CHAPTER 1<\/p>\n
The Story of Jesus as the Story of God<\/p>\n
Michael F. Bird<\/p>\n
So exactly \u201cwhen\u201d did Jesus become God? To be honest, let\u2019s recognize that this is a loaded question as it assumes that there was a time when Jesus was not God at all. Accordingly, for some, like Professor Bart Ehrman, Jesus was a human being who lived a human life and died an ordinary human death. It was through the incrementally increasing religious devotion of his followers after his death that he was eventually elevated to the status of a divine being equal to the God of Israel. On a divine\u2014human spectrum, Ehrman has a low view of Jesus. \u201cThe Christians exalted him to the divine realm in their theology, but in my opinion,\u201d Ehrman confesses, \u201che was, and always has been, a human.\u201d Suffice to say, Ehrman\u2019s view of Jesus is low, so low in fact that it could probably win a limbo contest against a leprechaun.
\nSuch an approach to the historical origins of belief in Jesus\u2019 deity is essentially evolutionary\u2014with beliefs about Jesus mutating over time shaped by various internal and external influences. This view begins, as Charlie Moule said years ago, \u201cwith a Palestinian Rabbi and ends with the divine Lord of Hellenistic Saviour-cult.\u201d None of this is particularly innovative or new; others have said much of the same thing before. However, Ehrman is the latest proponent to prosecute the idea that belief in Jesus\u2019 divinity and worship of him as a divine figure was a gradual process that developed as time went on.
\nI have my own view as to \u201cwhen\u201d Jesus became God. It was not by virtue of the evolution of belief, nor as the result of any ecumenical committee; rather, I think I can articulate the answer by way of a quotation from John the Evangelist: \u201cIn the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God\u201d (John 1:1). Jesus\u2019 deity did not spring forth from the resolution of any church council, but rests in eternity past. So he never became God; he was always God, and he became human, the man Jesus of Nazareth. The testimony of John the Evangelist is that Jesus is the Logos, the preexistent Word of God, Israel\u2019s Messiah, Son of God and Son of Man, equal to God, one with the Father, and the Father\u2019s agent for the restoration of Israel and for the renewal of creation. John\u2019s claim is on any level extravagant and even offensive to the monotheistic sensibilities of many Jews and Muslims. And yet it is a programmatic claim for the entire gospel. C. K. Barrett, a distinguished British biblical scholar, once said: \u201cJohn intends that the whole of his gospel shall be read in light of this verse. The deeds and words of Jesus are the deeds and words of God; if this be not true the book is blasphemous.\u201d
\nI entirely admit that such a claim about Jesus\u2019 divine identity is a confessional one, borne of religious devotion and justified by the theological claims of a believing community. I admit too that the gospel of John\u2019s precise articulation of the identity of Jesus is disputed, as is the continuity between John\u2019s image of Jesus and other images of Jesus in the rest of the New Testament. Then there is question of whether John the Evangelist is even correct. Is Jesus really God?
\nWhether Jesus of Nazareth really is God, as Christians of all varieties have historically claimed, can only be answered as a matter of faith. It comes down to whether one believes the early church\u2019s testimony to Jesus attested by Holy Scripture that he is the Son of God. I belong to a community that does, and I am not ashamed to identify myself in that way. However, exactly when, where, and why Christians first began to make such elevated claims about Jesus\u2019 heavenly origins and divine nature is a historical question and one that can only be answered through a concerted investigation of the evidence. Such an enquiry can be responsibly pursued by mapping out the christological claims and religious devotion of early Christian writings in the first four centuries of the Common Era. This is the area in which we wish to critically engage the work of Ehrman directly. For he claims \u201cthat Jesus was not originally considered to be God in any sense at all, and that he eventually became divine for his followers in some sense before he came to be thought of as equal with God Almighty in an absolute sense. But the point I stress is that this was, in fact, a development.\u201d<\/p>\n
THE EARLY HIGH CHRISTOLOGY CLUB<\/p>\n
In contrast to the thesis of Ehrman and others that a \u201chigh Christology,\u201d which identified Jesus as a fully divine figure, was an evolutionary development, a cohort of scholars has argued for something more akin to a \u201cbig bang\u201d approach to the origins of a fully divine Christology. Several scholars have asserted that the first few decades of the church saw the rise of a form of devotion and types of christological confession that clearly placed Jesus within the orbit of the divine identity. The cast of scholars who have done the most to promote this paradigm of an early and relatively strong identification of Jesus with the God of Israel is known within scholarly circles as the EHCC, or, \u201cEarly High Christology Club.\u201d The names Martin Hengel, Richard Bauckham, and Larry Hurtado are associated with this \u201cclub.\u201d This group is far from monolithic and agreed on every aspect about Christian origins and devotion to Jesus. However, they are in full accord that a \u201chigh Christology\u201d emerged very early.
\nThe late Martin Hengel exposed many of the tenuous arguments put forward for an evolutionary process of christological development. He argued: \u201cThe time between the death of Jesus and the fully developed Christology which we find in the earliest Christian documents, the letters of Paul, is so short that the development which takes place within it can only be called amazing.\u201d If that is the case, then \u201cmore happened in this period of less than two decades than in the whole next seven centuries, up to the time when the doctrine of the early church was completed.\u201d
\nHengel surgically dismantled the view held by the old \u201chistory of religions\u201d school about how belief in Jesus as God emerged. On their account there were a number of separate and insulated Christian communities comprised of Jewish Christian, Hellenistic Jewish Christian, and Gentile Christian tiers, each of which represented a separate developmental phase in the formation of beliefs about Jesus. This development began with Jesus as the \u201cSon of Man\u201d in Palestinian communities to a fully divinized \u201cLord\u201d influenced by mystery cults in Greek-speaking centers. However, as Hengel ably pointed out, the earliest evidence indicates that Aramaic-speaking and Greek-speaking believers existed side by side from the beginning. They coexisted in Jerusalem and elsewhere, such as Caesarea, Damascus, Antioch, and Rome. The movements of key persons like Barnabas, John Mark, Silas\/Silvanus, Paul, and Peter\u2014known from Paul\u2019s letters and the Acts of the Apostles\u2014demonstrates how these linguistic groups interpenetrated each other and were mutually influential on each other\u2019s beliefs. Therefore, confession of Jesus as the divine Lord was not the result of faith in Christ encountering Greek religion and philosophy.
\nHengel also contended that Paul\u2019s letters, written mostly in the 50s, use traditional and stereotyped formulations for talking about Jesus\u2019 identity and divine status (e.g., Rom 1:3\u20134; 1 Cor 8:6; Gal 4:4; Phil 2:5\u201311; etc.), and go back to his earliest missionary activities in the eastern Mediterranean in the 40s. These texts make outstandingly elevated claims about Jesus, including his preexistence, his divine nature, and his mediation of creation and salvation. Hengel does not deny that development did occur. The later Logos Christology of the John the Evangelist at the end of the first century and Justin Martyr in the mid-second century represent a genuine development that attempts to flesh out Jesus\u2019 divine functions and to explain them in terms relatable to Greek metaphysics. Yet these developments are based on a logical fusion of Jesus\u2019 preexistent sonship with Jewish wisdom traditions, and so they are not derived from an interface with pagan sources.
\nAccording to Hengel, the key influences for the church\u2019s beliefs about Jesus were not Hellenistic mystery cults or a Gnostic redeemer myth, but a mixture of experience and scriptural exegesis. The sending of the Son had a close analogy with Jewish wisdom traditions about the descent and ascent of wisdom into the world as sent from God. Confessions of Jesus as \u201cSon of God\u201d and \u201cLord\u201d were stimulated by reflection on Psalms 2 and 110. Going even earlier, the germinal roots of the Christology of the early church can be traced to: (1) the impact of Jesus on his closest followers; and (2) after Jesus\u2019 crucifixion, the experience of visions of the risen Christ to his followers and the experience of the Spirit soon after. These two factors set off a \u201cunique dynamic and creative impulse\u201d among Jesus\u2019 followers, which expressed itself in devotion toward him as the exalted Lord and God.
\nLarry Hurtado has argued that the devotional practices of the early Christians were foundational for their doctrinal developments. So rather than focus on a study of the major christological titles found in the New Testament, Hurtado addresses instead the worship patterns in the early church and what they tell us about the divine status of Jesus. His conclusion is that early Christian worship shows a clear veneration of Jesus as the God of Israel in human form. Jesus was treated as a recipient of devotion and was associated with God in often striking ways. Such devotion to Jesus as divine \u201cerupted suddenly and quickly, not gradually and late, among first-century circles of followers\u201d and exhibited \u201can unparalleled intensity and diversity of expression.\u201d
\nHurtado situates this phenomenon of Jesus devotion within the context of Jewish monotheism. While maintaining that Jewish monotheism was a characteristically strict monotheism, Hurtado contends that the crucial indicator of divinity was the giving or withholding of worship. The worship of Jesus, in prayer and by other means, is a sure pointer to his divine status in the eyes of devotees\u2014so much so that the Christian God could be properly identified as the Old Testament deity, who had created all things, who had spoken through Moses and the prophets, and who was now revealed more fully and decisively through Jesus.
\nRichard Bauckham is a British scholar who has devoted much attention to Jewish monotheism as the context for early Christian claims about Jesus (and yet his work is entirely ignored by Ehrman!). According to Bauckham, Jewish authors focused on several salient elements to identify the uniqueness of God. God was known as the one and only God through his relationship to Israel as the one who reveals the divine name, YHWH, but also, and more importantly, through God\u2019s relationship to all of reality as the sole Creator and highest sovereign over all things. In the New Testament, Bauckham argues, Jesus is also regarded as a divine figure since his relationship to Israel and to the whole of reality is configured in a similar way. As such, Bauckham declares: \u201cWhen New Testament Christology is read with this Jewish theological context in mind, it becomes clear that, from the earliest post-Easter beginnings of Christology onwards, early Christians included Jesus, precisely and unambiguously, within the unique identity of the one God of Israel\u201d so that \u201cthe earliest Christology was already the highest Christology.\u201d
\nFor Bauckham a focus on intermediary figures as precedents for Jesus\u2019 divinity fails because the intermediary figures are either (a) created beings distinct from the divine identity (e.g., archangels, patriarchs, etc.), or (b) personifications of God and part of the divine identity (e.g., Word and Wisdom). The accent in New Testament christological texts falls squarely on Jesus\u2019 divine identity as a participant in creation, possessing the divine name, sharing God\u2019s throne, and receiving worship. This Christology of divine identity shows that Jesus Christ was regarded as being intrinsic to the unique and eternal identity of the God of Israel. The theological reflection of the church fathers did not so much develop this theme as transpose it into a conceptual framework to be readily explored in terms of essences and natures.
\nI do not mean to say that the EHCC (i.e., Hengel, Hurtado, and Bauckham) represents some kind of infallible triumvirate about the emergence of belief in Jesus. Each of the contributors to this volume will have his own assessment of their claims and arguments. However, it would be fair to say that our team is broadly supportive of the EHCC approach to mapping the emergence of a fully blown \u201cchristological monotheism,\u201d where the one God is known as and identified with Jesus the Christ.
\nFurthermore, if the EHCC is correct, two things follow. First, belief in the divinity of Jesus emerged surprisingly early. While the coherence and grammar of \u201cincarnation\u201d still had to be worked out, there was an immediate regard for Jesus as belonging to the God-side of the ledger in our earliest sources. Second, it also means that later creedal claims about Jesus\u2019 divine personhood are not wildly innovative. The creedal formulations find their theological DNA within the devotional practices and theological confessions of the primitive church. In other words, the Niceno-Constantinopolitan creeds of the fourth century are not purely politically driven and radically innovative statements of faith. They are, instead, contextualized clarifications of New Testament teaching.<\/p>\n
THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO EHRMAN<\/p>\n
The claims of the EHCC and our own cohort of contributors can be contrasted with the thesis that Ehrman sets forth in his book How Jesus Became God: The Exaltation of a Jewish Preacher from Galilee.
\nFor Ehrman, ancient monotheism was not particularly strict. In his reading of ancient texts, Ehrman posits a pyramid of power, grandeur, and deity that could be shared with creatures to some degree. There was no absolute divide between the divine and human realms; it was more like a continuum, where divine beings could become human, and humans could become divine. The many mythical stories about intermediary figures, like heavenly angels who become human or powerful kings who become divine, provide a way of understanding what the early Christians meant when they regarded Jesus as a \u201cgod.\u201d
\nIn addition, according to Ehrman, Jesus was not regarded as God by anyone during his own lifetime. Jesus did not think of himself as God. Rather, Jesus was an apocalyptic prophet who looked for God\u2019s dramatic intervention in the world. Jesus had set his hopes on a mysterious and heavenly figure called the \u201cSon of Man,\u201d whom God would use to usher in his kingdom in the immediate future. Explicit claims to Jesus\u2019 divinity in the gospel of John are secondary and inventive accretions to the tradition, which have been projected back into Jesus\u2019 career.
\nWhat is more, the gospel accounts of Jesus\u2019 resurrection are highly contradictory and are not historically accurate. Although Jesus was definitely crucified, he was not buried by Joseph of Arimathea, nor was his tomb found empty. Instead, reports of his resurrection emerged when his disciples had visionary experiences of him as still alive. These visionary experiences were transformative for his disciples, and they thereafter began to talk of Jesus in elevated categories, as a human exalted to heaven. Then later others began to think of Jesus as a preexistent being who became human.
\nAs such, Ehrman identifies two primary ways in which Jesus was divinized by the early church. First, and the earliest version, was \u201cexaltation Christology,\u201d whereby Jesus was a man who was made divine at his resurrection or baptism. Second was \u201cincarnation Christology,\u201d whereby Jesus was a preexistent being who became human. Applying this paradigm to the New Testament, the gospel of Mark understands Jesus in terms of an exaltation Christology, while the gospel of John reflects an \u201cincarnation Christology. In the case of Paul, Ehrman believes that Paul thought of Jesus as an angel who became human and was then exalted to a position beside God.
\nFinally, Ehrman describes the various controversies about the nature of Christ that were waged in the churches in the succeeding centuries, climaxing is the Nicene Creed in the fourth century. There he maintains that what was the earliest form of Christology, namely, exaltation Christology, was deemed heretical or unorthodox by the church in the second century. Among the many repercussions of the Nicene Christology was the increase in anti-Semitism. In the mind of Christians, if Jesus was God and if the Jews killed Jesus, then the Jews had killed their own God. According to Ehrman, the Christ of Nicea is a far cry from the historical Jesus of Nazareth. Despite the innovations that took place in the twenty or so years after Jesus\u2019 death, where followers believed him to be a preexistent being who became human only temporarily before he was made Lord of the universe, still, it was only at Nicea that Jesus became fully God.<\/p>\n
A SUMMARY OF OUR CASE AGAINST EHRMAN<\/p>\n
In chapter 2, Michael Bird addresses Ehrman\u2019s account about intermediary figures whose divinization is said to provide a way of understanding what people meant when they began to describe Jesus as \u201cGod.\u201d Several problems abound on Ehrman\u2019s approach to this subject. First, Ehrman overemphasizes the similarities between ancient views about intermediary figures with Christian views about Jesus as divine without properly recognizing the often tangible differences. Second, Christian beliefs about Jesus as divine were not based on ripping off ideas in these sources about intermediary figures, as much as they were based on a \u201cchristological monotheism.\u201d By that I mean, Jesus was regarded part of God\u2019s own identity but without thereby compromising the strict nature of Jewish monotheism. In the end, mighty angels and exalted persons serve God, but they do not share his rule, nor do they receive his worship, but Jesus does. Thus, Ehrman has not accounted for the genuine innovation that typified early views about Jesus.
\nIn chapter 3, Michael Bird contests Ehrman\u2019s treatment of Jesus\u2019 self-understanding. According to Bird, it is probable that Jesus understood himself as a divine agent who uniquely shared in divine prerogatives, embodied God\u2019s sovereignty, and identified his work with God\u2019s action in the world. Also, if Jesus is located against the backdrop of Jewish restoration hopes for the future, including the hope for the Lord\u2019s return to Zion, then Jesus probably believed that in his own person this return was actually happening. Amidst Jesus\u2019 kingdom message and kingdom work, God was becoming king and coming to redeem his people. Such a conviction enables us to make sense of several sayings and symbolic actions where Jesus indicated that he spoke and acted for and even as God. In addition, Jesus undoubtedly did refer to himself as the Son of Man. The cohort of sayings about a future Son of Man is best understood with Jesus as the intended subject. On top of that, since Jesus spoke Aramaic, his use of son of man amounts to a Semitic idiom that, when used in a definite sense, is a form of self-reference. Finally, Jesus also appears to have understood himself as the figure in Daniel 7:13\u201314, who would be enthroned beside God on God\u2019s own throne.
\nIn chapter 4, Craig Evans contests Bart Ehrman\u2019s claims that the story of the burial of Jesus in a known tomb is a late fiction and that therefore there probably was no tomb discovered by his followers. He further claims that Jesus in all probability was not buried, according to Roman law and custom, and that the empty tomb in any event probably played no role in early Christianity\u2019s understanding of the resurrection of Jesus. Evans responds that these arguments are not persuasive, for Roman law in fact did permit burial of the executed, including the crucified. Moreover, there is compelling literary and archaeological evidence that Roman authority in Israel in the time of Jesus did respect Jewish law and burial traditions, in which all dead, including the crucified, were buried before nightfall. It is further argued that Jesus\u2019 followers would not have spoken of Jesus\u2019 resurrection had the body of Jesus remained in the tomb.
\nIn chapter 5, Simon Gathercole examines evidence for the christological claims of the Synoptic Gospels and the \u201ctunnel period\u201d of preliterary sources running roughly 30 to 50 CE. According to Gathercole, the Synoptic Gospels do have a Christology of divine identity in a strong sense, as well as one of preexistence. Their Christology of preexistence is exemplified in the \u201cI have come\u201d sayings, where Jesus\u2019 \u201ccoming\u201d implies a journey from a heavenly abode to earth because such sayings are closely analogous, not to the opening remarks by biblical prophets, but to statements given by angels as to the purpose of their earthly visitation in the Old Testament. Moreover, other elements in the Synoptics indicate that Jesus shares the identity of God, not least that he performs activities and possesses prerogatives thought to be exclusive privileges of God according to the Old Testament. The evidence from the \u201ctunnel period\u201d in texts like Romans 1:4 and Acts 2:36 does not provide evidence that Jesus was made something that he was not. Instead, it shows that Jesus entered into new roles appropriate to his divine person in a postincarnation exalted state. The \u201cchanges\u201d that took place in Jesus\u2019 exaltation are about Jesus\u2019 relationship to the church and the world rather than to his relationship to God the Father.
\nIn chapter 6, Chris Tilling subjects Ehrman\u2019s conception of monotheism and Christology to rigorous scrutiny. He engages in a critical discussion of Ehrman\u2019s interpretive approach, such as his understanding of \u201cmonotheism,\u201d his postulation of two alternative Christologies of \u201cexaltation\u201d and \u201cincarnation,\u201d and the claim that a text like Galatians 4:14 supports an \u201cangel Christology.\u201d Tilling argues that these interpretive judgments, which appear throughout Ehrman\u2019s argument, cannot account for the data that they seek to explain and are therefore artificially imposed. As a consequence, they signal Ehrman\u2019s profound interpretive confusion.
\nIn chapter 7, Tilling continues his critique by examining Ehrman\u2019s understanding of incarnational Christology, principally in Paul\u2019s letters. Tilling sets out what is actually involved in understanding the apostle\u2019s Christology. Tilling demonstrates that doing the work of a historian involves examining a few explanatory conditions, and this\u2014in turn\u2014shows Paul\u2019s Christ as fully divine in the sense of sharing the transcendent uniqueness of the one God of Israel. Second, Tilling turns to assessing Ehrman\u2019s actual exegesis, and his verdict is far from sympathetic. Tilling claims that Ehrman\u2019s textual analysis is deficient on the grounds that it focuses on just one passage from Paul\u2019s letters and does not demonstrate any substantial awareness of a wider swath of scholarship. While Ehrman\u2019s book might be given some latitude since it is a popular level work, in any case, Ehrman\u2019s study appears distinctly uninformed and even superficial. The upshot is that Ehrman simply misconstrues Paul\u2019s Christology and so undermines his entire project. Thereafter, Tilling closes by looking at a few problems in Ehrman\u2019s reading of the gospel of John and the letter to the Hebrews, which prove to be equally as dissatisfying as his reading of Paul.
\nIn chapter 8, Charles Hill takes a look at what happened in the early church after the books of the New Testament were written. Hill reviews what Ehrman says about a number of christological \u201cdead ends\u201d (i.e., adoptionism, docetism, Gnosticism) and about what he calls \u201chetero-orthodoxies,\u201d that is, christological views that affirmed both the humanity and deity of Christ, but were ultimately rejected. This chapter reminds readers of the resolutely biblical orientation of the orthodox theologians and tests some of Ehrman\u2019s more questionable claims about the Ebionites, the Modalists, and Tertullian in particular.
\nIn chapter 9, Charles Hill continues narrating the story of people and movements in the early church and how they handled the paradox of Jesus being both God and man, and the paradox of the Trinity consisting of one God in three persons. He reviews and deconstructs Ehrman\u2019s newly-coined term \u201cortho-paradox.\u201d Ehrman\u2019s chronology of christological development is shown to be not the conclusion of historical study, but rather a presupposition that determines the outcome of historical study in advance. Finally, Hill takes up and contests Ehrman\u2019s charge that the mistreatment of Jews in the fourth and fifth centuries is directly attributable to the belief that Jesus was divine.
\nNot everything Ehrman says is wrong. Much we accept, and other scholars may side with him on issues here and there. However, our overall verdict is that Ehrman has not extended or enhanced our knowledge of Christian origins. Therefore, we hope to put up a rival perspective to Ehrman by critiquing his arguments and by offering a better model for understanding the origins of belief in Jesus\u2019 divine nature. In doing so, we aim to give a historically informed account as to why the Galilean preacher from Nazareth was hailed as \u201cthe Lord Jesus Christ\u201d and how he became the object of worship in the early church. We believe, in short, that God became Jesus!<\/p>\n
CHAPTER 2<\/p>\n
Of Gods, Angels, and Men<\/p>\n
Michael F. Bird<\/p>\n
INTRODUCTION<\/p>\n
So what counts as a \u201cgod\u201d these days?
\nSuch a question reminds me of the 1984 blockbuster movie Ghostbusters. In one scene from the movie, the Sumerian deity Gozer appears on top of a New York building, amidst much paranormal activity, and is confronted by the four ghostbusters. Gozer, who appears as a woman, challenges them by asking, \u201cAre you a god?\u201d Ray Stantz (Dan Aykroyd) replies, \u201cNo.\u201d Gozer responds, \u201cThen die!\u201d and she nearly blasts them off the top of the building. As they pick themselves up, one of the other ghostbusters turns to Ray and says, \u201cRay, when someone asks you if you\u2019re a god, you say \u2018yes!\u2019 \u201d But don\u2019t worry. The ghostbusters defeat Gozer in the end. Fair to say, though, that the ghostbusters had a fairly loose definition of what counts as a god.
\nSo when the early church claimed that Jesus was \u201cGod,\u201d what did they mean by that claim? Did they mean that he was the one and only God? Or were they making a slightly lesser claim, that Jesus was divine, like an angel, or perhaps like a king who was deified after death? Ehrman knows full well that the early church regarded Jesus as \u201cGod,\u201d but he seeks to determine in what sense they meant it (see the excursus at the end of the chapter for examples of intermediary figures like angels and divinized kings).
\nIn his book, Ehrman argues that in antiquity there was originally no concept of God as the sole and supreme sovereign, who was up in heaven, far above and beyond all earthly life. Such a notion of \u201cGod,\u201d as an exclusive and absolute deity, came much later and was a creation of the church in the fourth century, some three hundred years after Jesus. Instead, Ehrman contends that the ancients did not imagine a sovereign God up in heaven separated by a huge chasm from lowly sinners toiling down below. In Ehrman\u2019s reading of ancient sources, there was a continuum of existence from the human to the divine. Not only that, but within the divine realm there were numerous deities, ranked within a graded pyramid of power and grandeur.
\nEhrman spends the first two chapters of his book talking about Greco-Roman and Jewish sources that depict divine figures who become human or humans who become divine. These writings provide the \u201cfirst step in seeing how Jesus came to be thought of in these terms\u201d as divine in the early church. Jesus could be \u201cgod\u201d in the same sense that the Roman Emperor Augustus was deified after his death according to Suetonius, or that Enoch was transformed into an angel as depicted in 2 Enoch, or that Moses was declared to be a god by the Jewish philosopher Philo. In other words, to say that Jesus is \u201cgod\u201d does not require that he be part of an absolute and singular divine reality, which is infinitely removed from the world and utterly beyond all earthly reality. Jesus could be a \u201cgod\u201d in this broader sense of a lesser being who traverses the divine and human realms, but not \u201cGod Almighty\u201d in an infinite sense.
\nFor Ehrman, rather than thinking of Jesus as the one and only true God, a much better analogy for Jesus\u2019 divinity is in the stories of chief angels who visited earth and humans who later became angels. He writes: \u201cIn other words, if humans could be angels (and angels humans), and if angels could be gods, and if in fact the chief angel could be the Lord himself\u2014then to make Jesus divine, one simply needs to think of him as an angel in human form.\u201d There we have it, Jesus the angel! Gosh darn it, could Oprah and the Jehovah\u2019s Witnesses actually be right?<\/p>\n
A NOTE ON METHOD<\/p>\n
The sources Ehrman cites might strike some modern readers as shocking since they make fantastic claims about deified kings, divine men, horny gods, misbehaving angels, an exalted Enoch, a mysterious Melchizedek, and even Moses gets some divine majesty of his own. All of this could well grate against the convictions of anyone with monotheistic sensibilities. However, it is worth remembering that the New Testament authors were perfectly aware of this world. It is evident that they not only read about it, but they even experienced it in the marketplace of religions and philosophies in the ancient world. Part of the challenge of the early church was to negotiate a way within this religiously diverse context in order to make converts to the faith and to strengthen churches that faced manifold challenges pertaining to their beliefs.
\nAs evidence of early Christian awareness of this environment, the apostle Paul wrote to the church in Corinth: \u201cFor even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth (as indeed there are many \u2018gods\u2019 and many \u2018lords\u2019), yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live\u201d (1 Cor 8:5\u20136). As to what these \u201cgods\u201d were, Paul seems to think of them as somewhere between nonentities and demons (see 1 Cor 8:4; 10:20\u201321). Paul and Barnabas also had the amusing, though soon problematic, experience of being confused with the gods Zeus and Hermes in Pisidian Antioch (Acts 14:12\u201313).
\nIn Paul\u2019s letter to the Colossians, there is also a warning against the worship of angels, a presumably hot issue in the smelting pot of religions in the interior of Asia Minor (Col 2:18). Jude also quotes writings such as 1 Enoch and the Assumption of Moses in his letter to churches, encountering strange teachings and immoral behaviors (Jude 9, 14). The idea of the Logos, the governing rational principle of the universe in Stoic philosophy, was utilized by John the Evangelist in his prologue as a way of describing the incarnation of the preexistent Jesus as God\u2019s self-communication. John the Seer devotes much of his Apocalypse to confronting the problem of how Christians in Asia Minor are to respond to the imperial cult with its demands for worship of the emperor. For anyone who had lived and travelled around the Mediterranean basin, the stories of gods becoming human or humans becoming gods would hardly be new. The question is how this all relates to the divine nature of Jesus according to early Christian sources.
\nEhrman assumes that these sources explain how or in what sense Jesus was regarded as divine. So for Ehrman, Augustus was hailed as a son of God, and Jesus was hailed as a Son of God, so they might be saying the same thing with only minor variations on a theme. Moses became an angel, Enoch became an angel, so maybe Jesus became an angel too. Well, there are obvious relevancies with such comparisons, but it might not be so simple as A = B. It\u2019s kind of like saying, \u201cButternut squash and butterscotch pudding, they are all made of butter, aren\u2019t they?\u201d Alas, no, they are not the same thing! So a few comments are in order.
\nFirst, Ehrman risks the error of relying too heavily on parallels with ancient sources to provide an explanation for Christian claims about Christ. The problem here is that for a long time scholars have been aware of a fallacious line of argumentation that Samuel Sandmel called \u201cparallelomania.\u201d This is what happens when scholars find words and concepts in one document and allege that they mean the same thing in another document. The parallels are then said to show that the same idea is shared by both sources or that there is a literary dependency of one document borrowing from the other. However, it does not always work that way.
\nFor example, the prologue to John\u2019s gospel (John 1:1\u201318) has been compared to every type of source imaginable: Old Testament, Jewish wisdom literature, rabbinic writings, the Dead Sea Scrolls, Philo, Gnosticism, Mandaean literature, and much, much more. Many scholars have claimed that the real meaning of John\u2019s prologue is found in \u201cX\u201d or that \u201cX\u201d was even the source from which John took his ideas. Indeed, John 1:1\u201318 has been a parallelomaniacs playground. Now there is no denying that literary parallels do matter for context and background, but they should assist in illuminating rather than overpowering the literary and rhetorical analyses of a given text. A whole scale reliance on parallelizing our sources to try to understand them is actually paralyzing for good historical investigation of texts.
\nSecond, we must also remember that analogy does not mean genealogy. Just because there are verbal and conceptual similarities between Christian claims about Jesus and Greco-Roman claims about divine figures does not prove that Christians borrowed from pagan sources. For example, while scholars have often claimed that the gospel birth narratives are largely modeled on Greco-Roman accounts of the birth of heroes like Alexander the Great and Augustus, which Ehrman points to, closer precedents are probably found in Old Testament birth stories, like the story of Hannah and Samuel (1 Samuel 1\u20132) and Ahaz and Hezekiah (Isaiah 7\u201311). In the case of the similarities between the gospel accounts of Jesus and Philostratus\u2019 biography of Apollonius of Tyana, written at least a hundred years after the Gospels, it seems clear to me that Philostratus\u2019 biography has been written as a polemical parody of the Gospels, a type of refutation by imitation. Apollonius could be held up as a pagan antitype to Jesus Christ. If so, there were occasions when pagans modeled stories from Christian sources rather than vice-versa.
\nThird, a good account of Christian origins will give equal attention to both its similarities and its differences with other literature. On the one hand, the faith of the early church was not expressed in a vacuum. Christian discourse about Jesus, in proclamation, worship, and debate, was expressed in Jewish, Greek, and Roman idioms that had currency in their setting. The New Testament authors probably intended to make deliberate connections between their accounts and the literary forms and literary culture around them. Such connections were certainly perceived by subsequent Christian readers and by pagan critics alike. I would also add that in order to understand how Christianity is different from Greco-Roman religions, we must first understand how they are similar, whether that pertains to beliefs about God, social structures, or ethics. We should expect no less because Christianity took root in the synagogue as much as the agora; it was lived in the real world and engaged with various philosophies and religions, so comparisons of its claims about God within the intellectual world of the time were inevitable.
\nOn the other hand, we should not use the various similarities as a reason to skim over the hard job of understanding Christian claims about Jesus on their own terms, in their own context, and with a mind to determining their distinctive shape. For instance, the worship of a crucified and risen Messiah was definitely unique and incredibly scandalous to all audiences, whether Jewish or Greek. To Jewish audiences, worshiping a crucified man was blasphemy; it was about as kosher as pork sausages wrapped in bacon served to Jews for a jihad fundraiser. To Greeks, worshiping a man recently raised from the dead was like doing obeisance to the first zombie you met in a zombie apocalypse. If Christian ideas about God were so snug and down within the ancient world, then why was Paul flogged by Jewish communities (2 Cor 11:24) and laughed out of the Athenian Areopagus by Greek philosophers (Acts 17:32)? Could it be that the Christian idea of God was startling, odd, and even offensive to Jews and pagans, who had trouble swallowing its claims about Jesus? Perhaps the reason why New Testament authors like Paul, Luke, and John spent so much time talking about Jesus and God is because they meant something very different by \u201cGod\u201d than what their Jewish and pagan neighbors thought, and it took some effort to get the redefinition of God across.
\nFor a case in point, Philo, the cosmopolitan Jewish philosopher, rejected the iconic worship of human figures by saying, \u201cSooner could God change into a man than a man into God.\u201d From this it seems as if Philo is saying that if Jews can scarcely imagine God becoming a man, they have an even harder time imagining a man, like a Roman emperor, becoming God. In which case, Jewish beliefs about intermediary figures were not necessarily interchangeable with Greco-Roman beliefs about semidivine figures.
\nOn top of that, it is surely interesting that a second-century pagan critic like Celsus\u2014who was not averse to pointing out the similarities between pagan mythologies and the Gospels\u2014could deny that gods or sons of the gods became human. He wrote: \u201cO Jews and Christians, no God or Son of God either came or will come down [to earth]. But if you mean that angels did so, then what do you call them? Are they gods, or some other race of beings? Some other race of beings [doubtlessly], and in all probability daemons.\u201d Celsus did not think that pagan mythologies provided a precedent for Christian claims about Jesus, and he really struggled to understand exactly what kind of divine visitation Christians thought happened in the coming of Christ.
\nIn terms of uniqueness, it is fair to say that early Christian beliefs about Jesus were a revised form of Jewish monotheism. Christian devotion to Jesus was not a syncretistic experiment with Greco-Roman religious ideas that gradually broke away from Jewish monotheism. More likely it was a reconfiguration of Jewish monotheism, operating under its key premises, but spurred on by the impact of Jesus on his followers and by religious experiences to express this monotheism in light of fresh convictions about God, Messiah, and Spirit. The first Christians held to the Jewish belief in one God, but this God was now known as God the Father, the Lord Jesus, and (eventually) the Holy Spirit.
\nUnsurprisingly in the early years of the church there emerged a clear binitarian devotion focused on God the Father and the Lord Jesus. Note how Paul opens his earliest letter that we possess with the words: \u201cTo the church of the Thessalonians in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ: Grace and peace to you\u201d (1 Thess 1:1). Or again, look at what he said to the Galatians in another letter opening: \u201cGrace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins to rescue us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen\u201d (Gal 1:3\u20135). God the Father and Lord Jesus go together like peanut butter and jelly, like Australia and kangaroos, like cheese and wine, or like baseball and beer! When the early Christians mentioned God, they had to mention Jesus as well, and whenever they mentioned Jesus, they felt constrained to mention God in the same breath. It\u2019s like God was Jesified and Jesus was Godified. For this reason, a number of scholars have spoken about a \u201cchristological monotheism.\u201d The God of Israel is revealed in, through, and even as the Lord Jesus Christ. Of course, to say that monotheism has been revised raises some good questions about monotheism itself.<\/p>\n
ANCIENT MONOTHEISMS<\/p>\n
Ehrman seems to think that a strict and absolute monotheism was a later invention that took place in the fourth century as part of the Christianization of the Roman Empire. He goes so far as to say that, apart from Jews, \u201ceveryone was a polytheist.\u201d The problem is that this is just plain untrue. There was a long tradition of pagan monotheism well before the Christian era. Celsus, a second-century critic of Christianity, was himself a pagan monotheist. It was possible in the ancient world to be a pluralistic monotheist by giving the one God different names. So in the Epistle to Aristeas 16 it is said that the Jewish God is known to the Gentiles as Zeus or Jove. The Jewish author Aristobulus said about philosophers who speak about Zeus that \u201ctheir intention is to refer to God.\u201d The pagan author Varro claimed the \u201cGod of the Jews to be the same as Jupiter.\u201d Celsus could even say that it made no real difference whether one worships Zeus, Adonai, Sabaoth, or Amoun because it was all the same God.
\nThe cult of the Most High God, extant around Asia Minor and Greek cities near the Black Sea, provided an expression of monotheism that was ambiguous enough to accommodate Jews and pagans in a common worship. Pagan monotheism may have even prepared for the spread of Judaism, the rise of Christianity, and the eventual conquest of Islam in the east. So to borrow a line from James Crossley, ancient religious belief wasn\u2019t all Jason and the Argonauts or Clash of the Titans.
\nI am convinced by the study of several scholars that Jewish monotheism was, generally, strict. There is one Creator God, who stands above all other reality, and this is the God who covenants with Israel. God\u2019s unique identity is bound up with his sacred name, YHWH, revealed to Israel. Monotheism entails monolatry, the worship of the one true God to exclusion of all others. These elements of one Creator, divine name, and exclusive worship make up the substance of Jewish monotheism. Such views permeate the sources in every era. The Shema, the famous prayer that all faithful Jews are meant to recite every day, goes, \u201cHear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one\u201d (Deut 6:4).
\nWe see the same thing in a prayer from the second century BCE recalling Nehemiah\u2019s words at the resumption of sacrifices in the temple: \u201cO Lord, Lord God, Creator of all things, you are awe-inspiring and strong and just and merciful, you alone are king and are kind, you alone are bountiful, you alone are just and almighty and eternal\u201d (2 Macc 1:24\u201325). Even Philo, who could refer to Moses as \u201cGod and King of the whole nation\u201d and call the Logos a \u201csecond God,\u201d still touted monotheistic principles: \u201cTherefore, of first importance, let us inscribe in ourselves this first commandment as the holiest of all commandments, to think that there is but one God, the most high, and to honor him alone; and do not permit polytheistic doctrine to even touch the ears of any person who is accustomed to seek after the truth, with a clean and pure of heart.\u201d Note the emphasis: God alone, God alone, God alone!
\nThe Jewish people in the Roman era had an acute case of \u201cmono,\u201d not mononucleosis from playing spin the bottle with dirty Gentile teenagers, but monotheism and monolatry. This exclusive devotion to one God isn\u2019t based on abstract philosophical speculation or a generalized belief about the world above. Instead, it is a clear, crisp, and sharp belief that Israel\u2019s God was the Creator of all, unique among all claimants to divinity, and Israel\u2019s God is and will be King over all. Of course, that doesn\u2019t mean that every Jew was faithful to this belief. Some Jews made offerings at pagan shrines or even departed from the Jewish faith altogether and became pagan. That said, all things being equal, Jews were generally devout monotheists, so much so that a pagan author like Tacitus could comment that \u201cthe Jews conceive of one god alone.\u201d
\nGiven this Jewish monotheistic context\u2014giving honorific status to Jesus\u2019 name, identifying Christ as Creator, and making him a recipient of worship\u2014was theologically adventurous, sociologically scandalous, and historically unprecedented as far as I can tell. This is clear from several lines of investigation. To proffer but a few off-the-cuff examples. In the Christ hymn of Philippians 2, which I take to be pre-Pauline, the words of YHWH about his sovereignty found in Isa 45:23 (\u201cBefore me every knee will bow; by me every tongue will swear\u201d) are nonchalantly applied to Jesus with these words: \u201cat the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth\u201d (Phil 2:10). In another Christ hymn, this time from Colossians, we are told that \u201cin him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him\u201d (Col 1:16).
\nIn addition, early patterns of devotion show Jesus worshiped in a way fitting for YHWH, seen in prayers offered to Jesus or in his name, invocation of his name as \u201cLord,\u201d baptism in his name, hymns and doxologies exalting his role as Creator and Savior, memorial meals in his honor, and prophetic inspiration deriving from him. According to Hurtado, \u201cThis concern to define and reverence Jesus with reference to the one God is what I mean by the term \u2018binitarian.\u2019 Here we see the powerful effect of Jewish monotheism, combining with a strong impetus to reverence Jesus in unprecedented ways, in the innovative and vigorous devotional pattern advocated and reflected in Paul\u2019s letters.\u201d<\/p>\n
ANCIENT MONOTHEISM AND INTERMEDIARY FIGURES<\/p>\n
But how does this strict Jewish monotheism square with all these \u201cintermediary figures\u201d like angels who become human or humans who become angels? For ancient Jews, the heavens were full of angels, and there was ample room for the involvement of such figures from God\u2019s heavenly council in the operation of God\u2019s sovereignty over the world. Jews could imagine beings who took the divine name within them, were referred to by one or more of God\u2019s titles, and were so endowed with divine attributes that were often difficult to distinguish from God, functioning as personal extensions of his powers and sovereignty. Yet rather than place devotion to Jesus under the aegis of a revised Jewish monotheism, i.e., \u201cchristological monotheism,\u201d Ehrman prefers to see Jesus\u2019 divinity as part of this phenomenon of powerful angels who take human form or else exalted human figures who become divine.
\nFor the sake of brevity, let me focus on my favorite chief angel, Metatron. I like Metatron, mainly because his name sounds like \u201cMegatron,\u201d the leader of the Decepticons, the evil robots who menace earth in the Transformer movies. Only yesterday I received my copy of the recently published Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: More Noncanonical Scriptures. I randomly opened to the middle of the book, found a document called Sefer Zerubbabel, and the first thing I read was this:<\/p>\n
Michael, who is (also) Metatron, answered me saying: \u201cI am the angel who guided Abraham throughout all the land of Canaan. I blessed him in the name of the Lord. I am the one who redeemed Isaac and [wept] for him. I am the one who wrestled with Jacob at the crossing of the Jabbok. I am the one who guided Israel in the wilderness for forty years in the name of the Lord. I am the one who appeared to Joshua at Gilgal, and I am the one who rained down brimstone and fire on Sodom and Gomorrah. He places His name with me: Metatron in gematria is the equivalent of Shadday. As for you, Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, whose name is Jeconiah, ask me and I will tell you what will happen at the End of Days.<\/p>\n
This quotation is from a medieval Jewish apocalypse (much later than the time of Christian beginnings), but it showcases the fascination with angelic figures like Metatron by Jewish authors. So who is Metatron and what does he have to do with monotheism? Metatron is a chief angel in Jewish angelology known mainly in rabbinic and hekhalot literature about visions and ascents to heavenly palaces. His name means \u201cThe lesser YHWH,\u201d kind of like YHWH\u2019s own lieutenant-governor. He operates as a divine vice-regent and as a lesser manifestation of the divine name. In some literature, he is identified with the angel of the Lord, as in the Sefer Zerubbabel cited above, and elsewhere Enoch is absorbed into Metatron after his translation to heaven (3 En. 15.1\u20132). According to 3 Enoch (a document produced around the fourth or fifth century CE but with literary precursors), Metatron is the highest of archangels, who functions as God\u2019s personal secretary (3 En. 4.5; 10.3\u20136; 12.1\u20135). Metatron even has his own little throne where he holds court over celestial beings, and even angels fall prostrate before him (3 En. 4.9; 16.1\u20132). Metatron is identified with Enoch, the son of Jared (3 En. 4.3).
\nYet lest we think that the Metatron tradition has shown that Jewish monotheism was not quite so strict, we must remember a few things. First, in 3 Enoch, there is vigorous emphasis on God\u2019s sovereignty over the world and his spatial remoteness from the human race. As per much Jewish mystical literature, God resides in the seventh heaven, and he is inaccessible to humans from there. In fact, the angels complain to God why he bothers with humans like Adam and Enoch, good for nothing idolaters that they are; in response, God withdraws his glory from the face of the earth (3 En. 5.10\u201314). In this setting, figures like Metatron are not examples of heavenly beings with absolute divine power, but they are the only conduits by which visionaries and mystics may experience God, precisely because God is so distant and transcendent.
\nSecond, Metatron\u2019s place in heaven is by appointment and by no means assured. Metatron is given his position by God to be a type of grand vizier over all things (3 En. 4.3; 6.3; 10.1\u20132), but this excludes authority over the eight angels charged with guarding the gates to the heavenly palaces (3 En. 10.3\u20134). Moreover, at one point a mystic named \u2019Aher (i.e., Elisha ben Abuya, according to other sources) sees Metatron in all of his enthroned splendor in the heavenly court, and \u2019Aher cries out, \u201cThere are indeed two powers in heaven.\u201d When \u2019Aher says this, a voice from God rebukes him, while another angel goes up to Metatron and strikes him with sixty lashes of fire and forces him off his throne, just so everyone knows who is really in charge (3 En. 16.1\u20135). So Metatron, for all his might and marvel, is still a created and subordinated being before God. Evidently exalted angels serve God, but they do not share his rule, nor do they receive his worship.
\nThere is a reason why angels like Metatron or Michael could never level up and become the object of devotion equal to God. There was a strong Jewish prohibition about the worship of angels (e.g., Tob 12:16\u201322; 3 En. 16.1\u20135), which carries over into the New Testament (Col. 2:18; Rev. 19:10; 22:9). Ehman infers from this: \u201cWe know that some Jews thought it was right to worship angels in no small part because a number of our surviving texts insist that it not be done\u201d Well, okay, maybe some Jews were a bit too enthusiastic in their devotion to angels (much like some teenage girls I\u2019ve heard about in the American Bible Belt!). That said, the worship of angels was not necessarily the same as worship of God. In our ancient sources angels could be venerated or invoked in any number of ways: (1) by prayers and even by magical manipulation for assistance, protection, good health, and vengeance; (2) their heavenly worship could be seen as mysterious and worthy of mimicking; (3) angels could be objects of thanksgiving in relation to various functions or activities that they performed on God\u2019s behalf. After a meticulous survey of the evidence about angel veneration, Loren Stuckenbruck concludes:<\/p>\n
Therefore, on the basis of the texts it would be hasty for one to speak of the veneration of angels in Early Judaism. The relevant sources do not allow us to infer a common practice, but rather seem to reflect specific contexts within which worship of angels, in a variety of forms, could find expression.\u2026 Angel veneration is not conceived as a substitute for the worship of God. Indeed, most often the venerative language is followed by an explanation which emphasizes the supremacy of God.<\/p>\n
That is interesting because in the book of Revelation we have clear prohibitions of angel worship (Rev 19:10; 22:9), but also lucid accounts of the heavenly worship of the \u201cLord God Almighty\u201d (4:1\u201311) and \u201cthe Lamb\u201d (5:1\u201314). In other words, Jesus receives the worship that is given to God but forbidden for angels. In Revelation, the worship given to Jesus is not angel worship but God worship! In that biblical book we have the deliberate treatment of Jesus as an object of worship right alongside a deliberate retention of the Jewish definition of monotheism by exclusive worship of the one God.
\nLet\u2019s look at one more example of these intermediary figures who are thought to be divine by Ehrman. A good candidate for examination is the \u201cSon of Man\u201d found in 1 Enoch, a composite Palestinian document probably composed in the first century (and note that in one part of the document, though probably a later interpolation, the Son of Man is identified as Enoch [1 En. 70\u201371]). It should be of obvious relevance to us since \u201cSon of Man\u201d is a term of self-reference for Jesus in the Gospels and a title for Jesus in other parts of the New Testament. Ehrman surveys the relevant parts of 1 Enoch and concludes about the Enochic Son of Man:<\/p>\n
He is a divine being who has always existed, who sits beside God on his throne, who will judge the wicked and the righteous at the end of time. He, in other words, is elevated to God\u2019s own status and functions as the divine being who carries out God\u2019s judgment on the earth. This is an exalted figure indeed, as exalted as one can possibly be without actually being the Lord God Almighty himself.<\/p>\n
Is Jesus \u201cdivine\u201d in the same way that the Enochic Son of Man is divine?
