Resurrected but not the Messiah?

Over the weekend I read The Resurrection of Jesus: a Jewish perspective by the late Professor Pinchas Lapide. Its a short read and certainly one I would recommend.

In this book, Pinchas Lapide, who was an Orthodox Jew, argues in favour of the resurrection of Jesus as a historical event. Ill leave the book to explain how he does it but it basically comes down to there being no better explanation for the response of the Disciples after Jesus’ death and the movement that was raised up. Significantly he sees their willingness to die for this message.

He sees this as a thoroughly Jewish response and does not believe they made it up or were hallucinating, but that actually something took place. Being a historian, he does not say it certainly happened, but that it probably happened as it accounts best for their reaction and that any other explanation simply fails to explain how they came to be proclaiming this message and were giving their lives for it.

Whats interesting is that he does not believe this makes Jesus the awaited Messiah of Israel. He does not go very much into this but in his epilogue he simply states that the resurrection, though an act of God, does not lead him to being the Messiah.

I think this is fascinating and I dont really get how he can maintain this. Granted that Jesus was not the only one to be raised but he was the only to be raised and never died again, right? I do think he mentions that people being taken up into heaven are also no novelty to the history of Israel but I still dont quite get how he is able to detach these two things.

Paula Fredriksen also mentions that the resurrection as perceived* by the apostles was not taken as a sign for his Messiahship, she writes:

Why, finally, did these apostles see Jesus as the messiah? Not because of his resurrection. That event signaled, rather, the nearness of the End, since at the End the dead (or perhaps only the righteous dead) were to be raised. It thus confirmed Jesus’ message [of the nearness of the End], and consequently his status as messenger. But nowehere did Judaism anticipate a dying and rising messiah; and the apostles, like Paul after them (Rom 1:3-4), would have no reason to infer from his resurrection that Jesus was the messiah. (From Jesus to Christ, 2000, p. 141)

I personally havent encountered this line of thought before, anyone familiar with this?

*do note that she does not hold like Pinchas Lapide that it probably happened but consistently writes about “their experiences”

Quote on the NT

From oral to written; from Aramaic to Greek; from the End of time to the middle of time; from Jewish to Gentile; from the Galilee and Judea to the Empire.

-Paula Fredriksen

Short thought on the limits of symbolism

I was thinking about the symbolism of the Lord’s supper:

Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. 54 Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. 55 For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. 56 Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him.

Now obviously its strictly forbidden to eat a human being’s flesh or consume any living beings blood, in Maimonides list of commandments, it is negative commandment no: 184.

184. Not to consume blood, as [Leviticus 7:26] states: “Do not consume any blood.”

And needless to say Jesus does not mean one should literally consume his blood but only symbologically. Yet I wonder whether this kind of symbolical language is common in Rabbinic Literature. I cant say I really looked out for it so might have overlooked it but dont remember any analogy or symbolical language in which the forbidden was used to make a point.

Any thoughts or insights?

Prophecy Historicized

Over the last months, I have picked up a more critical view of the text of the New Testament and have begun to notice several things. One of which is the function of prophecy in the NT.

I used to be very excited about reading prophecies being fulfilled in the NT because I saw it essentially as one of the ‘proofs’ for my faith. I hardly ever doubted their accuracy and never entertained the thought that the verses may have meant something very different. I saw these verses as recorded in the Tanakh as divinely inserted which the NT authors faithfully extracted, in response to what they witnessed.

Several things have made me cast doubts on this idea:

1. Authorial intent

It is far from clear that the authors in the Tanakh ever thought of  their words to include any more than the near future or current events. Take for example Isaiah 7:14, that reads: “Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.”

These words were directed to King Ahaz, and most probably referred to the birth of a Davidic prince that would deliver Judah from its enemies. The word virgin in all likelihood did not refer to a virginal conception but to a young girl that  had reached the age of being eligible for marriage.

Another example is the famous vision in Daniel 7, where the son of man most likely refers to the nation Israel and not, at least not in the first place to the messiah.

While this can still be reconciled by saying that maybe the authors of the Tanakh werent aware of the depth of their own writing, the next point is much more difficult.

2. Prophecy Historicized

In examining the stories in the NT, it is apparent that there are many parrallels with stories from the Tanakh. For example the stories contained in the first chapters of Matthew are largely following a combination of the birth of Moses and other stories. What follows is largely based on the work of R.E. Brown, The Birth of the Messiah:

• Matt 2:13-14 Now when they had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Rise, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him.” 14 And he rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed to Egypt

Ex 2:15 When Pharaoh heard of it, he sought to kill Moses. But Moses fled from Pharaoh and stayed in the land of Midian. And he sat down by a well.

