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Loading...In the current thread I’m trying to establish that Jesus believed he was the messiah. I have pointed out that his followers would not have considered him the messiah because they believed he had been raised from the dead (since the messiah was not supposed to die and rise again) unless they had already considered him the messiah prior to his death. But that, of course, does not mean that Jesus *himself* thought he was the messiah. And so we have to look for evidence from Jesus’ life that indicates that this is what he thought about himself, and my argument is going to be that there are several pieces of evidence that strongly suggest it is, of which my plan is to stress two.
As background, in my previous post, I laid out the world view that Jesus himself almost certainly subscribed to, a view that scholars have called Jewish apocalypticism. I need to develop these thoughts a bit in this post; and the next; after that I’ll lay out in (very) summary fashion what I think we can say with relative certainty about the basic features of Jesus’ teaching; and I will then, once all that is completed, point to specific reasons for thinking that Jesus’ considered himself the messiah.
It is obviously one thing to say that apocalypticism was a common world view in Jesus’ day and another to say that Jesus himself subscribed to it. But that has nonetheless been the view among most critical scholars, as I indicated yesterday, since the great work of Albert Schweitzer. Schweitzer is best known today for his humanitarian efforts as a medical missionary in Africa. He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1952.
But before all that,
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Albert Schweitzer is the author of The Quest of the Historical Jesus and Christianity and the Religions of the World, among others.
Bart, another question.
Obviously it has been a long-standing and nigh-universal Christian belief that Jesus was the Messiah, the promised one, even though his conception of that role was different from that of most Jews, of that and all subsequent eras. It was not ultimately considered that this claim in any way conflicted with his also being the begotten Son of God, and an aspect of God–there has been a lot of scholarly writing that convincingly calls into doubt the notion that Jesus considered himself divine.
At what point in scholarly circles did it start to be questioned that he considered himself the Jewish Messiah, and why? You’re going to some considerable pains to make this claim, and you’re clearly not trying to persuade believing Christians (who already agree that he thought he was Messiah, because he was Messiah), so what’s the background to this dispute? We’ve recently seen Reza Aslan’s book “Zealot”, claiming Jesus believed himself to be the Messiah in the more traditional militant sense, which I do not believe. I know you don’t concur with this opinion.
To be clear, I’ve known for years that Jesus’ thinking was apocalyptic in nature. He believed the Kingdom was coming, and it was his job to prepare people for that event, that was coming in the very near future. But once you get past that point, it does start getting fuzzier. So I am looking forward to your interpretation of the data we have.
Self-evidently, he had to think he had an important mission to fulfill.
I suppose the questioning of whether Jesus saw himself as the messiah became fashionable with the rise of critical biblical scholarship, especially in the 19th century. But yes, I think it needs to be *demonstrated* (just as all history needs to be).
Is it possible that the disciples, or others who saw Jesus’s startling deeds, believed that “Christ” was a spiritual being who manifested himself in different people at different times? We find this view in the Pseudo-Clementine works, and I am wondering if it could have been widely held at an early stage.
Thanks!
I’m afraid we don’t have any indications of that view in our early sources.
This may be in one of your books (I’ve read them, but not recently). I’m wondering how a lower-class man, probably illiterate, coming from a remote hamlet like Nazareth, could have *learned about* apocalypticism. Learned not just tidbits, but enough that he felt competent to preach it.
It’s hard to believe anyone would think he’d absorbed that much from hearing *one* diatribe by John the Baptist. (And I have problems with the very idea of his having – presumably – hiked all the way from Nazareth to Judea to be “baptized.”)
Could Nazareth really have had a rabbi who was well-versed in apocalyptic theory, and for some reason, taught Jesus? If that was the case, it’s understandable no tradition would have been passed on, because the early Christians wanted to claim Jesus was divine, and didn’t *need* to be taught.
My sense is that it was “in the air.” Today you don’t have to go to university to learn about democracy or free-enterprise; you just pick up the ideas from your environment.
