[../xtalk]

This is a moderated, academic e-List  dedicated to the scholarly investigation and discussion of the critical questions and issues surrounding the study of the Jesus of history and the rise of  Christianity. The List's  purpose is to provide an on-line platform for queries, debate, and  proposals relating to the reconstruction of (1) the life, career,  and aims of Jesus of Nazareth, (2) the social, political, and religious world in which he lived, and (3) the nature and  development of the social/religious movement which arose in his name.

[The log has been edited by JDC to remove typos, insert cross-references, and avoid personal greetings. Those changes hope to make it as user-useful as possible]

 

QUESTION 1

(David Hester Amador: History & Ethics)

I have read you work over the years with great interest, being introduced to you almost 12 years ago at the 2^nd Jesus Seminar held in Redlands, CA while I was only a new graduate student in biblical studies, having just read your book In Parables.  It was an exciting time, hearing you speak and watching the early dynamics of the Jesus Seminar unfold before my eyes.

I have a question that, I’ll admit, is a little hard to formulate, so I anticipate a misunderstanding right from the start and acknowledge that is will be due to my own inability to state it clearly.

Question:  how does one reconcile the disciplinary apologetic of history as quasi-scientific, positivist pursuit of ‘truth’ with the disciplinary history of the discipline as an ethical pursuit?

Let me back up: since its foundations and until 1810-1812 with Georg Nieburh’s publication of a critical history of Rome, history had been interested less in the critical discovery of the ‘truth’ of events, their sequence, their causes and their outcomes per se, and more interested in focusing upon, for example, ‘the lives of famous men’.  That is, its focus was upon providing models and anti-models of ethical behavior for others to follow (or avoid), even when its genre was not biographical.

Only recently, particularly in the late 19^th century with respect to our field of biblical studies, has history endeavored to become (under the influence and powerful forces of the physical sciences on particularly German, then later American research university campuses)a discipline dedicated sole to ‘objective’ research.

Setting aside the issue of genre composition that constrains history anyway (why to we recount history as drama: with setting, characters, plot, story-line, etc.?) as something that brings with it necessarily ‘ethical’ issues, I am fascinated by how the rhetoric of the discipline’s discourse and practice continues to employ its pre-disciplinary habit of ‘ethics’, while presenting an apologetic (almost ideologically) of ‘pure scientific’ pursuit of ‘facts’.

Take the Jesus Seminar:  At the end of the day, having completed work on both the acts and sayings of Jesus, Bob Funk, trying to keep things moving along, has asked the group to ponder whether the message and life of Jesus has anything significant to speak to humankind today.  And this question coming from a Jeffersonian modernist dedicated to an ideology of scientifism (which, by definition, rules out questions of importance from its inquiry as so much ‘irrational’ and ‘irrelevant’ questions on values—and, as we know, science is ‘value-less’).

You yourself, in what I read as move of self-defense, suggested that you would accept the accusation that Jesus studies means necessarily "looking down a deep well and finding your own reflection".  This admission, while rhetorically an attempt to deflect criticism, speaks to the heart of the issue:

As biblical historians, we are not really interested at all in the pseudo-objectivist pursuit of ‘truth’ and the quasi-scientific pursuit of ‘knowledge’, but are, indeed, dealing with questions of ethics.  And yet, we stake our claims to ‘authenticity’ (or, what is a ‘compromise’ position - ‘honesty’) and ‘truth’ upon the rigorous application of our method which is supposed to assure against the influence of values (particularly dogma, canon law, etc.).

In other words, we say we are pursuing the ‘truth’ (which is itself a value in need of serious pondering), but are engaged in the ethical pursuit of determining whose Jesus is the ‘right’ Jesus - a power struggle of determining which ‘Jesus’ is the one against whom all others are judged. Can one reconcile these conflicting claims without undermining the authenticity of either?

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

There are a lot of words in there, David, big and important words, which appear with quotation marks around them, but I am not always sure we mean the same things by them. But, as best I understand your question, this is how I’ve tried to answer it.

First, I have spent only a minimum amount of time explaining it in theory and much more time trying to do it in practice. On the level of theory, I distinguish between narcissism, which projects its own face entirely onto the subject it studies, and positivism (or historicism) which imagines it can see the subject totally uncontaminated by its own viewing presence. In between those extremes I have sought for interactivism which attempts to make as fair and equitable a dialogue between past and present as humanly possible. The ethic of that process does not mean that you can ever get out of your own personal or social skin. But that you try to make the dialogue between viewed and viewer as interactive as possible. T

Second, the only ethical way that I know to do this is to be as self-conscious and self-critical as you can about your method (how you do it) and methodology (why you do it that way and not some other). That is why I spend so much time on methodology and why I took almost an entire year to lay out as fully as I could the entire units of the Jesus tradition. For example, I have insisted that there is a line from Materials (how one sees the gospels) to Methods (how one reconstructs based on those presuppositions) into Results (the conclusions you get).

Finally, I would insist that the merits of any method/ology is comparative. It is serenely simple to demolish, in fact even to ridicule, (and I am not suggesting that you are doing that) another person’s method/ology. The real question, however, is whether any given methodology is the best one around for here and now, for this time and place. It is in the light of that statement that I am quite happy to defend my methodology. It is not because I think it is perfect or permanent, but because I think it is better than the other ones around at the moment.

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QUESTION 2

(Jack Kilmon : Gospel of Thomas in Present Quest)

I think all would agree, even his detractors, that Dom Crossan has been a "hub" for contemporary efforts in reconstructing the HJ from the available evidence. If I were to choose what is unique about his methodology it would be the "Triple Triadic Process." If I were to speculate over what is new about the evidence to which this methodology is applied, I would look at the Gospel of Thomas. It is no secret among my Xtalk friends that I consider GOT to be independent of the Synoptics (in spite of a tad of synoptic corruption) and to be the earliest material of sayings, dating perhaps to the lifetime of the HJ himself. It is also no secret that my primary rule for the earliest sayings material is "follow the Aramaic." I have noticed some Aramaisms in GOT sayings material but cannot consider that probative unless Crossan’s "second triad" involving stratification is first applied and that I am "following the Aramaic" in first stratum material rather than Synoptic corruption of the text. My question, therefore, to Dr. Crossan is how he has handled GOT in his methodologies and if he has inventoried 1^st stratum material.

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

I agree with you, Jack, that the Gospel of Thomas is independent of the Synoptics (apart, as you say, from some synoptic retrojection similar to that which canonical scribes did in aligning the New Testament Gospels with one another). I do not think, however, that it is the earliest chunk of sayings material, let alone that it dates from the lifetime of the historical Jesus. In my own methodology, simply as a disciplinary safeguard, I bracket from my primary stratum anything that is singly attested in it or anywhere else. I do not mean that such material cannot be original. Of course it can (the Good Samaritan, for example). But as a safeguard I hold it and assess it on a secondary level. Similarly, I do not use as my primary level, anything that is only in the Gospel of Thomas. Furthermore, I can accept a final dating for Thomas wherever the Thomas experts manage to agree because what I am using from it (and this is emphatically not my idea, but Steve Patterson’s) is the material that is common to both the Gospel of Thomas (I accept its independence) and Q (I accept its existence). That Common Sayings Material cannot be created by either of them, since I consider them mutually independent (from both sequence diversity and content difference), and so it must be earlier than both of them. It is on that material that I focus. In The Historical Jesus I looked at everything that I considered in the earliest stratum. That meant, essentially, anything in Paul and elsewhere or in Q and elsewhere (independently). In The Birth of Christianity I focused primarily (having read Patterson) on that Common Sayings Tradition. That would be what I would call first stratum material. I would not use that term for the Gospel of Thomas itself. You also mention that you tried to "follow the Aramaic." I must admit that I lack the linguistic capabilities to find the Aramaic in a Coptic gospel translated from the Greek.

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QUESTION 3

(Robert M Schacht: Methodological Prerequisites)

My question has to do with methodological prerequisites. As you make clear in The Birth of Christianity (p. 96f.) you think that it is imperative that our methods be based on the four criticisms (source-, redaction-, form-, & tradition-criticism). However, Tom Wright has criticized this approach, saying that it has lead only to divergent interpretations, and no consensus. Each of the criticisms has its own problems. For example, there are competing source-critical models, each with its own problems and advantages. Instead, he wants to try a different approach.

Do you think that by committing ourselves to the particular scholarly paradigm you have advocated that we run a risk similar to the pre-Copernican astronomers who insisted that in order to navigate, one must first understand the system of epicycles, and then build on that? (I am of course referring to Thomas Kuhn’s theory of paradigm shifts.) I am not trying to be tendentious here; obviously the problem with the system of epicycles is that one of the fundamental assumptions (that the universe revolved around the earth) was wrong. I am not suggesting that the Four Criticisms are as flagrantly defective in their assumptions. But yet, some of their assumptions could be defective in less dramatic ways. I am not suggesting that we should abandon the Four Criticisms, but only that perhaps they should not all be regarded as mandatory methodological prerequisites?

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

Let me begin with an analogy, Robert. Without anyone particularly noticing or making much fuss about it, we [ both scholars as such and Christians as such] have decided that the Greek texts of the New Testament must not be taken directly from some extant manuscript (like the Alexandrinus, Vaticanus, or Sinaiticus), but be reconstructed by a committee which votes on levels of certitude (a horrifying habit copied by the Jesus Seminar). That means for scholars as such, and indeed most Christians as such, the Biblical text is reconstructed subject to the vagaries of history and the chance discoveries of Egyptian aridity. If you ask me is that safe, I can only say that it is inevitable. I do not know how to avoid the ifs, buts, and maybes of historical reconstruction. Unless, of course, you wish to avoid history completely and assert dogma: This text is the way it is yesterday, today, and forever.

If I turn to the historical Jesus, I do not know how to avoid similar decisions if we are doing history and not asserting dogma. Once we have learned that Matthew and Luke copied Mark, I do not know however to go back and avoid the implications of such knowledge. As you mentioned, Tom Wright has said that one should and that he would "bypass" the historical presuppositions of the various methods established in the last 200 years of scholarship. That method would be perfectly right if one was studying Paul where, for example, nobody thinks that Romans has a three-level stratigraphy of materials from Paul himself, from the tradition after Paul, and from the final author of Romans. If the Gospels were like the Pauline Epistles, I would act exactly the same way that Tom does, If I thought they were four independent witnesses to the Jesus tradition, I would have, perforce, to work out a synthetic correlation just as Tom does. And in the end, the synoptic Jesus or the four-gospel Jesus, or the New Testament Jesus would be simply equated with the historical Jesus. My methodological challenge is not that everyone must agree with my presuppositions about the nature and relationship of the Gospels, but that nobody can avoid some such presuppositions in reconstructing the historical Jesus.

Finally, I have countered Tom’s suggestion that no classical historians work like gospel historians by this simple question. How would classical historians work if they learned that of the four biographies of Tiberius, Paterculus was written about 40 years after the Emperor’s death, that Tacitus and Suetonius copied most of Paterculus, and that Dio Cassius used all of those three preceding sources. They would, I think, have to act exactly like gospel historians who are in a similar position.

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QUESTION 4

(Johan M Strijdom: Allison’s Challenge)

Dale Allison, in his book Jesus of Nazareth (1998), offers an extensive criticism of Crossan’s methodology. I would like to know Crossan’s response to the following two points noted by Allison:

(1) Why does Crossan draw the dividing lines between his strata at 60, 80, 120 and 150 CE? In Allison’s words (1998:14): "Why are the lines drawn where they are? Why not a line at 50 or 70 CE or one at 100 CE? Crossan may have good reasons for his choices, but he does not, as far as I can see, let us know what they are."

