A Gateway to the Research of the Jesus Seminar
|
Mahlon H. Smith Because there is only
reconstruction. We
need a fiction that we recognize to be fictive. 1.1. Historical Reconstruction & the
Human Imagination. The shift in the Jesus Seminar’s
focus from assembling a data base of historically reliable information about
Jesus to comparing profiles of him involves a critical change in methodology.
Describing a person is a synthetic exercise that is qualitatively different
than amassing data. Finding facts is an act of digging: extracting items from
a site that currently obscures their original function. Describing is an act
of construction: combining accessible elements into a new structure,
even if it is a reconstruction of the past. Descriptions are not found; they are
assembled out of what has already been discovered. Thus, they are
"fictions" in the root sense of that term:
It is this
constructive element that makes any description---historical or
religious---fictive, as Gerd Theissen has noted./4/ For
as a construct of a particular human imagination, a description is always
subject to deconstruction and creative reconstruction when new data is
discovered or when the old is viewed from a different angle. Nowhere is this more evident than in
the case of Jesus. The central thesis of L.T. Johnson’s critique of the
Jesus Seminar and two centuries of NT literary criticism is that the real
Jesus cannot be equated with "a historically reconstructed Jesus"
since "historical reconstructions are by their nature fragile and in
constant need of revision."/5/ Instead,
he argues: Corresponding to the Christian
claim, there is a "real Jesus" in the texts of the New
Testament as they have been transmitted to this generation. It is a Jesus inscribed
literarily in the New Testament compositions as compositions./6/
Even the Seminar’s
most vociferous critic here concedes that the descriptions of Jesus in the
gospels are literary constructs --- i.e., the products of the poetic
imaginations of some ancient scribes. His argument is solely with the
presumption of modern scholars to reconstruct these canonical texts,
since a reconstructed Jesus he contends is "a product of scholarly
imagination."/7/ Johnson’s point
seems to be that, as ancient artifacts, the profiles of Jesus
"composed" by the authors of the gospels can claim historical
superiority over any later scholar’s composition. The synoptic gospels themselves,
however, validate reconstruction of the image and message of Jesus
recorded in inherited texts. Gospel scholars are virtually unanimous on one
point: two of these gospels are literary revisions of the third. Luke
explicitly introduces his work as a systematic account based on his research
into previous records (1:1-4). If that is not a description of historical
reconstruction by a latter-day scholar, what is? If historical reconstruction
cannot clarify the real Jesus, then what are Luke and Matthew doing in the
church’s canon? Are their divergent revised descriptions of Jesus
merely the product of their "scholarly imagination"?/8/
Every image depends
upon someone’s imagination. Historical research is the
discipline that keeps the meanderings of the human imagination in touch with
the real facts by clarifying whose imagination is responsible for which image.
As Theissen notes, the advantage of constructs of the historical imagination
is that they are "relatively free of arbitrariness, [and] capable of
being corrected by sources."/9/ Any
description of Jesus is someone’s fiction. What makes one description
historically superior to others is not its antiquity but the fact that it
accounts for everything known about the primary data better than the
alternatives. The Jesus Seminar has spent a dozen
years assessing every saying and narrative report of Jesus in the ancient
records to distinguish primary evidence that can be traced to Jesus himself
from later developments in the tradition. To bring all this historical data
into clearer focus, Fellows are of course free to adjust the density of
particular elements from previous voting by suggesting reasons for a different
weighting. But the rationale for such correction must come from insight into
the importance of particular items to account for other historically probable
data rather than from the unexorcised prejudices of our own poetic
imaginations. Our quest is to find what R. W. Funk calls a "true
fiction": a profile that captures the features of the Jesus who generated
these proven facts. 1.2. Relative Viewpoints & Narrative
Tensions. Neither ancient nor modern profiles
of a historical person like Jesus should be paraded as absolute fact. A
historical fact --- whether verbal or visual --- is the rugged residue of a
dynamic process that has outlasted its original environment. A profile of a
person is inevitably more fragile and tentative (as Johnson rightly noted),
depending to a large degree on patterns evident to a particular viewer at a
given time and place. It is for just this reason that the gospels are
misrepresented by Johnson and others who claim they are definitive
descriptions of Jesus. They are, rather, a series of drafts of a sketch by
admirers of Jesus dependent on second-hand testimony a generation or more
after his death. As such, the impressions presented by each author are subject
to clarification and correction by comparison with those of other
gospel profiles and analysis of the evidence they all present. Even in photos of a living subject,
quite different---even contrary---impressions may be caught on different
days by different lenses. Only profiles of artificial cartoon characters, like
Charlie Brown, never change. Instead of a static picture of Jesus, the gospels
present a person who made a wide spectrum of impressions on people with whom
he interacted. So, if it is a really historical Jesus we seek to describe
rather than a comic book Christ, our profiles are bound to be fleeting
glimpses, consciously tentative and candid rather than pretending to be
definitive and comprehensive. Since the Jesus Seminar methodically
minimized elements imported from worldviews not distinctive of Jesus,
the odd bits of surviving genuine sayings, deeds and biographical data read
like a badly disintegrated manuscript in need of extensive shuffling and
filling in to be restored to a coherent pattern. This is a sensitive and
controversial task. The Seminar’s suppression of the perspectives of gospel
narrators and regrouping of their data has already led L. T. Johnson to declare
the whole historical quest invalid: It is not legitimate on the
basis of demonstrating the probability of such items [that "Jesus said
and did"] to then connect them, arrange them in sequence, infer
causality, or ascribe special significance to any combination of them. This
is why the abandonment of the Gospel narratives throws open the door for any
number of combinations. Once that narrative control is gone, the
pieces can be (and have been) put together in multiple ways./10/
What disturbs the
author of this ruling and many other conservative Christians is that
historical reconstruction presents new insights into the character of Jesus
apart from the plot set by the post-crucifixion kerygma. Johnson insists, in
effect, that Jesus’ spiritual skeleton should not be disturbed but simply
reverently viewed in the narrative caskets that Matthew, Mark, Luke and John
provided. His edict cannot be enforced, however, without reducing gospel study
to rote repetition. Taken literally it would put an end not only to historical
reconstruction but to all preaching and exegesis as well, since the gospels
would have to be read as written without comment on one passage’s
importance or relation to other material either inside or outside that text. Even casual reading of the canonical
gospels shows that none of these authors was bound by the
"narrative controls" of previous accounts. For each has, in fact,
reconfigured the basic bits of Jesus’ words and deeds, inferred causality
and ascribed special significance to connections not made by the others, to
produce profiles of Jesus that are contradictory at key points. It is
the demonstrable narrative freedom of the gospel writers that created
the quest of the historical Jesus in the first place. If the synoptics
were controlled by a single "messianic pattern," as Johnson claims,
then everything they report would simply illustrate and reinforce the same
paradigm. But any unbiased reader of Mark and the other gospels --- a reader,
that is, who does not assume a priori that they all say more or less
the same thing --- can see that this is patently not the case. Rather, each
gospel reports sayings and deeds of Jesus which not only subvert the paradigms
championed by others but which stand in dialectical tension with the author’s
own profile of Jesus. H. S. Reimarus’ insight, that to
hear the original voice of Jesus, one has to distinguish his
viewpoint from that of later gospel writers, is just as cogent today as it was
two centuries ago: I find great cause to separate completely
what the apostles say in their own writings from that which Jesus himself
actually said and taught, for the apostles were themselves teachers and consequently
present their own views; indeed they never claim that Jesus himself said
and taught in his lifetime all the things that they have written./11/ The fact that many
passages in the gospels do not fit well within the narrative frames in which
they are now preserved not only justifies their separation but mandates
rearrangement in a tighter, more stable pattern that is closer to the
intrinsic logic of the mind that generated them. 1.3. Hermeneutical Honesty & Historical
Guarantees. Having adopted a historical method
that highlights distinctive patterns of Jesus’ voice and behavior, the
problem the Jesus Seminar now faces is how to expose the logic that motivated
him, without imposing an alien viewpoint. R.W. Funk has observed: The facts are meaningless unless
held in solution in some narrative or paradigm, some configuration that
makes them hang together, cohere./12/ But what is to
guarantee that a particular narrative or paradigm --- your reading or mine ---
is true to the original text? Not the text of Mark or some other gospel
writer, that is, but the fabric of a life woven in word and deed by Jesus
himself. For the restoration of this thread is what the historical quest is
all about. The bulk of the pieces we have to
work with are patterns Jesus himself constructed over an uncertain span
of time and space. But drawing the right connections is up to us. Funk
compares the nodes of historical data to dots on a page./13/
These unnumbered dots represent Jesus’ viewpoint; the
lines connecting them represent our insights. The first is an ancient fact;
the second is patently a modern fiction. If we were writing a novel, this
would present no problem. We could imitate Theissen in forewarning readers:
"Of course I have invented the narrative framework."/14/
Yet, to concede that history is the invention of the
historian is out of the question here, since this phase of the historical
quest was designed to sort out what probably happened at the generative
level of the Jesus tradition. Funk’s suggestion that Fellows
label the elements of their profiles "data" or "insight"
is an admirable adaptation of Theissen’s type of hermeneutical honesty to
the historical task. Most who have claimed to represent the real Jesus
--- whether in print or in pulpit --- deliberately blur the distinction
between given fact and interpretive fiction. Yet, Funk’s tactic only calls
attention to the problem of the hermeneutical circle. It does not circumvent
it. Nor does it provide others with a reason other than personal taste for
preferring a new insight over more traditional interpretations. A modern
historian’s profile of Jesus may appeal to some moderns more than
those sketched by first century authors. But the only truly historical
rationale for preferring the new profile of Jesus to the old is that --- in
spite of its apparent novelty --- it is demonstrably closer to the shadows
that Jesus himself cast. 2.1. The Paradigm Paradox: "Who
do you say I am?" Jesus has been described as a person
who defies classification --- a conclusion that anyone who has studied him is
bound to come to sooner or later. /15/ But
it is impossible to leave him at that, from either a historical or religious
perspective. For, despite the claims of Christian mystics, one can neither
understand nor relate to an enigma. The human mind cannot focus on the pieces
of any puzzle --- the Jesus tradition included --- without searching for a
pattern that ties them together. So the first step in drawing a historical
profile of Jesus is to find a functional paradigm that makes sense out of what
he probably said and did. (1) Search.
Recognition that inherited models of Jesus do not adequately
account for an essential portion of the primary data base is the engine that
started and continues to drive the historical quest. The shift of scholars
from one controlling paradigm to another --- from the classic Hellenistic
divine wonder-worker to Reimarus’ politically motivated Jewish messiah to
Schweitzer’s apocalyptic visionary to Bornkamm’s prophetic rabbi to an
iconoclastic itinerant Galilean sage (Theissen, Crossan, et al) --- is
due less to current cultural preferences than to a continuing conviction that Jesus
can be correctly understood only on his own terms. Although it is easy to demonstrate
that people unwittingly project their own shadows on Jesus --- or anyone else
for that matter ---, Schweitzer’s celebrated claim that "each epoch
found its reflection in Jesus; each individual created Him in accordance with
his own character" should be seen for what it is: a poetic exaggeration
that is more rhetoric than fact. /16/ Any
description of anything inevitably reflects the viewpoint and values of the
author rather than the subject. I describe things as I see them. But what
I see is not limited to my own reflection. Rather, I describe whatever draws
my attention: phenomena that both attract and repel, inspire and perplex.