I was about to ask a question on the next blog entry that Wilusa touched on in his comment above so I’ll ask here. Wilusa says he has a hard time believing Jesus could become an apocalypticist based on *one* diatribe from John the Baptist. I’m getting the feeling from your posts here that Schweitzer (or you?) believed Jesus was possibly a disciple of John, hence, the manner in which Jesus learned about apocalypticism. I was thinking about the verses in Matthew in which Jesus’ disciples informed him of the death of John the Baptist. Why would those verses be in Matthew? Is it possible this is an intimation that Jesus would have wanted to be informed of his former rabbi’s death? Was Matthew 11:3 a deflection of the John Jesus master / disciple reality (or possible reality)?
Yes, I do think that is why!
It is the opinion of many scholars that Jesus did not simply hear John give one speech–that the reason he was baptized by John was that he was John’s disciple for an unknown period of time. Obviously the Messiah could not have been anyone else’s disciple, so when the gospels were written, this was played down. John’s role became that of a supporting player in the story, albeit an important one.
Of course, this merely pushes the question back to how John could have learned this–how could anyone? We do not know Jesus was illiterate, and we don’t know John was literate. Nor is it clear to me that literacy would be necessary to pick up (or create) important religious ideas.
I’m amazed that it never occurred to me that he might have spent more time with John, as a disciple, and his own later followers wouldn’t have mentioned it. Thanks for pointing it out!
Dr. Ehrman,
Very interesting. I don’t take issue with anything you’ve written so far in the last several posts about Jesus as apocalyptic preacher. However, I’m still dubious on the issue of whether Jesus actually thought that he, himself, was the Messiah of his prophecies. (I await you’re ultimate illucidation on this matter.)
In the meantime, however, I would like to lay out my reason for thinking otherwise, and I would appreciate your feedback on whether these bits of evidence amount to anything substantial. Let me start out by hypothesizing that Jesus saw his principle role as prophet and sage (as opposite to a “teacher”, which implies that he saw his role as an educator, which he doubt he did). The reasons for this, I believe, come from not just a survey of the NT and other comtemporary documents, but also from specific astronomical events that just so happen to occur, coicidently, at the very time Jesus was active. And as the hermeneuticists were wont to say: “As above, so below”.
–ca. 4 CE, After complaints by the Jewish aristocracy over Archelaus’ rule of Judea, Archelaus (son of Herod the Great) is deposed by Emperor Augustus and banished to Gaul, leaving Judea without a king. The Jewish aristocracy requests that Rome provide a governer in the meantime, beginning seven decades of Roman governance of Judea (along with Samaria and Idumea; and briefly interrupted by Agrippa the Great’s reign from 41 to 44).
–The Galilean radicals saw this as a betrayel of Jewish quasi-sovereignty and immediately began a rebellion, led by the likes of Judas the Galilean, which was quickly crushed by the Romans and their allies in the Jewish aristocracy. But the rebellious party founded by Judas, the Zealots, became dormant, awaiting their opportunity to rise again.
–At this time, some Jews, especially amongst the Galileans, began to speculate that the true Messiah may been born right after the death of Herod the Great, whom many Jews saw as a false king because he wasn’t actually Jewish (he was an Idumean convert, who, like the Samaritans, the Jews never came to fully trust). Assuming this future Messiah was born around the time of Herod’s death, that would mean he would reach full adulthood sometime after 15CE (which just so happens to be around the time of Caesar Augustus’ death, and a period when sentiments for Jewish rebellion would have grown in the power vaccum), and which would be the first year that Jews would begin activately looking for the grown up Messiah.
–Jump to Pilate’s appointment as governor of Judea in 26CE. (The adult Messiah could be about 30 years old.) Pilate engages in several scandalous behaviors that would have annoyed Jewish sensibilities, and which Jewish apolocalyticist could have interpreted as signs.
–First sign, Pilate’s attempt to bring images into Jerusalem that the Jews saw as idols. For example, the shields incident. Apocalypticists could have interpreted this as an “abomination of desolation” that the prophets talk about.