(2) Crossan’s method let him focus on complexes rather than ideas/themes with multiple independent attestation. Allison (1998:23) argues that the recurrent appearance of themes/ideas/motifs in independent sources should be taken much, much more seriously than Crossan’s work does. In one case, he concedes, Crossan does break out of the limitations of his own methodology: to argue for a fundamental difference between the Baptist and Jesus, Crossan uses two complexes with single attestation (144 Wisdom Justified [1/1] and 106 Fasting and Wedding [1/2]) which nevertheless evince independent attestation of the same theme. But this procedure, Allison holds, should be given much more attention. What is Crossan’s response to Allison’s proposal?

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

As you may know, Johan, I am beginning a debate with Dale Allison which will be published eventually in a book by Polebridge Press. What I say here, or anywhere else in this seminar about his work, he has already seen and read. On your first question about the dates for my strata: they are, quite frankly, arbitrary. I had originally thought of 60, 90, 120, and 150 as simple generational dates, every 30 years or so. I think it was Bob Funk that said my 90 should be 80, so at least (presuming the two-source theory) Mark was on a separate stratum than Matthew and Luke. I agreed because, quite frankly, the dates are purely arbitrary, but the succession of strata are not. What is important to me is which stratum comes before which other one and you can date them any way you want. In fact, if those dates are a distraction, forget them. What is at stake for me is this: what was the earliest stratum and what were the successive strata to it.

With regard to your second question, I have no problem with extending my focus on complexes to ideas, themes, and even names. I had noticed in setting up the emphasis on complexes, for example, that it often failed to underline names (like Peter or Mary ) which were surely very early and very important. But I do not think that themes or ideas are as clearly definable as complexes, so I preferred, in general, to emphasize the former. My major response to Dale, for example, will be to ask this question: If the theme of apocalypticism is a continuity from John the Baptist, through Jesus into Paul, Q, and Mark, what distinctions must be made within it? Themes, in other words, are slightly more slippery than complexes and demand even more fine tuning for useful purposes.

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QUESTION 5

(John T. Bristow: Prophecy Historicized)

My inquiry relates to one of your special contributions to historical Jesus study, an amplifica-tion of a principle which you refer to as "prophecy historicized."

As a hypothesis, it makes sense—that stories about Jesus should be shaped to conform to (or "fulfill") scriptures that were regarded (or could be regarded) as messianic in nature.

However, given the number of hypotheses that have fallen into disappointing disfavor during past Jesus research, I am hesitant to embrace an appealing argument unless it can be supported by historical evidence. In the matter of "prophecy historicized," the only historical example that comes to my mind is that of Josephus, and it would seem to oppose reliance on this hypothesis.

Josephus’ enjoyment of patronage from Vespasian is affirmed by the very existence of Josephus1 writings. The report that this patronage arose from Josephus’ prediction that Vespa-sian would become emperor has the quality of legend, except that it is told so convincingly (Wars, III, 399-408; Life, 414-423) and it explains the extensive favors bestowed upon Josephus (land, books, liberation of some friends, Roman citizenship, lodging in the former palace, and a pension), favors that made his writings possible. As far as I am aware, the veracity of this account is not seriously disputed. However, the story is remarkably similar to that of Josephus’ name-source, Joseph bar Jacob, in his rise from prisoner to favored one with the Egyptian king (Gen. 40-41).

For me, the similarity between the stories of Joseph and Josephus urges us to be cautious in assuming that like similarities between reported incidences in the Gospels and passages in the Hebrew Bible are best regarded as "prophecies historicized."

Is this caution warrented? Are there historical data that lend support to the "prophecy historicized" hypothesis?

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

My term "prophecy historicized," John, was used originally for a very specific purpose. Granted the historicity of the crucifixion, where did all those detailed hour by hour, word by word, blow by blow, data come from? I asked whether it came from history remembered and answered that it came from prophecy historicized.

My negative reasons for that conclusion were (1) that nobody outside the Gospels ever mentioned any of them, (2) that everyone seemed very dependent on Mark and went their dramatically separate ways when they ran out of Mark at 16:8. It seemed difficult to explain how Matthew and Luke (for most scholars) and John (for some scholars) were so dependent on Mark1s narrative if everyone knew such a "history remembered" passion since the 30s.

The positive reason was that the overall structure, the individual units, and the particular texts of the passion narrative were all resonant in the background with Old Testament models, narrative and texts. My conclusion was, in that case, prophecy historicized was the best solution, not for the brutal fact of crucifixion but for all its attendant details. I would make, by the way, a similar argument for Matthew1s birth story. I am sure Jesus was actually born, but the details that Matthew gives are based on the popular Mosaic birth-stories current in the first century. Each case, however, where prophecy historicized is claimed, must be established on its own merits. I know, of course, no way in which one could disprove a position holding that God is controlling everything so that the details of such prophecies were being historically actualized in the life of Jesus. It is, however, one thing to suggest that Matthew invented Herod’s slaughter of the innocents to parallel Pharaoh1s. It is another to suggest that God did so in actuality.

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QUESTION 6

(Julio Zabatiero: Latin America)

In Latin America, biblical scholars are used to see the Historical Jesus as the leader of a popular movement of liberation of the peasant and poor people of Israelite cities. Some people say that this image of the Historical Jesus is born out  of a Marxist stance, so it is not reliable nor scientific. The same charge, however, could be leveled against other attempts to define a sociological portrait of Jesus. So, there would be an ideology-free method to recover and reconstruct the image of the historical Jesus? Or else, would that goal a worth one to be pursued?

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

I would not want, Julio, to get into an abstract argument on whether it is possible to have an ideology-free method to reconstruct the historical Jesus. With no definition of ideology submitted beforehand, that might be quicksand from which we would never recover. I do recognize, however, that the accusation of "Marxist exegesis" is for some people an easy way to dismiss questions of justice. The background from Jewish tradition, which I found most helpful for understanding the historical Jesus, was taken from the core of the Law and the Prophets (see BofC 182-208). It was the Law, for example, which insisted that God owned the land (Leviticus), that God, being just, the land must be distributed and maintained fairly, justly, and equitably among its owners, that land could not be bought and sold like any other commodity because land was the material basis of life, and that debts and foreclosures, the other easier way to obtain land than buying it, were to be carefully controlled and regulated. That tradition does not announce, in shining manifesto, that all Jews are created equal, but it attempts, in the small print of the Covenant, to make a stand against the continual growth of inequality. I find that same concern not just for social justice (too weak a word), but for divine justice on earth, throughout the prophets. They also insist that worship of God is not simply the necessary stroking of a transcendental Ego, but the attempt to live a life of justice here below in union with a God of justice there above (Jeremiah 7, for example). It is clear, I hope, that the justice involved is structural and systemic, rather than just individual or personal. Also that it is primarily a question of distributive rather than retributive justice. Marx may or may not have been working out of that halakhic-prophetic tradition, but calling it Marxist, does not make it go away.

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QUESTION 7

(Jim Crutchfield: Jokes & Stable Oral Tradition)

I would like to ask Professor Crossan whether he or others have considered jokes as a possible model for studying the stability of form and content in oral tradition, and, if so, what conclusions he has drawn in that regard.

It seems to me that jokes are the closest analogue we have for the sayings of Jesus as passed down through oral tradition. Like the parables, jokes are brief sayings whose specific details may vary, but whose variability is limited by the requirements of the form. While parable rarely have clear punch lines, yet their effectiveness may be said similarly to depend on the preservation of certain necessary elements.

Moreover, people tend to object when a joke-teller changes even incidental details of a familiar joke. Even though a new version may be just as funny as the old, somebody among the hearers is quite likely to say, "Well, I heard it like this:" and proceed to tell the traditional, normative version.

We know from old joke books that some jokes have been passed down virtually unchanged through several centuries. Although these jokes are written down and republished from time to time, I suspect that these "scribal" versions are not strongly influential in preventing changes in jokes. I think the form itself imposes a certain conservatism, which is reinforced by the natural conservatism of the audience: people like to hear a joke told a certain way.

Now certainly Jesus’s parables are far more subtle than most jokes, and clearly they have been modified by various retellers to serve new purposes (such as moralising, mystical allegory, etc.); and so the inherent pressure to preserve the basic form & content seem to be less. Yet I can’t help thinking that jokes are evidence that an oral tradition might well have preserved the original content of Jesus’s sayings rather more reliably than the evidence of traditional poetry and storytelling (analyzed to great effect in The Birth of Christianity) has led Prof. Crossan to conclude.

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

I am quite willing to discuss oral tradition in reconstructing Jesus, Jim, both in abstract theory and in specific example. The abstract theory in the BofC 59-89 (taken actually from experimental psychology and brain research) was intended as a warning about the problems of memory and orality. But none of that abstract theory is as important as the data that we have about the Jesus tradition itself. It is not impossible, a priori, that Jesus, even though illiterate, drilled his equally illiterate followers to memorize his aphorisms or parables. Neither is it impossible, a priori, that alley-scribes from the small towns of Galilee took down deliberately his sayings. My problem is that I do not find the evidence for that very compelling. Furthermore, and this is much more important, when I look at the way a writer like Matthew uses a written text like Mark by changing it so that what was gospel for Mark becomes gospel for Matthew, I do presume the possibility that similar effects would have gone on even in an oral tradition. In other words, I am quite aware that jokes can go on in more or less the same structural form across generations, but I do not find any similar process operative within the Jesus tradition. In fact, if a Jesus-fellow said to another Jesus-fellow "remember what the Lord said," that fellow would probably not be appealing so much to memory as to obedience. It would be a case, not just of remembering it, but of doing it. That is why I put more emphasis on continuity in life-style and not just on retention in good memory (mimetics over mnemonics, as I put it in BofC).

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QUESTION 8

(Davidson Loehr: Presuppositions)

My question comes from the left field where I roost. It has to do with the (in my view) necessity that Jesus Seminar folks make their own faith stances clear, their scientific/metaphysi-cal presuppositions. Tom Sheehan reminded us in October that this is one of the major features of Strauss’ Life of Jesus that’s been missing in the Seminar.

I’d suggest, as a minimum, that you/we make these two distinctions:

1. Difference between "Liberal" and "Literal" styles of religion, where we are all identified within the first not the second, and assume, with Philo, Origen et al that the key terms in religion are to be taken symbolically, metaphorically, parabolically, rather than literally. Or: that we think the literal reading is coherent only within a first century SCIENTIFIC worldview, which nobody today shares.

2. Difference between "liberal" and "conservative/literal" SCHOLARSHIP.

When faced with a conflict between scholarship and the received/traditional faith, liberal scholarship stays with the scholarship, no matter what it may do to the faith, conservative/literal scholarship stays with the received/tradition faith, even if they must ignore or bracket the scholarship.

Mind you, I’m not suggesting you duck questions like these. You’ve been pretty clear. But we’re talking, in part, about method, and I think that part of our method needs to be clarifying our presuppositions, and distinguishing between scholarship in the service of orthodoxy (conservative/literal) and scholarship in the service of evolving (unorthodox) truth.

What do you think? If you agree, can you think of a clearer way to do this? If you don’t think this is important, why not?

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

Since you were at the special Westar Institute’s Jesus Seminar on "The Once and Future Jesus," Davidson, you know not only what Tom Sheehan said, but what I said at that meeting. I proposed to my colleagues, including Tom, that we should all get out of the 19^th century and that the best way to enter the 21^st was to get back to the 1^st. I rejected then the extremes of 19^th century rationalism, one of which (let me call it secularism) said that events like divine or virginal conceptions, miraculous cures and supernatural phenomena, resurrections and ascensions, were simply impossible and therefore never happened because they never could. The other extreme (let me call it fundamentalism) admitted that those things did not happen normally or regularly, but insisted that they all had happened once in the past to our Jesus. Impossibility, on the one hand, fought with uniqueness, on the other. I claimed that both those positions were absolutely impossible in the first centuries of the common era. They were not, in other words, ancient options, but modern alternatives. Because of that, I do not find the disjunctive options you offer particularly helpful. They are actually unhistorical when applied to ancient times and until we get back to those ancient times, we will not understand what they took absolutely for granted culturally and socially (namely, that all those events could and did happen) and, only thereafter, understand the true alternatives that faced everybody involved (be they pro-or anti-Christian).

