Jesus. The other Gospels may present Jesus as having divine status (some scholars question whether or not the authors of the Synoptic Gospels really believed Jesus was fully divine during his time on earth but maybe only became divine after his resurrection), but John's Gospel insists on an essentially divine nature to the person of Jesus. With this in mind, we will see over and over again how the stories of Jesus in this Gospel reinforce this understanding of the divine nature of Jesus.
An Aside on Ehrman's Method - Once again Ehrman offers us a particular nuance on his methodological approach to a Gospel, this time calling it "Literary-Historical Perspective." But his approach in analyzing John is really only different in degree from the others. Calling it "historical" is a misleading label, since we know Ehrman believes there is no historical value in the Gospel of John. It will definitely be a literary approach, but one that is attune to the theological nuances of the narrative. What we find in the Gospel of John is a narrative presentation of the divine nature of Jesus in human form. The purpose of the Gospel is blatantly evangelistic: "That you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah the Son of God . . . " (John 20:31). So the purpose of this Gospel is not so much to tell a story or provide a biography as to effect a conversion upon the reader/hearer.
There is also a curiosity about this Gospel concerning its style of Greek. It is extremely easy to read. The Gospel of John and the Letters of John are the only writings in the New Testament in which the word order would seem to us to follow what we would consider the sense order of the sentence. In most Greek writings, the word order is based on order of importance of thought, in which the most important clause might be placed first in the sentence, but contain neither the subject nor verb, but rather a subordinate clause containing the thought or idea the author wishes to emphasize. In Greek, the endings on the words tell you what is the subject, the object and the indirect object, and the verbs can be used in ways much more nuanced than is possible in English. But in John, the sentences read a lot like what what we would expect in English, which means that simplicity is emphasized for purposes of clarity and getting the basic point across to the reader.
Of particular interest in John is the emphasis on the miracles that Jesus performs, but they are always called "Signs." Which is a blatant way of saying that the miracle itself is not what is most important, but rather how that miracle points to a greater truth about Jesus. In most cases that "great truth" is in some way related to the divine nature of Jesus and his role as Messiah and the Divine Son of God.
The big scheme of the divine plan of salvation in John is that the the divine son comes down from heaven and returns to heaven. This is well illustrated in the subsequent story that follows the feeding of the 5,000 in chapter 6. Jesus uses that occasion to say that the true bread from heaven is not the manna that Moses provided, but Jesus himself (6:35-38 & 6:51). It is a little curious that Jesus refers to himself here as the "Son of Man" (John 6:27 & 6:62), and it is difficult to know exactly how John intends this title to be understood. The apocalyptic Jesus is not a major part of John's Gospel, perhaps just the opposite. John 5:25 makes it sound like the eternal life begins when a person believes in Jesus, and John 3:18 makes it sound like the divine judgment is pronounced when a person refuses to believe in Jesus. But John 5:26-29 refers to a future judgment for unbelievers, and John 6:39-40 speaks of a future resurrection for believers.
Many historical critical scholars believe the conflicting views on judgment and resurrection can be explained by saying that an original version of the Gospel did not have any future eschatology in it, but was added in a later addition. It is hard to know for sure. But many scholars are also quite sure that the Gospel of John as we have it now is not the only version that ever existed.
Ehrman's discussion on the "sources in John" (see pages 115-118) is a fine presentation of this theory. No historical critical scholar today questions that there are awkward transitions in the narrative in numerous places, that scholars like to refer to as "literary seams" (see page 116). However, there is another approach to this issue that postulates an evolutionary model for the development of this Gospel, on the supposition that the Gospel of John is the product of an evolving tradition about Jesus that developed over decades in a particular (otherwise unknown) faith community, in which the views about Jesus changed (developed, were refined) over time and additions were made to the Gospel that reflect those changes/development of belief and perspective. For instance, on page 117 at the bottom, Ehrman proposes that (within the very lengthy "Farewell Discourse" chapters 13-14 and 18 come from one source and chapters 15-17 come from another source. The developmental theory of the Gospel's composition (what I call an evolutionary model) says that chapters 15-17 represent a later addition to the Gospel. According to this theory, the reason for the literary awkwardness is that the tradition about Jesus in chapters 13-14 and 18 were already revered by the community and could not be altered without doing violence to the community's accepted story about Jesus. Therefore, chapters 15-17 are added as a lump of material rather than woven into the already existing text. If chapters 15-17 represent an addition to an existing Gospel tradition, were these chapters seen by their faith community as a "lost" piece of tradition? Were they a new revelation? We really do not know. However, there is some reason (in my personal opinion) for going with the latter (new revelation, given the emphasis on the Holy Spirit providing missing information in chapter 14:26 & 16:13).
If we look carefully at the Gospel of John, we find a very obvious peculiarity (in comparison with the synoptics), which is the long theological discourses that Jesus engages in. We find these in almost every chapter. Indeed, chapters 13, 14, 15, 16, & 17 are all part of one long extended speech which scholars refer to as the "Farewell Discourse" where Jesus is preparing his disciples for his departure and what to expect after that. The question is, what degree of historical truth was ascribed to these discourses by the faith community that produced this Gospel? Undoubtedly, they were embraced as theologically true. But if they cannot be traced back to the historical Jesus, where did they come from? Some New Testament scholars are of the opinion that for the people who produced John's Gospel these discourses arose from prophetic pronouncements in which "prophets" within that faith community claimed to speak for the risen Jesus and brought to their fellow Christians the truths that Jesus, now the Risen Jesus, was teaching them. The basis for this is taken from John 14:26, "But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything and remind you of all that I have said to you." It would seem that these Christians believed that the Risen Jesus still spoke to the faith community just as clearly as he spoke to his disciples during his time on earth.
Ehrman mentions the primary proponent of the evolutionary theory of the Gospel in his "Suggestions for Further Reading," which is Raymond Brown and his, The Community of the Beloved Disciple. Curiously, Ehrman does not even mention the primary proponent of the multiple sources theory (Robert Fortna). Perhaps that is because Ehrman wants to present it as his own approach.
Be sure to read over "Jesus and the 'I Am' Sayings" discussion in Box 8.5 (page 123). This is a feature that is unique to John but very clearly emphasizes the divine nature of Jesus. The frequency of these sayings in John makes it clear that this is a literary device intended to emphasize a theological point that is central to John's portrayal of Jesus in this Gospel.
There is one more peculiarity of the Gospel of John I wish to mention. The death of Jesus is never straightforwardly presented as an atoning sacrifice for sins. However, the combination of the statement of John the Baptist at the beginning, "Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world" (1:29) and the fact that in John Jesus is crucified at the same time as the Passover lambs are being slaughtered makes an implicit connection between the two. However, there is a nuance to this we easily overlook. When John the Baptist makes that pronouncement in 1:29, the word sin is in the singular. There is only one sin that Jesus comes to take away: the sin of unbelief. Just as the Gospel of Matthew is never about believing, the Gospel of John is only and always about believing. Which means that maybe for the author(s) of John's Gospel, Jesus' death on the cross might not be an atoning sacrifice after all? But the death of Jesus may be for the author of the Gospel of John a submission to the will and plan of the father in which Jesus knows that his glorification and exaltation are already assured. There is no wavering on the part of John's Jesus. In a strange way, his lifting up on the cross for crucifixion is also his exaltation because the one guarantees the other. This is quite clear in John 12:27-28 and 12:32, in which there is a direct connection between the plan of God, the crucifixion of Jesus and the glorious exaltation of Jesus after his resurrection. The "lifting up" always has a double meaning in John for both crucifixion and exaltation (so as in John 3:14-15).
Overall, Ehrman's chapter on the Gospel of John is an excellent presentation of the basic features of the Gospel of John in terms of the accepted interpretation of most historical critical scholars.