–Second sign, Pilate takes Temple Korbanot to build his aquaduct. Not only was it sacrilegious for a pagan to touch the Korban, but the actual building of the aquaduct smacked a lot of the river of water flowing from/to Jerusalem that the prophets often talk about, especially in the latter chapters of Ezekiel. Pilate threatens to massacre thousand of Jews over this incident, only to back down when he realized the potential backlash. Both incidents likely occured within only a few years of Pilate taking office, ca. 26 to 28 CE. This is important.
–Third sign, there is a total lunar eclipse on June 14th, 29 CE, that would have been more that 90% visible to those living in the Levant from 8 to 9 pm at night, and would have looked like a “blood moon” that the prophets regularly mention as a sign of the coming Messiah (see esp. Joel 3:4).
–Fourth sign, the Leonids meteor shower of 29 CE would then last from November 15-20, and since the level of intensity of the Leonids tends to go in 33 year cycles (roughly xx00, xx33, xx66) it’s quite conceivably that the shower of November 29CE, falling within the window of the cycle, could have been a rather spectular one. The apocaplyticists could have interpreted this meteor shower as the “falling of the stars” that the prophets also mention.
–The astronomical wonders are capped off by a spectular solar eclipse that occured on November 24th of 29CE, the path of which went straight of the Judean desert. Anyone in the desert who saw the “sackcloth” sun would certainly have interpreted as the sackcloth sun of the prophets (again, see Joel 3:4)
–Around this time (either before or after the solar eclipse) John the Baptist (the voice crying in the desert) began is mission. He was likely arrested and executed within months if not weeks of his preaching. Let’s say, for the sake of argument, John was killed sometime in December 29CE or January 30CE. It’s important for Jesus that John is killed off, because John’s baptism is no longer available to Jews who want to be saved, which strongly suggests that Judgment Day is literally right around the corner.
–Jesus, having spent much of this time watching and interpreting these events, comes to conclude that all these signs point to the Messiah coming within months if not weeks, and, from the Gospel accounts, it seems Jesus thought that the Passover of 30CE was somehow important to this event. So Jesus spents that next several months leading up to the Passover of April 3rd, 30CE on preaching the imminent coming apocalypse (which makes Jesus’ total ministry, from the time of gathering his disciples to his truimphant entrance in to Jerusalem to be no more than three months!), which is certainly not enough time to reach every righteous person, which means that Jesus saw himself as only one of many possible preachers of righteousness.
So, considering this hypothetical timeline, what does that say about Jesus’ pretenses to being the Messiah himself?
Correction: Archelaus was deposed in 6 CE, not 4 CE.
Thanks. I’ll be getting to my views soon.
Re the ” … messiah was not supposed to die …”, is there any chance that some of the apocalypticists of the day might have expected a messiah who was prophesied to be killed? Dan 9:26 seems to anticipate an Anointed One who was to be put to death/cut off. The remaining chapters of Daniel then give an impression of “guess whose back”.
If there were, they didn’t leave us any writings! And Daniel was not interpreted messianically in this way, so far as we know.
After Schweitzer’s book, what do you think was the next great classic in the field of historical Jesus work?
Thanks!
I would say there wasn’t another enormously influential book until E. P. Sanders Jesus and Judaism.
The stained glass windows of my congregation’s sanctuary, Bart, depicts the sacred history of the world from the garden of Eden to modern times (the sanctuary was built in the ’50’s). Schweitzer ministering to the Africans gets the panel representing the 20th century saint. 🙂
Wow!
“This book is still available in a lively English translation, and I strongly urge anyone interested in New Testament studies and the historical Jesus to read it.”
A suggestion to those interested in reading Schweitzer’s book. There are (at least) two English editions available on the market. One is an English translation of the first German edition (1906), which lacks several chapters added to the second German edition. Although that first edition is still on the market, interested readers would be advised to purchase what Fortress Press bills as the “First Complete Edition,” which is an English translation of the second German edition (1913), and which includes the added chapters about the disputed “historicity of Jesus.”