Schweitzer himself is evidence that distortions of Jesus’ image are more
often due to latent hero worship than to historical research that
distinguishes Jesus’ perspective from one’s own. /17/ Reimarus’
principle is still the first commandment of scholars dedicated to the
historical quest: It is not to be assumed that Jesus
intended or strove for anything in his teaching other than what may be
taken from his own words./18/
The past two
centuries of debate have simply tightened the controls for pinpointing the
patterns of speech and action that reflect Jesus’ viewpoint rather than
those of others. Since it is always easier to recognize someone else’s
fictions than one’s own, our first task is to test whether the traditional
paradigms are adequate for understanding Jesus on his own terms. (2) Models.
The problem with the templates that have dominated the historical quest
thus far --- messiah, prophet, sage (and variants: "teacher" or
"rabbi") --- is that, while intrinsic to our sources, they are
uniformly extrinsic to Jesus’ own viewpoint. Although these models probably
echo characterizations of Jesus by contemporaries, they represent insights
by primitive admirers rather than patterns projected by Jesus himself.
They are, therefore, no more historically objective than characterizations of
Jesus by contemporary detractors --- e.g., "a glutton and a drunk, a pal
of toll collectors and sinners" (Matt. 11:19 // Luke 7:19) or "agent
of Beelzebul" (Mark 3:22 etc.)./19/ In
fact, the positive paradigms are more plausibly accounted for as reactions to
the negative, rather than the reverse. They are attempts by Jesus’
supporters to fit the unconventional, even scandalous, things that Jesus said
and did into social patterns defined by Jewish tradition: that is, to connect
prickly points of data with familiar positive lines of interpretation. Yet, the oldest narrative sources
illustrate the failure of traditional roles to account for Jesus’ pattern of
behavior. Both Mark and the Johannine signs source independently prove that
Jesus’ earliest fans could not find a positive paradigm that fit him
exactly. Instead of agreeing that Jesus’ performance followed a single
"messianic pattern" (as L. T. Johnson repeatedly alleges)/20/
the gospels preserve the residue of a primitive debate over
rival profiles of Jesus, anticipating the current phase of the Jesus Seminar
by almost two millennia. Was Jesus the Messiah (John 1:41,
Mark 8:29)? or
"the Prophet who is to come" (John 6:14,
Mark 6:15b)? or Elijah
(Mark 6:15a,
8:28c)?/21/ or even the
shade of John the Baptizer (Mark 6:14,
8:28b)? Mark subjects the idolizing christology of the most prominent pillars of the apostolic church (Peter,
James and John) to repeated ridicule as a failure to understand Jesus (Mark
8:33, 9:6,
10:38), while the fourth gospel has Jesus caustically castigate
admirers --- including his own mother (John 2:4) --- for expecting him to
reveal himself through some significant word or gesture. The primitive Christian solution to
the problem of dissimilarity between traditional messianic expectations and
the facts of Jesus’ life was to modify the messiah paradigm by melding it
with another traditional icon (Isaiah’s suffering servant) that better fit
Jesus’ fate, to produce a powerful paradox: a dying savior. Scholars since
Schweitzer, however, have generally abandoned the messianic model altogether
due to lack of reliable evidence that Jesus deliberately posed as a messiah of
any sort. It has long been conceded by most critically trained scholars that
messianic consciousness was a figment, not of Jesus’ own mind, but of the
minds of some of his early Jewish fans./22/
(3)
Hero? The same must now be said of the other
traditional paradigms, prophet and sage, which in one guise or another have
been favored in historical profiles of Jesus for the past half century./23/
The issue here is not whether one can find evidence to show
that Jesus had things in common with Amos or Jeremiah or Qoheleth or Hanina
ben Dosa or Diogenes of Sinope. It is, rather, whether Jesus wittingly
mimicked the social roles such men defined. Sages and prophets are, after all,
intellectual heroes and brokers of ultimate truth. They are readily admired by
liberal, bourgeois scholars and preachers like me. Such admiration has blinded
many historical questers --- myself included --- to the fact there is no solid
evidence that Jesus aspired to the respectable social status of any kind of
prophet or sage./24/
Jesus’
own sayings are evidence that he deliberately disavowed the type of admiration
that prophets and sages invite. The one prophetic allusion that can reliably
be traced to him is the impersonal observation that prophets in general lack
respect at home (Thomas 31:1, John 4:44,
Mark 6:4)./25/ Although
the context of this saying in canonical sources implies that it was an
indirect self-reference, it is important to note that the gospels are
unanimous in identifying Jewish crowds rather than Jesus himself as the source
of any explicit claim that he was a prophet (Mark 6:15,
8:28; John
6:14). Far from enhancing Jesus’ status as a prophet, Jesus’ impersonal
observation about prophetic reputations actually deflates it by pointing out
that he was not regarded as a prophet by those who knew him best. In
form this saying is a proverb, like Jesus’ less certain comment that stone
buildings are not eternal (Mark 13:2). Taken at face value both statements are
designed to counter unqualified awe in an imposing phenomenon with a
generalized observation about the relativity and impermanence of even the most
prominent person or thing. From a purely phenomenological
perspective, the style of Jesus’ sayings fits the paradigm of savant
better than prophet or messiah. The tentativeness of worldly grandeur is,
after all, a fundamental insight of classical wisdom. So, was Jesus really a
sage? We, like Josephus, may characterize him as such./26/ Yet,
the mere fact that Jesus used aphorisms to express pithy observations about
reality is still no guarantee that he would have accepted
classification as a sage. For the wine Jesus poured into the skins of
traditional wisdom was so volatile that it stretched the social mold of sage
beyond the breaking point. Like the most radical philosophers --- Socrates or
the Cynics --- he did not pose as a wise man. In fact, he warned people
to avoid the trappings of social respect enjoyed by scholars ---
including the fellows and academic critics of the Jesus Seminar../27/
By thanking God for hiding from sages what was
evident to infants (Luke 10:21 // Matt. 11:25), Jesus turned his wit against anyone
who pretended to be wise./28/ So it would
be ironic indeed if the author of this sentiment presented himself as a
sage of any stripe. (4) Social inversions.
The inverted social logic of many of the most clearly genuine Jesus
sayings is the basic reason for doubting that Jesus consciously identified
with the role of either prophet or sage. The Jesus who told people that God’s
basileia --- the office of the divine ruler --- belonged to paupers
(Luke 6:20, Thomas 54) or to youngsters (Mark 10:14b, Thomas 22:1) obviously
had a worldview that turned traditional social structures upside down./29/
Jesus, moreover, expressly identified with those at the
bottom of the social pyramid. At some point in his life he was a homeless
wanderer who could ironically quip that birds and foxes had a more secure
existence than he (Matthew 8:20 // Luke 9:53 // Thomas 86)./30/
And even as an adult, Jesus shamelessly referred to God with
childish familiarity as "Papa" --- Abba, that is (Mark 14:36;
Galatians 4:6)./31/ Instead of
self-consciously posing as mediator of ultimate truth and paradigm of social
virtue, he identified himself as a sibling of anyone who heeded the one
he acknowledged as Parent (Matthew 12:50,
Thomas 99:2)./32/
The author of these
sayings did not claim ontological, social, intellectual or moral superiority
over anyone. Jesus did not claim to be a hero and he steadfastly refused to
pose as mediator of anything. The only dignity he ascribed to himself was the
lot he shared with all other humans as offspring of Adam (and Eve): freedom to
wander at will (Matthew 8:20 // Luke 9:53 // Thomas 86) and to determine how
to spend his time even on the sabbath (Mark 2:27-28)./33/ At
an early date, admirers of Jesus misinterpreted indirect remarks that implied
he was a "son of God" or "son of Man" as exclusive titles
which exalted him above mere mortals. Paradoxically, however, these are the
paradigms that Jesus himself invoked as the lowest common denominators
to identify himself with fellow humans. Instead of claiming a favored position
for himself as "the firstborn among many brothers," as Paul
later characterized him (Romans 8:29), Jesus insisted that in Abba’s
family the last are given priority, while those who put themselves
first are sent to the end of the line (Matthew 20:16,
Mark 10:31)./34/
Thus, he could claim with unqualified hyperbole what
none of his supporters would have dared: that John the Baptist was the
greatest person who ever had a mother (Luke 7:28a // Matthew 11:11a). Yet, Jesus knew, in a household where
"Papa" is in charge, it is the smallest child rather than the
greatest that really matters (Luke 7:28b, Matthew 11:11b)./35/
Instead of characterizing the cosmic Parent that rules the
human household as a strict patriarch who cared for the obedient and
castigated the undisciplined, he represented God as a self-consistent Provider
who shed sunshine and rain on the unruly and upright alike (Matthew 5:45)./36/
Rather than describe his Abba’s realm as a heavenly
throne room more eternal than the loftiest redwood, Jesus whimsically likened
it to minuscule bits of organic matter in the cosmic kitchen: common mustard
weed (Thomas 20, Mark 4:30-32) or a fermenting scrap of sourdough (Luke
13:20-21, Matthew 13:33). Jesus himself did not shun the common
or even the corrupt. He neither withdrew from the uneducated masses nor
frequented the exclusive table-debates of the leading intellectuals of Jewish
culture --- the self-styled hakhamim (literally:
"sages"). On the contrary, his indiscriminate socializing invited
notoriety as a "pal of toll collectors and sinners" (Luke 7:34 //
Matthew 11:19). Instead of commending those who believed in him, he merely
congratulated anyone who did not take offense at his outlandish quips and
uncouth social behavior (Luke 7:23 // Matthew 11:6)./37/
Only in a
topsy-turvy world would Jesus’ behavior be thought to fit the definition of
a sage. In a status-conscious hierarchical society of either the first or
twenty-first century he was more likely to be regarded as a clown or a fool./38/
Like the family of Francis of Assisi twelve centuries later,
Jesus’ own relatives considered him insane (Mark 3:21). Most religious folk,
preachers, and biblical scholars today, if they ever met him, would
probably be inclined to agree. But those who embrace Jesus’ paradoxical
vision of God’s inverted priorities would concur with an equally paradoxical
Pharisee named Paul: that God’s fool was saner than any human sage (1 Cor.
1:25). (5) Jesus’ fiction.
What
we need then is a paradigm that does justice to Jesus’ intimacy with both
God and sinners, to both his sense of the human family and his
sensitivity to the social scandal his own behavior provoked; a paradigm
that is totally consistent with his vision of God’s paradoxical concern for
his most difficult child. A fiction? Certainly; yet a fiction that is as
durable and distinctive as anything Jesus said or did: a paradigm that was not
the figment of someone else’s mind, superimposed on him either before or
after his death. In order to reconstruct a historically reliable profile of
Jesus, what we need is a figure from Jesus’ own imagination: a fictive
character based on his personal experience. The prodigal son is the one ancient
prototype that makes perfect sense out of the surviving pieces of genuine
Jesus tradition, whose author is otherwise bound to seem more of a historical
oddity than the platypus: a comic Jewish Cynic. However close the latter may
come to an accurate profile of Jesus, it remains a composite sketch drawn at a
distance. Without eyewitness comparisons of Jesus to those deliberately
shameless social gadflies whom contemporaries derided as "doggies"
modern skeptics can easily challenge the historical plausibility of such a
subject. /39/ The prodigal, on the other
hand, is almost certainly a snapshot from Jesus’ own imagination, and thus
bound to be a better representation of his viewpoint than any
characterization of him by fan or foe./40/
My thesis --- that
Jesus is best profiled in one of the more disreputable figments of his own
imagination --- might be heresy in the eyes of both theological and literary
dogmatists. But, for now, it is the most promising vaccine against the
infectious human tendency to idolize Jesus or reinvent him in our own image.