Ehrman, Chapter 7, Luke
The Gospel of Luke is unique in the sense that it does not stand alone but in tandem with the Acts of the Apostles. Both books were written by the same author, and together they comprise 25% of the words in the New Testament, far more than that written by any other author of the New Testament. This connection between Luke and Acts becomes obvious by comparing the introductions to both books, as they were written for a certain Theophilus (means 'friend of God'). Scholars debate whether this might have been an actual person or simply a generic address to the intended readership. It could have been to an individual interested in knowing more about the Christian faith, since sometimes a wealthy individual might commission the writing of a book on a topic he/she wished to learn more about. Another interesting feature of Luke's Gospel is that the introduction (Luke 1:1-4) is written in a polished literary style (you cannot tell it from an English translation), whereas the rest of the Gospel was written in a style reminiscent of the narrative portions of the Greek Old Testament, which is also very much like what is found in Matthew and Mark.
When Ehrman speaks of his "comparative method" he is really not doing anything differently from what he did in his discussion of Mark and Matthew. The differences in approach are much less (in my opinion) than Ehrman thinks he is doing, and more a matter of difference in emphasis than any real shift in method. In all cases Ehrman is making use of a style of literary analysis developed by New Testament scholars over the last 35 years in which the scholar is interested in the literary themes in the Gospel as well as the theological interests of the Gospel's author in which it is typical to look at each Gospel separately and in comparison with each other. While most scholars like to say they are evaluating the merits of each individual Gospel, at the same time it is often helpful to compare Gospels and see what an author chooses to put in or leave out, and how they describe the same event in different ways.
The introduction to Luke's Gospel indicates that the author clearly sees himself functioning in the mode of a historian (according to the norms of ancient historiography, which were not as rigorous as what we expect today). This is evident in his mention of having eye-witness accounts that are used in the composition of the Gospel, as well as believing his work is superior to all that was written before on that topic. Now it is hard to know if this comment is intended to indicate the quality of his sources or (as I think) to assure the person who had commissioned the work that his money is buying the best work on the topic.
Most historical critical scholars treat the first two chapters of the Gospel of Luke as containing mostly legendary material, if it was not created by Luke himself based on Old Testament patterns (compare Mary's song in 1:46-55 with Hannah's song in 1 Samuel 2:1-10). Regarding Luke's genealogy the key feature is that it goes back to Adam, when compared to Matthew which traces Joseph's lineage back to Abraham, modern scholars have long held a consensus that this feature in Luke is pointing toward Jesus as the savior of all humanity, not simply the Jewish savior. Of course, this is especially evident when the second volume (Acts) is taken into consideration. Ehrman does a good job of explaining this on page 100.
Beginning on page 101 Ehrman discusses what he considers to be the overarching theme of the presentation of Jesus in Luke: Jesus the rejected prophet. This theory for interpreting Jesus in Luke has been around for over 20 years, and obviously Ehrman finds it to be most convincing. In Luke, Jesus as the Jewish Messiah does not seem to be important, and the Son of God title does not seem to get much emphasis. As Ehrman points out, Luke portrays Jesus as God's spokesman right from the beginning in Luke 4, and when Jesus gives examples to back up his expectation of rejection ("No prophet is accepted in his hometown," 4:24), he mentions two prophets held in high esteem, Elijah and Elisha (4:25-28). The townspeople, feeling they have been disrespected by their native son, oblige his expectation of rejection by trying to throw him off a precipice at the edge of town (4:29).
Part of the background to this approach to Jesus as a rejected prophet is the parallel with the legends about the Old Testament prophets, that they came to an untimely end, as referred to in Luke 11:49-52 and 13:34-35 ("the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it"). Granted that Matthew also contains these passages. However, when seen in light of the mention of Jesus suffering the same fate as the prophets later in the Gospel at the time he rides to Jerusalem, it becomes clear that the rejection of Jesus is central to Luke's portrayal of Jesus. The theme of rejection of the King appears in the parable of the Pounds(19:14) and in the lament over Jerusalem (19:41-44), which implies that if Jesus had not been rejected the city would not have been destroyed by the Romans.
Another telling feature in Luke's portrayal of Jesus' death are the words spoken by the centurion at the foot of the cross. It Mark he says "Truly this man was God's Son." But in Luke he says, "Certainly this man was innocent" (see Ehrman, page 105, col. 2). As Ehrman states, this alteration brings into question whether or not Luke understood Jesus' death to be an atoning sacrifice (whereas Mark certainly interpreted Jesus' death as an atonement, see Mark 10:45).
Another interesting feature in Luke's crucifixion scene is the statement to one of the two thieves, "Today you will be with me in Paradise" (23:43). While Ehrman does not spend much time talking about what I believe is the dominant theme in the message of Jesus in Luke's Gospel, it comes out clearly here: God's forgiving love for sinful humanity. It is not without reason that the parable of the Prodigal Son is placed in the center of the Gospel 15:11-32); it is the centerpiece of Luke's portrayal of Jesus as the messenger of the God's forgiving love, both in word and deed.
New Testament scholar E.P. Sanders even goes so far as to say that repentance is a theme particular to Luke, as references to human repentance in connection with divine forgiveness occur frequently in Luke and Acts, but mention of repentance occurs rarely elsewhere in the New Testament. I had never given this much thought before reading Sanders on the topic, but he does have a point. Even though repentance is a central doctrine in most Christian theologies, the term and the action of repentance occurs rarely in the New Testament outside of Luke and Acts.
In the 1970's much was written about the social concerns of Jesus in Luke's Gospel, and these concerns certainly come to the fore in the ministry and message of Jesus in Luke. This theme is much more obvious in Luke than in the other Gospels, in large part because that is the main point of the passage from Isaiah from which Jesus reads while in the Nazareth synagogue in Luke 4 (4:18-19). This makes it clear that Luke wants to emphasize that aspect of Jesus' message. Ehrman mentions this emphasis in a section on this topic (page 108, col 2). But Ehrman has (in my opinion) only scratched the surface of what can be said on this topic. In particular, many of the parables of Jesus found only in Luke have as their central theme the use and abuse of money and possessions and putting one's possessions above the needs of others, whereas Jesus' message proclaims that the love of God is best demonstrated in showing loving concern to others, and that a concern for possessions will hinder this. For instance, there are the parable of the Good Samaritan (10:29-37), the parable of the Rich Fool (12:13-21), the parable of the Great Dinner (14:7-24), and of special note, the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus (16:19-31). Each of these parables carries a warning that one's possessions can be detrimental to one's spiritual well being. The implied message is that being generous with one's money and possessions towards others in need is the proper attitude for a follower of Jesus to exhibit.
When Ehrman speaks of his "comparative method" he is really not doing anything differently from what he did in his discussion of Mark and Matthew. The differences in approach are much less (in my opinion) than Ehrman thinks he is doing, and more a matter of difference in emphasis than any real shift in method. In all cases Ehrman is making use of a style of literary analysis developed by New Testament scholars over the last 35 years in which the scholar is interested in the literary themes in the Gospel as well as the theological interests of the Gospel's author in which it is typical to look at each Gospel separately and in comparison with each other. While most scholars like to say they are evaluating the merits of each individual Gospel, at the same time it is often helpful to compare Gospels and see what an author chooses to put in or leave out, and how they describe the same event in different ways.
The introduction to Luke's Gospel indicates that the author clearly sees himself functioning in the mode of a historian (according to the norms of ancient historiography, which were not as rigorous as what we expect today). This is evident in his mention of having eye-witness accounts that are used in the composition of the Gospel, as well as believing his work is superior to all that was written before on that topic. Now it is hard to know if this comment is intended to indicate the quality of his sources or (as I think) to assure the person who had commissioned the work that his money is buying the best work on the topic.
Most historical critical scholars treat the first two chapters of the Gospel of Luke as containing mostly legendary material, if it was not created by Luke himself based on Old Testament patterns (compare Mary's song in 1:46-55 with Hannah's song in 1 Samuel 2:1-10). Regarding Luke's genealogy the key feature is that it goes back to Adam, when compared to Matthew which traces Joseph's lineage back to Abraham, modern scholars have long held a consensus that this feature in Luke is pointing toward Jesus as the savior of all humanity, not simply the Jewish savior. Of course, this is especially evident when the second volume (Acts) is taken into consideration. Ehrman does a good job of explaining this on page 100.