Thanks for pointing that out. I had added the book to my wish list on Amazon earlier this morning so I’ll make sure I get the one you recommend!
It’s fascinating that the early Christian writers took the central teaching of Jesus – that the Kingdom of God on Earth was coming soon, in the first century – and twisted its meaning, ignoring the fact that Jesus was wrong. Not surprising, but fascinating. And that continues in Christian pulpits every Sunday to this day.
Another great book by Schweitzer is “The Mystery of the Kingdom of God”. His books turned my fundamentalist background on its head.
This is great stuff, and so well argued. It is not just your view. How is it that other Christian scholars, knowing this, manage to still “buy” the resurrection?
Because they are believers! Faith is not built on historical knowledge!
I first read Schweitzer’s book in college and it markedly change my views about Jesus. I was especially affected by the idea that Jesus may have been wrong about something, namely about the end times coming before the deaths of His disciples. I have discussed this with many good Christians most of whom contend that a “spiritual” kingdom of God came during the lifetime of the disciples. Does this idea about the kingdom of God having come in a “spiritual” sense during the lifetime of the disciples have any historical basis?
Not really. Usually it’s thought that this spiritualization happened after the actual kingdom never arrived.
“Schweitzer was not a Christian in the traditional understanding of the term. He did not believe that Jesus was correct in his proclamation of the coming kingdom, and Jesus did not rise from the dead. But in another sense Schweitzer was one of the great Christians of modern times: …”
He was certainly not a fundamentalist Christian, if that is what you mean by ‘the traditional understanding of the term’, but I believe he himself always considered himself a Christian and maintained a very strong sense of a mystical union with Christ. Correct me if I’m wrong; it’s been a long time since I’ve read Schweitzer, but I seem to recall this idea being very strongly expressed in one of his latest books.
I read his biography years ago, but don’t remember precisely how he ended up describing his relation to Christianity.
When you say a lively translation, do you mean the much older translation by W. Montgomery (1910) of the 1906 1st Edition (available free online) ?
Or the newer version by Bowden (2001) which translates the 1913 2nd Edition ?
I haven’t read the Bowden translation. Was it a new translation or a reprinting of the Montgomery?
I haven’t read Bowden’s version, but I’m told that Schweitzer revised his original text and also added further chapters.
Bowden’s translation covers this expanded edition. I will try to track down a copy.
Bowden also translated Schillebeeckx.
I also read his translation of Theissen’s The Shadow of the Galilean which was a very interesting novel about the early Jesus movement.
Bowden’s obituary can be found here:
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2011/jan/18/the-rev-john-bowden-obituary
But Jesus was mistaken about that. God did not intervene; the kingdom did not come; and at his death he realized his mistake.
Aside from the baseless assumption that there was a ‘Jesus’, this person’s “kingdom” could well have come for his followers. How do you know it didn’t? “Like lightning from East to West” doesn’t mean that everyone alive at the time of a disciple’s realization will see the Son. It is an INTERNAL vision. “Moon and stars going dark” is a well-known occurrence in disciples of mystics of the East! It happens at the “eye-center” (“thine eye BE SINGLE”) — another widely held understanding among disciples of Mystics. My own organization comprises probably close to three million people by now. These Mystics are real. They charge NOTHING. They teach and initiate freely in all nations. Why won’t you read about them? Is there something you have against traditions outside your own? You will learn a great deal, and see that Western knowledge of spirituality is so primitive as to be laughably non-existent. Whatever people may have thought, then or now, that these apocalyptic sayings meant, they were NOT about the end of the world, OR a kingdom on earth. Where oh where do you get THAT from the words of Jesus? I know where I get that it isn’t: John 18:36.
The New Testament is just THE OPPOSITE of what you and Christians think it is. It is disinformation about salvation. The church wanted POWER, not the truth. Read the modern Mystics. Then you will know.