\nThe fact that Enoch\u2019s Son of Man is placed on God\u2019s throne, exercises judgment on God\u2019s behalf, and is worshiped by kings and rulers is troublesome to Bauckham, so much so that he concedes that the Enochic Son of Man is the \u201cone exception which proves the rule\u201d about the strict nature of Jewish monotheism. I am not quite willing to fold on this. The fact that kings and nations worship him, even while on God\u2019s throne, is still merely the acknowledgment that he is God\u2019s appointed agent who will gather the elect and punish wicked kings and nations who have not acknowledged the one true God and his people.
\nKeep in mind that angelic creatures, who were part of God\u2019s heavenly court, and biblical heroes like Enoch, who were thought to have ascended to heavenly glory, were not treated as rightful recipients of cultic worship in Jewish circles. Jewish devotion showed a concern to preserve God\u2019s uniqueness, and in their cultic worship they maintained an almost paranoid anxiety about exclusivity. The upshot is that Jewish practice was concerned with safeguarding monolatry, which suggests a genuinely robust commitment to a strict monotheism. In this case, devotion to Jesus Christ\u2014not as a second god, not as an angel beside, but as an expression of faith in the one God\u2014is strikingly unusual.
\nThe best way to understand these intermediary figures is by adopting the taxonomy proposed by Bauckham. These intermediary figures were not ambiguous semidivine beings that somehow straddled the boundary between God and creation. Some were aspects of God\u2019s own unique reality (Logos, Word, Wisdom), while most others were unambiguously creatures, exalted servants by all accounts, but still distinct from God\u2019s person, God\u2019s sovereignty, and God\u2019s worship (e.g., angels, exalted patriarchs, etc.).
\nIn sum, therefore, there was in Jewish thought accommodated beliefs and honorific titles given to various agents like chief angels such as Metatron and to exalted humans such as Enoch. However, a sharp line was drawn between the veneration of intermediary figures and the worship of the one God (so Hurtado), and this was based on the fact that such beings were not part of God\u2019s divine identity (so Bauckham). In this case, and contra Ehrman, the continuity between Jewish monotheism and New Testament Christology does not flow from intermediary figures, but from christological monotheism.<\/p>\n
TOUCHED BY AN ANGEL CALLED \u201cJESUS\u201d \u2026 NOT!<\/p>\n
I grew up watching great American TV shows about angels like Highway to Heaven and Touched by an Angel. We all love angels. What\u2019s not to like? Big wings, divine superpowers, sometimes they look like Hollywood actor Nicholas Cage, and they can fly. As proof of our culture\u2019s angel fixation, while writing the first draft of this book, there are news feeds about alleged angel appearances at the funeral of Nelson Mandela in South Africa. On the topic of angels, I even used to go up to girls in bars and say, \u201cHey, are you alright? Did you hurt yourself when you fell?\u201d To which the girl would typically reply, \u201cWhat? Who fell?\u201d Then smiling I\u2019d add, \u201cWhen you fell from heaven. Cause you have the face of an angel.\u201d Sometimes I\u2019d get a giggle and a blush, but usually I was just told to take my routine elsewhere. But I did marry an angel. I\u2019m convinced my wife Naomi is an angel for two reasons. First, she has a positively angelic glow when she smiles. Second, she said that if I ever forget her birthday again as I did in 2007, that she\u2019s gonna smite me the same way that the angel of the Lord smote the Assyrians (see 2 Kgs 19:35). So I\u2019m pro-angel to the max! But was Jesus an angel?
\nThe idea that one becomes an angel upon death is called \u201cangelomorphism,\u201d and in relation to Christ is known as \u201cangelomorphic Christology.\u201d Ehrman rightly points to examples of Enoch and Moses as persons reckoned in some sources to have become an angel after their deaths, and he seizes on them as a potential scheme applicable to early depictions of Jesus. There is some traction to this view in Christian sources. First, consider Acts 12, where Peter escapes from prison, goes to the house of Mary, the mother of John Mark, and knocks on the door. Rhoda hears Peter\u2019s voice, runs back, and tells the others that Peter is outside the premises. But they don\u2019t believe her that it is Peter, and they infer that \u201cit must be his angel\u201d (Acts 12:13\u201316). In other words, they think that Peter is already dead and the dude at the door must be his angelic doppelganger.
\nSecond, among the church fathers, the strange \u201cangel of the Lord\u201d in the Old Testament (see, e.g., Gen 16:13; 21:17\u201318; 22:11\u201313; etc.) was regarded as an appearance of the preincarnate Christ (i.e., a \u201cchristophany\u201d), a tradition that is as early as Justin Martyr in the mid-second century.
\nThird, the descriptions of Jesus in Rev 1:13\u201316 and 14:14\u201316 do have angelomorphic qualities as Jesus is described in terms reminiscent of angels, like the one mentioned in Rev 10:1\u20133. So, is Jesus simply the human manifestation of the \u201cangel of the Lord\u201d? Did Jesus morph into an angel after his exaltation to heaven? I doubt it!
\nFirst, the identification of the \u201cangel of the Lord\u201d with the preincarnate Christ does make sense if one engages in a self-consciously retrospective and deliberately canonical and christological reading of the Old Testament. Whether the appearances of the \u201cangel of the Lord\u201d was a precedent that early Christians drew on to explain the coming of Jesus is, however, quite another matter. While New Testament authors could regard Jesus as preexistent and present with the Israelites in their sacred history (see 1 Cor 10:4, 9; Jude 5), there is no indication that he was ever identified with the angel of the Lord, not at least until the time of Justin Martyr in the second century. The angel of the Lord remains an anomalous figure because he not only brings a message from God, but he speaks for God in the first person. So in one biblical episode we read: \u201cThe angel of the LORD went up from Gilgal to Bokim and said, \u2018I brought you up out of Egypt and led you into the land I swore to give to your ancestors\u2019 \u201d (Judg 2:1).
\nElsewhere the angel not only represents God but even embodies God\u2019s presence, which explains why the angel of the Lord who appeared to Moses in the burning bush said, \u201cI am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob,\u201d and was the one who revealed the divine name to Moses (Exod 3:2, 6, 14). Paradoxically the angel of the Lord both is YHWH and is not YHWH. He is the subject in mysterious divine encounters that attempted to speak of God\u2019s immanence with his people without forfeiting his transcendence. However, ambiguities of this order (don\u2019t get me wrong, there are other ambiguities to deal with) did not shape expressions of belief in Christ. The problem with the angel is whether or even how he is identifiable with YHWH\u2019s own presence and person. However, Christ\u2019s person was understood as being distinct from God the Father, and his mode of divine presence was couched in far more concrete language, like \u201cform\u201d of God, \u201cglory\u201d of God, \u201cimage\u201d of God, and even \u201cGod enfleshed.\u201d
\nSecond, on an alleged angelomorphic Christology, it has little currency as an explanatory framework for what the early Christians thought of Jesus. In regards to the presentation of Jesus\u2019 earthly life according to the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, known as the Synoptic Gospels, Jesus remains distinct from the angels and even possesses a complete authority over them. Angels are said to serve him when he was in the wilderness (Matt 4:11; Mark 1:13), he has authority to call on the angels if he wanted to (Matt 4:6; Luke 4:10), and up to twelve legions of angels would come to his defense if he summoned them (Matt 26:53). The various sayings about the coming of the Son of Man describe the angels as his vanguard or attendants, and the Son of Man is never identified as one of them (see Matt 25:31; Mark 8:38; Luke 12:8). The angel of the Lord is active in predicting Jesus\u2019 birth and resurrection in such a way that it was unlikely that confusion of the two ever entered the Evangelists\u2019 minds (see Matt 1:20, 23; 2:13, 19; 28:2; Luke 1:11; 2:9).
\nThe New Testament authors are at pains to emphasize that Jesus has been exalted above all powers and authorities, presumably including all tiers of angels (see Phil 2:9\u201311; Col 1:16\u201317; 2:8\u201310, 20; Heb 1:5\u20139; 2:5\u20139; 1 Pet 3:22; Rev 5:11\u201314). The descent and ascent motif related to the Son\u2019s two stages of humiliation and exaltation results in Jesus having a status high above any of the angels (Phil 2:5\u201311; Heb 2:5\u20139, 16\u201318). In one of the Pastoral Epistles, Paul gives a ministerial charge to Timothy before a hierarchy of witnesses including \u201cGod and Christ Jesus and the elect angels\u201d (1 Tim 5:21). Clearly, Jesus is never depicted as one of the angels; rather, he is always depicted as inherently superior to them in view of his unique relationship to God the Father and his unique relationship to believers.
\nThird, in Revelation, the risen Jesus is similar in many respects to glorious angels, the living creatures, and the elders. For example, the presentation of Jesus in Rev 1:13\u201316 is indeed similar to the description of the mighty angel in Rev 10:1\u20133. However, there is no reason to see the two as identical, and the Apocalypse more probably presents the divine figure of Jesus in Revelation 1 as temporarily taking up angelic form in order to underscore the heavenly character of his message. The mighty angel in Revelation 10 is not Christ either, but deliberately is like Christ because John wants to emphasize that this angel reflects some of Christ\u2019s own glory and has come with Christ\u2019s own authority.
\nAt one point, Ehrman cites Hurtado saying that principal angel speculation provided Christians with a basic scheme for accommodating Christ next to God without compromising Jewish monotheism. That is true, but Hurtado says in the same place that the principal angel is no ordinary angel as he is set apart in his various functions from the other angels; the analogy with principal angels proves only that Christ can act as a divine agent without lapsing into di-theism, and the angel analogy breaks down when it is remembered that God rather than angels is the worthy recipient of divine worship. For Hurtado, none of this does anything to prove that Christ was perceived in early Christian tradition to be or to have become an angel. Furthermore, Hurtado\u2019s own summary of his book says quite the opposite: \u201cI have demonstrated in One God, One Lord, we have no analogous accommodation of a second figure along with God as recipient of such devotion in the Jewish tradition of the time, making it very difficult to fit this inclusion of Christ as recipient of devotion into any known devotional pattern attested among Jewish groups of the Roman period.\u201d<\/p>\n
Revelation 1:13\u201316: Jesus
\nRevelation 10:1\u20133: The Mighty Angel<\/p>\n
13 \u2026 and among the lampstands was someone like a son of man, dressed in a robe reaching down to his feet and with a golden sash around his chest. 14 The hair on his head was white like wool, as white as snow, and his eyes were like blazing fire. 15 His feet were like bronze glowing in a furnace, and his voice was like the sound of rushing waters. 16 In his right hand he held seven stars, and coming out of his mouth was a sharp, double-edged sword. His face was like the sun shining in all its brilliance.
\n1 Then I saw another mighty angel coming down from heaven. He was robed in a cloud, with a rainbow above his head; his face was like the sun, and his legs were like fiery pillars.
\n2 He was holding a little scroll, which lay open in his hand. He planted his right foot on the sea and his left foot on the land, 3 and he gave a loud shout like the roar of a lion. When he shouted, the voices of the seven thunders spoke.<\/p>\n
CONCLUSION<\/p>\n
Ehrman asks a legitimate question: In what sense was Jesus considered to be \u201cgod\u201d by the first Christians? If an absolute monotheism did not exist in the first century, as Ehrman alleges, then could Jesus be divine in the same sense as a deified king or an angelic creature? Ehrman thinks so, but there are reasons to question this.
\nFirst, Ehrman\u2019s use of sources verges on parallelomania, and he overemphasizes the similarities between various intermediary figures and Christian conceptions of Christ as divine to the detriment of the serious differences. Early Christology was not so unique as to be unintelligible in its religious environs, but the story of Jesus and rituals of Jesus devotion entailed a thorough redefinition of what Christians meant by \u201cGod.\u201d The early church did not invent a strict monotheism; rather, they inherited it from Judaism. But they did create a christological monotheism, where the one God was now known through, in, and as the Lord Jesus Christ.
\nSecond, in regards to monotheism itself, contra Ehrman, there were pagan monotheists, but Jewish monotheism was strict. The various intermediary figures known in ancient sources, whether angelic or human, do not make monotheism malleable, because such figures shared neither in God\u2019s exclusive worship nor in God\u2019s unique identity, whereas Jesus certainly did.
\nThird, while not discounting the relevance of angelomorphism to views of Jesus in the early church, it proves in the end to be a red herring rather than an explanatory paradigm for early beliefs about Jesus.
\nIf the preceding analysis is correct, the early church did not simply rip off existing ideas of descending gods and ascending humans and not-so-subtly apply them to Jesus. Rather, it seems that what happened was that the among Jesus\u2019 earliest followers there was an immediate move to reconfigure Jewish monotheism, whereby the one God of Israel was now known and experienced as the Lord Jesus Christ and God the Father.<\/p>\n
EXCURSUS 1<\/p>\n
Kings, Angels, and Holy Men<\/p>\n
MacedonianBoy\/Wikimedia Commons, CC-BY-SA 3.0<\/p>\n
FIGURE 1 Fresco of an angel on a rock in Osogovo Monastery, Macedonia.<\/p>\n
Since Ehrman talks about the relevance of gods becoming human and humans becoming divine for early Christology, it is worth looking at a few examples to get an awareness of what these texts about intermediary figures actually say. The ancient world certainly knew of the divinization of kings and semidivine intermediary figures like angels. What follows is a sample of texts illustrating this phenomenon:<\/p>\n
1. ISRAEL\u2019S KING AS ONE WHO SITS AMONG THE GODS<\/p>\n
Your throne, O God, will last for ever and ever;
\na scepter of justice will be the scepter of your kingdom.
\nYou love righteousness and hate wickedness;
\ntherefore God, your God, has set you above your companions
\nby anointing you with the oil of joy. (Ps 45:6\u20137)<\/p>\n
Psalm 45 was originally a wedding psalm recited to celebrate the marriage of a Judean king to his new bride. The king is addressed as \u201cGod\u201d (Elohim in Hebrew and Theos in Greek). The identification of the king as \u201cGod\u201d is not meant to be taken literally, but it is an honorific title that was customarily used in the Ancient Near East for monarchs. The psalmist notes that the king still has his own God (i.e., \u201cyour God\u201d), upon whom he is reliant for the reception of his reign. Since ruling and judging were principally prerogatives of God, the king had to be Godlike in the just execution of his regal responsibilities.<\/p>\n
2. AUGUSTUS AS GOD AND LORD<\/p>\n
\u2026 for the god and lord emperor. (P.Oxy 1143.4)<\/p>\n
In three papyri from Egypt, the Roman Emperor Augustus (reigned from 31 BCE\u201314 CE) is given the title \u201cLord\u201d and \u201cGod.\u201d At his accession, he was known as the \u201cSon of the Divine Julius,\u201d named after his adopted father, Julius Caesar. Augustus was well acquainted with the eastern tradition of worshiping kings and queens as living manifestations of the gods, but remained mostly allergic to it. He permitted the erection of temples to the emperor and imperial family in provincial areas of Gaul, Italy, Greece, and Asia Minor, but expressly forbade such worship in Rome itself. Such prohibitions did not extend to popular media like papyri and ostraca that circulated in the provinces. It was only after his death that Augustus was officially granted celestial honors and declared to have become a god by apotheosis, that is, by ascending into the realm of the heavens. Subsequent emperors, especially Caligula, Nero, and Domitian, did not show such restraint, and they not only accepted divine honors, but in some cases they even demanded them of their subjects. Many scholars claim that the New Testament confession of Jesus Christ as \u201cLord\u201d is meant as a deliberate challenge to the honorific status and divine power claimed by the Roman imperial apparatus. In other words, to confess that \u201cJesus is Lord\u201d was to imply that \u201cCaesar is not.\u201d<\/p>\n
3. MOSES ON GOD\u2019S THRONE<\/p>\n
Ezekiel the Tragedian also speaks about these things in the Exag\u014dg\u0113, including the dream seen by Moses and interpreted by his father-in-law. Moses himself speaks with his father-in-law in dialogue:<\/p>\n
On Sinai\u2019s peak I saw what seemed a throne
\nso great in size it touched the clouds of heaven.
\nUpon it sat a man of noble mien,
\nbecrowned, and with a scepter in one hand
\nwhile with the other he did beckon me.
\nI made approach and stood before the throne.
\nHe handed o\u2019er the scepter and he bade
\nme mount the throne, and gave to me the crown;
\nthen he himself withdrew from off the throne.
\nI gazed upon the whole earth and round about;
\nthings under it, and high above the skies.
\nThen at my feet a multitude of stars
\nfell down, and I their number reckoned up.
\nThey passed by me like armed ranks of men.
\nThen I in terror wakened from the dream.<\/p>\n
And his father-in-law interprets the dream as follows:<\/p>\n
My friend, God gave you this as a sign for good.
\nWould I might live to see these things transpire.
\nFor you shall cause a mighty throne to rise,
\nand you yourself shall rule and govern men.
\nAs for beholding all the peopled earth,
\nand things below and things above God\u2019s realm:
\nthings present, past, and future you shall see.<\/p>\n
In this intriguing story, Moses has a dream that he visits the throne room of heaven, and while there God basically vacates the throne and invites him to sit on it. Moses\u2019 father-in-law interprets the dream as meaning that Moses can expect to one day hold a position of kingly power over the peoples of the earth. Lest this seem too incredible, it is worth remembering that in the book of Exodus there is a curious passage where God tells Moses, \u201cSee, I have made you like God to Pharaoh\u201d (Exod 7:1), which means that Moses will have absolute divine power over Pharaoh and the Egyptian gods. The Alexandrian Jewish author Philo could also depict Moses as both a king and as a Godlike figure (e.g., Philo, Life of Moses 1.55\u201362; Worse 160\u201362; Sacrifices of Cain and Able 9\u201310). The dream is obviously surreal and therefore not a real statement of Moses\u2019 divinity; instead, Moses represents the elevation of Israel to rule over the nations, a point found in other writings too (e.g., Dan 7:18, 22, 27; Rev 5:10; 4 Ezra 6:55\u201359).<\/p>\n
4. TIERS OF ANGELS<\/p>\n
Angel Iao, may you give all success
\nand power and favour and assistance
\nto Asklepiakos with [the help of the]
\nfirst angels
\nand
\nmiddle angels
\nand final angels
\nthroughout [his] life
\nand bodily protection,
\nAbrasax O Da[mnamene]us
\nforever. (NDIEC, 10:16\u201319)<\/p>\n
The inscription is found on a gem stone and is datable to 150\u2013250 CE. The inscription is basically a prayer by a man named Asklepiakos to the angel Iao for help from these lesser angels in blessing him with physical health and well-being. The petition exhibits an unprecedented description of a hierarchy of angels. It was probably angelic hierarchies such as this that Paul responded to when he wrote to the Colossians about avoiding the \u201cworship of angels\u201d (Col 2:18). For all the ancient speculation and devotion to angels, Jewish and Christian authors retained a strong prohibition against the worship of angels (see e.g., Rev 19:10; Tob 12:16\u201322; 3 En. 16.1\u20135; Asc. Isa. 7:21; 8:5; Apoc. Zeph. 6.11\u201315.).<\/p>\n
CHAPTER 3<\/p>\n
Did Jesus Think He Was God?<\/p>\n
Michael F. Bird<\/p>\n
INTRODUCTION<\/p>\n
I did not grow up in a religious home. As a kid, everything I knew about Christianity I learned from Ned Flanders from the TV show The Simpsons. But we had a chaplain at my public high school, a lovely guy named Graham, a local Baptist pastor. At our graduation ceremony Graham told us, \u201cThe most important question you will ever ask is who is Jesus? Is he a lunatic, a liar, or Lord?\u201d I just rolled my eyes at the time, but for some reason the question stuck with me. Who is this Jesus anyway, and what is all the fuss about? Years later, while I was a paratrooper of all things, I came to the decision that Jesus was definitely Lord. But that\u2019s another story. Confessing that Jesus is Lord is one thing, but believing that Jesus believed himself to be the Lord is quite another. Whatever faults there are in Ehrman\u2019s study of Jesus, at least he\u2019s forcing us to ask some good and honest questions about faith, history, and Jesus. Who is Jesus, and who did he think he was?
\nIt is worth noting that the question of \u201cWho is Jesus?\u201d began in the pre-Easter period, where followers and critics of Jesus alike were all confronted with the question as to who Jesus was and, more importantly, who he thought he was. Indeed, the question continued to be asked steadily thereafter in the nascent church and even into the period of the church fathers. Christians spent the best part of four hundred years trying to find the best language, imagery, categories, and scriptural texts to answer Jesus\u2019 question to his disciples: \u201cWho do you say that I am?\u201d (Mark 8:29). When the dust finally settled, the church\u2019s final verdict was that Jesus was \u201cGod from God, Light from Light, begotten, not made, of one Being with the Father,\u201d as stated in the Nicene Creed.
\nWhat everyone wants to know, however, is to what extent Jesus shared that evaluation of himself. Did the disciples think that Jesus was their God? Did Jesus himself know he was God? Did Jesus ever explicitly say he was God? Ehrman gives a negative answer on all fronts. According to him, Jesus \u201cthought he was a prophet predicting the end of the current evil age and the future king of Israel in the age to come.\u201d Jesus saw himself as the Messiah, but also looked forward to the \u201cimminent arrival of the Son of Man, who would judge the earth and bring in God\u2019s good kingdom.\u201d Although the gospel of John claims that Jesus is equal with God (John 8:58; 10:30; 14:9; 17:24), Ehrman contends that such claims are late and secondary, so that \u201cthe divine self-claims in John are not historical.\u201d Ehrman reaches this conclusion: \u201cWhat we can know with relative certainty about Jesus is that his public ministry and proclamation were not focused on his divinity; in fact, they were not about his divinity at all.\u201d
\nIn response to Ehrman, my objective is to show that Jesus identified himself as a divine agent with a unique authority and a unique relationship with Israel\u2019s God. In addition, he spoke as one who spoke for God in an immediate sense and believed himself to be embodying the very person of God in his mission to renew and restore Israel. While the early church may have said more than that, they certainly never said less. The point to note is that Jesus\u2019 presentation of himself to his followers was arguably the singular most important factor in shaping their subsequent devotion to him and the way that it developed. However, before we get down to what Jesus thought about himself\u2014his \u201cself-understanding\u201d as it is often called\u2014we need to say something about Ehrman\u2019s methodology for studying Jesus.<\/p>\n
EHRMAN\u2019S METHOD: ERRONEOUS MANUSCRIPTS, HISTORICAL CRITERIA, AND THE HISTORICAL JESUS<\/p>\n
I have to confess that whenever I read Bart Ehrman saying anything about the historical Jesus, I always feel like tweeting \u201c@BartEhrman #epicfacepalm.\u201d Here\u2019s why. On the one hand, Ehrman has courted notoriety and fame for arguing that the New Testament manuscripts were corrupted and distorted to the point that we cannot realistically talk about recovering an original autograph. He has written:<\/p>\n
Not only do we not have the originals, we don\u2019t have the first copies of the originals. We don\u2019t even have copies of the copies of the originals, or copies of the copies of the copies of the originals. What we have are copies made later\u2014much later.\u2026 And these copies all differ from one another, in many thousands of places \u2026 these copies differ from one another in so many places that we don\u2019t even know how many differences there are.
\nIf one wants to insist that God inspired the very words of scripture, what would be the point if we don\u2019t have the very words of scripture? In some places, as we will see, we simply cannot be sure that we have reconstructed the original text accurately. It\u2019s a bit hard to know what the words of the Bible mean if we don\u2019t even know what the words are!
\nThe fact that we have thousands of New Testament manuscripts does not in itself mean that we can rest assured that we know what the original text said. If we have very few early copies\u2014in fact, scarcely any\u2014how can we know that the text was not changed significantly before the New Testament began to be reproduced in such large quantities?<\/p>\n
At a Society of Biblical Literature panel discussion I\u2019ve even heard Ehrman declare, \u201cWe can\u2019t talk about the \u2018Word of God\u2019 since we don\u2019t know what the original words even were.\u201d So it would seem that the New Testament manuscript tradition is messed up and we have little prospect of recovering the original text.
\nNevertheless, something strange happens. Ehrman is somehow still able in his voluminous writings to use this corrupted and contaminated textual tradition as his primary source to reconstruct the career of the historical Jesus. In fact, he\u2019s written an entire book about the historical Jesus! Not only that, but Ehrman is also able to uncover the real stories about Peter, Paul, and even Mary Magdalene.
\nAbsolutely amazing stuff, I have to say. Amazing, because what Ehrman says about the New Testament manuscripts makes his inquiry about Jesus methodologically impossible. If the New Testament was so heavily corrupted, then how can you use it as your primary source to reconstruct Jesus\u2019 life? Well, to be honest, you can\u2019t, but for some reason Ehrman is not perturbed by this. Ehrman likes to play the part of the super-skeptic when it suits him, but on other occasions he seems to move seamlessly from his English Bible all the way back to Jesus of Galilee as if none of these critical issues existed. It\u2019s as if he says in one book that \u201cthe emperor has no clothes,\u201d and then in the next book he says, \u201cI just love what the emperor was wearing at the Vanity Fair Oscars party; oh my, he looks gorgeous in Armani.\u201d Ehrman has been accused of a great many things by his critics, however, and quite obviously, methodological consistency will not be one of them.
\nA further problem with Ehrman\u2019s method is his entire attitude toward historical Jesus studies. He thinks that we cannot take the Gospels at face value as historically reliable accounts of the things Jesus said and did. Ehrman makes some broad and sweeping comments about the sources behind the Gospels and the nature of the Gospels as faith-documents that should render us historically suspicious of their accounts of Jesus. He does not think that the Gospels are useless as historical sources, but because they are more interested in proclaiming Jesus than with giving a true history of Jesus, we have to sift through the Gospels with the aid of various criteria to separate the fictions from the facts. A couple of comments are required here.
\nFirst, if the Gospels are not, in their basic outlines at least, somehow reliable, then we might as well stop wasting our time and go fishing. I like how Dale Allison puts it:<\/p>\n
Either they [the Gospels] tend to preserve pre-Easter memories or they do not. In the former case, we have some possibility of getting somewhere. But in the latter case, our questing for Jesus is probably pointless and we should consider surrendering to ignorance. If the tradition is seriously misleading in its broad features, then we can hardly make much of its details.<\/p>\n
Similar is Sean Freyne: \u201cEither we accept that the early followers of Jesus had some interest in and memory of the historical figure of Jesus as they began to proclaim the good news about him, or we must abandon the process entirely.\u201d Approaches like Ehrman\u2019s, which begin by casting doubt on the historical value of the Gospels for reconstructing the life of Jesus, but then proceed to formulate a hypothesis about the historical Jesus anyway, are essentially creating a vacuum and then filling it with scholarly fiction.
\nAlternatively, I would advocate that the Gospels are generally reliable and coherent sources for studying the historical Jesus. As long as the early church knew the \u201cLord Jesus\u201d to be the same as \u201cthe crucified one,\u201d the historical Jesus was always going to be properly basic for the church\u2019s faith. The things Jesus said and did pre-Easter mattered for what the church believed and said about him post-Easter.
\nThat is not to deny that the Gospels are documents designed for proclamation, theologically loaded, and written to create faith. The Gospels are, then, the interpretation and application of the memory of Jesus for readers in the Greco-Roman world. A memory was carried by eyewitnesses and was put into the custody of corporate interest in the Jew from Nazareth. Thus, what the Gospels produce is not the transcript for CNN-style video footage of Jesus\u2019 career. A better analogy is that they offer a dramatic representation, much like a documentary drama, of Jesus\u2019 actions in the past and his voice for the present available through the corporate memory of Jesus. Consequently, the memory of Jesus deposited in the Gospels bequeaths to us both authenticity and artistry, fact and faith, history and hermeneutic. The objective of the Evangelists was not to write a life of Jesus to satisfy modernist demands for detail, nor was it to offer an image of Jesus that they pretty much made up to satisfy their own ideological bent. The Evangelists intended to narrate a story and evoke the significance of one called \u201cJesus,\u201d Israel\u2019s Messiah and the world\u2019s rightful Lord.
\nSecond, Ehrman is dependent on the use of several \u201ccriteria\u201d to establish the authenticity of stories about Jesus in the Gospels. Generally speaking, criteria of authenticity are useful as a way of trying to figure out which traditions in the Gospels go back to Jesus. I\u2019ve used them myself at times, but like others I\u2019ve become increasingly aware of their limitations and become convinced that they do not offer a path to an objective history of Jesus. For a start, trying to sort out the authentic traditions from the inauthentic traditions is not really that easy, for the simple fact that the history of Jesus has been thoroughly welded together with the early church\u2019s proclamation of Jesus at every point. Trying to separate the history from theology in the Gospels is a bit like trying to separate blue from red in the color purple. What is more, many of the criteria have been critically examined and found to be inadequate as a way of establishing the historical or unhistorical nature of any given unit in the Gospels. Dale Allison speaks with candor on this: \u201cThe older I become, the less I trust anyone\u2019s ability to answer this sort of question, to trace the history and origin of a particular saying.\u2026 It is not so easy to establish that any particular saying goes back to Jesus, and it is not so easy to establish that any particular saying does not go back to him.\u201d
\nFor case in point, let\u2019s consider Ehrman\u2019s use of the \u201ccriterion of dissimilarity,\u201d which on his account dictates that a given unit in the Gospels is historically authentic if \u201cit is dissimilar to what the early Christians would have wanted to say about him.\u201d This criterion is well-known and has received a devastating barrage of criticism to the point that I am, to be frank, at a loss as to why Ehrman continues to use it. It jumped the shark about the same time that the TV show Dawson\u2019s Creek did. In extreme cases some scholars looked for a double dissimilarity, whereby a tradition is authentic when it is dissimilar to both Judaism and to the early church. Ehrman wisely uses it in its less extreme form and only applies it to dissimilarity from the early church.
\nBut even then it verges on the ludicrous. Think about it. A story about Jesus or as a saying attributed to Jesus is only historical if it does not sound anything like what the church was saying about Jesus. What historian would say that the historical Plato is different from what the platonic school said about Plato? Who would say that reliable information about the Teacher of Righteousness who founded a community by shores of the Dead Sea can only to be found when material attributed to him in the Dead Sea Scrolls sound nothing like the Dead Sea Scrolls? Who thinks that the real John Wesley can only be retrieved by searching for un-Wesleyan things that Wesleyans said about John Wesley? The criterion of dissimilarity posits a huge rupture between a movement founder and his or her subsequent movement that is simply absurd. You end up with a Jesus who said, thought, and did nothing that his earliest followers believed that he said, thought, and did. Jesus becomes a free-floating iconoclast artificially insulated from the movement that took its name from him, claimed to follow his teachings, and memorialized his deeds and actions.
\nNo wonder, then, that the criterion of dissimilarity has been near universally abandoned and replaced with something far more credible, like a criterion of historical plausibility. We can regard a unit in the Gospels as claiming a high degree of historical authenticity when a saying or event attributed to Jesus makes sense within Judaism (i.e., plausible context) and also represents a starting point for the early church (i.e., a plausible consequence).
\nRather than try to drain the theological dross from the historical silver in the Gospels through several fallible criteria, more recently scholars have been interested in the application of social memory research to the study of the historical Jesus. In other words, how did the things Jesus said and did create a memory in his followers, a memory that was faithfully transmitted, yet also refracted according to the theological framework that the early church was developing. In which case, we cannot hope to penetrate the impregnable bedrock of the church\u2019s interpretation and proclamation of Jesus found in the Gospels and discover a deeper layer of historically accurate data laid beneath. At the end of the day the best way to read the Gospels responsibly and historically is to narrate the story of Jesus in a way that has realism and explanatory power\u2014a story that makes Jesus fit plausibly into his Jewish context, that brings all of the sources together, that explains the shape and direction of the early church, and that accounts for why and how the Gospels are what they are. Allison again puts it well:<\/p>\n
As historians of the Jesus tradition we are storytellers. We can do no more than aspire to fashion a narrative that is more persuasive than competing narratives, one that satisfies our aesthetic and historical sensibilities because of its apparent ability to clarify more data in a more satisfactory fashion than its rivals.<\/p>\n
Ehrman\u2019s entire approach to historical Jesus studies does not commend itself as a good way of doing history.<\/p>\n
JESUS, THE RESTORATION OF ISRAEL, AND THE RETURN OF YHWH TO ZION<\/p>\n
Okay, back to our question: Did Jesus think he was God?
\nWell, to begin with, there is no reason to see Jesus as anything other than a good monotheist. Jesus proclaimed the kingdom of God (Mark 1:14\u201315), he prayed to God as Father (Mark 14:36; Matt 6:9\u201313\/Luke 11:1\u20134; John 11:41\u201342), he affirmed the Jewish confession of God\u2019s oneness, the Shema (Deut 6:4; Mark 12:29\u201330), and he called for steadfast devotion to God (Matt 6:24\/Luke 16:13). All this would seem to fit neatly into Ehrman\u2019s thesis that Jesus was a prophet and a messianic claimant, but not the Son of Man, and definitely did not think of himself as God\u2019s equal.
\nBut then again, Jesus may have spoken of himself in far more elevated ways than Ehrman imagines. It is certainly not the case that Jesus proclaimed God\u2019s kingdom and later on the church proclaimed Jesus. For even within Jesus\u2019 kingdom message there was always an implicit self-reference. Not only is the kingdom coming, but Jesus is the one who inaugurates it through his mighty deeds, exorcisms, healings, and preaching. Jesus is remembered as saying: \u201cBut if it is by the finger of God that I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you\u201d (Luke 11:20; cf. Matt 12:28). Jesus is not simply the FedEx delivery boy announcing the kingdom; he is its harbinger and hero in the then and there!
\nBut before we go any further, I need to clear the deck. I think it is necessary to explode a popular caricature where Jesus cruises around Galilee announcing, \u201cHi, I\u2019m God. I\u2019m going to die on the cross for your sins soon. But first of all I\u2019m going to teach you how to be a good Christian and how to get to heaven. And after that I thought it would be fitting if you all worshiped me as the second member of the Trinity.\u201d This might seem a rather silly way to understand Jesus\u2019 identity, but it is a sketch of Jesus that many Bible-believing Christians have. When I contend that Jesus understood himself to be divine, this is definitely not what I am talking about. When I say that Jesus knew himself to be God, I mean that he was conscious that in him the God of Israel was finally returning to Zion (i.e., Jerusalem) to renew the covenant and to fulfill the promises God had made to the nation about a new exodus.
\nLet\u2019s have a look at a saying from the Gospels that Ehrman is rather fond of, namely, Matt 19:28 and Luke 22:28\u201330:<\/p>\n
Matthew 19:28
\nLuke 22:28\u201330<\/p>\n
Jesus said to them, \u201cTruly I tell you, at the renewal of all things, when the Son of Man sits on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.
\nYou are those who have stood by me in my trials. And I confer on you a kingdom, just as my Father conferred one on me, so that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom and sit on thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.<\/p>\n
This short saying is important because it shows that Jesus regarded the object of his ministry as the reconstitution of Israel. When all things come together, the Son of Man will be enthroned, and the twelve apostles will be charged with leading a renewed Jewish people. The background to this saying is that ever since the Assyrian exile (ca. 722 BCE) and the Babylonian exile (ca. 587 BCE), the twelve tribes of Israel had long since been dispersed. A remnant had returned to Judea from Babylon (ca. 538 BCE), but the vast majority of Jews in Jesus\u2019 day lived dispersed across the Mediterranean and Middle East in major population centers like Babylon, Alexandria, and Rome. During the subsequent period, Israel\u2019s political fortunes were mixed and ranged from independence, to occupation, to autonomy under foreign powers. For the most part, however, Israel found itself as the battleground that great military powers in Africa, Asia, and Europe trampled over to extend their power. Even though the Babylonian captivity had technically ended, the next half millennium was hardly a golden age of Israel\u2019s political and spiritual fortunes. According to Jewish scholar Joseph Klausner, the actual fact was<\/p>\n
slavery to foreign governments, wars, tumults and torrents of blood. Instead of all nations being subject to Judah, Judah was subject to the nations. Instead of the \u201criches of the Gentiles,\u201d godless Rome exacted taxes and tribute.\u2026 Instead of the Gentiles \u201cbowing down with their faces to the ground\u201d and \u201clicking the dust of their feet,\u201d comes a petty Roman official with unlimited power of Judea. Instead of Messiah the son of David, comes Herod the Edomite.<\/p>\n
However, the hope of Israel, going back to the prophets, was that one day God would restore the twelve tribes, bring them back together, forgive the sins that led to Israel\u2019s exile, defeat Israel\u2019s enemies, bring forth a new Davidic King, inaugurate a new covenant, and build a new temple. There would be great agricultural fecundity, and the nations would flock to Zion to worship Israel\u2019s God as well. Furthermore, another crucial element of that hope was that YHWH himself would return to Zion.
\nIt is no surprise, then, that in the first century various prophetic and protest movements in Judea looked for the coming of the kingdom of God and with it the coming of God. According to John Meier, when such groups spoke about the \u201ckingdom of God,\u201d they had in mind \u201cnot primarily a state or place but rather the entire dynamic event of God coming in power to rule his people Israel in the end time.\u201d It meant a divine visitation with the accompanying effects of a new exodus, the forgiveness of Israel\u2019s sins, the renewal of the covenant, a new temple, and God\u2019s victory over evil.
\nOn the coming of God as king, a passage that kindled the candle of many hopes was Isaiah 40\u201355, which has among its opening words:<\/p>\n
A voice of one calling:
\n\u201cIn the wilderness prepare
\nthe way for the LORD;
\nmake straight in the desert
\na highway for our God.\u201d (Isa 40:3)<\/p>\n
This verse was programmatic for both John the Baptist out in the Judean wilderness and the Qumran community on the shores of the Dead Sea, as both were quite literally out in the desert preparing for this future event of God\u2019s coming, either by way of prophetic warning to the masses (John the Baptist) or by separating from the impurity of the masses (Qumran).
\nThe wider context of Isaiah 40 is illuminating, for later in the same chapter we read more about YHWH\u2019s coming reign and YHWH\u2019s return to Zion:<\/p>\n
You who bring good news to Zion,
\ngo up on a high mountain.
\nYou who bring good news to Jerusalem,
\nlift up your voice with a shout,
\nlift it up, do not be afraid;
\nsay to the towns of Judah,
\n\u201cHere is your God!\u201d
\nSee, the Sovereign LORD comes with power,
\nand he rules with a mighty arm.
\nSee, his reward is with him,
\nand his recompense accompanies him.
\nHe tends his flock like a shepherd:
\nHe gathers the lambs in his arms
\nand carries them close to his heart;
\nhe gently leads those that have young. (Isa 40:9\u201311, italics added)<\/p>\n
And a little later in Isaiah we find something similar:<\/p>\n
How beautiful on the mountains
\nare the feet of those who bring good news,
\nwho proclaim peace,
\nwho bring good tidings,
\nwho proclaim salvation, who say to Zion, \u201cYour God reigns!\u201d
\nListen! Your watchmen lift up their voices;
\ntogether they shout for joy.
\nWhen the LORD returns to Zion,
\nthey will see it with their own eyes.
\nBurst into songs of joy together,
\nyou ruins of Jerusalem,
\nfor the LORD has comforted his people,
\nhe has redeemed Jerusalem.
\nThe LORD will lay bare his holy arm
\nin the sight of all the nations,
\nand all the ends of the earth will see
\nthe salvation of our God. (Isa 52:7\u201310, italics added)<\/p>\n
The Isaianic announcement of YHWH\u2019s kingship means YHWH is going to bring the exile to an end in a new exodus, where YHWH will return to Zion and judge Israel\u2019s enemies, and then he will dwell with his people.
\nSuch a motif is not restricted to Isaiah, but is found amply in other prophetic books. The themes of the end of exile, a new temple, a new covenant, and a new Davidic king are rehearsed with prophetic poise and power in the book of Ezekiel. At one point, God speaks to the exiles:<\/p>\n
\u201c \u2018Therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of the LORD: As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign LORD, because my flock lacks a shepherd and so has been plundered and has become food for all the wild animals, and because my shepherds did not search for my flock but cared for themselves rather than for my flock, therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of the LORD: This is what the Sovereign LORD says: I am against the shepherds and will hold them accountable for my flock. I will remove them from tending the flock so that the shepherds can no longer feed themselves. I will rescue my flock from their mouths, and it will no longer be food for them.
\n\u201c \u2018For this is what the Sovereign LORD says: I myself will search for my sheep and look after them. As a shepherd looks after his scattered flock when he is with them, so will I look after my sheep. I will rescue them from all the places where they were scattered on a day of clouds and darkness. I will bring them out from the nations and gather them from the countries, and I will bring them into their own land. I will pasture them on the mountains of Israel, in the ravines and in all the settlements in the land. I will tend them in a good pasture, and the mountain heights of Israel will be their grazing land. There they will lie down in good grazing land, and there they will feed in a rich pasture on the mountains of Israel. I myself will tend my sheep and have them lie down, declares the Sovereign LORD. I will search for the lost and bring back the strays. I will bind up the injured and strengthen the weak, but the sleek and the strong I will destroy. I will shepherd the flock with justice.\u2019 \u201d (Ezek 34:7\u201316, italics added)<\/p>\n
According to Ezekiel, YHWH stands against the false shepherds, and he is coming, coming to regather and to shepherd the people. Yet, just a few verses later, we read something rather peculiar:<\/p>\n
I will save my flock, and they will no longer be plundered. I will judge between one sheep and another. I will place over them one shepherd, my servant David, and he will tend them; he will tend them and be their shepherd. I the LORD will be their God, and my servant David will be prince among them. I the LORD have spoken. (Ezek 34:22\u201324, italics added)<\/p>\n
This speech starts off by saying that YHWH is coming to shepherd his people, but then we are told that the one doing the actual shepherding will be \u201cmy servant David.\u201d Now obviously this does not mean that David is YHWH, but neither is David just a kind of subcontractor. What it does mean is that David will be to the people what YHWH has promised he will be to the exiles: a shepherd.
\nThis narrative of Jewish restoration hopes formed not only the backdrop but the script for Jesus\u2019 own words and actions. When Jesus declared the coming of God\u2019s kingdom, he was talking about the coming of God as King. Jesus\u2019 selection of twelve followers was a way of symbolically showing that Israel\u2019s restoration was beginning at last with his own ragtag band of disciples (see Mark 3:13\u201316). The various healings and exorcisms Jesus performed were meant to be tangible signs that the day of deliverance was at hand and God was at last becoming king (see Matt 11:1\u20136\/Luke 7:20\u201323, which correlates exactly with 4Q521 2.1\u201321 in the Dead Sea Scrolls).
\nI concur with Ehrman that Jesus saw himself as the king of this coming kingdom, the Messiah, but on the back of Jewish restoration eschatology I want to say more than that. Jesus believed that in his ministry and even in his person, YHWH was finally returning to Zion. In light of that premise, it is useful to read afresh a number of episodes from Jesus\u2019 career that illustrate that the lines between divine author and divine agent were becoming blurred. Several stories and sayings in the Synoptic Gospels point toward Jesus\u2019 unique role as a divine agent with an unprecedented authority and who undertakes divine action.
\nTo begin with, the exchange that takes place between Jesus and the scribes in a healing story is a perfect illustration as to what Jesus was claiming about himself:<\/p>\n
A few days later, when Jesus again entered Capernaum, the people heard that he had come home. They gathered in such large numbers that there was no room left, not even outside the door, and he preached the word to them. Some men came, bringing to him a paralyzed man, carried by four of them. Since they could not get him to Jesus because of the crowd, they made an opening in the roof above Jesus by digging through it and then lowered the mat the man was lying on. When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralyzed man, \u201cSon, your sins are forgiven.\u201d
\nNow some teachers of the law were sitting there, thinking to themselves, \u201cWhy does this fellow talk like that? He\u2019s blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?\u201d
\nImmediately Jesus knew in his spirit that this was what they were thinking in their hearts, and he said to them, \u201cWhy are you thinking these things? Which is easier: to say to this paralyzed man, \u2018Your sins are forgiven,\u2019 or to say, \u2018Get up, take your mat and walk?\u2019 But I want you to know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.\u201d So he said to the man, \u201cI tell you, get up, take your mat and go home.\u201d
\nHe got up, took his mat and walked out in full view of them all. This amazed everyone and they praised God, saying, \u201cWe have never seen anything like this!\u201d (Mark 2:1\u201312, italics added)<\/p>\n
In this episode, Jesus pronounces the forgiveness of sins on a paralytic man, which leads to a charge of blasphemy by the teachers of the law. Ordinarily there was nothing wrong with someone declaring a person\u2019s sins forgiven, as long as that someone was a priest and everyone was in the temple. But nobody says, \u201cHang on, you\u2019re not a priest!\u201d or \u201cWait a minute, this isn\u2019t the temple!\u201d Rather, the complaint is, \u201cWho can forgive sins but God alone?\u201d (Mark 2:7; see Isa 43:25). The offense that Jesus\u2019 words provoke is by his presumption to speak with a divine prerogative. Clearly Jesus\u2019 declaration of forgiveness in such a context was tantamount to assuming the authority to forgive on God\u2019s behalf. When Jesus explains why he is able to do so, declaring that \u201cthe Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins,\u201d he makes that claim explicit.
\nEhrman takes this story to mean that \u201cJesus may be claiming a priestly prerogative, but not a divine one.\u201d I\u2019m afraid not! Jesus was not acting like a rogue priest. He was not from the tribe of Levi anyway, and he wasn\u2019t anywhere near the temple. So by what authority could he pronounce the forgiveness of his sins? The scribes do not complain, \u201cWho can forgive sins but a priest alone?\u201d Nor does Jesus explain his action by saying, \u201cI want you to know that I\u2019ve recently purchased a Galilean franchise on the priesthood licensing me to forgive sins, preside at weddings, and officiate at bar mitzvahs.\u201d No, instead he says, \u201cBut I want you to know that the Son of Man has authority to forgive sins,\u201d which turns out to be a divine authority. He commands the paralytic man to stand, pick up his mat, and go home. Even more astounding, the man does so. A miraculous healing takes place. Jesus claims for himself an unmediated divine authority that, to those steeped in Jewish monotheism, looks absolutely blasphemous. Yet, somehow, the paralytic man is healed. The bite of Jesus\u2019 rhetoric is that he\u2019s proven right. If he can make a paralytic walk, then he has the authority to pronounce the forgiveness of sins.