Beginning on page 101 Ehrman discusses what he considers to be the overarching theme of the presentation of Jesus in Luke: Jesus the rejected prophet. This theory for interpreting Jesus in Luke has been around for over 20 years, and obviously Ehrman finds it to be most convincing. In Luke, Jesus as the Jewish Messiah does not seem to be important, and the Son of God title does not seem to get much emphasis. As Ehrman points out, Luke portrays Jesus as God's spokesman right from the beginning in Luke 4, and when Jesus gives examples to back up his expectation of rejection ("No prophet is accepted in his hometown," 4:24), he mentions two prophets held in high esteem, Elijah and Elisha (4:25-28). The townspeople, feeling they have been disrespected by their native son, oblige his expectation of rejection by trying to throw him off a precipice at the edge of town (4:29).
Part of the background to this approach to Jesus as a rejected prophet is the parallel with the legends about the Old Testament prophets, that they came to an untimely end, as referred to in Luke 11:49-52 and 13:34-35 ("the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it"). Granted that Matthew also contains these passages. However, when seen in light of the mention of Jesus suffering the same fate as the prophets later in the Gospel at the time he rides to Jerusalem, it becomes clear that the rejection of Jesus is central to Luke's portrayal of Jesus. The theme of rejection of the King appears in the parable of the Pounds(19:14) and in the lament over Jerusalem (19:41-44), which implies that if Jesus had not been rejected the city would not have been destroyed by the Romans.
Another telling feature in Luke's portrayal of Jesus' death are the words spoken by the centurion at the foot of the cross. It Mark he says "Truly this man was God's Son." But in Luke he says, "Certainly this man was innocent" (see Ehrman, page 105, col. 2). As Ehrman states, this alteration brings into question whether or not Luke understood Jesus' death to be an atoning sacrifice (whereas Mark certainly interpreted Jesus' death as an atonement, see Mark 10:45).
Another interesting feature in Luke's crucifixion scene is the statement to one of the two thieves, "Today you will be with me in Paradise" (23:43). While Ehrman does not spend much time talking about what I believe is the dominant theme in the message of Jesus in Luke's Gospel, it comes out clearly here: God's forgiving love for sinful humanity. It is not without reason that the parable of the Prodigal Son is placed in the center of the Gospel 15:11-32); it is the centerpiece of Luke's portrayal of Jesus as the messenger of the God's forgiving love, both in word and deed.
New Testament scholar E.P. Sanders even goes so far as to say that repentance is a theme particular to Luke, as references to human repentance in connection with divine forgiveness occur frequently in Luke and Acts, but mention of repentance occurs rarely elsewhere in the New Testament. I had never given this much thought before reading Sanders on the topic, but he does have a point. Even though repentance is a central doctrine in most Christian theologies, the term and the action of repentance occurs rarely in the New Testament outside of Luke and Acts.
In the 1970's much was written about the social concerns of Jesus in Luke's Gospel, and these concerns certainly come to the fore in the ministry and message of Jesus in Luke. This theme is much more obvious in Luke than in the other Gospels, in large part because that is the main point of the passage from Isaiah from which Jesus reads while in the Nazareth synagogue in Luke 4 (4:18-19). This makes it clear that Luke wants to emphasize that aspect of Jesus' message. Ehrman mentions this emphasis in a section on this topic (page 108, col 2). But Ehrman has (in my opinion) only scratched the surface of what can be said on this topic. In particular, many of the parables of Jesus found only in Luke have as their central theme the use and abuse of money and possessions and putting one's possessions above the needs of others, whereas Jesus' message proclaims that the love of God is best demonstrated in showing loving concern to others, and that a concern for possessions will hinder this. For instance, there are the parable of the Good Samaritan (10:29-37), the parable of the Rich Fool (12:13-21), the parable of the Great Dinner (14:7-24), and of special note, the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus (16:19-31). Each of these parables carries a warning that one's possessions can be detrimental to one's spiritual well being. The implied message is that being generous with one's money and possessions towards others in need is the proper attitude for a follower of Jesus to exhibit.
Ehrman, Chapter 6, Matthew
In this chapter, Ehrman addresses the decidedly Jewish character of Matthew's portrayal of Jesus. Now this is in spite of the fact that in Matthew Jesus heaps scorn upon the Pharisees in chapter 23. Even though it is clear that Matthew sees Jesus as the universal savior of the world, he is still the Jewish Messiah in fulfilling that role.
While each of the Gospels recognizes Jesus as the Jewish Messiah, they do so in very different ways. In Matthew, it is clear that one of the main themes is: Jesus is greater than Moses (the Gospel of John makes the same claim but in a much different way). The mention of Jesus' sojourn in Egypt in Matthew 2 makes a parallel to Moses (although the quotation of Hosea 11:1 in Matthew 2:15, "Out of Egypt I have called my son," originally referred to Israel as a people not just Moses or Jesus). The Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) is clearly the giving of a new law, that seems to implicitly supersede that of Moses (both the "antitheses" in Matthew 5:21-48 and setting of a "mountain" all point to the idea that Jesus is a greater law giver than Moses (the setting is actually a hillside by the sea of Galilee) . Even though Jesus does say that he did Not come to abolish the law (Matthew 5:17), the fact that he has come to "fulfill" the law (Matthew 5:17) means that what he offers supersedes what Moses presented to the people Israel. The story of the transfiguration (present in all three synoptic Gospels) is a blatant statement that someone greater than Moses or Elijah (the law-giver and the great prophet) has arrived (Matthew 17:1-8).
Do not put too much stock in the distinction that Ehrman makes between a "literary-historical" analysis of Mark and a "redaction criticism" analysis of Matthew. The way that Ehrman approaches both Gospels is similar; in discussing both Matthew and Mark Ehrman tends toward the use of a literary analysis that has been adapted for Biblical studies and arose out of the analytical approach to biblical criticism that was originally coined by German scholars as editorial criticism, but since the German word for editor is Redactor, in English it came to be called redaction criticism. But when "redaction criticism" was first developed by historical critical scholars in the 1960's, they were simply taking a Gospel Parallels book and (assuming that Matthew and Luke both used Mark), look to see what changes Matthew and Luke made to the parallel passages in Mark, thereby seeking "theological tendencies" in the author's alterations to the text. But when Ehrman looks at the beginning of Matthew in comparison to Mark, he is not examining parallel texts, but rather what literary devices the author has employed in introducing the topic (Jesus), thus technically it is not redaction criticism the way it was originally conceived. But Ehrman's approach does retain the interest in the author's theological biases.
As Ehrman goes to great pains to point out, the groups of 14s in the genealogy betray a desire to make a connection between Jesus and the greats of the history of the people Israel with the symbolic value of well rounded perfection, both in terms of the lineage and the timing; that is, that it happened in that particular generation (remember that 7 is the number of completeness in the Bible). How historically accurate Matthew's genealogy is - is open for debate; but that is of no interest to Ehrman as he is much more interested in the literary function of this genealogy within Matthew's Gospel.
Concerning the birth of Jesus, Ehrman highlights a feature of Matthew's Gospel that occurs infrequently in the other Gospels, the "fulfillment citation." Matthew's Gospel is full of lines where an event in the life of Jesus is portrayed as fulfilling a specific prophecy in the Jewish scriptures. This is especially true in Matthew's birth narrative. As Ehrman states, there are five such places where a passage of scripture is quoted to indicated that it has been fulfilled in the coming of Jesus. That has the value of emphasizing the fact that Jesus is very much fulfillment of the expectation of the Jewish Messiah.
What Ehrman presents in his discussion on Jesus and the law is mostly the standard interpretation offered by historical critical scholars. Ehrman does not offer any personal theories or unusual interpretations of the material. One thing that Ehrman does not mention that is an often overlooked peculiarity of Matthew is that what a person believes does not seems to have any bearing on that person's salvation or relationship with Jesus as far as Matthew's Gospel is concerned. When Jesus commissions his disciples at the end of the Gospel, nothing is mentioned about what converts are supposed to believe. Rather the command is to go out "teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you" (Matthew 28:20). The teaching of Jesus in this Gospel is all about what he expects his followers to "do." This becomes especially clear at the end of the Sermon on the Mount. In 7:24 only those who hear the words of Jesus and put them into practice can be considered wise. In 7:21 Jesus makes the same point when he states: "Not everyone who says to me 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven." Nothing about believing here; it is all about doing.