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QUESTION 9

( Mark Goodacre: Methodological Prerequisites)

Prof. Crossan wrote [see Question 3 response above]:

"That method would be perfectly right if one was studying Paul where, for example, nobody thinks that Romans has a three-level stratigraphy of materials from Paul himself, from the tradition after Paul, and from the final author of Romans. If the Gospels were like the Pauline Epistles, I would act exactly the same way that Tom does, If I thought they were four independent witnesses to the Jesus tradition, I would have, perforce, to work out a synthetic correlation just as Tom does. And in the end, the synoptic Jesus or the four-gospel Jesus, or the New Testament Jesus would be simply equated with the historical Jesus" Thank you for these interesting observations, here excerpted from your longer message. I would like to make two observations. First, the point about Tom Wright (for whom I nevertheless have the greatest respect and admiration) is astute. It occurred to me when reading his Jesus and the Victory of God that his procedure for the Jesus tradition does not substantially differ from his treatment of the epistles of Paul. And this in turn confirmed an observation when he lectured. He was simultaneously lecturing in Oxford, when I was an undergraduate, on the epistle to the Galatians and on the Synoptic Gospels and I could not help thinking that the difference between his approaches to each was not substantial—the attempt to find a controlling motif and run with it. And of course he did begin his academic studies as a scholar of Paul.

Second, I wonder about your comment that "in the end, the synoptic Jesus or the four-gospel Jesus, or the New Testament Jesus would be simply equated with the historical Jesus". Would it? Isn’t one of the points of your preface in The Historical Jesus that the primary Jesus material you have isolated is a score to be played etc. and that there are many possible performances? And if it is true that the work really begins after isolating the earliest, best attested material, surely the same would apply all the more if one were simply to take in all the Synoptic material as Tom does? i.e. one person’s historical Jesus taking for granted all the Synoptics would be quite different from another person’s historical Jesus taking for granted on all the Synoptics.

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

Thank you, Mark, for your experiences as a student with Tom Wright. I expect that bio-scholarly differences are probably operative between somebody like Tom who started with Paul and somebody like myself who started with Jesus.

With regard to your question about a plurality of synoptic Jesuses, my answer would be: yes, of course. But my point still stands. If you are reconstructing the historical Jesus, you may well end up with different Jesuses (I have no problem with that, by the way, and expect it to happen). But if we agreed, for example, that we are trying to do synthetic reconstructions of a synoptic Jesus, or of a four-gospel Jesus or of a New Testament Jesus, the diverse results would be precisely of those types of Jesus. We would still, from my point of view, not be talking of the historical Jesus unless, of course, we took it for granted as a presupposition, that any synoptic Jesus (or canonical or credal one) would be the same as the historical Jesus. I hope that’s clearer.

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QUESTION 10

(Mahlon Smith: Johannine Dependence?)

There is one point, Dom, that I’ve wanted to probe you on since our brief exchange regarding the source of the Passion Narratives at the end of the Jesus Seminar debate. It has to deal with your argument for dependence of the three other gospel’s passion narratives on Mark.

Let me preface it by saying it isn’t easy to find fault in public with the thinking of a long-time colleague & friend, particularly one with whom one basically agrees & from whom one has learned so much. But I raise this in the interest of historical clarity regarding materials & consistency regarding method, two points which you yourself regard as basic & concerning which this e-Seminar was convened.

In BoC (114) you write: "Hence my third major presupposition about the intracanonical gospels is that John is dependent on the synoptic gospels at least and especially for the passion narratives...and for the resurrection narratives....Once again, if that is wrong, everything that I build on it is invalid."

I would agree. While I have no desire to prove your monumental historical edifice invalid, I would like you to reexamine & clarify the basis for your "third major presupposition" regarding the relation of the contents of the intracanonical gospels. You yourself write (BoC 113) that you are "*not yet* convinced about the dependence of the [Johannine] miracle/discourse sections" parallel to the synoptics. And I think rightly so, given the difficulties in demonstrating 4G’s version of this material represents redaction of any synoptic text. Therefore, you characterize your views thus (BoC 112): "My own position presumes both independence and dependence."

Now it seems to me that if one is prepared to grant the substantial independence of one work from the contents of another, then any suspicion of dependence of any section must be supported by more than one observation about one point in the text. Otherwise one would be forced to conclude with Farrerites & Griesbachians that Luke knew & used Matthew because of the not so minor non-Markan agreement at the conclusion of their PN accounts of the Sanhedrin trial when the judges ask a blindfolded J: TIS ESTIN hO PAISAS SE? (Matt 26:68//Luke 22:65).

Now I take it that neither you nor I think that this parallel is sufficient evidence to demonstrate Lukan dependence on Matthew or reason to discard Q, given the demonstrable independence of Matthean & Lukan narratives at other major points. Yet in the case of John, as far as I can tell, you rest your whole argument for dependence on the synoptics on the single claim of finding "Markan DNA" in the Johannine account of Peter’s denials.

In the abstract this argument seems impressive;

1. Mark typically intercalates originally independent scenes - granted.

2. Like Mark 4G frames J’s interrogation by the high priest with elements of the story of Peter’s denial [A1-B-A2] - also granted.

What I question, however, is whether these general observations are sufficient evidence to identify the DNA in 4G as "Markan." To identify DNA one has to match minute particulars of extended chains of elements.

And that is precisely what is lacking here. You yourself recognize that 4G divides the account of Peter’s denials differently than Mark (BoC 113, 565). Therefore, admittedly the DNA in these pericopes is not identical but a mutation. Johannine A1 & A2 is demonstrably not the same

as Markan A1 & A2. But the direction of any mutation can only be determined by sampling other material.

Here what you have apparently overlooked—or at least failed to mention—that Johannine element B (an informal interrogation in the house of the high priest) is totally different from Markan element B (a formal trial before the council of priests & elders concluding in a formal condemnation for blasphemy). It seems to me anyone who maintains that 4G’s PN is dependent on the synoptics has to be prepared to explain why the author of 4G (of all people) would have suppressed the synoptic account of a formal Jewish trial of Jesus which finds him guilty of the charge that 4G twice earlier identified as "the Jews" reason for seeking J’s execution (Jn 5:18 & 10:33). Isn’t it more plausible that the synoptics would have turned an original midnight interrogation before Passover in the Johannine source (=SG expanded to include PN) into a formal trial during Passover than vice versa?

So your argument seems to rest solely on your a priori conviction that literary intercalation of two scenes is a "peculiarly or even uniquely Markan literary-theological structure" (BoC). I would grant that it is "typically" Markan. But not "peculiar" or "even unique" since it also appears in 4G’s PN & there is no text of 4G from which it is absent. The fact that Mark makes more use of it is not adequate proof either that he invented it or that anyone else who used this structure knew the gospel of Mark. For repetition of a verbal or structural pattern can be & often is interpreted as a sign of dependence of one text on another, as in the case of Matt’s duplication of material from both Mark & Q.

Thus, I have trouble granting your claim of "Markan" DNA in 4G & even more trouble viewing the Johannine PN as a whole as dependent on the synoptic PN given its demonstrable differences in both chronology & content. Yet, I do think it plausible that both PN performances are traceable to a single common source. And my hunch is that in many particulars the Johannine version is closer to the original than the synoptic.

I eagerly await your response.

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

This is a question, Mahlon, on which you and I may have to agree to disagree because I am not sure if I have any particularly new or additional arguments to make (besides the BofC arguments there are also, of course, the more detailed ones in debate with the late Ray Brown on just this question.)

I begin with a few words of scholarly bio not to prove anything one way or the other, but to assess where prejudice might be involved. When I wrote In Fragments, one of the several preparatory books as I worked towards The Historical Jesus, I convinced myself that John had an independent collection of miracle stories and Jesus sayings which he had combined into a format characteristically his own in which physical miracles were symbols of spiritual phenomena.

When, therefore, I turned to the passion narratives (as a later stage of that overall process towards the big book) my presumption was that John was independent in his passion narrative. What changed that presumption (apart from Louvain arguments) was the following twofold conclusion. What persuades me that any Text B is dependent on any Text A is two arguments: (a) Some redactional sequence or content of A is found, however changed, in B; and (b) that you are able to explain all the changes made by Text B in adopting/adapting Text A. I need both those arguments together to feel sure about and argument for dependence. In the present case a Markan intercalation found in John’s passion narrative is my argument (a). By the way, an intercalation, as proposed by Markan scholars, is never simply the interruption of one point, the completion of that second point, and then the reversion to complete the first point. It always involves that literary structure for a definite theological purpose, namely, to let the intertwined stories vibrate hermeneutically with one another. I do think, with those scholars that that is quite a unique Markan phenomenon. That claim is not, a priori and I would disagree with your use of that term. It is a literary conclusion about Markan redaction which then becomes a literary presupposition for Johannine dependence.

Finally, and this is most important with regard to the (b) argument. After finding that Markan fingerprint, my hypothesis was to test Johannine dependence. Not just in that one section, but in the entire passion burial tradition. I could understand all the major changes in John’s narrative on a very simple principal. Take Mark, in particular, or the synoptic tradition in general, and put Jesus in total charge and control of his own execution and burial. Now see what you come up with. You come up with John. That includes the diminution of the "Jewish" trial to emphasize the "Roman" trial. From all of that, my present working hypothesis is John’s dependence on the synoptics for his passion narrative.

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QUESTION 11

(David Hester Amador : Presuppositions)

Thank you for your thoughtful response [to Question 1 above], and since my concerns will be more tangential to the current conversation as it is shaping up, I’ll try not to interrupt the conversation too often, or demand one thread of it continue along my interests.

Along with Davidson Loehr [see Question 8 above], however, I am also interested in the presuppositions, presumptions, judgments and values at work behind this whole question of method, not because I think we should find a way to transform our discipline into something that can escape them, nor because I want to elicit a ‘confession’ of where you are coming from. I do not believe we can escape the values inherent in our disciplinary efforts, nor should we. And I do not believe we gain anything by sociological/ideological ‘confessionalism’, which is an academic counterpart to the high-school proclivity of saying, ‘well, that’s just your/my opinion’.

What I want to ask, however, is whether it would be of any interest to you to engage in a discussion that I know my students who are on-line are very interested in overhearing, perhaps even participating in: when you say something like, "I choose to develop this method/ology, because it is better than the ones I have seen around," I am wondering if you would care to reflect a bit on: better at doing what?

And such a question is ‘intended’ to elicit something more than the answer "at doing history", because it is precisely this that I have been wondering about in my own research: what does it mean to do history, esp. history about Jesus? what do you hope to achieve? what are the effects of choosing these particular methods and their goals within a disciplinary paradigm of new testament studies as historical research? who is historical research FOR and who is it AGAINST?

I suspect that at least part of the answer is something like: it is FOR those interested in coming to grips, as best they can, with the best possible reconstruction of the life of Jesus, and it is AGAINST dogma. But then, I begin to wonder: there sure appears to be something quite dogmatic about what we do as scholars (not just with respect to the results of inquiry, nor particularly the methods of inquiry, but also that what we do as historians should not be associated with or answerable to dogma).

I have been asking and wondering and searching for answers to what appears to be a very simple questions, but ends up being quite complex: just what is OUR ‘dogma’, and can we be quite sure that 1) church dogmatics do not (should not?) enter in and 2) historical (disciplinary) dogmatics do not (should not?) enter in?