The crucial historical question is whether Jesus found the model for the
anti-hero of his longest narrative parable in observation of someone else or
in personal experience of Abba’s treatment of himself. 2.2. The Parable Perplex: "You don’t
get this?" The past century of research into
Jesus’ sayings has confirmed the synoptic parables as the most reliable
selection of gospel logia for analyzing Jesus’ distinctive
perspective on the world. So, it is ironic that the parables have generally
been overlooked as the best reflection of Jesus’ personal experience./41/
B. B Scott has compensated for the "disappearance of
parables" in the most recent historical portraits of Jesus by presenting
them as a revolutionary poet’s window on an alternate world./42/
Without disputing that insight, I would argue that they are
also a mirror in which Jesus cast his reflections on his own interaction with
historical contemporaries. (1) Metaphor.
The
primary advance in parable interpretation in recent years has been the
conclusion of specialists that the graphic scenes Jesus plotted are understood
better as metaphor than as advice./43/ Measured
by conventional standards of justice and ethics, both the images and plots of
the bulk of Jesus’ parables range from the strange to the subversive,
especially when compared to first-century Jewish codes of social purity. Read
as metaphors for God’s imperium, however, --- the divine management
of a less than perfect human economy, that is --- most of the parables are
less problematic, at least for those who like myself prefer to think that the
Force which governs the universe is inclined to equilibrium rather than to the
survival of just the fittest. But, as J. D. Crossan astutely noted
in echoing Marianne Moore, as metaphor "a parable gives us
‘imaginary gardens with real toads in them.’"/44/
The point of metaphor is, after all, to invoke a
phenomenon within the auditor’s own experience that makes
something abstract or obscure as painfully tangible as a hot potato. Jesus’
imaginary gardens are loaded with real toads, warts and all. His parables
about leaven (Matt. 13:33 // Luke 13:20-21), a mustard granule (Thomas 20,
Mark 4:30-32) and a Samaritan (Luke 10:30-35) were framed for Palestinian Jews
with intimate experience of each. Only later goyim who had no
first-hand acquaintance with the pejorative connotations of such phenomena in
Jesus’ native culture could readily accept them as theological symbols
without raising an eyebrow. (2) Anti-heroes.
Except for classical satirists, Jesus was the first narrator to focus public
attention on the exploits of the anti-hero. The protagonists of several of his
longer narrative parables are particularly disreputable individuals whose role
in each respective plot shatters stereotypical thinking. Though preserved only
by a gentile scribe (Luke), these parables presuppose a completely Jewish
perspective./45/ But first-century
Palestinian Jews would be no more inclined to imagine the charitable behavior
of Jesus’ Samaritan than their twentieth-century descendants to fabricate
the story of a Nazi like Oskar Schindler. Without some cogent point of
reference in the real world either plot would strike a Jewish audience as a
totally incredible and politically perverse fantasy./46/
Likewise, the
incompetent manager who acts out of self-interest (Luke 16:1-8) and the
wayward son who wastes his inheritance (Luke 15:11-32) were probably just as
common in Jesus’ culture as they are, unfortunately, in ours. But the
experience of each of Jesus’ anti-heroes in escaping discipline by a higher
authority, though strikingly similar, is disturbingly unexpected in a culture
that demands social justice --- disturbing, that is, unless one sides with the
deviant. In other words, these narrative
parables are likely to have been dismissed as unworthy fantasy by Jesus’
contemporaries unless they were prepared to grant the reality of the toad in
each magic garden. To have functioned as a real metaphor the behavior of the
protagonist of any of these parables would have had to be as much a
recognizable phenomenon on the historical horizon of both author and audience
as the behavior of the sprouting mustard seed or the leavened dough. Lacking
reference to some third party, these parables must have been provoked by some
familiar element in the experience of Jesus, his audience or, most likely,
both. (3) Viewpoint.
We gospel scholars, as distant auditors, usually interpret the plots of the
parables as quasi-didactic fictions through which a clairvoyant Jesus
attempted to acquaint people with his vision of God’s relation to them.
But this just lets the shadow of the traditional view of Jesus as mediator,
teacher, sage in the back door. Non-literal instruction is instruction
nonetheless. Although Jesus may not have represented himself as the ultimate
broker of God’s basileia, he would have behaved as such, if he
formulated his parables to tell others what God meant for their lives.
As designer of these imaginary gardens he would, in effect, be identifying his
hearers as toads, calling attention to all their warts. As reader-response analyses of the
parables of the Samaritan, the unjust steward and the prodigal have often
pointed out, however, Jewish auditors --- ancient or modern --- would be less
likely to identify with the agent at the center of any of these plots than
with the passive bystanders in the margins: the mugged merchant lying flat on
his back in a ditch along the Jerusalem-Jericho highway, consumers who owe
more to a creditor than they could ever hope to repay, the dutiful son who
felt an injustice when his undisciplined sibling was honored instead. In each
case the face of the disreputable figure on whose behavior the parable hinges
remains blank. People in desperate straits, whose garden has lost its magic,
might be ready to entertain the notion that even a toad could serve as a
prince charming in disguise. But unless one materialized and acted as such,
the toad in each of these parables --- the helpful Samaritan, the
debt-canceling manager and the celebrated prodigal --- was bound to be
regarded as an improbable fantasy. Thus, the most plausible explanation
of Jesus’ penchant for casting disreputable figures in the leading roles of
his narrative parables is that these fictions reflect to some extent his
own experience and notorious behavior. In spite of modern literary critics’
protests to the contrary, authors --- ancient or modern --- inevitably project
their own experiences into the characters and scenes they imagine. Poets,
after all, are as much subject to quantum physics as historians. The personal
perspective of any artist invariably sets the field of vision of all he or she
portrays. (4) Transactional
analysis. As poetry, a parable, like other art, is born as a
creative reaction to a set of stimuli in the artist’s own experience; so it
inevitably retains traces of the artist’s encounter with particular
phenomena. Since the phenomena depicted in parables function as metaphors,
however, a modern attempt to reconstruct a parable’s originating pretext
in Jesus’ experience might seem an exercise in pure speculation. For art is
not bound to the artist’s studio but may be rehung almost anywhere. Yet, no
picture can hang in a void. The hermeneutical consequence of refusal to
retrace a parable’s roots within Jesus’ personal horizons, is to let it be
transplanted into an imaginary garden designed by someone else: the author of
a synoptic gospel or some latter day interpreter like you or me. Funk was
right to insist that as poetic speech no parable can be reduced to a single
fixed point./47/ Every metaphor comes
with as many handles as there are hearers. But the identification of a
particular set of metaphors as parables of Jesus of Nazareth is a historical
judgment that presupposes probable historical grounds for claiming they are
the product of the imagination of this individual rather than some other. Like
any claim of historical authenticity those grounds require reconstruction. Since speech is inherently
transactional, reconstruction of a dialog is possible and justified when ---
as in the reconstruction of ancient manuscripts ---the missing elements are
suggested by the vocabulary and logic of the lines that have
been preserved. A hypothetical pretext for one of Jesus’ parables can be
considered probable when it is supported by other documented evidence:
biographical data or verbal challenges that Jesus’ supporters are not apt to
have fabricated. Moreover, the validity of the reconstructed transaction can
be tested further and confirmed by its coherence with standards of social
interaction advocated by Jesus himself. Three principles that are particularly
relevant here are "love your enemies" (Matt. 5:44 // Luke 6:27),
"turn the other cheek" (Matt 5:39 // Luke 6:29)
and "take the timber out of your own eye" before attempting to remove a
speck from a sibling’s (Thomas 26)./48/ The author
of these sayings was obviously dedicated to creative, non-abrasive strategies
of social interaction. Since these striking injunctions are traceable to
Jesus, a reconstruction of Jesus’ verbal transactions that illustrates them
is historically more probable than one that does not. (5) Ironic repartée.
Jesus’ quips --- about a wedding party fasting (Mark 2:19); the healthy
needing a doctor (Mark 2:17); harvesting grapes from thorns (Matt. 7:16 //
Thomas 45:1); blind leading the blind (Luke 6:39 // Thomas 34); or a camel
passing through a needle (Mark 10:25) --- amply demonstrate his mastery in
invoking familiar phenomena to get others to recognize the absurdity of a
scene. They are rapier thrusts of a sharp wit to win a point not easily
parried. The same ironic wit is evident in the
plots of Jesus’ parables. As verbal illustrations, parables usually
originate as a response to verbal stimuli: supporters’ questions or skeptics’
challenges. It is a historical fact that certain socially precise Jews branded
Jesus a pariah. It is also a fact that Jesus’ longer narrative parables
create imaginary gardens that reveal the behavior of such social toads to be
benign. These stories turn slander into magic. Thus, a positive twist in a
scandalous scenario is a good sign that the parable was created as Jesus’
retort to an opponent’s slur. Slander is often cast in socially
pejorative images. An excellent example of the type of repartée that graphic
invective invites is found in the synoptic story of Jesus’ encounter with a
Lebanese woman (Mark 7:24-30 // Matt 15:21-28)./49/ Jesus
at first refuses the foreigner’s request for aid by invoking a table
metaphor about the inappropriateness of throwing children’s food to
"dogs" (Mark 7:27)./50/ Instead
of disputing the demeaning canine image, the woman seizes it to turn Jesus’
logic against himself, by pointing out that dogs get to eat the children’s
scraps (Mark 7:28). Thus, in this case at least, a parabolic plot was
suggested by verbal sparring. Jesus’ concluding commendation of his female
opponent for getting the better of him makes this sparring match a scene that
is not easily dismissed as a fabrication by some fan of Jesus like Mark. A Jesus who formulated metaphors to
thrust could just as easily seize them to parry./51/ This
element of creative repartée, which is usually ignored in parable
interpretation, is what makes the narrative parables ideal nodes for
reconstructing a historical profile of Jesus: not as literal descriptions of
his life but as metaphors suggested by situations he actually encountered. (a) Creative debt
management. The parable of the manager who was fired for
incompetence (Luke 16:1-8) is particularly perplexing when viewed as a
pedagogical metaphor for either social ethics or divine action in general./52/
For the image of a boss commending the unprofitable behavior
of an employee who had just been dismissed for wasteful management is a
metaphor designed to undermine any economy. But the point of this parable becomes
transparent when read dialectically, as Jesus’ retort to critics of his own
behavior. It is certain that Jesus was himself accused of sloppy accounting in
his social relationships, for no fan would have caricatured him as "a pal
of toll collectors and sinners" (Matt. 11:19 // Luke 7:34;
Mark 2:16)./53/
Almost as certainly, Jesus assured debtors that they could
avoid the ultimate bill collector simply by not collecting what was owed
them (Matt. 6:12,
18:23-35). This is exactly what the dismissed manager does
during his last days on the job. Rather than pick up the gauntlet by
protesting his innocence and slapping his accusers with libel charges, the
parable’s protagonist simply acknowledges his limitations and makes the most
out of the options available in the time he has left. Similarly, instead of
challenging his critics’ charge of incompetence, Jesus simply appropriates
it to validate his questionable behavior in discounting the debts of others.