If this would seem to imply a path to heaven similar to the "work righteousness" that the Apostle Paul denounces, Matthew scholar Ulrich Luz (The Theology of the Gospel of Matthew, Cambridge University Press, 1995), says Matthew's approach may look like "works righteousness" but it is not, for two reasons. First the emphasis on "doing" the will of God must be tempered with the acknowledgment that Matthew's Jesus says often that gaining heaven is a "reward" which implies that it cannot be earned (see Matthew 5:12; 5:46; 6:1-16; 20:1-16). Likewise, it the "doing" of the will of God cannot be taken as the sole determiner of gaining heaven because forgiveness plays a major role in the belief structure of Matthew's Gospel (see 6:12; 6:14-15; 18:23-35). These verses make clear that God's forgiveness is necessary for gaining heaven, but that divine forgiveness is still dependent on the human willingness to forgive others. So Matthew's view of what it takes to gain heaven is not a pure "works righteousness" in the sense of earning heaven. But the heavy emphasis on "doing" the will of God (including the Sermon on the Mount as well as the Jewish moral law as presented in the Jewish scriptures), gaining heaven really hinges on whether or not the human can forgive others in the same way that she/he has been forgiven by God.
Luz notes that for the Apostle Paul, Judaism and Christianity are two fundamentally opposing principles. Where as for Matthew, "He sees no rupture between Judaism and Christianity. On the contrary, the Jesus who fulfilled the Law and the prophets represents the true Israel" (Luz, page 148). The only rift is between Jesus and the leaders of Israel (and their followers) who do not do as Jesus teaches. Those who do not follow the teachings of Jesus "exclude themselves from God by virtue of their deeds" (Luz, page 149). For the Apostle Paul, righteousness refers to the action of God in justifying humanity through the death of Jesus. Whereas for Matthew, " 'righteousness' is that which God in his love demands of men and women. 'Righteousness' [in Matthew] means the human path which Jesus' disciples must travel when they allow themselves to be taught, led and accompanied by the Immanuel" (Luz, page 149).
Now back to Luz and Jesus and the Law in Matthew. Luz sums up his interpretation of how the law and the Sermon on the Mount fit in with Christian salvation with: "Living in accordance with the Sermon on the Mount is therefore a path to perfection. One should travel this path as far as possible. On the Day of Judgement the Son of Man will show just where the minimum righteousness lies that is necessary for entrance into the kingdom of heaven" (Luz, page 56).
NOTE: If Luz is correct in his assessment of Matthew's Jesus on role of human deeds and human righteousness for personal salvation, though tempered with the mercy of God on the day of judgment, then the model for human salvation that Matthew puts in Jesus' mouth is very similar to that of the Pharisees of Jesus' time. Of course, Matthew adds the very dramatic qualification that one must accept Jesus as the Jewish Messiah and lord over all humanity, which the Pharisees refused to do.
In another place Luz states: "Our personal relation to the heavenly Lord Jesus . . . none of this will be decisive on the Day of Judgment, only our works" (Luz, page 58). "Matthew rehearses with his readers the absolute sovereignty of the Judge of the world [Jesus], against whom there are no demands that can possibly be raised, but only his assessment of human deeds" (Luz, page 61). Jesus "is now God's Immanuel and the traveling companion of the community [of Christians], the same who is now proclaiming God's commandments to the community , and who is leading them in prayer to their Father in heaven" (Luz, page 61).
All ideas expressed above on the role of the commandments in Matthew and the accompanying quotations are taken from: The Theology of the Gospel of Matthew, by Ulrich Luz, Cambridge University Press, 1995.
One final note about Ehrman and the Gospel of Matthew. For some inexplicable reason, Ehrman did not emphasize the fact that the Day of Judgment when Jesus will return as the divine judge (the Son of Man) is a really big deal in Matthew as should be obvious to even a cursory reading of Matthew's Gospel. Mention of this upcoming event appears over and over as a warning to the reader to shape up and live right. But for some reason, Ehrman completely ignores this.
While each of the Gospels recognizes Jesus as the Jewish Messiah, they do so in very different ways. In Matthew, it is clear that one of the main themes is: Jesus is greater than Moses (the Gospel of John makes the same claim but in a much different way). The mention of Jesus' sojourn in Egypt in Matthew 2 makes a parallel to Moses (although the quotation of Hosea 11:1 in Matthew 2:15, "Out of Egypt I have called my son," originally referred to Israel as a people not just Moses or Jesus). The Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) is clearly the giving of a new law, that seems to implicitly supersede that of Moses (both the "antitheses" in Matthew 5:21-48 and setting of a "mountain" all point to the idea that Jesus is a greater law giver than Moses (the setting is actually a hillside by the sea of Galilee) . Even though Jesus does say that he did Not come to abolish the law (Matthew 5:17), the fact that he has come to "fulfill" the law (Matthew 5:17) means that what he offers supersedes what Moses presented to the people Israel. The story of the transfiguration (present in all three synoptic Gospels) is a blatant statement that someone greater than Moses or Elijah (the law-giver and the great prophet) has arrived (Matthew 17:1-8).
Do not put too much stock in the distinction that Ehrman makes between a "literary-historical" analysis of Mark and a "redaction criticism" analysis of Matthew. The way that Ehrman approaches both Gospels is similar; in discussing both Matthew and Mark Ehrman tends toward the use of a literary analysis that has been adapted for Biblical studies and arose out of the analytical approach to biblical criticism that was originally coined by German scholars as editorial criticism, but since the German word for editor is Redactor, in English it came to be called redaction criticism. But when "redaction criticism" was first developed by historical critical scholars in the 1960's, they were simply taking a Gospel Parallels book and (assuming that Matthew and Luke both used Mark), look to see what changes Matthew and Luke made to the parallel passages in Mark, thereby seeking "theological tendencies" in the author's alterations to the text. But when Ehrman looks at the beginning of Matthew in comparison to Mark, he is not examining parallel texts, but rather what literary devices the author has employed in introducing the topic (Jesus), thus technically it is not redaction criticism the way it was originally conceived. But Ehrman's approach does retain the interest in the author's theological biases.
As Ehrman goes to great pains to point out, the groups of 14s in the genealogy betray a desire to make a connection between Jesus and the greats of the history of the people Israel with the symbolic value of well rounded perfection, both in terms of the lineage and the timing; that is, that it happened in that particular generation (remember that 7 is the number of completeness in the Bible). How historically accurate Matthew's genealogy is - is open for debate; but that is of no interest to Ehrman as he is much more interested in the literary function of this genealogy within Matthew's Gospel.
Concerning the birth of Jesus, Ehrman highlights a feature of Matthew's Gospel that occurs infrequently in the other Gospels, the "fulfillment citation." Matthew's Gospel is full of lines where an event in the life of Jesus is portrayed as fulfilling a specific prophecy in the Jewish scriptures. This is especially true in Matthew's birth narrative. As Ehrman states, there are five such places where a passage of scripture is quoted to indicated that it has been fulfilled in the coming of Jesus. That has the value of emphasizing the fact that Jesus is very much fulfillment of the expectation of the Jewish Messiah.
What Ehrman presents in his discussion on Jesus and the law is mostly the standard interpretation offered by historical critical scholars. Ehrman does not offer any personal theories or unusual interpretations of the material. One thing that Ehrman does not mention that is an often overlooked peculiarity of Matthew is that what a person believes does not seems to have any bearing on that person's salvation or relationship with Jesus as far as Matthew's Gospel is concerned. When Jesus commissions his disciples at the end of the Gospel, nothing is mentioned about what converts are supposed to believe. Rather the command is to go out "teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you" (Matthew 28:20). The teaching of Jesus in this Gospel is all about what he expects his followers to "do." This becomes especially clear at the end of the Sermon on the Mount. In 7:24 only those who hear the words of Jesus and put them into practice can be considered wise. In 7:21 Jesus makes the same point when he states: "Not everyone who says to me 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven." Nothing about believing here; it is all about doing.