I know I’m not being clear, and I apologize for it. And please know, I do not have any hidden ‘agenda’, but am engaged in an understanding of the ramifications of our discipline’s habits. I was once very intrigued in pursuing historical Jesus research, but started wondering about what it was we thought we were doing? I suppose you can say that as a scholar, I experienced a ‘crisis of faith’ with respect to our field, only it wasn’t a ‘crisis’ (more an intriguing series of unasked questions) and I really wasn’t very ‘faithful’ to our discipline to begin with.

I am only hoping that some of these questions might be of interest to you, too?

Thank you so much!

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

Once again, David, we are concerned with the borderline between abstract theory and concrete example. I concede that if we stay in theory we could easily persuade ourselves that historical reconstruction can never be done, that we are so locked into bias and prejudice, opinion and viewpoint, that all we can ever do is operate power plays on one another. And maybe at this stage I am willing to announce one foundational presupposition (dogma, if you prefer), namely, that historical reconstruction can and must be done. I presume the definition that I gave you in BofC (p. 20) for historical reconstruction. Why is that a foundational presupposition? Because we believe that we live under law and we think that in matters of life and death twelve people can reconstruct the past beyond a reasonable doubt. If there is no historical reconstruction possible, there is no life under law possible either. Is it necessary to emphasize all those times when reconstruction occurs incorrectly? My point is very simple, and I am repeating myself from BofC. Due process in legal indictment or historical reconstruction demands self conscious and self critical assessment of what we are doing, how we are doing it, and why we are doing it that way rather than some other. The better your due process, the better your method. But, in summary, historical reconstruction would be impossible (in theoretical debate) if it was not necessary (in actual life). Finally, you ask "Who is historical research "FOR" and who is it "AGAINST." I agree with you that it is for anyone who considers it important in general life or significant in an individual case, but I would not say it is "AGAINST dogma." Historical reconstruction is against all those who say it cannot be done in general or it should not be done in this particular case. It is also against those who say the first when they mean the second (sorry about that repetition from the opening paragraph of The Historical Jesus).

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Question 12

(Robert M Schacht: Methodological Prerequisites)

Professor Crossan wrote:

"My term "prophecy historicized," John, was used originally for a very specific purpose. Granted the historicity of the crucifixion, where did all those detailed hour by hour, word by word, blow by blow, data come from? I asked whether it came from history remembered and answered that it came from prophecy historicized" [see Question 5 response].

Thank you for responding to this question (and thanks to John Bristow for asking it), because it was something I wanted to ask you about anyway. What I really like about this section of your book (May I refer to it as TBOC? [also known as BofC])  is that it poses here two alternative hypotheses, which you name above, to explain different versions of a particular event. You then proceed to summarize your argument against the first hypothesis, labelled "history remembered":

 "My negative reasons for that conclusion were (1) that nobody outside the Gospels ever mentioned any of them, (2) that everyone seemed very dependent on Mark and went their dramatically separate ways when they ran out of Mark at 16:8."

Before they go their separate ways, however, there are two important pericopes found in all 4 canonical gospels plus the Gospel of Peter: the Burial in the Tomb (Mark 15:42-47 and parallels, including Gospel of Peter 6:1-4; 8:1-6), and the Empty Tomb (Mark 16:1-8 and parallels, including Gospel of Peter 12:1-13:3). I know you doubt the historicity of these passages, but they both must be from the first or second earliest strata of texts. I will return to these pericopes below.

You said: "It seemed difficult to explain how Matthew and Luke (for most scholars) and John (for some scholars) were so dependent on Mark’s narrative if everyone knew such a ‘history remembered’ passion since the 30s."

Here, and in the book, your summary of evidence against the first hypothesis certainly has merit.

You then summarize evidence for the second hypothesis, prophecy historicized:

"The positive reason was that the overall structure, the individual units, and the particular texts of the passion narrative were all resonant in the background with Old Testament models, narrative and texts. My conclusion was, in that case, prophecy historicized was the best solution, not for the brutal fact of crucifixion but for all its attendant details."

All of its attendant details? Including the Burial in a Tomb and the Empty Tomb? It seems to me that, while this is a promising start for supporting evidence for the second hypothesis, it is incomplete in important respects. It is plausible, but not compelling (unless one prefers explanations of this kind).

One problem is that you have to patch together a number of different Old Testament sources—I count six of them in TBOC p. 521. This is a rather elaborate patchwork. It would be more compelling if the author was historicizing one "prophecy" rather than six fragments from here and there (and actually a seventh—see below).

Another problem, as I read your summary in TBOC, was that this was an ad hoc explanation, unique to this set of texts. Ad hoc explanations are, in general, weaker than those that appeal to established literary principles. Therefore I appreciate that in your response to this question, that you now add another "instance" of similar use of prophecy:

You said: "I would make, by the way, a similar argument for Matthew’s birth story. I am sure Jesus was actually born, but the details that Matthew gives are based on the popular Mosaic birth-stories current in the first century. Each case, however, where prophecy historicized is claimed, must be established on its own merits."

It is this last sentence that I have difficulty with. If "prophecy historicized" is a legitimate explanation, then it should be a literary device the use of which is somewhat predictable. That is, it might be the literary device of choice for particular authors, in particular circumstances, in predictable ways, rather than each instance being totally unique. Which of the evangelists do you credit with initiating the use of  this literary device?

Was itMark? Although I do not find this argument in TBOC, I do find in the Acts of Jesus (AJ) p. 160 an appeal to Joshua 10:26-27 to explain the origin of the Burial in a Tomb pericope. All versions of the Empty Tomb passages, according to AJ 465, share these elements: it is the first day of the week or the Lord’s Day, Mary of Magdala is present, the stone has been removed, the tomb is empty, and the women are given a message by an angelic figure and leave. I have not found thus far any OT precedent to explain the core elements of this pericope. Whence came this core story, if it is not historical? Do you consider it to be a logical projection from the Resurrection tradition (1 Corinthians 15:3-8)?

Was it Matthew or Luke? Both Matthew and Luke have elaborate passion accounts. If they did not get the idea of historicizing prophecy from Mark, on the Q hypothesis they either came up with the same idea (i.e., to historicize prophecy) independently, or else they got it from Q or some other common source other than Mark. And since you name Matthew’s birth story as prophecy historicized, does the same apply to Luke’s birth story? If so, did he come up with the idea independently, or pick it up from Matthew or another source?

Here is another important question: How do they know which prophecies to historicize?  Why do they choose to historicize certain prophecies and not others? That is, what triggers the use of this literary device? To ignore these triggers is to suggest that the historicizing appeared ex nihilo, which makes no sense to me. Was the Empty Tomb story or the Resurrection tradition the nucleus around which various prophecies could be historicized?

If these questions can be answered, then we’d know how and under what circumstances prophecies were historicized, and your explanation of the passion narratives, the Matthean birth narrative, and similar texts would be much more compelling.

To summarize with a focus on methodology, I find ad hoc explanations less compelling than those based on established principles, and suggest that whenever we can define and establish such principles, we have a firmer basis for reconstruction and interpretation. Your suggestion regarding "prophecy historicized" shows some promise in this regard, but needs more work to advance from the "plausible" to the "probable," IMHO.

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

With regard to empty tomb tradition in Mark and those dependent on Mark, I did mention the Joshua texts in The Cross that Spoke and Who Killed Jesus?, but I did not think of them as using biblical prophecy so much as using a simple biblical model. In other words, I did not make much of it. My understanding of the empty tomb tradition, by that I mean the story in Mark 16:1-8, is that Mark created it for two purposes. One was to avoid apparitions in general and ones to Peter and/or the Inner Three and/or the Twelve in particular since his gospel is a radical and continual criticism of them, and (b) to leave a desolate emptiness  between resurrection and parousia, consonant with the persecutions and sufferings that his own community had suffered in the first Jewish war. In other words, I find it almost predictable having read Mark 1-15 that he would have to end it with something like 16.

In the case of Mark, in other words, that conclusion is not really prophecy historicized, but "history" actualized. That is he ends the story not by telling us what happened in the past, but by telling us what is appropriate to his present community. I would describe Mark 16:1-8 as parable, not history.

You asked about how one knows what prophecies to historicize. Since all such activities begin in the present and go back into the past to understand that present and project the future, they always know what they are looking for. After the execution of Jesus, for example, they are going back to anywhere in their tradition that tells them that the righteous one(s) is/are oppressed, persecuted and even martyred. It is very easy to find what you want, when you know what you are looking for. Everyone was doing it. Virgil knew exactly what had to be painted on that shield in the Aeneid because he was going to find the story of Caesar Augustus promised upon it. The Pharisees knew what to find as oral tradition at Mt. Sinai because they knew what they needed for their present understanding of the law. The Essenes knew what they needed to comprehend their present situation and had no trouble finding it looking backwards. The Christians were just doing what everyone else was doing to understand their own experiences.

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QUESTION 13

(Bob MacDonald: On Sayers)

In your overall statement of method (BoC p. 93), you imply that source and redaction criticism might be ‘wrong’. "If it is wrong, any historical reconstruction of Jesus built upon it is methodologically invalid." I first heard The twelve radio plays of Dorothy Sayers, The Man Born to be King, (BoC p.91) some 28 years ago (circa ‘72 Easter Saturday on CBC, 12 hours in a row). As I have thought about this experience, it has struck me that the point of good drama about the Life of Jesus is not to uncover historical ‘fact’ but to reveal present experience. Sayers uses her detective skills along with the populist reconstruction of "Who Moved the Stone?" (F. Morrison) to arrive at a set of plays that moved her audience such that the un-critical would ask from week to week, ‘Eh mate, is that really in the Bible? - show me where.’ (May I say that I also am moved by BoC with gratitude to its author - I particularly love the rejected title ‘Life after Jesus’ and the invitation to justice.).

It seems to me that your contrast between Sayers story-telling and the three ‘-criticisms’ is not so much one of conflict of ‘common sense against the eccentricity of scholarship’ as one of differing audiences. What is ‘methodologically invalid’ may still be moving - As Sayers puts it in the mouth of one of her characters: "Right in art is right in practice".

[In one of the surprising turns of my own life, I find myself cast in the role of story teller. I would wish that others much better trained in languages, culture, history, and text than I would also write more (eg as Gerd Thiesen has attempted)].

Granted that Sayers and Morrison come from a different time in the history of criticism, what advice do you have for story tellers today who, while recognizing the (potential) peril of a literalist view of ‘history’, still want together with others to rejoice in the Presence of the Holy One of Israel, incarnate through the Spirit in our own time as in 1943 CE or for that matter the first year of Domitian or the eighth of Claudius, and incarnate in the flesh from about the time of Caesar Augustus when Quirinius was governor of Syria till about the 17^th year of Tiberius. Thanks for your good story written for us.

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

I think my answer to you, Bob, is very redundant with the answer to Davidson [see Question 8 response above]. I cannot accept that our historical reconstruction of Jesus is just about present experience. Nor would I be willing to accept the statement that "right in art is right in practice." I am quite ready to admit that my historical reconstruction, like any other historical reconstruction, could be wrong in part or in whole. But I am not ready to agree that it is simply a good story. It makes claims about what actually happened, as best that can be reconstructed. Its alternative is another reconstruction making similar claims. An example. Imagine I am writing an historical novel about Jesus and everyone recognizes the intended genre. If I have him born at Nazareth or Bethlehem, if I have Mary an adulterer and Jesus a bastard or Mary a virginal birth and Jesus divine, what sort of claims am I making in that "story?" I must say it scares me very much to use an argument that something must be true because it "moved an audience." I would want, whether we are dealing with story or history, fiction or fact, at least to know to what did the presentation move them?

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QUESTION 14

(Davidson Loehr: Do we care?)