\nIn other places it is clear that Jesus expressed a sense of unmediated divine authority that led the authorities to query him about its origin (Mark 11:27\u201333), and public opinion was that he spoke with a unique authority that set him apart from the scribes (Mark 1:22, 27; Matt 8:9\/Luke 7:8). Jesus reconfigured divine commandments based on his own authority (Matt 5:21, 27, 33, 38, 43), and in one instance he claimed authority to transcend the Sabbath since the Son of Man was \u201cLord of the Sabbath\u201d (Mark 2:27\u201328). The renowned Jewish scholar Jacob Neusner, in an interview about his book A Rabbi Talks with Jesus, said that he found Jesus\u2019 approach to the law so unsettling that it made Neusner want to ask Jesus, \u201cWho do you think you are\u2014God?\u201d
\nElsewhere Jesus identifies himself as the Son of God who is Lord to the Son of David, an agent of divine wisdom, the seat of the divine presence, and even an expression of divine power over evil. Jesus is remembered as referring to the Messiah as David\u2019s own Lord (Mark 12:35\u201337), to himself as an envoy of divine wisdom (Matt 11:19\/Luke 7:35; Matt 11:28\u201330), one who is greater than the temple (Matt 12:6), and one who is stronger than the Satan (Mark 3:27; Matt 12:29\/Luke 11:21\u201322). These are not claims to superhuman abilities, but claims to be the one who embodies God\u2019s reign, carries God\u2019s wisdom into the world, conveys God\u2019s presence in a manner greater than the temple, and is able to defeat God\u2019s adversary, Satan. Jesus is then identifiable with God\u2019s own activity in the world and his victory over evil. Heed this point well. None of this material is a cheap ripoff from Homer or Virgil ostentatiously read back into Jesus\u2019 life; rather, these ideas are all enmeshed in thoroughly Jewish ways of conceiving of God\u2019s presence in the world and God\u2019s purposes for the world.
\nIt is fascinating how Luke portrays Jesus as approaching Jerusalem, not as a religious tourist but as something far more grandiose. The whole sequence of Luke 19 is that Jesus\u2019 arrival is uncannily like \u2026 could possibly be \u2026 strangely resembles \u2026 YHWH\u2019s return to Zion. To be sure, Jesus comes as Israel\u2019s Messiah, but in that same coming is the manifestation of Israel\u2019s God.
\nFirst, Jesus\u2019 journey through Jericho became the occasion to engage in some scandalous activity seen in his willingness to dine in the house of the much-despised tax collector named Zacchaeus (Luke 19:1\u201310). Of course, reclining with such reprehensible scoundrels was one of the most characteristic parts of Jesus\u2019 career (see Mark 2:15\u201316; Matt 11:19\/Luke 7:34; Luke 15:1). His practice of open table fellowship with sinners was a symbol of the openness of the kingdom and represented a radical challenge to presumptions of who is \u201cin\u201d or \u201cout\u201d with God. At the end of the story, once Zacchaeus\u2019s repentance has become public, Jesus explains why he does such things by saying: \u201cThe Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost\u201d (Luke 19:10). Jesus does not talk like an ancient prophet and tell wayward sinners to seek out God while he may be found (see Amos 5:4; Zeph 2:3). Instead, Jesus is seeking out marginalized Israelites in a manner reminiscent of how God in his climactic return to Zion was believed to be coming to regather the lost flock of Israel (Jer 31:10; Ezek 34:8\u201310; Zech 9:16). It is not hard to hear the echoes of such texts here with the coming of YHWH to seek out and to shepherd his people as representing a fitting description for Jesus\u2019 own activity.
\nSecond, the following parable of the talents in Luke 19:11\u201327 about a nobleman who goes abroad to receive his kingdom and then returns has long been read as a prediction of Jesus\u2019 second coming. Matthew\u2019s version of the parable (the parable of the pounds in Matt 25:14\u201330) certainly gives that impression by marrying the parable to some subsequent remarks about the Son of Man judging all the nations in 25:31\u201346. However, when Luke and Matthew share material from the sayings tradition (often called \u201cQ\u201d), the Lucan version is usually regarded as the more primitive version and most like any \u201coriginal\u201d telling by Jesus.
\nOn top of that, Luke\u2019s account of the parable is not dealing with what a generation of scholars once thought it was, the dreaded delay of the return of Jesus, trying to explain why Jesus\u2019 second advent is taking sooo long. Note this: the occasion for the parable is not the problem of the kingdom\u2019s postponement; quite the contrary, Luke explicitly tells us that the reason why Jesus uttered the parable was because his audience had a heightened expectation of the kingdom\u2019s imminence (Luke 19:11). Far from extinguishing such hopes for the kingdom\u2019s imminence, Jesus\u2019 parable actually excites them all the more as evidenced by the enthusiasm of his followers in the triumphal entry that soon follows (Luke 19:37\u201338).
\nOn the parable of the talents itself, rather than think of it a morality tale for the faithful to be ready for the second coming that has been anachronistically projected back into Jesus\u2019 teaching syllabus, what if Jesus was not predicting his second coming, but simply retelling a well-known scriptural story about the return of YHWH to Zion? In doing so, he deliberately evoked hopes that God\u2019s saving justice was about to be dramatically revealed! In a nutshell, the notion of a king who returns after a short absence fits squarely within Jewish hopes for the return of YHWH to Zion.
\nThird, in Luke\u2019s version of the triumphal entry, Jesus approaches Jerusalem weeping with grief upon the city, uttering an oracle of woe as much as an ode of lament: \u201cThey will dash you to the ground, you and the children within your walls. They will not leave one stone on another, because you did not recognize the time of God\u2019s coming to you\u201d (Luke 19:44; cf. Matt 23:39). Jerusalem faces dire consequences, war with Rome, because they do not recognize that now is the time of deliverance, now is the day of God\u2019s visitation to his people. This language of \u201cvisitation\u201d is also found in the Dead Sea Scrolls for the dramatic arrival of YHWH to deliver his judgment. Tragically, the great day of YHWH\u2019s return has arrived, but it meets a mixed reception. If so, divine judgment may not be in Israel\u2019s favor, but might actually fall on Israel if they do not repent of their sins. All in all, Jesus returns to Jerusalem intending to enact, symbolize, and personify the climactic hope of YHWH returning to Zion. Israel\u2019s long-awaited return of the king was not the return of Aragorn to Gondor\u2014apologies to LOTR fans\u2014but God in Jesus of Nazareth coming to his people in a day of visitation.<\/p>\n
THE SAGA OF THE SON OF MAN<\/p>\n
A final species of evidence we must consider is the Son of Man sayings. There is no area of discussion of Jesus more confusing and complicated as this body of material. Ehrman\u2019s view is that Jesus, the good apocalyptic visionary he was, preached a message about the kingdom to be brought by the Son of Man. Yet this Son of Man was not Jesus himself but a heavenly or angelic figure. Ehrman goes so far as to say that in many of the sayings, there is no hint that Jesus is talking about himself when he mentions the Son of Man coming in judgment on the earth. So did Jesus think that he was the Son of Man? I believe he did.
\nFirst, the phrase \u201cSon of Man\u201d in Hebrew (ben adam) can simply mean \u201chuman being.\u201d Think of Ps 8:4: \u201cWhat is man [enosh] that you are mindful of him, or the son of man [ben adam] that you should care for him?\u201d (NIV 1984). The verse contains synonymous parallelism so that \u201cman\u201d and \u201cson of man\u201d are identical terms for human beings, as our English translations make clear. In Ezekiel, the most frequent form of address by God for Ezekiel is \u201cson of man,\u201d which appears to be the equivalent of something like \u201cmere mortal\u201d (see, e.g., Ezek 2:1, 3, 8).
\nThe identification of \u201cSon of Man\u201d as signifying humanity in general has even left its imprint on the Synoptic tradition. Matthew arguably re-semitizes Mark\u2019s account of Jesus\u2019 healing of the paralytic man by underscoring the Semitic idiom at play:<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I want you to know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.\u201d So he said to the paralyzed man, \u201cGet up, take your mat and go home.\u201d Then the man got up and went home. When the crowd saw this, they were filled with awe; and they praised God, who had given such authority to man. (Matt 9:6\u20138, italics added)<\/p>\n
Matthew properly captures the meaning of the Semitic idiom by describing the crowd\u2019s elation at God giving such authority to a \u201cman,\u201d because \u201cSon of Man\u201d in Hebrew and Aramaic means \u201cman.\u201d
\nSecond, Daniel 7 was a crucial influence on Jewish and Christian messianism as it designated a human figure with royal and transcendent qualities who is enthroned beside God, and is even worshiped alongside God. In brief, Daniel 7 is a vision report about four terrifying beasts, which consecutively arise out of the sea to ravage the earth, including poor old Israel. But then the beasts are stripped of their power, and Daniel narrates:<\/p>\n
In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his presence. He was given authority, glory and sovereign power; all nations and peoples of every language worshiped him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and his kingdom is one that will never be destroyed. (Dan 7:13\u201314, italics added)<\/p>\n
The beasts symbolize the consecutive kingdoms of Babylon, Media, Persia, and Greece (Dan 7:17). The \u201cone like a son of man\u201d is a multivalent symbol for God\u2019s kingdom, God\u2019s king, and God\u2019s people. That is why the figure is closely connected with God\u2019s reign (7:13\u201314); he is the heavenly counterpart to the beasts, which are explicitly designated as kings (7:8, 11, 17, 23\u201324), and the dominion given to the human figure is the same as that given to the people of Israel (7:18, 27).
\nIt is important to note that Daniel\u2019s \u201cson of man\u201d was given an explicit messianic interpretation in apocalyptic literature like 1 En. 37\u201371, 4Q246 from the Qumran scrolls, obviously the Gospels, the book of Revelation, and the post-70 CE apocalypse 4 Ezra. In the developing tradition, the Son of Man was also regarded as a heavenly and preexistent being. There is no doubt, then, that this story from Daniel influenced Jesus; on that, Ehrman and I are fully agreed.
\nThird, Jesus spoke Aramaic, and in Aramaic bar enash can have a generic meaning of \u201chumanity,\u201d an indefinite sense of \u201ca man\u201d or \u201csomeone,\u201d or a definite connotation of \u201cthis man.\u201d Jesus seems to have used the Aramaic idiom as a form of self-reference, to designate himself as the person in question, or at least one within a particular class of people. In this case, Jesus probably employed bar enash in some instances as a form of self-reference. Consider the following:<\/p>\n
Jesus replied, \u201cFoxes have dens and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.\u201d (Luke 9:58; cf. Matt 8:20)<\/p>\n
John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine, and you say, \u201cHe has a demon.\u201d The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and you say, \u201cHere is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.\u201d (Luke 7:33\u201334; cf. Matt 11:18\u201319)<\/p>\n
In these two sayings, both attributed to Q, we clearly have \u201cSon of Man\u201d used by Jesus as a form of self-reference, and it makes perfect sense in Aramaic as meaning something like \u201cthis man.\u201d Such sayings are probably authentic because, let\u2019s face it, who in the early church would invent the taunt of Jesus as a glutton and a drunkard, or celebrate Jesus\u2019 homelessness, so we are on good historical ground here. In light of this, I find it strange that the Aramaic background to the Son of Man sayings is never once mentioned by Ehrman.
\nAs I said, the Son of Man material is complex because we have to deal with issues related to Aramaic idioms and how the \u201cSon of Man\u201d figure from Daniel 7 is interpreted in apocalyptic literature like 1 Enoch and elsewhere. Here is what this means for Ehrman\u2019s case:
\n(1) If the Son of Man is a messianic figure in Jewish literature, and if Jesus thought he was the Messiah as even Ehrman admits, then what reason do we have for not thinking that Jesus referred to himself as the Son of Man? None as far as I can tell! The phrase \u201cSon of Man\u201d was a deliberately cryptic way of speaking about his messianic identity but still ambiguous enough to avoid creating a needless provocation to his royal aspirations.
\nLet me emphasize that understanding things this way avoids so many absurdities that Ehrman\u2019s view creates. For example, on Ehrman\u2019s account of Matt 19:28\/Luke 22:30, the Son of Man (someone other than Jesus) sits on his glorious throne, with the twelve disciples judging Israel. But there\u2019s just one small problem in this interpretation: Where the heck is Jesus? The Son of Man gets a glorious throne, the disciples each get their own throne and preside over the twelve the tribes of Israel, but what does Jesus get for his efforts? A token piece of heavenly brisket? Front row seats at the Jewish comedy club in heaven? If Jesus believed himself to be, as Ehrman says, \u201cthe future ruler of Israel\u201d and if \u201cJesus would be seated on the greatest throne of all, as the messiah of God,\u201d we should expect Jesus to be where the Son of Man is sitting! But if Jesus is the Son of Man in this saying, the absurdity is instantly removed.
\n(2) The phrase \u201cSon of Man\u201d is repeatedly a self-designation for Jesus across the Gospels. In fact, it meets Ehrman\u2019s own criteria for authenticity since it is in multiple sources like Mark, Q, John, and even the Gospel of Thomas. Not only that, but the title \u201cSon of Man\u201d was not even the church\u2019s preferred way of referring to Jesus. It occurs nowhere in Paul\u2019s letters, and it appears only four times in the entire New Testament outside of the Gospels (see Acts 7:56; Heb 2:6; Rev 1:13; 14:14). Moreover, in an early second-century document like the Epistle of Barnabas, there is a flat out denial that Jesus is the Son of Man. Now that is what I call dissimilarity!
\n(3) In Aramaic, bar enash can be used in generic, indefinite, and definite ways, and when used definitely by Jesus, it either describes himself as an individual or at least as a leading individual among others. Jesus\u2019 usage of the phrase also has clear allusions to Dan 7:13\u201314 and the Son of Man figure therein described. The overwhelming testimony of the Jesus tradition is that Son of Man is an apocalyptically encoded way of Jesus self-describing his role as the one who embodies God\u2019s authority on earth, achieves God\u2019s salvation by his death and resurrection, and shares God\u2019s glory in his enthronement. The \u201ccoming\u201d of the Son of Man is often coterminous with the coming of God as King. Eugene Boring is surely right to conclude, \u201cThe Christological language of the Son of Man sayings is thoroughly theocentric.\u201d
\nThere is one particular saying that, I think, lets the cat out of the bag, and Jesus really outs himself not only as the Messiah, but as a Messiah enthroned with God.<\/p>\n
Again the high priest asked him, \u201cAre you the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed One?\u201d
\n\u201cI am,\u201d said Jesus. \u201cAnd you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Mighty One and coming on the clouds of heaven.\u201d
\nThe high priest tore his clothes. \u201cWhy do we need any more witnesses?\u201d he asked. \u201cYou have heard the blasphemy. What do you think?\u201d
\nThey all condemned him as worthy of death. (Mark 14:61b\u201364, italics added)<\/p>\n
The whole trial scene in the Gospels is a morass of textual, historical, and theological issues. Suffice to say, it is plausible that at his trial Jesus was asked point blank by the high priest if the rumors were true; was he claiming to be the Messiah? The charge of blasphemy does not come from Jesus pronouncing the divine name, the Tetragrammaton \u201cYHWH,\u201d when he says, \u201cI am.\u201d More probably it comes from his conflation of Ps 110:1 and Dan 7:13 with the implication that he was going to be\u2014or was already being\u2014enthroned with God.<\/p>\n
Again the high priest asked him, \u201cAre you the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed One?\u201d
\n\u201cI am,\u201d said Jesus. \u201cAnd you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Mighty One and coming on the clouds of heaven.\u201d (Mark 14:61\u201362)
\nIn my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven. (Dan 7:13)<\/p>\n
The LORD says to my lord: \u201cSit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.\u201d (Ps 110:1)<\/p>\n
The background to this saying and the explanation for why Jesus was thought to have committed blasphemy is something like a Jewish version of the TV show Game of Thrones. Does YHWH share his throne with anybody? In the previous chapter, we\u2019ve already seen what happened in 3 En. 16 when Elisha ben Abuya, who had a vision of Metatron on his throne, claimed that there were \u201ctwo powers in heaven\u201d; Elisha was summarily rebuked by God himself. Then there is the famous story of the great rabbi Akiba (died ca. 135 CE), who suggested that the plural of \u201cthrones\u201d in Dan 7:9 included \u201cone for God, one for David.\u201d His proposal was apparently met with a charge of blasphemy, to which Akiba is said to have capitulated. So, many Jews were fairly uncomfortable with the suggestion that Israel\u2019s Lord had a miniature throne buddy.
\nYet Jesus was probably interpreting Psalm 110 and Dan 7:13\u201314 in a way similar to Akiba, and he sees them as referring to the Messiah\u2019s enthronement. More to the point, Jesus was clearly identifying himself with the enthroned messianic figure of Dan 7:13\u201314, an astounding claim to say the least, and we have no example of any person from the first century ever staking such a claim. We must remember that the whole point of Daniel 7 is that when God acted in history to deliver his people, the agent through whom he acted would be vindicated, honored, enthroned, and exalted in an unprecedented manner. Jesus\u2019 claim is not that he\u2019s going to sit on his own little throne next to God; rather, he will sit at God\u2019s right hand on God\u2019s throne. If Jesus thinks that Dan 7:13\u201314 is about him, then he is placing himself within the orbit of divine sovereignty and claiming a place within the divine regency of God Almighty. If he\u2019s wrong, it isn\u2019t just bad theology; it is blasphemy and an affront to Jewish monotheism.
\nEhrman seems to think that it was the resurrection that transformed Jesus from a failed prophet to a divine person (though only \u201cdivine\u201d in a limited sense, like an angel or a king who becomes a god at death). But that just won\u2019t do. Belief in the resurrection contributed to a Christology but did not create one from nothing. Belief in Jesus\u2019 resurrection would not mean he was the Messiah, the Son of Man, or an angel. The two witnesses in Revelation 11 rise from the dead and ascend to heaven without garnering further attention or veneration. Herod\u2019s view that John the Baptist had come back to life meant identifying him with Jesus, not with an angelic figure. In the Testament of Job, Job\u2019s children are killed when their house falls on them, and their bodies are taken to heaven; but no one thereafter begins to imagine that they are divine or angelic. If one of the bandits crucified with Jesus were thought to have come back to life, would anyone have seriously thought that he was the Son of Man, the Son of God, the angel of the Lord, or even God Almighty? I seriously doubt it!
\nThe resurrection alone did not create a divine Christology. Easter faith did not turn Jesus into something other than what he was before. Jesus made extravagant claims about himself as to his authority, mission, and origin, and the resurrection was a divine affirmation that those claims were good. Viewed this way, the resurrection magnified rather than manufactured Jesus\u2019 claims to a divine status. Viewed this way, the resurrection intensified rather than initiated belief in Jesus\u2019 unique relationship with God. Viewed this way, the resurrection transposed rather than triggered recognition of Jesus as a divine figure. It would seem, as it does to Dale Allison, that \u201call the primary sources repeatedly purport that Jesus had astounding things to say about himself. One can dissociate him from an exalted self-conception only through multiple radical surgeries on our texts.\u201d Moreover, \u201cwe should hold a funeral for the view that Jesus entertained no exalted thoughts about himself.\u201d<\/p>\n
THE JOHANNINE TESTIMONY<\/p>\n
Ehrman dismisses the gospel of John as a source about Jesus because the Johannine Jesus makes explicit claims to be equal with God that are not paralleled in the Synoptic Gospels and do not pass muster with any of the criteria of authenticity. My gut response is that Ehrman\u2019s use of the criteria here amounts to trying to catch butterflies using a bazooka and a badminton net. On top of that, he basically indicts John for not being the same as the Synoptics.
\nBut, to be honest, the gospel of John does constitute something of a problem. Going from the Synoptics to John is like going from New York in peak hour traffic on Friday afternoon to a Rose Bowl parade on January 1. While many similarities exist between John and the Synoptics, John is clearly in a class of his own and is doing his own thing. That gospel has a unique texture, a distinctive feel, and a definite set of objectives. My intuition is that John\u2019s gospel is indebted to the testimony of a Judean disciple of Jesus who established a church or cluster of churches in the vicinity of Ephesus. While it definitely has its own historical tradition and is a genuine source about Jesus, nonetheless this tradition has been well and truly interpreted through a pronounced theological lens. Many of its unique sayings about Jesus are probably based on a mixture of memory, metaphor, and midrash, a theological elaboration of words and impressions made by Jesus on his followers.
\nHowever, John and the Synoptics are not so different as to be like watching election night news reports by Fox News and CNN on split screens simultaneously. The four Gospels as a whole agree that Jesus is God\u2019s Son and that as the Son, he is the divine agent par excellence, and even part of the divine identity. John\u2019s claim that Jesus is \u201cequal with God\u201d (John 5:18) and \u201cone with the Father\u201d (10:18) is simply verbalizing what is already assumed by the Synoptics Gospels, namely, that Jesus has a unique filial relationship with Israel\u2019s God and Jesus possessed an authority equal to that of God. For case in point, note the famous \u201cJohannine Thunderbolt,\u201d a saying of Jesus appearing about the middle of Matthew and Luke, but which sounds strangely like the Fourth Gospel: \u201cI praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this is what you were pleased to do\u201d (Matt 11:25\u201327\/Luke 10:21\u201322). The gospel of John expresses by way of several unique narratives and discourses that Jesus is the one-of-a-kind Son of God, whose very person is bound up with the God of Israel. It comprises a magnification rather than a mutilation of the claims of Jesus found in the Synoptic Gospels.
\nI think it is worth adding that John\u2019s ideas are not resourced in Greek philosophy, and they stand solidly within a Jewish conception of God\u2019s activity within the world. John actually tweets the incarnation, can you believe? I learned on Twitter the other day that John 1:14 in Greek is exactly 140 characters: \u201cThe Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.\u201d John is saying that just as God\u2019s glory dwelt in the temple, just as God\u2019s wisdom dwelt in Torah, so now God\u2019s word dwells in human flesh. John\u2019s theology of incarnation did not emerge from an extended encounter with Hellenism; rather, incarnation is a Jewish doctrine if there ever were one.
\nThe church\u2019s encounter with Hellenism in the following centuries has shown that rather than imagining God enfleshed, sharing in the muck and mire of human existence, what Hellenism actually pushed many toward\u2014and some jumped at the chance\u2014was docetism. Docetism is the view that Jesus was not really a physical human being, but more like a phantasm. On some accounts this phantom Jesus had little to do with Israel\u2019s God, but was imbued with some great ideas for spiritual self-discovery. In other words, a thoroughly Hellenized Christianity would not give us the incarnational theology of John, or Tertullian, or even Nicea; it was more likely to produce a cross between Caspar the Friendly Ghost and Dr. Phil the TV therapist!
\nLet\u2019s wrap things up. First, John\u2019s theology of divine sonship, while distinctive in some respects, is certainly compatible with the Synoptic Gospels and is drawn from a parallel and interlocking pool of tradition. Second, John\u2019s high Christology did not get high by inhaling the fumes of a Hellenistic philosophy that overpowered his historical sensibilities about Jesus. The gospel of John remains a thoroughly Jewish story, with its own historical contribution, and it makes an authentic interpretation of the life of Jesus as validated by the testimony of the \u201cbeloved disciple.\u201d The real historical question that folks like Ehrman need to answer is why there are so many parallels between the Synoptics and John and how did such an interpretation of Jesus as \u201cequal with God\u201d arise in the first place.<\/p>\n
CONCLUSION<\/p>\n
I believe that the topic we have engaged in this chapter is an important one. Somebody once said: \u201cThe Church cannot indefinitely continue to believe about Jesus what he did not know to be true about himself.\u201d If Jesus did not think he was God, then it does not seem viable for the church to continue to profess faith in him as God. If Ehrman is right, if Jesus never claimed to be in any meaningful sense \u201cdivine,\u201d then the central claims of the Christian canon and creed are meaningless.
\nEhrman claims that Jesus thought of himself as the Messiah, but not as God. He looked forward to the advent of a figure called the \u201cSon of Man\u201d to usher in the kingdom in the future, and material in the Gospels that explicitly identifies Jesus as divine was a later invention of the early church. I dispute these claims.
\nFirst, I began by noting some methodological problems with Ehrman\u2019s approach. Specifically, (1) Ehrman\u2019s skepticism about recovering the text of the New Testament cannot be reconciled with using the New Testament as a primary source in historical research; and (2) Ehrman\u2019s use of several alleged criteria to establish the historicity of materials is problematic and not a reliable index for determining the historical authenticity of the Gospels.
\nSecond, Jesus\u2019 aims should be located within the context of Jewish restoration hopes for the future, and chief among those hopes was the return of YHWH to Zion. Jesus believed that in his own person this return was happening, God was becoming king, and the day of judgment and salvation was at hand. Jesus\u2019 belief on this point can be correlated with several actions and activities he undertook that suggest he not only spoke with an unmediated divine authority, but that he acted in such a way as to identify himself with God\u2019s own activity in the world.
\nThird, and contra Ehrman, Jesus most definitely did refer to himself as the Son of Man. The sayings about a future Son of Man still make the best sense if Jesus is speaking of himself as the principal subject (e.g., Matt 19:28\/Luke 22:30). If Jesus spoke Aramaic, then bar enash was used by Jesus in a definite sense to refer to himself as the person spoken about. Furthermore, at Jesus\u2019 trial, he most likely spoke to the effect that he believed that he was the figure of Dan 7:13\u201314 and that he was rightfully enthroned beside God.
\nFourth, the evidence of the gospel of John contributes much to our understanding of Jesus, albeit obliquely. The Johannine Evangelist interprets the Jesus tradition in a specific theological trajectory, but he shares with the other Evangelists a conception of Jesus as the Messiah and one-of-kind Son of God, in whom God is definitively revealed.
\nIf I am right, if this argument has cogency and substance, I think the summation of Craig Evans is a perfectly apt way of putting it: \u201cThe New Testament\u2019s deification of Jesus Christ, as seen especially in the theologies of Paul and the fourth evangelist, has its roots in the words and activities of the historical Jesus.\u201d<\/p>\n
CHAPTER 4<\/p>\n
Getting the Burial Traditions and Evidences Right<\/p>\n
Craig A. Evans<\/p>\n
INTRODUCTION<\/p>\n
In chapters 4 and 5 Bart Ehrman rightly underscores the importance of the resurrection of Jesus for his followers\u2019 growing appreciation of their Master\u2019s divine identity. However, he also arrives at a number of negative conclusions that must be challenged. Among these is the idea that the burial of Jesus in a known tomb is a late fiction and that therefore there probably was no tomb discovered by his followers. Indeed, Ehrman believes it unlikely that Jesus was even buried. Another negative conclusion that must be challenged is the claim that the discovery of an empty tomb\u2014assuming that such a discovery was actually made\u2014would have played little or no role in awakening faith in Jesus\u2019 followers. I will address at length the first negative claim and will then offer a few brief comments regarding the second.<\/p>\n
WAS THE BODY OF JESUS PLACED IN A TOMB?<\/p>\n
Ehrman believes that the burial of Jesus in a tomb and the subsequent discovery of the tomb empty \u201care unlikely.\u201d He thinks the story of the burial and discovery was a later development, perhaps originating in Christian circles where women were influential. He argues for this on the basis that no tomb is mentioned in the earliest creed and on the basis of history and archaeology. I begin with the first point, the nonmention of a tomb in the earliest creed.
\nThe earliest creed to which Ehrman refers is Paul\u2019s summation of the \u201cgospel\u201d in his letter to the Christians of Corinth. The original creed, Ehrman thinks, may have looked something like this:<\/p>\n
1a Christ died
\n2a For our sins
\n3a In accordance with the Scriptures
\n4a And he was buried.
\n1b Christ was raised
\n2b On the third day
\n3b In accordance with the Scriptures
\n4b And he appeared to Cephas.
\n1 Cor 15:3b\u20135a<\/p>\n
Why doesn\u2019t Paul speak of Jesus buried in a tomb? Moreover, why isn\u2019t Joseph of Arimathea, the man who buried Jesus mentioned by name? After all, the creed states that Jesus \u201cwas seen by Cephas [Peter].\u201d (The RSV translates \u201cappeared to Cephas,\u201d but the Greek literally reads \u201cwas seen by Cephas.\u201d) Ehrman makes much of the nonappearance of a name associated with the burial of Jesus. He reasons that 4a (\u201cAnd he was buried\u201d) should parallel more closely 4b (lit., \u201cAnd he was seen by Cephas\u201d [i.e., Peter]). If Jesus had really been buried by one Joseph of Arimathea, as the Gospels relate (Matt 27:57\u201360; Mark 15:42\u201346; Luke 23:50\u201356), then why doesn\u2019t 4a read, \u201cAnd he was buried by Joseph\u201d? Ehrman believes that the author of the creed \u201csurely would have included\u201d reference to Joseph, a respected member of the Jewish Council, had he known of such a tradition.
\nThe nonappearance of Joseph\u2019s name leads Ehrman to conclude that the \u201ctradition that there was a specific, known person who buried Jesus appears to have been a later one.\u201d He further notes that in Paul\u2019s speech in Acts nothing is said of Jesus being buried by Joseph. All we hear is the vague \u201cthey took him down from the tree, and laid him in a tomb\u201d (Acts 13:29). Ehrman believes he has found a discrepancy, telling us that \u201chere it is not a single member of the Sanhedrin who buries Jesus, but the council as a whole. This is a different tradition. There is no word of Joseph here, any more than there is in Paul\u2019s letters.\u201d Ehrman also underscores the Roman practice of not allowing someone crucified to be buried, which casts further doubt on the story about Joseph of Arimathea.
\nAll of this leads Ehrman to suspect that Jesus was probably not buried, or if he was, his disciples did not know where. Accordingly, the discovery of the empty tomb is probably a later fiction and therefore the empty tomb and missing body of Jesus did not really play any role in early Christianity\u2019s understanding of Jesus\u2019 resurrection and divinity.
\nThere are several problems in the position Ehrman has taken here. His description of Roman policy relating to crucifixion and nonburial is unnuanced and incomplete, especially as it relates to policy and practice in Israel in the time of Jesus. His arguments relating to Joseph of Arimathea do not take into account Jewish law and custom. He has also failed to take into account the archaeological evidence. We will now address these topics.<\/p>\n
What was Rome\u2019s Policy regarding the Burial of the Crucified?<\/p>\n
It is often stated that people crucified in the Roman Empire were not buried but were left hanging on the cross to rot and be picked apart by animals and birds. There are some gruesome references to this in ancient writings. Horace (ca. 25 BCE) speaks of \u201changing on a cross to feed crows\u201d (Epistles 1.16.48). Suetonius (ca. 110 CE) reports that an angry Octavian (ca. 42 BCE) assured a man about to be executed (probably by crucifixion) who had expressed concern about this burial, \u201cThe birds will soon settle the question\u201d (Augustus 13.2). Juvenal (ca. 125 CE) gives expression to gallows humor when he says, \u201cThe vulture hurries from dead cattle and dogs and crosses to bring some of the carrion to her offspring\u201d (Satires 14.77\u201378). A third-century text describes the crucifixion victim as \u201cevil food for birds of prey and grim picking for dogs\u201d (Apotelesmatica 4.200). On a second-century epitaph the deceased declares that his murderer, a slave, was \u201ccrucified alive for the wild beasts and birds\u201d (Amyzon, cave I). Many other texts spare readers such gruesome details, but do mention the denial of proper burial (e.g., Livy 29.9.10; 29.18.14).
\nWith evidence such as this in mind, Ehrman argues that the body of Jesus was probably not taken down from the cross and buried, especially in light of the fact that it was by Roman authority that Jesus was put to death. He states: \u201cIt was not Jews who killed Jesus, and so they had no say about when he would be taken down from the cross. Moreover, the Romans who did crucify him had no concern to obey Jewish law and virtually no interest in Jewish sensitivities.\u201d Later Ehrman adds that \u201cwhat normally happened to a criminal\u2019s body is that it was left to decompose and serve as food for scavenging animals.\u201d
\nIn fact, we are not sure how \u201cnormal\u201d leaving the corpse on the cross, unburied, was in the Roman Empire. That it often happened is not in dispute. But the evidence is more variegated than Ehrman and others have assumed. An interesting passage that bears on this question is found in Philo (ca. 20 BCE\u201350 CE), in his account of the malfeasance and demise of Flaccus, the governor of Egypt. Ehrman cites and discusses this passage, in which mention is made of mercy shown victims of crucifixion. Here is part of the quotation:<\/p>\n
I have known cases when on the eve of a holiday of this kind, people who have been crucified have been taken down and their bodies delivered to their kinsfolk, because it was thought well to give them burial and allow them the ordinary rites. For it was meet that the dead also should have the advantage of some kind treatment upon the birthday of the emperor and also that the sanctity of the festival should be maintained. (Flaccus 83)<\/p>\n
Philo is building his case against Flaccus, the Roman governor of Egypt appointed in 32 CE. Philo claims that although the governor served well enough in his first five years in office, things changed when Emperor Tiberius was succeeded by Caligula in 37 CE. Thereafter Flaccus not only did nothing to curb pagan hostilities toward the Jewish population of Alexandria, but he actually encouraged it. Philo complains of the insults visited on the recently appointed Agrippa I when he visited Alexandria: the desecration of synagogues, the looting of Jewish homes, and the flogging and crucifixion of some of the Jewish councilors\u2014on the day of the emperor\u2019s birthday no less. The fact that these poor men were crucified and then denied burial on a day when normally mercy is shown (and the anti-Semitic Alexandrians knew full well how important burial was to Jews) only underscores the brutality and callousness of the governor\u2019s behavior.
\nEhrman thinks this passage offers no support for the New Testament Gospels\u2019 report that Pilate permitted the body of Jesus to be taken down from the cross and be properly buried. He thinks it is the \u201cexception that proves the rule,\u201d that is, that the bodies of crucifixion victims were not normally buried, \u201cbecause it goes against established practice.\u201d Ehrman further notes \u201cthe cases when on the eve of a holiday of this kind\u201d involved families of influence, and that the \u201choliday of this kind\u201d was a Roman holiday (e.g., the birthday of an emperor), not a Jewish holiday (such as Passover). Accordingly, Ehrman thinks Philo\u2019s passage lends no support to the New Testament Gospels\u2019 narrative of Jesus\u2019 burial. Had Jesus been crucified in Alexandria, Ehrman\u2019s point would be well taken. But Jesus was crucified in Jerusalem, in the land of Israel, where very different political and religious factors were in play. I will return to this point shortly.
\nWhat is important in the Flaccus passage for the matter at hand is that this sorry incident demonstrates that it was in fact Roman practice, under various circumstances, to permit bodies of the crucified to be taken down and be buried. If there was no such Roman practice, this part of Philo\u2019s complaint loses all force. Indeed, the Romans not only permitted the bodies of the executed, including the crucified, to be buried; they even pardoned those in prison and sometimes even pardoned those awaiting or faced with the threat of execution, whether by crucifixion or other means.
\nThe Roman practice of granting clemency is attested in a variety of sources. We find in a text dating to about 85 CE, the words of Septimius Vegetus, governor of Egypt, addressed to one accused of a serious crime: \u201cYou were worthy of scourging \u2026 but I give you to the crowds.\u201d Pliny the Younger, governor of Bithynia in Asia Minor in the early second century, speaks of those imprisoned being released. Under what circumstances and under whose authority was his only concern (Epistles 10.31). An inscription from Ephesus relates the decision of the proconsul of Asia to release prisoners because of the outcries of the people of the city. Livy (5.13.8) speaks of special dispensations whereby chains were removed from the limbs of prisoners.
\nWhat these examples show is that on some occasions Roman officials, serving in various capacities and at various ranks, sometimes showed mercy to the condemned. This mercy at times extended to those who had been crucified. Clemency sometimes was occasioned by a holiday, whether Roman or a local non-Roman holiday, or simply out of political expediency, whatever the motivation. We actually have evidence that Roman justice not only allowed for the executed to be buried, but it even encouraged it in some instances. We find in the summary of Roman law (known as the Digesta) the following recommendations:<\/p>\n
The bodies of those who are condemned to death should not be refused their relatives; and the Divine Augustus, in the Tenth Book of his Life, said that this rule had been observed. At present, the bodies of those who have been punished are only buried when this has been requested and permission granted; and sometimes it is not permitted, especially where persons have been convicted of high treason. Even the bodies of those who have been sentenced to be burned can be claimed, in order that their bones and ashes, after having been collected, may be buried. (48.24.1)<\/p>\n
The bodies of persons who have been punished should be given to whoever requests them for the purpose of burial. (48.24.3)<\/p>\n
This summation of Roman law makes it clear that bodies were sometimes released to family and friends. (The whole of Digesta book 48 is concerned with criminal prosecution and punishment.) Indeed, the Digesta argues that the bodies of the executed \u201cshould be given to whoever requests them for the purpose of burial\u201d (emphasis added). In light of what we read here and in light of what we find in other sources, it is simply erroneous to assert that the Romans did not permit the burial of the executed, including the crucified. Bodies were in fact released to those who requested them.
\nJosephus himself makes this request of Titus, son of Vespasian, and Titus granted it (Life 420\u201321). Of course, Roman authorities often did not permit burial, request or no request, especially in cases of \u201chigh treason,\u201d as the Digesta states. Nonburial was part of the horror\u2014and the deterrent\u2014of crucifixion. But crucifixion, especially during peacetime, just outside the walls of Jerusalem was another matter. Given Jewish sensitivities and customs, burial would have been expected, even demanded.
\nWe do have evidence that relates to Roman acts of clemency in Israel itself. When Governor Albinus (procurator of Israel, 62\u201364 CE) prepared to leave office, he released all prisoners incarcerated for offenses other than murder (Josephus, Antiquities 20.215). The Mishnah (a compendium of rabbinic interpretations of the laws of Moses) says that \u201cthey may slaughter (the Passover lamb) for one \u2026 whom they have promised to bring out of prison\u201d on the Passover (m. Pesa\u1e25im 8:6). Who the \u201cthey\u201d are is not made clear (Jewish authorities? Roman authorities?), but it is interesting that the promised release from prison is for the express purpose of taking part in Passover. In her book on Pontius Pilate, Helen Bond comments: \u201cPilate, and possibly other governors, may have occasionally released lesser criminals as a gesture of Roman goodwill, especially during such a potentially volatile festival as the Passover.\u201d
\nPeacetime administration in Palestine appears to have respected Jewish burial sensitivities. Indeed, both Philo and Josephus claim that Roman administration in fact did acquiesce to Jewish customs. In his appeal to Caesar, Philo draws attention to the Jews who \u201cappealed to Pilate to redress the infringement of their traditions caused by the shields and not to disturb the customs which throughout all the preceding ages had been safeguarded without disturbance by kings and by emperors\u201d (Embassy to Gaius 300, emphasis added). In saying \u201cwithout disturbance by kings and by emperors,\u201d Philo is speaking of foreign\u2014not Jewish\u2014kings. In his day \u201cemperor\u201d would refer to the Roman emperor. The whole force of his argument is that it had been customary of Roman authority to respect the customs of the Jewish people. This should come as no surprise, for the relationship between Rome and Israel started out on a friendly footing in the second century BCE, when Rome supported the Hasmoneans in their bid to free themselves from the Seleucid kingdom. The alliance between Rome and Israel was further strengthened in the time of Herod the Great and continued, though in weakened and less stable form, under his sons and successors.
\nA generation later, Josephus asserts the same thing. The Romans, he says, do not require \u201ctheir subjects to violate their national laws\u201d (Against Apion 2.73). The Jewish historian and apologist adds that the Roman procurators who succeeded Agrippa I \u201cby abstaining from all interference with the customs of the country kept the nation at peace\u201d (Jewish War 2.220), customs that included never leaving a \u201ccorpse unburied\u201d (Against Apion 2.211). Had Roman governors\u2014in Israel, especially in the vicinity of Jerusalem itself\u2014regularly crucified Jews and left their bodies hanging on crosses, it is unlikely they would have \u201ckept the nation at peace.\u201d
\nOne of the incidents involving Pilate that Ehrman mentions supports the point I am making. I refer to the incident in which Pilate attempted to place Roman standards, bearing images of the emperor, in Jerusalem (Josephus, Antiquities 18.55\u201359). Josephus explains that Jewish law forbids the making of images (Exod 20:4) and that for this reason previous Roman governors never attempted to bring such images into the holy city. (What would have made these images especially offensive in Jewish eyes is that the Roman emperor was considered divine, a \u201cson of god.\u201d Such images then would constitute a clear violation of the command not to make images of God or of other deities.) That the previous Roman governors never attempted to bring images into the city shows that Roman authority did indeed respect Jewish law and custom in Israel (and often outside Israel as well).
\nPilate either did not understand Jewish law and custom and so acted in ignorance, or he did, thinking he could force on his Jewish subjects his allegiance to the emperor. In either case, he quickly learned how loyal the Jews were to their law and wisely backed down. I find it hard to believe that later, acting in concert with the ruling priests in the execution of Jesus, on the eve of Passover, just outside the walls of Jerusalem, he would have defied Jewish law and sensitivities by not permitting the bodies of Jesus and the other two men to be taken down and buried prior to nightfall. (The ruling priests were ultimately responsible for the purity of Jerusalem, and they and the Sanhedrin were responsible for the proper burial of executed persons\u2014more on this below.) Had Pilate and other Roman governors of Israel in the 6\u201366 CE period of time regularly crucified people (whether Jewish or Gentile) and left their bodies hanging on the cross unburied, thus defiling the land, there would have been riots, if not uprisings.
\nJosephus applies this point specifically to crucifixion when he says, in reference to the rebels who had seized control of Jerusalem in 66 CE and killed some of the hated ruling priests: \u201cThey actually went so far in their impiety as to cast out their dead bodies without burial, although the Jews are so careful about burial rites [peri tas taphas], that even malefactors who have been sentenced to crucifixion are taken down and buried before sunset\u201d (Jewish War 4.317, italics added). Those \u201csentenced to crucifixion\u201d in the time of Josephus were people crucified by the Romans (and not by Jewish rulers, such as the Hasmoneans). And although crucified by the Romans, these unfortunates were \u201ctaken down and buried before sunset.\u201d
\nThe reference to being \u201cburied before sunset\u201d alludes to the law of the execution and burial of criminals in Deut 21:22\u201323: \u201cAnd if a man has committed a crime punishable by death and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree, his body shall not remain all night upon the tree, but you shall bury him the same day, for a hanged man is accursed by God; you shall not defile your land which the LORD your God gives you for an inheritance.\u201d This is, of course, an old Mosaic law. Was it observed in the time of Jesus?
\nAfter crucifixion came to be practiced in Israel (probably first by the Persians, then later by the Greeks, Hasmoneans, and Romans), Deuteronomy 21 was paraphrased in a new way, as we see in the Temple Scroll found at Qumran:<\/p>\n
If a man is a traitor against his people and gives them up to a foreign nation, so doing evil to his people, you are to hang him on a tree until dead. On the testimony of two or three witnesses he will be put to death, and they themselves shall hang him on the tree. If a man is convicted of a capital crime and flees to the nations, cursing his people and the children of Israel, you are to hang him, also, upon a tree until dead. But you must not let their bodies remain on the tree overnight; you shall most certainly bury them that very day. Indeed, anyone hung on a tree is accursed of God and men, but you are not to defile the land that I am about to give you as an inheritance. (11Q19 64:7\u201313a)<\/p>\n
Deuteronomy\u2019s order of \u201cput to death,\u201d then \u201chang on tree,\u201d is reversed in the Temple Scroll, where it is \u201chang on tree,\u201d then \u201cuntil dead\u201d (twice, first in lines 8 and again in 10\u201311). Most interpreters believe the Temple Scroll\u2019s reversal of Deuteronomy\u2019s sequence reflects the practice of crucifixion, to which the people of Israel had become accustomed when the Temple Scroll was written (first century BCE). What is interesting is that the Temple Scroll, like Deuteronomy, commands Israel to bury the executed \u201cthat very day.\u201d Their bodies were not to \u201cremain on the tree overnight\u201d (line 11). Failure to take the body down and bury it is to defile the land (line 12). This is the key point. The concern, above all, is to avoid defiling the land. In the passage quoted earlier, Josephus confirms that the law of Deuteronomy 21, even during the first century CE, when Rome governed Israel, was still very much in force.
\nEvery source we have indicates that this was the practice in Israel, especially in the vicinity of Jerusalem, in peacetime. War was another matter, of course. When Titus besieged Jerusalem from 69 to 70 CE, thousands of Jews were crucified and very few of them were buried. The whole point was to terrorize the resistance and bring the rebellion to an end (as recounted by Josephus, Jewish War 5.289, 449). This was the true \u201cexception that proves the rule\u201d: Roman authority in Israel normally did permit burial of executed criminals, including those executed by crucifixion (as Josephus implies), but they did not during the rebellion of 66\u201370 CE.
\nThere is another important point that needs to be made. The process that led to the execution of Jesus, and perhaps also the two men crucified with him, was initiated by the Jewish Council. According to law and custom, when the Jewish Council (or Sanhedrin) condemned someone to death, by whatever means, it fell to the council to have that person buried. The executed were to be buried properly, but not in places of honor, such as the family tomb. This is clearly taught in the earliest writings of the rabbis: \u201cThey did not bury (the executed criminal) in the burying-place of his fathers. But two burying-places were kept in readiness by the Sanhedrin, one for them that were beheaded or strangled, and one for them that were stoned or burnt\u201d (m. Sanhedrin 6:5, italics added). \u201cNeither a corpse nor the bones of a corpse may be transferred from a wretched place to an honored place, nor, needless to say, from an honored placed to a wretched place; but if to the family tomb, even from an honored place to a wretched place, it is permitted\u201d (Sema\u1e25ot 13.7).
\nNot only was the body of a criminal not to be buried in a place of honor, no public mourning for executed criminals was permitted: \u201cthey used not to make [open] lamentation \u2026 for mourning has place in the heart alone\u201d (m. Sanhedrin 6:6). None of this law would make any sense if executed criminals were not in fact buried. There would have been no need to set aside tombs for executed criminals. There would simply be no remains to transfer from a \u201cwretched place\u201d to an \u201chonored place.\u201d
\nThe Jewish Council was responsible to oversee the proper burial of the executed because their bodies were normally not surrendered to family and friends. The burial of the executed in \u201cwretched places,\u201d that is, in tombs set aside for criminals, was part of the punishment. No public mourning and lamentation were permitted. The remains of the executed could not be transferred from these dishonorable tombs for one year. After one year (see b. Qiddu\u0161in 31b), the remains could be taken by family members to the family tomb or to some other place of honor.
\nThe Jewish Council, in concert with the aristocratic priesthood (some of whom were members of the council), was charged with protecting the purity of the sanctuary, the temple precincts, Jerusalem, and the land. This sensitivity is clearly witnessed in texts and artifacts from the first century and earlier. One thinks of the inscriptions that warn Gentiles not to get too close to the sanctuary; if they do, they will be executed (OGIS no. 598; CIJ no. 1400; Philo, Embassy to Gaius 212; Josephus, Jewish War 5.193\u201394; Antiquities 12.145; cf. Num 1:51 \u201cif anyone else comes near [the tabernacle], he shall be put to death\u201d). According to Acts, Paul was nearly beaten to death when he was accused of defiling the sanctuary by bringing Gentiles into the restricted area (Acts 21:27\u201332).