If this would seem to imply a path to heaven similar to the "work righteousness" that the Apostle Paul denounces, Matthew scholar Ulrich Luz (The Theology of the Gospel of Matthew, Cambridge University Press, 1995), says Matthew's approach may look like "works righteousness" but it is not, for two reasons. First the emphasis on "doing" the will of God must be tempered with the acknowledgment that Matthew's Jesus says often that gaining heaven is a "reward" which implies that it cannot be earned (see Matthew 5:12; 5:46; 6:1-16; 20:1-16). Likewise, it the "doing" of the will of God cannot be taken as the sole determiner of gaining heaven because forgiveness plays a major role in the belief structure of Matthew's Gospel (see 6:12; 6:14-15; 18:23-35). These verses make clear that God's forgiveness is necessary for gaining heaven, but that divine forgiveness is still dependent on the human willingness to forgive others. So Matthew's view of what it takes to gain heaven is not a pure "works righteousness" in the sense of earning heaven. But the heavy emphasis on "doing" the will of God (including the Sermon on the Mount as well as the Jewish moral law as presented in the Jewish scriptures), gaining heaven really hinges on whether or not the human can forgive others in the same way that she/he has been forgiven by God.
Luz notes that for the Apostle Paul, Judaism and Christianity are two fundamentally opposing principles. Where as for Matthew, "He sees no rupture between Judaism and Christianity. On the contrary, the Jesus who fulfilled the Law and the prophets represents the true Israel" (Luz, page 148). The only rift is between Jesus and the leaders of Israel (and their followers) who do not do as Jesus teaches. Those who do not follow the teachings of Jesus "exclude themselves from God by virtue of their deeds" (Luz, page 149). For the Apostle Paul, righteousness refers to the action of God in justifying humanity through the death of Jesus. Whereas for Matthew, " 'righteousness' is that which God in his love demands of men and women. 'Righteousness' [in Matthew] means the human path which Jesus' disciples must travel when they allow themselves to be taught, led and accompanied by the Immanuel" (Luz, page 149).
Now back to Luz and Jesus and the Law in Matthew. Luz sums up his interpretation of how the law and the Sermon on the Mount fit in with Christian salvation with: "Living in accordance with the Sermon on the Mount is therefore a path to perfection. One should travel this path as far as possible. On the Day of Judgement the Son of Man will show just where the minimum righteousness lies that is necessary for entrance into the kingdom of heaven" (Luz, page 56).
NOTE: If Luz is correct in his assessment of Matthew's Jesus on role of human deeds and human righteousness for personal salvation, though tempered with the mercy of God on the day of judgment, then the model for human salvation that Matthew puts in Jesus' mouth is very similar to that of the Pharisees of Jesus' time. Of course, Matthew adds the very dramatic qualification that one must accept Jesus as the Jewish Messiah and lord over all humanity, which the Pharisees refused to do.
In another place Luz states: "Our personal relation to the heavenly Lord Jesus . . . none of this will be decisive on the Day of Judgment, only our works" (Luz, page 58). "Matthew rehearses with his readers the absolute sovereignty of the Judge of the world [Jesus], against whom there are no demands that can possibly be raised, but only his assessment of human deeds" (Luz, page 61). Jesus "is now God's Immanuel and the traveling companion of the community [of Christians], the same who is now proclaiming God's commandments to the community , and who is leading them in prayer to their Father in heaven" (Luz, page 61).
All ideas expressed above on the role of the commandments in Matthew and the accompanying quotations are taken from: The Theology of the Gospel of Matthew, by Ulrich Luz, Cambridge University Press, 1995.
One final note about Ehrman and the Gospel of Matthew. For some inexplicable reason, Ehrman did not emphasize the fact that the Day of Judgment when Jesus will return as the divine judge (the Son of Man) is a really big deal in Matthew as should be obvious to even a cursory reading of Matthew's Gospel. Mention of this upcoming event appears over and over as a warning to the reader to shape up and live right. But for some reason, Ehrman completely ignores this.
Sunday, June 12, 2011
Ehrman, Chapter 5, Mark
Most historical critical scholars are certain that Mark's Gospel was written first. Not that they believe that anyone by the name of Mark wrote the Gospel. However, they choose to continue to use the traditional name of this Gospel in order to make it clear to what document they are making reference. Ehrman begins by reviewing the "synoptic problem" and the four-source hypothesis (also covered in my earlier Blog entry on this topic). As I mentioned in my Blog entries on the historical critical method, this whole understanding of the origination of the Gospels presupposes that the material in the Gospels was handed on orally for several decades before anyone thought to write it down. This process of oral transmission begins with the actual words of Jesus, but believes that few words of Jesus that were accurately remembered, and the whole oral tradition reworked the sayings of Jesus to adapt the sayings and actions of Jesus to a new setting. This new setting is the life of the early Christians attempting to define themselves as religious people over against the Judaism out of which Christianity emerged.
An intriguing theory that several scholars came up with about 10-15 years ago is the idea that the Gospel of Mark was originally an oral composition. That is, the entire Gospel was originally composed and transmitted orally before being written down at some point by someone. This theory has the advantage of explaining some of the stylistic peculiarities in Mark, such as the often noted tendency to over use the adverb "immediately" which serves to provide a link between otherwise disconnected passages and also beginning most sentences with "and" which provides an aural cue that a new sentence is beginning.
If it might seem odd that people would memorize the entire Gospel, early Christian Monks committed the entire book of Psalms to memory for their daily recitation. Also, Muhammad's Quran was handed on orally for many years after his death and only written down when disputes arose concerning the exact content of the Quran. Even today it is Not difficult to find Muslims who have committed large portions of the Quran to memory (in Arabic, for there is no such thing as an acceptable translation of the Quran for worship purposes).
When the Jesus material is finally collected into the various Gospels, it has become quite different from what it was when Jesus originally spoke it, and some of the sayings and stories may have been created along the way. At least this is what historical critical scholars tend to believe. In a similar way, the study of the Gospels themselves tends to be more focused on the particular theological interests of the Gospel's author than on the sayings and actions of Jesus.
The old traditional view of the Gospel of Mark is that this Gospel was composed by a companion of the Apostle Peter named Mark in Rome, and the content of the Gospel represents Peter's reminiscences of his time with Jesus. Historical critical scholars believe we do not have any reliable information whatsoever about the authors of the four Gospels or about where the Gospels might have been written, and deciding when they were written is educated guesswork. If Mark was written first, then the others have to be dated later, and allowing sufficient time for Mark to be copied and circulated around the eastern portion of the Roman empire. Ascribing a date of 65-70 CE to Mark is based on the fact that Mark, chapter 13, seems to presuppose the destruction of the temple (and since predictive prophecy is impossible to historical critics), therefore, the Gospel must have been written after the temple was destroyed (or when its destruction had become a foregone conclusion). However, an alternative interpretation of Mark 13 and the destruction of the temple is offered by scholar E.P. Sanders, who points out that when Jesus makes the prediction in Mark 13, he speaks of "not one stone will be left here upon another," whereas the actual destruction of the temple was by fire. And if this particular passage is a fictional prophecy after the fact wouldn't we expect the prophecy to be closer to the historical reality? So, even from a historical critical view, it may be possible Jesus really did make this prophecy.
As we see at the beginning of the Gospel of Mark, a central theme is affirming Jesus as both the Son of God and Messiah (Mark 1:1; Christ is simply the Greek word for the Jewish Messiah, meaning "anointed one," see Box 5.1 on page 61). The first two chapters in the Gospel are quite important for establishing this point of Jesus as Son of God and Messiah by emphasizing that Jesus speaks and acts on behalf of God, such as forgiving sins (2:7) and expelling demons (1:27).
Yet, we also find that Mark portrays Jesus as quite harassed by various Jewish groups, in particular the Galilean Pharisees and the Herodians. Many scholars find this odd since we do not hear much about Pharisees in Galilee in Jesus' time from Josephus. The Herodians are not known to scholarship outside of these two references in Mark (3:6 and 12:13) and one parallel reference in Matthew. The mention in 3:6 would seem to be Mark's way of casting a shadow over Jesus' ministry by warning the reader that Jewish leaders, feeling threatened by Jesus, want to be rid of him. This emphasis on the suffering of Jesus does not come to the fore in the Gospel narrative until the middle of Mark when Jesus first predicts his death (8:31). From there to the end of the Gospel, the idea of Jesus as the suffering Son of God seems to be the dominant theme.