Thus, the parable of the incompetent but shrewd manager paints a connection
between these two facts: a line not invented by any modern scholar but drawn
by Jesus himself. The parable of the disreputable
manager can, therefore, be cited as evidence that Jesus actually lived by his
precept of turning the other cheek (Matt 5:39 // Luke 6:29). Instead of
striking back, Jesus disarms his opponent by exposing his own vulnerability.
It is a vulnerability that the opponent cannot exploit without shaming
himself, since he issued the charge of incompetence in the first place. Funk’s
description of the function of Jesus’ parables in general is especially true
in a dialectical situation like this, where the controlling metaphor was
probably proposed by Jesus’ opponent: They present a world the listener
recognizes, acknowledges. Then he is caught up in the dilemma of the
metaphor: it is not his world after all!/54/
The opponent
presumes to dictate the terms by which the real world is judged. Jesus’
parable restructures that world by showing that a generous, non-judgmental
lord is actually in control. (b) Suspect savior.
The parable of the Samaritan also fits better in a dialectical context
than in a didactic one. The primary problem with the traditional
interpretation of this story as a lesson in neighborliness is that only a
Samaritan audience would be in position to take it this way. For Luke
presupposes that the auditor is supposed to imitate the agent in the parable
who showed compassion on the victim. Having just finished portraying Jesus’
chief disciples as invoking a heavenly holocaust on a Samaritan village that
did not offer them hospitality (Luke 9:51-56), Luke knew full well the
animosity between Jews and Samaritans. So, if he designed this parable
to fit his narrative context, the identity of the characters would have been
inverted. For he introduces the parable as Jesus’ response to a Jewish
lawyer’s question: "Who is my neighbor?" (Luke 10:29); and
he concludes with Jesus telling him: "Go and do the same yourself"
(10:37). Thus, the parable would conform to Luke’s narrative horizons only
if the fictive benefactor were a Jew and the victim of the mugging a
Samaritan. If any Jews heard another Jew portray a Samaritan in the
role of benefactor they would accuse the speaker of siding with the enemy. This is, in fact, a charge that the
fourth gospel claims Jesus himself faced from erstwhile Judean supporters:
"Aren’t we right to say that you are a Samaritan and
demon-possessed" (John 8:31, 48)./55/ Such
a venomous description is hardly likely to have been fabricated by any later
fan of Jesus, especially the author of the gospel in which Jesus calls a
Samaritan woman a theological ignoramus for not recognizing that
"salvation is from the Judeans" (John 4:22). While the fourth
evangelist has Jesus dismiss the idea that he is motivated by a malevolent
spirit, it is noteworthy that he does not deny the Samaritan label
(John 8:49). This omission is hardly evidence that author of the fourth gospel
thought Jesus was literally a Samaritan or let the label stick to curry
Samaritan support for Jesus. For Jesus’ alleged response shows an acute
awareness that the intent of this epithet was to defame him. The ultimate shame for a
first-century Palestinian Jew was to be branded a Samaritan by compatriots.
Josephus reports that Jews charged with kosher or sabbath
violations often found refuge in Samaria./56/ So,
there is good historical evidence that religious Judeans were apt to label a
non-conformist Galilean a "Samaritan," especially one from a village
near the Samaritan border, like Nazareth, who claimed that nothing
ingested could defile a person (Mark 7:15) and that the human being per se
was "lord" of the sabbath (Mark 2:27-28)./57/
What is
historically suspect about the scenario in John 8 is not the hostile epithet
ascribed to some Jews, but rather Jesus’ alleged provocation. If Jesus
called fellow Jews offspring of "the father of lies" (John 8:44),
then they were justified in characterizing him as an ethnic blood-enemy. But
the voice that characterized Jews as "children of the devil" is
probably that of a non-Jewish gospel writer rather than the historical Jew,
Yeshu of Nazareth. For it is totally incompatible with Jesus’ self-critical
caution to rid one’s own vision of flaws before focusing on someone else’s
faults (Thom 26). Jesus’ parable of the Samaritan, on
the other hand, is a perfect, non-aggressive retort to a Jewish charge of
heresy, which is, after all, the valence of the label "Samaritan" in
a story told by a Jew to fellow Jews. The "neighbors" chosen for the
main roles in this plot are parties to a longer rivalry than the Montagues and
Capulets. But, like Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, Jesus’ story of a
Samaritan in Judean territory spotlights a scene where common humanity
momentarily triumphs over blood feud. Since the Jewish merchant just lies
there, the point of the parable is not to tell Jews how to behave or to try to
make them trust Samaritans in general, but to assure them that a particular
"Samaritan," whom they regarded as a dangerous heretic, was really
their friend. Drawing a dialectical connection from
Jesus’ parable of the Samaritan to Judeans who characterized Jesus himself
as such provides indirect evidence that Jesus treated even his harshest
critics with love (Luke 6:27). If Jesus called those who characterized him as
an enemy "liars," he would only have proven them right. Instead, he
takes them at their word. Whether Jesus was an observant full-blooded Jew or
not is irrelevant here. The fact is: some other Jews saw him as a heretic.
Hence, they were not lying in characterizing him as such. To prove that
their perception was wrong, Jesus accepted the Samaritan slur without
blinking, but then went on to tell his Jewish accusers a story in which one
such character went out of his way to save a destitute Judean. Jesus did not
shun contact with destitute Jews who were ritually unclean any more than did
the stranger in this parable. Thus, his story of this enemy as rescuer was
probably designed to help Judeans see his own disregard for canons of purity
in a more favorable light. (c) Problem child.
If the benefactor toads in the previous pair of
parables were designed by Jesus as self-profiles drawn from his detractors’
point of view, then the prodigal son is an even more transparent disguise. The prodigal was impatient, asking
his father for an immediate share of his estate (Luke 15:13). Likewise,
Jesus demanded his Papa’s domain (Luke 11:2), confident that whatever he
requested would be granted. /58/ Unlike the
cautious servant in another parable (Matt. 25:14-30 // Luke 19:12-26), the
prodigal does not keep his capital but, rather, exhausts it with a
nonconservative lifestyle (zon asotos) among outsiders (Luke
15:14). Jesus himself mocked efforts to preserve life (Luke 17:33) or
property (Luke 12:16-21) and perplexed conservative Jews by fraternizing
with those they regarded as riffraff (Mark 2:16)./59/
The prodigal
provokes his dutiful brother to issue a contemptuous denunciation:
"that son of yours devoured your living with prostitutes"
(Luke 15:30). Jesus too was caricatured as a shameless libertine ---
"A glutton and a drunk! A pal of toll collectors and sinners!"
(Luke 7:34 // Matt. 11:35) --- and assured conservative critics that toll
collectors and prostitutes had a prior claim on his Papa’s estate
(Matt. 21:31)./60/
The prodigal’s
homecoming prompts his father to celebrate with a feast (Luke 15:23-24).
Jesus
regarded the present as a time to celebrate, brashly comparing his
own presence to a bridegroom (Mark 2:19) and his Father to a person who
threw a dinner party for everyone (Thomas 64)./61/
The prodigal’s
sober brother stayed outside the celebration for his disreputable sibling
(Luke 15:28). Likewise, Jesus’ brothers remained outside the circle of
those who idolized him (Mark 3:31-32
// Thomas 99) --- until after his
death (Acts 1:14)./62/
The prodigal’s
brother is portrayed as a dutiful, self-righteous son who can tell his
father without fear of contradiction: "I never once disobeyed any of
your orders" (Luke 15:29). Jesus’ brother Ya’akov (James) was
nicknamed "the Righteous" (Thomas 12:2; Eusebius Eccles. Hist.
2.23.4-7) and was held in high repute by "those who were strict in
keeping the laws" (Josephus Antiquities 20.200-201)./63/
Any of these
parallels alone could be regarded as figments in the mind of this modern
reader that were not intended by the original tale spinner (Jesus). But their
number and the fact that they have been tightly woven into the most complex and
most realistic of Jesus’ stories, which Luke presents as explanation of
Jesus’ own behavior, prevents easy dismissal as unintentional coincidences. (d) Allegory or
autobiography? The very length and
realistic dramatic development of the plot of the prodigal puts it in a class
by itself as reflecting more of the world as Jesus imagined it than any other
saying. The basic plot---a father’s benevolent concern for all his children,
the bad seed as well as the good---makes it a perfect illustration of Jesus’
uncommon aphorism envisioning the morally blind impartiality of divine
providence (Matt 5:45//Luke 6:35); and the fact that the parable’s
characters cohere more to the Matthean form of that Q aphorism than to the Lukan indicates that it is probably not the product of Luke’s own
imagination. Moreover, recognition of a healthy dose of Jesus’
autobiographical input in the construction of this parable resolves problems
that have long perplexed scholars regarding its structure and focus and avoids
the temptation to allegorize both cast and plot. As an author, Jesus had to get the
inspiration for his characters from somewhere. Although the motif of sibling
rivalry between a father’s sons over the inheritance was a familiar mytheme
in Jewish tradition, the characterization of the sons in this parable is not
based on any standard Hebrew story. Instead of shrewdly cheating his older
brother out of his birthright (like Jacob) or rising to power in a foreign
land (like Joseph), the younger son is portrayed as a self-indulgent problem
child who irresponsibly squanders his patrimony and is reduced to degraded
circumstances in an alien setting. Though his return may occasion a
celebration, it does not prompt the father to declare the younger son
his heir or strip the understandably jealous elder son of his favored status.
Since the interaction of characters in this parable does not conform to
traditional Jewish mythemes it is better explained as a reflection of the
world that the author personally experienced or at least deemed possible. Moreover, the narrator who created
this plot had to have some motivation for developing it in such detail. If
the point of this parable was simply to illustrate the father’s joy in the
return of the prodigal, the character of the elder son and the conclusion
would be superfluous. The lost sheep or lost coin (Luke 15:4-6,
8-9) make that
point better. If the original intent was to shame critics of Jesus’
association with sinners (Luke 15:1-2), then the father’s concluding
assurance that the elder son is his eternal companion and heir (Luke 15:31) is
an inappropriate punch line./64/ If
the author of this story were Paul, then it might be passed off as an allegory
of all God’s children, with the elder brother personifying Israel and the
younger, the goyim. But the scenario and dénouement preclude
such an application./65/ At first glance,
Luke’s fictional setting suggests a plausible allegorization of persona in
this parable within Jesus’ world (prodigal = sinners; brother = Pharisees).