Playing off the great question from Julio Zabatiero [see Question 6 response above], if we approve of the real-world use made of this Latin American imaginative Jesus, if it fits the needs of that situation better than any other, do we care? (Yes, this means we have to share the political goals of the people who have created their Jesus to fit their needs—well, haven’t we done that too? Creating a nonsupernatural Jesus to fit our nonsupernatural worldview?)

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

I could never agree, Davidson, that it is ethically correct simply to equate story and history (or memoir and fiction). All history may be story, but all story is not history. When you do historical reconstruction, you are making certain claims, certainly within the possibilities of human error, but you still are asserting that something happened. A story does not need to make any such claims. It can contain profound truths about human nature, but it does not claim that what it describes actually happened. If oppressed peasants want to make up any stories they want about Jesus, they have every right to do so and, indeed, those who oppress them may equally well be making up stories to justify what they are doing. But to claim historical reconstruction is to make a different claim. Let me recall the terrible example I used in BofC. If a young girl accuses her father of sexual abuse, it is necessary to decide whether that is a story (however sincerely she may believe it) or a history (it is what actually happened).

 

QUESTION 15

(Sukie Curtis: Literal vs. Metaphorical)

In your response to Davidson Loehr [see Question 8 response above], you wrote concerning "events like divine or virginal conceptions, miraculous cures and supernatural phenomena, resurrections and ascensions," that for the first centuries of the common era the modern alternatives of "impossibility" vs. "uniqueness" were not "ancient options." Rather, you wrote, "They are actually unhistorical when applied to ancient times and until we get back to those ancient times, we will not understand what they took absolutely for granted culturally and socially (namely, that all those events could and did happen) and, only thereafter, understand the true alternatives that faced everybody involved (be they pro-or anti-Christian)."

I take that to mean that those in the first centuries of the common era believed such events could and did actually, literally, physically happen, and could and did happen to pagans as well as Jews as well as Christians.

You have also said and written that (forgive the paraphrase) at the Enlightenment we got dumb and took those first centuries stories (of such events) literally instead of metaphorically; that the ancients told powerful metaphorical stories, and we (condescendingly) assumed they had meant them literally, which of course we were too smart to do!

Is there some contradiction there, between asserting that the ancients believed such events could and did happen, and yet their stories of such events were metaphorical rather than literal? Or by "could and did happen," do you mean they spoke and wrote AS IF such things could and did happen, but it was all understood and meant metaphorically and symbolically?

 

RESPONSE
(John Dominic Crossan)

I presume, Sukie, that the ancients, like the moderns, lived on a spectrum between 100% literal and 100% metaphorical on any and all of their foundational or even vitally significant stories. By moderns I am thinking about those people who buy the tabloid press and whether they believe its contents. When Sarah and I stand at the checkout counter and spend the time reading the front of those papers and study what inquiring minds want to know, I do not have the faintest idea, even though I live in the same world as the people who buy them, where they take them on that spectrum from 100% literal to 100% metaphorical. Worse still, I have not the faintest idea of how one could ever find out precisely. I am not even sure those people who buy them would be able to answer it themselves.

However, the major point I wish to make is that wherever ancients were on that spectrum as they accept foundational stories, it was not culturally viable for them to use IMPOSSIBLE (as attack) or UNIQUE (as defense), as opposing alternatives. Let me presume the seminar’s permission and maybe push its indulgence a little by copying at the end of this reply two texts. They are both from the period in which Christians and pagans stopped simply calling one another names and tried to give arguments against one another’s position. The first text is from Justin Martyr around the year 150 giving a pro-Jesus apologetic. The second is from the pagan writer Celsus (via Origen) giving an anti- Jesus polemic from around 180.  I imagine them, as it were, in conversation with one another. Notice the argument, and especially that they agree on the core question which is not about impossibility versus uniqueness, but inferiority versus superiority. Justin argues that divinities have always produced virginal conceptions, divine births, miraculous healings, final resurrections, and heavenly ascensions (he misses second comings, however.) So also he argues with Jesus. No argument about uniqueness. BUT, he argues, and will continue to do so, all of those products rolled up together in a ball are not worth Jesus’ little finger (that’s my rough translation). Celsus’ argument is remarkably the same. Jesus is part of, and maybe copied from, all such stories. But what has he ever done for anyone? They both accept, in other words, that such stories are possibly true (once again I leave it wide open where they are on that spectrum of literal/metaphorical). But their debate is about superiority-shown-by action. If I claim, in those centuries that Jesus can heal, I must be ready to argue, indicate, and prove that he does it as well or better (or maybe cheaper?) than does Asclepius. As long as we debate impossibility versus uniqueness, we are not in that cultural world. Inferiority versus superiority (for whom and how decided?), now that’s a valid ancient question. Allow me then to attach the texts because they are absolutely constitutive from my own understanding of antiquity in argumentation about Jesus’ status:

1. Pro-Jesus Apologetics (note core pro-argument that "the superior is revealed by His actions"):

Justin Martyr, First Apology 21-22: "And when we say also that the Word, who is the first-birth of God, was produced without sexual union, and that He, Jesus Christ, our Teacher, was crucified and died, and rose again, and ascended into heaven, we propound nothing different from what you believe regarding those whom you esteem sons of Jupiter. For you know how many sons your esteemed writers ascribed to Jupiter: Mercury, the interpreting word and teacher of all; Aesculapius, who, though he was a great physician, was struck by a thunderbolt, and so ascended to heaven; and Bacchus too, after he had been torn limb from limb; and Hercules, when he had committed himself to the flames to escape his toils; and the sons of Leda, and Dioscuri; and Perseus, son of Danae; and Bellerophon, who, though sprung from mortals, rose to heaven on the horse Pegasus. For what shall I say of Ariadne, and those who, like her, have been declared to be set among the stars? And what of the emperors who die among yourselves, whom you deem worthy of deification, and in whose behalf you produce some one who swears he has seen the burning Caesar rise to heaven from the funeral pyre? And what kind of deeds are recorded of each of these reputed sons of Jupiter, it is needless to tell to those who already know. This only shall be said, that they are written for the advantage and encouragement of youthful scholars; for all reckon it an honorable thing to imitate the gods. But far be such a thought concerning the gods from every well-conditioned soul, as to believe that Jupiter himself, the governor and creator of all things, was both a parricide and the son of a parricide, and that being overcome by the love of base and shameful pleasures, he came in to Ganymede and those many women whom he had violated and that his sons did like actions. But, as we said above, wicked devils perpetrated these things. And we have learned that those only are deified who have lived near to God in holiness and virtue; and we believe that those who live wickedly and do not repent are punished in everlasting fire. Moreover, the Son of God called Jesus, even if only a man by ordinary generation, yet, on account of His wisdom, is worthy to be called the Son of God; for all writers call God the Father of men and gods. And if we assert that the Word of God was born of God in a peculiar manner, different from ordinary generation, let this, as said above, be no extraordinary thing to you, who say that Mercury is the angelic word of God. But if any one objects that He was crucified, in this also He is on a par with those reputed sons of Jupiter of yours, who suffered as we have now enumerated. For their sufferings at death are recorded to have been not all alike, but diverse; so that not even by the peculiarity of His sufferings does He seem to be inferior to them; but, on the contrary, as we promised in the preceding part of this discourse, we will now prove Him superior ‹ or rather have already proved Him to be so ‹ for the superior is revealed by His actions. And if we even affirm that He was born of a virgin, accept this in common with what you accept of Perseus. And in that we say that He made whole the lame, the paralytic, and those born blind, we seem to say what is very similar to the deeds said to have been done by Aesculapius.

2. Anti-Jesus Polemics (note core argument: "what have you done [Jesus] by word or deed that is quite so wonderful as those heroes of old?"):

Celsus (ex Origen), On the True Doctrine.  Are we to think that the high God would have fallen in love with a woman of no breeding? .... After all, the old myths of the Greeks that attribute a divine birth to Perseus, Amphion, Aeacus and Minos are equally good evidence of their wondrous works on behalf of mankind - and are certainly no less lacking in plausibility than the stories of your followers. What have you done [Jesus] by word or deed that is quite so wonderful as those heroes of old?.... Has there ever been such an incompetent planner: When he was in the body, he was disbelieved but preached to everyone; after his resurrection, apparently wanting to establish a strong faith, he chooses to show himself to one woman and a few comrades only. When he was punished, everyone saw; yet risen from the tomb, almost no one.

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QUESTION 16

(Jeff Peterson: : Paul as Primary Source for Jesus)

I have a question regarding the value of the genuine Pauline letters as sources for the historical Jesus. I was struck by the statement early in THE BIRTH OF CHRISTIANITY that "if you begin with Paul, you will interpret Jesus incorrectly; if you begin with Jesus, you will interpret Paul differently" (p. xxi). In one sense this is incontestable: if by "beginning with Paul" one means beginning with Paul’s developed theology, Christology, etc. and attributing them to Jesus (as e.g. Jeremias did to a degree).

But in another sense it seems entirely proper to begin with Paul, as his letters constitute our earliest extant sources for the character of Jesus’ ministry, written at least a decade before any of the Gospels (and arguably a decade before Q, as well, since Q 13:34-35 may presuppose the fall of Jerusalem). The half-dozen or so explicit references to Jesus’ earthly ministry in Paul’s letters constitute the earliest securely datable pieces of Jesus tradition we have. Further, whereas we have no really firm information aobut the provenance of material preserved in the Gospels, we know that the tradent who speaks to us in the Corpus Paulinum was in personal contact with apostles of the earthly Jesus like Peter and John, as well as with members of Jesus’ family like James. Paul’s reliability is commended not only by Dodd’s famous observation that one can’t imagine him spending the whole of his fortnight as Cephas’s houseguest talking about the weather, but also by the fact that to complete the collection for Jerusalem Paul arranged to put those to whom he retailed his Jesus traditions in close proximity with these very authorities and with the community in which they were active (1 Cor 16:1-4). It’s most unlikely that Paul gave his churches a portrait of Jesus that could be falsified by Peter, James, et al., and the house churches they nurtured.

It’s routine to downplay the Pauline testimonia, but they yield a definite profile: Jesus, born of Davidic ancestry (Rom 1:3) and reared under Torah (Gal 4:4), executed some sort of DIAKONIA among Israel (Rom 15:8); commissioned emissaries (1 Cor 9:14) among whom was a group known as "the Twelve" (1 Cor 15:5); taught his followers about such matters as the indissolubility of marriage (1 Cor 7:10-11), the conduct of their mission (1 Cor 9:14 again), and—perhaps most surprisingly—his own (posthumous?) return in glory (1 Thess 4:15-17); instituted a memorial supper that bound his disciples together after his death (1 Cor 11:23-25); and was ultimately executed as an enemy of the Roman order (1 Cor 1:23 et al.), not without Judean involvement (1 Thess 2:14-15, if authentic). Paul doesn’t ascribe any wonders to the earthly Jesus, but he regards such as the distinguishing marks of those sent in Jesus’ name (2 Cor 12:11-12), and it’s not unreasonable to conclude that he understood their master to have acted similarly. Had the Synoptics not been preserved, the Pauline evidence would still allow us to reconstruct a figure congruent with their protagonist, and to conclude that this representation of Jesus was current in the first two to three decades of the Christian movement. And this is the only representation of Jesus that we can so securely date to the movement’s first generation.

As BIRTH OF CHRISTIANITY amply attests, one of the principal challenges for Jesus research is that the sources don’t permit us to "begin with Jesus." Instead, we must begin with surviving accounts of Jesus and weigh the historical value of the traditions they preserve. My question, then, is whether any reconstruction of Jesus that does not take account of the Pauline testimonia—either by making them foundational or by showing cause for disregarding them—can justly claim to be historical.