\nOne thinks also of some of the Qumran scrolls, which reflect priestly concerns for purity. According to one scroll, the reason God drove out the Canaanites, to make room for Israel, was because the Promised Land under the care of Gentiles had become \u201cdoubly filthy through impurity\u201d (4Q381 frag. 69, lines 1\u20133). With Israel now in the land, the land \u201cwill be pure\u201d (ibid., line 6). Another scroll, concerned with the bloody aftermath of the destruction of the Kittim (i.e., the Romans), charges Israel\u2019s high priest to oversee the cleansing of Israel from the \u201cguilty blood of the corpses\u201d of the Romans slain in the final great battle (4Q285 frag. 7, lines 5b\u20136 = 11Q14 frag. 1, col. i, lines 14\u201315). Similar ideas are expressed in early rabbinic tradition, where we hear that \u201cthe land of Israel is clean\u201d (m. Miqwa\u2019ot 8:1) and that \u201che who walks in the land of the gentiles in the hills or in rocks is unclean\u201d (m. \u2019Ohaloth 18:6). (These concerns with maintaining the purity of Jerusalem and the land, as well as the obligation to bury those condemned to death by the Jewish Council, are relevant for understanding the role played by Joseph of Arimathea, which will be considered shortly.)
\nIn the time of the Roman governors (6\u201366 CE) the Jewish Council lacked the authority to execute anyone. To do so, they had to present their case before the Roman authority. This is mentioned in the gospel of John, where the Jewish authorities acknowledge: \u201cIt is not lawful for us to put any man to death\u201d (John 18:31). This is no fiction. Josephus provides important support. The first Roman governor sent to Judea in 6 CE, to replace the deposed ethnarch Archelaus, was \u201centrusted by Augustus with full powers, including the infliction of capital punishment\u201d (Josephus, Jewish War 2.117). That these full powers, including capital punishment, remained in the hands of the Roman governor alone in the decades leading up to the Jewish revolt is witnessed in the murder of James the brother of Jesus and its aftermath. Josephus describes the incident, which took place in 62 CE shortly after the death of the Roman governor Festus. The account begins with reference to the audacity of the younger Annas, the son of Annas the high priest (Luke 3:2; John 18:13, 24; Acts 4:6).<\/p>\n
The younger Annas, who, as we have said, had been appointed to the high priesthood, was rash in his temper and unusually daring. He followed the school of the Sadducees, who are indeed more heartless than any of the other Jews, as I have already explained, when they sit in judgment. Possessed of such a character, Annas thought that he had a favorable opportunity because Festus was dead and Albinus was still on the way. And so he convened the judges of the Sanhedrin and brought before them a man named James, the brother of Jesus who was called the Christ, and certain others. He accused them of having transgressed the law and delivered them up to be stoned. Those of the inhabitants of the city who were considered the most fair-minded and who were strict in observance of the law were offended at this. They therefore secretly sent to the King Agrippa urging him, for Annas had not even been correct in his first step, to order him to desist from any further such actions. Certain of them even went to meet Albinus, who was on his way from Alexandria, and informed him that Annas had no authority to convene the Sanhedrin without his consent. Convinced by these words, Albinus angrily wrote to Annas threatening to take vengeance upon him. King Agrippa, because of Annas\u2019 action, deposed him from the high priesthood which he had held for three months and replaced him with Jesus the son of Damnaeus. (Antiquities 20.199\u2013203)<\/p>\n
Josephus makes it clear that Annas the younger committed two breaches of policy and law: he convened the Sanhedrin, which was a breach of policy, and he executed James and \u201ccertain others\u201d (probably also Christians), which was a breach of law, for only the Roman governor possessed the power of capital punishment, something Roman authority took very seriously. Josephus notes that the \u201cfair-minded\u201d of Jerusalem urged King Agrippa to order Annas \u201cto desist from any further such actions.\u201d Reference to \u201cany further such actions\u201d may imply that Annas was planning a major pogrom against the Christian movement.
\nIn any event, when Albinus, the newly appointed governor, was informed of what had happened, he was angry and threatened to punish Annas. No doubt wishing to reestablish his own credibility in the eyes of Rome, the Jewish puppet king, Agrippa II, deposed Annas and replaced him with a member of a rival priestly family.
\nThe evidence shows that the Jewish priestly aristocracy and the Jewish Council (or Sanhedrin) could condemn someone to death but could not carry out capital punishment (unless there was a serious infraction within the temple precincts themselves). Only the Roman authority held capital authority.<\/p>\n
The Archaeological Evidence<\/p>\n
We actually possess archaeological evidence from the time of Jesus that confirms the claims we find in Philo, Josephus, the New Testament, and early rabbinic literature, to the effect that executed persons, including victims of crucifixion, were probably buried.
\nThe discovery in 1968 of an ossuary (ossuary no. 4 in Tomb I, at Giv\u2018at ha-Mivtar) of a Jewish man named Yehohanan, who had obviously been crucified, provides archaeological evidence and insight into how Jesus himself may have been crucified. The ossuary and its contents date to the late 20s CE, that is during the administration of Pilate, the very Roman governor who condemned Jesus to the cross. The remains of an iron spike (11.5 cm in length) are plainly seen still encrusted in the right heel bone (or calcaneum; see fig. 2). Those who took down the body of Yehohanan apparently were unable to remove the spike, with the result that a piece of wood (from an oak tree) remained affixed to the spike. Later, the skeletal remains of the body\u2014spike, fragment of wood, and all\u2014were placed in the ossuary. Forensic examination of the rest of the skeletal remains supports the view that Yehohanan was crucified with arms apart, hung from a horizontal beam or tree branch. However, there is no evidence that his arms, or wrists, were nailed to this cross beam.<\/p>\n
Photograph courtesy of Greg Monette.<\/p>\n
FIGURE 2 Striking a knot in the wood, or perhaps the end of another nail, the sharp end of the nail became fish-hooked, making it impossible to extract. Yehohanan was buried with the nail still in his heel.<\/p>\n
Yehohanan\u2019s leg bones were broken, but there is disagreement over how and when they were broken (i.e., while still on the cross, or after being taken down). Some think that the breaks in the lower leg bones of Yehohanan, including the cut to the talus bone of the foot, are due to crurifragium, the breaking of a victim\u2019s bones to hasten his death. Others do not think the talus suffered such an injury. Indeed, the talus under question may actually belong to one of the other two individuals, whose skeletal remains had been placed in the ossuary. Accordingly, the conclusion that Yehohanan\u2019s leg bones were broken before death and decarnation is disputed. Because of the age and degraded condition of the skeletal materials, a measure of uncertainty remains.
\nIf Yehohanan\u2019s legs were broken before death, we then know not only that he was taken down and buried (as indicated by the discovery of his remains in an ossuary), we also know that his death was intentionally hastened. The most likely and most compelling reason for hastening death in this manner was so that his corpse could be taken down from the cross and placed in a tomb before nightfall, as commanded in the law of Moses (Deut 21:22\u201323) and as Jewish custom required. The Romans had no reason of their own to expedite death by crucifixion, but they permitted it for reasons discussed above.
\nIn Giv\u2018at Ha-Mivtar\u2019s Tomb D were the remains of a man (aged 50), who had been decapitated. Two strokes were required to take off the man\u2019s head, which was the norm in antiquity. Although he had been executed (possibly for murdering a relative interred in Tomb C), he was buried properly, first (we may assume) in a place of dishonor, and then later in an ossuary in his family tomb.
\nPerhaps the most dramatic recent development is the reassessment of the nails, skeletal materials, and inscription from the so-called Abba Cave in Jerusalem, also in the neighborhood of Giv\u2018at Ha-Mivtar. The cave was discovered in 1970 and on the inside wall was found a remarkable inscription, in Palaeo-Hebrew script (i.e., Hebrew written in very old forms of letters), that identifies the occupant of an ornate ossuary as one \u201cMattathias son of Judah.\u201d In 1974 J. M. Grintz published a brief study in which he concluded that the inscription referred to none other than Antigonus son Aristobulus II, whose Hebrew name was Mattathias son of Judah, the last Hasmonean ruler, the man defeated by Herod the Great in 37 BCE. Grintz\u2019s interpretation was supported by Nicu Haas later that year. Haas described the skeletal remains as belonging to a tall man in his mid-twenties, which would have been the age of Antigonus son of Aristobulus II at the time of his death. A recent study by Yoel Elitzur has confirmed the views of Grintz and Haas. In all likelihood, the ossuary and skeletal remains of the last Hasmonean prince have been discovered.
\nWhat makes this case interesting is that Mattathias\/Antigonus had suffered both crucifixion and beheading. According to Josephus, Marcus Antonius beheaded Antigonus in Antioch (Josephus, Antiquities 15.8\u20139; cf. Plutarch, Life of Antony 36.4). Dio Cassius seemingly contradicts Josephus when he specifically refers to crucifixion, but his full statement can be harmonized with what Josephus says. The Roman historian says: \u201cAntony bound Antigonus to a cross and flogged him\u2014a punishment no other king had suffered at the hands of the Romans\u2014and afterwards he slew him\u201d (History 22.6). The slaying \u201cafterwards\u201d probably refers to beheading, which is what Josephus relates.
\nThis is what Haas thought had happened to the man whose skeleton remains were recovered from the Abba Cave. He had been nailed to a cross (and three nails, still bearing traces of human calcium, were recovered from the ossuary) and then (after passing out?) was beheaded, either with a sword or very sharp axe.
\nHow many other skeletons have been recovered of persons executed by crucifixion, beheading, or strangulation is hard to say. If the neck bones are fairly well preserved (and they often are not), signs of decapitation are pretty clear (as in the case of Mattathias\/Antigonus and the man in Giv\u2018at Ha-Mivtar Tomb D). Signs of strangulation would be almost impossible to detect, while signs of crucifixion are also difficult to detect because the bones that would show these signs (i.e., hands, wrists, feet, ankles) are bones that rarely survive intact. Indeed, had the iron nail, with its fish-hooked sharp end that made extraction impossible, not remained imbedded in Yehohanan\u2019s right heel, I doubt anyone would have thought that the poor man had been crucified. Of all the human skeletons that have been recovered from tombs in and around Jerusalem (and other locations in Israel), we simply do not know how many had been executed, by whatever means.
\nBut there are indications that suggest that many executed persons, including victims of crucifixion, were given proper burial. I refer to the discovery of dozens, perhaps more than one hundred, nails that have been recovered from tombs and ossuaries, some of which bear traces of human calcium. These nails, especially those with traces of calcium, were used in crucifixion and, strangely, were viewed as talismans. The presence of calcium, sometimes encircling the nail, indicates its use in crucifixion and suggests that the corpse, still pierced by the nails, was buried and sometime later (when the calcium had adhered to the nail) the nails were recovered and put to new use (see fig. 3).<\/p>\n
Photograph courtesy of Greg Monette.<\/p>\n
FIGURE 3 Nails found in or near the Caiaphas Ossuary are thought to have been used in crucifixion. Many of these nails were probably buried with the remains of the executed. After the passage of time, human calcium and bone became attached and remained attached even after the nails were recovered and put to secondary usage.<\/p>\n
What about Joseph of Arimathea\u2014Did He Bury Jesus?<\/p>\n
The Jewish people buried their dead, then later gathered the bones and placed them in containers called ossuaries or a vault set aside for this purpose. The practice of gathering the bones of the deceased is called ossilegium, or secondary burial (cf. y. Mo\u2018ed Qa\u1e6dan 1.5: \u201cAt first they would bury them in ditches, and when the flesh had decayed, they would gather the bones and bury them in ossuaries\u201d).
\nBurial took place the day of death or, if death occurred at the end of the day or during the night, burial took place the following day. Knowing this lends a great deal of pathos to some otherwise familiar gospel stories (see Matt 9:23; Luke 7:12). Following death, the body was washed and wrapped. We can find this custom mentioned in several episodes in the Gospels and elsewhere. We see it in the story of Lazarus, who was bound and wrapped with cloths (John 11:44). The body of Jesus was wrapped in a clean linen shroud (Matt 27:59; Luke 23:53; John 19:40). The body of Ananias was wrapped and buried (Acts 5:6); so also Dorcas, who \u201cfell sick and died; and when they had washed her, they laid her in an upper room\u201d (Acts 9:37). Moreover, the corpse was usually perfumed (Josephus, Antiquities 15.61; for spices, see Antiquities 17.196\u201399; John 19:39\u201340).
\nThe day of burial was the first of seven days of mourning (Sema\u1e25ot 12.1). This is clearly stated by first-century Jewish historian Josephus, in reference to the death, burial, and funeral of Herod the Great (d. 4 BCE): \u201cNow Archelaus [Herod\u2019s oldest surviving son] continued to mourn for seven days out of respect for his father\u2014the custom of the country prescribes this number of days\u2014and then, after feasting the crowds and making an end of the mourning, he went up to the temple\u201d (Josephus, Antiquities 17.200). The custom of seven days of mourning arose from Scripture itself: Joseph \u201cmade a mourning for his father seven days\u201d (Gen 50:10); and, in reference to the remains of King Saul and his sons, Israelite men \u201ctook their bones and buried them under the tamarisk tree in Jabesh, and fasted seven days\u201d (1 Sam 31:13).
\nOne year after death it was customary to gather the bones and place them in a bone niche or in an ossuary. This is readily observed in the archaeological excavations of Jewish tombs in the time of Jesus. It is also attested in later rabbinic literature: \u201cWhen the flesh had wasted away they gathered together the bones and buried them in their own place\u201d (m. Sanhedrin 6:6); \u201cMy son, bury me at first in a niche. In the course of time, collect my bones and put them in an ossuary but do not gather them with your own hands\u201d (Sema\u1e25ot 12.9; cf. Sema\u1e25ot 3.2). As already noted, the custom of the interval of twelve months from primary burial to secondary burial is also attested in rabbinic literature (cf. b. Qiddu\u0161in 31b).
\nI have already discussed how burial practices for the executed were at some points different. For them there could be no public lamentation. They could not be buried in their family tomb or any place of honor. For them awaited tombs reserved for criminals. In these \u201cwretched places\u201d their corpses had to remain for one year. When the flesh had wasted away, their bones could be collected and taken to the family tomb. According to Jewish law, it was the responsibility of the council to bury the executed (at least in Jerusalem; the traditions elsewhere in Israel may have been different).
\nIt is against this legal and cultural backdrop that the story of Joseph of Arimathea should be understood. Because the Jewish Council (or Sanhedrin) delivered Jesus to the Roman authorities for execution, it was incumbent upon it to arrange for proper burial (as in m. Sanhedrin 6:5, cited above). This task fell to Joseph of Arimathea, a member of the council. The gospel narratives are completely in step with Jewish practice, which Roman authorities during peacetime respected. Joseph may have volunteered for this assignment, perhaps because he felt pity for the family of Jesus or because he sympathized with some of Jesus\u2019 aims. He may have volunteered to show this mercy as a way of registering his disapproval of Caiaphas and supporters. His request (Mark 15:43; Greek: aitein) for the body of Jesus reflects the language used in petitioning officials in Roman late antiquity (see P.Pintaudi 52 [29 CE], where one is directed to approach an official and make a request [aitein]; and O.Did. 344 [ca. 80 CE], where an officer promises to make a request [aitein] on behalf of a lower-ranking solider).
\nPilate\u2019s response to Joseph\u2019s request, in which he inquires into Jesus\u2019 condition (Mark 15:44), reflects the practice of Roman officials (see P.Oxy. 475 [182 CE]: \u201ctake a public physician and view the dead body that has been shown and having delivered it up for burial make a report in writing\u201d; P.Oxy. 51 [173 CE], in which an official orders the inspection of a corpse).
\nIn short, there is nothing irregular about the Gospels\u2019 report that a member of the Sanhedrin requested permission to take down the body of Jesus and give it proper burial, in keeping with Jewish burial practices as they related to the executed. It is entirely in keeping with all that we know from the literature and from archaeology. This is why Jodi Magness, a Jewish archaeologist who serves on the faculty of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, is able to say that the \u201cGospel accounts of Jesus\u2019 burial are largely consistent with the archaeological evidence. Although archaeology does not prove there was a follower of Jesus named Joseph of Arimathea or that Pontius Pilate granted his request for Jesus\u2019 body, the Gospel accounts describing Jesus\u2019 removal from the cross and burial are consistent with archaeological evidence and with Jewish law.\u201d When all of the relevant evidence is considered, we should conclude that it is probable that the body of Jesus, in keeping with Jewish customs of his time, was given proper burial.<\/p>\n
THE ROLE OF THE EMPTY TOMB AND THE BELIEF THAT JESUS HAD BEEN RESURRECTED<\/p>\n
Ehrman makes light of the tradition that women observed where Jesus was buried and were the first to find the tomb empty. But if the gospel stories were filled with as much fiction as Ehrman thinks, one must wonder why the Evangelists did not alter the stories and give more prominence to men. However prominent and influential women may have been in early Christian leadership (and the appeal to Junia the apostle in Rom 16:7 is appropriate), the male Evangelists would surely have been aware that having women as first discoverers of the empty tomb would make it easier for skeptics\u2014Jewish and Gentile alike\u2014to raise doubts. This in fact happened, as we see in the mocking challenges offered by pagan skeptics like Celsus and Porphyry. The second century Gospel of Peter, which claims that hostile Jewish leaders and Romans, along with the male disciples themselves, witnessed the resurrection, was composed to answer that criticism.
\nThe closest followers of Jesus may have run away (understandably fearing that they too could be subject to arrest), as the Gospels tell us, but other followers and family members would have been available to visit the tomb of Jesus and show their respects (quietly and privately, as Jewish law and custom permitted). After all, there is no evidence that the authorities rounded up Jesus\u2019 followers and imprisoned them in the immediate aftermath of Jesus\u2019 arrest and execution. In my view the tradition of the women as first discoverers of the empty is a strong piece of evidence in favor of the historicity of the empty tomb, if not the reality of the resurrection also.
\nAt this time I want to return to Ehrman\u2019s point about Paul\u2019s nonmention of the empty tomb in the creed that he quotes in 1 Corinthians 15. He believes the nonmention of Josephus of Arimathea, the man who buried Jesus, and the nonmention of a tomb constitute evidence that there probably was no tomb in the earliest stories and traditions.
\nI find this reasoning wholly unpersuasive. By their very nature creeds are terse and minimalistic. To read \u201cand he was buried in a tomb\u201d would have struck all as redundant. To be \u201cburied\u201d is to be placed in a tomb. Of course, as Jews, Jesus\u2019 earliest followers would have been well versed in Jewish burial practices. They would have known that the executed were taken down and placed in certain tombs reserved for executed criminals. The creed, especially in Jewish thinking, really doesn\u2019t have to allude to burial at all. Just to say that \u201cChrist died\u201d is to imply burial. But the creed mentions \u201cwas buried\u201d in order to have a counterpart to \u201cwas raised.\u201d Paul himself in his letter to the Christians of Rome seizes on this contrast in order to make a theological point: \u201cWe were buried \u2026 as Christ was raised\u201d (Rom 6:4).
\nThe creed\u2019s statement, \u201che was buried,\u201d flies in the face of the speculation that the body of Jesus was not given proper burial, that his body had been left hanging on the cross to rot and be eaten by birds and animals. It is hard to see how such an ancient creed (and its antiquity is conceded by Ehrman) could have taken shape in a Jewish context and include a matter-of-fact reference to burial, if in fact Jesus had not been buried.
\nI find it strange to think that the absence of the name of Joseph of Arimathea in the creed of 1 Corinthians 15 is evidence that no one named Joseph had buried Jesus. Being buried by Joseph is hardly the equivalent to being seen by Cephas (i.e., Peter). Who saw the risen Jesus was important, both to the creed and to the point that Paul is making in 1 Corinthians. Who buried Jesus was not. There are many other things that Paul and the creed do not mention, such as Jesus\u2019 death in Jerusalem, at the time of Passover, at the request of the Jewish Council, and at the hands of Pontius Pilate (though Pilate will finally make it into the Apostle\u2019s Creed, sometime in the third century). The failure to mention these details does not mean they did not happen or were not involved.
\nBut what about Ehrman\u2019s argument that for the followers of Jesus to believe that their Master had been resurrected there really was no need for an empty tomb? Theoretically Ehrman could be correct. After all, if the appearances of Jesus to his followers were so vivid, that he could actually be touched, that he was not transparent or ghostlike, I suppose his followers might well conclude\u2014even if the body of Jesus remained in a tomb\u2014that Jesus had truly been resurrected.
\nBut I do have my doubts. Jews of late antiquity who believed in resurrection spoke of the body being raised up. The scriptural basis for this expectation centered on Ezekiel\u2019s vision of the bones regaining flesh and life (Ezekiel 37) and, especially, Isa 26:19 and Dan 12:2. The first reads, \u201c[Your] dead shall live, their bodies shall rise. O dwellers in the dust, awake and sing for joy!\u201d What is translated \u201cbodies\u201d in the Hebrew could also be translated \u201ccorpses.\u201d The Old Greek version of this verse reads, \u201cThe dead will rise, and those in the tombs will be raised up.\u2026\u201d The Greek translator clearly understands the dead of Isaiah\u2019s passage to refer to corpses \u201cin tombs.\u201d The Isaiah passage is echoed in Dan 12:2, \u201cAnd many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life.\u2026\u201d These verses inspired the Maccabean martyrs, who suffered at the hands of the Seleucid king Antiochus IV (see 2 Maccabees 7). These martyrs not only spoke of being \u201craised up,\u201d but expected to have their limbs and bodies restored (2 Macc 7:10\u201311). For them resurrection involved the body and not simply a spirit.
\nAs best as we can determine, the expectation of a bodily resurrection was the belief of the Pharisees, a religious-political sect that sometimes was antagonistic toward Jesus and later toward his following. Saul of Tarsus, who after his conversion became the well-known apostle Paul, missionary to the Gentiles, was a Pharisee. It was the resurrection of Jesus that attracted some of these Pharisees to the Jesus movement (see Acts 15:5) and led some, who were members of the Jewish Council, to defend Paul when he stood before them (Acts 23:6\u20139).
\nI find it difficult to explain Paul\u2019s proclamation of Jesus as resurrected, had the followers of Jesus spoken only of a spiritual resurrection and had the body of Jesus remained dead and decomposing in a tomb. After all, the Jewish people had their traditions of ghosts, spirits, and visions, which did not lead to the conviction that people had been resurrected. There was something about the appearances of the risen Jesus that convinced his followers, including the indifferent (such as brothers James and Jude) and the hostile (such as Saul of Tarsus), that they had encountered the resurrected Jesus and not simply the ghost of Jesus. But I doubt that they would have spoken of resurrection if Jesus\u2019 corpse was still in the tomb.
\nAnother important point to make is that the whereabouts of the place where Jesus\u2019 corpse was interred would have been known. No matter what people said about seeing the risen Jesus, the place of burial would have remained important. Had his corpse remained in the tomb, that would have been known and its eventual retrieval for burial in an honorable place (whether the family tomb in Galilee or perhaps a tomb near Jerusalem) would have been planned.
\nI conclude that the burial of the body of Jesus in a known tomb, according to Jewish law and custom, is highly probable. I think it is also probable that the tomb in which family and friends knew the body of Jesus had been placed was known to be empty. I think it is also probable that the first to discover this tomb were women, among whom Mary Magdalene was the most prominent. These conclusions make the most sense of the evidence. It was the knowledge of the tomb and the discovery that it was empty, in addition to the appearances of Jesus, that led the followers of Jesus to speak in terms of resurrection and not in other terms.<\/p>\n
CHAPTER 5<\/p>\n
What Did the First Christians Think about Jesus?<\/p>\n
Simon J. Gathercole<\/p>\n
INTRODUCTION<\/p>\n
The beginning is obviously an important part of any story. How the earliest disciples thought about Jesus at the beginning of the church is a key question for anyone, like Bart Ehrman, who wants to tell a convincing story about the views of Christians in the ancient world. As the title of Ehrman\u2019s book\u2014How Jesus Became God\u2014implies, he sees a story of a transformation: a kind of \u201cugly duckling\u201d or Sound of Music tale. In this story, someone who is a normal human being, and one even rejected by many and executed as a political danger, eventually becomes\u2014to quote the Nicene Creed\u2014\u201cGod from God, Light from Light\u201d and \u201cof one being with the Father.\u201d
\nThat transformation, on Ehrman\u2019s view, is not by any means instantaneous, but an evolution that took place over centuries. Ehrman\u2019s account of the journey begins even before the historical Jesus and proceeds to the Council of Chalcedon in 451 CE. Even so, the most important elements in the story happen early on. It is the resurrection appearances that are the key turning point in the story, for it is at the resurrection that Jesus becomes elevated to the right hand of God. These visions of the risen Jesus\u2014in which some of the earliest disciples really thought they saw Jesus\u2014Ehrman acknowledges as historical fact, whatever one thinks of the historical truth of the resurrection of Jesus itself. These visions triggered the great changes in how Jesus was understood, and the principal changes took place in what scholars call the \u201ctunnel period\u201d of around twenty years between the historical Jesus and the first Christian writings (i.e., ca. 30\u201350 CE).
\nWhen the disciples considered that Jesus had really been raised from the dead, their view of who he was changed drastically. As a result of their visions, they came to believe, according to Ehrman\u2019s How Jesus Became God, that Jesus had been adopted as God\u2019s Son and had\u2014in some sense at least\u2014become divine. In the course of that \u201ctunnel period,\u201d Jesus gradually came to be seen as even more significant. He subsequently came to be regarded as having become God\u2019s Son even earlier. Some saw this \u201cadoption\u201d as taking place at his baptism; others took this back still further, to his very birth and even conception. Ehrman goes on to express the view that in Paul\u2019s writings, Jesus is seen as an angel-like being\u2014\u201cpre-existent,\u201d that is, existing even before becoming human.
\nThe key technical terms in Ehrman\u2019s account for our chapter here are \u201cexaltation Christology\u201d and \u201cadoptionist Christology.\u201d It is with the perception of Jesus\u2019 exaltation, or elevation, to the right hand of God that Christology begins. According to How Jesus Became God, the view of Jesus held by the earliest believers was that after Jesus\u2019 death, God elevated him to a position of supreme authority (\u201cChristology\u201d simply means what one thinks or says about Christ.) Not only that, but God had \u201cadopted\u201d Jesus as his Son, even if he did not have the same kind of divine nature as his newfound Father. Nevertheless, he could be worshiped by the earliest Christians, and because they were Jews, he was worshiped not as a separate deity, but alongside God the Father.
\nIn this chapter I propose to deal with three main areas, touched on in a number of places in How Jesus Became God, but especially in chapter 6: \u201cThe Beginning of Christology: Christ as Exalted to Heaven.\u201d We will work backward chronologically, looking first of all at the \u201cChristologies\u201d of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, all written in the second half of the first century. Then, in the second part of this chapter, we will move back in time into the shady territory of the \u201ctunnel period.\u201d Finally, we will give a different account of what took place at Jesus\u2019 exaltation. Overall, we will see in the course of this chapter that the evidence does not enable us to plot a gradual development in the early Christians\u2019 view of Jesus.<\/p>\n
JESUS ACCORDING TO MATTHEW, MARK, AND LUKE<\/p>\n
I need to begin by reordering this list of Gospels, because\u2014as almost every biblical scholar acknowledges\u2014Mark\u2019s gospel was written first. There is a bit more controversy about which came next, Matthew or Luke, but my impression is that most scholars probably favor the order Mark\u2013Matthew\u2013Luke (especially those who think that Luke used Matthew\u2019s gospel\u2014conversely, hardly anyone thinks that Matthew used Luke). In fact, I need to change it again, because I am going to work backward in time from Matthew and Luke to Mark. Following that, in the second part of this chapter, I will deal with the \u201ctunnel period\u201d before the Gospels.<\/p>\n
Becoming Son of God at Birth? The Christologies in Matthew and Luke<\/p>\n
Ehrman\u2019s views of the Christologies of Matthew and Luke overlap to a large extent. He does not see either as containing a \u201cpreexistent\u201d Jesus, that is, a Jesus portrayed as having a back story in heaven. Rather, How Jesus Became God defines Jesus in these two gospels as coming into existence as God\u2019s Son at his conception or birth. In Luke, the Holy Spirit comes upon Mary and therefore the holy child will be called the Son of God. Ehrman sees Matthew as not quite so explicit about the process whereby Jesus is conceived, but still this gospel views Jesus as Son of God from the moment of conception. As a result, Jesus is\u2014in a loose or weak sense, at least\u2014divine from the beginning of his earthly existence. Ehrman is at pains to emphasize, however, that Matthew and Luke certainly cannot be regarded as agreeing with the definition of Jesus in the creeds:<\/p>\n
I should stress that these virginal conception narratives of Matthew and Luke are by no stretch of the imagination embracing the view that later became the orthodox teaching of Christianity. According to this later view, Christ was a preexistent divine being who \u201cbecame incarnate [i.e., \u2018human\u2019] through the Virgin Mary.\u201d But not according to Matthew and Luke. If you read their accounts closely, you will see that they have nothing to do with the idea that Christ existed before he was conceived. In these two Gospels, Jesus comes into existence at the moment of his conception. He did not exist before.<\/p>\n
I cannot resist responding to this paragraph, because I once wrote a whole book arguing the opposite view, specifically on the topic of the preexistence of Christ in the gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Among a few other points, I focused attention especially on the \u201cI have come\u201d sayings of Jesus, of which there are a number in Matthew and Luke (as well as in Mark). Jesus on various occasions sums up his mission in phrases such as the following:<\/p>\n
It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners. (Mark 2:17\/Matt 9:13\/Luke 5:32; Luke adds \u201cto repentance\u201d)<\/p>\n
Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the prophets. I have not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them. (Matt 5:17)<\/p>\n
I have come to cast fire onto the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled. (Luke 12:49)<\/p>\n
Do not think that I have come to bring peace on the earth; I have not come to bring peace but a sword\/division. (Matt 10:34\/Luke 12:51)<\/p>\n
For I have come to divide man against father and daughter against mother, and daughter in law against mother-in-law. (Matt 10:35)<\/p>\n
For even the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many. (Mark 10:45\/Matt 20:28)<\/p>\n
For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost. (Luke 19:10).<\/p>\n
I would suggest that the natural sense of these sayings is that they imply that Jesus has come from somewhere to accomplish his mission. (Jesus is not talking in each case about how he has arrived in a particular town, having \u201ccome,\u201d for example, from Nazareth to Capernaum.) When one examines these sayings of Jesus, the closest matches with them in the Old Testament and Jewish tradition are statements that angels make about their earthly missions (within the Old Testament, see, e.g., Dan 9:22\u201323; 10:14; 11:2). I found twenty-four examples in the Old Testament and Jewish tradition of angels saying, \u201cI have come in order to \u2026\u201d as a way of summing up their earthly missions. A prophet or a messiah in the Old Testament or Jewish tradition never sums up his life\u2019s work this way.
\nI am not for a moment suggesting that Jesus is viewed as an angel in the Gospels, but rather that he is seen as having come from somewhere to carry out his life\u2019s work, namely, from heaven. Ehrman insists that if you read Matthew and Luke carefully, \u201cyou will see that they have nothing to do with the idea that Christ existed before he was conceived.\u201d But I think if you read Matthew and Luke carefully in the light of their Jewish background, you can see that they have everything to do with Christ existing before he was conceived, before he \u201ccame\u201d to embark on his earthly mission.<\/p>\n
Becoming Son of God at Baptism? The Christology in Mark\u2019s Gospel<\/p>\n
The description in How Jesus Became God of Mark\u2019s gospel overlaps with the pictures of Matthew and Luke in that Ehrman does not see Jesus as a preexistent being in Mark. (The points made about preexistence just now, however, apply to Mark too, because Jesus\u2019 \u201cI have come\u201d statements are scattered across Matthew, Mark, and Luke.) According to Ehrman, Mark\u2019s \u201corthodox\u201d credentials are even weaker, however, because\u2014in contrast to Matthew and Luke\u2014Mark\u2019s Jesus is not born of a virgin either. He is still regarded as the Son of God, but in Mark Jesus attained to that position later than he did in Matthew and Luke, namely, at his baptism. Ehrman\u2019s view here is based on the words of the voice from heaven at Jesus\u2019 baptism: \u201cYou are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased\u201d (Mark 1:11).
\nCommenting on this verse, Ehrman asserts: \u201cThis voice does not appear to be stating a preexisting fact. It appears to be making a declaration. It is at this time that Jesus becomes the Son of God for Mark\u2019s Gospel.\u201d I chose the word \u201casserts\u201d deliberately here, because that is about all it is. Ehrman goes on to say, perhaps by way of explanation, that after the baptism Jesus does all kinds of remarkable deeds, but this does nothing to show that Jesus became Son of God for the first time at his baptism. What is striking is that a voice from heaven comes later on in Mark\u2019s gospel and says something similar. At the transfiguration, God says of Jesus: \u201cThis is my Son, whom I love. Listen to him!\u201d (Mark 9:1). Presumably God is not adopting Jesus again. But it is hard to see how the voice at the baptism could refer to God\u2019s adoption of Jesus and the similar-sounding voice at the transfiguration could mean something different.<\/p>\n
Jesus as Divine in Matthew, Mark, and Luke?<\/p>\n
Perhaps surprisingly, Ehrman would answer this question: Yes! At the same time, however, it is important to recognize what he means: in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, Jesus occupies a certain position in the divine hierarchy or pyramid, but he is certainly not at the top. He is divine, but not in the sense that he shares in the identity of the one God of Israel. Briefly in this section I aim, first, to set out some of the ways in which Jesus in these three gospels demonstrates or implies his divine identity. Then, second, I will discuss briefly (more detail can be found in the chapters in this volume by Mike Bird and Chris Tilling) why this divine identity cannot be seen as a lower-grade divine identity, because of the absolute distinction between God and creation presupposed in the religious environment of the earliest disciples.
\nThere are a number of points at which Jesus in Matthew, Mark, and Luke does look like he has the privileges of YHWH, God himself. I have described this evidence in more detail elsewhere, and so I will only give a brief sketch here. Strikingly, Jesus says and does things that not only overlap with what God in the Old Testament says and does. Jesus says and does things that are privileges uniquely of the God of Israel. When Jesus speaks and acts this way, responses\u2014unsurprisingly\u2014include worship on the one hand and accusations of blasphemy on the other.
\nOne of the most remarkable statements is Jesus\u2019 authority to forgive sins, seen once in Matthew and Mark and twice in Luke (Mark 2:1\u201310 and parallels; also Luke 7:49). It is difficult to see this as merely something Jesus can do as a god low down in the divine pecking order because it is something\u2014as the scribes in Mark 2 recognize\u2014that is a prerogative uniquely of the one true God. This was something that no angel, prophet, or even nondivine Messiah, or any other figure, had the authority to do.
\nOne of the best known facts about Jesus is that he chose twelve disciples, and scholars usually take this as Jesus forming the nucleus of a renewed people of God, with the twelve disciples representing the twelve tribes of Israel (Mark 3:13; Luke 6:13). This looks, therefore, as if Jesus is occupying the position of God in the Old Testament, and this is echoed in the fact that Jesus has the power of electing people to be saved elsewhere in the Gospels. This appears in the famous saying in Matthew and Luke, where Jesus states: \u201cNo one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him\u201d (Matt 11:27\/Luke 10:22): Jesus chooses who can know the Father. The people of God in Mark can even be called \u201chis [i.e., Jesus\u2019] elect\u201d (Mark 13:27\/Matt 24:31): the people of God belong to Jesus. In the same verse, one of my coauthors in this book, Craig Evans, has drawn attention to what an extraordinary thing it is that Jesus refers to angels belonging to him as well (see also Matt 13:41; 25:31).
\nOther features of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, such as the sea miracles, Jesus\u2019 sending of prophets, his exercise of supernatural knowledge, his belonging in the divine triad Father-Son-Spirit (Matt 28:19), all imply that Jesus shares in the identity of the one true God of Israel.
\nThis identity is reflected in the responses to Jesus in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. We have already mentioned the accusations of the scribes: \u201cWhy is he speaking in this way? He is blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?\u201d (Mark 2:7). This accusation resurfaces at the end of Mark\u2019s gospel, when Jesus claims to share the authority of God in heaven. The high priest states: \u201cWhat further witnesses do we need? You have heard the blasphemy!\u201d (14:63\u201364).
\nOn the more positive side, there are various kinds of reverence offered to Jesus in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Some of these exceed the bounds of esteem for a mere human being, and as we will soon see, such reverence cannot be regarded simply as worship of a secondtier god. This is especially apparent in Luke, because he considers it inappropriate to give reverential prostration to mere human beings. (Other authors may well use the term more liberally than Luke.) The Greek word for this reverential prostration is proskyn\u0113sis, a kind of technical term. This was the reverence that in 327 BCE, Alexander the Great imposed on his fellow Greeks as an obligation; some of them refused, denying him what amounted to formal worship as a god. Luke narrates a scene in Acts that is almost a mirror image of that, in which Cornelius bowed down to (prosekyn\u0113sen) Peter, after which Peter said: \u201cStand up, for I too am a man\u201d (Acts 10:25\u201326). So when the disciples offer proskyn\u0113sis to Jesus at the end of Luke\u2019s gospel, it is clearly worship due uniquely to God that is in view (Luke 24:52).
\nWe can explore further this question of what kind of divine identity the events in Matthew, Mark, and Luke imply about Jesus. Ehrman repeatedly emphasizes the need to ask not just whether Jesus is seen as divine or not, but also in what sense he is divine. Chapter 1 of his book rightly emphasizes that deity in the wider Roman Empire was a rather flexible affair, and that in a few cases (although I think chapter 2 of How Jesus Became God exaggerates), some Jewish texts can have a degree of flexibility too. Matthew, Mark, and Luke, however, imply that the Jewish milieu, which Jesus inhabited, was one in which there was a strict God\/creation divide. The scribes in Mark 2, for example, do not think that Jesus\u2019 forgiveness of sins was an interesting experiment in the degree to which a human being might participate in the divine realm, but accused Jesus of blasphemy, as one crossing the creator\/creature boundary and encroaching upon divine privileges; the same is true, as we have seen, in Mark 14.
\nNew Testament authors frequently appeal to this boundary as important. Revelation emphasizes it, as is seen in the places where John, dazzled by the glory of the angels he encounters, bows down to them. They promptly rebuke him, because they are merely fellow servants of the true God, who alone is worthy of worship (Rev 19:10; 22:8\u20139). Hebrews 1 also draws a clear line between angels on the one hand, and God and Jesus on the other. A further point of importance is that in four separate places in the New Testament, we find almost formulaic statements that through Jesus all things were created (John 1:3; 1 Cor 8:6; Col 1:16; Heb 1:2). There is a clear line between Creator and creature, and Jesus stands on the Creator\u2019s side of that line.
\nBut there is a prime witness who needs to be called at this point\u2014Paul. Not so much Paul the apostle, but Saul the Pharisee. It is notable that in Paul\u2019s writings there is an absolutely rigid and inflexible boundary between God the Creator and the created cosmos, a divide that is fundamental to his theology. At various points Paul contrasts God and creation and emphasizes that \u201cfrom him and through him and for him are all things\u201d (Rom 11:36). But the key statement comes in his condemnation of idolatry in Romans 1. What is fundamentally wrong with idolatry? The answer is that it is worship of the creation rather than its Creator: \u201cthey exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator\u2014who is forever praised\u201d (Rom 1:25).
\nWhy is Paul such a key witness? The answer is that he was active as a Pharisee just around the time of Jesus\u2019 ministry and its immediate aftermath, at the beginning of the \u201ctunnel period\u201d when Ehrman sees so much crucial development. Scholars generally agree, I think rightly, that the basic Creator\/creation distinction was not a radically new thought for Paul at his conversion. His ideas about idolatry and its basis expressed in Rom 1:25 are almost certainly views he held earlier. Such a view reflects the milieu in which Jesus and the earliest disciples after the first Easter were active. We see this expressed in the response of the scribes and the high priest to Jesus in Mark\u2019s gospel, as well as in the view of Saul of Tarsus.
\nThe implications of this are significant for how we regard the divine identity of Jesus. It implies that when Jesus in Matthew, Mark, and Luke says and does things that in the Old Testament are divine prerogatives, it can only be because he shares in the identity of the God of Israel.<\/p>\n
Summary<\/p>\n
Ehrman\u2019s argument that the Jesus of Matthew, Mark, and Luke is a Jesus fundamentally different from the later preexistent, divine Jesus of the creeds is a flawed one. For one thing, preexistence is more deeply rooted in the Gospels than Ehrman recognizes (although, to be fair, most other commentators on the Gospels also underestimate its significance). More importantly, a divine identity is attributed to Jesus in the Gospels, and not merely a divine identity of a low-level kind. The Gospels\u2014as do Acts 10, Romans 1, Hebrews 1, and Revelation\u2014reflect a Jewish milieu where a strict division between God and human beings, between Creator and creation, was much more in evidence than a continuum between the divine and human spheres.<\/p>\n
THE \u201cTUNNEL PERIOD\u201d: JESUS ACCORDING TO PRELITERARY FORMULAE<\/p>\n
Even so, Matthew, Mark, and Luke might not, it could be argued, get us back to the earliest Christians mentioned in the title of this chapter. By general consensus, they belong to the second half of the first century. And in Ehrman\u2019s view, none of the Gospels in the New Testament reflects the views of the very first disciples. Be that as it may, Ehrman seeks to go further back in time in order to discover the most primitive views of the earliest Christians.
\nHow, one might ask, can one do this when no literature exists from between 30\u201350 CE, the period at the beginning? Ehrman\u2019s answer\u2014and that of many other biblical scholars\u2014is that within the final texts of the New Testament writings as they stand, one can detect traces of these earlier views. Ehrman calls these \u201cpreliterary traditions\u201d\u2014traditions, because they have been handed down, and preliterary because they were handed down in oral form, before the Christians became bookish.
\nIn How Jesus Became God, we find the argument that these preliterary traditions reveal a view of Jesus that is more primitive than the views of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Jesus did not become the Son of God at conception or birth, as put forward by Matthew and Luke. Jesus did not even become Son of God at the baptism, as maintained, on Ehrman\u2019s line, by Mark. One must look later on in Jesus\u2019 curriculum vitae. These preliterary traditions, according to Ehrman, take the line that Jesus was adopted by God at his resurrection.<\/p>\n
Romans 1:3\u20134<\/p>\n
Ehrman\u2019s first example of a preliterary formula about Jesus comes at the beginning of Romans:<\/p>\n
\u2026 regarding his Son, who as to his earthly life was a descendant of David, and who through the Spirit of holiness was appointed the Son of God in power by his resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord. (Rom 1:3\u20134)<\/p>\n
Ehrman identifies, following a great many other scholars, a primitive Christian creed here, consisting of two elements: (a) Jesus\u2019 descent from David in fleshly, human terms, followed by (b) Jesus\u2019 descent (in the sense of sonship) from God in spiritual, superhuman terms\u2014a descent that was conferred upon him by adoption at the resurrection.
\nThere are two separate considerations here. The first (1) is the question of whether this is a \u201cpre-Pauline\u201d creed or not, and the second (2) is the matter of how one can identify the original wording of this creed. Ehrman concludes that Paul merely added to the primitive wording of the creed the phrase \u201cin power\u201d (after \u201cSon of God\u201d) in Rom 1:4. The whole process is, of course, conjectural, but that is not necessarily fatal to the entire enterprise. To conclude (1) is a reasonable enough conjecture: the statement satisfies some of the criteria commonly invoked in these discussions\u2014such as tightly paralleled structure and uncommon language (e.g., the phrase \u201cSpirit of holiness\u201d is unparalleled in Paul). There is a good sporting chance that this might be an early Christian creed.
\nEhrman goes further and (3) identifies this formula as perhaps one of the earliest even of the preliterary formula because it seems to have an Aramaic background. It is \u201carguably the oldest fragment of a creed in all of Paul\u2019s letters.\u201d Ehrman concludes that this goes back to an original creed in Aramaic, the language of Jesus and his first disciples. This is because the phrase \u201cSpirit of holiness\u201d in Rom 1:4 is an unusual Greek phrase, but one that may reflect the pattern of Aramaic or Hebrew phraseology (what scholars call a \u201cSemitism\u201d in Greek).
\nWe have conjecture upon conjecture upon conjecture here. We can take them in reverse order. In (3) we are on unsteady ground. Even if the phrase \u201cSpirit of holiness\u201d may have the ring of a \u201cSemitism,\u201d this is not sufficient evidence to say that the creed goes back to an Aramaic original. As has been widely recognized in scholarship for a century or so, Semitisms are much more complicated than that.
\nIt is in (2) that the speculative nature of the argument is most evident and the circularity most vicious. (I mean that the argument is a vicious circle, not that Bart Ehrman is being vicious!) One of the criteria, which Ehrman and other scholars use, is that one may be able to identify preliterary formulae that have been incorporated by a later author if that formula expresses an idea that is either inconsistent with, or at least unparalleled in, the author\u2019s other writings. So in this case, one of the indicators that Rom 1:3\u20134 is not originally Pauline is evident from the presence of \u201cideas that are not found anywhere else in Paul,\u201d and that \u201cthis earlier tradition has a different view of Christ than the one that Paul explicates elsewhere in his surviving writings.\u201d
\nThere are two apparent theological oddities in the formula. The first is that \u201cJesus\u2019s earthly messiahship as a descendant of King David is stressed,\u201d and it is true enough to say that this is not stressed elsewhere in the undisputed letters of Paul (though note 2 Tim 2:8). However, it is not accurate to say that this Davidic messiahship is \u201ca view not otherwise mentioned in the writings of Paul.\u201d Fast-forward to the end of Romans, and we see Jesus invoked in the words of Isaiah as \u201cthe root of Jesse\u201d (Rom 15:12, citing Isa 11:10)\u2014a phrase that is a standard way of alluding to a Davidic Messiah.