Yet, the blocking of the brothers’ roles and the father’s dialog are still
strangely out of sync. The prodigal returns on his own initiative. Luke, on
the other hand represents sinners as responding to Jesus’ initiative (Luke
5:32, 19:10). The dutiful brother is assured that he is his Father’s eternal
companion and heir, while Luke characterizes the Pharisees as
"moneygrubbers" (Luke 16:14) whose self-righteous prayers are
rejected by God (Luke 18:10-14). The difficulty in making the structure and
details of this parable match Jesus’ message or Sitz im Leben, has
led some scholars to suggest it has been rewritten. Since its characters and
plot are not typically Lukan constructs, however, it is more likely that the
original point of the story of the prodigal has eluded interpreters to date. Taken at face value the parable of
the prodigal is a drama about the resolution of family tensions. One need look
no further than Jesus’ own family to find his inspiration for this plot. The
story has been designed to reduce a dutiful son’s resentment regarding the
fuss being made over a disreputable younger brother. This parable neither
favors the prodigal, nor rehabilitates his reputation nor censors his older
brother. On the contrary, by conceding the latter’s perception of his
impetuous sibling’s folly (Luke 15:30) it focuses on getting the
firstborn to join the party by assuring him of his father’s constant
favor. So, the most likely auditor for whom Jesus crafted this story is his
own brother James, who emerged as undisputed leader of the Jerusalem-based
wing of the Jesus movement soon after his controversial sibling’s death./66/
An autobiographical
interpretation of this parable, with the father’s two sons as fictionalized
versions of Jesus and James, is the simplest solution to the perplexing
problem of accounting for the unique features of its composition. One does not
have to resort to forced or imperfect allegorizations to recognize Jesus as
model for the disreputable venturer and James the Just as prototype of his
self-righteous brother./67/ One need only
concede that the traditional christologically motivated characterizations of
Jesus as "firstborn" and "the holy one" are not
biographical facts. The fact that this parable concludes
without indicating the older son’s response is evidence that it was composed
before Jesus’ own brothers decided to associate with those who
celebrated Jesus’ presence. B. B Scott notes that this most intricate plot
of all of Jesus’ parables has been left without a proper ending./68/
The simplest explanation of this fact is that the author
composed it as an open invitation and was awaiting his big brother’s reply.
At a later date, during James’ presidency, this invitation could have been
used as an olive branch to Pharisees (like Paul) and other law-abiding Jews,
as the setting in Luke suggests. In any case, the fact that this parable
focuses on persuading a brother who is standing outside to come in makes it a
logical sequel to the scene in which Jesus’ own brothers (and mother) are
described as outsiders (Mark 3:31-35 //
Thomas 99). The author of the parable of the
prodigal was more concerned with restoring personal relationships than his own
reputation. In characterizing himself as the disreputable son, Jesus once
again concedes his critic’s pejorative caricature of him. /69/
In not censoring his elder brother’s jealousy he
demonstrates his commitment to his own principle of reconciliation: focus on
your own flaws rather than those of your brother (Thomas 26). Modern fans who
cling to a historically distorted reputation for Jesus that was concocted by
ancient partisans who never understood this witty self-effacing Jew may fail
to find the historical Jesus’ own profile in this uncensored fiction
designed to overcome alienation between two brothers. But it provides the best
model for making a coherent reconstruction of many of the other unquestionably
genuine pieces of the Jesus puzzle. It remains to be determined, however,
whether the line between the story of the prodigal and its creator is limited
to stylized character icons or whether it involves more precise
autobiographical insights into Jesus’ self-image. 3.1. The Baptizer’s Successor: "Are
You the One?" While the character of the prodigal
son bears unmistakable similarities to unvarnished glimpses of Jesus scattered
through the gospels, the plot of this parable does not follow the
outline of Jesus’ career made familiar by the synoptics. Anyone who
recognizes that Jesus had a rather shady reputation among decent first century
Jews might be prepared to grant that he based the description of this
disreputable son on his own public image. But the career paths of creator and
creature do not appear to be at all parallel. The impetuous prodigal starts by
earning a scandalous reputation but is reduced to penitence. The synoptic
account of Jesus’ public career, on the other hand, starts when Jesus leaves
a preacher of repentance (John) to return to his homeland where he begins to
act up, scandalizing his family and Pharisees by flaunting his freedom from
all religious regulations. In the parable the father’s celebration is
occasioned by his wayward offspring’s return to the relatively sober
discipline of the family fold. Jesus’ celebration was not with his
biological family but rather with toll collectors and sinners. Since the
synoptic account of Jesus’ homecoming is diametrically opposite the plot of
this parable, cautious scholars can be excused for not immediately conceding
that the prodigal is a reliable self-portrait of Jesus. The discrepancy between the scenarios
of parable and gospels is a cogent objection to the historicity of the plot of
the prodigal, however, only if the chronology of the synoptic accounts
proved to be historically reliable. But this is hardly the case./70/
Matthew, Mark and Luke are certainly mistaken in describing
a Sanhedrin trial and Jesus’ execution during Pesach./71/
So, if their chronology of the climax of Jesus’ career is
unreliable, how can their sequence of events at its beginning be trusted? If
the Passion narrative is demonstrably a christological construct,/72/
are the gospel accounts of Jesus’ inaugural appearance any
less so? The introduction of Jesus career
after the conclusion of John the Baptizer’s has clearly been shaped by
sectarian propaganda./73/ John was a
highly visible and influential Jewish folk hero whose charismatic reputation
almost certainly preceded and overshadowed the public career of Jesus./74/
Jesus himself granted John’s superior social stature (Luke
7:28a // Matt. 11:11a; Thomas 46)./75/ The
synoptic authors even conceded that some Jews tended to regard Jesus as a
carbon copy of John (Mark 6:15,
8:28). Jesus’ partisans, on the other hand,
identified Jesus as John’s greater successor./76/ Thus,
it is hardly surprising that all the gospels (except Thomas) introduce Jesus
only after citing the Baptizer’s prediction that his successor will
be far more powerful than he (Mark 1:7-8; Luke 3:16 // Matt. 3:11; John
1:26-27). Since the synoptic narrative sequence
has been dictated by christological propaganda rather than reliable
biographical data it cannot be invoked to disprove an autobiographical basis
of the parable of the prodigal. The Markan outline is an obvious author’s
fiction, with incidents arranged by motif rather than historical causality.
The literary refinements of Matthew and Luke disguise but fail to alter the
artificial character of the synoptic sequence. Chronological indicators
provided by Mark and his editors are simply products of redactional activity./77/
None of the anecdotes that the synoptics string together to
develop their portraits of Jesus contain built-in markers to indicate their
original order. They are reported after the stories of Jesus’ baptism
and John’s arrest simply to illustrate the theological thesis that Jesus was
John’s greater successor who initiated a baptism with a holy spirit. But
that very thesis poses problems that undermine the credibility of the synoptic
"narrative controls."/78/ 3.2. The Markan Conundrum:
"What are folks saying about me?" The chronology of Jesus’ relation
to John the Baptist in the synoptic narratives is intertwined with the
question of Jesus’ public reputation. Mark opens his gospel of Jesus the
Messiah (1:1) by implicitly equating the Baptizer with Elijah (1:2-6). Jesus’
initial appearance is fleeting. A brief post-baptismal vision, in which the
narrator tells the reader that Jesus saw the holy spirit alight on him,
(1:10) drives Jesus offstage into the wilderness from which John emerged
(1:12). John’s arrest provides the cue for Mark to recall Jesus to center
stage (1:14). The Elijah motif is introduced again when Jesus’ own
"reputation had become well known" (6:14). The Markan narrator
reports that "some" anonymous fans of Jesus "spread the rumor
that he was Elijah" or some other prophet (6:15). Herod Antipas,
however, is alleged to have identified Jesus as John redivivus (6:16),
which leads Mark to present a lurid flashback detailing the circumstances of
John’s execution (6:17-28). Only when the headless Baptizer is entombed
(6:29) does Jesus start to act as John’s successor, since the Jewish
mob is now compared to a shepherdless flock (6:34). Yet, in Mark’s report,
no one --- neither the Jewish people nor Jesus’ own disciples --- apparently
gets any significance from Jesus’ repeated feeding of thousands in
the wilderness (6:35-44,
8:1-9) or in gathering symbolic sums (12 & 7
baskets) of remnants (8:16-21). Still, when asked about Jesus’ public
reputation (8:27), the disciples report the same string of paradigms (John,
Elijah, prophet) that the narrator introduced two chapters earlier (8:28 //
6:15-16). Matthew makes only minor adjustments in this scenario, while Luke
edits out some of Mark’s more politically loaded segments. The odd thing about this sequence is
that Mark reports nothing to account for Jesus’ alleged public
reputation. On the contrary, the pericopes Mark inserts between his reports of
John’s arrest (1:14) and execution (6:16) sharply distinguish Jesus from the
ascetic herald of repentance who practiced the most rigid standards of
personal purity. John preached repentance as precondition of forgiveness of
sins (1:4)./79/ As Mark tells it, Jesus
was accused of blasphemy for presuming to forgive sins (2:6-7) and shocked
purity-minded Pharisees by dining with sinners (2:16) without once suggesting
that any "sinner" need repent of anything./80/ John
is portrayed as an extreme ascetic (1:6) whose disciples observed ritual fasts
(2:18)./81/ Mark spotlights Jesus as
dinner guest of secular types (2:15-16) who cites his mere presence to justify
his disciples’ deviance from religious abstinence (2:18-19). John was
unquestionably "an upright and holy man" (6:20), whom the gospels
claim characterized his successor as agent of an even more thorough-going
spiritual purgation (1:8). Though Jesus was introduced by Mark as a
charismatic exorcist (1:23), his public reputation was anything but pure./82/
Mark has a single foul spirit declare Jesus holy,
only to be silenced (1:24-25). Everything else that Mark reports about the
inaugural phase of Jesus’ public career portrays him as a social deviant who
repeatedly initiated contact with those whom Jews normally regarded as impure,
leading Judean scholars to regard Jesus as an agent of the chief demon (3:22)./83/ The problem with
Mark’s scenario is not its discontinuity between the profiles of Jesus and
John. Q preserved sayings that paint the respective behavior and messages of
these figures in even bolder contrasting colors (Luke 7:31-35,
16:16)./84/
Rather, it is Mark’s timing that is historically dubious. If
Jesus began to deviate from the orthopraxis of John and other
Torah-minded Jews after John’s arrest, he would have been rightly
labeled a renegade and no Jew would ever have confused Jesus with John, much
less regard him as John’s greater successor. Only if Jesus’ shady
reputation was earned prior to his association with the Baptizer could
his supporters hope to convince other Jews that Jesus was a credible candidate
to fill the leadership void created by John’s execution. The simplest
explanation of the gospels’ campaign to present Jesus as John’s greater
successor is that there were many who supported John who, from the moment that
John was arrested, had serious doubts that Jesus was fit to fill or even tie
his sandals. The chief historical flaw in the
"narrative controls" of Mark and the other synoptics is that the logical
sequence of profiles in Q (first John, then Jesus) has been historicized by
introducing all accounts of Jesus’ activity only after John’s has ceased.
The practice of describing Jesus’ behavior after John’s can be traced to
the logion about children in the marketplace, which concludes with this
rhetorical contrast (Matthew 11:18-19 // Luke 7:33-34): Just remember, John
appeared on the scene neither eating [bread] nor drinking [wine]; and you
say: "He is demented!" Mark apparently based the outline of
his first two chapters on this rhetorical pattern and Matthew and Luke simply
followed suit. Thus, in the synoptic gospels chreiae commemorating Jesus’
scandalous behavior are set after his baptism without ever accounting for his
baptism in the first place. It is virtually certain that Jesus
was baptized by John./85/ Since John’s
baptism was linked to his call for repentance, then Jesus most probably
submitted to baptism as a sign that he was penitent./86/ If
Jesus did penance, then his previous behavior was admittedly deviant
from the social norms of Judaic religious tradition. In that case, the paths
of Jesus and the prodigal are perfectly parallel. Thus, the plot of this
parabolic fiction reflects Jesus’ own life journey better than the narrative
structure of any gospel. 3.3. Matrix for a Message: "Where’s
he getting this?" Beyond its ability to act as a
corrective of romantic idealization of Jesus and literalistic reading of the
synoptic narratives, the parable of the prodigal has one distinct advantage
over other paradigms for reconstructing a historical profile of Jesus: it
portrays a very human person rather than an abstract type. The prodigal son is
the only character in the synoptic narratives (including Jesus) who undergoes
existentially plausible psychological development. A brash youth prematurely
sets out to establish his own fortune. Free from family discipline, his
optimism turns him into a bon vivant. Still fiercely independent when
hard times come, he struggles to survive without parental support until
he compares his present lot to those back home. Stripped of his arrogance and
self-assurance, he returns with no pretense of being better than anyone else,
only to be overwhelmed by the generous reception of a parent of whom he felt
unworthy to be heir. Finally, he is really free to celebrate, not his own
achievements but the amazing tolerance of a provider who cares for both
the rebellious and the pious. At last he sees that his father’s house
is an open house that has room even for his hostile sibling. This sketch of the prodigal’s
experience that calls him to his senses is the matrix that makes
historical sense out of the most distinctive features of Jesus’ own message.