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

Jeff, you cited my comment in BofC that "if you begin with Paul, you will interpret Jesus incorrectly; if you begin with Jesus, you will interpret Paul differently" (p. xxi). It indicated two dangers: one about content/theology, another about materials/method. You accepted one danger: reading Jesus’ theology through Pauline glasses. The other was mentioned in the earlier conversation between Mark and myself: methodology for (authentic) Pauline materials does not and should not involve the sort of stratigraphic and genetic analyses required by gospel source criticism. Therefore, one might argue, it should not be used in Jesus studies either. I disagree.

But your main point was about the fact that "it’s routine to downplay the Pauline testimonia." On the one hand, I think it would have been important for you to mention that I emphatically do use some very important Pauline material which he himself declares to be pre-Pauline in order to understand the Jerusalem community (you cited Dodd’s comment, which I would also accept). It is very possible to raise a strong counter-argument that Paul got nothing from Jerusalem but everything from Antioch. In BofC I was trying to investigate the alternative hypothesis, namely that, following Koester, you could use pre-Pauline material to understand the Jerusalem community. On the other hand, you are quite right that I did not use what you detail as the "Pauline testimonia" about Jesus. I’m going to pick up that question later in responding to Johan, but I think it is a perfectly valid question to use those testimonia about Jesus. I did not do so probably because of my emphasis on complexes rather than themes. But I would make one postscript here. If we did not have the gospels or could expunge them completely from our minds, I do not find a very clear picture of Jesus from those testimonia alone. I am not at all sure I would know why the Romans actually crucified him. Or be very sure about how or why "the Jews" were involved in that execution. I would certainly know about execution and resurrection, but bereft of the gospels and using only Pauline testimonia, I would find myself happily at home in another mystery religion. Maybe it is possible, because I know I have never tried, to take those testimonia and without in any way cheating derive a full historical picture of Jesus from them. But I am not as confident as you are that it could be done very convincingly. In general conclusion, I tend to date the Pauline letters and the Q Gospel to the 50s and the challenge for me is to try and understand two such divergent wings within earliest Christianity at a very early stage without making either of them more foundational than the other.

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QUESTION 17

(David Hester Amador: More ‘normal’ issues)

As an aside, but very much a part of what is shaping up to be the dominant conversational topic:

I’m pretty sure it has been amply demonstrated by Vernon Robbins and Burton Mack, in their marvelous book Patterns of Persuasion, that form criticism in particular is simply wrong in its model of communication, notably ancient communication and rhetorical instruction.

Question:  what kind of an impact would this have upon reliance upon source and redaction criticism?  If we have found that our communicative models and presumptions simply run contrary to the evidence from ancient progymnasmata and handbooks, does this have radical ramifications upon these other methods as well?

Secondly: I am fascinated by the presumption of ‘development’ that dominates our field.  Namely, that one starts with the ‘simple’ and works to the more ‘complex’.  I see it at work time and again, but also in your own work: with respect to the Passion Narratives, you suggest something like a trajectory from GPeter, Mark, Matthew, John, based upon both a source-critical foundation (John is later, for example) and upon a developmental schema that suggests one starts with less inflammatory (GPet) and grows to more inflammatory rhetoric (John).  Why?  What evidence can you cite to verify such a trajectory, esp. among such divergent communities as these four sources represent?  For example, social movements rhetoric criticism does not necessarily demonstrate such a trajectory among groups with diverging populations.  Indeed, it has documented the early presence of rather caustic rhetoric, and a possibility of many responses (from reconciliation to separation), not to mention a very short period of time in which this can happen (not the decades your model would have to assume).

From another angle: What happens if John is shown to be earlier than Mark, or at least as early and independent of it?

Can’t we find something as potentially useful as your conclusions are without having to depend so much upon very dubious, but widely held assumptions re: early xian mythmaking and its chronology and development?  Better: I wonder what wonderful, chaotic, new worlds of social experimentation we can uncover if we let go of some of our very poor, 19^th century literary models?

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

As you probably realize, David, my use of form criticism in BofC and probably elsewhere earlier is almost negligible. Its program of linking form to function was theoretically unsound and practically impossible. I do not want to argue that here and there certain formal conclusions were not helpful, but I know of very few functional ones that work.

On the other hand, I consider source criticism, for example, that Matthew and Luke used Mark and that we have Mark to understand such usages, to be constitutive for historical criticism of the gospels. Without that relatively secure basis, I would find myself walking on very thin ice forever. In other words, no conclusions about "patterns of persuasion" in the ancient world can negate what we know (meaning, of course, by scholarly reconstruction) about source criticism from, for example, Josephus’ use of the biblical materials as rewritten in his Antiquities or the gospels’ rewriting of one another. I do not derive any of that from theories or any "presumption of ‘development’ that dominates our field." I have never presumed that "one starts with the ‘simple’ and works to the more ‘complex.’" That sometimes happens, and when it does, I note it. So does the opposite and when it does, I note it. And, if I use the word development, it is always development-as-change rather than development-as-improvement. I do think although Mahlon quite legitimately disagrees with me on this point, that John uses Mark, changes Mark, develops Mark, but I would never suggest, whether he shortens or lengthens it, that he improves it.

It is necessary whenever you cite something that I do that it be done within its own context. The late Ray Brown, for example, had argued that the Gospel of Peter was more "anti-Jewish" than any of the canonical gospels. And that was only to be expected in a late or second century text. I countered by saying on that very principle, because of its attitude to the Jewish people as distinct from the Jewish authorities, it was early rather than late. That argument was not based on any general principle that I would accept (more or less caustic equals more or less early) but was simply a rebuttal of Ray within his own suggested principle.

Your final question about "what happens if John is shown to be earlier than Mark or as least as early and independent of it," requires a distinction. What is crucial for me, is not so much whether it is early or late, but whether it is independent or not. That is the first and more important question.  If John is independent of Mark, for example, in his passion narrative, then everything changes. I have made that point, for my taste ad nauseam, and that is what I mean by one’s decisions about materials being foundational. That is also why I wrote so many books in preparation for the big ones on the historical Jesus and his first companions. I had to decide for myself (with the sort of infinite painstaking of a book like In Fragments) what I thought about the nature and development (change not improvement) of the gospel tradition.

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QUESTION 18

(David C. Hindley: Cross-Cultural Anthropology)

Instead of asking a question, I would be pleased if you would allow me to offer some observations about your use of cross-cultural anthropology. I am sure I will learn something valuable from the manner that you review and respond to them.

First, let me say that I reviewed two of the books from which you drew epigraphs. I particularly enjoyed Gerhard E. Lenski (_Power and Privilege_, 1984 [1966]) who does a wonderful job of describing the evolution of societies and their class structures, and John H. Kautsky (The Politics of Aristocratic Empires, 1982) who provides a good political analysis of agrarian societies he calls "traditional aristocratic empires" and the effects of their commercialization into modern states. These are both "keepers" and will definitely be added to my bookshelf.

However, in reading these books, it became evident to me that you have been selectively reading them and adding your own interpretations into your descriptions of their positions. I will only comment on parts of your chapter 11, on Cross-Cultural Anthropology, in order to avoid too lengthy of a post.

You adopt what you call the "Lenski-Kautsky model" of class, but define social class according to G. E. M. de Ste. Croix ("Karl Marx and the History of Classical Antiquity", Arethusha 8, 1975). I don’t start to notice dissonance until we reach pg 153 (Marked Social Inequality). There you quote Lenski to establish your three distinctive features causing the increase of social inequality when an agrarian society replaces an advanced horticultural society (without specifically stating this, by the way).

Your quote that illustrates the mushrooming process of urbanization in newly agrarian societies does not mention that Lenski elsewhere on the same page of his book (199) indicated that these "fairly large" cities were more often than not national capitals, with perhaps five hundred thousand permanent residents at the very most, with the vast majority of towns being much more modest in size.

In support of the feature of monetization, Lenski is quoted to the effect that the introduction of money in agrarian societies offered aristocrats the opportunity to use it to indebt and consequence exploit the peasants. However, Lenski also says (again on the same page, 207) that "in the rural areas especially, the use of money was an infrequent experience, especially for peasants." In other words, while money lending could be "highly rewarding", it appears also to have been the exception rather than the rule.

You also quote Lenski (pg 155) to the effect that "[t]he Peasant Class, that vast majority of the population, was held "at, or close to, the subsistence level" (271)", ignoring the fact that all his examples are drawn from medieval Europe, China and Japan, and then add your comment "so that their appropriated surplus could support elite conspicuous consumption", which, while based on a passage elsewhere in Lenski’s book, seems inserted here to make a social-political point of your own.

Later, at pg 157 (Agrarian Commercialization), you begin to quote Kautsky to the effect that ""ancient Athens and Rome ... are commercialized" agrarian empires. (25 note 31)." However, if we read a tad more of note 31 this turns out to be an incorrect statement: "To be sure, the term "traditional" has also been applied to empires existing up to the emergence of modern states, like the Chinese, Russian, and Ottoman empires into the nineteenth century ... not to mention ancient Athens and Rome— all of which are commercialized and hence modern (emphasis mine)." This suggests to me that you are letting yourself mix and match the technical terms to your liking.

Then on pg 158 you emphasize that Kautsky represents aristocrats as living off peasants surplus in a one sided manner with no reciprocity involved for the Peasants. However, G. E. M. de Ste. Croix, who you earlier cited approvingly for a definition of "class", published The Class Struggle in the Ancient Greek World in 1981, a year before Kautsky. De Ste. Croix, who does a brilliant job of relating classes to socio-economic factors, takes a far more lenient view of the exploitative relationship between aristocrats and peasants than does Kautsky, yet you do not cite it in your bibliography. I have to presume that you knew of this publication but chose not to deal with it in your book. Why is de Ste. Croix so reliable when he defines "class" but not so reliable when he defines economic relationships between classes?

Later in page 158 you discuss (localized) peasant revolts as characteristic of commercialization of agrarian empires (relying on Kautsky, although you represent it as inherent in your Lenski-Kautsky model) However, Lenski speaks only of "inconsistent status" individuals as leaders of revolutions, and only on pp 88 & 409. This also ignores de Ste. Croix who indicated that crushing levels of economic exploitation did not characterize the Roman empire until the 4^th century CE. Then (pg 166) you ask a rhetorical question: "What if priests, prophets, scribes, bureaucrats, or retainers, acting institutionally or charismatically, instigate an idealogical revolution?" Presumably this is in replacement of political revolution.

And so it appears to me that you have made use of statements, taken out of context at times, from Lenski and Kautsky, have then given them your own spin to emphasize the element of social dissatisfaction. Is all this really necessary in order to support text-critical positions that represent Jesus as vocalizing social critical aphorisms and philosophy?

My apologies if I too seem to have over-stated my case. This was not meant as any sort of personal criticism of you, for whom I have the utmost respect. My point is that if so many liberties appear to have been taken in forming your model, the question must be asked whether the presuppositions you have adopted justify your methodological focus, as you say in Ch 7 of BOC.

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

I find it difficult, David, to answer your post because it seems to me to work on two levels, one of which I find legitimate, and the other which I reject flatly. You mention about the Lenski-Kautsky model that I have been "selectively reading them and adding your own interpretations into the description of their positions." On the one hand, I want to say: of course, and welcome to scholarship. But on the other, I sense an undertone that I am doing something invalid, if not unethical. Something akin not to research, but, as you say, to "spin."

First, the Lenski-Kautsky model is not something either of those scholars proposed, but something that was created by combining them.

Second, that was not done by me alone or first, but by other scholars who, as far as I can see in general, use it in much the same way and with much the same understanding as I do.

Third, the system of monetization-scribalization-industrialization-romanization is different from a big city to a small town. But my point is that that systemic process hit Galilee finally in the 20s with the arrival of Tiberias. Of course it is a process, of course it is more or less present in different places. But without, for example, what Antipas was doing from Sepphoris to Tiberias, I am not sure I could use it at all for Galilee in the 20s.