\nThe second oddity is that, on Ehrman\u2019s view, the formula expresses the idea that Jesus was adopted as God\u2019s Son at the resurrection. This, of course, would not tally with Paul\u2019s thought elsewhere. This is evident for Ehrman not least from the fact that Paul has to modify it slightly: \u201cPaul himself probably added the phrase \u2018in power\u2019 to the creed, so that now Jesus is made the Son of God \u2018in power\u2019 at the resurrection.\u201d This, according to Ehrman, conforms the formula to Paul\u2019s own theology. It should be obvious why this can be styled a vicious circle. The following syllogism is at work in this reasoning (not just in Ehrman, but in other scholars as well):<\/p>\n
The creedal formula propounds an adoptionist Christology.<\/p>\n
\u201cSon of God in power\u201d undermines the adoptionist thought.<\/p>\n
Therefore \u201cin power\u201d is Paul\u2019s addition.<\/p>\n
So Paul incorporates an \u201cadoptionist\u201d fragment in Romans 1. But hang on\u2014Rom 1:3\u20134 is not adoptionist. But we can make it adoptionist if we remove \u201cin power.\u201d This reveals, I think, why the idea that \u201cin power\u201d ought to be seen as a Pauline addition to something older is an unwarranted prejudice. Dunn adds a further argument for why the idea that \u201cin power\u201d was inserted by Paul should be abandoned.
\nI do not wish to abandon the idea (1) that Rom 1:3\u20134 might be a pre-Pauline formula. But if we do \u201cadopt\u201d such a view, we need constantly to remember that there is a considerable degree of speculation involved, which should give us pause before we build on that speculation. Ehrman, however, does build on it, stating (2) that there are clear criteria according to which one can distinguish within such creedal formulae which parts are original and which parts are additions by Paul. But this is a process fraught with difficulty. The key point is that one might well make the occasional speculation about this question, but to grant one\u2019s speculations the force of probability such that one can then proceed to use them as foundations for other arguments is\u2014not to put too fine a point on it\u2014indefensibly bad method.
\nAt the time of writing this article (in January 2014), I am also reading Simon Singh\u2019s marvelous book Fermat\u2019s Last Theorem. In the 1600s, the French civil servant Pierre de Fermat stated that he had proven a great number of mathematical theorems (in his spare time!), but without setting out the actual proofs. Near the end of the twentieth century, all of these had been shown by others really to hold\u2014other mathematicians had supplied proofs. One remained\u2014hence Fermat\u2019s last theorem\u2014which was finally solved by Andrew Wiles in 1995. During the course of Simon Singh\u2019s book, he comments on how disastrous it would have been for mathematicians to assume Fermat\u2019s last theorem to be true if it were not. Since theorems are fundamental building blocks in mathematics, had Fermat\u2019s theorem been assumed, any subsequent theorems built on it would turn out to be false if Fermat\u2019s theorem were false. Singh comments: \u201cAny logic which relies on a conjecture is itself a conjecture.\u201d The same applies to building on conjecture in the study of the New Testament, in this case, the study of Romans 1.<\/p>\n
Acts 13:32\u201333<\/p>\n
Ehrman\u2019s next example is also an adoptionist fragment allegedly incorporated by an author who takes a different view\u2014Luke. Luke does not think that Jesus was adopted as Son of God at the resurrection, as is evident from his account of Jesus\u2019 birth: as we have seen, for Luke, Jesus is \u201cSon of the Most High\u201d and \u201cSon of God\u201d (Luke 1:32, 35), as well as \u201cChrist\u201d and \u201cLord\u201d (2:11), from the beginning. As a result, it might appear surprising to read Paul in Acts\u2014the sequel to Luke\u2019s gospel\u2014declaring:<\/p>\n
We tell you the good news: What God promised our ancestors he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising up Jesus. As it is written in the second Psalm: \u201cYou are my son; today I have become your father.\u201d (Acts 13:32\u201333)<\/p>\n
Ehrman clearly sees it as surprising:<\/p>\n
I am not sure there is another statement about the resurrection in the entire New Testament that is quite so astounding.\u2026 In this pre-Lukan tradition, Jesus was made the Son of God at the resurrection. This is a view Luke inherited from his tradition, and it is one that coincides closely with what we already saw in Romans 1:3\u20134. It appears to be the earliest form of Christian belief: that God exalted Jesus to be his Son by raising him from the dead.<\/p>\n
I fear I am not so astounded. When one looks at the way in which the New Testament books use the Old Testament, those New Testament authors often quote it in a way that is not assuming simply that the Old Testament text is a straightforward theological or historical account of what is now the case. Consider, for example, one of the first citations of the Old Testament in the opening pages of the New:<\/p>\n
When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi. Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled: \u201cA voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no more.\u201d (Matt 2:16\u201318)<\/p>\n
Here, Herod\u2019s slaughter of the infants is said to be a fulfillment of a report of a lament in Jeremiah 31. There are points at which Matthew and Jeremiah differ here: (1) Herod has ordered the slaughter of infants in Bethlehem, not Ramah, and (2) the matriarch Rachel is weeping, not the first-century BCE mothers of Herod\u2019s victims. But it would be flat-footed to say that the quotation of the psalm is inappropriate. Ramah is near Bethlehem, and Jacob\u2019s wife Rachel is one of the mothers\u2014sometimes the mother\u2014of Israel as a whole. Overall, the oracle in Jeremiah is cited in Matthew because of its suggestive similarities with the circumstances surrounding Jesus\u2019 birth, rather than because it is a straightforward prediction of the slaughter of the innocents. Indeed, the oracle in the Old Testament is already metaphorical, because Rachel was already long-dead at the time of Jeremiah.
\nThe same applies in Acts. In Acts 1, it is to make a point graphically that Peter applies the words of Psalm 69 to Judas: \u201cMay his place be deserted; let there be no one to dwell in it\u201d (Acts 1:20, citing Ps 69:25). Peter does not necessarily want Judas\u2019s entire extended family to be wiped out. In Acts 2, in Peter\u2019s next speech, he cites Joel, announcing that with the arrival of the Spirit at Pentecost, various prophesied end-time events have come to fulfillment, such as the statement that \u201cthe sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood\u201d (Acts 2:20, citing Joel 2:31). But there has\u2014as far as we are told in Acts 2\u2014been no extraordinary celestial transformation of the moon to make it look like one of the moons of Tatooine in Star Wars. Peter quotes these words\u2014which, as in the Jeremiah\/Matthew case just mentioned, were already metaphorical to start with\u2014to make the point graphically that those present are experiencing an amazing act of God with cosmos-changing consequences.
\nWe could go on. Still in Acts 2, Peter cites Ps 110:1: \u201cThe Lord said to my Lord, \u2018Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.\u2019 \u201d This is despite the fact that, of course, God does not really have a right hand, and he does not really intend to construct for Jesus a footrest out of the remains of his victims, like the Incan lord Pachacuti reputed to have made flutes out of the arm bones of those he conquered. Again, neither is the earth really God\u2019s footstool in the reference to Isa 66:1 in Stephen\u2019s speech (Acts 7:49).
\nSo when we come to the citation of Psalm 2 in Acts 13, we should not necessarily be so astounded:<\/p>\n
We tell you the good news: What God promised our ancestors he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising up Jesus. As it is written in the second Psalm: \u201cYou are my son; today I have become your father.\u201d (Acts 13:32\u201333)<\/p>\n
Ehrman\u2019s interpretation is that this psalm quotation should be read as a quite literal statement, in which each component has a straightforward reference: You are my son\u2014God declares that Jesus is his son. This is grounded in: today\u2014the day of resurrection; I have become your father\u2014I now adopt you.
\nHowever, having gone through some of the ways in which the speeches in Acts use the Old Testament in the run-up to this case in Acts 13, we can see that the statement does not need to be understood so woodenly. The experience of David reflected in the Psalms\u2014applied so widely to Jesus in the early chapters of Acts\u2014is again seen as prefiguring the experience of Jesus. This is because of the suggestive similarity of (1) how David\u2019s miserable suffering was reversed by God, who exalted him to the throne of Israel, and (2) how Jesus\u2019 miserable suffering was reversed by God, who exalted him to his very own throne.<\/p>\n
Acts 2:36<\/p>\n
One of the places where a number of scholars have seen a primitive adoptionist formula is in the climax of Peter\u2019s Pentecost sermon:<\/p>\n
Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah.<\/p>\n
Strictly speaking, this statement cannot be taken as adoptionistic in the normal sense. Romans 1:3\u20134 and Acts 13:32\u201333 are concerned with sonship, which is the point of adoption. Here in Acts 2 we are dealing instead with Jesus being \u201cLord\u201d and \u201cMessiah\u201d\/\u201cChrist.\u201d Again, Ehrman acknowledges the obvious fact that Luke does not himself think that Jesus became Lord and Christ at the resurrection. The same two terms appear in the well-known Christmas reading: \u201cToday in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord\u201d (Luke 2:11). On Luke\u2019s own view, Jesus is already Messiah and Lord when he is less than a day old.
\nEhrman\u2019s view of this passage is that it encapsulates the earliest Christian views of Jesus: it is at the resurrection of Jesus that God appoints him both Messiah and Lord. Jesus had taught his disciples privately that he was to be Messiah in God\u2019s kingdom when that kingdom came; now that he has been exalted to heaven, he has evidently now taken on that office of Messiah. More than that, he was also \u201cLord\u201d in the sense that he was \u201cruling as Lord of the earth.\u201d
\nThe picture is made more complicated, though, when we look at the context at the end of Peter\u2019s speech. In the run-up to Acts 2:36 we see Peter making the following statements:<\/p>\n
2:31\u2014David foresaw the resurrection of the Christ.
\n2:32\u2014Now God has raised up this Jesus, and of that you are witnesses.
\n2:33\u2014He has been exalted to the right hand.
\n\u2014He has received the promised Spirit.
\n\u2014He has poured out this Spirit.
\n2:34\u201335\u2014David heard God say to Jesus:
\n\u2014\u201cSit at my right hand until I put all your enemies under your feet\u201d (Ps 110:1)
\n2:36\u2014Therefore, let it be known that God made Jesus both Lord and Messiah.<\/p>\n
Rather than extracting Acts 2:36 from Peter\u2019s speech and trying to understand it as a free-floating formula, we should try to understand it in its context. The build-up to this final statement explains what it means. Jesus sits at the right hand of God, which he was not doing in the course of his ministry. It also means that he received the promised Spirit and gave that Spirit to the church, taking on a new role in salvation history, in relation to a new entity (the church), which has not previously existed. He stands\u2014or rather sits\u2014in a new position vis-\u00e0-vis the world, because the world in its hostility to God is passing away, such that all Jesus\u2019 enemies will soon be vanquished, according to the words of Psalm 110. So there both is and is not change. This is something we can now, in closing this chapter, explore further.<\/p>\n
AN ALTERNATIVE VIEW OF JESUS\u2019 EXALTATION<\/p>\n
It will help to make sense of Acts 2:36 and the other passages discussed earlier if we look at how various New Testament books draw the contrast between Jesus\u2019 earthly mission and his position as exalted Lord at the right hand of God after his resurrection. Why do so many passages sound like they could be interpreted in an adoptionistic direction?
\nTo some skeptical readers, it might seem that \u201cconservatives\u201d are engaged in a kind of special pleading when they attempt to explain away some of these passages. The objection might go: even if one might be able to find ways to wriggle out of an adoptionist understanding of \u201cGod made Jesus Lord and Christ\u201d in Acts, or Jesus being \u201cappointed\u201d Son of God in power in Romans, does that not seem to be what they are saying? And aren\u2019t there so many of these statements that some of them at least must be letting the adoptionist cat out of the bag?
\nThe reason for this charge (or, conversely, an anxiety among some conservatives that it really is the case) is that there are exaltation passages in the New Testament that do assign real roles that Jesus takes on at his exaltation. His activity in the course of his earthly ministry is different from his activity when seated at the right hand of God in glory. This needs to be carefully and precisely described.<\/p>\n
Jesus\u2019 Earthly Mission<\/p>\n
It is commonly emphasized across the New Testament that Jesus\u2019 earthly mission is one of suffering in order to bring salvation. Jesus states that even he does not know the day or the hour of the Son of Man\u2019s coming to judge the earth (Mark 13:32\/Matt 24:36). Why does Jesus not know? Presumably the Evangelists, who generally thought that Jesus had all kinds of supernatural knowledge, assumed that this particular fact had not been vouchsafed to Jesus because his role on earth was not to exercise that judgment\u2014i.e., the knowledge was not necessary to his earthly mission. Jesus came not to overwhelm the world with his heavenly glory, but as a suffering rescuer. The \u201cransom\u201d saying in Mark and Matthew expresses this fact: \u201cFor the Son of Man came not be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many\u201d (Mark 10:45; cf. Matt 20:28). This is part of a wider pattern in Mark\u2019s gospel, in which the Son of Man (whom I take to be Jesus himself) announces his authority (Mark 2:10, 28), then declares that he is going to relinquish that power in death (8:31; 9:31; 10:45), but proclaims that he will finally reveal it to all at the end (13:26; 14:62).
\nJohn\u2019s Gospel also makes this point in different places:<\/p>\n
For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. (John 3:17)<\/p>\n
For I did not come to judge the world, but to save the world. (John 12:47b)<\/p>\n
We see the same picture here, then, as in Mark and Matthew, namely, that Jesus\u2019 earthly mission was limited to his work of salvation. The \u201cPhilippians hymn\u201d in Phil 2:6\u201311\u2014like the Gospels\u2014also emphasizes the humility of Jesus\u2019 earthly mission, stressing that he humbled himself to death, even death on a cross (2:8). Hebrews also draws attention to the \u201ccrying and tears\u201d that characterized \u201cthe days of his flesh\u201d (Heb 5:7). This all stands in stark contrast to Jesus\u2019 exalted position.<\/p>\n
Jesus\u2019 Exalted Position<\/p>\n
Earliest Christian writings had a conception of Jesus\u2019 postresurrection characteristics and activities that were, understandably, very different from what he was seen as accomplishing in his earthly ministry. Some of these characteristics and activities can be briefly mentioned.
\n(1) Glorious transcendent existence. In the course of his earthly ministry, Jesus is assumed to be subject to bodily pain and human suffering, as is especially evident in the crucifixion. After the resurrection, Jesus is seen by all the New Testament writers who touch on the subject as transformed into a new state, albeit one that is still material and physical. Jesus, while still physical\/material, nevertheless transcends the constraints that usually accompany such a nature. Mark says little on this subject. Matthew\u2019s Jesus has escaped from the tomb even before the stone is rolled away (unlike the scene in the Gospel of Peter). In Luke, Jesus\u2019 nature is such that his identity can be concealed from his two fellow travelers; this risen Jesus has \u201cflesh and bones\u201d and can eat (Luke 24:39, 42\u201343), but can also disappear and reappear (24:31, 36).
\nThe picture in John is similar: he rises, again is apparently unrecognizable before being revealed (John 20:15\u201316), and appears from nowhere on several occasions (20:19, 26; 21:1). In John, one of Jesus\u2019 final prayers before his death is: \u201cFather, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world began\u201d (John 17:5). Paul talks of Jesus\u2019 possession in the present of a \u201cglorious body\u201d (Phil 3:21). The constraints and weaknesses of his preresurrection physique have been left behind.
\n(2) Giving the Spirit. All four Gospel writers contrast John\u2019s baptism with water and Jesus\u2019 baptism with the Holy Spirit (Matt 3:11; Mark 1:8; Luke 3:16; John 1:33; cf. Acts 1:5). John elaborates on this further with the statements in the Farewell Discourse about Jesus\u2014with the Father\u2014sending the Spirit, or \u201cParaclete\u201d (John 14:26; 15:26; 16:7). Luke more extensively describes it, saying that the risen Jesus foretold the coming of the Spirit before his ascension (24:49), before Jesus again announces the Spirit\u2019s coming (Acts 1:8). Peter\u2019s speech agrees with the ambiguity in John\u2019s gospel about the cosending of the Spirit by the Father and Son: \u201cExalted to the right hand of God, he has received from the Father the promised Holy Spirit and has poured out what you now see and hear\u201d (Acts 2:33). This role as giver of the Spirit is a position he had not occupied before.
\n(3) Lordship over the church. Closely related to Jesus\u2019 action as giver of the Spirit is that the church has come into existence, of which he is Creator and Lord. This has a key place in the post-Easter period in various New Testament books. Matthew\u2019s Jesus states that he is building his church (Matt 16:18). He is now\u2014as Paul puts it\u2014head of the \u201cbody of Christ\u201d (1 Cor. 12\u201314; Col 1:18, 24). The church is \u201cin God the Father and in the Lord Jesus Christ\u201d (1 Thess 1:1; cf. 2 Thess 1:1). Similarly, when speaking to Paul before his conversion in Acts, Jesus asks, \u201cWhy do you persecute me?\u201d Jesus\u2019 identification with the church is strong. Christ \u201cfeeds and cares for\u201d the church in Ephesians (Eph 5:29), because of the unity of Christ and the church, which is a \u201cprofound mystery\u201d (5:32).
\n(4) Cosmic rule and judgment. To be sure, Jesus is portrayed in the Gospels as having extraordinary authority\u2014to repeat examples noted already, he has authority on earth to forgive sins and authority over the Sabbath (Mark 2:10, 28). Matthew and Luke record a saying in which Jesus states that all things have been committed to him by his Father (Matt 11:27\/Luke 10:22). Nevertheless, there is a clear sense in different authors that in his risen and exalted state, he exercises that authority in a way that he did not before. At the Great Commission, Jesus declares that \u201call authority in heaven and on earth\u201d has been given to him (Matt 28:18); how exactly this differs from 11:27 is unclear, but it seems to reflect an intensification of his authority. In contrast to the saving work of his earthly ministry, Jesus also takes on the role of final judge.
\nMoving to John, it is probably proleptically\u2014i.e., implying that it is in process, or about to happen\u2014that Jesus states near the time of his death that he has \u201covercome the world\u201d (John 16:33), with the \u201cprince of this world\u201d being cast out and condemned (12:31; 14:30\u201331; 16:11). The risen Jesus is not just Lord of the church, but, as both Acts and Romans put it, \u201cLord of all\u201d (Acts 10:36; Rom 10:12). \u201cChrist died and returned to life so that he might be the Lord of both the dead and the living\u201d (Rom 14:9). This is the context of his future role as judge.
\nThis is only a sketch of various results of the resurrection: (1) the constraints and weaknesses of Jesus\u2019 preresurrection physique have been left behind; (2) he has acceded to the position in which he is giver of the Spirit; (3) he has become Lord of the church, with that church having come into existence; and (4) his exercise of cosmic dominion has come into effect in a new way and will come to a climax in his return as judge.<\/p>\n
So What Happened at Jesus\u2019 Exaltation?<\/p>\n
How much do these four results of the resurrection mean a change in Jesus\u2019 nature or status or position? As far as (1) is concerned, in being freed from physical weakness, suffering, and death, he is really returning to his preexistent condition rather than being elevated to a brand new physical state. Jesus\u2019 role as (2) giver of the Spirit is an interesting case, because it marks a new point in salvation history. There is no sense here that Jesus\u2019 identity or nature has changed; he merely engages in a new activity, namely, giving the Spirit. Crucially, the Father is involved in this activity as well, and there is of course no sense that the Father \u201cchanges\u201d his nature or identity in sending the Spirit. Similarly, in \u201cbecoming\u201d (3) Lord of the church, Jesus has a new relationship, but this is simply because the church had not been in existence before.
\nHere it is necessary to invoke the category well-known where I live: the \u201cCambridge change.\u201d I originally thought that this had come to have its meaning of \u201capparent, but unreal change\u201d because of the near immutability of the institution at which I work, but apparently the name was given because the idea was developed by John McTaggart and Bertrand Russell while they were working in Cambridge. The concept of a \u201cCambridge change\u201d takes account of the fact that some types of change are real and metaphysical, but there are also changes that are changes of relation. Mortensen gives as an example that a boy can change from being \u201cnon-brother\u201d to \u201cbrother\u201d simply by virtue of his mother giving birth to a second son. It would be interesting for students of New Testament Christology to engage more fully with philosophical understandings of change and apply them to questions of how Jesus may or may not be \u201cdifferent\u201d after the resurrection. Jesus \u201cbecoming\u201d Lord of the church seems a good example of a Cambridge change.
\nFinally, (4) Jesus\u2019 new cosmic lordship is a change of a sort, but it is again the result of new conditions of salvation history that have meant a change in the cosmos more than in Jesus. The powers, hostile to God, that held sway in the cosmos have been vanquished, or\u2014putting it less strongly\u2014at least sentence has been pronounced on them and their days are numbered. As a result, in this sense Jesus\u2019 authority has been extended. But again, as in the case of the giving of the Spirit, one could say much the same about God (the Father): when people pray \u201cthy kingdom come, thy will be done,\u201d they pray not for God to change, but for the world to change.
\nPsalm 110:1 promises not that Jesus will climb over his enemies, but that God will place them under his feet. In this sense, the \u201cchange\u201d in Jesus is the same as the \u201cchange\u201d in God: eventually all things will be under his full control. Every knee \u201cin heaven, on earth, and under the earth\u201d will bow to Jesus, to the glory of God the Father (Phil 2:10\u201311). His authority\u2014in parallel with the kingdom of God the Father\u2014becomes more far-reaching. As an aside on Ehrman\u2019s view of Phil 2:9 that Jesus finally ascends to a position above where he had been before, God does not \u201chyperexalt\u201d Jesus above his original, preexistent condition; the point is that God superexalts him from the depths of the cross above everything below the earth, and on the earth, and even in heaven. As a result, he takes on a further role that is radically different from his earthly mission\u2014that of final judgment (Mark 8:38; Luke 12:8\u20139; John 5:26\u201327).
\nThis is what it means that Jesus at the resurrection becomes Son of God in power, and Lord and Christ in a new sense. He is \u201cSon of God in power,\u201d in stark contrast to his physical condition in his earthly ministry, which culminated in his death, \u201ceven death on a cross\u201d (Phil 2:8). This \u201cpower,\u201d and his messiahship and lordship, also extend over the new sphere of the church, which had not existed before. Jesus is \u201cLord\u201d in a new way, because he acts in a new way through the Spirit in the plan of God. His power, messiahship, and lordship extend further\u2014in parallel to God\u2019s kingdom in the Lord\u2019s Prayer\u2014now that Jesus has defeated death on the cross, and he has also set in train the utter defeat of those hostile powers. At the end, Jesus will judge from \u201cthe judgment seat of Christ\u201d (2 Cor 5:10), and will also judge as \u201cLord\u201d (2 Tim 4:8; Jude 14\u201315).<\/p>\n
CONCLUSION<\/p>\n
Having gone on so long already, I will keep this conclusion brief and merely summarize. The first part treated the view of Jesus in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, where we saw that Jesus is not viewed in Mark as adopted at the baptism. Similarly, these three gospels see Jesus as having preexisted and as divine in the strong sense of that word. The second part of this essay moves from the second half of the first century to the first half, or more specifically to the \u201ctunnel period\u201d of\u2014roughly\u201430\u201350 CE. The fragments from Romans and Acts reputed to give evidence of an earlier, more primitive Christology of exaltation and adoption do not really do so. Nevertheless, as we saw in the third and final section, it is important to give a description of the character of Jesus\u2019 exaltation that takes seriously the verbs \u201cmade\u201d and \u201cappointed\u201d in Acts 2:36 and Rom 1:4. These need to be understood as new roles that Jesus takes on, and an extension or intensification of his authority (in parallel with the extension or intensification of God\u2019s reign) in relation to a changed and still-changing cosmos, but not as indicating a change in his nature or his identity in relation to God.<\/p>\n
CHAPTER 6<\/p>\n
Problems with Ehrman\u2019s Interpretative Categories<\/p>\n
Chris Tilling<\/p>\n
INTRODUCTION<\/p>\n
Imagine trying to explain the game of chess to someone who has never even heard of it. You could begin by describing how the pieces move, that players take turns to move, that the idea is to capture the opponent\u2019s king, and so on. You would be giving them a good framework for understanding the game and a way to interpret what chess players are actually doing.
\nBut let\u2019s say that you decided to have a bit of fun with your non-chess-playing friend. Instead of offering this helpful introduction, you explain that the game is all about racism: do you want to fight as White or Black? The queen is the most powerful piece because Russian Marxist feminists wanted a powerful woman center stage, and so sat down and invented the game last century. The bishops don\u2019t move in a straight line because these Marxists wanted to show that religion is always off center, bending from the truth, the opium of the masses. After a few minutes of this, we run out of time and don\u2019t get round to summarizing the important stuff. The result: we have offered a poor way to understand what chess players actually do in playing the game. We have provided poor \u201cinterpretative categories\u201d for grasping the game of chess.
\nIn this chapter, I will argue that this is precisely what Ehrman has done with Christology. He has offered us poor interpretative lenses or categories for understanding the nature and development of early Christology. But although I have a number of critical things to say about Ehrman\u2019s arguments in How Jesus Became God, a number of positive things can and should be noted. I do this as I certainly do not want my essays to sound like apologetic Christian vitriol! I have had the privilege of meeting Bart Ehrman only once, and to me he seemed a true gentleman. That he no longer professes faith does not mean that he has nothing to teach Christians. Indeed, I have often found that I learn the most from reading those with whom I most vigorously disagree, as they approach the material with a different pair of interpretive eyes. In this vein, I must commend Ehrman for at least the following:<\/p>\n
\u2022 He has pointed out the christological significance of at least one passage, namely, Gal 4:14, not often analyzed by scholars engaging in New Testament Christology. He is also entirely justified in maintaining that the Similitudes of Enoch should factor in attempts to understand early Christology.
\n\u2022 I particularly appreciate that Ehrman wasn\u2019t seduced by an exhaustive analysis of the so-called \u201cchristological titles\u201d (\u201cLord,\u201d \u201cSon of God,\u201d etc.), even if such studies have their place.
\n\u2022 Ehrman is a clear writer and helpfully explains misleading or technical concepts for the beginner, such as \u201ccult.\u201d He is the American \u201cTom Wright\u201d when it comes to clear prose. (Yes, I just made that comparison).
\n\u2022 Ehrman\u2019s book is extremely ambitious and wide-ranging, while still managing to organize a coherent argument.
\n\u2022 He is absolutely right that a key question to answer is: \u201cIn what sense did Christians think of Jesus as God?\u201d
\n\u2022 I also appreciate his exegetical honesty when rejecting an Adamic reading of Philippians 2:6\u20139. Here, at least, we agree!<\/p>\n
More could be said, no doubt, but I did want to begin on a positive note before delivering what I think are some heavy blows to Ehrman\u2019s argument. As I have already intimated, in this chapter I will focus on some of Ehrman\u2019s highly problematic interpretive categories and moves, that is, key language that he uses to structure his arguments and judgments. In other words, here we deal with some of Ehrman\u2019s strategic decisions, focused on certain words, that he pushes through his entire book and that function as powerful tools of selection and evaluation. In particular, this will mean scrutinizing the crucial distinction between what he calls \u201cexaltation Christologies\u201d on the one hand, and \u201cincarnational Christology\u201d on the other. It will mean criticizing his use of the word \u201cdivine,\u201d his understanding of \u201cJewish monotheism,\u201d and more. These criticisms may make more sense when we trace what happens when Ehrman engages actual New Testament texts (see my next chapter). But it\u2019s a chicken-and-egg situation, so I\u2019m going to jump straight in!<\/p>\n
EHRMAN\u2019S TWO CHRISTOLOGIES<\/p>\n
Key to Ehrman\u2019s entire project is the distinction he draws between \u201cexaltation Christologies\u201d and \u201cincarnational Christology.\u201d The earliest Christology, he tells us, understood Christ as a human like any other. He was later exalted at his baptism or resurrection to become Son of God, a divine being of some sort. As time passed, Christians gradually came to understand Jesus as \u201ca divine being\u2014a god\u2014[who] comes from heaven to take on human flesh temporarily.\u201d This incarnational Christology began early in the church, perhaps earlier than 50 CE, Ehrman speculates. In the letters of the apostle Paul one can see a transition between these two types of Christologies taking place. Only later were the earliest \u201cexaltation Christologies \u2026 deemed inadequate and, eventually, \u2018heretical.\u2019 \u201d
\nAlthough Ehrman does not always seem to be convinced by his own chronological distinction, at least understood simplistically, he still contends \u201cthat the earliest exaltation Christologies very quickly morphed into an incarnational Christology.\u201d There is for Ehrman, therefore, development within the New Testament, from the humble Christology of Jesus himself, through exaltation to incarnational Christologies. Only later still were these left behind for an understanding of Jesus akin to modern orthodox Christian confessions.
\nWhat should we make of all of this? Although further problems with these claims will become evident as my argument progresses, I begin by pointing out that Ehrman\u2019s distinction does not explain the New Testament data. Even he doesn\u2019t find the New Testament texts themselves obeying the rules. Not just in Paul do exaltation and incarnational Christologies sit cheerfully together. The same is found in Hebrews and John, as Ehrman admits. In other words, the distinction between two sorts of Christologies, which are then chronologically arranged, is artificial (I refer also to Chuck Hill\u2019s similar criticism in chapter 9). Nevertheless, he still allows this model to function as a historical plumb line, with interpretative power for making key decisions. For example, he suggests that there are \u201cclear historical reasons\u201d for thinking that the earliest Christians did not believe Jesus was equal with God. Why? The answer he immediately supplies: because of this distinction between exaltation and incarnation Christologies!
\nSo Ehrman seems at points to recognize the problems associated with a rigid chronological distinction between two Christologies, and every now and then he backs away from it. But in doing so he makes understanding Christology in terms of time absolutely central. So when he turns to analyze material in John\u2019s gospel, where he would now expect only an incarnational Christology, he explains the presence of an exaltation Christology as follows:<\/p>\n
To be sure, Jesus comes to be \u201cexalted\u201d here.\u2026 But the exaltation is not to a higher state than the one he previously possessed, as in Paul. For John, he was already both \u201cGod\u201d and \u201cwith God\u201d in his preincarnate state as a divine being.<\/p>\n
Hence, in order to deal with the way the New Testament texts fudge his categories, he hangs on to his key \u201ctwo Christologies\u201d interpretative grid in the following way. He orders the Christologies according to the relation between Jesus\u2019 personal existence and time (i.e., whether they suggest his preexistence or not). But there are a number of unavoidable problems here. First, although Ehrman would not be the first to try to structure a New Testament christological study in terms of preexistence (to what extent or whether Jesus was understood to have existed before his own birth), it remains the case that the vast majority of New Testament christological language is simply not focused on preexistence. It is not a major concern of the New Testament witnesses, and so one wonders to what extent his interpretative grid is going to be useful in explaining that data. Imagine trying to explain to an alien what a phonebook is. But instead of describing what the numbers are, what they are for, and why humans would need them listed, you spend all of your time speaking about the phonebook\u2019s typesetter and publishing house. That would be silly as you would leave out what is important and focus on that which is peripheral. Ehrman makes this same mistake.
\nThis is not to deny that New Testament authors believed in the preexistence of Christ; they clearly did (and Paul did as well, as even Ehrman acknowledges)! Rather, and second, New Testament statements about Christ\u2019s relation to time seem logically derivative. Christ\u2019s preexistence is not a first principle that should be used to organize entire swathes of the New Testament. To go back to our phonebook analogy, we might be able to derive an equation, based on the telephone numbers, that could predict how many possible numbers could be listed. But the phonebook itself is primarily interested in simply listing the numbers so that people can dial and contact other people. Primary is the listing of numbers. Derivative is a theory about how many possible numbers there could be.
\nLikewise, the language of the New Testament depends on something more fundamental, namely, the way in which Christ shares the \u201ctranscendent uniqueness\u201d of the one God of Israel (more on this below). To the extent that Christ does share this, it is logically derivative that he is also preexistent (and so some New Testament authors mention it in passing). In other words, Ehrman is getting the cart before the horse by forcing his analysis through this particular interpretive framework. He is not allowing the phenomenon of New Testament christological language to shape his presentation sufficiently, and so his entire project is misshaped. The extent to which this is so will become clear a little later when we examine how all of this actually affects Ehrman\u2019s treatment of key New Testament texts. In sum, this means that he has to ignore a huge amount of important New Testament data, and then force the rest into his artificial grid.<\/p>\n
GALATIANS 4:14 AS THE INTERPRETIVE KEY?<\/p>\n
But this is just the beginning of a landslide of interpretative difficulties. Mention must now also be made of his use of Gal 4:14 in terms of his interpretive project (\u201cyou welcomed me as if I were an angel of God, as if I were Christ Jesus himself\u201d). Later, we will see that Ehrman misunderstands Paul\u2019s Christology by claiming that Jesus is, for Paul, an angel that became human. But to do this he needs to make two questionable moves. (1) He uncritically adopts a disputed understanding of Gal 4:14. Gordon Fee and Darrell Hannah (no, not Daryl Hannah of the movies Blade Runner and Splash. I got excited for a moment too), neither of which Ehrman engages, reject this reading for good reason.
\n(2) But more importantly for my present purpose, Ehrman, in a highly dubious move, uses his disputed reading of Gal 4:14 as the interpretive key for Paul\u2019s entire Christology! With this verse at the centre we are told:<\/p>\n
\u2026 virtually everything Paul says about Christ throughout his letters makes perfect sense. As the Angel of the Lord, Christ is a preexistent being who is divine; he can be called God; and he is God\u2019s manifestation on earth in human flesh.<\/p>\n
But this interpretive approach toward Paul\u2019s Christology certainly does not allow Paul\u2019s own texts to set the agenda. Whole swathes of Pauline material cannot be explained (as we will see in my next chapter). Nor does Ehrman attempt to show why his claim would stand against potential objections. Once again, his interpretive\u2014heuristic\u2014categories seem highly problematic.
\nSo not only is Ehrman\u2019s centrally important distinction between two types of Christologies awry, so too is his interpretive key for understanding Paul\u2019s Christology. And this leads to an additional two even more significant problems with Ehrman\u2019s project at the level of interpretive categories: his use of the word \u201cdivine\u201d and his grasp of Jewish monotheism.<\/p>\n
EHRMAN\u2019S USE OF THE WORD \u201cDIVINE\u201d<\/p>\n
Any project that claims to explore New Testament Christology, and particularly the relation between Jesus and God, must, naturally, make sure that it has a good grasp of the nature of Jewish faith in the one God. In light of this, one can then make judgments about how Jesus fits into any of it. It is to Ehrman\u2019s credit that he at least discusses Jewish monotheism, but that is where the praise must end. We noted above that central to his project is the claim that the earliest Christologies were not incarnational, but about the exaltation of a simple man (not a god). Only later, after a lengthy developmental process, does it make it to orthodox Christian teaching. Yet Ehrman realizes that astonishing things are said about Jesus in the New Testament, and yes, in the earliest layers of the New Testament. So he finds a way to explain all of this without suggesting that the earliest layers approach anything like orthodox Christian teaching. His interpretive strategy at this point is largely rhetorical, but is structured as follows.
\nThe term divine is used as a catch-all term deployed rhetorically to support his concrete position regarding the nature of first-century AD Jewish monotheism. In other words, the word \u201cdivine,\u201d for Ehrman, is a rather vacuous or nebulous receptacle. Under this label, he places the majority of New Testament christological language, God, angels, demons, and all manner of spiritual beings. This, then, is taken as evidence for an \u201cinclusive\u201d monotheism. In this section I will explain what I think has gone wrong with Ehrman\u2019s use of the word \u201cdivine.\u201d In the next section I will show how this supports his problematic understanding of monotheism. Both of these issues lead to interpretive confusion.
\nIn analyzing divine humans in ancient Greece and Rome, Ehrman argues that the ancients did not consider there to be a sharp and hard division between the divine and the human realms. Of course, some may object at this point, as Mike Bird does in chapter 2, but I have no major objections myself. Let\u2019s face it, stories of gods becoming human, and vice versa, have inspired a genre of literature from Homer to Rick Riordan\u2019s Percy Jackson novels (which are rather good, actually. Yes, I just wrote that). Three main problems start when Ehrman not only uses the word \u201cdivine\u201d in unhealthily flexible ways in relation to Second Temple Judaism, but when he also incorporates \u201cGod\u201d within this category. Behold the following:<\/p>\n
\u2022 \u201cJews also believed that divinities could become human and humans could become divine.\u201d
\n\u2022 \u201cJews also thought there were divine humans.\u201d
\n\u2022 \u201cGod was the ultimate source of all that was divine. But there were lower divinities as well.\u201d
\n\u2022 \u201cThere are other figures\u2014apart from God himself\u2014who are sometimes described as divine in ancient Jewish sources.\u201d
\n\u2022 Then there is a whole section on \u201chumans who become divine\u201d in Judaism.<\/p>\n
The first key problem is that \u201cdivine\u201d is too broad a category in these citations to facilitate helpful analysis. It could be replaced with other words, such as \u201cspiritual\u201d or \u201cheavenly,\u201d without strain on his rhetoric. In other words, he has not sufficiently defined a term that, for him, is central in his interpretive project. In his introduction he states that \u201cthe key Christological question of them all [is]: How is it that the followers of Jesus came to understand him as divine in any sense of the term?\u201d But it matters a great deal what one means by divine for the question to mean much. Indeed, this claim stands in tension with the more helpful one he poses later: \u201cIn what sense did Christians think of Jesus as God?\u201d
\nSecond, what compounds the already troublesome situation is that he then slides the word \u201cGod\u201d into this nebulously deployed term. His language is like using a meat cleaver when a razor blade is called for. So he writes:<\/p>\n
\u2022 \u201cJust as within pagan circles the emperor was thought to be both the son of god and, in some sense, himself god, so too in ancient Judaism the king of Israel was considered both Son of God and\u2014astonishingly enough\u2014even God.\u201d
\n\u2022 \u201cThere are passages in which the king of Israel is referred to as divine, as God.\u201d<\/p>\n
Third, in commentating on the way Ps 45:6\u20137 speaks of the human king as God, he adds: \u201cThere is not a question of identity or absolute parity here\u2014the King, sitting at God\u2019s right hand\u2014is not God Almighty himself.\u2026 The king is being portrayed as a divine being.\u201d Again he writes: \u201cThe king is in some sense God. Not equal with God Almighty, obviously \u2026 but God nonetheless.\u201d In examining Philippians 2, we are told that the Christ is portrayed as \u201ca divine being, an angel\u201d; he is not \u201cGod Almighty,\u201d by which he means \u201cnot the Father himself.\u201d Also in John: \u201cI need to be clear: Jesus is not God the Father in this Gospel.\u201d
\nSo the christological import of Ehrman\u2019s three interpretative moves in terms of the word \u201cdivine\u201d becomes clear. God and angels and demons and Jesus were all seen as divine in some sense. So exalted things could be said about Jesus; they mean he was \u201cdivine\u201d or \u201cGod.\u201d But, and this is crucial, Jesus is not thereby \u201cGod\u201d in the sense \u201cGod Almighty.\u201d He is merely \u201cdivine.\u201d So by deploying this word, he has created an interpretive space crucial to his argument.
\nThe problems are legion (and whoever claimed that Jesus was God the Father in John or Paul?!), and not just that Ehrman makes \u201cdivine\u201d into a veritable contortionist among words.
\n(1) The rationale of these moves is not made explicit in Ehrman\u2019s argumentation. The effect is a rhetorical rug under which key issues are swept. Ehrman simply dodges such central question as these: What is it that distinguishes \u201cGod Almighty,\u201d the title that Ehrman appears, again without discussion, to reserve for Israel\u2019s one God as opposed to all other \u201cdivine\u201d beings? On what grounds does he claim that such and such a divine being is \u201cobviously\u201d not \u201cGod Almighty\u201d?
\n(2) This way of categorizing matters runs roughshod over the New Testament data itself, demonstrably fudging rather than clarifying matters, as we will see in the next chapter.
\n(3) Ehrman places tremendous interpretive pressure on language he does not discuss, namely, \u201cGod\u201d and \u201cAlmighty.\u201d The latter word, \u201cAlmighty\u201d (pantokrat\u014dr), only appears in two New Testament books (outside Revelation [9x], it is found in only one verse [2 Cor 6:18], and that one is an Old Testament quotation!). This fact alone should give us pause for thought before accepting too readily the key distinction Ehrman places on this word. Also, his use of the title \u201cGod\u201d (Theos) is employed more for shock effect. In languages influenced by the Judaeo-Christian tradition, we write \u201cGod\u201d (with a capital \u201cG\u201d) as a way of distinguishing the one God from all other divinities and \u201cgods.\u201d So it may indeed seem shocking that Moses or an Israelite king (or Melchizedek, for that matter, in 11QMelchizedek\u2014something Ehrman doesn\u2019t mention) can be called \u201cgod.\u201d But Paul, in the New Testament, can call Satan \u201cthe god\u201d (ho theos) in 2 Corinthians 4:4. Hence translators simply help modern readers distinguish what is going on by using a capital \u201cG\u201d or lower case \u201cg.\u201d There is no cover up or conspiracy theory here; the church has not needed to suppress the truth of what is actually in the Bible. So Ehrman argues that \u201cobviously\u201d angels are not \u201cGod Almighty.\u201d But although Jesus is \u201cGod,\u201d he is also not \u201cGod Almighty.\u201d His argument proceeds due to the use of language that lacks definition or precision. He has succeeded in confusing matters.
\n(4) Ehrman doesn\u2019t discuss this central and interpretively weighty terminology in anything like a systematic way. Nor does he engage with the vast majority of those biblical scholars who have sought to employ careful distinctions and nuanced language when speaking of the divinity of the one God of Israel and Jesus. For example, the German scholar Johannes Woyke realizes the complex issues involved in distinguishing and speaking of divinities, gods, and God in Paul\u2019s letters. For this reason he works with distinctions between monotheism, polytheism, monarchy, polyarchy, monolatry and polylatry, all of which can be further parsed in terms of other matters. None of these key issues seem of interest to Ehrman.
\n(5) That said, Ehrman does at least distinguish between henotheism on the one hand, and monotheism on the other, but his definitions are anachronistic (a chronological inconsistency, as in the sentence, \u201cThe Apostle Peter gave Paul a call on his telephone\u201d), as I will explain below. As a consequence, his distinctions are misleading, especially as he insists that beings other than God were also worshiped. To explain this, it is now necessary to show how his use of the words \u201cdivine,\u201d \u201cGod,\u201d and \u201cAlmighty\u201d rhetorically support a problematic understanding of \u201cmonotheism\u201d in such a way that leads to confusion. His entire interpretive apparatus is creaking under the weight of ill-defined and inconsistent terminology that does little to illuminate.<\/p>\n
EHRMAN\u2019S MONOTHEISM<\/p>\n
Mike Bird has already addressed this issue in chapter 2, and he argued that Ehrman engages in illegitimate parallelomania. Bird, with the majority of scholars, also makes a case for what he calls \u201cchristological monotheism.\u201d I will look at this important issue from the perspective of Ehrman\u2019s interpretive project, especially given what we\u2019ve already said about his use of the word \u201cdivine.\u201d
\nThe first thing to notice is that Ehrman endorses what could be called the problematic \u201cinclusive monotheism\u201d construct. Arguably the most up-to-date and scholarly representation of this position is offered by William Horbury (who is oddly not mentioned by Ehrman). Horbury argues:<\/p>\n
The interpretation of Judaism as a rigorous monotheism, \u201cexclusive\u201d in the sense that the existence of other divine beings is denied, does less than justice to the importance of mystical and messianic tendencies in the Herodian age\u2014for these were often bound up with an \u201cinclusive\u201d monotheism, whereby the supreme deity was envisaged above but in association with other spirits and powers.<\/p>\n
That Ehrman\u2019s position is similar can be seen from the following:<\/p>\n
It is absolutely the case that by the time of Jesus and his followers most Jews were almost certainly monotheists. But even as they believed that there was only one God Almighty, it was widely held that there were other divine beings\u2014angels, cherubim, seraphim, principalities, powers, hypostases. Moreover, there was some sense of continuity\u2014not only discontinuity\u2014between the divine and human realms.<\/p>\n
One should notice is how the term \u201cdivine\u201d functions, for Ehrman, within this essentially inclusive monotheism. So the critique offered now in this section goes hand in hand with my comments about his use of terminology above.
\nThree things should be said in response. First, since Ehrman doesn\u2019t add anything new to this debate, I will simply repeat Bauckham\u2019s (arguably) devastating response to Horbury\u2019s version, one that is anyway far better documented than Ehrman\u2019s. Incidentally, I find it astonishing that Ehrman has not referred to Bauckham\u2019s important work at all in his book. Bauckham is the most creative and brilliant scholar working in early Christology, and Ehrman hasn\u2019t shown any evidence of having read him! But back to the task: Bauckham rightly points out that Horbury\u2019s definition of exclusive monotheism is anachronistic. In it, Horbury equates \u201cother divine beings\u201d with \u201cother spirits and powers\u201d (as does Ehrman). Bauckham continues (and it is worth citing him at length):<\/p>\n
If it [is] supposed that \u201crigorous\u201d or \u201cexclusive\u201d monotheism must deny the existence of any supernatural or heavenly beings besides God, then it is clear that such monotheism never existed until the modern period. Traditional monotheism in the Jewish, Christian and Islamic traditions has always accepted the existence of vast numbers of supernatural beings: angels who serve and worship God, demons who oppose God within an overall sovereignty of God over all. But such beings have been considered creatures, created by and subject to God, no more a qualification of monotheism than the existence of earthly creatures is.<\/p>\n
All Ehrman has done is deploy this problematic notion of monotheism in the garb of an imprecise wordplay with the terms \u201cdivine,\u201d \u201cGod,\u201d and so on. The game has worked to put all exalted language about Jesus in the New Testament in the \u201cdivine\u201d box, all the while separating Jesus from \u201cGod Almighty.\u201d But the effect is a misleading rhetorical trick, not a position that sheds light on the data.
\nSecond, one must remember that the majority of English and German biblical scholars, therefore, do not seriously court \u201cinclusive monotheism.\u201d Rather, they promote versions similar to what Bird has called \u201cchristological monotheism\u201d in chapter 2. For more names associated with this, arguably correct, view, see this footnote. Why, then, did Ehrman think he could simply avoid engaging the concerns of the majority and their criticisms of his adopted version of monotheism? Imagine a conservative Bible scholar made a move\u2014fundamental to his entire argument\u2014that simply presupposed, without acknowledging scholarly counterarguments, the disputed Pauline authorship of the Pastoral Epistles. He would be ignored! Ehrman is not making a sympathetic reading of his book any easier with these problems.
\nThird, as scholars in this field know full well, central to first-century Jewish faith in God is the Shema, a set of Pentateuchal texts likely repeated twice daily in prayer by most Jews. It is the closest thing Second Temple Judaism had to a creed, and it remains central to the monotheistic convictions of Jews and Christians alike. It begins:<\/p>\n
Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength\u201d (Deut 6:4\u20135).<\/p>\n
I find it shocking that although Ehrman has a chapter on the nature of Jewish monotheism and others that look at faith in God in the New Testament, he does not mention the Shema even once! This is like talking about British politics during the Second World War, and forgetting to ever mention Winston Churchill! Rather, together with the majority of scholars, this leads to the assertion of a more than less \u201cstrict\u201d monotheism (see, for starters, Mark 12:29\u201333; Rom 3:30; 11:36; 16:27; 1 Cor 8:4\u20136; Gal 3:20; Eph 4:6; Jas 2:19), which draws a sharp line between God and everything else, but nevertheless could still incorporate Christ \u201con the divine side of the line.\u201d To do this one is served by reading these ancient Jewish texts inductively, as Larry Hurtado argued long ago, and resisting the temptation to import later (anachronistic) definitions of monotheism back on to them.