Scholars have sometimes described the Gospel of Mark as a Passion narrative with an extended introduction (passion in the sense of the Latin word passio for suffering). While I sometimes think Ehrman is overplaying the opposition to Jesus in Mark (as in this section on page 64), it is clear that the opposition to Jesus (by the Pharisees and others) is an important part of Mark's portrayal of Jesus. It would seem that Mark intends to explain why it was necessary for the Son of God, the Messiah to suffer. The idea of a suffering Son of God or Messiah would not have been readily accepted by anyone from a Jewish background. So it seems that part of Mark's intent in writing his Gospel is to explain how this was all part of God's plan.
A curious feature of Mark's Gospel is the fact that Jesus is so often misunderstood by his disciples (see Ehrman, page 66). Modern scholars are quite certain that this is an intentional literary device on Mark's part (and has nothing to do with how the disciples historically might have behaved while actually with Jesus). What scholars cannot agree on is what this peculiarity means. One popular theory (35 years ago) was that the disciples represented a group of Christian opponents Mark was writing against. This theory is no longer widely accepted. My favorite theory is that the disciples represent what Not to do as a disciple and Jesus represents the ideal disciple, and a model for discipleship. Jesus was willing to suffer for the faith and the disciples ran away when following Jesus became too risky (when Jesus was arrested, 14:50). As I said, the disciples' lack of understanding is a curious feature, and there is no unanimity among New Testament scholars in trying to explain it.
Another curious feature of mark is what scholars is the so-called "Messianic Secret." It has always seemed a bit odd that Jesus would tell people not to tell others about his miracles (see Ehrman, Box 5.3 on page 67). This feature was explained by most scholars as having a purpose in the life of the historical Jesus, until German scholar Wilhelm Wrede in 1901 offered a non-historical explanation as to why Jesus several times orders that no report of his miracles should go out. Wrede proposes that this feature is a theologically motivated literary device employed by Mark in the composition of the Gospel to explain why Jesus was not widely recognized as the Messiah during the course of his earthly life. Jesus did not want the word to get out until after his resurrection, which would of course, explain why the word did not get out during Jesus' lifetime (at least Wrede was quite sure that no one believed that Jesus was the Jewish Messiah during his earthly lifetime, though even the skeptic Ehrman is quite sure that Jesus' disciples historically must have believed Jesus to be the Messiah). Wrede's explanation fits in rather nicely with the thinking of much of liberal Protestant New Testament scholarship was during the 20th century, most of whom were quite sure Jesus did not proclaim himself to be the Messiah.
As is the case with the apparent lack of comprehension on the part of the disciples, Jesus' commands not to tell anyone about his miracles is a curious feature of the Gospel for which there are numerous theories and not much consensus among scholars.
The overall perspective of the Gospel of Mark portrays Jesus as the Messiah and Son of God who reveals his true identity in his miracles and teachings, but also in his suffering in which the necessity of the death of the Messiah is a major part of the divine plan for the salvation of humanity. Ehrman does a good job explaining this on pages 68-71.
Regarding the conclusion of Mark's Gospel, most modern scholars are quite sure that for some reason Mark intentionally ended the Gospel at 16:7. This is obviously a very abrupt ending. To say that Mark intended the Gospel to end this way, leaving the reader hanging and wondering what comes next seems to presuppose a very modern way of thinking about the nature of a story. The traditional explanation has been that the original ending (now lost) would have included a resurrection appearance, even though this not present in the earliest existing manuscripts.
The modern conservative theory is that the original ending was lost and information was supplied from other sources outside of the other three Gospels to create the longer endings to Mark in some manuscripts. This is based on the belief that if John (what has no known connection with the other three Gospels includes resurrection appearances, then people expected the story of Jesus to end with a resurrection appearance. The key scholarly question is: does a Gospel require a resurrection appearance or are we only conditional to expect one based on the other three Gospels? Most modern scholars prefer to explain Mark's abrupt ending as part of the manner in which Mark's Gospel makes a distinction between the role of the disciples and the role of the reader (described well by Ehrman at the top of page 73). Thus, for Ehrman and most historical critical scholars, the abrupt ending at Mark 16:7 reflects the original intent of the author.
A couple of alternative explanations for the originality of the short ending that had some adherents in the 20th century were that the lack of a resurrection appearance by Jesus in Mark was because 1) the readers would soon see Jesus because he would return any day now, or 2) to stress the absence of Jesus until he returns, but we know not when. Scholar John Dominic Crossan believed that the author of Mark concocted the story of the empty tomb to emphasize the absence of Jesus until his return. But that theory has found little acceptance among scholars because it presupposes that the author of John's Gospel had access to Mark's Gospel (which few scholars believe true), because then you have to explain why the author of John's Gospel had no interest in using almost all of the other material in Mark's Gospel, except for the story of the empty tomb. Such a supposition strains credulity for most scholars.
An intriguing theory that several scholars came up with about 10-15 years ago is the idea that the Gospel of Mark was originally an oral composition. That is, the entire Gospel was originally composed and transmitted orally before being written down at some point by someone. This theory has the advantage of explaining some of the stylistic peculiarities in Mark, such as the often noted tendency to over use the adverb "immediately" which serves to provide a link between otherwise disconnected passages and also beginning most sentences with "and" which provides an aural cue that a new sentence is beginning.
If it might seem odd that people would memorize the entire Gospel, early Christian Monks committed the entire book of Psalms to memory for their daily recitation. Also, Muhammad's Quran was handed on orally for many years after his death and only written down when disputes arose concerning the exact content of the Quran. Even today it is Not difficult to find Muslims who have committed large portions of the Quran to memory (in Arabic, for there is no such thing as an acceptable translation of the Quran for worship purposes).
When the Jesus material is finally collected into the various Gospels, it has become quite different from what it was when Jesus originally spoke it, and some of the sayings and stories may have been created along the way. At least this is what historical critical scholars tend to believe. In a similar way, the study of the Gospels themselves tends to be more focused on the particular theological interests of the Gospel's author than on the sayings and actions of Jesus.
The old traditional view of the Gospel of Mark is that this Gospel was composed by a companion of the Apostle Peter named Mark in Rome, and the content of the Gospel represents Peter's reminiscences of his time with Jesus. Historical critical scholars believe we do not have any reliable information whatsoever about the authors of the four Gospels or about where the Gospels might have been written, and deciding when they were written is educated guesswork. If Mark was written first, then the others have to be dated later, and allowing sufficient time for Mark to be copied and circulated around the eastern portion of the Roman empire. Ascribing a date of 65-70 CE to Mark is based on the fact that Mark, chapter 13, seems to presuppose the destruction of the temple (and since predictive prophecy is impossible to historical critics), therefore, the Gospel must have been written after the temple was destroyed (or when its destruction had become a foregone conclusion). However, an alternative interpretation of Mark 13 and the destruction of the temple is offered by scholar E.P. Sanders, who points out that when Jesus makes the prediction in Mark 13, he speaks of "not one stone will be left here upon another," whereas the actual destruction of the temple was by fire. And if this particular passage is a fictional prophecy after the fact wouldn't we expect the prophecy to be closer to the historical reality? So, even from a historical critical view, it may be possible Jesus really did make this prophecy.
As we see at the beginning of the Gospel of Mark, a central theme is affirming Jesus as both the Son of God and Messiah (Mark 1:1; Christ is simply the Greek word for the Jewish Messiah, meaning "anointed one," see Box 5.1 on page 61). The first two chapters in the Gospel are quite important for establishing this point of Jesus as Son of God and Messiah by emphasizing that Jesus speaks and acts on behalf of God, such as forgiving sins (2:7) and expelling demons (1:27).
Yet, we also find that Mark portrays Jesus as quite harassed by various Jewish groups, in particular the Galilean Pharisees and the Herodians. Many scholars find this odd since we do not hear much about Pharisees in Galilee in Jesus' time from Josephus. The Herodians are not known to scholarship outside of these two references in Mark (3:6 and 12:13) and one parallel reference in Matthew. The mention in 3:6 would seem to be Mark's way of casting a shadow over Jesus' ministry by warning the reader that Jewish leaders, feeling threatened by Jesus, want to be rid of him. This emphasis on the suffering of Jesus does not come to the fore in the Gospel narrative until the middle of Mark when Jesus first predicts his death (8:31). From there to the end of the Gospel, the idea of Jesus as the suffering Son of God seems to be the dominant theme.