If you think I am a fool, as I am sure you do, consider this from Hegesippus, one of our earliest sources. Note who says the famous quotes later attributed to ‘Jesus’, and while you are at it, remember what Judas sees in his “vision” on page 44 of the Gospel of Judas, or what Luke says happened to him in Acts 1:
The aforesaid scribes and Pharisees accordingly set James on the summit of the temple, and cried aloud to him, and said: “O just one, whom we are all bound to obey, forasmuch as the people is in error, and follows Jesus the crucified, do thou tell us what is the door of Jesus, the crucified.” And he answered with a loud voice: *”Why ask ye me concerning Jesus the Son of man? He Himself sitteth in heaven, at the right hand of the Great Power, and shall come on the clouds of heaven.”*
And, when many were fully convinced by these words, and offered praise for the testimony of James, and said, “Hosanna to the son of David,” then again the said Pharisees and scribes said to one another, “We have not done well in procuring this testimony to Jesus. But let us go up and throw him down, that they may be afraid, and not believe him.” And they cried aloud, and said: “Oh! oh! the just man himself is in error.” Thus they fulfilled the Scripture written in Isaiah: “Let us away with the just man, because he is troublesome to us: therefore shall they eat the fruit of their doings.” So they went up and threw down the just man, and said to one another: “Let us stone James the Just.” And *they began to stone him*: for he was not *killed by the fall*; but he turned, and kneeled down, and said: “I beseech Thee, Lord God our *Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do*.”
Not surprising that Jesus was an apocalyptic end-of-times messiah figure, because we have such people at least once each generation (often leading their people to disappointment if not disaster). Any thoughts on why this is such a persistent theme, even though every previous apocalypticist has been wrong?
Maybe I’ll add this to my mailbag!
You will be explaining why you think jesus thought he was the messiah, but do you have any ideas why *he* thought he was the messiah? A vision or dream? Or he just thought he deserved it? Or he always wanted to be the chosen one so he convinced himself he would be? Why does a person think that out of a whole nation, they are the chosen one? Maybe someone else convinced him? Imagine the feelings he would have gone through on the cross when he realised he was wrong.
I’m afraid we’ll never be able to penetrate his psychological state, no matter how many sources turn up.
I can’t help thinking the most *likely* explanation is that his admiring disciples convinced him.
You say “God did not intervene; the kingdom did not come; and at his death Jesus realized he had made a mistake.” Is this statement based solely on “Eloi Eloi lama sabachthani” or are there other nuances to Jesus’ final epiphany?
Yes, I’m not stating this as my view but as Schweitzer’s. And I assume this verse indeed is what informed his logic.
…”we must be prepared to find that the historical knowledge of the personality of Jesus will not be a help, but perhaps an offence to religion.”
“The historical Jesus will be to our time a stranger and an enigma.”
Albert Schweitzer, “The Quest of the Historical Jesus”
Two quotes from the final chapter of “The Quest…” that I had highlighted in my copy. It seems that the Zeitgeist of historical Jesus scholarship has, in some ways, changed little in the past 100+ years.
Dr. Ehrman: Jewish apocalypticism was a very common view in Jesus’ day – it was the view … of the Pharisees…
Steefen: Please let us know the basis for saying it was the view of the Pharisees. They didn’t join Jesus in marching into the Apocalypse with the Son of Man.
Temple authorities were believers in apocalypticism? They believed in the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple?
The Sadducees believed in apocalypticism? They believed in the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple?
Jesus’ vision was about the destruction of the Temple and Jerusalem surrounded by armies. His apocalypse was local not global.
What forces of evil did they all identify?
What forces of evil did Jesus identify?
+ + +
If we need to go there: with all the Astrology practiced during the first century, the end of the Age of Aries was not a surprise. The end of an astrological age is somewhat an apocalyptic event.
Examples of the twelve zodiac signs with Helios in his sun chariot surrounded by angels have been discovered in seven ancient synagogues in Israel. In addition to Beth Alpha, the zodiacs appear at Hammath Tiberias, Khirbet Susiya,Yafia, Sepphoris, Beth Shean, Husifa,and Na’aran. The Louvre also has a tiny first or second century mural remnant of the sign of Capricorn from the wall of Dura-Europus. All the pavements consist of three parts: an inscription or scene, a center zodiac panel and a representation of Jewish religious objects such as the Ark, Torah or menorah.