\nTwo implications flow from this. (1) It means that the ontological separation between God and everything else is not a later church invention, as Ehrman asserts it is. Bauckham rightly notes:<\/p>\n
The essential element in what I have called Jewish monotheism, the element that makes it a kind of monotheism, is not the denial of the existence of other \u201cgods,\u201d but an understanding of the uniqueness of YHWH that puts him in a class of his own, a wholly different class from any other heavenly or supernatural beings, even if they are called \u201cgods.\u201d I call this YHWH\u2019s transcendent uniqueness.<\/p>\n
God, for first-century Jews, contra Ehrman, is simply not \u201cthe highest member of a class of beings to which he belongs.\u201d So, (2) the second implication is that the key question comes into sharp relief: On what basis or in what ways was God\u2019s transcendent uniqueness understood in the first century? As we saw above, this central matter is ignored by Ehrman because of his terminological confusion. We will explore answers to this question in my next chapter. But it should be observed before we move on that Ehrman notes the importance of \u201cworship\u201d for identifying God in his unique divinity. However, he suggests that although Jewish monotheism did forbid the worship of beings other than God, the very fact that it was forbidden means that some Jews did worship other figures. \u201cFair enough,\u201d I am tempted to say. But in a reckless move, Ehrman then takes this conclusion to be the interpretive key for the entirety of New Testament Christology!
\nAll of this is a far cry from careful scholarship. It is an unsophisticated and inadequately researched presentation of the nature of monotheism, a fact that is something of a \u201cwrecking ball\u201d for Ehrman\u2019s entire argument. His understanding of monotheism, facilitated by a fudged notion of \u201cdivine,\u201d is the interpretive basis for everything he has to say about the relationship between God and Jesus in the New Testament. Ehrman\u2019s position is not only problematic, he also doesn\u2019t engage with those key and well-known scholars who have published books that contradict the views he has adopted.<\/p>\n
OTHER INTERPRETATIVE MISSTEPS<\/p>\n
Simon Gathercole and Mike Bird have already touched on matters relating to pre-Pauline traditions in their chapters, but I did want to flag up another interpretive misstep by pointing out how Ehrman\u2019s argument unfolds. Having (1) decided that there are two Christologies and that (2) these are chronologically arranged with exaltation Christologies coming first, Ehrman proceeds to offer evidence for this thesis from what he deems to be \u201cour oldest surviving Christian sources.\u201d He admits that our \u201cearliest surviving [Christian] writing is probably 1 Thessalonians,\u201d but he does not make any significant use of this letter. Instead, in addition to examining \u201cthe speeches in Acts,\u201d he turns to the potentially speculative task of detecting pre-Pauline fragments in Paul\u2019s letters. This includes a look at Rom 1:3\u20134 and, in defense of a transitional Christology between \u201cexaltation\u201d and \u201cincarnation\u201d sorts, Phil 2:6\u201311. Much is arguably at fault here, and the litany of errors will be detailed in other chapters, including my next one.
\nBut first, a methodological problem deserves mention. He claims that Rom 1:3\u20134 is a well-known early church creed that \u201cencapsulated so accurately the common faith Paul shared with the Christians in Rome.\u201d However, he immediately adds: \u201cAs it turns out, Paul\u2019s own views were somewhat different and more sophisticated\u201d than the adoptionist\/exaltation Christology of Rom 1:3\u20134. The problem I wish to show with this is threefold.
\n(1) Ehrman has been selective in his analysis of what counts as pre-Pauline. He has only focused on texts that would seem to support his chronological construal. He ignores passages that could be troublesome for his own thesis. What about the christological significance of, for example, 2 Cor 12:1\u20132? There Paul speaks of visions and revelations \u201cgiven to me by the Lord Jesus,\u201d with one such vision dated to \u201cfourteen years ago.\u201d Ehrman doesn\u2019t even mention it. What about the significance of the language Paul uses to describe his conversion or calling? Indeed, many have made an argument for a fully divine Christology in Paul on the basis of just this issue. Important here would be an analysis of the christologically rich 2 Cor 4:6, which Ehrman also does not mention. Also important would be an analysis of material in Phil 3:4\u20138, which speaks very much against Ehrman\u2019s proposal, as would the early christological implications of Gal 1:11\u201312; 2:19\u201320; 1 Cor 1:17; 3:5; 2 Cor 10:8; 13:10. I would not wish to propose that the earliest Christology was univocal, which is counterintuitive to say the least. It seems to me likely that different understandings of Jesus coexisted at the earliest period. The problem is that Ehrman does not reference any of these texts even once, and they arguably pose great problems for his thesis!
\n(2) The implication in all of this for Ehrman\u2019s interpretive strategy is significant. He has postulated a chronological scheme, relating to two different Christologies. This alone is problematic, as we saw above. But he then compounds the problem by ignoring evidence that his proposal would struggle to accommodate. It seems he wants to make the evidence fit his scheme, and his interpretative strategy here involves a carpet and a sweeping motion!
\n(3) Ehrman\u2019s overconfidence in his (selective) reconstruction also lacks historiographical self-awareness. Recent biblical scholarship, conversant with up-to-date historiographical theory, questions the idea that one can reconstruct the \u201cwhat actually happened\/what was actually believed\u201d behind the sources in the way Ehrman attempts. It smacks of old-fashioned positivistic historiography. That is, to claim that \u201cPaul\u2019s own views were somewhat different and more sophisticated\u201d than Rom 1:3\u20134 will struggle to look most modern historiography and social memory theory in the eye with confidence. He even speaks of the Philippians\u2019 Christ poem as written by an \u201canonymous writer.\u201d Ehrman has not sufficiently explained why it is that Paul appeals to this tradition in particular, and why the language remains as it is in Romans.
\nIn my next chapter, I will spend a bit more time on Christology in 1 Thessalonians to disrupt Ehrman\u2019s project at another level. But enough has been said about his interpretive devices at this point. Instead, I now continue examining a few final problems involving Ehrman\u2019s general interpretive posture.
\nSo, second, Ehrman\u2019s rhetoric can be a little misleading. For example, he writes that \u201cI am no longer a believer. Instead, I am a historian of early Christianity.\u201d But some of us will respond that one can be a believer and a historian at the same time! Perhaps (I hope) he would agree, but his rhetoric is potentially misleading. This is especially so because he goes on to say that, as a historian, he is \u201cno longer obsessed with the theological question of how God became a man.\u201d But if the texts he is claiming to understand speak of such theological matters, he would do well to consider them seriously too.
\nThis has immediate ramifications, for on the next page he claims that the idea a \u201cparticular human was a god\u2014or that a god had become a human\u201d was \u201cnot unique to Christians.\u201d But to suggest that the incarnation of the one God of Israel in a Jewish peasant is \u201cnot unique\u201d shows that his aversion to theological matters has not served his analysis well. It is also the reason for his rather rash rhetorical question: \u201cChristians were calling Jesus God directly on the heels of the Romans calling the emperor God. Could this be a historical accident?\u201d Only if one wrongly equates both uses of \u201cGod\u201d in this sentence in the way he does, an act arguably symptomatic of his theological aversion, will this strange question look sensible.
\nFor this reason, too, he erroneously thinks that Christianity is an example of the \u201ctwo-powers heresy\u201d of Segal fame (no, not Steven Segal but Alan Segal; sorry to disappoint any ninja-obsessed readers), and that the declaration of Caesar Augustus as \u201cdivine\u201d neatly reflects material in Philippians 2 concerning Christ. And he does himself engage in some theologizing when he postulates that a fully divine Christology provoked Christians toward anti-Semitism, a point that Chuck Hill will discuss in chapter 8. One wishes Ehrman had read a little more theology at this point and pondered the Christology of German Christians. These theologians resisted the lower Christologies of German liberalism and managed, partly because of a high Christology, to find the space to construct a critique of anti-Semitism.
\nThird, Ehrman\u2019s use of the work of experts in the field of early Christology needs to once again be noted. I have already expressed my disappointment that he shows no evidence of having read the important work of Richard Bauckham. But he also misrepresents Larry Hurtado. Ehrman states that Hurtado supports his view regarding divine agents (such as the principal angel) because this \u201cprovided the earliest Christians with the basic scheme for accommodating the resurrected Christ next to God without having to depart from their monotheistic tradition.\u201d \u201cIn other words,\u201d Ehrman summarizes, \u201cto make Jesus divine, one simply needs to think of him as an angel in human form.\u201d But this goes well beyond anything Hurtado wishes to argue. Whether one agrees with Hurtado\u2019s particular emphasis on agency categories or not, Ehrman\u2019s summary of Hurtado\u2019s case is misleading. Finally, I should note that Ehrman uncritically makes use of the problematic arguments proffered in King and Messiah as Son of God.<\/p>\n
CONCLUSION<\/p>\n
So what have we discovered about the language Ehrman uses to structure his arguments and proposals, i.e., his interpretive categories? This is an important question as Ehrman drives these key interpretive judgments throughout his book\u2019s argument as powerful tools of selection and evaluation. His postulated \u201ctwo Christologies\u201d are problems when seen in light of the New Testament data itself, and his chronological arrangement is artificial. His treatment of Gal 4:14 is problematic, and his use of the words \u201cdivine,\u201d \u201cGod,\u201d and \u201cAlmighty,\u201d sitting as they do alongside a misconstrual of Jewish monotheism, leads to profound interpretative confusion. In addition to these factors, we had reason to question his handling of so-called pre-Pauline traditions, his misleading rhetoric, and his use (or lack) of key experts in the field of early Christology. Like our less than helpful chess player described above, Ehrman has not provided the reader with a helpful framework for understanding key matters relating to Christology, monotheism, and much more besides. Just as the non-chess-playing friend won\u2019t be able to play chess properly after a speech about Marxist feminism and racism, so too Ehrman\u2019s readers will struggle to negotiate the terrain of early Christology.<\/p>\n
CHAPTER 7<\/p>\n
Misreading Paul\u2019s Christology: Problems with Ehrman\u2019s Exegesis<\/p>\n
Chris Tilling<\/p>\n
INTRODUCTION<\/p>\n
In the news recently was a story about Amazon tribes in Brazil that have never before been contacted. They live their lives as nomadic hunter gatherers and have no idea about the so-called \u201cdeveloped\u201d or \u201ccivilized\u201d worlds. The report included an astonishing video of these uncontacted indigenous peoples shooting arrows at the film maker\u2019s plane as it flew overhead. I have often wondered what it would be like to meet such tribes. How would I describe to them what that plane was, for example? I could tell them that it was a flying monster made out of stone, but though they may understand me, it wouldn\u2019t be true. But Ehrman\u2019s analysis of Paul makes a similar mistake. He fails to explain what is really going on in Paul\u2019s letters. He says Paul\u2019s Christology is one thing, when it is actually something else.
\nWhat does Ehrman say about Paul, then? He makes a case that the earliest Christologies were of the \u201cexaltation\u201d type, that is, that the human being Jesus was seen to be exalted to \u201cdivine\u201d status. Next, Ehrman argues that Christ came to be understood as \u201ca divine being\u2014a god\u2014[who] comes from heaven to take on human flesh temporarily.\u201d In Paul, he argues, there is a transition between the earlier \u201cexaltation\u201d Christologies to the later \u201cincarnation\u201d sort.
\nTo make this claim, Ehrman first reiterates that Christology started \u201clow,\u201d with the human being Jesus. But later in John, there is a clear \u201cincarnational\u201d view. As the earliest evidence does not see Jesus as \u201cGod during his lifetime,\u201d eventually he was understood to be something more. When this happened, Jesus was seen as \u201can angel or an angel-like being,\u201d as \u201ca superhuman divine being who existed before his birth.\u201d This, we are told, is \u201cthe incarnation Christology of several New Testament authors.\u201d So Paul \u201cunderstood Christ to be an angel who became human.\u201d Only \u201clater authors went even further and maintained that Jesus was not merely an angel \u2026 but was a superior being: he was God himself come to earth.\u201d
\nMuch of Ehrman\u2019s chapter 7 then involves an analysis of Paul\u2019s Christology. A smaller section looks at John\u2019s gospel and a few paragraphs are devoted to Colossians and Hebrews. This leads to his conclusion that \u201cexaltation Christologies eventually gave way to incarnation Christologies, with some authors\u2014such as the anonymous writers of the Philippians\u2019 Christ poem and the letter to the Hebrews\u2014presenting a kind of amalgam of the two views.\u201d
\nWhat are we to make of this? Certainly, his argument is not entirely original. Charles Talbert has made an oddly similar case, though his, too, is deeply problematic. But more needs to be said. In chapter 6, I outlined problems associated with Ehrman\u2019s terminology and interpretative categories, all of which function determinatively in his arguments at this point. As I now turn to Ehrman\u2019s claims set out in his chapter 7, this will mean spending much time on his reading of Paul. As we will see, Ehrman fails to offer a serious analysis of Paul\u2019s letters altogether and therefore twists the actual shape of Paul\u2019s Christology entirely out of shape to fit his wider scheme.
\nI choose my words carefully here: Ehrman has botched his reading of Paul so entirely that his whole project collapses. It is as misleading as suggesting that the plane is a stone monster. To show this, I will first advance in a more constructive direction. I will show how Paul is to be better understood by actually engaging with the dominant language in his letters, something Ehrman fails to do. This will lead, second, to a critique of Ehrman\u2019s portrayal. Third, I will finally offer a few critical thoughts on Ehrman\u2019s readings of John and Hebrews.<\/p>\n
PAUL\u2019S DIVINE CHRISTOLOGY<\/p>\n
In order to best grasp Paul\u2019s \u201cdivine Christology,\u201d one must meet a number of explanatory conditions. We don\u2019t have time to discuss all of them, but here are a few for starters. First, one should offer an accurate account of first-century Jewish monotheism, both that in non-Christian Jewish sources as well as that evidenced within Paul\u2019s own letters. This will then drive the key question: What is \u201cdivine\u201d about Christology? Second, one\u2019s portrayal of Paul\u2019s Christology\u2014his understanding of Christ\u2014ought to cohere with Paul\u2019s \u201cway of knowing,\u201d the style of his theological conceptualizing. In other words, if we want to speak of Paul\u2019s Christology, we need to think about Paul\u2019s epistemology. This point may seem a little abstract right now, but it should become clear. Third, any portrayal of a Christology that claims to be Pauline, of course, needs to explain the data we find in Paul\u2019s letters. Examining all of these issues, by the way, is what is involved in doing the work of a good historian.<\/p>\n
Explanatory Condition 1: Monotheism<\/p>\n
First, then, we return once again to the question of monotheism. Biblical scholars have proposed at least four different models for understanding Jewish faith in one God in the New Testament period. There are three minority positions. (1) Some argue that because first-century Jewish monotheism was so \u201cstrict\u201d or \u201cexclusive\u201d Christ cannot be divine. The strict boundary between God and everything else must, so the argument goes, exclude Christ from \u201cinclusion.\u201d (2) Other scholars doubt that first-century Jewish faith in God was monotheistic at all. (3) The group to which Ehrman belongs argues that first-century Jewish faith in God was indeed monotheistic, but it was inclusive.
\nBut the majority position, as I outlined in the previous chapter, seeks a more inductive approach in conceptualizing the nature of Jewish faith in the one God. God is \u201ctranscendently unique,\u201d so not on a par with other \u201cdivinities\u201d and different only in being more exalted. This, then, raises the key question that Ehrman\u2019s position must problematically ignore: How was God\u2019s transcendent uniqueness understood in distinction from the many divine entities such as angels and demons, exalted human agents, and so on? That is to say, what distinguishes \u201cGod Almighty\u201d from the \u201cgods\u201d (to use Ehrman\u2019s language\u2014though it is not that of the New Testament, by and large)? And this introduces us to a number of key scholarly positions that Ehrman did not tackle.
\nAs Mike Bird helpfully noted in chapter 2, distinguishing the \u201ctranscendent uniqueness\u201d of God means, for many, focusing on worship. The one God is the one who is worshiped, and no other beings can be. So, for example, Hurtado argues that it is \u201cin the area of worship that we find \u2018the decisive criterion\u2019 by which Jews maintained the uniqueness of God over against both idols and God\u2019s own deputies.\u201d This is certainly a better position than Ehrman\u2019s, which relies on an argument from silence.
\nHowever, even this position is not without problems. Certain texts cited by Ehrman, such as the Similitudes of Enoch, describe the worship of figures other than God, namely, Enoch\u2019s \u201cSon of Man.\u201d To explain this, Hurtado, for example, needs to insist that true God worship is not simply a literary phenomenon (as with Enoch\u2019s \u201cSon of Man\u201d), but the actual activity of cultic communities. But care is needed here, or one is in danger of missing the heart of what worship was for first-century Jews and Christians altogether, as well as of misunderstanding New Testament Christology.
\nWhy is this so? As Schrage notes: \u201cGod\u2019s praise does not only have its place in the church service \u2026 but the entire bodily existence should be for the glorification of God.\u2026 True monolatry mobilizes and involves the whole.\u201d Likewise, \u201ccultic worship\u201d could be scorned by the prophets (e.g., Isa 58:1\u201314; Amos 5:21\u201327; Zech 7\u20138) unless it reached into the whole of life (see Deut 6:4\u20139). Besides, Diaspora life meant that the \u201chome and family replaced the temple and community as the focus of worship.\u201d So, too, was Paul\u2019s understanding of worship in Rom 12:1 about the whole of life.
\nIt follows that this should inform conversations that try to define God\u2019s \u201ctranscendent uniqueness\u201d in terms of religious devotion. For if one is not careful, focusing too much on worship may lead us to think that certain worshiped figures (like Enoch\u2019s \u201cSon of Man\u201d) are more important than they really are (as Ehrman clearly holds). What is more, one may also then end up finding that their analysis of New Testament texts is too restricted. And let us be clear: Paul doesn\u2019t have too much to say about the (cultic) worship of Christ, which is why some, like James Dunn and Maurice Casey, push back on Hurtado and arguably give Ehrman interpretative space for his views.
\nBauckham\u2019s approach could be seen as an improvement. He has offered his own analysis of what constitutes the \u201cdivine identity\u201d of the one God of Israel. He focuses on the relation in which God stands to all reality (God alone is \u201ceternal,\u201d \u201ccreator,\u201d \u201csovereign ruler,\u201d etc.). But some of his categories have been challenged from various quarters.
\nI suggest another way forward, building especially on Bauckham\u2019s insights. As noted in my previous chapter, and as all those engaged in these debates recognize, central to first-century Jewish faith in God is the Shema. There we see a confession of God\u2019s \u201coneness\u201d (\u201cHear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one,\u201d Deut 6:4) allied to an expression of loving commitment to the one God (\u201cLove the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength,\u201d 6:5). As I pointed out earlier, Ehrman ignores the Shema altogether, which is enough to make whatever he says about Jewish monotheism almost redundant.
\nBut let me press on with my more constructive argument. The Shema introduces the key way first-century Judaism conceived of the transcendent uniqueness of God. God\u2019s uniqueness was understood in an undoubted variety of ways, with different names for God and different emphases. But central to them all, threading throughout, was a pattern of language that spoke of a unique relationship between Israel and YHWH. As Nathan MacDonald has brilliantly argued, the \u201cprimary significance of the Shema is the relationship between YHWH and Israel. YHWH is to be Israel\u2019s one and only.\u201d In terms of the New Testament, Erik Waaler argues in a book examining the Shema in Paul, \u201cto know that \u2018God is the only God\u2019 or that \u2018he is one\u2019 implies that one relates to one God only.\u201d
\nIndeed, rather significantly, such an understanding of monotheistic faith in God sums up nicely what one finds in Paul\u2019s letters. So Dunn argues:<\/p>\n
To know God is to be known by him, a two-way relationship of acknowledgment and obligation (Gal. 4:9). As in the (Jewish) scriptures, the \u201cknowledge of God\u201d includes experience of God\u2019s dealings, the two-way knowing of personal relationship.<\/p>\n
Precisely this kind of faith in God is found in such passages as 1 Cor 8\u201310; 1 Thess 1:9 (Christ-followers \u201cturned to God from idols, to serve a living and true God,\u201d italics added); 2 Cor 6:16 (with its echoes of Lev 26:11\u201312 and Ezek 37:27), Gal 4:8\u20139, Rom 1:23, 25 etc.
\nHence, as faith in God was so expressed, it is sensible to think that God\u2019s transcendent uniqueness was also understood in relational terms. This is indeed what we find. Although certain figures, who were not the one God, could be worshiped in astonishing ways (the \u201cSon of Man\u201d in the Similitudes of Enoch being the most important example), the pattern of themes associated with relation to God was unique to the one God. Relation to God, and God alone, was described and lived in terms of this relational pattern, whether in the entire Old Testament or in any other texts from the Second Temple period. This includes the Similitudes of Enoch and all of the other texts Ehrman refers to in his second chapter, which he ill-advisedly cites to support an \u201cinclusive\u201d monotheism.
\nThat relation-to-God-pattern often includes descriptions of cultic worship, but also a lot more besides, indeed necessarily so. It typically includes expressions of a human\u2019s ultimate goals and motivations, and it describes the passionate nature of religio-ethical commitment to God in typical ways. It contrasts typical themes with this devotion. It presents the experienced presence of God (through the Spirit) as well as his absence. It speaks of a variety of communications between God and Israel\/individual Israelite, personal and corporate. It tends to call God certain things and characterize him in habitual ways, and so on. This relation to YHWH can have different emphases, use different names for God, and incorporate a wide range of other heavenly beings, but the uniqueness of this pattern of language describing relation to YHWH is always maintained and remains much the same shape, whether in 1 Enoch, Deuteronomy, Isaiah, or Paul.<\/p>\n
Explanatory Condition 2: Paul\u2019s \u201cWay of Knowing\u201d<\/p>\n
Second, studies examining the shape, nature, and structure of Paul\u2019s \u201cway of knowing\u201d (i.e., his epistemology) are also revealing. So Dunn argues that \u201cwhereas in Greek thought the term [\u2018to know\u2019] characteristically denotes a rational perception, the Hebrew concept also embraced the knowing of personal relationship.\u201d Ian Scott\u2019s study, as well as the collection of essays in the Healy and Parry edited volume, point in the same direction. So Scott submits that \u201cknowledge of God\u201d in the Old Testament is \u201cmost often a passionate devotion to Yahweh.\u201d And in Paul, \u201cknowledge of God\u201d involves, at its heart, \u201ca harmonious relationship with the Creator.\u201d As Mary Healy argues, for Paul, knowledge can be expressed as relationship. To understand this better, ask yourself how we know theological truth. It tends to involve ticking the right set of boxes next to a set of propositions (i.e., sentences on a page). For Paul, theological truth involved a living relationship with God and Jesus. If this was missing, so was the truth.
\nAll of this clarifies what one must look for in examining whether Paul\u2019s Christology is \u201cdivine\u201d and inform what we mean by that word. For Ehrman, \u201cdivine\u201d is a nebulous concept, as we noted in my previous chapter. On the basis of the argument here, the question becomes sharp. It isn\u2019t even simply whether Christ, in the New Testament, is \u201con the divine side of the line which monotheism must draw between God and creatures,\u201d though it includes this. Rather, it should run: Is the pattern of language that describes the relation between Jesus and his followers, Christ and the church, analogous to or different from Israel\u2019s unique relation to YHWH? This gets us to the heart of the matter and accords with Paul\u2019s monotheism and \u201cway of knowing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Explanatory Condition 3: Paul\u2019s \u201cChrist\u201d Language<\/p>\n
These two conditions dovetail nicely with the third explanatory issue. Any portrayal of a Christology that claims to be Pauline needs to explain the data we find in Paul\u2019s letters. Sounds obvious, doesn\u2019t it, but Ehrman seems to ignore it. In approaching matters with this explanatory condition addressed, things fall into place as it means accounting for the things Paul actually wrote. Of course, it will be about relation to Christ because all of Paul\u2019s letters were in one way or another concerned with the relation between Christ-followers and Christ. Paul, in writing his many letters, sought to strengthen this vital relationship to the risen Lord. Crucially, this also corresponds to the language of Paul\u2019s Christology.
\nThese three explanatory conditions come together in 1 Corinthians 8\u201310, where Paul tackles problems associated with eating idol food. There, Paul makes recourse to the Shema as part of his argument against Christian participation in idolatry in Corinth. In 1 Cor 8:1\u20133, importantly, Paul does this by framing his entire discussion (which will continue until 11:1) by distinguishing between the (merely propositional) knowing of the \u201cknowledgeable,\u201d and the necessary knowing associated with loving God and being known by him. Here we see Paul\u2019s \u201cway of knowing\u201d in action! Plus, Paul makes an argument on the basis of precisely the kind of relational monotheism we have summarized already.
\nWhat is remarkable, however, is how the rest of Paul\u2019s argument unfolds in relation to idol food. Instead of speaking of the relation between Christians and God over against idolatry, Paul instead speaks of the relation between Christians and the risen Lord over against idolatry. And what is more, Paul describes this Christ-relation with the themes and language traditionally used to describe the relation between Israel and YHWH (this is the heart of God\u2019s \u201ctranscendent uniqueness\u201d for Jews like Paul). For example, in 1 Cor 8:6, the Deuteronomic \u201cLord\u201d (kyrios) is, for Paul, the risen Lord. For many, this verse is a clincher, showcasing a \u201cchristological monotheism,\u201d including Christ in the Shema. All the Greek words of the Shema in the Greek translation of the Bible used by the earliest Christians are repeated by Paul in 8:6. The \u201cGod\u201d and \u201cLord\u201d of the Shema, which both identify the one God of Israel, are now split between \u201cGod\u201d the Father and the \u201cLord\u201d Jesus Christ. But the full significance of this verse becomes clearer in Paul\u2019s wider argument, as hopefully is becoming obvious.
\nSo 1 Cor 8:12 then speaks of \u201csin against [the brothers],\u201d which is ultimately \u201csin against Christ\u201d (cf. Gen 39:9; 2 Sam 12:9, 10, 13; Ps 51:6; Prov 14:31; 17:5). After what most commentators understand as the rhetorical digression of 1 Corinthians 9, this Christ-relation finds more developed expression in 10:4, 9, and 14\u201322. There, drawing on scriptural YHWH-Israel relation themes, Paul speaks of \u201ctesting Christ\u201d (\u201cas some of them did\u201d), faithful fellowship (koin\u014dnia) with the risen Lord over against the same with idols\/demons, and of the (risen) Lord\u2019s jealousy in 10:22. In other words, in a context in which Paul clearly understands monotheism as the relational commitment of Christ-followers to the one God over against idolatry, Paul speaks of the relation between Christians and the risen Lord.
\nPaul does this using language and categories drawn from the complex of interrelated themes and concepts that describe the relation of Jewish believers with YHWH. Compare, for example, Deut 6:14\u201316. Remember, it is precisely this that constitutes the \u201ctranscendent uniqueness\u201d of the one God of Israel, the God to whom Jews owe covenant allegiance. The stories told and retold in the scriptural narratives that affirm, express, and explain this relation with all of its thematic interrelations are retold by Paul, and rethought around the relation between risen Lord and Christ-followers. Including Christ in the Shema in 8:6 is but one part of this. Here we see Jewish-Christian Christology in the making.
\nThis correspondence between God and Christ relational language is found not just in one passage in Paul\u2019s letters. We can find it in almost every chapter of every Pauline letter in the canon! It would be cumbersome to go through the entire data of Paul\u2019s letters, something I have done elsewhere, but consider 1 Thessalonians, especially because this is the Pauline letter Ehrman considers our \u201cearliest surviving writing.\u201d
\nIn this letter Paul describes the relation between Christ and Christians in a number of ways. These Christians \u201chope in our Lord Jesus Christ\u201d (1 Thess 1:3). They \u201cwait for his [God\u2019s] Son from heaven\u201d (1:10). They \u201cglory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes\u201d (2:19). Paul and his team \u201creally live, since\u201d the Thessalonian Christians \u201care standing firm in the Lord\u201d (3:8). Paul then prays:<\/p>\n
Now may our God and Father himself and our Lord Jesus clear the way for us to come to you. May the Lord make your love increase and overflow for each other and for everyone else, just as ours does for you. May he [i.e., the Lord Jesus] strengthen your hearts so that you will be blameless and holy in the presence of our God and Father when our Lord Jesus comes with all his holy ones. (1 Thess 3:11\u201313, italics added)<\/p>\n
So Paul clearly believed that he could pray to Jesus while wandering the Mediterranean world, and not only expected that Jesus would hear, but also that he could actively change the hearts of these Thessalonian Christians (presumably through the Spirit). In both 4:17 and 5:10 Christ\u2019s presence is portrayed as the great encouragement. The point of salvation is that \u201cwe may live together with him [Christ]\u201d (5:10). Thus, although the risen Lord is in some sense absent (they also wait for his \u201ccoming,\u201d etc), Christ is at the same time present and active to answer Paul\u2019s prayers. So Paul ends his letter: \u201cthe grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you\u201d (5:28, italics added). And notice how Christ is characterized in this, as \u201cgracious\u201d and as \u201cavenger.\u201d Listing the many scriptural parallels with descriptions of the Israel-YHWH relation here would be cumbersome, but anyone with a Bible can see this looks a lot like the way Jews described relation to the one God.
\nOf course, Ehrman does not consider any of this Pauline material in anything like the depth it needed. This is a huge problem because it represents Paul\u2019s dominant christological language found across his letter (see our third explanatory condition). In passage after passage one finds a pattern of data that describes, in one way or another, the relation between Christ and Christ-followers (including Paul himself). It is a pattern, which arguably Paul recognized, that regularly corresponds in theme and language with the YHWH-Israel relation.
\nThis is just a smattering of relevant verses, but for example (you might want to buckle up, here): it includes an array of Christ-shaped goals and motivations and expressions of devotion that extend into the whole of life. It involves descriptions of the Christ-relation as all-consuming, involving great fervency. It contrasts this broad understanding of Christ-devotion with matters reminiscent of Jewish God-language. As part of the Christ-relation, the risen Lord is also present and active in numerous ways, and yet at the same time absent; and in heaven, and so present through the Spirit. To underscore the relational dynamic involved, Christians communicate with this present-by-the-Spirit-yet-also-absent-Lord, and the risen Lord likewise communicates with Christians. And so Christ\u2019s character and the nature of his lordship are also described in God-language-analogous ways.
\nThese matters constitute, to a greater rather than lesser extent, an existential reality in Paul\u2019s life and so they are not merely a collection of loose, unrelated ideas. The absence and desired presence of Christ was for Paul the force behind his most deeply expressed yearnings (see Phil 1; 2 Cor 5 etc.). These various points are also regularly found together in single arguments in Paul\u2019s letters.
\nIn other words, and this is where the rubber hits the road, \u201cthe way Second Temple Judaism understood God as unique, through the God-relation pattern, was used, by Paul, to express the pattern of data concerning the Christ-relation.\u201d This is a very Jewish(-Christian) way of saying that Jesus isn\u2019t merely an exalted being, nor even just some kind of \u201cdivine god.\u201d It is saying, in such a manner that corresponds neatly with our explanatory conditions, that Jesus is on the divine side of the line, that Jesus is, as other New Testament scholars would say, included in the \u201cunique divine identity.\u201d And these conclusions are, crucially, grounded on dozens of Pauline texts! Paul\u2019s Christ is therefore fully divine, sharing the transcendent uniqueness of the one God of Israel. If this case is to be refuted, a lot of texts need to be \u201cexplained away.\u201d All I can say is \u201cGood luck with that!\u201d<\/p>\n
PICKING APART EHRMAN\u2019S PAULINE CHRISTOLOGY<\/p>\n
We are now in a place to make five critical observations about Ehrman\u2019s treatment of Paul, and the report is not going to look good.
\nFirst, as my above overview of Paul\u2019s christological language shows, to claim that \u201cPaul understood Christ to be an angel who became a human,\u201d as Ehrman does, requires ignoring masses of the relevant Pauline data that would speak directly against such a claim. Ehrman will need to do a lot more than simply elect Gal 4:14 as the interpretive key, as I noted in my previous chapter. Of course, one may embark on a creative rereading of all of that material (and once again I say, \u201cGood luck with that!\u201d), but Ehrman simply chooses to ignore it. There is no angel or intermediary being of any kind in any text that parallels the way Paul speaks of this Christ-relation. Rather, the way Paul describes the relation between Christ and Christians is analogous only to the relation between Israel and YHWH. As we noted in our explanatory conditions, this is a conclusion of great christological significance.
\nSecond, Ehrman does admit that Paul could speak of Christ as \u201cGod\u201d in Rom 9:5. But the significance he attaches to this reveals a much more extensive error of judgment. Who cares if Paul called Jesus theos in Romans 9:5? And I\u2019m not entirely convinced that this is the best translation of the disputed syntax either. Paul could speak of Satan as ho theos (\u201cthe god\u201d) in 2 Cor 4:4! Simply calling a being \u201cgod\u201d is, frankly, not what Ehrman thinks it is. Remember, we need to do the work of historians and ask how Jewish faith in the one God (\u201cGod Almighty\u201d as Ehrman writes) is distinguishable from language about other divine beings. We have suggested it is through a relational pattern, and this is likewise understood in a relational way.
\nThird, the only extensive piece of exegetical work Ehrman undertakes in terms of Paul analyses Phil 2:6\u201311. But his exegesis of these slender few verses involves some highly problematic moves. Here Ehrman would have benefited from a close study of Fee\u2019s Pauline Christology. Ehrman claims:<\/p>\n
Christ appears to be portrayed here, in his preexistent state, as a divine being, an angel\u2014but not as God Almighty. He is not the Father himself, since it is the Father who exalts him. And he is not\u2014most definitely not\u2014\u201cequal\u201d with God before he becomes human.<\/p>\n
A number of problems exist here. (1) Which scholar ever claimed that Jesus was \u201cthe Father himself\u201d? This is setting up a straw man argument. Jesus is also not portrayed as a Mercedes Benz. It is an irrelevant claim.
\n(2) Is Christ called \u201can angel\u201d by Paul here? No. What about anywhere in the whole of Philippians? No. Does this claim not, further, run counter to the christological language that surrounds it? Yes. For instance, what about the christological significance of language in Philippians 1, where Paul states that he would rather die and be with Christ, \u201cwhich is better by far\u201d (1:23)? Or what about that same chapter\u2019s portrayal of Christ as present and active (though also absent and in heaven) by the Spirit (1:19)? Or the language of boasting in Christ, being confident in the Lord and being slaves of Christ, or Paul\u2019s desire to exalt Christ in his body (1:1, 14, 20, 26)? And in Philippians 3, Paul speaks of rejoicing and boasting in Christ (3:3\u20134), and of everything being considered as rubbish \u201cbecause of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord\u201d (3:8). Paul speaks of Christ who has \u201cpower that enables him to bring everything under his control\u201d (3:21), and so on. All of this is language of great christological significance, especially when one keeps the matters we discussed earlier in mind about faith in God. You will not find such language used to describe relation to an angel in any ancient Jewish texts. In Philippians, the way relation to Christ is described and mapped out, and therefore understood, is analogous only to Israel\u2019s relation to YHWH. Hence, elucidating the meaning of Phil 2:6\u201311 through Gal 4:14 is way off target and shows poor exegetical judgment.
\n(3) Ehrman\u2019s claim above, that Christ is \u201cmost definitely not\u201d equal with God before he becomes human, is based on a disputed translation of a single word. He refers to one scholar, Samuel Vollenweider, in defense of his reading. But what about the arguments famously proffered by Hoover (not mentioned by Ehrman), endorsed by Wright, Gorman, Fee, and others? They translate the word not as \u201cgrasped after\u201d (i.e., that which Christ would have tried to seize, but didn\u2019t), but as an idiom meaning \u201ctaking advantage of.\u201d In this case, Christ was \u201cequal with God\u201d and didn\u2019t \u201ctake advantage of this,\u201d but poured himself out. My beef is not so much with Ehrman\u2019s conclusion (my internal jury is still out on this translation issue), but the misplaced confidence of his conclusion (the \u201cmost definitely not\u201d bit), especially when he does not refer to or tackle the most recent defenses of the opposing reading (e.g., Fee\u2019s and Gorman\u2019s). Indeed, Ehrman thinks that the two halves of this \u201cpoem\u201d (2:6\u20138 and 2:9\u201311) sit uncomfortably together. But is this simply because Ehrman\u2019s reading has trouble accounting for the flow of thought in the language? Others, as we have already noted, do not find their readings presenting the same problems.
\n(4) For his claim that Jesus is not \u201cGod Almighty\u201d in this passage, I refer to my previous chapter and the discussion about his use of the words \u201cGod\u201d and \u201cAlmighty,\u201d as well as my examination of monotheism in both of my chapters. Let it be noted that \u201cGod the Father\u201d isn\u2019t called \u201cGod Almighty\u201d in Philippians, either! I also insist that \u201cdivine being\u201d is too vague a term to be useful, as Paul will go on and exegete parts of Isaiah 40\u201355 in 2:9\u201311, as Ehrman also acknowledges. In this Isaianic text we are told that \u201cI am the LORD; that is my name! I will not yield my glory to another or my praise to idols\u201d (Isa 42:8). Are idols \u201cdivine\u201d in the same sense as YHWH? Ehrman\u2019s language is too imprecise. As Wright opines in commenting on this verse in his recent slender volume: \u201cThe God who refused to share his glory with another has shared it with Jesus.\u201d This looks more like the kind of christological monotheism that Bird summarized in chapter 2 than Ehrman\u2019s vaguely defined \u201cinclusive\u201d monotheism.
\nSo one may roughly render the logic of Phil 2:6\u201311 as follows, although, I note, 2:6\u201311 involves poetic language not necessarily suitable to a perfect argumentative representation. I therefore strongly urge that we not forget, as most do, the equally important christological language in Philippians 1 and 3!<\/p>\n
2:6\u20138
\nBecause Christ is equal with God, he does not consider this equality as something to be used for his own advantage.<\/p>\n
Being in the form of God, he therefore pours himself out for others, even to death on a cross.<\/p>\n
2:9\u201311
\nIn light of this act of selfless love for others, God publicly vindicates and recognizes Jesus\u2019 selfless act as a demonstration of God\u2019s true divinity.<\/p>\n
Therefore, Christ is honored as the prophets said only the one God of Israel can be: in universal worship and obeisance, all to the glory of the Father.<\/p>\n
The poem is, in this at least plausible reading, all about the graciousness of true divinity. It is about the love of God expressed in Christ giving himself \u201cfor us,\u201d a position that accords nicely with Paul\u2019s theology elsewhere (e.g., Rom 5:8).
\nSo after these critical remarks, Ehrman\u2019s original claim would better read as:<\/p>\n
\u201cChrist appears to be portrayed here, in his preexistent state \u2026\u201d and let\u2019s stop there.<\/p>\n
Fourth, and I want this point to sink in, Ehrman\u2019s questionable exegesis of Phil 2:6\u201311 is the only extended engagement with Paul\u2019s letters in his entire book! Ehrman has constructed a case about the nature of Paul\u2019s Christology by analyzing in depth only six verses in one passage. Just one passage! Your coffee or tea should be in the process of being spat out over this book in disbelief. Of course, Ehrman could be forgiven: a book the size he wrote covering the scope of material it attempts could not possibly analyze all relevant passages. However, it would then be necessary that the portrayal of Pauline passage chosen for such exclusive focus represents Paul\u2019s Christology more generally. And this is not the case. Ehrman\u2019s exegesis puts Paul\u2019s overall christological language entirely out of shape. That plane is starting to look like a flying stone monster.
\nFifth, Ehrman does not do the work of a historian in other ways. He does not, for example, consider Paul\u2019s way of knowing. Nor does he examine the way Paul expressed his faith in God. He makes general points about monotheism, as we saw, and then imports his dubious conclusions onto Paul.
\nMore could be said in criticism of his treatment of Paul. His claim that the apostle represents a trajectory on the way to a Christology that sees Jesus as \u201ca divine being\u201d who \u201ccomes from heaven to take on human flesh temporarily,\u201d is again evidence of a poorly timed aversion to theological nuance. The logic of his claim that \u201cit is because of this exalted status that Jesus was deemed worthy of worship\u201d should be challenged. And so on. But more centrally, his limited exegesis does little to support a proposal that, indeed, stands in tension with the vast majority of Paul\u2019s language. Christ, in Paul, is already understood as Jews understood the transcendent uniqueness of the one God. Ehrman\u2019s entire explanatory project, therefore, fails.<\/p>\n
MOPPING UP THE PIECES<\/p>\n
The heart of Ehrman\u2019s chapter on incarnation Christologies was all about Paul, so my response has focused on the same. Space is running out, so I only have room for a couple of comments about his reading of John and his paragraph on Hebrews.
\nFirst, apart from his problematic interpretative framework, which I critiqued in my last chapter and which operates throughout his reading of these texts, I was more satisfied. That said, his logic seems to run: John\u2019s Christology is \u201cincarnational\u201d and must therefore be late. He may have just thrown away a key historical explanatory aid in one fell swoop.
\nThis is to say, and second, that more nuance was called for in dealing with questions about John and historicity, at least conversing with scholars such as Paul Anderson, Tom Thatcher, Richard Bauckham, and others. Now of course John\u2019s Gospel isn\u2019t \u201csimple recorded history,\u201d but then neither are the Synoptics and for the same reason: they have theological agendas. Of course, Ehrman would agree with this, but the key inference is that John cannot so neatly be bracketed out of historical questions, as Ehrman maintains. Yet he writes: John does not offer \u201cJesus\u2019s words\u201d for the gospel is about \u201cJohn\u2019s words placed on Jesus\u2019s lips.\u201d And so an unnatural either\/or is perpetrated.
\nThird, Ehrman resorts again to this kind of claim: \u201cJesus is not God the Father in this Gospel.\u201d Who on earth ever claimed that Jesus was \u201cGod the Father\u201d? The question is whether Jesus was considered to be \u201con the divine side of the line\u201d in terms of the first-century Jewish monotheism that most advocate, and which I have discussed in my two chapters. This Ehrman does not do.
\nFourth, he claims that the Prologue of John\u2019s Gospel (John 1:1\u201318) is \u201ca very high Christology indeed\u2014higher than that even in the Philippians poem.\u201d But this claim assumes the problematic association of decisive christological evaluation with time, as critiqued in my previous chapter. Further, it misses that Paul\u2019s Christology is as high as it gets, as I have outlined above. His rhetoric makes up \u201cdevelopment\u201d from lower to higher when there is only difference of emphasis (at least in terms of whether there is a fully divine Christology).
\nFifth, his reading of John\u2019s gospel is one-sided and forced to fit his chronological scheme. What about the subordination language in John, for example when Christ says \u201cthe Father is greater than I\u201d (John 14:28)? But by the time we get to John, Ehrman needs an incarnational Christology that has clearly moved on from Paul. But both Paul and John entertain subordination language as indeed both present a fully divine Christ. Once again we see that Ehrman\u2019s scheme does not, account well for the data.
\nSixth, there is his single paragraph on Hebrews, a text that claims that Christ is superior to angels. Here, one would expect, some attempt to wrestle with the potential problem of having suggested that New Testament Christology presented Christ as \u201can angel.\u201d Alas, no such discussion emerges. And so he resorts, out of the blue, to an ethical objection to divine Christology: that it would eventually end in anti-Semitism. Is this a diversion tactic? Are we witnessing a rhetorical ploy to draw attention away from the fact that his theory is destabilized by the data it seeks to explain?<\/p>\n
CONCLUSION<\/p>\n
Ehrman\u2019s thesis has seriously disfigured Paul\u2019s Christology. He only spends time in one Pauline passage (Phil 2:6\u201311), and even that is far from a success, as he illegitimately imports interpretative language from outside Philippians (\u201cangel,\u201d \u201cGod Almighty\u201d) and ignores vitally important data within Philippians itself (not to mention the rest of Paul). Let me repeat: he only spends time in one passage! But, and this is really where the rubber hits the road, his proposal does not explain the vast majority of the rest of Paul\u2019s language across his letters and is actually refuted by them. As a result, his work on this part of early Christology is a serious weakness. He leaves so much out of his thesis and distorts that which it does include, that unfortunately the academic community should have serious reservations about the here discussed aspects of How Jesus Became God. In my view, the general public would therefore do well not to take his thesis very serious either.<\/p>\n
CHAPTER 8<\/p>\n
An Exclusive Religion: Orthodoxy and Heresy, Inclusion and Exclusion<\/p>\n
Charles E. Hill<\/p>\n
INTRODUCTION<\/p>\n
On an unusually temperate December day in 1988, I was digging postholes for a fence to go around our trailer in rural Nebraska. The trailer had been generously loaned by my in-laws, rent free, for as long as my wife and I would need it. It was important to get a fence up right away, though, to keep animals at a safe distance. As I struggled to keep from bending the blades of the post-hole digger on the frozen Nebraska soil, I reflected on the fact that just four days earlier I had been breathing the rarified (and warmer) air of Cambridge, England, nervously defending my dissertation before the two scholars who had the power to decide whether it passed or failed, over a cup of tea. Thankfully, the tea was a token of approval. Now we were back in the USA, jobless but happy to have a roof over our heads and a functioning heating system.
\nAs it happened, the Presbyterian church (PCUSA) in town was without a pastor at that time. They invited me to preach for them and after a few weeks offered me a temporary position as Interim Pastor while their search for a permanent pastor continued. It wasn\u2019t long before the chairman of the Committee on Ministry for the presbytery called me up. (In Presbyterian polity, a presbytery is the assembly of pastors and elders of all the Presbyterian churches in a given area charged with oversight of the churches.) The committee was about to have a meeting and the chairman wondered if I could come along, just to get acquainted with some of the other pastors and elders. A friendly gesture, I thought. The chairman, having formed the opinion that I might be on the more conservative end of the theological spectrum from himself, thought there was one elder in particular I would enjoy meeting. \u201cShe has a fairly high Christology,\u201d he said.
\nThe elder with the \u201cfairly high Christology\u201d was mentioned to me because she stood out from the crowd of pastors in the presbytery who, by implication, must have held christological views that were something lower than \u201cfairly high.\u201d This did not surprise me. I knew, however, that it would have surprised and deeply distressed most of the people in that presbytery\u2019s congregations, and probably ruined their Christmases, to learn that any of their pastors did not believe that the Word ever really did become flesh and dwell among us (John 1:14).
