What Are You Reading and Why?

        Vermes, professor Jewish studies at Oxford, attempts to consider Jesus, the primitive church and the New Testament as part of first century Judaism and seeks to ream them as such rather than through the eyes of a theologian conditioned and subconsciously influenced by two millennia of Christian belief and church directives

        The Greek New Testament is a ‘translation of the genuine thoughts of the Aramaic thinking and speaking Jesus, a translation not just into a totally different language, but also a transplantation of the ideology of the gospels into the completely alien and cultural and religious environment of the pagan Graeco-Roman world’ (p 3).

        A key example is ‘Son of G-d’, in Hebrew or Aramaic a metaphor of ‘a child of G-d’, whereas in Greek addressed to Gentile Christians grown up in a religious culture filled with gods, sons of god, the NT expression tended to be understood literally as a ‘Son of G-d’, as source of the same nature of G-d. Vermes also demonstrates how differing descriptions of Jesus are found in the NT writings eg messiah figure or stranger from heaven, lamb of G-d (John), son of G-d and universal redeemer of mankind (Paul), prophet, lord and Christ (Acts), charismatic healer, teacher and eschatological enthusiast (synoptic gospels).

        Vermes, Professor Jewish Studies at Oxford, expounds all the sayings which Jesus supposedly uttered, in an attempt to rediscover the genuine religious messages preached and practised. Jesus’ doctrinal and moral statements are focused on minor literary categories: narrative and commands, controversy stories, words of wisdom, parables, biblical quotations, payer, Son of Man sayings, sayings about the Kingdom of G-d, and eschatological rules of behaviour (all statements of Jesus are commented on by category, and reduced to a listing in the appendix). Eg ‘the Beatitudes are precious pearls from the point of view of both piety and property’ (p 312); here Vermes also adds a Beatitude from the Gospel of Thomas to his canonical base

        Vermes adds brief summarizing statements. Three questions dealing with contradictory statements are considered carefully (eg did Jesus intend to address only Jews or did he expect the gospel to benefit the entire non-Jewish world (p 376)? The shape of Jesus’ theology is sketched: the role of faith, the efficacy of prayer, the fatherhood of G-d, need to become like children, a new concept of the family, healing and exorcism, use of hyperbolical speech (p 390-396). Of interest is Vermes’ summary of Jesus’ religion: the kingdom of G-d, the observance of Torah, the eschatological piety of Jesus, the prayers of Jesus, the G-d of Jesus.

        The book is a good treatment of basic New Testament theology that takes seriously the oral and canonical traditions.

        A literary critic, Bloom examines the character and personality of Jesus and of Yahweh (the deity of the Hebrew bible). An interesting side-view compares the order of books in the Hebrew bible and the Christian bible (Old Testament), and comments on the difference in a canon that ends with Chronicles (history) rather than with Malachi (prophet).

        Bloom is interested in comparing two very different divine names, Jesus Christ and Yahweh (p 92), their narrative characterizations and dramatic juxtaposition (p 93). Documentation for traditional views of Jesus is lacking: ‘there is no history, only biography’ (p 42). The American Jesus has been shaped by romantic wishing; ‘he promises greater dreamlike happiness, compounded of emancipated selfishness, and an inner solitude that names itself as true freedom’ (p 104).

        ‘Gnostic sayings of Jesus in the Gospel of Thomas ring more authentically,(p 18) than those in the synoptic gospels. His rejection of the oral tradition requires some sort of reader decisions; on this point he is at odds with Geza Vermes and Bauckham. He dismisses the Trinity as poetry (p 98).

        Wright maintains that the church has sold short the story of Jesus, and avoided the challenge of Jesus’ central claims and achievements. We have reduced the kingdom of G-d to private piety; the victory of the cross to comfort for the conscience. Simply Jesus re-examines from a basically conservative perspective the textual background of the New Testament writings, attempting to see the relationship between first century Jewish culture and history, and their implications for Jesus’ message.

        Wright uses the metaphor of three great rivers who come together, merging Jewish messianic dreams, servant perspectives, and G-d’s return to the people (p 169). ‘Instead of the frantic pressure to defend the identity of people, land and temple (cf the exilic experience), Jesus’ followers are to recover the initial vision of being a royal priesthood for the whole world’ (p 181), ‘the presence of Israel’s G-d no longer in cloud and fire, wilderness tabernacle, but in and as a Human Being Jesus himself. (p 181)

        Jesus’ kingdom is a different sort of kingdom: a kingdom without violence, a kingdom not from this world but through Jesus’ work a kingdom for this world’ (p 183) Wright deals strikingly with atonement. ‘Somehow Jesus’ death was seen by himself as the ultimate means by which G-d’s kingdom was established’ (p 185)(this is no reductionist or substitutionary atonement).

        ‘The canonical gospels and the creeds are not in fact presenting the same picture’ (p 11). The creeds (eg Apostles Creed, Nicene Creed) make no mention of what Jesus did or said between his birth and his death. The creeds ignored the central theme of the four gospels; they omit the story of Jesus’ actual life and the meaning this story conveys.

        What Wright finds in the four gospels is the challenge that ‘G-d has really become king, in and through Jesus’ (p 27). And Paul repeats the theme: ‘the story of Jesus is the story of how Israel’s G-d became king. In the events concerning Jesus of Nazareth, the G-d of Israel has become king of the whole world’ (p 38).