Scholars have sometimes described the Gospel of Mark as a Passion narrative with an extended introduction (passion in the sense of the Latin word passio for suffering). While I sometimes think Ehrman is overplaying the opposition to Jesus in Mark (as in this section on page 64), it is clear that the opposition to Jesus (by the Pharisees and others) is an important part of Mark's portrayal of Jesus. It would seem that Mark intends to explain why it was necessary for the Son of God, the Messiah to suffer. The idea of a suffering Son of God or Messiah would not have been readily accepted by anyone from a Jewish background. So it seems that part of Mark's intent in writing his Gospel is to explain how this was all part of God's plan.
A curious feature of Mark's Gospel is the fact that Jesus is so often misunderstood by his disciples (see Ehrman, page 66). Modern scholars are quite certain that this is an intentional literary device on Mark's part (and has nothing to do with how the disciples historically might have behaved while actually with Jesus). What scholars cannot agree on is what this peculiarity means. One popular theory (35 years ago) was that the disciples represented a group of Christian opponents Mark was writing against. This theory is no longer widely accepted. My favorite theory is that the disciples represent what Not to do as a disciple and Jesus represents the ideal disciple, and a model for discipleship. Jesus was willing to suffer for the faith and the disciples ran away when following Jesus became too risky (when Jesus was arrested, 14:50). As I said, the disciples' lack of understanding is a curious feature, and there is no unanimity among New Testament scholars in trying to explain it.
Another curious feature of mark is what scholars is the so-called "Messianic Secret." It has always seemed a bit odd that Jesus would tell people not to tell others about his miracles (see Ehrman, Box 5.3 on page 67). This feature was explained by most scholars as having a purpose in the life of the historical Jesus, until German scholar Wilhelm Wrede in 1901 offered a non-historical explanation as to why Jesus several times orders that no report of his miracles should go out. Wrede proposes that this feature is a theologically motivated literary device employed by Mark in the composition of the Gospel to explain why Jesus was not widely recognized as the Messiah during the course of his earthly life. Jesus did not want the word to get out until after his resurrection, which would of course, explain why the word did not get out during Jesus' lifetime (at least Wrede was quite sure that no one believed that Jesus was the Jewish Messiah during his earthly lifetime, though even the skeptic Ehrman is quite sure that Jesus' disciples historically must have believed Jesus to be the Messiah). Wrede's explanation fits in rather nicely with the thinking of much of liberal Protestant New Testament scholarship was during the 20th century, most of whom were quite sure Jesus did not proclaim himself to be the Messiah.
As is the case with the apparent lack of comprehension on the part of the disciples, Jesus' commands not to tell anyone about his miracles is a curious feature of the Gospel for which there are numerous theories and not much consensus among scholars.
The overall perspective of the Gospel of Mark portrays Jesus as the Messiah and Son of God who reveals his true identity in his miracles and teachings, but also in his suffering in which the necessity of the death of the Messiah is a major part of the divine plan for the salvation of humanity. Ehrman does a good job explaining this on pages 68-71.
Regarding the conclusion of Mark's Gospel, most modern scholars are quite sure that for some reason Mark intentionally ended the Gospel at 16:7. This is obviously a very abrupt ending. To say that Mark intended the Gospel to end this way, leaving the reader hanging and wondering what comes next seems to presuppose a very modern way of thinking about the nature of a story. The traditional explanation has been that the original ending (now lost) would have included a resurrection appearance, even though this not present in the earliest existing manuscripts.
The modern conservative theory is that the original ending was lost and information was supplied from other sources outside of the other three Gospels to create the longer endings to Mark in some manuscripts. This is based on the belief that if John (what has no known connection with the other three Gospels includes resurrection appearances, then people expected the story of Jesus to end with a resurrection appearance. The key scholarly question is: does a Gospel require a resurrection appearance or are we only conditional to expect one based on the other three Gospels? Most modern scholars prefer to explain Mark's abrupt ending as part of the manner in which Mark's Gospel makes a distinction between the role of the disciples and the role of the reader (described well by Ehrman at the top of page 73). Thus, for Ehrman and most historical critical scholars, the abrupt ending at Mark 16:7 reflects the original intent of the author.
A couple of alternative explanations for the originality of the short ending that had some adherents in the 20th century were that the lack of a resurrection appearance by Jesus in Mark was because 1) the readers would soon see Jesus because he would return any day now, or 2) to stress the absence of Jesus until he returns, but we know not when. Scholar John Dominic Crossan believed that the author of Mark concocted the story of the empty tomb to emphasize the absence of Jesus until his return. But that theory has found little acceptance among scholars because it presupposes that the author of John's Gospel had access to Mark's Gospel (which few scholars believe true), because then you have to explain why the author of John's Gospel had no interest in using almost all of the other material in Mark's Gospel, except for the story of the empty tomb. Such a supposition strains credulity for most scholars.
Thursday, May 19, 2011
Ehrman, Chapter 10
When Ehrman states that Christianity began with the belief in the resurrection of Jesus, he sides with that portion of scholarship that believes there is a distinct discontinuity between the Jesus of history and the religion about him that believed Jesus was the Messiah (Christ), the Son of God, the savior of the world. Ehrman's view on this topic emphasizes that Jesus never used any of these titles to refer to himself, but rather the early Christians (as a result of the resurrection appearances) began to place these titles on Jesus, and then the Gospel writers then retroject these titles back into the story of Jesus.
But how we get from a Jesus who was all about proclaiming the end of the world as we know it to a religion that proclaimed him the universal savior of the world is the main business of historical critical scholarship as it pertains to development of the Jesus tradition that forms the Gospels. As I mentioned in the Historical Critical Method, Part 3, Bultmann's whole project was to devise a way to move back to the historical Jesus from the Gospels as we have them. So, after we have peeled away all the layers of Christian tradition that have been added to the sayings and actions of Jesus we find the true historical Jesus. But in so doing, we also discover how the Jesus tradition developed in the succeeding decades until it is finally placed in written form in the Gospels. As Bultmann liked to say about this process, the proclaimer became the proclaimed.
Now in making a connection between Jesus' resurrection appearances and apocalyptic Judaism, Ehrman is on solid ground. This is because it is only Jewish people who embraced apocalyptic views believed that a resurrection was even possible. Granted the expectation was that this would happen at the end of time. And granted the expectation was that there would be a general resurrection of all dead people at the end of time. This is why Ehrman claims that when the disciples of Jesus believed that he had been raised from the dead, they also (probably) believed that the end was at hand and that Jesus' resurrection marked the beginning of the general resurrection (see page 156, col. 1 top). At least this seems to make sense in light of the comment that Paul makes where he refers to Jesus' resurrection as "the first fruits of those who have died" (1 Corinthians 15:20). The "first fruits" is using Jewish language that refers to that which is offered to the Lord at the beginning of a harvest. So for Paul to use this word ("first fruits", one word in Greek) indicates that he sees the resurrection of Jesus as the beginning of the resurrection of all believers to eternal life.
Therefore, Ehrman's comment that in light of this reasoning about Jesus' resurrection and the beginning of the end, it seems plausible to assume that this might have been the event that spurred Jesus' disciples to think of him in much more elevated terms, such as Messiah (Christ), , Son of God, Son of Man, and savior of the world. Of course Ehrman's point only makes sense if you believe that Jesus never ever intended his disciples to think such of him in such elevated terms.
There is an assertion that Ehrman makes on this topic that puts him at odds with the majority of historical critical scholars. In box 10.2 Ehrman makes what seems to be a common sense suggestion that maybe Jesus' disciples thought he was the Messiah before he even was executed, so their belief in his resurrection only provided them with the confirmation of what they were already inclined to believe. In proposing this, Ehrman is grappling with a problem he sees in making such a connection, that is, there is nothing in the writings of apocalyptic Judaism to suppose anyone ever thought that the first one resurrected would be the Messiah. Most expectations of a divinely sent Messiah were that this being would arrive on earth and fulfill his mission, but never die. Most historical critical scholars are inclined to believe that Jesus' disciples would never have conceived of Jesus being more than a prophet to begin with, and that in general they were "slow of heart to believe" (to borrow a phrase from Luke 24:25).