\nThe meeting, as it turned out, was not as friendly as I was expecting. I quickly learned that there was only one item on the agenda. It was an \u201cexamination of the candidate\u201d\u2014and I failed. Unanimously! Not even the elder with the fairly high Christology voted for me. My contract was rescinded and a letter of reprimand was written to the local church, whose hiring of me was declared \u201cout of order.\u201d
\nIn principle, I certainly do not fault the committee. It was their responsibility to protect their people from influences that, in their opinion, would have been a detriment to the people\u2019s spiritual well-being\u2014and I happen to agree with that. I just had not thought of myself as one of those influences. But maybe I was wrong.
\nOne of Bart Ehrman\u2019s points, as he begins chapter 8 of his book How Jesus Became God, is that Christianity from early on has tended to be an exclusive religion\u2014exclusive both in regards to other religions and even in regards to other versions of Christianity itself. Christianity, at some times in its history more than others, has shown a tendency to divide itself up. To most people today, this is not a particularly attractive trait. This exclusivist trait is associated almost \u201cexclusively\u201d with conservative or orthodox churches. One reason I related the personal episode above is simply to illustrate that theological exclusivism is not the sole province of \u201cconservative\u201d churches, or of those who are interested in the survival and proclamation of the historic, orthodox Christian faith.
\nIn any case, it will become clear to anyone who embarks on a study of the early Christian church that it soon engendered a remarkable profusion of groups who held sometimes slightly and sometimes radically differing views of who Jesus was. One thing is for sure: this one man Jesus of Nazareth quickly became a source of fascination for a lot of people! And that fascination shows no signs of letting up even today.
\nIt is the purpose of Ehrman\u2019s chapter 8 to chronicle some of the major alternatives to the orthodox affirmation of the full humanity and full deity of Jesus Christ. Thus Ehrman introduces the concepts of orthodoxy and heresy\/heterodoxy. Using these terms as a historian, he of course is not endorsing the implication that what is called \u201corthodox\u201d is true or that what is called \u201cheretical\u201d is not true. These are simply convenient terms historians adopt when speaking of what became, in fact, the majority view and what became any number of minority or rejected views.
\nI am glad Ehrman has chosen to use these terms and to explain his use of them. This is because in many earlier publications he has promoted the use of the terms \u201cproto-orthodox\u201d and \u201cproto-heresy,\u201d etc., when talking about the period before the fourth century. The reason for this nomenclature is his often-stated position that, before the fourth century, Christianity was so diverse and disorderly (no good Committees on Ministry back then) that there was no mainstream, no majority, nothing that could be reasonably termed \u201corthodoxy,\u201d despite what some early Christian leaders wanted to claim. Ehrman\u2019s reformed practice in this book recognizes that, without asking whether anybody was right or wrong, there was apparently a \u201cmajority\u201d or mainstream in Christianity quite soon after the New Testament books were written. This is certainly an advance over his former practice. I hope he sticks with it.
\nWhat we find is that this majority in the early church held to the twin \u201cparadoxical\u201d affirmations: first, that Jesus is God and that he is man; second, that Jesus is God and that this somehow does not jeopardize the confession that there is only one God. Often Ehrman\u2019s explanations of the various alternative systems of beliefs are helpful, and nothing if not clear. He offers the reader a quick and interesting tour of such groups as the Ebionites and (Theodotian) adoptionists, who could not accept Jesus\u2019 full divinity. Then there were various groups of Docetists, who could not accept Jesus\u2019 true humanity. Finally he describes the Gnostics, who separated Jesus and Christ into two entities. There are some disagreements I would have over how to classify all these alternatives, but these are quibbles. Being the outstanding teacher that he is, Ehrman does more than simply describe. Very much like ancient historians (gospel writers included), who were also teachers, Ehrman tries to draw lessons for his readers from his telling of history. Sometimes these lessons are subtle, sometimes more overt.<\/p>\n
HUNTERS OF HERETICS<\/p>\n
One lesson that comes through in Ehrman\u2019s telling of early Christian history is that many of the Christians who played for the winning side (the orthodox), Christians who believed Jesus was both God and man, were not people to be admired. They did some bad things, most of which you might say have to do with the already mentioned Christian tendency to exclusivism. We\u2019ll see this in a big way in the next chapter. Apparently the lesson we are supposed to draw from these examples of exclusivist-tending behavior is that it should cast doubt on the legitimacy of their beliefs.
\nWe begin to see the moral judgments in chapter 8 in the repeated use of the term \u201cheresy hunter.\u201d Is this, like \u201corthodoxy\u201d and \u201cheresy,\u201d a value-free term common to the historian\u2019s trade? It certainly does not seem like it is. The people labeled as such are said to be \u201cobsessed\u201d with \u201cdiscerning right and wrong beliefs.\u201d They are blamed for \u201crewriting history\u201d and for \u201cclaiming\u201d that views held by some of their contemporaries were never held by the apostles or the majority of Christians, when\u2014according to research conducted centuries later by modern scholars\u2014these views really were acceptable to their predecessors. Finally, these \u201cheresy hunters\u201d are implicitly criticized for \u201ctrouncing and rejecting\u201d these formerly acceptable views as innovations. They were definitely exclusivists!
\nThis moral judgment is interesting on several levels. If indeed the earliest Christians believed Jesus had been elevated to deity only at his resurrection (a claim we\u2019ll have to come back to later), is this something the second-, third-, and fourth-century \u201cheresy hunters\u201d knew? Of course it is not. They did not read the Gospels, Acts, and the letters of Paul and others in the same way modern scholars do, by searching for earlier (and ideally, conflicting) sources embedded in these books, and by dissecting them into various hypothetical earlier and later editions. They had not yet discovered that buried within the words of their favorite books was the revelation that their earliest forebears in the faith did not believe Jesus was by nature divine. Should the \u201cheresy hunters,\u201d who didn\u2019t know all this, be held responsible for rewriting a history they did not know existed\u2014a history that, by the way, no one really knew existed until modern historians wrote it, using modern presuppositions and methods of study (which means they too are rewriting history)?
\nIn an earlier portion of his book, Ehrman gives helpful instructions on how to do history. History has to be done in conformity with the views of the majority of historians: \u201cit is not appropriate for a historian to presuppose a perspective or worldview that is not generally held\u201d; \u201chistory, as established by historians, is based only on shared presuppositions.\u201d This is Ehrman\u2019s defense for adhering to the naturalistic assumptions by which he operates as a historian. After all, who would want to suffer \u201cexclusion\u201d from the discipline of History for holding presuppositions contrary to those of the majority of historians? But that is another topic. For our purposes here, if we apply this standard to the early orthodox \u201chistorians,\u201d who supposedly rewrote history, they appear to have been acting precisely as they were supposed to act, precisely as historians in today\u2019s guild act too. They were giving a history that conformed to the historical understanding of a majority of their colleagues who knew anything about history. If the minority had a different view, well, they were the minority and could be dismissed. They were not doing history.
\nAgree with them or not\u2014and Ehrman obviously thinks we should not\u2014the heresiologists (at least most of them; I\u2019m reserving judgment on Epiphanius of Salamis from the late fourth century) appear to have been sincerely concerned for the souls of the people under their charge. Besides arguing against their opponents, they also prayed for them (e.g., Irenaeus, Against Heresies 5.25.7). They were not unlike the caring pastor in Ehrman\u2019s story in chapter 3, who wept when he learned of Ehrman\u2019s rising doubts about the Bible.
\nBut what about the actual truth of the matter? Were the people Ehrman says the heresiologists were slandering really simply perpetuating views that would have been acceptable among orthodox Christians in a previous era? Were people like Justin, Irenaeus, Hippolytus, and Eusebius in fact rewriting history, when they claimed that the heresies were innovations?<\/p>\n
DEAD ENDS AND IRONIES<\/p>\n
A main point of chapter 8 of How Jesus Became God is to argue that \u201cviews that were originally considered \u2018right\u2019 eventually came to be thought of as \u2018wrong\u2019; that is, views originally deemed orthodox came to be declared heretical.\u201d Ehrman even identifies this as \u201cone of the hard-and-fast ironies of the Christian tradition: views that at one time were the majority opinion, or at least that were widely seen as completely acceptable, eventually came to be left behind.\u201d
\nIt is, of course, true that among the orthodox we can trace a certain evolution in the depth and precision of christological views and other theological tenets as well. Forms of expression that might once have been tolerable later became unacceptable, as flaws or points of vulnerability came to be exposed in the earlier expressions. It is debatable, however, how radical the shifts were or how regularly views \u201coriginally deemed orthodox came to be declared heretical.\u201d For at least some of the examples Ehrman cites, I will argue, do not establish the sort of \u201chard-and-fast\u201d irony he speaks of. One of these, the one Ehrman labels the clearest example, I will argue is not a real example at all. This will emerge, I think, as important not only for teaching the moral lessons Ehrman wants to teach, but for the entire argument of his book. I\u2019ll come to some specific examples and some specific theologians in a moment, but first an observation about the general, or at least, ideal orientation of orthodox discussions, which will help to show why some attempts became \u201cdead ends.\u201d<\/p>\n
Back to the Bible<\/p>\n
When it comes to the church\u2019s understanding of Jesus and of God, the case can be made that theological evolution among the orthodox in the early centuries always had a fundamental retrospective orientation toward the biblical texts (as they were understood at the time). That is, alongside an increasing sophistication and complexity to the definitions, one can see an increasing effort to understand the implications of the whole of the church\u2019s Scripture.
\nChristian theology, with its backward orientation toward the original, is like other religious phenomena of antiquity. Take, for instance, the translation of the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek. After some of the first bold attempts were made (what is called the Old Greek, or the Septuagint), several later revisions of this text that we know about seem to be revisions toward the Hebrew. In one sense, the first attempts at translation had the potential to be the best, as they were carried out closest to the time of the underlying text. But in another sense, they were often loose or rough and stood open to many improvements. And as improvements were made, they were generally oriented to the original.
\nOr take the copying of New Testament manuscripts. In one sense, the earliest had the potential to be the best, since the manuscript tradition was less cluttered with variants in the early decades. But in another sense, the earliest copyists may not always have been the best trained ones and they may not have had access to the best exemplars. Later scribes, those responsible for the great fourth-century manuscripts known as Codex Vaticanus and Codex Alexandrinus, at least to some degree were able to \u201crestore\u201d the text to a much earlier form, as text critics still try to do today.
\nSimilarly in Christian theology, the first bold attempts are in some ways potentially better, as they are fresher and executed temporally closer to the original revelation, uncluttered by later admixtures. Later attempts at refinement, at least ideally, could benefit however from the consolidated canon of New Testament Scriptures and from ongoing discussion and the mistakes of the past, as they aimed at a more perfect contemporary expression of the ancient givens of the faith.
\nThe mind-set of early orthodox theologians seems well encapsulated in this statement by third-century writer Hippolytus of Rome, in a treatise written against the modalism of a certain Noetus.<\/p>\n
There is, brethren, one God, the knowledge of whom we gain from the Holy Scriptures, and from no other source. For just as a man, if he wishes to be skilled in the wisdom of this world, will find himself unable to get at it in any other way than by mastering the dogmas of philosophers, so all of us who wish to practice piety will be unable to learn its practice from any other quarter than the oracle of God. Whatever things, then, the Holy Scriptures declare, at these let us look; and whatsoever things they teach, these let us learn; and as the Father wills our belief to be, let us believe; and as He wills the Son to be glorified, let us glorify Him; and as He wills the Holy Spirit to be bestowed, let us receive Him. Not according to our own will, nor according to our own mind, nor yet as using violently those things which are given by God, but even as He has chosen to teach them by the Holy Scriptures, so let us discern them. (Against Noetus 9)<\/p>\n
Where, and to the extent that, such devotion to the Old and New Testament Scriptures was maintained, most of the theological alternatives to orthodox Christology and theology simply had no chance of long-term survival. This is particularly the case with the Ebionites and adoptionists, those who taught that Jesus was simply a man, perhaps \u201cadopted\u201d by God. One can say the same for the various docetic groups, who taught that Jesus was not fully human, or that he was a man visited by a heavenly Christ. For differing reason, these attempts to understand Jesus did not fully assimilate huge segments of New Testament teaching (in fact, the docetists began to be active before the entire New Testament was written and are specifically refuted in 1 and 2 John). Near the middle of the second century Marcion explicitly rejected most of the New Testament books. Others such as the Valentinians (and some Gnostics), however, made use of at least the majority of our current New Testament books (but other books as well). But they employed interpretative techniques that completely baffled non-Valentinian readers of the texts, techniques that required mastery of a \u201csecret\u201d and complex mythological \u201ccode\u201d in order to make sense of the interpretations.
\nAs simple and as popular as they might have been for a time (we\u2019ll investigate just how popular below), the various \u201cmodalistic\u201d theories ultimately were doomed to the same fate. The idea that Christ was himself the Father (and the Spirit), clearly reported in several sources to have been the position of modalists like Noetus of Smyrna, seems so scripturally nonsensical that some scholars have suggested it could not have been real but was a \u201cpolemical invention\u201d of his opponents. Perhaps Noetus\u2019s view was a bit more sophisticated than our reports allow\u2014who knows? In any case, Hippolytus, in his tract Against Noetus, said the man\u2019s followers \u201cmake use only of one class of passages\u201d of Scripture, just as he says Theodotus, champion of the view that Christ was a mere man, was also one-sided in his use of Scripture (Against Noetus 3).
\nOrigen of Alexandria, with little doubt, possessed the most encyclopedic \u201cbiblical\u201d mind of anyone in his day, and he provided the church with an astounding treasure of biblical scholarship. But his theological experimentation was most unsuccessful precisely when it ventured to sail beyond Scripture\u2019s teaching, with speculation on the preexistence of the soul, and eternal worlds. The church historian Henry Chadwick famously alluded to one of Longfellow\u2019s poems when thinking of the work of Origen.<\/p>\n
There was a little girl,
\nAnd she had a little curl
\nRight in the middle of her forehead.
\nWhen she was good,
\nShe was very, very good,
\nAnd when she was bad she was horrid.<\/p>\n
The final stanza of the poem ends with little Jemima\u2019s mother catching her in the middle of one of her \u201chorrid\u201d deeds: \u201cShe took and she did spank her most emphatic\u201d\u2014which is not a bad description of the actions of some in the mother church to the excesses of the great Alexandrian scholar!
\nYou could perhaps say that it was not until the Arian and semi-Arian debates of the fourth century that one really gets a sophisticated and plausible alternative attempt at interpreting all the biblical evidence. At many points the Arian and semi-Arian positions seemed to meet the biblical requirements and seemed to align with the spiritual practice of many Christians. But in the end each position was judged to have failed to attribute to Christ the fullness of deity that Colossians says dwelt in Christ.<\/p>\n
The Adoptionism of the Ebionites and Theodotians<\/p>\n
Perhaps the most important example Ehrman brings forth for Christianity changing its mind, and the most radical, has to do with the view called adoptionism. This view he attributes to the Ebionites (who flourished in the second century) and the Theodotians (who flourished in the early years of the third century). Each of these groups is said to have believed that Jesus was a mere man who was \u201cadopted by God at his baptism.\u201d For someone with views like Ehrman\u2019s, discovering the Ebionites or the Theodotians is like discovering gold. Here are people who, whether they had been preserving it all along or had just stumbled upon it, were holding to the very teachings that, according to Ehrman, the earliest Christians held about Christ!
\nIn fact, Ehrman reports the view of some scholars that the Ebionites were the remnant of the very first Christians: \u201cJewish believers who congregated in Jerusalem in the years after Jesus\u2019s death around the leadership of his brother James.\u201d Ehrman is sympathetic to this view, as he says: \u201cIn terms of their Christological views, the Ebionites do indeed appear to have subscribed to the perspective of the first Christians.\u201d
\nWe should briefly remind ourselves of what the perspective of the first Christians was, according to Ehrman. He has made it clear that \u201cthe earliest believers\u2014as soon as they had visions of Jesus and came to believe that he had been raised form the dead\u2014thought he had been exalted to heaven.\u201d In the pre-Pauline creed in Rom 1:3\u20134 (so he argues), \u201cChrist is said to have been exalted to heaven at his resurrection and to have been made the Son of God at that stage of his existence \u2026 he was the human who was exalted at the end of his earthly life to become the Son of God and was made, then and there, into a divine being.\u201d \u201cSometimes this view is referred to as an adoptionist Christology.\u2026 He was \u2026 a human being who has been \u2018adopted\u2019 by God to a divine status.\u201d
\nYet even here there is a bit of confusion or equivocation. For Ehrman repeatedly writes that the \u201cfirst\u201d or \u201cearliest\u201d Christians believed Jesus had been exalted or adopted to divine status at or because of his resurrection. But when we come to the \u201cadoptionists\u201d of the second and third centuries, we are told they believed Jesus was adopted by God at his baptism. Such a view, according to Ehrman\u2019s chronology of christological development, is actually later than the view that he was adopted at the time of his resurrection. So, to be precise, the adoptionist Ebionites and Theodotians should not be hailed as holding the views of the earliest Christians, but perhaps of the second earliest.
\nDespite that minor clarification, we may still sense the irony Ehrman wants us to sense: how far Christianity has come, to turn from believing in a man who became God, to believing in a God who became man! And then even to turn against those who continued to maintain the original (or second-to-original) Christology, a view of Jesus as adopted by God and exalted to divine status at his resurrection\u2014or was it his baptism? In either case, this turnabout in Christian theology is, Ehrman thinks, the clearest of them all.
\nBut it is only clear if two things are true. First, it can only be clear if, as Ehrman believes he has shown in chapter 6 of How Jesus Became God, the first Christians were actually adoptionists, who believed Jesus was a mere man who was exalted to deity at his resurrection (let\u2019s just stick with the earliest of the early adoptionist Christologies at this point). In my opinion Ehrman has not shown this. I\u2019ll have more to say about the earliest Christians later and will also, of course, recommend you read Simon Gathercole\u2019s analysis of \u201cexaltation Christology\u201d in chapter 5 of this book.
\nSecond, the turnabout is only true if indeed the Ebionites taught what Ehrman says they taught, that Jesus had been adopted, exalted to divine, Son of God status, at his baptism (or was it his resurrection?). And the problem is, this is hard to establish.
\nOur earliest reports of a group known as Ebionites never say they believed Jesus had been exalted to divine status. Ever. Not at his resurrection (supposedly the view of the earliest Christians), nor at his baptism (supposedly the view of the gospel of Mark), nor at his birth (supposedly the view of the gospels of Matthew and Luke). Irenaeus, our earliest source for the teaching of the Ebionites, says that they believed Jesus was the offspring of Joseph and Mary by natural generation and says nothing about them holding that Jesus was ever elevated to divine status (Against Heresies 1.26.2; 5.1.3). Tertullian bluntly claims the Ebionites \u201crefused to think that Jesus was the Son of God\u201d (Prescription 33.11). Not even from the time of his baptism? Not according to the report of Tertullian. Hippolytus agrees: \u201cThey assert that our Lord Himself was a man in a like sense with all (the rest of the human family)\u201d (Refutation 7.22). Not only does Hippolytus\u2019s account lack any notice of the Ebionites believing Jesus was exalted to deity, but he reports their claim that Jesus was named \u201cChrist of God and Jesus\u201d because he alone had completely observed the law, and they stated that whoever could keep the law as Jesus did could become a Christ like Jesus was.
\nIt is not until Origen in the third century (Against Celsus 5.61) that we have a report of two branches of Ebionites, one that believed Jesus was \u201cborn of a virgin\u201d and the other that denied this. But Origen\u2019s reports are inconsistent, for elsewhere (Homilies on Luke 17) he seems to say that all Ebionites deny the virgin birth. The confusion may be based on his reading of Justin Martyr, who wrote many decades earlier. Justin seems to know of two types of Jewish believers in Jesus, but he does not call either of them Ebionites. Each of these groups keeps the Jewish law, but one group does not believe Jesus is divine (Dialogue 48) and the other does (Dialogue 47). The implication is that those who do believe Jesus is divine believe he preexisted as God, like Justin did. Clearly, if these are Ebionites, then the Ebionites agree that Jesus is divine by nature; if they are not Ebionites, we have no evidence yet that Ebionites believed Jesus was divine in any sense.
\nEusebius, in the early fourth century, repeats Origen\u2019s report of two branches of Ebionites but asserts that even the group that affirmed Jesus\u2019 birth from a virgin by the Holy Spirit did not affirm that he preexisted as God, Word, Wisdom (Ecclesiastical History 3.27). We still have no clear report that any Ebionites believed Jesus was divine. We could hypothesize that the second branch of Ebionites, those who believed in the virgin birth of Jesus, might have believed he was elevated to deity. But if so, it would only be on the basis of their belief in the virgin birth\u2014no mention is made of whether they believed Jesus rose from the dead. And if they followed the view attributed to one splinter group of the Theodotians (Hippolytus, Refutation 7.23), they could have believed in a virginal birth and still not believed Jesus was divine. We have no reason to believe that any group of Ebionites thought Jesus was exalted to deity at his resurrection (or his baptism)\u2014the belief Ehrman asserts they shared with the earliest Christians.
\nJust as an aside, there is one splinter group that might be a lifeline for Ehrman\u2019s claim. One splinter group of the followers of Theodotus of Byzantium, according to Hippolytus (Refutation 7.23), taught that Jesus was made God \u201cafter the resurrection from the dead.\u201d They were apparently an offshoot of the original Theodotians who believed Jesus was made God at his baptism. It appears that the chronology here went in the opposite direction from the way it allegedly did at the beginning of the Christian movement. But other Theodotians, like the Ebionites, denied that Jesus was ever made God.<\/p>\n
Postscript<\/p>\n
This may be neither here nor there, but I have just learned that there are modern-day Ebionites who claim to be \u201cthe living continuation of the Jewish religious movement of Jesus.\u201d They apparently have read the ancient testimonies about the Ebionites closely\u2014and they appear to be familiar with historical Jesus studies to boot. As they say on their website:<\/p>\n
We want everyone to know immediately that the Ebionites are not Christians or messianics. Jesus of Nazareth is\/was not the messiah, a savior, or part of a godhead. Thinking so is evil and blasphemy. His teachings do not constitute a new or different way to God. It is our goal to show that Judaism is the religion of God, and that worshiping Jesus is a grave sin, but also there is no historically legitimate reason for Christianity. Christian religion was never the intention of Jesus. We see Christianity as a horribly evil religion. We are not a \u201cchurch\u201d or competing movement within Judaism. Contact a local non-messianic synagogue for regular guidance and worship. Our view regarding theology is based on historical Jesus studies. Jesus is dead.<\/p>\n
Again, these are modern Ebionites, and I certainly cannot vouch for their claim to be the \u201cthe living continuation of the Jewish religious movement of Jesus.\u201d At any rate, it doesn\u2019t sound like these modern Ebionites and self-professed followers of Jesus of Nazareth believe Jesus was ever exalted to deity, at his resurrection (was he resurrected?), his baptism, or his conception. Nor does it sound as if they are any more tolerant and accepting of the \u201corthodox\u201d than the orthodox were of the Ebionites in the second and third centuries.<\/p>\n
HETERO-ORTHODOXIES AND IRONIES<\/p>\n
Modalism<\/p>\n
We come now to one christological view that Ehrman dubs a \u201chetero-orthodoxy,\u201d that is, a view that affirmed both Jesus\u2019 humanity and his deity, but was still rejected as heretical. Modalism is the view that there is one God who manifested himself at different times in three different modes (Father, Son, and Spirit). By all accounts it was a rising phenomenon in the third century. We know of several teachers associated with it who attracted attention. Ehrman goes so far as to assert that modalism \u201cevidently was held by a majority of Christians at the beginning of the third century\u2014including the most prominent Christian leaders in the church, the bishops of the church of Rome (i.e., the early \u201cpopes\u201d).\u201d This statement seems to be a generous interpretation of a slim amount of evidence. It is one thing to speculate that the majority of Christians perhaps could not have articulated a clear statement of trinitarian theology; it is quite another to assert that they therefore had specifically a modalist understanding of God.
\nEhrman\u2019s authority for suggesting that modalism was the majority view of Christians seems to be Tertullian himself in chapter 3 of his work Against Praxeas. Here, according to Ehrman, Tertullian \u201cadmits that the \u2018majority of believers\u2019 have trouble accepting his own view but prefer the view of the modalists (Against Praxeas 3).\u201d Here is what Tertullian says:<\/p>\n
The simple, indeed, (I will not call them unwise and unlearned) who always constitute the majority of believers, are startled at the dispensation (of the Three in One), on the ground that their very rule of faith withdraws them from the world\u2019s plurality of gods to the one only true God; not understanding that, although He is the one only God, He must yet be believed in with His own oikonomia [economy]. The numerical order and distribution of the Trinity they assume to be a division of the Unity.<\/p>\n
The only way to make this say that the majority of Christians are modalists would be to try to make a syllogism out of it: the simple are modalists; most believers are simple; therefore, most believers are modalists. But this only works if there is another hidden element: not just \u201cthe simple are modalists\u201d but \u201call the simple are modalists.\u201d If only some of the simple are modalists, we don\u2019t know if most believers are modalists or not. And in fact, Tertullian doesn\u2019t even say that the simple are modalists, only that they are startled by the Trinity in Unity because of a confused preunderstanding.
\nThe simple are startled because, when leaving paganism (they may be new converts), they thought they were leaving a plurality of gods for the one true God. They are now being told, in a distortion of the church\u2019s teaching, that there are \u201cthree gods.\u201d But, as Tertullian labors to show, this is not the church\u2019s trinitarian teaching.
\nTertullian\u2019s larger account in his treatise against Praxeas indicates that the swelling number of modalists was a brand new thing. Praxeas, according to Tertullian, was the person who brought these ideas to Rome from Asia, but he had actually recanted his views. For some time, then, these views remained dormant until they recently had sprung up again (Against Praxeas 1). Now, it is always possible that Tertullian is stretching the truth or even telling a flat-out lie. But the fact remains that we have no positive evidence for modalism being the majority view even in Rome, let alone in the entire church, as Ehrman implies.
\nWe get another take on the situation in Rome from Hippolytus, and there are similarities to the account of Tertullian. Modalism, according to Hippolytus, was held by two men in Rome who were bishops (Hippolytus does not consider them legitimate): a man named Zephyrinus (bishop 199\u2013217 CE) and a man named Callistus (bishop 217\u2013222) (Refutation 9.2). According to Hippolytus, Zephyrinus only adopted these views on the bad advice of Callistus, who was the real ringleader. Like Tertullian, Hippolytus too says this teaching was a newcomer, having \u201csprung up in our own day\u201d (Refutation 9.1). It was introduced by a man named Noetus from Smyrna (some have thought that Tertullian\u2019s Praxeas and Hippolytus\u2019 Noetus are the same person), but brought to Rome by one of his followers. Interestingly, Hippolytus too, like Tertullian, reports that after surfacing in Rome, it went underground for a time. In Hippolytus\u2019s narrative, it was he himself who refuted Zephyrinus and Callistus and forced them \u201creluctantly to acknowledge the truth.\u201d For a short time they confessed their errors, and modalist views were kept at bay in Rome. But now, he laments, they \u201cwallow once again in the same mire\u201d (Refutation 9.2).
\nThe bottom line here is that from neither of these writers are we able to conclude that modalism was the majority view even of Christians in Rome, let alone in every place throughout the empire.<\/p>\n
Tertullian<\/p>\n
But was Tertullian himself, the first Christian theologian to use the word trinitas, a heretic in waiting? In a typical Ehrman twist, the hunter (heresy hunter) would later become the hunted. Ehrman says that \u201cTertullian articulated a view that would later be deemed a heresy.\u201d
\nEhrman bases this statement on what Tertullian says in Against Praxeas 9: \u201cThus the Father is distinct from the Son, being greater than the Son, inasmuch as He who begets is one, and He who is begotten is another.\u201d What is evidently taken to be, by later standards, \u201ccompletely inadequate\u201d and \u201cheresy\u201d is Tertullian\u2019s statement that the Father is not merely \u201cdistinct from the Son,\u201d but \u201cgreater than the Son.\u201d Such a view has been called \u201csubordinationism\u201d by theologians and church historians. Christ\u2019s subordination to the Father, in this view, would not simply be due to his temporary messianic mission on earth. All Christians would believe that Christ submitted himself to the will of the Father to accomplish his work on earth. There was, as Tertullian says in the passage quoted above from Against Praxeas 3, a divine \u201ceconomy\u201d or arrangement between the three persons of the Trinity.
\nIn this economy or arrangement, while all three persons are one in mind and will, each person is found to exercise certain roles or operations. In relation to these roles, it might be said that the Father is \u201cgreater\u201d in that the Son submits to follow the will of the Father while he is on earth as the Messiah. Such an understanding would not be subordinationism. Rather, subordinationism would teach that Christ is intrinsically, essentially, and eternally inferior to the Father, as he would be if he were a \u201ccreature\u201d of the Father. A clear statement of this view would be a heresy by Nicene trinitarian standards.
\nWas Tertullian advocating subordinationism? When we look at a larger context of Tertullian\u2019s statement, things look a bit different.<\/p>\n
For the Father is the whole substance, while the Son is an outflow and assignment of the whole, as he himself professes, Because my Father is greater than I (John 14:28); and by him, it is sung in the psalm, he has also been made less, a little on this side of the angels (Psalm 8:6). So also the Father is other than the Son as being greater than the Son, as he who begets is other than he who is begotten, as he who sends is other than he who is sent, as he who makes is other than he through whom a thing is made. (Against Praxeas 9)<\/p>\n
Here it becomes plain that Tertullian, writing against those who thought Christ and the Father were the same person, is simply deriving his statement about the Father being greater than the Son from Jesus\u2019 words in John 14:28. And it is just as plain that he does not emphasize the word \u201cgreater\u201d but simply the distinction; in the next part of the sentence, where he could have repeated the word \u201cgreater,\u201d he says only \u201cother.\u201d While some might think that Jesus\u2019 words in John 14:28 themselves should be problematic for trinitarian theology, the great proponents of trinitarian theology themselves certainly did not think so, and they did not avoid these words. In his Oration against the Arians, Athanasius affirms that the Son<\/p>\n
is different in kind and substance from originated things and rather is peculiar to the Father\u2019s substance and of the same nature. For this reason the Son himself did not say, \u201cMy Father is better than I\u201d [cf. John 14:28], lest someone suppose that he is foreign to his Father\u2019s nature, but he said \u201cgreater,\u201d not in some greatness or in time, but because of the generation from his Father. Besides, in the statement, \u201che is greater\u201d he showed again the particularity of his substance. (Oration against the Arians 1.58)<\/p>\n
Elsewhere in his treatise Against Praxeas Tertullian is specific that the three divine persons are one substance or essence, speaking as he does of \u201cthree coherent Persons, who are yet distinct One from Another. These Three are, one essence, not one Person, as it is said, \u2018I and my Father are One,\u2019 (John 10:30) in respect of unity of substance not singularity of number\u201d (Against Praxeas 25). It does not appear, then, that Tertullian should be labeled a subordinationist. As William Rusch says, \u201cTertullian took an important step in recognizing the Trinitarian distinction of the three persons. In so doing, he also made a special effort to maintain God\u2019s essential unity\u201d; \u201cTertullian\u2019s clear distinction between the three that are of one substance will be an important element in the Nicene formulation.\u201d
\nThat eventual Nicene formulation, though it has been accepted by all major branches of historic Christianity, is not without its own controversies. Accordingly we will next look at what Ehrman calls the \u201cOrtho-Paradoxes on the Road to Nicea.\u201d<\/p>\n
EXCURSUS 2<\/p>\n
Second-Century Evidence for Jesus as God<\/p>\n
Pagan, Early Orthodox, and Gnostic Testimony<\/p>\n
Early Christian literature is filled with explicit and implicit references to Jesus as God. Here we give attestations from three different kinds of second-century texts: one from a bishop in the early orthodox tradition, one from a gnostic or semignostic source, and one from a pagan governor.<\/p>\n
THE PAGAN: PLINY THE YOUNGER<\/p>\n
But they declared that the sum of their guilt or error had amounted only to this, that on an appointed day they had been accustomed to meet before daybreak and to recite a hymn antiphonally to Christ, as to a god, and to bind themselves by an oath, not for commission of any crime but to abstain from theft, robbery, adultery and breach of faith, and not to deny a deposit when it was claimed. After the conclusion of this ceremony it was their custom to depart and meet again to take food; but it was ordinary and harmless food, and they had ceased this practice after my edict in which, in accordance with your orders, I had forbidden secret societies. (Pliny, Epistles 10.96.7, cited from H. Bettenson).<\/p>\n
Gaius Plinius Caecilis Secundus (ca. 61\u2013113 CE) was a Roman lawyer and senator who held several important administrative posts in his political career. In Pliny\u2019s correspondence with the Roman emperor Trajan, written while Pliny was governor of Pontus-Bithynia in Asia Minor (ca. 111\u2013113 CE), he presents Trajan with the problem of how to act against those who are accused of being Christians. Pliny provides a report as to how he has been conducting interrogations of the accused. He asks the accused three times if they are Christians; if they answer affirmatively, they are either executed or, if Roman citizens, sent to Rome for trial. Those who denied being Christians or said that they were once so but were no longer, were made to prove their innocence by invoking the gods, making offerings of wine and incense to the emperor\u2019s image, and then cursing Christ. Pliny is scornful about Christians even calling their religious conduct \u201ca depraved and unrestrained superstition.\u201d Interestingly enough, Pliny gives an account of what went on at Christian meetings, and he describes their devotion to Christ through hymns as the veneration of a god.<\/p>\n
THE BISHOP: IGNATIUS OF ANTIOCH<\/p>\n
I bid you farewell always in our God Jesus Christ; may you remain in him, in the unity and care of God. I greet Alce, a name very dear to me. Farewell in the Lord. (Ignatius, To Polycarp 8.3, trans. M. Holmes).<\/p>\n
Ignatius was the bishop of Syrian Antioch (died ca. 110 CE). He wrote a series of letters to several churches while being escorted to Rome en route to his execution. In these letters he makes several striking affirmations about Jesus as God and intimately related to the Father. In some cases, the language seems liturgical, hymnic, and overtures later creedal christological statements (e.g., Eph. 7.2; 18.2; 19.3; Rom. 3.3; 6.3; Smyrn. 10.1; Trall. 7.1). There is repeated reference to Jesus Christ as \u201cour God.\u201d In the letter to Polycarp, the bishop of Smyrna, the refrain is mentioned in the closing greeting as if it were completely normal for a Christian bishop to talk that way about Jesus. According to Thomas Weinandy: \u201cIgnatius effortlessly and spontaneously wove within his understanding of the relationship between the Father and the Son the simple and unequivocal proclamation that Jesus Christ is God.\u201d<\/p>\n
THE GNOSTIC: THE INFANCY GOSPEL OF THOMAS<\/p>\n
What kind of great thing he could be\u2014whether a divine being or an angel\u2014I do not know even what to say. (Infancy Gospel of Thomas 7.4, trans. B. Ehrman).<\/p>\n
The Infancy Gospel of Thomas, though its manuscript history is messy, is a second-century account of the childhood of Jesus with an acute emphasis on his great powers. The document may have been known to Irenaeus, who at least considered one of the stories it tells about Jesus to have originated from a Gnostic group known as the Marcosians (Irenaeus, Against Heresies 1.20.1). The purpose of the book is probably to underscore that the supernatural power of Jesus goes as far back as his childhood, and he used his miraculous abilities to amaze teachers with his wisdom and to crudely kill off playmates who irritated him. The document bears none of the marks of a fully-blown Gnostic cosmology, where the world was created by an evil demiurge. Nonetheless, it does emphasize the \u201cknowledge\u201d of Jesus and is certainly conducive to a Gnostic interpretation. In the text quoted above, a teacher named Zachaeus takes on Jesus as a pupil, only to be astounded and ashamed that Jesus\u2019 allegorical interpretation of the alphabet leaves him looking like an ignorant fool. Zachaeus complains to Joseph about Jesus and then wonders what kind of child he is, stating that Jesus is not of this world, and he must have been born before the world began. In the end, Zachaeus wonders if Jesus is a \u201cgod or an angel.\u201d For some reason, however, Ehrman translates theos as \u201cdivine being\u201d rather than \u201cGod.\u201d
\nWe should not assume that Pliny, Ignatius, and the author the Infancy Gospel of Thomas all had the same idea of a god\/God in mind in relation to Jesus. What does appear certain, though, is that early in the second century Christians worshiped Jesus in a way ordinarily appropriate for the veneration of a deity (Pliny), Jesus was related to the Father in such a close and intimate way that he could even be considered the God of Christians (Ignatius), and Jesus was a preexistent and supernatural being clearly belonging to the divine realm (Infancy Gospel of Thomas).<\/p>\n
EXCURSUS 3<\/p>\n
Second Century Evidence for Jesus as God<\/p>\n
The Nomina Sacra<\/p>\n
One of the unique features of early Christian manuscripts is their preference for abbreviated forms for sacred names\u2014hence the Latin term, nomina sacra. Typically such abbreviations comprised of combining the first and last letter of a word and omitting all the letters in between. So a name like I\u0113sous for \u201cJesus\u201d would be contracted to IS and the title Kyrios for \u201cLord\u201d would be contracted to KS. Added as well is a horizontal line over the letters called a macron, probably to help better identify when a nomina sacra is being used.
\nHurtado points out that in the earliest observable stage of Christian scribal activity, four words in particular were written as nomina sacra with great regularity: God, Lord, Christ, and Jesus. The use of the nomina sacra for these names is remarkably widespread and found in early Christian writings, both canonical and noncanonical, from the beginnings of the second century. While the origins and meaning of the nomina sacra are debated, the most likely influence was Jewish reverential attitudes toward the writing of the Tetragrammaton, YHWH, which has carried over into Christian usage. The fact that the four earliest Christian nomina are key words for God (Theos and Kyrios) and designations for Jesus (I\u0113sous, Christos, and Kyrios) leads Hurtado to conclude:<\/p>\n
The nomina sacra practice represents an expression of piety and reverence, it is a striking departure from pre-Christian Jewish scribal practice to extend to these designations of Jesus the same scribal treatment given to key designations for God. That is, the four earliest Christian nomina sacra collectively manifest one noteworthy expression of what I have called the \u2018binitarian shape\u2019 of earliest Christian piety and devotion.\u201d<\/p>\n
Photo courtesy of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology & Anthropology, object E 2746, image #174653.<\/p>\n
FIGURE 1 The image shown here is a detail taken from a fragment of the gospel of Matthew copied in the early third century (P. Oxy. 002, also known ?1), containing the beginning of the gospel. The first line shows three nomina sacra in succession, IY XY YY in Matthew 1:1, meaning \u201cof Jesus Christ the Son [of David].\u201d<\/p>\n
These abbreviations were used almost universally in the early church. Nomina sacra contractions of the name of Jesus appear not only in early Christian manuscripts, but they have been discovered in a third-century floor mosaic at Megiddo in Palestine and in a third-century wall painting in a house church at Dura Europa on the banks of the Euphrates River.<\/p>\n
CHAPTER 9<\/p>\n
Paradox Pushers and Persecutors?<\/p>\n
Charles E. Hill<\/p>\n
A CHRISTIAN TELL-ALL<\/p>\n
As I write this, networks all over the United States are abuzz with discussion of some pre-release excerpts from former Defense Secretary Robert Gates\u2019s new memoir, Duty: Memoirs of a Secretary at War. Garnering the most attention are some disconcerting revelations Gates has made about President Obama and Vice President Biden. Political \u201ctell-alls\u201d written by ex-administration insiders of both parties have become common in recent years. As officials quit an administration, it has almost become customary for some of them to spill dirt that those who stay within the fold have to try to clean up. Tell-alls are popular in the celebrity world too. One of the first and certainly most controversial celebrity tell-alls was Christina Crawford\u2019s 1978 book about her mother Joan, sarcastically titled Mommy Dearest. I can\u2019t say I\u2019ve ever read it or seen the movie, but I have seen the famous clip (you can find it now on YouTube) of Faye Dunaway channeling Mommy Crawford in an emotional rampage, screaming: \u201cNo wire hangers!\u201d
\nWhenever a tell-all comes out, from a one-time insider who has now turned his or her back on the \u201cfamily,\u201d it draws attention. But questions are always asked. Can all those allegations really be true? Is s\/he just bitter? Is there a financial motive?
\nMany readers have likely felt that they are reading a religious tell-all when they read books like How Jesus Became God and others of the genre. Here is a former insider (a former fundamentalist, no less), dishing out the scandalous truth about his former love. Like the steady drip of Edward Snowden\u2019s revelations about the \u201cinformation gathering\u201d activities of the NSA, books offering to expose the embarrassing secrets of the Christian faith are appearing these days with seemingly unstoppable regularity.
\nIn the final chapters and in the epilogue of How Jesus Became God, we get some tantalizing revelations: contradictions forced Christians to invent paradoxes (with the introduction of a new word, \u201cortho-pardoxes\u201d); Christians flip-flopped on doctrine; Christians fought with each other; Christians who believed Jesus was God did some bad things to others. The flavor can be seen in one excerpt.<\/p>\n
More specifically, if Christ is God, and God the Father is God, in what sense is there only one God? And if one adds the Holy Spirit into the mix, how does one escape the conclusion either that Christ and the Spirit are not God, or that there are three Gods? In the end, the orthodox settled for the paradox of the Trinity: there are three persons, all of whom are God, but there is only one God. One God, manifest in three persons, who are distinct in number but united in essence. This too became the standard doctrine of the orthodox tradition, and as happened with the Christological ortho-paradox, it also led to further disputes, heretical interpretations, and nuanced refinements.<\/p>\n
There we have it. Intractable contradictions constrained the orthodox to \u201csettle\u201d for the paradox of the Trinity\u2014desperate times call for desperate measures! But alas, this settlement did not bring peace. Far from it. The construction of the paradox was followed by \u201cfurther disputes, heretical interpretations, and nuanced refinements.\u201d This is before we even get to the subject of Christian bad behavior.<\/p>\n
PARADOXES<\/p>\n
There is a strong reliance in chapter 9 of Ehrman\u2019s book on the notion that most readers will think the concept of a \u201cparadox\u201d is detrimental to Christianity. Aren\u2019t paradoxes simply an admission that your doctrines don\u2019t make sense? Ehrman is certainly not the first, nor will he be the last, to think so. Trypho, the Jewish philosopher portrayed by Justin as having an encounter with him in Ephesus sometime between 135\u2013160 CE, said this to his Christian conversation partner:<\/p>\n
Resume the discourse where you left off, and bring it to an end. For some of it appears to me to be paradoxical, and wholly incapable of proof. For when you say that this Christ existed as God before the ages, then that He submitted to be born and become man, yet that He is not man of man, this [assertion] appears to me to be not merely paradoxical, but also foolish. (Justin Martyr, Dialogue 48.1)<\/p>\n
Justin, who believed and defended the \u201cparadox,\u201d was obviously not so embarrassed about it that he would not record and deal with Trypho\u2019s challenge. But should he have been?<\/p>\n
ORTHO-PARADOXES<\/p>\n
If Ehrman is correct, Justin should have been quite embarrassed. In order to show what Justin and his orthodox companions were up against, Ehrman coins a new term for this chapter: \u201cortho-para-doxes.\u201d Of course, as we have just noticed, Christians and even non-Christians like Trypho have always just called these \u201cparadoxes.\u201d The reason for calling them \u201cortho-paradoxes\u201d is that \u201cthey are the paradoxes that came to figure so prominently in specifically orthodox Christianity.\u201d By analogy, I suppose paradoxes that figured prominently in heterodox Christianity could be called \u201chetero-paradoxes.\u201d I have checked the index of the book Lost Christianities: The Battles for Scripture and the Faiths We Never Knew, however, and have found no entry for that term.
\nThese ortho-paradoxes emerged from what Ehrman calls \u201ctwo brutal facts.\u201d I\u2019m not sure why these facts are \u201cbrutal,\u201d but the adjective surely fits the tenor of Ehrman\u2019s presentation. The first brutal fact is that \u201csome passages of scripture appear to affirm completely different views,\u201d and the second is that \u201cdifferent groups of heretics stated views in direct opposition to one another, and the orthodox thinkers knew that they had to reject each of these views.\u201d It seems to me that these two facts really resolve into one, for how did the orthodox know they had to reject the directly opposing views of different groups of heretics (the second brutal fact)? Mainly because of the first brutal fact. These Christians, as we saw in the last chapter, were committed to following what they found in Scripture, and \u201csome passages of scripture appear to affirm completely different views.\u201d
\nWhen Ehrman turns to give examples of Scripture appearing to affirm \u201ccompletely different views,\u201d he understandably goes to the Gospel of John and the first epistle of John. Each of these books openly and unabashedly affirms both Jesus\u2019 deity and his humanity. But here we have to stop, for this brings up two rather weighty problems for the view Erhman is advocating in the volume. Okay, the first problem is not all that weighty, but the second is. The first problem is that, because the paradox of Christ\u2019s humanity and divinity arises first and foremost from the books the early Christians deemed to be Scripture, it was not simply an \u201cortho-paradox\u201d\u2014one that resulted from the later orthodox struggling to come to grips with two apparently irreconcilable affirmations. It was a paradox from the beginning. It is not so much an \u201cortho-paradox\u201d as it is a New Testament paradox\u2014certainly a Johannine paradox, or, as we will soon see, a Pauline paradox or even a pre-Pauline paradox. This simply means that the newly minted term \u201cortho-paradox\u201d is redundant and might not be one of the words added to the Oxford English Dictionary in 2014. That is not too serious.
\nThe second problem is more serious. For the legitimacy of Ehrman\u2019s overall argument in How Jesus Became God, it might even be \u201cbrutal.\u201d The problem, as I see it, is that these \u201cpassages of scripture [that] appear to affirm completely different views\u201d are found integrated in single books, or in the mind of one and the same person. The writer of the Gospel of John clearly teaches that Jesus Christ is preexistent God, even from the very first verse: \u201cand the Word was God\u201d (John 1:1). Then only a few verses later, the same book and the same author says, \u201cThe Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us\u201d (John 1:14).
\nThe writer of 1 John teaches the same two things about Jesus Christ (for our purposes we do not have to decide whether John and 1 John have the same author). We have no indication that the author(s) of these books thought this was embarrassing, that the two ideas about Jesus Christ were \u201ccompletely different,\u201d \u201ccontradictory,\u201d or \u201cin direct opposition to one another.\u201d Instead, to all appearances, this author (or these authors) believed that the facts of Christ\u2019s preexistence as God and his incarnation as man were not brutal but amazing and awe-inspiring, and in some wonderful way, harmonious and glorious. \u201cWe have seen his glory,\u201d the Johannine writer exclaims, \u201cthe glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth\u201d (John 1:14).