(Google Synagogue with Zodiac.)
When one reads the gospels, Jesus’ enemy did not see himself as the Messiah because his greatest enemy from whom his people needed to be saved were the Pharisees. They are the only political group is cursed out. The Messiah was supposed to save the people from an external threat. Not once did Jesus call the Romans vipers.
Herod’s Temple was not even finished when the biblical Jesus was crucified. No one was thinking about the end of Judaism except for those who didn’t appreciate the architectural wonder the Temple was, those who didn’t like Herod, and those who were not smart enough to realize Rome could improve the Jewish nation’s infrastructure.
If Jesus thought he was the Messiah, he surely did not say anything when Jews bared their necks to Pilate. He gets made at money changers but what did he do when Pilate pulled money out of his father’s house for aqueducts? Nothing.
Jesus was not a Messiah in his own vision. He issued not one prayer against the destruction of the Temple, let alone save it as one would expect a Messiah/Savior would.
Steefen (corrected):
When one reads the gospels, one does not find Jesus seeing himself as the Messiah.
Who was the greatest enemy of the Jewish people from whom he needed to save them?
That enemy was the Pharisees: woe, blind, vipers. They were the only one he practically cursed out. The Messiah was supposed to save the Jewish people from an external threat.
Not once did Jesus have woes for the Romans, call them blind, call them vipers, call them hypocrites.
He gets mad at money changers but what did he do when Pilate pulled money out of his Father’s house of prayer for aqueducts? Nothing.
Verse after verse, the Pharisees were the danger against which Jesus tried to save his disciples and the Jewish people. He did not have political, messianic victory even against them, an internal threat, let alone the Romans. The truly identifiable enemy of the Messiah in the Gospels defeated him. They put a stop to his Son of Man-Kingdom of Heaven/Righteousness movement–Jesus interrupted; son of God, owner of the Promise Land, killed by Wicked Tenants, the Pharisees. Prophets, others sent by God, killed. Son, sent by God, killed. Messiah, killed, before he could even install his 12 disciples as judges over the 12 tribes of Israel.
Moses had slaves asking their God for deliverance from the cruelties of Egypt. Did Jesus have people asking their God for deliverance from the cruelties of Rome? How great was the call for a Galilean Messiah, 27-33 C.E.?
Practically, the most the biblical Jesus could have done was meet with Queen Helena and see if Rome’s enemy, the Parthian Empire would be his army in his fight for Jewish independence from Rome. He could have asked her to go to the kingdom of Aurania, northeast of Judea, named after Queen Ourania. She had an even thicker bloodline to Parthia.
If Jesus is thought of as the Messiah for Jewish independence, in practical terms, replacing the occupying kingdom, Rome, with the Kingdom of Heaven/Aurania which brought a messianic army against Rome, an army which had won wars against Rome, then why should the Temple, the building of which was started under Rome’s approved king, Herod the Great, not be destroyed in the Son of Man’s kingdom coming into fruition?
Queen Helena was already on board. She converted to Judaism.
Hi Bart, how do you think nations should be understood in Mark 13:10 which says, “The gospel must first be preached to all the nations.” I’m becoming more drawn to the view that Jesus was an apocalyptic prophet but have seen an objection based on this verse.
The objection is that Jesus can’t be expected to come back in a generation since it would take more than that for the gospel to spread to all nations.
The two questions I have is how is (as mentioned before) how should “nations” be understood (the Roman Empire, Japan, Brazil)? And how long is a generation?
My sense is that first century Jews in rural Galilee probably had no idea that China or Brazil existed. Even so, I’m not sure Jesus said these exact words. I sense that his own view was that all Israel had to hear, and that he wasn’t particularly concerned about outsiders. I think he led a fairly insular existence, given his context and upbringing.