Finally, it is quite possible to take a benign or malign view of the relationship between empire and colony, master and slave, or any other superior and inferior relationship in the ancient (or modern) world. They can be taken as mutually beneficial and equally fair. It is true, for example, that few empires have ever said: "We are bigger, stronger, and nastier than you, so we are going to take your stuff, do you have a problem with that?" All such relationships are usually couched in the language of "in your best interest" or "for your own good." It may well be that Lenski reads such relationships more benignly than does Kautsky or that de Ste. Croix does also, but I have not the slightest problem at that stage in disagreeing with such an opinion. If they had made a big issue of it being absolutely reciprocal and equitable, I would certainly have underlined my disagreement, but as best my memory holds, they did not make a big issue of it being like that, even if they might not have insisted that it was exploitative.

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QUESTION 19

(Johan Strijdom: Categories?)

To David Hester Amador you wrote: ‘the merits of any method/ology is comparative’ [see Question 1 response]. And in response to my question, you said: ‘I have no problem with extending my focus on complexes to ideas’ [see Question 4 response]. But you qualified your willingness by noting that themes ‘are slightly more slippery than complexes and demand even more fine tuning for useful purposes.’

My question now focuses on that ‘fine tuning’ of themes, but it is not restricted to the micro-level of Christian texts. It rather deals with the ‘reciprocal’ interaction between your micro-, meso-, and macro-levels.

It is clear to me that any comparison of words, texts or contexts should attend to both similarities and differences (as Jonathan Z. Smith makes quite clear in his Drudgery Divine of 1990). My problem, however, is more specific: How does one decide on the CATEGORIES or POINTS OF COMPARISON, when one compares texts and contexts, themes and ideas? I will try to elucidate my problem by means of two examples:

(1) Purity Concerns: Paula Fredriksen, in her book Jesus of Nazareth (1999), thinks that you (and Marcus Borg) misconstrue (im)purity by letting it correspond to social class and by viewing it as ‘one of the ways elite culture imposed itself on peasant society’ (p 284; cf also p 201). Instead, she holds, ‘impurity and purity were states that one moved in and out of, [which] could [therefore] hardly serve to stratify society along class lines. ... The lowliest peasant who had just completed the ritual of the red heifer was pure, the most aristocratic chief priest, having just buried a parent, was not’ (p 201).

How will you go about (i.e., what method will you follow) to ‘fine tune’ a theme like ‘purity’? Which CATEGORIES will you use, and, more specifically, how will you go about to decide on these ones rather than those ones? Would you consider the modern explanatory category of boundary markers (we versus they), the socially relevant categories of class, gender and ethnicity, the postmodern concerns for body and spirit (‘sarcophilic’ versus ‘sarcophobic’), the reformers’ distinction between ritual purity and moral purity (which Fredriksen maintains are ‘modern’ distinctions and can therefore not be projected anachronistically onto ancient phenomena)? Or should one rather try to find some categories that are inductively inferred

by a comparative reading of the ancient evidence (the emic approach, which Fredriksen will endorse as an exercise in ‘concrete thinking’)? Or would you argue that both ways should be followed ‘interactively’ (ie, the relevance of modern theories and categories should be tested in the light of ancient data, and our reading of the ancient materials should ‘simultaneously’ and ‘equally’, or ‘hierarchically’, be scrutinized for issues that are raised by modern theories?)

(2) Apocalyptic Mentalities and Movements: When you compare apocalyptic mentalities/movements in Second Temple Judaisms, you do it in ‘The Historical Jesus’ in terms of upper- and lower class on one axis, and of violence and non-violence on the other axis. Why do you choose those categories as the primary ones, rather than some other ones? Allison, for example, underlines the importance of the restoration of Israel, and Fredriksen the importance of the conversion of the Gentiles in the thinking of many of these apocalyptic groups. Although you say that you start with context, and only then move to text (Birth of Christianity, p 147), it seems to me that your eventual conclusions on the micro-level already influence what you include in your description on the meso-level: you do not think the restoration of Israel or the conversion of the Gentiles are important for an understanding of the Baptist or Jesus, and therefore they do not deserve a prominent place in your ‘sharpest possible reconstruction of the 20s in Lower Galilee’(Birth of Christianity, p 148).To restate my question then: What exactly dictates your choice of POINTS OF COMPARISON? Why do you choose some categories, and ignore others?

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

Sorry, Johan, if my comment about themes being more slippery than complexes, seemed in any way dismissive. I think, actually, there is a huge area of research possible if we can raise that issue and discuss it self-critically. I found complexes easier to establish because most people seemed to agree where the same unit came up in different sources, even if they disagreed completely on the genetic relationship between those sources. Themes will be much more difficult. Let me just, off the top of my head, imagine one taken from Jeff Peterson’s question [see Question 16 above]. Imagine a theme called "the Davidic theme." I am trying to be deliberately vague and not say Davidic decent or Davidic relationship. Maybe we might agree that the theme had to bring Jesus into some kind of contact with David. Maybe even that the word "David" had to be there (would Bethlehem alone be adequate, etc.?) You could argue, accepting Jeff’s mention of Paul’s testimonia and the Bethlehem-birth common and therefore earlier than Matthew and Luke, that here we have an extremely early "theme" which is every bit as early and good as any of my complexes. I am all in favor of that, have just never thought of doing it, but recognize possible doctoral theses when I see them.

All of that is very much in general, but is emphatically work to be done. You go on to mention two very important such themes. One is purity and the other is apocalypticism.

I admit immediately to having a strong problem with Paula’s book because I find myself caricatured badly in it. To say that I "misconstrue (im)purity by letting it correspond to social class and by viewing it as ‘one of the ways elite culture imposed itself on peasant society’" is not very helpful.

First, I have never thought or written that you could equate purity/impurity with aristocracy/peasantry. Is it in there somewhere and I have just forgotten it?

Second, this is more ambiguous and is a point where I disagree with Marcus. I think that the aristocracy would have used purity, like they used every other element of the Great Tradition, in order to keep the peasantry in their ideological, symbolical, and material place. in the same way the peasantry would have used their Little Tradition to fight back (that’s from James Scott). But I see absolutely no reason to particularly privilege aristocratic use of purity, as distinct from Law, History, Tradition, Bible or anything else you want to mention. What is desperately needed and would be very helpful, is if we could lay out in scholarship all the options of purity in the 1^st century Jewish homeland. For example: Should we distinguish justice and purity, would justice be all those things that "eschalotogical Gentiles" (Paula’s phrase from a much earlier article, with which I am in complete agreement) would still have to observe and would purity be all those things which they could ignore? Should we use purity as the overarching concept and simply divide it into (what terms dare I use without being accused of something awful?) moral and ritual elements? Let me put this bluntly. I have always found what Paula says about me to be rhetorically polemical rather than collegially accurate. And that only serves to obscure the work to be done in this area.

This is getting so long, Johan, that I will abbreviate the next section because I think it will have to come up again. In reading Dale Allison’s book, as distinct from Paula’s, I found it to be much more accurate in laying out my own position and opposing it completely. In conversation, eventually to be published with Dale, I have already begun to try and think out what distinctions we need to make within apocalypticism rather than simply arguing apocalypticism vs. non-apocalypticism with each side avoiding definitions and distinctions.

Just as an example, to conclude by bringing Paula and Dale together, this question. If you accept Paula’s distinction (as I do, following her) of apocalyptic consummation for the Gentile nations involving either a "negative" extermination OR a "positive" conversion to the God of Israel (but not to Israel’s ethnic purity rules), and, if you use that distinction as Paula does (and as I do following her), to understand why Gentiles are immediately accepted into full fellowship in Jewish Christian communities, you will have to add to her distinction between "negative" and "positive" apocalypticism another one between active and passive apocalypticism. By passive I mean praying, hoping, waiting, living perfectly in expectation of apocalyptic consummation. By active I mean exactly what somebody like Paul was doing, going out there, travelling far and wide, and hustling for Gentile converts. Surely somebody must have said to him: we should stay here at prayer in Jerusalem and wait for God to do it (maybe the "false brethren" said it?) That simply begins a process in which I am fairly deeply involved, in dialogue with Dale, to set up a series of distinctions within the general "theme" of apocalypticism necessary, as I see it, to explain what those early Christian Jewish communities were actually doing. Let me stop it here for now, but this is also very much to be continued.

 

QUESTION 20

(Michael Wakelin: Sepphoris & the Kingdom of God)

1. In what ways, if any, can recent research at Sepphoris give us insight into Jesus’ background.

2. What would be a modern way of illustrating what Jesus meant by ‘the Kingdom of God.’

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

I will try to keep my answers as short as your questions, Michael. First, the rebuilding of Sepphoris in 4 bce and the building of Tiberias by 19 ce indicate, for me, that, most directly (1) Antipas is bringing urbanization=Romanization fully and finally into Lower Galilee, and, more indirectly, that (2) Antipas is now making his move to become King of the Jews (he hopes). Second, here is one "modern" way of "translating" Kingdom of God: What would America look like if God made up the budget?

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QUESTION 21

(Mike Szilagyi: Central Manuscript Control?)

In The Birth of Christianity, Chapter 8, "Relating Gospel Contents," you begin by quoting an incendiary critique by Luke Timothy Johnson, one that includes the charge that "the game is fixed," to which you answered, with admirable restraint I believe, that including extracanonical gospels is "rather controversial."  Responding to his charge, you then lay out the groundwork of the methods used, summing up with six clearly stated presuppositions about sources.  The systematic, scholarly evolution of these hypotheses over the last two hundred years is also clearly summarized.  Chapter 9, "Comparing Gospel Manuscripts," continues the argument for including the apocryphal gospels by making the point that the earliest fragments of intra- and extracanonical texts are both found in almost exclusively codex format, and both contain virtually the same distinctive nomina sacra, characteristics which distinguish these early gospels from other contemporary secular or religious texts.  There seems to be no difference between the way the intra- and extracanonical gospels were copied and prepared, and in fact both appear to adhere to the same standards of preparation.  Thus far I follow the argument for their inclusion and find it convincing.

The end of Chapter 9 explores what these common characteristics between canonical and apocryphal gospels might mean.  The possibility that the uniform format of these early gospels can be attributed to their being copied based on some exemplar such as a Pauline epistle or Mark’s gospel is noted but not explored.  The hypothesis that some early church authority controlled the production of both intra- and extracononical gospels seems to be your preferred explanation.  After assessing the sources of church authority as can be gleaned from Acts 15 and 1 Clement, you conclude "In that first century, it seems to me, only Jerusalem had the authority, be it exemplary of peremptory, to establish such striking novelties as papyrus codices and sacred abbreviations widely across Christian communities."  How wide is meant by "widely?"

The ten fragments listed on page 125 of BofC were all discovered in the Egyptian Fayuum.  (The location of the discovery of the later complete Coptic Gospel of Thomas was still further south in Egypt.)  Granted that the extraordinary combination of dry climate and circumstance that yielded the very early papyrus in Egypt are not likely to be duplicated in Asia Minor or perhaps anywhere else in the Empire, is it safe to extrapolate those finds, specific to the Fayuum, to the rest of the early church?  Have there been discoveries of second century gospel texts in say, Antioch or Ephesus, or lacking such discoveries, is there reason to expect that the sorts of finds made in Egypt reflect the type of gospels then in widespread circulation throughout the early church?

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

That is a very important question, Mike, and one that I became aware of myself the more I thought about my arguments in Chapter 9 of BofC. Let me recap a bit before addressing your question directly. I was concerned that many of my colleagues had decided that ALL extracanonical texts were late and dependent on intracanonical ones. I would, by the way, have been equally concerned if they had concluded that ALL such texts were original and independent. It was the ALL that bothered me because it sounded unlikely, even in sheer statistics. We had agreed that the Q Gospel was an independent and extracanonical text, but in any case, it was now safely enclosed within canonical frames by Matthew and Luke. I did not think it statistically likely that there were no others out there that managed to get through the vagaries of time and be discovered in modern digs.