        The key to understanding the New Testament writings is to centre on the cross that allows us to ‘take over the world not with the love of power but the power of love, when the kingdom of G-d overcomes the kingdom of the world’ (p 239).

        This is a fascinating compilation of writings of the church and government officials of the first five centuries of the CE. Why the animosity by government officials? ‘Once Christianity separated from Judaism and began converting pagans, some Romans began to suspect that Christianity had the potential of tearing the fabric of Roman society apart’ (p 4). ‘The persecutions were sporadic. The sum total of Christians who died as a result of the Roman persecutions in the era before Constantine was less than the number of Protestants who died at the hands of Charles V in the Netherlands’ (p 9). Of major significance (especially for research in John’s apocalypse) is lack of data on Domitian persecution; major attention should be paid to Trajan and Neronian persecutions (p 10).

        Of particular interest is Cook’s documentation of Christians ‘revenge’ on pagans once they had the political power (eg an 11-year old boy who is compelled to certify that he sacrificed to the gods ‘all his life’ (p 188). Pagans teaching in public institutions were not to receive public stipends (p 184). Synagogues were destroyed or converted into churches (p 287).

        Fascinating documentation of a difficult time in western thought in the transition of religious and political structures.

        Casey presents a careful look at all the fields of Jesus research, in a formidable historical and linguistic treatment. A major case is the one Casey makes for attempting reconstruction of Aramaic formations of key Jesus formulations (eg the Lord’s Prayer, the Eucharist).

        Emphasized in Casey’s research is that Jesus was a first century Jewish prophet; here, Casey relies most strongly on E. P. Sanders and Geza Vermes. Casey sees the Virgin Birth and the resurrection account as being in the same genre of story telling, using categories of authentic, re-written and secondary traditions, and pays careful attention to Jesus’ background in an observant Jewish family that gave two of its members to the early church leadership.

        He has a chapter on ‘G-d’: G-d’s Fatherhood and kingdom (kingship of G-d), and emphasizes Jesus’ activity as exorcist and healer; a chapter on ethics (translating ‘return’ as the Aramaic rather than ‘repent’ which is Hebrew). He details the polemic between Jesus and the scribes and Pharisees. Most of his followers, even after his death, continued to believe in his mission, and some came to believe in his resurrection (some of his closest friends claimed Jesus had appeared to them after his death).

        It’s an old book, but Reicke’s treatment of the era remains insightful and helpful; his perspectives on the development of the early church remain balanced and helpful.

        Christ and the church were related in different ways to Judaism and also to Hellenism and the Roman Empire. Jesus and his disciples were particularly confronted with political, social and religious factors in Judaism, Hellenism and the Roman empire. Of crucial importance is the restoration of Judaism after the Babylonian captivity, and the emergence of institutions characteristic of Jewish society in the time of primitive Christianity, the intense cultural struggle of Judaism with Hellenism.

        My major interest is Reicke’s sketch of Palestine at the time of Jesus and the apostles: the institution (synagogues), the political tensions (Samaria, Roman administration), the groups (High Council, Sadducee, Pharisees, priests, Essenes. Reicke does a careful treatment of the data of the Last Supper, and he opts for the Johannine scenario. He also describes the crucifixion process.

        Markus outlines the nature of the changes that transformed the intellectual and spiritual horizons of the Christian community from the fourth to the sixth centuries. He summarizes how Christians, who had formerly constituted a threatened and beleaguered minority, came to define their identity as religious respectability, where their faith became a source of privilege and power.

        Markus details the transition from the Roman world to the established cultural life of the church, and points out the change in the way Christians understood what was involved in following the Lord (p xii).

        The central questions from the early church to the present ecclesiastical form, is ‘how tightly is Christianity bound to particular cultural forms’ (p 1); the emphasis on change has resulted more often in cultural disturbance than in conversion. He points out that Christians are generally more worried about what pagans are doing, than about what they believe, and explores the boundaries of Christianity, ‘what minimally will make a convert a Christian’ (p 6). ‘Pagan survival’ is seen as what resists the efforts of Christian clergy to abolish, to transform, to control (p 9).

        The Jewish community underwent major upheavals through exile (the northern kingdom in 722 BCE, the southern kingdom in 587). The bulk of the common scriptures were written, shaped or edited by people in exile. ‘A deepened understanding of biblical texts that emerged from the crisis of exile can provide a higher degree of sensitivity for dealing with comparable catastrophes and migration or refugee problems in modern society’ (p 2)

        This volume looks not only at the biblical historical data about exile (Kings, Jeremiah) but to the ‘indirect’ sources (Ezekiel, Lamentations); a new interpretation is now taking place. Before, emphasis was given to the cohesive family life Judean deportees were able to pursue in Babylon, and little attention was given to the people and circumstances in the land of Judah between 587 and 539 (viewing Judah as a ‘virtually empty land’).

        Contemporary treatment of the situation focuses now on the experience of exile as a severe and traumatic personal, social and psychological crises, drawing on the experience of Japanese-American enduring internment and black South Africans in the midst of apartheid; the Jewish exilic community developed coping strategies (eg development of new folklore literature and heroes, such as Daniel and Joseph).