• Matt 2:16 Then Herod, when he saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, became furious, and he sent and killed all the male children in Bethlehem and in all that region who were two years old or under

Ex 1:22 Then Pharaoh commanded all his people, “Every son that is born to the Hebrews you shall cast into the Nile, but you shall let every daughter live.”

• Matt 2:19 Herod died

Ex 2:23 the king of Egypt died

• Matt 2:19-20 an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt, 20 saying, “Rise, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who sought the child’s life are dead.”

Ex 4:19 And the Lord said to Moses in Midian, “Go back to Egypt, for all the men who were seeking your life are dead.”

• Matt 2:21 And he rose and took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel.

Ex 4:20 So Moses took his wife and his sons and had them ride on a donkey, and went back to the land of Egypt.

The parallels are amazing, and I remember very well that I used to think, “Great! Look, this too is prophecy fulfilled”, but it could very well be that this is not history prophesied, but as Dominic Crossan put it: “Prophecy historicized”.

Many other stories in the NT can be treated in this way as well and this makes me have doubts on how much you could talk about prophecies being fulfilled. As in my opinion it is more the hand of the author the Gospel in these accounts than sober history being recorded. And this feels uncomfortable because its evident that they had an interest in polishing the stories to reflect their beliefs concerning Jesus.

3. Authority of the Tanakh for the authors of the NT; reading Scripture Christian-ly

This point was driven home well by James Dunn in the chapter titled “The Use of the Old Testament” in his Unity and Diversity in the NT, he says:

In short, the first Christians valued the OT not as an independent authority so much as an interpreted authority. p. 102

The Tanakh was read through the eyes of the ‘new’ revelation, and as such there were few problems in ‘establishing proofs’ for Jesus as:

[...] where the old revelation did not fit with the new there was little question for the mainstream of first-century Christianity but that the old had to be adapted to the new or else abandoned. p. 110

A footnote brings this out even more eloquent:

The place of the Old Testament in the formation of New Testament theology is that of a servant, ready to run to the aid of the gospel whenever it is required, bolstering up arguments, and filling out meaning through evocative allusions, but never acting as the master or leading the way, nor even guiding the process of thought behind the scenes. p. 110 n. 33

Taking this into account it doesnt really make sense to see ‘all’ those prophecies as proofs for Jesus messiahship… true there are some general events that are hard to be denied such as his suffering and vindication, not to mention the expansion of the God of Israel across the globe (however tainted that may have been), but in light of this it doesnt make alot of sense to draw up whole lists of parallels between the gospels and the Tanakh as it seems often these are not cases of history prophesied but prophecy historicized…

Accounting for bias

I have just finished the book Seth recommended me; Is the NT reliable? by Paul Barnett.

Some observations:

First of all, it was kind of conservative, or better said, apologetic. In much of what he wrote there was a tendency to fill up the gaps in the NT, and argue for the NT. Now this is a worthy cause and surely I would be much more frustrated would the opposite happen. But at times it felt not really fair, and open… I just think a few question marks would have been appropriate and could have strenghtened his work, i.e. in places where he, or NT scholarship, arent sure, it would be appropriate to leave things open and not to argue it for the sake of arguing or filling up gaps.

Another thing that struck me was the fact that on the one hand he was putting forth some of the results of source crticism, such as the Q sayings, L and M but on the other hand was able to argue that most of the witnesses in the NT did not depend on each other. 

Also when it comes to dating the documents he is accounting quite conservatively and quotes several times J.A.T. Robinson who placed nearly all documents before 70 C.E.

But one of the major points in this book that I have problems with is the portrayal of the NT authors as reliable witnesses, now dont get me wrong, I do think that most of them are reliable but I think a major point that is missing in his presentation is bias. That is, the authors of the NT are biased and dont have the intention to present the facts and let the reader decide him/herself what to do with it. Clearly, they have a motive in writing these documents, consider the Gospel of John: “but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.”

And while the popular saying: “the winners write history” holds for other documents as well, this certainly should or lets say could be taken into account when examining the NT. And in my opinion this is done very little, especially in this book.

Some input from various places

The questions I asked in the posts: Secondary theological modifications? and the one that followed it A bit more on the last post I also asked around on the web at some other places, and for those interested here are two other responses: James McGrath’s blog and Open Source Theology. Another comment I found enlightening was given in response by a friend:

Ultimately, I follow an individual, not a text, and the text is just a window into who he was and what he taught.

Today I listened to a lecture by Bart Ehrman on his book Misquoting Jesus and found the differences he pointed out to be very similar – and in some cases exactly the same – to the ones I used in my posts. I found him less threatening than I had expected and found him to sound quite sensible and found the question marks he put to be very similar to the ones I put up. I might read a book of him some time, but think thats a bit too early and more likely Ill try to get my hand on James Dunn’s Unity and Diversity in the New Testament first.