In any case, what I asked myself was this. Are there any more or less objective criteria to see how what we term intracanonical and extracanonical texts (especially gospels) might have been viewed within the first two centuries? It was not a subject that I knew much about and almost everything I learned is summarized in Chapter 9. As you recognized, I did choose what seemed to me the most convincing argument for the more or less objective criteria I discovered: common early dates, common use of the papyrus codex, common use of sacred abbreviations. BUT you put your finger exactly on the problem. I am not sure what to do about it. All of that material was found in Egypt. It occurred to me that Egypt (does that mean Alexandria primarily?) may have had Christian scribal traditions which used those criteria (at least the last two), but which might not have been operative elsewhere. Could they have invented them solely by themselves so that they would not tell us anything about Palestine, Syria, Asia Minor, or anywhere else? I would like much more expert opinion on that question from the papyrologists. In the meantime, all I can conclude is that the evidence we have, however limited it may be by the fact that it all comes from Egypt, establishes that both intracanonical and extracanonical gospels were treated alike in that scribal tradition. Your question, however, about how wide is "widely" still stands and still has to be answered.

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QUESTION 22

(Brian McCarthy: Contradictory biblical characterizations of God)

 

In chap. 12 of BofC and in its Epilogue you do a fine job of presenting the witness of all parts of the Hebrew scriptures to the charge of the God of Israel to the people to serve him by seeking to realize justice in their life, social as well as individual.

You do note one problem, the God of apocalyptic, whether Jewish or Christian, who seems to be a god of vengeance and destruction and not of justice.

But there is another, more far-reaching one. There is a whole series of texts where the God of israel is portrayed as someone who achievs his goals via indiscriminate mass killings that extend to children and infants. One particularly explicit example is I Sam 15, which concerns Saul, the Amelekites and disobedience. (Verse 3 "...kill both man and woman, child and infant...")

Another concerns Israel’s occupation of the Land. Deuteronomy 20:16 contains the divine command of genocide—v. 16 "...you must not let anything that breathes remain alive..."—and Joshua purports to recount Israel’s zealous efforts to carry out this command via a whole series of total local genocides, all achieved because ‘God is on their side’ (Josh. 10:42)

But the worst concerns the canonical account in Exodus of the paradigmatic divine intervention to deliver his people from slavery. The god of Israel might have inflicted pharaoh, who alone made the decisions. from ‘head to toe’, like Job (2:7), but authors, tradents and canonizers clearly find it much more satisfactory to portray him in the 10^th ‘plague’ as himself indiscriminately killing all the first-born of the Egyptians, and emphasize that this includes the first born of powerless, oppressed Egyptians such as the slave-girl at the mill and the prisoner in the dungeon!

And, if we had any doubt about what is going on, all we need to do is read of the strutting chauvinism of Moses in 11:7. The discrimination that interests this god is that between the Egyptians and the Israelites, not that between the innocent and the guilty!

That can easily sound terribly anti-Jewish, but of course, as you suggest, it is in the Christian Bk of Revelation—the book which in the Christian Bible brings the whole great story begun in Genesis to its triumphant conclusion, the prism through which large numbers of Americans view i) the rest of the Bible ii) Jesus iii) the world around them—that this theme reaches its cosmic culmination.

Do you see any move, methodological or other, by which we can escape this most radical biblical ambiguity?  And how can you possibly say that "God’s law was not a matter simply of divine will or divine command but of divine nature and divine character" (p. 176)?

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

I find, Brian, that the line between vengeance and justice is a very thin and porous one. I find that to be true, first and above all, within my own heart and conscience and, maybe, that is true of us all or most of us? (For example, raise the subject of capitol punishment in the US, and watch how hard it is to distinguish vengeance from justice in the debate). I therefore find no surprise that (1) from one end of the Bible to the other, (2) across both Old Testament and New Testaments, and (3) throughout the history of Christian thought and action, those twin responses intertwine together so that it is almost impossible to distinguish them even in theory. In my own mind, I distinguish them, in general, by thinking of vengeance as swift, merciless and violent,  justice as slow, merciful (maybe that is the same as slow because it leaves time for repentance, restitution, forgiveness), and nonviolent. I do not think that solves all our problems, but at least it begins the discussion on whether they are exactly the same, and, if not, how they are to be distinguished.

With that as background, I can go through the Bible, and once again I insist it is from end to the other, and find long lists of items to prove a God of justice and equally long lists of items to prove a God of vengeance. That latter is so obviously present in the book of Revelation that I find no possible way that we can call the God of the Old Testament a God of vengeance and the God of the New Testament a God of justice, let alone love. Both those options are there across the two Testaments. As far as I can see, they are never resolved. They are simply left there side by side. That forces us, the reader, to make a decision about them. How, if we think justice is not simply another name for vengeance, do we handle that contradiction (I deliberately use a stronger word than ambiguity)?

What we are discussing here links immediately with that earlier discussion [see Question 19 response above] about Paula Fredriksen’s distinction between "positive" and "negative" poles of apocalyptic consummation (in other words, conversion vs. extermination or justice vs. vengeance, in my terms). Those, she said (and I agree with her there) were the two options within Jewish apocalyptic consummation. She also said (once again, I agree) that the choice of conversion was the option chosen by some/many/most/all of earliest Christianity? I consider that we have a lot more work to do on precisely this point, but at least that raises it as forcibly as I can (after Paula’s idea).

Finally, you seemed surprised by my statement that: "God’s law was not a matter simply of divine will or divine command, but of divine nature and divine character." That is what I thought Torah meant. It was not a set of decrees that God had made up whereas another set might easily have been made as an alternative. In other words,  justice and righteousness for humans derived from divine character and not just divine decree. Torah, as I understand it,  was an attempt to articulate the character of God in concrete law. It was, as I understood it, an attempt to bring a community into unity with the character of that God. That is still the way I see it and find no reason to change that view, so far.

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QUESTION 23

(David Hestor Amador: History, Power and Ethics)

I’m concerned, because we have reverted to a legalistic (read adversarial) model of knowledge, and have not considered the severe ramifications and implications of this model upon our efforts at producing knowledge. I was hoping we had learned something from Lyotard regarding this stuff: how the very rules of model of litigation creates the Differend, the excluded. The very Jews and others for whom the War-Crime trials were silenced by the rules of evidence designed to allow them to speak. This is the epistemic violence at the heart of this model, and it is a violence whose modalities of power we must be careful to learn from and leave behind.

You are not alone in this: I have been in a discussion with Barbara Theiring, and she appealed to the same model. It is perhaps only intended to be exemplary, to function to explain or give a concrete instance of the kinds of issues and concerns you would like to raise, but it is telling that this model is so easily broached.

We want to know ‘what happened’, what ‘really’ happened. I have a hard time believing we want to know this only out of historical curiosity. Is it only because it is of some value to set ‘facts’ in order, to get the (hi)story straight, as (hi)storians? So the reason we do history is to disprove those who claim we can’t do history?

If that’s all, then great: let’s go home. We’ve uncovered some mildly interesting ‘facts’ about a guy who lived 2000 years ago in an obscure part of a backwater region of the ancient Mediterranean world living under the Roman Imperium. Big deal - these series of facts, or at least our narrativization of them, should strike us a precisely important as, say, reconstructing a critical life of Josephus or Philo or Ezekias or anybody else. Which may be exactly why, as a discipline, we are showing signs of diminishing importance in university life, why our departments are being cut, why positions are not being replaced once someone retires, etc. We are certainly expending a great deal of effort over one person - try to justify an entire department dedicated to a reconstruction of the life of, say, Hyrcanus, with all the books, all the journals, all the publishing houses, all the methods and languages deemed necessary by our apparently legal-adversarial system of knowledge. It wouldn’t work at all, would it?

So, it is not as simple as ‘doing history for history’s sake’. And here I’m trying, indeed, to be very ‘local’, to be very concrete, not abstractly theoretical at all. There is much, much more to our enterprise, isn’t there? Knowledge and power, while not the same thing, are inextricably intertwined, and to avoid the great issues of power with respect to our discipline is simply to turn a blind eye to them, I think. It is to allow for the kind of world you describe would take place ‘in theory’ ("I concede that if we stay in theory we could easily persuade ourselves that historical reconstruction can never be done, that we are so locked into bias and prejudice, opinion and viewpoint, that all we can ever do is operate power plays on one another.") to suffuse our very specific concrete efforts with impunity. Rather than to ignore it, perhaps it is time to face up to it and look at how these strategies affect our work, to learn from them, to get better at figuring out what it is we are hoping to achieve by them, and to quit fooling ourselves into thinking we can avoid the issues altogether by just getting ‘real’, getting ‘methodological’, by establishing ‘due process’ (not a very scientific concept, that; more ethical, I would say).

I also suspect that the rather neat division of "those who claim to do the first (history) when they are in fact doing the second (dogma)", while it is a powerful rhetorical assertion, is nonetheless pragmatically quite impossible in our discipline. I do not intend to suggest that since this is so, we should just throw up our hands and let things run wild (though, I’m pretty sure that such happens anyway), but that we take a very close, very critical look at our work within the context of the struggles of power that we are unavoidably engaged in and are shaping us. This would not be an easy thing to do, but I believe it is a necessary thing to do, and I wonder if any certain results would ensure and what they would look like.

I happen to like a great deal of what you have come up with in your studies. I have some questions re: the easy way in which very traditional methods and their results are accepted, but for the most part I find myself reading your works (and your responses here) and think, "Yeah, alright, I can accept that and wonder how it will play out..."

But I have a suspicion, just a hint of a suspicion that what is happening in our discipline is more the result of our ethical concerns and the ethical foundations of our discipline than we really feel comfortable admitting to, much less owning up to.

(Put succinctly: we cannot avoid the entry of values into our work by asserting rationality. Values can be reasoned through and with, except by a rhetorical caveat that rules them ‘out of court’ as ‘irrational’.)

RESPONSE

(John Dominic Crossan)

In BofC I gave three reasons for why I was doing historical Jesus research and I certainly intended them as challenges (power plays?) to others to declare why they were doing it. I insisted that those reasons were not what had started me out doing it, but the reasons why I thought it was important to have done it. As I see it, you are focusing primarily on my first reason in asking, granted the validity of any historical reconstruction, why reconstruct Jesus and not somebody else? I think the term "interactive," in my definition of history, is crucial for me because it means that the subject under investigation is being changed by our viewing it, but it is also changing us by being viewed. I suppose it is possible to do historical reconstruction on somebody which nobody even the researcher cares about, and even get it published. But certain people, like Jesus or Hitler, so intensified that interactivity that we learn almost more about ourselves than we learn about them but only in trying our very best to understand them. You say "we’ve uncovered some mildly interesting ‘facts’ about a guy who lived 2000 years ago in an obscure part of a backwater region of the ancient Mediterranean world living under the Roman Imperium." I must tell you that is not the reaction I myself have been experiencing during the last decade. If we turned our best knowledge on somebody who has been as historically important as Jesus for 2,000 years (whether we deem that for good or evil), and obtained only "some mildly interesting facts," that would be an indictment of our historical capacities and would indeed be evidence of "why, as a discipline, we are showing signs of diminishing importance in university life." In my experience, and I take that from the response of ordinary lay people as well as the response of my colleagues, we have uncovered much more than that.

Let me link directly to something in Johan’s post [see Question 19 above] which was very important and to which I did not to respond for lack of time. He asked me about how I chose categories such as aristocratic/peasant or violent/nonviolent.

First, on the conscious level, I was watching what had happened in the first century Jewish homeland, especially from reading Josephus. Eve