\nNor are these Johannine books alone in affirming and integrating these paradoxical ideas about Jesus Christ. Ehrman quotes Col 1:19, \u201cin him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell,\u201d and likens this teaching to the teaching in the Prologue of John, claiming, \u201cWe have now moved into an entirely different realm from the earlier exaltation Christologies.\u201d But in fact, after mentioning again how the fullness of deity dwelt bodily in Jesus (Col 2:9), the letter goes on to mention Christ\u2019s exaltation, when God \u201craised him from the dead\u201d (2:12; cf. 3:1).
\nThe twin beliefs that Jesus was true man and also true God are combined and assimilated in a massive way in the thought of the author of the letter to the Hebrews. Ehrman rightly says that Hebrews too has \u201cthe kind of incarnational Christology found in the Gospel of John.\u2026 But a hint of exaltation Christology remains here as well.\u201d More than a hint, I would say. But the point is, the \u201ctwo Christologies\u201d appear not as the uncomfortable concatenation of two originally conflicting Christologies. They are a seamless whole in the thought of the author, who interweaves them naturally and instinctively:<\/p>\n
In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the universe. The Son is the radiance of God\u2019s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven. So he became as much superior to the angels as the name he has inherited is superior to theirs. (Heb 1:1\u20134)<\/p>\n
He, God\u2019s Son, was \u201cappointed heir,\u201d but he was already the agent of creation; he is the radiance of God\u2019s glory and sustains the universe, but \u201cbecame\u201d superior to the angels and inherited a name. No sense of being brutally beaten by two irreconcilable facts here!
\nI\u2019m suggesting that this is a problem that goes to the heart of Ehrman\u2019s book and to the heart of the historical reconstruction of early Christianity as evidenced by Ehrman and others. In order to show this, I\u2019ll have to back up to earlier parts of the book to pick up Ehrman\u2019s finely constructed but ultimately unsuccessful argument. It is an argument about the development of early Christology.
\nEhrman\u2019s method, as a historian, is to establish the \u201cearliest\u201d tradition about who Jesus was, then to see how that tradition developed to the end of the New Testament period, and then to see how it developed even further in the post-New Testament period, up to the great symbolic definitions of the councils of Nicea and Constantinople. As he says, he is interested in \u201chow Jesus became God.\u201d
\nBut how does one discern where the earliest ideas about Jesus are to be found? The New Testament Gospels, which tell the story of Jesus, are actually not as early as the letters of Paul. So it looks like our earliest source of information for what the earliest Christians believed about Jesus will be found in Paul. But sometimes Paul apparently quotes some earlier compositions\u2014hymns, creeds, confessions, or poems\u2014that already existed before he wrote. These, it is thought, can give us even earlier information about what Jesus\u2019 followers believed about him. So far, so good.
\nBut what about the chronological order of these several bits of pre-Pauline tradition? This is more difficult, but it is critically important. For the earliest of these bits of pre-Pauline tradition (so it is argued) present only an exaltation Christology. An exaltation Christology, as defined by Ehrman, assumes that Jesus was fully human but only human, as merely human as you and me. Unlike you and me, though, he became divine when God is believed to have exalted him to divine status at some pivotal point.
\nOther bits of pre-Pauline tradition preserved in Paul\u2019s letters, however, present an incarnational Christology. Sometimes, at least, it is an incarnational theology that does not necessarily reject the exaltation of Jesus to heavenly glory after his resurrection but can even affirm it. How can we tell which bits of pre-Pauline tradition are earlier? For we cannot pick them up, turn them over, and find dates printed on the back. Ehrman seems certain that there is an order to them: the exaltation Christologies came first, and the incarnational Christologies were a later development. But his certainty rests not on historical study but on a predetermined chronological grid that is not provable historically. He gives us this grid, but only late in the book. He presents it as a conclusion, but actually it is a presupposition.<\/p>\n
To use the older terminology, in early Christianity the views of Christ got \u201chigher and higher\u201d with the passing of time, as he became increasingly identified as divine. Jesus went from being a potential (human) messiah to being the Son of God exalted to a divine status at his resurrection; to being a preexistent angelic being who came to earth incarnate as a man; to being the incarnation of the Word of God who existed before all time and through whom the world was created; to being God himself, equal with God the Father and always existent with him.<\/p>\n
It is easy for the reader to get the impression that this chronology is a rational \u201cconclusion\u201d of unbiased historical study\u2014instead of what it actually is, a presupposition of historical study\u2014because of the way in which Ehrman presents the evidence.
\nHere is how he does it. In chapter 4 he introduces the pre-Pauline tradition contained in 1 Cor 15:3\u20135, and in chapter 6 he presents the tradition in Rom 1:3\u20134. Each of these passages is interpreted to mean that Christ only \u201cbecame\u201d God after his resurrection. These must represent the views of the \u201cearliest\u201d Christians, and, as far as the reader suspects at this point, there are no other \u201cearly\u201d traditions out there to compete with them. Meanwhile, waiting in the wings is Phil 2:6\u201311, a passage that is not introduced until chapter 7. Phil 2:6\u201311, containing what Ehrman calls a \u201cChrist poem,\u201d is also pre-Pauline. It, however, assumes that Christ existed before his human birth, and existed in the form of God (not simply an angel). Christ was exalted again to heaven after he had humbled himself to take human form and suffer crucifixion in obedience to God. What is more, we now learn there are other pre-Pauline attestations of similar incarnational views of Christ, such as the one Paul uses in 1 Cor 8:6\u2014\u201cyet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live.\u201d
\nThese pre-Pauline, incarnational traditions, we are told, are later than the pre-Pauline traditions that only viewed Jesus as divine based on his exaltation. Ehrman therefore calls the incarnational traditions \u201camalgams\u201d of earlier traditions. But how do we know this? How do we know that the \u201cexaltation\u201d traditions are not in fact simply abbreviations of a fuller incarnational tradition, used to stress Jesus\u2019 humanity or his suffering or his fulfillment of prophecies about the coming Messiah?
\nThis is surely how they functioned for Paul, as abbreviations of a fuller Christology. When Paul at the beginning of Romans quoted a tradition that emphasized that Christ was descended from David \u201caccording to the flesh,\u201d and was set forth as Son of God in power by his resurrection from the dead, he was certainly not thereby denying that Christ was also the preexistent Son of God by nature. When he cited a preformulated creed containing \u201cexaltation\u201d Christology in 1 Cor 15:3\u20135, this did not cancel out the incarnation Christology he had already expressed earlier in the same letter when he quoted an \u201cincarnation\u201d creed in 1 Cor 8:6. Similarly, when the pre-Pauline author of the Christ poem in Phil 2:6\u201311 put the poem together, this author too did not see the preexistence of Christ as God as contradicted by his exaltation to heavenly status after the resurrection.
\nSo, how do we know that even the author(s) of the creeds used by Paul in Rom 1:3\u20134 and 1 Cor 15:3\u20135 did not also view their creeds as abbreviations of a fuller incarnational Christology? As another example, the author of 1 John writes: \u201cThis is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God\u201d (1 John 4:2). Did the author really mean that a spirit from God would not have to believe that Jesus also rose from the dead, or that he also was God \u201cin the beginning\u201d (1 John 1:1)? Of course not. There is an issue at hand, the issue of Jesus Christ\u2019s true humanity\u2014\u201cin the flesh\u201d\u2014and the author is specifically addressing that issue. What the spirits must confess here is just one abbreviated summary of a portion of what the author\u2019s community believed about Jesus.
\nThe New Testament authors, and Christians ever since, constantly make statements or confessions about Jesus that encompass only a small part of what they believe about him. In fact, they do so whenever they use these words from the Apostles\u2019 Creed:<\/p>\n
I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord,
\nwho was conceived by the Holy Spirit
\nand born of the virgin Mary.
\nHe suffered under Pontius Pilate,
\nwas crucified, died, and was buried;
\nhe descended to hell.
\nThe third day he rose again from the dead.
\nHe ascended to heaven
\nand is seated at the right hand of God the Father Almighty.
\nFrom there he will come to judge the living and the dead.<\/p>\n
There is nothing explicit here about Jesus\u2019 preexistence or his full deity. True, it is surely assumed in the meaning of the words \u201chis only Son\u201d in the first line. But according to Ehrman, such a bare statement could just as well mean that Jesus was exalted to Son of God status at his baptism or resurrection, perhaps even at his conception. Or one could say that Christ\u2019s full deity is assumed by the fact that the creed divides itself in a trinitarian way, with statements about the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. This is no doubt true, but again, this is the assumption behind the creed; the creed itself does not spell it out. Creeds are always mere summations of what believers believe; the rest is assumed to be filled in by teaching and preaching and is usually commonly known in the community. The Apostles\u2019 Creed has much more to say about Jesus\u2019 resurrection and ascension to heaven than about his preincarnate deity. But it was constructed and used by Christians who believed in Christ\u2019s preincarnate deity and has been confessed through the centuries by people who believe in his preincarnate deity. Even the Apostles\u2019 Creed (like all of the creeds) expresses only a part of what Christians believe.
\nThe only way we know that the pre-Pauline creeds and other expressions of incarnational Christology embedded in his letters are later and the exaltation christological expressions are earlier is by accepting the predetermined chronological grid: Christology must have begun from the \u201clower\u201d and moved to the \u201chigher.\u201d But if this is predetermined, how is it \u201chistorical\u201d and \u201cscientific,\u201d open to testing and falsification?
\nHere is where the naturalistic assumption makes a determinative difference in historical research. For this presupposed theory of christological development determines all of Ehrman\u2019s historical\/theological judgments throughout the book. And so, the problem of a rigidly applied but unproven chronology of belief about Jesus forms a crack that extends throughout his historical reconstruction of early developments in Christology.
\nAs we saw in the last chapter, the Ebionites and other \u201cadoptionists\u201d in the second and third centuries are said to have held to the Christology of the earliest Christians. This claim is then drawn in to serve as one of the great ironies of Christianity: later Christians rejected as heretics the people who held the first Christian beliefs. We also saw in the last chapter that the Ebionites cannot be shown to have ever believed Jesus became God, let alone that he became God at his resurrection. Now we see that we cannot establish that the earliest Christians believed Christ was a mere man exalted to deity only at his resurrection (or his baptism). Such a view, if it ever existed, cannot be shown to be any earlier than a view that recognized Jesus\u2019 preexistent deity.
\nNone of the New Testament writers attempted a full articulation of the mysteries of the person of Jesus Christ. We might wish they had, but it is likely that even if they had been both more precise and more expansive, they would not have removed the paradox. As it is, both sides of the \u201cparadox\u201d are clearly held, and they are not clumsily juxtaposed but integrated in the writings of the New Testament authors. As far as we can tell, none of these writers was discomfited by the \u201cseeming contradictions\u201d or the supposed brutality of these two facts, that Jesus was God and that he had come in the flesh. As hard as it may seem to believe, there is no evidence of the kind of hesitation, inner turmoil, or mental torture as is supposed to be experienced by many. These authors had come to the stunning realization that Jesus was both God and man, and none of them thought that either the humanity or the divinity of Jesus, or the humanity and divinity together, rendered faith in him impossible. The \u201cparadox\u201d was accepted as such and did not prevent these authors advocating and commending a full faith in Jesus as the Messiah and Savior to outsiders. It was that faith.<\/p>\n
THE ORTHODOX AND THE PARADOXES<\/p>\n
So what happens when we step away from the New Testament authors mentioned above and come to early orthodox theologians, like Justin, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Hippolytus, Novatian, and others? Once again we might be led by Ehrman and others to expect to hear panic in their voices. After all, they were left with the unreasonable task of having to reconcile the irreconcilable. But by the time these authors wrote, Christian communities had been reconciled to these irreconcilable realities for a long time.
\nOrthodox theologians are exercised, no doubt, and sometimes rattled, apparently not by the unnerving contradictions that had been handed them in the muddled testimonies of their Scriptures, but by what they saw as distortions and even blasphemies that were being promoted in their day. Their own attempts at explaining the revelation of Jesus Christ given through the apostles were not always fully consistent, either with themselves or with each other or with Scripture. Their expressions were not always exceptionally well guarded. Some of their efforts were later seen as unsuccessful. They struggled to integrate all the scriptural data and to find the right vocabulary to teach and defend their doctrine. But what Ehrman calls their \u201cortho-paradoxes\u201d are what they celebrated, not what they tried to cover up and hide from view. And what they were celebrating had been celebrated in their Christian communities for a long time.<\/p>\n
Justin Martyr<\/p>\n
Justin is an important figure for our knowledge of Christianity in the second century. Ehrman wants to emphasize that for Justin, Christ \u201cdid not always exist\u201d and was \u201cbrought into existence\u201d; for Justin, Christ is \u201ca kind of second God created by God the Father.\u201d Justin\u2019s language at times has left him open to the charge of holding to some form of \u201csubordinationism,\u201d the idea that the Son is a being essentially inferior to God the Father, that he is not fully God. Yet as we will see, this could simply be because Justin did not always fill in the blanks, for, as J. N. D. Kelly has said, Justin\u2019s theology \u201cis far from being systematic.\u201d
\nThe reason Ehrman\u2019s presentation is misleading is that for Justin, Christ, the Logos, is begotten of the Father, and Justin makes a clear distinction between what is begotten of God and what is \u201ccreated.\u201d As Kelly summarizes, for Justin, \u201cwhile other beings are \u2018things made\u2019 (poi\u0113mata) or \u2018creatures\u2019 (ktismata), the Logos is God\u2019s \u2018offspring\u2019 (genn\u0113ma), His \u2018child\u2019 (teknon) and \u2018unique Son\u2019 (ho monogen\u0113s): \u2018before all creatures God begat, in the beginning, a rational power out of Himself.\u2019 \u201d Justin is emphatic on the distinction between being begotten and being created. Christ is not \u201ca kind of second God created by God the Father.\u201d
\nBut does the mere fact that he was begotten of the Father mean, as Ehrman concludes, that the Logos \u201cdid not always exist\u201d? When Justin says that the Logos, begotten by God, \u201cwas with the Father before all the creatures and the Father communed with Him\u201d (Dial. 62.4), does this imply that Justin thought, as Arius would later put it, \u201cthere was (a time) when he was not\u201d? Is Justin an Arian? The most one could say is that perhaps Justin left some room for an Arian interpretation. But then, such an Arian position had not yet been broached. And the room he left could have been filled the way Athanasius filled it, who countered that God\u2019s begetting of the Son is not subject to \u201ctime.\u201d
\nWhat is important for Justin is not the issue of whether there was any \u201ctime\u201d before he was begotten, but rather the idea that the Logos and he alone is begotten, not created. This crucial affirmation is echoed in the Nicene Creed itself:<\/p>\n
We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ.
\nThe only Son of God,
\nEternally begotten of the Father,
\nGod from God, Light from Light,
\nTrue God from true God,
\nBegotten, not made,
\nOf one Being with the Father.<\/p>\n
It is sung by advent choirs in one stanza of the hymn, O Come, All Ye Faithful:<\/p>\n
God of God,
\nLight of Light,
\nLo he abhors not the Virgin\u2019s Womb.
\nVery God,
\nBegotten not created.
\nO come, let us adore him \u2026
\nChrist the Lord<\/p>\n
At the right time, \u201cthrough the power of the Word, according to the will of God the Father and Lord of all, He was born of a virgin as a man, and was named Jesus, and was crucified, and died, and rose again, and ascended into heaven\u201d (1 Apol. 46). \u201cIncarnation Christology\u201d and \u201cexaltation Christology\u201d certainly coexist in Justin.
\nThere is also the matter of who it is that Christians worship. Ehrman says Justin indicates \u201cthat Christians worship God, the Son, angels, and the Spirit\u2014clearly not a Trinitarian view (1 Apology 13).\u201d The passage in question is not in 1 Apology chapter 13 but chapter 6 (chapter 13 is important, as we will see). The translation in the Ante-Nicene Fathers edition is:<\/p>\n
But both Him, and the Son (who came forth from Him and taught us these things, and the host of the other good angels who follow and are made like to Him), and the prophetic Spirit, we worship and adore \u2026<\/p>\n
One way of construing this rather confusing sentence is as a claim that Christians worship angels, along with the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. This is how Ehrman takes it. But this reading is suspect. Not only would it go against all prior (and subsequent) prohibitions against worshiping angels, such as Col 2:18 or Rev 19:10; 22:8\u20139, but Justin himself clearly says God created the \u201crace of angels\u201d in the beginning along with the race of men (1 Apology 7.5). Unlike the Logos, angels were not begotten but created. Moreover, in chapter 13 Justin offers a sharper and more concise statement that Christians \u201creasonably worship Him, having learned that He is the Son of the true God Himself, and holding Him in the second place, and the prophetic Spirit in the third.\u201d Then in chapter 16 he speaks of baptism \u201cin the name of God, the Father and Lord of the universe, and of our Saviour Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit.\u201d In neither of these passages are angels mentioned. Thus, many have thought that the angels in chapter 6 are meant to go alongside \u201cus\u201d as those whom the Son has taught: \u201cthe Son (who came forth from Him and taught us and the angels \u2026 these things).\u201d The particular Greek construction in 1 Apology 6 would supports such a reading, as it shows Justin linking together the Father, the Son, and the Spirit by the use of a conjunction (te), which is not used for the company of angels.<\/p>\n
COMING TO THE \u201cDESIRED RESULT\u201d<\/p>\n
While the writings of many more theologians beckon, this will just about have to do for our purposes here. I can agree with Ehrman that the third-century Roman presbyter Novatian articulated a trinitarianism that was bound not to last. Rusch judges that \u201cNovatian\u2019s work represents a regression from the levels reached by the Apologists, Irenaeus, and Tertullian.\u201d Yet only a few years later, Novatian\u2019s contemporary in Rome, a bishop named Dionysius, fared better. In his letter to Dionysius of Alexandria, the Roman Dionysius offers a clear argument that Christ the Son of God is also coeternal with God. The way Ehrman puts it is, \u201cDionysius reaches the desired theological result.\u201d
\nAs we look back on some of the embryonic, pre-Nicene statements of those in the orthodox tradition, such as those catalogued in chapter 9 of How Jesus Became God, most Christian readers will likely be inclined toward sympathy for the well-intentioned but not always fully adequate efforts they read about. Let\u2019s face it; it is not easy even today, even for those who are familiar with the definitions of Nicea and the writings of Athanasius and others, to make sure they always state everything with correctness and precision. How much more for those Christians writing before Nicea?
\nSomewhat more annoying is that even in How Jesus Became God, while Ehrman certainly can and does use the standard trinitarian terminology, he also often muddies the waters by mixing up the terms \u201cbeing\u201d and \u201cperson.\u201d Of the views of Hippolytus and Tertullian he says, \u201cIn the divine economy there are three persons\u2014the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. These are three distinct beings,\u201d even though this is not their terminology. Speaking of Justin\u2019s view he says, \u201cChrist came forth from God and became his own being,\u201d though Justin does not use that language. For the orthodox, \u201cit was concluded that Christ was a separate being from God the Father.\u201d Actually, for the orthodox he was a distinct person from God the Father, but the same being. Speaking of Dionysius of Rome, \u201cThere need to be three divine beings. But the three need to be one, not three.\u201d Actually, there \u201cneed\u201d to be three divine persons who share the same being or essence.
\n\u201cThree beings\u201d already gives the impression of three distinct Gods, three Gods that somehow \u201chave to be brought together\u201d to avoid the implication that there are actually three Gods. This is accurate to Ehrman\u2019s perception of the predicament of the history of Christian theology, for he seems to perceive it as a confounded logical mess that Christians got themselves into by choosing to submit themselves to the contradictory ideas of their Scriptures. It then becomes a puzzle to solve, to achieve the \u201cdesired result.\u201d But this is apparently not the way the Christians perceived it, who were trying to speak faithfully about the ineffable God they worshiped.
\nTrinitarian theology especially from the time of Tertullian, but using terminology formulated at least as early as Justin, speaks of three divine \u201cpersons\u201d (Greek pros\u014dpon; Latin persona), rather than divine beings. The terminology was not taken from some procedure of analytical logic that had nothing to do with Scripture, but instead came directly from the practice of the exegesis of Scripture as relating to theology and Christology.
\nMichael Slusser points out that Justin, Irenaeus, and Tertullian often spoke of how, in prophetical literature of the Old Testament, such as the Psalms or Isaiah, the reader has to keep in mind the different \u201cpersons\u201d doing the speaking, or being spoken to, or being spoken of. For instance, the psalmist says, \u201cThe LORD says to my Lord\u201d (Ps 110:1), or \u201cyour throne, O God, is forever\u201d (Ps 45:7). As Tertullian states:<\/p>\n
So in these [texts], few though they be, yet the distinctiveness of the Trinity is clearly expounded: for there is the Spirit himself who makes the statement, the Father to whom he makes it, and the Son of whom he makes it. So also the rest, which are statements made sometimes by the Father concerning the Son or to the Son, sometimes by the Son concerning the Father or to the Father, sometimes by the Spirit, establish each several Person as being himself and none other.<\/p>\n
Slusser concludes, \u201cIt was a method of literary and grammatical analysis of Scripture that provided the early Christian thinkers with a way to talk about God in a Trinitarian fashion.\u201d The method and the terminology that these theologians eventually developed were not simply a mechanism by which to solve an abstract puzzle, but were \u201ccongruent with both Christian piety and Christian worship.\u201d<\/p>\n
THE EPILOGUE<\/p>\n
Now we come to the bad behavior alluded to earlier. I will admit that I have not looked forward to dealing with this portion of the material, but there is, I think, value in taking it up. In the epilogue Ehrman wants to take us to the aftermath of the long struggle to establish orthodox doctrine about Jesus and about the trinitarian understanding of God. In relation to the pagan world, the conversion of Constantine changed everything for Christianity. Christian readers will probably see this as both bad and good. The long competition between the Christian God and the Roman emperor as god took a new turn. \u201cIn the early fourth century, one of the competitors caved in and lost the struggle. With Constantine, the emperor changed from being a rival god to Jesus to be being a servant of Jesus.\u201d
\nHow can Christian readers not rejoice? How can anyone not rejoice, unless one thinks the persecution of Christians ought to be a permanent aspect of civilized society? But then \u201cConstantine required the soldiers in his army not to worship him, but to worship the Christian God.\u201d The problem here, of course, from our perspective 1,700 years later, is that Constantine required the soldiers in his army to worship anyone. The \u201cgood thing\u201d that ended the persecution also brought a real, and sad, irony: \u201cRather than being a persecuted minority who refused to worship the divine emperor, the Christians were on the path to becoming the persecuting majority.\u201d
\nAnd here is where the story turns sour. The eventual mistreatment of Jews by some Christians, once the church had come into a favored political position in the fourth and later centuries, is a serious matter and is a continual blight on the history of the Christian religion. Entire books have been written, deservedly so, to shine the light on a shameful aspect of Christian history. The puzzling, and I confess, troubling thing is why this topic has to figure so prominently in a book on early Christology.
\nThe ostensible reason is that, in Ehrman\u2019s argument, there is a close connection between belief in Christ\u2019s deity and violent, Christian anti-Judaism. This is clearly one of the most important lessons he wants readers to learn, as he devotes a section of the epilogue to it and primes the reader for it several times in the last chapters.
\nThe priming starts near the end of chapter 7 in a comment on John 1:11. This text says that Jesus came to his own people and his own people did not receive him. This statement, Ehrman says, has a \u201cclear downside.\u201d The downside is not that this rejection of Jesus meant that he would later be killed, or that his followers would bear some of the same abuse he did. The downside of the rejection of Jesus by his people is that, according to the teaching of the gospel of John, Jesus is divine. Thus, if the Jews reject Jesus, they are rejecting God. (This, of course, is true, but it applies to all who reject Jesus, not just to Jews who reject him.) \u201cThe far-reaching, and rather horrific, implications of this view,\u201d Ehrman promises us, \u201cwill be the subject of a later discussion in the epilogue.\u201d
\nLater, after noting that the letter to the Hebrews argues for the superiority of Christ to \u201csimply everything in Judaism,\u201d readers are once again \u201cconfronted with the discomfiting situation. To make such exalted professions about Christ more or less forced the Christians to drive a wedge between their views and those of Jews, a matter to which we return in the epilogue\u201d\u2014even though both the writer of Hebrews himself and his original audience were Jews themselves. Finally, when considering the Ebionites in chapter 8, Ehrman again puts the reader on notice that Christians\u2019 opposition to key aspects of Judaism will be explored \u201cat greater length in the epilogue.\u201d
\nWhen we finally arrive at the long-anticipated section of the epilogue, Ehrman begins with a sermon on the Passover preached in the late second century by Melito of Sardis. In this sermon \u201cMelito delivers his ultimate charge against his enemies, the Jews.\u201d In this highly rhetorical oration Melito charges (is it a \u201ccharge\u201d or is it a lament?) that God was murdered at the hand of Israel. Here is the charge of \u201cdeicide,\u201d the killing of Jesus, who is God. As Ehrman points out, it is the first instance on record of a Christian charging Jews with this crime. Melito himself, as a Christian living in the second century, was far from being in a position to be persecuting anybody, and Ehrman admits this. (This is speculation, but it probably never occurred to Melito to set fire to a synagogue). But it is this one charge of deicide that provides the cover for the remaining account of deplorable conditions that resulted for Jews, once the Christians gained the upper hand.
\n\u201cJews came to be legally marginalized under Christian emperors and treated as second-class citizens with restricted legal rights and limited economic possibilities.\u201d No one can argue with that ugly historical reality. Two authorities on the subject of Christian anti-Judaism, though, provide a little more of the context.<\/p>\n
Yet orthodoxy\u2019s anti-Judaism provided only one small tributary to those Roman legal traditions regarding Jewish rights and practices that had coursed, by Constantine\u2019s day, for more than three centuries.\u2026 Harsh rhetoric aside \u2026 Christian emperors through the fifth century by and large continued and arguably even extended the policies of their pagan predecessors, granting to Jewish communities a significant degree of autonomy, both religious and social.\u2026 By mandate, synagogues were protected from destruction, from appropriation by the military (troops were not to be quartered therein), and from unlawful seizure (in such cases, Jewish communities were to be fairly compensated for their property).<\/p>\n
In other words, second-class citizenry for Jews in Roman society, though not undone by Christian emperors, had been a steady condition centuries before any Christian emperor came onto the scene. Modest efforts to enhance Jewish autonomy were extended after Christianity gained influence, and laws protecting synagogues were put in place. Compared to other changes resulting from Constantine\u2019s conversion, \u201cthe changes that the Christianization of the government worked on the Empire\u2019s official legal posture toward Jews and Judaism seem relatively mild.\u201d
\nWhat was probably more detrimental than official government constraints, according to Fredriksen and Irshai, was the rise in status of the bishops. Christian bishops advanced up the social ladder largely because they were pressed into service by the Roman government to perform various administrative functions. In any case, they sometimes took advantage of their newfound positions of influence and used this influence to the disadvantage of nonbelievers. We have the incident mentioned by Ehrman, in which a bishop was accused of inciting a mob to burn down a synagogue in the city of Callinicum. Fredriksen and Irshai catalogue at least seven similar burnings over the period from about 386 CE and through the reign of Theodosius II (408\u2013450). Despite these incidents, they say:<\/p>\n
Paradoxically, however, the one island of relative safety for religious outsiders remained the synagogue. Jews, like everyone else, could be the occasional object of mob violence. However, Roman legal tradition in general prevailed, and Judaism\u2014unlike paganism or heresy\u2014even when marginalized, was nonetheless never outlawed.\u2026 Indeed the hostility of ecclesiastical writers, their repeated efforts to delegitimize and disallow Christian involvement (both clerical and lay) in synagogue activities, and their insistence that Judaism itself represented the ultimate antitype of the true faith, obliquely witness to a positive attitude towards Jews and Judaism on the part of many in their own congregations.<\/p>\n
They go on to point out that Judaism never had the same relation to the church as paganism and heresy had:<\/p>\n
\u2026 if only for the reason that Judaism, according to orthodoxy\u2019s own self-understanding, was incontrovertibly the source of (true) Christianity. As Augustine observed, although the Church was the bride of Christ, the synagogue was his mother (Contra Faustum 12.8). The Church\u2019s rise to power did little to resolve the tradition\u2019s abiding and intrinsic ambivalence. Thus, from the late fourth century onward, searing hostility and episcopally orchestrated violence\u2014against pagans and contesting Christian churches as well as against Jews\u2014could unpredictably disrupt the comfortable social and religious intimacy that often characterized relations between these various urban communities.<\/p>\n
Again, the ostensible reason for the concentration on anti-Judaism is the argument that it can be traced directly to the belief that Jesus is God. The link is forged with iron by Ehrman: \u201cWhy not? These were the people who had killed God,\u201d \u201cthe bishops \u2026 were using that power in ugly ways against their longtime enemies, the Jews, those who allegedly killed their own God.\u201d Yet, without reducing for a moment the tragedy of what happened, may we not ask, is the persecution really traceable in any major way to this belief? It is at least curious that in none of the examples of later discrimination and violence cited by Ehrman does the charge of deicide come up as any kind of motivation.
\nIt does not come up in the records of the incident concerning Ambrose of Milan, on which Ehrman expands considerably. Ambrose in 388 CE strove to persuade the emperor Theodosius (379\u2013395) not to order restitution from a certain bishop in Callinicum who allegedly incited his congregation to burn down a synagogue, and not to punish wayward monks who, after being harassed on the road by some Valentinians, retaliated by burning down their meeting house. Ambrose never stipulates that the bishop actually did incite the burning (he does concede that the monks burned the Valentinian building).
\nIn any event, he does not think the bishop or any Christians should be forced to pay for a new synagogue. Why should the Jews be treated better than the Christians? For he cites several examples of Jews burning down churches in the time of the emperor Julian: two at Damascus, one in Gaza, Ascalon, and Berytus, \u201cand in almost every place in those parts\u201d (Letter 40.15). Further, \u201cat Alexandria a basilica was burnt by heathen and Jews, which surpassed all the rest\u201d (40.15). What was the response of the Christians to these burnings of their property? Ambrose reminds the emperor that \u201cno one demanded punishment.\u2026 The Church was not avenged, shall the Synagogue be so?\u201d (40.15). \u201cThe buildings of our churches were burnt by the Jews, and nothing was restored, nothing was asked back, nothing demanded\u201d (40.18). Recently, in Theodosius\u2019 own reign, the house of the bishop of Constantinople had been set ablaze (Ambrose does not say who did it). For this deed the Christian bishop explicitly pleaded with the emperor not to take vengeance on the perpetrator(s), \u201cfor it was worthy of him,\u201d says Ambrose, \u201cto forgive the injury done to himself\u201d (40.13).
\nAmbrose never defends anybody for burning the synagogue, or the monks for burning a Valentinian meeting place. He calls these acts sinful (41.26). It is true that Ambrose more than suggests that the synagogue fire, however it was started (he floats the idea that the Jews may have set the blaze themselves, in order to blame it on the Christians), was in keeping with the judgment of God on the Jews. They had denied and slain the Christ; they received neither the Son nor the Father (40.26). But he most definitely does not see this as any justification for anyone to commit acts of violence against Jews or their properties. And he never charges them with deicide, the specific crime of \u201cmurdering their God,\u201d and the professed reason for expounding on Christian anti-Judaism in a book on Christology.
\nI am certainly not claiming that the charge of deicide never functioned as a justification for ill treatment of Jews. Perhaps it did. But if it did, another question is, Would it really have been any different, once political fortunes had shifted, if Jesus had simply been a man elevated to deity as a result of his resurrection? Or adopted as Son of God at his baptism? Or even if he had simply died a forsaken apocalyptic preacher and was later touted as a misunderstood Messiah by zealous followers? I do not believe so, and Ehrman has certainly not shown the likelihood that it would have been.
\nTo reinforce the point, we might be reminded of a certain non-Christian religion whose non-divine prophet was not executed by Jews or by anybody else. This has sadly not guaranteed benevolent treatment of Jews, or of Christians, from all representatives of this religion.
\nCome to that, there is one explicitly anti-Christian political philosophy that has been responsible in its real-world expressions for mass murder on an almost unbelievable, truly \u201capocalyptic\u201d scale. Deaths by execution, by manmade famine, and by the imposition of impossible living conditions in slave-labor camps under communist regimes in the twentieth century number in the tens of millions. Yet the multitude of these unconscionable acts has not kept any number of university professors from praising and feting this political philosophy over the years. In the light of so many atrocities perpetrated by representatives of a non-Christian religion and by explicitly anti-Christian, atheist governments, is it really necessary to keep up the heat on Christians today who believe in Christ\u2019s deity, as though they should be sentenced to carrying the weight of a long line of anti-Judaism for doing so?
\nAs we have seen, the epilogue of How Jesus Became God seeks to consider some of the later historical implications of the orthodox doctrines of Christ and the Trinity. Most of these are not entirely pleasant. So, to end on a more uplifting note, I would like to append a couple of early testimonies from two who saw great societal good as the result of the coming of Christ.<\/p>\n
Justin says:<\/p>\n
And thus do we also, since our persuasion by the Word \u2026 follow the only unbegotten God through His Son\u2014we who formerly delighted in fornication, but now embrace chastity alone; we who formerly used magical arts, dedicate ourselves to the good and unbegotten God; we who valued above all things the acquisition of wealth and possessions, now bring what we have into a common stock, and communicate to everyone in need; we who hated and destroyed one another, and on account of their different manners would not live with men of a different tribe, now, since the coming of Christ, live familiarly with them, and pray for our enemies, and endeavor to persuade those who hate us unjustly to live conformably to the good precepts of Christ, to the end that they may become partakers with us of the same joyful hope of a reward from God the ruler of all. (1 Apology 14)<\/p>\n
On the prophecy that the wolf shall feed with the lamb (Isa 11:6), Irenaeus says:<\/p>\n
And this has already come to pass, for those who were before most perverse, to the extent of omitting no work of ungodliness, coming to know Christ, and believing Him, no sooner believed than they were changed to the extent of omitting no superabundance, even, of justice; so great is the change wrought by faith in Christ, the Son of God, in those who believe in Him. (Proof of the Apostolic Preaching 61)<\/p>\n
A great part of the aftermath of the coming of Jesus is that millions of people for nearly two thousand years have found spiritual peace, hope, strength, and even the power to change their natural vices in a Savior who has shared their human woes, yet who is more powerful than all other humans, who is able to save, because he is also God.<\/p>\n
Therefore he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them. (Heb 7:25)<\/p>\n
EXCURSUS 4<\/p>\n
Third-Century Evidence for Jesus as God<\/p>\n
The Alexamenos Graffitio<\/p>\n
Israelarchive Alexander Schick (c) www.bibelausstellung.de \/Photo by Elke Haas<\/p>\n
The Alexamenos Graffito is a famous piece of anti-Christian graffiti that was carved on a wall near the Palatine Hill close to the Circus Maximus in ancient Rome and dates from the third century. The inscription depicts the figure of a man with the head of a donkey hanging on a cross. Underneath is another man with his arms posed in a gesture of worship. The accompanying inscription reads, \u201cAlexamenos worships his god.\u201d The inscription is a wonderful insight into pagan ridicule of Christianity. The insult to Alexamenos is that his god amounts to a half-man half-ass hoisted on a cross. One can scarcely imagine a more visual way of displaying what the apostle Paul called the \u201cfoolishness\u201d of the cross to Greeks (1 Cor 1:18\u201322). What is important to note is how this inscription affirms that Jesus was worshiped by Christians and how Christian communities were perceived by critics as venerating Jesus as a divine being and bestowing divine honors on him.<\/p>\n
EXCURSUS 5<\/p>\n
Third-Century Evidence for Jesus as God<\/p>\n
The Inscription at Meggido<\/p>\n
Centre for Public Christianity<\/p>\n
During the late 1990s construction work in the vicinity of a prison in Tel Meggido in northern Israel uncovered the remains of an ancient church set within a Roman military camp, perhaps the first of its kind in Palestine, datable to the third century, maybe as early as ca. 235 CE. Among the finds include a prayer room with the remains of a broken table and four mosaic panels indicating that the area was probably used for eucharistic celebrations. On one of the panels is an inscription that reads: \u201cThe God-loving Akeptous has offered the table to God Jesus Christ as a memorial.\u201d Evidently a woman named Akeptous donated the table for use in the Christian community, and the inscription commemorates her generosity as a benefactor to the church. The words \u201coffered\u201d and \u201cmemorial,\u201d as well as \u201cGod Jesus Christ,\u201d are sure signs that Jesus is recognized as a divine figure worthy of receiving religious devotion normally appropriate for Israel\u2019s God.<\/p>\n
CHAPTER 10<\/p>\n
Concluding Thoughts<\/p>\n
Michael F. Bird<\/p>\n
I\u2019m sure you\u2019re all familiar with Santa Claus, the obese cola-chugging, cookie-chomping fat man, who commits breaking-and-entering offenses across the world, organized from his crime syndicate HQ in the tax-exempt North Pole, where he keeps little people with pointy ears enslaved in his sweatshop to make cheap merchandise for Toys-R-Us. But that Santa is not the real St. Nicholas. No, the real St. Nicholas of Myra was a bishop in the ancient church known for his care for the poor and his robust affirmation of Jesus\u2019 divinity. According to legend, St. Nicholas was a delegate to the Council of Nicea in 325 CE. Nicholas was part of the faction who supported the full and equal divinity of the Son with the Father against the Arians, who denied it. According to some hagiographies, Nicholas was so outraged with Arius\u2019s subordinationist view of Jesus as a being less than the Father that he slapped Arius in the face in front of the entire assembly.
\nOf course, Nicholas was summarily rebuked and had to apologize, but his violent outburst in the cause of orthodox Christology has been memorialized in legends and even in art. I know it\u2019s just a story, but we have to ask, \u201cWhat would St. Nicholas say to Bart Ehrman?\u201d I don\u2019t know for sure, but considering his violent encounter with Arius, St. Nicholas might do all his talking with his knuckles. I read on Ehrman\u2019s blog that he loves Christmas. Even so, the next time Santa comes to town, Ehrman may want to lock himself in his panic room lest the jolly fat man decides to give him a yuletide body slam as a punishment for being on his naughty list.
\nHumor aside, out of all the questions someone could conceivably ask about Jesus, a sensible one and an important one is definitely this: \u201cHow Did Jesus Become God?\u201d I commend Ehrman for raising it in the public forum and offering a fresh and vigorous engagement with the topic. The reason for the importance of such a question is easy to gauge. The truth of Christ as the revelation of God-in-the-flesh is the load-bearing symbol that bears the weight of the entire symbolic universe of the Christian faith. For Christian devotion rests on two crucial axioms: first, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself (2 Cor 5:21); second, that \u201cJesus is Lord\u201d (1 Cor 12:3). It is not too much to say that for Christians of all types and stripes, their idea of God is bound up with the story of Jesus. It is by looking at Jesus that we see the face of God.
\nEhrman is not a Christian, and one must wonder in what sense anyone could be God given Ehrman\u2019s agnosticism. He certainly does not think that Jesus is God, and he shies away from the question as to whether it is even possible for God to become a human being. As I read Ehrman\u2019s book, I kept hearing the melancholic and mocking lyrics of Joan Osborne\u2019s postmodern song, \u201cWhat if God Was One of Us?\u201d playing in my head. Ehrman\u2019s mind is already settled on such matters, and rather than offer religious reflections, he attempts instead to trace how belief in Jesus as God first emerged. Some of his observations about the early church are sound. That said, several of his conclusions as to how devotion to Jesus as a divine figure emerged and what it meant are far from sound. His account of Christian origins smells fishier than shrimp left out for too long in the hot sun.
\nIn this volume, we have attempted to critically engage Ehrman\u2019s arguments with a blow-by-blow response to his primary assertions.
\nBird argued that, against Ehrman, one cannot cut and paste Greco-Roman and Jewish views of intermediary figures onto early devotion to Jesus. That is because, despite some genuine analogies, the early church developed a uniquely cast christological monotheism whereby the person of Jesus was bound up with the identity of the God of Israel. This is why Jesus was considered a fitting object of worship in the early church.
\nBird also argued that, against Ehrman, Jesus did believe that he was God, since he acted in such a way as to communicate that he embodied God\u2019s return to Zion, he shared God\u2019s throne, and his deeds could be correlated with God\u2019s action in the world. The instantaneous drive to worship Jesus did not result from an extensive period of deliberation; rather, it was a reflexive response to the memory of Jesus carried by his first followers. These followers believed that in Jesus they had met the God of Israel in person.
\nEvans argued that, against Ehrman, the gospel burial traditions are probably historical. Ehrman completely fails to take into account archaeological evidence for victims of crucifixion being buried. In fact, Evans demonstrates that according to Roman custom and law, burial after crucifixion was not unusual. His observation, especially with respect to Roman Palestine, is confirmed by examination of the remains of several victims of crucifixion who were buried according to Jewish law and custom. In addition, what we know about Jewish burial practices makes Jesus\u2019 internment by Joseph of Arimathea and the visit of the women to the tomb entirely plausible. On top of that, appearances of Jesus alive to his followers after his death would not itself have generated the belief about resurrection. That is because there was a myriad of ways that his followers could have spoken of his postmortem existence, like his transportation to heaven, seeing his spirit or ghost, or his transformation into an angel. Since resurrection is about the rising of dead bodies, it was the empty tomb and the appearances of Jesus that led them to believe that he was resurrected.
\nGathercole argued that, against Ehrman, there is a theology of preexistence in the Synoptic Gospels, that a close reading of Mark\u2019s gospel does not support a view that Jesus\u2019 sonship began at his baptism, and that texts from the \u201ctunnel period\u201d such as Acts 2:36 and Rom 1:4 do not espouse an adoptionist or exaltation Christology. The language of Jesus being \u201cmade\u201d and \u201cappointed\u201d in his exaltation pertains not to his identity or relationship to God the Father changing, but to an extension or intensification of his authority over the church and cosmos, in parallel with the fact that God\u2019s own reign also extends and intensifies.
\nTilling argued that, against Ehrman, New Testament Christology cannot be forced into a scheme of development from \u201cexaltation christologies\u201d to \u201cincarnation christologies\u201d simply because the common denominator across the New Testament is that Jesus shares the transcendent uniqueness of the one God of Israel. In addition, Ehrman\u2019s reading of Gal 4:14 as supporting an angel Christology, which he makes a central interpretive motif, is steeped in a degree of dubious dubiety higher than Dubai City Tower. Also, Tilling points out that Ehrman\u2019s conception of language about God, divinity, and monotheism lacks precision and sophistication and is therefore prone to several category fallacies.
\nTilling then argued that, against Ehrman, Paul portrays Jesus as possessing the same transcendent uniqueness of the one God of Israel. This case is made, first, by examining certain explanatory conditions that responsible historians should grasp. Second, and in light of these conditions, Paul\u2019s language about Christ then comes into sharp focus. It becomes clear that the way Jews distinguished the uniqueness of God is deployed by Paul to speak of Christ. This is to say that Paul describes the relation between Christ and Christ-followers in a way Jews only spoke of God\u2019s relation to Israel. And it is in precisely this way that God\u2019s transcendent uniqueness was expressed. In other words, Paul constructs a Jewish way of unambiguously including Jesus on the divine side of the line monotheism must draw between God and creatures. Tilling can, in this light, accommodate for dozens of relevant Pauline texts, such as 1 Corinthians 8\u201310, in such a way that shows a fully divine Christology was central to Paul. This further means that language in Philippians 2 can be better understood, especially in light of material in Philippians 1 and 3. To this end, Tilling explores a number of problems with Ehrman\u2019s exegesis of Phil 2:6\u201311. This is crucial as Ehrman\u2019s dubious claims about this passage are the only detailed basis for his construal of Paul\u2019s Christology. All of this refutes Ehrman\u2019s suggestion that Paul depicts Jesus as a kind of angel. And that is not all. Tilling lists further problems with Ehrman\u2019s treatment of John and Hebrews that undermine Ehrman\u2019s entire project.
\nHill argued that, against Ehrman, orthodoxy was not the product of several alleged \u201cheresy hunters\u201d rewriting history. The heterodox deviations that emerged were weighed against the weight of the rule of faith and the Christian Scriptures and found wanting. In addition, Hill also contests Ehrman\u2019s account of the Ebionites, Modalists, and Tertullian, in particular as to what they actually believed and why.
\nHill then proceeded to argue that, against Ehrman, paradox, far from being inimical to orthodoxy, was actually foundational for it. The various paradoxes of the church\u2019s faith, such as how Jesus can be human and divine or how God can be three and one, were simply part of the testimony of the biblical writers, both individually and corporately. While these paradoxes gave inspiration to the rise of beliefs that were eventually regarded as fallacious and inadequate explanations of Christ and God, nonetheless, paradox was ingrained into Christian belief as part of the mystery of the incarnation and God\u2019s triune nature. Furthermore, Hill also points out that Ehrman\u2019s scheme of christological development might be amiss because several of the texts said to convey an exaltation Christology might in fact be abbreviations of an incarnation Christology. Lastly, while there has been a horrid history of Christian anti-Judaism, it wrong to say that its immediate cause was belief in the deity of Christ.
\nIn closing, I\u2019d like to offer one final thought. Back in 1992, before I came to faith, I attended an Australian production of Jesus Christ Superstar. I\u2019ve since seen several productions of the show in different cities around the world, and this production had many distinctive features. One thing I remember vividly was \u201cHerod\u2019s Song.\u201d It is a number toward the end of the second act sung by Herod Antipas, where Herod mocks Jesus in a very campish cabaret-style rock song, wonderfully performed by Aussie icon Angry Anderson. In the middle of the song, Herod stops, slaps himself in the face with both hands in frustration at Jesus, points a finger at Jesus, then turns to the audience and says, \u201cHe thinks he\u2019s God!\u201d The whole audience, myself included, erupted in riotous laughter. How silly for someone to think that he or she is God! And yet, billions of people around the world spend time every day, thinking about, believing in, and praying to Jesus as God.
\nBut is this really a silly belief? I believe it is not. It seems to me that Jesus spoke and acted in such a way as to be claiming that he spoke and acted with, for, and as Israel\u2019s God. His self-understanding was not delusional, but was vindicated by his resurrection from the dead, which is why those who encountered the risen Christ worshiped him (Matt 28:17), and even skeptics had to confess him as \u201cMy Lord and my God\u201d (John 20:21). Many to this day remain loyal in their worship because of the absolute worshipability of Jesus as the \u201cone who loved me and gave himself for me\u201d (Gal 2:20). And there endeth the lesson!<\/p>\n
title How God Became Jesus: The Real Origins of Belief in Jesus\u2019 Divine Nature\u2014A Response to Bart Ehrman<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
CHAPTER 1 The Story of Jesus as the Story of God Michael F. Bird So exactly \u201cwhen\u201d did Jesus become God? To be honest, let\u2019s recognize that this is a loaded question as it assumes that there was a time when Jesus was not God at all. Accordingly, for some, like Professor Bart Ehrman, Jesus … <\/p>\n