Use of the description of the evolution of the protagonist of this parable to
account for parallels in Jesus’ own outlook and behavior is historically
sound, since both are products of the same mind. Jesus’ insight into the
psychology of the prodigal offers a window into his own mental processes. It
explains not only his scandalous reputation but his self-effacing humility and
amazing tolerance of scathing criticism. It makes sense out of both his
identification with homeless paupers and his optimistic confidence that
God feeds those who lack a barn or bank account. It paints a backdrop that
makes his injunction to love enemies intelligible. And, above all, it provides
a clue for solving the greatest of historical puzzles: how this wayward
prodigal son of Israel could have been ultimately promoted by decent
law-abiding Jews like James and Saul of Tarsus to the status of model son and
heir to their common Father’s heritage. 3.4. Rescripting scripture: applying Jesus’
narrative control As a product of Jesus’ imagination,
the plot of the parable of the prodigal son provides a more reliable template
for reconstructing Jesus’ own early career than any gospel narrative. Of
course, the details of the fictive narrative are not literal autobiography
and, therefore, defy historicization. But this parable offers a glimpse of
experiences Jesus had prior to the redemption of his social reputation after
his baptism. Charges that Jesus caroused with irreligious types ("toll
collectors and sinners") were probably the baggage that he brought with
him in his own "homecoming" to John. He neither attempted to deny
these charges nor claimed moral stature comparable to that of the Baptizer.
Thus, the parabolic celebration for the return of the wayward son provides a
more accurate insight into the existential impact of Jesus’ baptismal
experience than the synoptic accounts of his post-baptismal vision. Far from
being an egocentric revelation that he was God’s uniquely favored son, for
Jesus the experience of his own unconditional reacceptance into his paternal
heritage was more likely the catalyst that convinced him that the God of
Israel was not a harsh judge who held sinners accountable but a benign
provider who invited all offspring to join the party. The advantage of this historical
scenario over a literalistic reading of the synoptic narratives is that it is
able to account for evidence that, despite a public reputation, social message
and theological vision which were almost diametrically opposed to John’s, it
was Jesus rather than the Baptizer who became the center of a Jewish baptizing
movement that expanded to include even gentile sinners. If one adopts Mark’s
narrative controls in reconstructing a profile of Jesus, it is difficult to
explain how any Jew could ever have identified Jesus as a prophet, much less
the Messiah. If one follows Matthew’s narrative controls, is hard to see why
religious Jews would have scorned Jesus as a social deviant. While Luke’s
narrative addresses both problems, his profile of Jesus’ social tolerance
does not account for claims that Jesus was heir to John. Though the plot of
the parable of the prodigal son does not provide a template for integrating
all historical facts in the Jesus puzzle, it presents a more cogent paradigm
than any gospel that identifies Jesus as God’s holy one for profiling a son
of Israel who spawned a movement focused on getting all God’s children, the
dutiful and the prodigal alike, to celebrate together. /1/
The Historical Jesus: Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant, p. 426. /2/
"The Issue of Jesus," FORUM 1,1 (March 1985), p. 12. /3/
The Latin verb fingo, fingere, finxi, fictum, while often carrying
purely aesthetic connotations of decoration or entertainment, was also used to
describe the sober tools of education that were "formed by
instruction," to teach or train (Lewis & Short, Latin Dictionary,
p. 751). /4/
"For all the accounts of Jesus contain a constructive element which goes
beyond the data contained in the sources. Historical imagination with its
hypotheses creates an ‘aura of fictionality’ around the figure of Jesus,
just like the religious imaginations of earlier Christianity. For in both
cases a creative power of imagination is at work, sparked off by the same
historical figure (Theissen and Merz, Historical Jesus, p.13). /5/
The Real Jesus:
The Misguided Quest for the Historical Jesus and the Truth of the Traditional
Gospels, pp. 167, 141. /6/
The Real Jesus,
p. 167 (italics author’s; boldface mine). /8/ Whether one
accepts the conclusion of most modern gospel scholars that Matthew is a
revision of Mark or not, it is Matthew who explicitly endorses scholarly
revision of treasured texts by ascribing this analogy to Jesus: "Every
scholar who is schooled in Heaven’s imperial rule is like some proprietor
who produces from his storeroom treasures new and old" (Matt. 13:52).
/9/ Theissen and
Merz, Historical Jesus, p. 13. /10/ The Real
Jesus, pp. 124-125 (italics author’s; boldface mine).
/11/
"Concerning the Intention of Jesus and his Teaching" § 3 in C. H.
Talbot ed., Reimarus: Fragments, p. 64 (italics mine).
/12/ Poetics of
Biblical Narrative, p. 300. /13/ "Profiles
of Jesus: A Protocol," The Fourth R 8/5-6 (Sept.-Dec. 1995), p. 22.
/14/ Shadow of the
Galilean, p. 1.
/15/ E.g., A.
Schweitzer, Quest of the Historical Jesus: "The historical Jesus will be
to our time a stranger and an enigma" (p. 397); "We can find no
designation which expresses what He is for us. He comes to us as One unknown,
without a name, as of old, by the lakeside, He came to those who knew Him
not" (p. 401).
/16/ Quest of the
Historical Jesus, p. 4. W. Wink extended Schweitzer’s challenge to the
pretense of historical objectivity with this observation: "Biblical
scholars have been exceedingly slow to grasp the implications of Quantum
Theory: that the observer is always a part of the field being observed, and
disturbs the field by the very act of observation" ["Jesus: As Real
As We Can Get Him." Jesus Seminar Papers (March 1997) pp. 28-29].
/17/ The irony of
Schweitzer’s critique of modern Jesus scholarship is that it concludes with
this poetic eulogy: "He was not teacher, not a casuist; He was an
imperious ruler...And to those who obey Him, whether they be wise or simple,
He will reveal Himself in the toils, the conflicts, the sufferings which they
shall pass through in His fellowship, and as an ineffable mystery, they shall
learn in their own experience Who He is" (Quest of the Historical
Jesus,
p. 401; italics mine).
/18/
"Concerning the Intention of Jesus and his Teaching" § 3 in C.H.
Talbot ed., Reimarus: Fragments, p. 64 (italics mine).
/19/ If the Fellows
had been asked to vote on things that Jesus’ contemporary opponents said,
these slurs would probably have been rated red. The "pal of toll
collectors" motif in Q is independently attested in
Mark 2:16 as the
pretext for a pink Jesus saying (Mark 2:17b // p1224 5:2); the Markan
Beelzebul charge is echoed in the even pinker Q retort (Luke 11:18-20 // Matt.
12:27-28).
/20/ The Real
Jesus, pp. 151-166.
/21/ Implicit
Elijah parallels are integral to both synoptic and Johannine accounts of Jesus’
deeds.
/22/ In the only
gospel texts where Jesus explicitly acknowledges being ho Christos, the
messianic title is introduced by someone else: Peter (Matt. 16:16-17),
Caiaphas (Mark 14:61-62), and a Samaritan woman (John 4:25-26). The fact that
no christological confession is credited to Jesus in parallel versions of the
first two incidents and there are no independent witnesses in the third
supports the conclusion summarized by M. J. Borg (Jesus: A New Vision, 10):
"Regarding Jesus’ own sense of identity, the growing historical
skepticism produced a consensus. Whether Jesus thought of himself as having a
special exalted identity---as "Messiah" or "the Son of
God"---we cannot know because of the very nature of the documents. When
we do find such statements in the gospels..., the careful historian (even if
he or she is also a Christian) must suspect them as the post-Easter
perspective of Jesus’ followers projected back into the ministry."
Notable dissenters to this scholarly consensus include A. Schweitzer, M.
Hengel and N. T. Wright (Jesus and the Victory of God, p. 488).
/23/ E.g., G. Bornkamm, Jesus of Nazareth, p. 56-57; G. Vermes, Jesus the Jew, pp. 224-225;
M. J. Borg, Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time, p. 30.
/24/ Bornkamm noted
the dissimilarity between Jesus and these traditional Jewish paradigms even in
adopting them: "He is a prophet of the coming kingdom of God...Yet he is
in no way completely contained in this category, and differs from the
customary ways of a prophet. A prophet has to produce his credentials...Jesus,
on the other hand, never speaks of his calling, and nowhere does he use the
ancient, prophetic formula. Even less do we find any trace of that
self-justification typical of the apocalyptic visionaries of later Judaism,
who claim the authority of ecstatic states of mind and visions, secret
revelations of the next world, and miraculous insights into God’s
decrees" (Jesus of Nazareth, p. 56). "This rabbi differs
considerably from the other members of his class. Even external facts reveal
this difference...There is nothing in contemporary Judaism which corresponds
to the immediacy with which he teaches" (p. 57). /25/ Multiple
attestation and the implicit embarrassment gave this pronouncement a pink
rating in the Jesus Seminar’s voting, just one point below the weighted 75%
weighted average required for a red saying.
/26/ While many
details of the testimonium Flavianum (Antiquities 18.3.3) have obviously been
altered by Christian scribes to make Josephus’ report confirm orthodox
christology, his formula of introduction is probably genuine: "Now about
this time came Jesus, a wise man (sophos aner)...."
/27/ The Jesus
Seminar deemed the Markan form of this critique of scholarly privilege in
general (Mark 12:38-39, Luke 20:46) to be closer to Jesus’ original
pronouncement than the Q version (Luke 11:43, Matt. 23:5-7), which singled out
the Pharisees for censorship, though both versions were weighted pink (61% vs.
53%).
/28/ See Excursus
1.
/29/ The multiply
attested makarism declaring the divine basileia the possession of "the
poor" received the third highest weighted average as a genuine Jesus
saying in the voting of the Jesus Seminar (91%). Discrepancies in the precise
formulation of aphorisms assigning this "kingdom" to children led to
a low pink rating (51%) for the canonical version.
/30/ This aphorism
was reviewed three times by the Jesus Seminar and in the final vote fell just
short of a red weighted average (74% pink).
/31/ Jesus Seminar
weighted average: red (77%). See Excursus 2.
/32/ The Fellows
gave the versions of this widely attested Jesus saying that refer to
"Father" a pink rating (60%). The versions that use the term
"God" (i.e., Mark and Luke) were rated lower.
/33/ The Markan
version of the "Lord of the sabbath" saying affirming the priority
of the generic human being (Adam) over the sabbath in the order of creation
was one of two "son of Man" sayings that the Seminar accepted as
genuine Jesus sayings (55% pink). The synoptic versions that omit reference to
the creation account were rated lower.