A bit more on the last post

Some more stuff I wanted to share and in the end a reissued question mark:

• In Mark 4:38 we read about Jesus sleeping in the boat and the disciples’ rebuke: “Teacher, do you not care if we perish”, however when reading Matthew (8:25) this is turned into a prayer “Lord, save us; we are perishing.”

• Mark 11:20-21 recounts the story of the figtree, it tells that the effect of Jesus’ curse becomes apparent after a day, yet in Matthew 21:19-20  the tree withers immediately.

• In Mark 8:27-33 we read about Peter’s confession who says “You are the Christ”, yet in Matthew 16:13-23 we read him saying “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God”.

I could go on but I think what Im trying to convey is clear, its not so much precisely these examples but more the general diversity between them that seems to be intentional. I mean it seems that Matthew adds things and sometimes omits things that dont fit his theological views, or maybe ‘intents’. Im familiar with the idea that the four gospels are all looking from a different perspective and report with a different intent yet I get the akward feeling that sometimes these different perspectives lead to different Jesusses, especially the moment we get John into the picture.

Compare for example the prayer of Jesus in the garden when his soul is in distress, Mark says he prays for this hour to pass from him, yet John tells us that when Jesus is sorrowful he muses “Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? But for this purpose I have come to this hour. Father, glorify your name.”

This is I find striking and makes me wonder about how to view the NT, as it seems more and more that theres a very human component in it, which it not necessarily wrong but just different than my initial views where I would take Paul’s exhortations to Timothy (2 Tim 3:16) and apply them to the NT. Also this makes me have somewhat appreciation for neo-orthodoxy, which I thought at first to be a very erroneous position. It just seems that authorial intent isnt always the way to go especially if one pursues this into the extreme. 

So theres some room for creativity yet when does one go from diversity to disunity? So authors like Dunn and Brown would say that the NT is a springboard for the later Trinitarian dogma, in other words even though this is not found in the text itself, theres room for it. Yet the Synoptics and especially Mark seem to present a very different picture not to mention the Tanakh. Yet I must admit that in the Tanakh theres also creativity at work and a development that at times can seem to lead to disunity…

And the Sages z”l read the Tanakh on their own terms as well, dismissing/mending authorial intent often in a way that could be characterized as supersessionist, so this isnt only a Christian problem, yet it seems that the Jewish colouring remains more faithful to Jesus’s interpretation than the Christian interpretation…

So reissued my question; should I feel uneasy about the gospel authors modifications/omissions or are these able to be categorized under diversity? If so, when do we get to disunity? If so (2), can we view church tradition in a similar light? Or would this be a misapplication?

Secondary Theological Modifications?

I started reading Raymond Browns’s An Introduction to New Testament Christology and like what Ive read so far, he writes in an accessible way and proceeds carefully. In reviewing passages that deal with Jesus’ knowledge something struck me:

He cites several stories and shows differences between the Gospel authors, which albeit little, at some points look like supression in the name of theological views, consider the following:

In Mark 5:30-33 Jesus is walking through a crowd and his garments are touched by a woman who thereupon is healed, in Mark Jesus ask who touched him, however when we turn to Matthew 9:22 this question and search is omitted. Which could indicate uneasiness with Jesus’ seeming ignorance.

Another example can be found in Mark 2:26, where Jesus relates David entering the house of God when Abiathar was high priest, however in 1 Samuel 21:2-7 the high priest is not Abiathar but Ahimelech, and when you look up Matthew (12:4) and Luke’s (6:4) version they omit any mention of the high priest. Again a detail, yet it could be supression in order to conceal Jesus confusing those two persons.

A final example: In Matthew 23:35 Jesus refers to the Zechariah the son of Berachiah being murdered between the sanctuary and the altar however Zechariah the son of Berachiah lived around the year 500 B.C.E. and the Zechariah that was killed during the time Jesus referred to was the son of Jehoiada who lived around the year 825 B.C.E. What is noteworthy is that Luke (11:51) omits the son of Berachiah. Which could indicate that Luke was aware of the mistake and consequently omitted it.

When arriving in the Gospel of John Jesus seems to come out very different, as someone who doesnt need to gain ordinary knowledge; Jesus asks Philip where bread can be found (John 6:5) but the author adds that he was only testing Philip implying that he already knew what he would do. In John 6:64 we learn that Jesus knew from the beginning who would refuse him and who would believe him, and lastly in 10:18 theres no sign of any uncertainty on part of Jesus when saying: “No one takes my life from me; rather I lay it down of my own accord. I have the power to lay it down, and the power to take it up again”.

I dont know, these things just struck me, as although they need not imply concious supression, they look alot like it.

What do you think, assuming that there has been some form of modifications to adjust to theological views, would you be comfortable with that? Im not sure if theres actual need for uneasiness but havent given this much thought, so feel free to jump in.