What Ehrman offers in the section on Jesus' Death According to the Scriptures is very much mainstream scholarship among historical critical scholars. In other words, most such scholars believe that it was in reflecting on the scriptures, especially Psalm 22 and Isaiah 53 (both seen as prophetic material) that they made sense of Jesus' death as a positive event.
John Dominic Crossan would even go so far as to say that the disciples knew nothing of the particulars of the death of Jesus since they had all fled, but that they gleaned all their information of what happened at Jesus' trial and execution from the Bible's prophetic material (which includes the Psalms, since David was considered both a prophet and the author of most of the Psalms. Crossan refers to this process as prophecy historicized. Most scholars are not nearly so pessimistic concerning the historical information that can be gained from the accounts of Jesus' execution, but neither do they accept them as completely reliable accounts either, since they were obviously biased in favor of a positive evaluation of Jesus' claims about himself.
In the section titled The Emergence of Different Understandings of Jesus, Ehrman presents what became the mainstream interpretation of how Jesus became the pre-existent Son of God. In the middle of the 20th century historical critical scholars took up an evolutionary view of the development of the understanding of who Jesus was. From initially being a prophet, we find the step to God making him the Son of God at his resurrection (based on Psalm 2:7, "You are my Son, today I have begotten you") (see especially how this is used in Acts 13:33-34). Another example would be Romans 1:3-4 where scholars believe we find the remnant of an earlier stage of belief in which Jesus becomes the Son of God at his resurrection.
The next step in this progression of moving from viewing Jesus as a human prophet to viewing Jesus as eternally divine is reflected in the next step of moving the date of Jesus becoming the Son of God from his resurrection back to Jesus' baptism, where the Gospels record the heavenly words: "This is my beloved Son". And then when we get to the stage of the composition of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke this key event (Jesus becoming the Son of God) is moved back to his conception, with the conception of Jesus taking place by the agency of the Holy Spirit. Then in the letters of Paul we find that Jesus is the pre-existent Son of God ( Philippians 2:6-7). Then the culmination of this process if reflected in the Gospel of John 1:1-2, in which Jesus is not only the pre-existent Son of God but fully divine and equal with the Father. So in all this, using an evolutionary model, scholars perceive there was a development in the understanding of who Jesus was as the Son of God (as the years passed after Jesus' death) by progressively pushing back the time that he became the Son of God, from his resurrection, back to his baptism, then back to his conception and then back to his pre-existent state before his earthly incarnation. In his description of this process on pages 160-161, Ehrman seeks to explain how the apocalyptic prophet from Nazareth became the Messiah (Christ), Son of God, savior of the world depicted in the Gospels.
But how we get from a Jesus who was all about proclaiming the end of the world as we know it to a religion that proclaimed him the universal savior of the world is the main business of historical critical scholarship as it pertains to development of the Jesus tradition that forms the Gospels. As I mentioned in the Historical Critical Method, Part 3, Bultmann's whole project was to devise a way to move back to the historical Jesus from the Gospels as we have them. So, after we have peeled away all the layers of Christian tradition that have been added to the sayings and actions of Jesus we find the true historical Jesus. But in so doing, we also discover how the Jesus tradition developed in the succeeding decades until it is finally placed in written form in the Gospels. As Bultmann liked to say about this process, the proclaimer became the proclaimed.
Now in making a connection between Jesus' resurrection appearances and apocalyptic Judaism, Ehrman is on solid ground. This is because it is only Jewish people who embraced apocalyptic views believed that a resurrection was even possible. Granted the expectation was that this would happen at the end of time. And granted the expectation was that there would be a general resurrection of all dead people at the end of time. This is why Ehrman claims that when the disciples of Jesus believed that he had been raised from the dead, they also (probably) believed that the end was at hand and that Jesus' resurrection marked the beginning of the general resurrection (see page 156, col. 1 top). At least this seems to make sense in light of the comment that Paul makes where he refers to Jesus' resurrection as "the first fruits of those who have died" (1 Corinthians 15:20). The "first fruits" is using Jewish language that refers to that which is offered to the Lord at the beginning of a harvest. So for Paul to use this word ("first fruits", one word in Greek) indicates that he sees the resurrection of Jesus as the beginning of the resurrection of all believers to eternal life.
Therefore, Ehrman's comment that in light of this reasoning about Jesus' resurrection and the beginning of the end, it seems plausible to assume that this might have been the event that spurred Jesus' disciples to think of him in much more elevated terms, such as Messiah (Christ), , Son of God, Son of Man, and savior of the world. Of course Ehrman's point only makes sense if you believe that Jesus never ever intended his disciples to think such of him in such elevated terms.
There is an assertion that Ehrman makes on this topic that puts him at odds with the majority of historical critical scholars. In box 10.2 Ehrman makes what seems to be a common sense suggestion that maybe Jesus' disciples thought he was the Messiah before he even was executed, so their belief in his resurrection only provided them with the confirmation of what they were already inclined to believe. In proposing this, Ehrman is grappling with a problem he sees in making such a connection, that is, there is nothing in the writings of apocalyptic Judaism to suppose anyone ever thought that the first one resurrected would be the Messiah. Most expectations of a divinely sent Messiah were that this being would arrive on earth and fulfill his mission, but never die. Most historical critical scholars are inclined to believe that Jesus' disciples would never have conceived of Jesus being more than a prophet to begin with, and that in general they were "slow of heart to believe" (to borrow a phrase from Luke 24:25).
What Ehrman offers in the section on Jesus' Death According to the Scriptures is very much mainstream scholarship among historical critical scholars. In other words, most such scholars believe that it was in reflecting on the scriptures, especially Psalm 22 and Isaiah 53 (both seen as prophetic material) that they made sense of Jesus' death as a positive event.
John Dominic Crossan would even go so far as to say that the disciples knew nothing of the particulars of the death of Jesus since they had all fled, but that they gleaned all their information of what happened at Jesus' trial and execution from the Bible's prophetic material (which includes the Psalms, since David was considered both a prophet and the author of most of the Psalms. Crossan refers to this process as prophecy historicized. Most scholars are not nearly so pessimistic concerning the historical information that can be gained from the accounts of Jesus' execution, but neither do they accept them as completely reliable accounts either, since they were obviously biased in favor of a positive evaluation of Jesus' claims about himself.
In the section titled The Emergence of Different Understandings of Jesus, Ehrman presents what became the mainstream interpretation of how Jesus became the pre-existent Son of God. In the middle of the 20th century historical critical scholars took up an evolutionary view of the development of the understanding of who Jesus was. From initially being a prophet, we find the step to God making him the Son of God at his resurrection (based on Psalm 2:7, "You are my Son, today I have begotten you") (see especially how this is used in Acts 13:33-34). Another example would be Romans 1:3-4 where scholars believe we find the remnant of an earlier stage of belief in which Jesus becomes the Son of God at his resurrection.
The next step in this progression of moving from viewing Jesus as a human prophet to viewing Jesus as eternally divine is reflected in the next step of moving the date of Jesus becoming the Son of God from his resurrection back to Jesus' baptism, where the Gospels record the heavenly words: "This is my beloved Son". And then when we get to the stage of the composition of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke this key event (Jesus becoming the Son of God) is moved back to his conception, with the conception of Jesus taking place by the agency of the Holy Spirit. Then in the letters of Paul we find that Jesus is the pre-existent Son of God ( Philippians 2:6-7). Then the culmination of this process if reflected in the Gospel of John 1:1-2, in which Jesus is not only the pre-existent Son of God but fully divine and equal with the Father. So in all this, using an evolutionary model, scholars perceive there was a development in the understanding of who Jesus was as the Son of God (as the years passed after Jesus' death) by progressively pushing back the time that he became the Son of God, from his resurrection, back to his baptism, then back to his conception and then back to his pre-existent state before his earthly incarnation. In his description of this process on pages 160-161, Ehrman seeks to explain how the apocalyptic prophet from Nazareth became the Messiah (Christ), Son of God, savior of the world depicted in the Gospels.
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