/34/ The Fellows
rated Matthew’s unqualified formulation, "The last will be first and
the first last," pink (58%); qualifications in other versions can be
credited to scribal attempts to deradicalize Jesus’ principle of inversion.
/35/ The Jesus
Seminar initially voted this saying gray because it has been interpreted as
inferring that Jesus’ movement is superior to JB’s. That interpretation,
however, ignores the fact that it obviously precludes exalting even Jesus, who
himself had a mother, above John. This saying was reconsidered when the
Seminar examined Jesus’ relation to JB in detail (Spring ‘92), and was
voted red in substance (weighted average, 85%; cf. Tatum, John the Baptist, p.
155).
/36/ The Matthean
version of this Q saying is remarkable not only because it does not fit
Matthew’s usual theme of the punishment of the wicked but because it places
"the bad" ahead of "the good," an emphasis confirmed by
the Lukan paraphrase (Luke 6:35).
/37/ This saying is
clearly out of place in its current setting and thus deserves a separate vote.
Recommendation: RED!
/38/ A conclusion
independent of but supported by S.J. Patterson’s observation: "Jesus
was remembered as a shameless fool. To spend time with expendables is to be a
fool --- to refuse to recognize the shame of another. Expendables are by
definition shamed. To have honor is to have place, to have a recognized
role" ("Jesus and the Empire of God" Jesus Seminar Papers
[March 1997], p. 22).
/39/ R. A. Horsley
in particular has pointed out (a) the differences between Jesus’
instructions to itinerants and normal cynic lifestyle and (b) the lack of
concrete evidence of cynics --- Jewish or otherwise --- in the Galilee of
Jesus’ day.
/40/ Discontinuity
between the parable’s plot and its gospel context shows that it is was not a
free Lukan creation. This and other source problems are discussed below
(2.2.5d).
/41/ A notable
exception is J. R. Michaels: "The assumption on which this book is based
is that what Jesus of Nazareth taught is what he himself first learned by
experience... Nowhere is this more apparent than in the metaphors and images
that dominate Jesus’ speech... The pictures he draws for disciples and
antagonists alike are pictures that he himself has seen... The stories he
told---his parables---and the stories he acted out---his meals with sinners,
his words of forgiveness, his miracles of healing---unfold for us his profound
and peculiar vision of what is real" (Servant and Son, pp, xi-xii).
/42/ "The
Reappearance of Parables," The Fourth R 10.1-2 (Jan-April 1997) p. 3.
/43/ R. W. Funk’s
hermeneutical analysis of "Parable as Metaphor" (Language, pp.
133-162) is still the classic study of the genre.
/44/ In
Parables,
p. 14 (italics his; boldface mine).
/45/ "The
parables in the special material give many indications that they are not the
compositions of the evangelists... In the two Lukan parables of the good
Samaritan and the prodigal son the narrative shows a Jewish perspective: the
Samaritans are aliens; the prodigal son almost comes to grief looking after
(unclean) pigs; his family lies in Jewish Palestine. It is improbable that the
evangelist composed such parables with a Jewish perspective" (Theissen
and Merz, The Historical Jesus, pp. 338-339).
/46/ An insight
originally independent of but supported by B. B. Scott: "To accept this
parable as anything but a fantasy, a hearer must accept the Samaritan as
helper-hero instead of expected opponent-villain and oneself as victim in the
ditch" ("The Reappearance of Parables," The Fourth R 10/1-2
[Jan.-April 1997], p.9).
/47/ "It is
thus possible...to affirm that the parable, as metaphor, has not one but many
"points," as many points as there are situations into which it is
spoken. And that applies to the original as well as subsequent audiences"
(Language, p.151).
/48/ The Jesus
Seminar was almost unanimous in recognizing the principle of turning the cheek
in reaction to an opponent’s slap as a genuine Jesus saying (92%). The
paradoxical injunction to love the opponent was also among the Seminar’s top
five red sayings (84%), while the non-canonical version of the advice to clear
one’s own vision before correcting someone else was ranked fiftieth (60% =
pink) among the more than 1500 sayings ascribed to Jesus in antiquity.
/49/ Most Fellows
(56%) accepted the thesis "there is a historical core to the story of
Jesus and the Syro-Phoenician woman." That core is the dialectical
structure of the repartée between Jesus and the woman. Though a majority
(52%) considered the dialog historically reliable, it fell shy of a pink
rating (43%-47%), because several who doubted that Jesus would insult a woman
voted black. Yet, almost 60% endorsed these general statements: "A woman
turned Jesus’ metaphors against him" and "Jesus accepted a woman’s
witty retort."
/50/ The Jesus
Seminar vote on similar metaphorical advice against throwing valuable things
to "dogs" or "pigs" (Matt. 7:6 // Thom. 93) was weighted
gray, indicating that some of the content, if not the form of the saying could
be traced to Jesus.
/51/ The Seminar
accepted the general thesis "Jesus defended his behavior in aphorism (and
parable)" as virtually certain (86% = red).
/52/ B. B. Scott’s
reader-response analysis of the impact of this parable is apt: "What is a
hearer to make of this?... Was the master being arbitrary in his judgment? Was
the accusation of wasting goods true or false? Was the steward’s behavior
simply harmless fun at the master’s expense? The parable offers no answers
to these questions, it only provokes them!... The hearer has no way to
navigate in the world. Its solid moorings have been lost" (Hear Then the
Parable, pp. 265-266).
/53/ The Jesus
Seminar almost unanimously agreed that "Jesus was criticized for eating
with ‘sinners’" (92% = red) and that this criticism was based on his
actual behavior.
/54/ Language,
Hermeneutic and Word of God, pp. 161-162.
/55/ The Fellows
overwhelmingly agreed with the thesis that "some who saw Jesus said he
had a demon" (Fall ‘92, item 21; 90% = red). No vote has yet been taken
on the thesis: "some Judeans called Jesus a Samaritan."
Recommendation: red.
/56/ Antiquities
11.346: "If anyone was charged by authorities in Jerusalem with eating
unclean things or with violating the sabbath or some other sin like this, he
fled to the authorities at Shechem, saying that he had been unjustly
banished" (italics mine).
/57/ The Jesus
Seminar voted both sayings pink:
Mark 7:14-15 (70%) and
Mark 2:27-28 (55%).
/58/ Whether Jesus
was responsible for the formulation of the Lord’s prayer or not, the wording
of the initial petition "Father!...Your basileia come!" mimics his
characteristic emphases. The transactional logic of this demand makes the
petitioner the intended recipient of the basileia. For it makes absolutely no
sense to ask the King to actualize what is his by definition. And there is no
third party in view; so the petition cannot be passed off as selfless
mediation. Any child who presumes to ask a parent for his car is really
demanding the keys for him or herself. After all, this petition is credited to
the Jesus who advised others "seek first [your Father’s] basileia"
(Luke 12:31 // Matt. 6:33) and assured them: "Ask -- and it will be given
to you!" (Luke 11:9 // Matt. 7:7).
/59/ The Seminar
accepted the parable of the rich farmer (60%) and the paradox about
saving/losing one’s life (52%) as essentially genuine (pink) Jesus sayings.
Criticisms for eating openly with ‘sinners’ were almost unanimously
accepted (92%) as even more certain (red).
/60/ The Fellows
voted the saying "toll collectors and prostitutes will get into God’s
imperium but you will not" gray primarily because of its questionable
Matthean context (as conclusion to the parable of the two sons). Since the
statement is not characteristic of Matthew’s general ethics and is coherent
with genuine aphorisms of Jesus that are socially shocking, it probably would
have been voted pink had it been treated separately. See Five Gospels, p. 232.
/61/ The Fellows
accepted the parable of the dinner party (69%) and the aphorism about wedding
guests (57%) as relatively reliable (pink) sayings of Jesus.
/62/ The Seminar
almost unanimously accepted these general theses as historically certain
(red): "Jesus had brothers" (97%) and "the family of Jesus
played a significant role in the early Jerusalem community" (91%). The
majority also agreed that the evidence made it probable (pink) that
"Jesus brothers were not in sympathy with him" (69%).
/63/ The Seminar
considered Paul’s portrayal of Jesus’ brother James (Gal. 1-2) as
"pre-eminent among the three leaders of ‘repute’ " among
Jerusalem Christians as historically accurate (95%).
/64/ B. B. Scott
notes the lack of congruence between Luke’s fictional audience & the
elder son and that "in the parable narrative itself there is no
rejection" (Hear Then the Parable, p. 103).
/65/ Scott also
notes: "The Christian adoption of the [two sons] mytheme...is
inappropriate to Jesus’ context...." (Hear Then the Parable, p. 124).
/66/ From this
angle, the father’s words "this brother of yours was dead and has come
back to life" (Luke 15:31) reads like a post-crucifixion but pre-Lukan
expansion.
/67/ J. R. Michaels
proposed the older son as Jesus’ fictive persona because the father
identifies that son as his heir who is always with him: "Like most other
hearers, Jesus would have found himself drawn into the story of the lost son
precisely through the figure of the older brother, and so called upon to share
the father’s joy and compassion. But for Jesus, unlike other hearers, the
self-identification was part of a larger pattern. Here as elsewhere he found
his sonship confirmed, while at the same time he learned obedience to his
Father’s will regarding tax collectors and other prodigals" (Servant
and Son, p. 219). The primary problem with this reading, as Michaels himself
notes, is that the parable ends with no indication that the heir is reconciled
to the prodigal.
/68/ Hear Then the
Parable, p.122.
/69/ Beyond the Lukan parables of the Samaritan, shrewd manager and prodigal, instances of
Jesus’ rhetorical concession of critics’ slander are found in Q (Luke 7:34
// Matt. 9:19 and Luke 11:19 // Matt. 12:27).
/70/ Theissen
summarizes the consensus of biblical critics since Wrede and Bultmann:
"The chronological and geographical outline of Mark is secondary to the
individual traditions; its form is determined by the author’s theological
premises and therefore [is] historically worthless (Theissen and Merz,
Historical Jesus, p.27).
/71/ The Seminar
overwhelming endorsed (85%=red) this unequivocal conclusion: "It is not
just the content of the trial but the fact of a trial that lacks historical
foundation" (Fall ‘95; cf. Acts of Jesus, p. 147f). The thesis on the
dating of the crucifixion was less precise --- "Jesus was crucified in
some conjunction with Passover" --- and the vote less conclusive
(48%=gray). But an earlier vote (Spring ‘94) overwhelmingly rejected the
thesis of the synoptic gospels that Jesus’ last supper was a Passover meal
(10%=black). Thus, the Seminar decisively rejected the historicity of the
synoptic passion narrative without ruling out the Johannine dating of Jesus’
execution prior to the paschal seder.
/72/ Three quarters
of the Fellows endorsed this thesis: "The underlying structure of the
Passion narrative was taken from the Septuagint texts."
/73/ The Seminar
considered it probable (pink) that the movements focused on John and Jesus
were rivals both during (67%) and after (70%) the lifetime of their leaders
[Tatum, John the Baptist, p.163-166]. But it deemed the synoptic thesis that
"Jesus began his public ministry at the time JB was imprisoned" only
possible (46%=grey). There were no red votes on that chronological marker.
/74/ The Fellows
confirmed the historical basis of the gospel accounts of John’s career with
the following red votes: "There was a person named John the baptizer"
(96%); JB’s exhortations and activities had a widespread appeal" (86%);
"JB’s time precedes and overlaps that of Jesus" (81%); "JB’s
activities posed a threat to Herod Antipas’ ability to maintain peace and
stability" (89%).
/75/ This saying
was weighted gray largely because the second strophe can be interpreted as
primitive Christian propaganda. "The Fellows agreed that few in the
Christian community would have been willing to say that ‘no human is greater
than John’" (The Five Gospels, p. 302). A subsequent vote (Spring ‘92)
affirmed that "Jesus identified JB as a great figure" (85%=red).
/76/ The majority
of Fellows (55%) deemed this thesis historically probable (pink): "Jesus’
disciples considered Jesus to be JB’s successor."
/77/ The Fellows
overwhelmingly rejected the thesis that "Mark’s temporal statements are
historically accurate" (10% = black; Spring ‘93).
/78/ Pace L. T.
Johnson (see above p. 3 n. 8).
/79/ The Fellows
agreed that John’s baptism was a sign of repentance (81% = red) but were
less certain that it was regarded as a sacrament of forgiveness (67% = pink)
[Tatum, John the Baptist, p. 121-124].
/80/ Although the
Fellows thought the story of the healing of the paralytic (Mark 2:1-12) had a
historical core (pink), the Markan parenthesis on the forgiveness of sins
(2:6-10) was deemed less probable [Spring ‘93; Acts of Jesus, pp. 63-65].
Mark 2:16 was voted pink (63%; Fall ‘94/5; Acts of Jesus, p. 66). The only
time Mark credits Jesus with a call to "repent" is a generalized
proclamation of God’s basileia (Mark 1:15). But there the Greek verb
metanoeite is best taken literally ("Change your mind") since Mark
gives no clue of the morality of intended auditors. This saying was voted
black anyway (20%; Fall ‘86).
/81/ The Fellows
overwhelmingly agreed John was an ascetic (there was no black and only one
gray vote on item 18S; Spring ‘92). A bare majority (51%) thought the Markan
characterization of his rustic diet historically probable. No vote was
recorded on his disciples practices (Tatum, John the Baptist, pp. 116-117).
/82/ The Fellows
overwhelming concurred in characterizing Jesus as an exorcist (88% = red; Fall
‘92 item 46; Acts of Jesus, p. 61). An exorcism in the synagogue at
Capernaum was weighted possible but historically uncertain (36% = gray; Fall
‘92 item 20; Acts of Jesus, p. 57).
/83/ The Seminar
deemed descriptions of Jesus as socially deviant (79% = red) and opponents’ labeling
him possessed (90% = red) historically accurate (Fall ‘92; items
11 & 15). No vote was recorded on references to his physical contact with
people in states of ritual impurity.
/84/ While
questions about the wording of the Q sayings about children in the marketplace
(Luke 7:31-35) and the kingdom and violence (Luke 16:16) initially left these
passages gray (Spring ‘89), a subsequent vote (Spring ‘92) colored the
general thesis "Jesus contrasted his behavior with that of JB (Q 7:31-35,
16:16)" bright pink (71%).
/85/ The Seminar
was practically unanimous (91%) in endorsing the historical proposition that
John baptized Jesus; there were no black votes [Tatum, John the Baptist, p.
148].
/86/ The Seminar
deemed that it virtually certain (red) that John both preached repentance
(78%) and baptized to signify repentance (81%) [Tatum, John the Baptist, pp.
122, 127]. I thank you, Father, Yes indeed, Father, --
Luke 10:21 // Matt. 11:25 (SV modified) This saying was weighted gray by the Jesus
Seminar because it received a divided vote (36%). As an echo of Ps. 8:2
traceable only to Q, it cannot automatically be assumed to be a formulation
of Jesus. But it was the fact that Q prefaced it to a quasi-Johannine
christological formula exalting Jesus as sole revealer of God (Luke 10:22, Matt
11:27-28) that led the majority of fellows to consider it the creation of an
early Christian scribe. There are three good reasons for reconsideration,
however: (1) Discontinuity. The
logic of the first saying (Luke 10:21 // Matt. 11:25) is contradicted by the
second (Luke 10:22 // Matt 11:27-28) and is, therefore, the product of a
different mindset. While the creedal formula identifies "the son"
(singular) as sole broker for any knowledge of "the Father,"
the prior thanksgiving affirms a radically immediate knowledge of God by
"babies" (plural) in general. Infants are impervious to verbal
instruction by anybody. (The Greek word νήπιος carried
connotations of a newborn and was even used to refer to fetuses). The subversive
consequences of this thanksgiving for catechetical
instruction probably led some Christian scribe to append the creedal affirmation
to prevent the originally independent thanksgiving from being interpreted as an
affirmation of innate human knowledge of God apart from Jesus. (2) Coherence. The
thanksgiving by itself is a perfect corollary of Jesus’ genuine declaration
(Mark 10:14) that God’s kingdom belongs to "little children"
(παιδία). The ironic social logic of both sayings overturns the world’s
hierarchical pyramid that equates wisdom and authority with seniority. So, the
mind that formulated one saying could easily have drafted the other. (3) Embarrassment and environment.
No follower who revered Jesus as the ultimate revealer of wisdom would have
created a categorical debunking of sages in general. (Compare this saying with
Paul’s less paradoxical contrast of worldly and divine wisdom in 1 Cor. 1-2.)
Since the author of Q presented Jesus as divine Wisdom’s offspring and
spokesman (Luke 7:35, Luke 11:49-51), this thanksgiving is probably not a
scribal fabrication. The only voice in Christian tradition that could
have composed such a gleefully positive devaluation of wisdom is that Jewish
wit who regularly celebrated the Creator’s subversive irony of social history:
Yeshu bar Yosef of Nazareth. Therefore,
Luke 10:21//Matt. 11:25 should be rated
at least pink. Abba, Father Much has been written in recent years to
challenge J. Jeremias’ thesis that the Aramaic word Abba was Jesus’
distinctive way of addressing God, indicating his unique sense of childlike
intimacy with the Deity. Yet Jeremias’ observations have not yet been
disproved. Though scholars have produced many examples of Jews addressing God as
"(Our or my) Father (in heaven)," it remains a fact that no example of
a Jew using the Aramaic form Abba as a direct address to
God has yet been found apart from primitive Jesus tradition. G. Vermes (Jesus the Jew, p. 211)
identified a rabbinic anecdote about the hasid Abba Hanan as an exception
(b Ta’anith 23b). It is not. In this story school-children
(i.e., pre-teens) address this plea to Hanan: "Abba, Abba,
give us rain!" Hanan then turns and addresses God with proper deference as
"Lord of the universe!" and asks him to ignore the impertinence of children
who fail to make the distinction between "the Abba who gives rain
and the Abba who does not." This story proves the rule that adult
Jews were not accustomed to addressing God as Abba. In Palestinian
Judaism Abba was sometimes used by children in addressing their teacher
to show both respect and a family loyalty, much as Christians later adopted Papa
as a designation of their bishop. In the case of Hanan, children deliver a
petition that only the Almighty could grant, to their teacher. The teacher then
forwards the misdirected petition to the Person with the authority to grant it
by changing the address ("Lord of the universe"). Hanan’s indirect
reference to God as Abba in this context is a pun prompted by
childish impertinence and, therefore, is not historical proof that either he or
Jewish children in first century Palestine were accustomed to addressing God
as Abba. On the contrary, this anecdote was recorded by non-Palestinian
rabbinic scribes only hundreds of years after Hanan’s death. Whether it is a
historically reliable report or not, the fact that it was considered remarkable
enough to be recorded at all, can be taken as evidence that it was regarded as a
unique deviation from Judaic custom. In first-century Greek Christian sources, the
Aramaic term Abba was used as a term of direct address to
God. But this term is exclusively ascribed to Jesus (Mark 14:36) or to the voice
of the spirit that Paul claims God sent into "whoever is baptized into
Christ" (Gal 3:27): "the spirit of his son" (Gal 4:6),
which is clear evidence that "we are children of God" and
"co-heirs with Christ" (Rom 8:16-17). So, while some of the
conclusions drawn from Jeremias’ claim that Jesus’ address of God as Abba
was unprecedented may have to be modified in the light of subsequent
scholarship, the gist of his insight is still historically valid: Abba was
Jesus’ characteristic designation of God that the first generations of his
followers imitated precisely because they found it socially innovative and
spiritually liberating. WORKS CITED Borg, Marcus J. Jesus: A New Vision. Spirit,
Culture, and the Life of Discipleship. San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1987. _____. Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time.
San Francisco: Harper-Collins, 1994. Bornkamm, Günther. Jesus of Nazareth. ET
by I. & F. McLuskey & J.M. Robinson. New York: Harper & Row, 1960. Crossan, J. Dominic. In Parables: The
Challenge of the Historical Jesus. San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1973. _____. The Historical Jesus: The Life of a
Mediterranean Jewish Peasant. San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1992. Funk, Robert W., Roy W. Hoover and the Jesus
Seminar. The Five Gospels: The Search for the Authentic Words of Jesus. New
York: Macmillan, 1993. Funk, Robert W and the Jesus Seminar. The Acts
of Jesus: The Search for the Authentic Deeds of Jesus. San Francisco:
HarperCollins, 1998. Funk, Robert W. Language, Hermeneutic and Word
of God: The Problem of Language in the New Testament and Contemporary Theology.
New York: Harper & Row, 1966. _____. The Poetics of Biblical Narrative. Sonoma:
Polebridge Press, 1988. _____, "Profiles of Jesus: A Protocol,"
The Fourth R 8/5-6 (Sept.-Dec. 1995), p. 22. Jeremias, Joachim. The Prayers of Jesus.
ET by John Bowden. Napierville, IL: Alec R. Allenson, 1967. Johnson, Luke Timothy. The Real Jesus: The
Misguided Quest for the Historical Jesus and the Truth of the Traditional
Gospels. San Francisco: Harper-Collins, 1996. Lewis, Charlton T. and Charles Short. A Latin
Dictionary. Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1879. Michaels, J. Ramsey. Servant and Son: Jesus in
Parable and Gospel. Atlanta: John Knox Press, 1981. Patterson, Stephen J. The Historical Jesus and
the Search for Meaning. Harrisburg, OA: Trinity Press International, 1998. Schweitzer, Albert. The Quest of the
Historical Jesus: A Critical Study of Its progress from Reimarus to Wrede. Trans.
by W. Montgomery. London: Adam and Charles Black, 1910. Scott, Bernard Brandon. Hear Then the Parable.
Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1989. _____, "The Reappearance of Parables," The
Fourth R 10/1-2 (Jan.-April 1997), pp. 3-14. Talbot, Charles H., ed. Reimarus: Fragments. ET
by Ralph S. Fraser. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1970. Tatum, W. Barnes. John the Baptist and Jesus:
A Report of the Jesus Seminar. Sonoma CA: Polebridge Press, 1994. Theissen, Gerd. The Shadow of the Galilean.
The quest of the historical Jesus in narrative form. ET by John Bowden.
Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1987. Theissen, Gerd and Annette Merz. The
Historical Jesus: A Comprehensive Guide. ET by John Bowden. Philadelphia:
Fortress Press, 1998. Vermes, Geza. Jesus the Jew: A Historian’s
Reading of the Gospels. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1973. Wright, N. T. Jesus and the Victory of God.
Christian Origins and the Question of God, vol 2. Minneapolis: Fortress Press,
1996. Copyright © 1998-2023 by Mahlon H. Smith |
Website designed by
Mahlon H. Smith
|