Hello All~ I did my PhD and published my first book on Dom Crossan’s early work on the parables of the historical Jesus (“Post-metaphysics and the Paradoxical Teachings of Jesus”). Now, my central argument here is something that I suspect Bart would find cringe-worthy – my contention is that we can indeed reconstruct the “original voice-print” of the historical Jesus as he lived and breathed. Now this is a very bold claim but I’m posting this here because the more skeptically minded members of this forum are also those most likely to critically deconstruct my illusions of radical novelty… So here’s the briefest possible summary of my reconstruction of the original (earliest) oral teachings (the parables) of Jesus. I would love to hear your thoughts and feedback here – and especially what Bart’s readers consider to be the primary critical and scholarly objection to this claim…
So what would the parables of Jesus look like if we extracted from them all subsequent moral and theological embellishment over the past two millennia, and unleash the disruptive event that the parables of Jesus contain in their first, disturbing, immediacy? Here’s a brief summary:
Good Samaritan Luke 10:25-37: the agents of neighborly love, i.e. the devout Pharisee & Levite, are exposed as morally and religiously bankrupt; the morally and religiously bankrupt, i.e. the half-caste Samaritan, is an agent of neighbor love.
Prodigal Son Luke 15:11-32: the younger wayward son, who is lost in rebellious exile from home, is saved with the father’s homecoming feast, the older dutiful son, who is saved in righteous obedience to his father’s home, is lost in rebellious exile from the homecoming feast.
Vineyard Workers Matthew 20:1-16: the privileged status of those who started work at day break is the source of their envy and their sense of injustice; the envy and injustice of those who started work just before sundown, is the occasion for their privileged status, (when both groups receive equal pay from the vineyard owner).
Pharisee and Tax Collector Luke 18:10-14: the self-righteous Pharisee, who is saved in as a Temple insider – is lost, just as the sinful Tax Collector, who is lost as a Temple outsider – is saved.
Two Sons Matthew 21:28-32: the acceptance of the first son is a refusal to work in the field, and the refusal of the second son is an acceptance to go work in the field.
Friend at Midnight Luke 11:5-8: the refusal of a friend becomes the acceptance of stranger, while the persistence of a stranger is the faithfulness of a friend.
Shrewd Manager Luke 16:1-8: a shrewd business manager is condemned his employer as a fraud, as this fraud is praised by his employer as a shrewd business manager.
Unjust Judge Luke 18: 2-8: the refusal to back down of a fearless judge is a merciful delivery of justice, just as the merciful pleas of the widow for justice are a fearless refusal to back down.
Unforgiving Slave (Matthew 18:23-35): an occasion for judgment is act of forgiveness, an occasion for forgiveness is an act of judgment.
Rich Fool (Luke 12:16-21, Gospel of Thomas 63): the wisdom of working to secure ones future is foolish hoarding, the foolishness of an unsettled and uncertain future, is wisdom and security.
Final Judgment (Matthew 25:31-46): those who know God’s name are damned in never serving the poor, while those who serve the poor are saved even though they never knew God by name.
Great Banquet (Luke 14: 16-24, Matthew 22:2-14, Gospel Thomas 64): the ones who to get in are the ones who are expected to be left out; while the ones who are left out are the ones who are expected to get in.
Rich Man and Lazarus (Luke 16:19-31): the rich man who is glorified in this life is destitute and without hope in the afterlife, just as Lazarus who is destitute and without hope in this life is glorified in the afterlife.
Wedding Feast (Matthew 22: 1-14): the outsiders are in, just as the insiders are out.
Treasure in the Field (Matthew 13:44) finding is losing and losing is finding.
Pear of Great Price (Matthew 13:45-46): looking through many is finding one, selling many is buying one.
Father’s Good Gifts (Matt 7:9-11, Luke 11:11-13): the suggestion of false gifts is an affirmation of good gifts, while the affirmation of good gifts is the suggestion false gifts (compared to the good gifts of the Father)
Talents (Matthew 25:14-30): the risk of losing what has been given is to save one’s life, to save what has been given is to risk of losing one’s life.
Slave at Duty (Luke 17:7-10): an occasion for grace is a demand for good works, while the occasion of good works is a confession of grace.
Faithful and Wise Slave (Matthew 24:45-51, Luke 12:42-46): to be a slave in the master’s absence is to possess all the riches in his presence, while to possess of all the master’s riches in his absence, is to be a slave in his presence.
Waiting Slaves (Mark 13:34-37, Luke 12:35-38): a promise is a threat as a threat is a promise.
Wicked Tenants (Mark 12:1-12, Matthew 21:33-46, Luke 20:9-19, Thomas 65-66): a time for fruitfulness is an occasion of violence, while an occasion for violence is really the time for fruitfulness.
Sower (Mark 4:3-8, Matthew 13: 3-8, Luke 8:5-8, Gospel of Thomas 9): just as abundant sowing leads to wide spread scarcity, the scarcity of a few seeds in good soil leads to wide spread abundance.
Weeds and the Wheat (Matthew 13:24-30): a cause for division is a time for union, and what is a cause for union is a time for division.
Barren Fig Tree (Luke 13:6-9): what is expected to be fruitful is judged to be barren, and a judgment of barren-ness is an opportunity for fruitfulness.
Seed Growing Secretly (Mark 4:26-29): manual labour is natural growth and natural growth is the manual labour.
Lost Sheep (Luke 15:4-7) and the Lost Coin (Luke 15:8-10): the one that is lost is more valuable than the many that are saved.
Children Playing (Matt 11:16-19, Luke 7:31-35): the funeral song is too sad for those that want to play the wedding dance, and the wedding song is too happy for those that want to sing the funeral dirge.
Summary and Conclusion: Since this paradoxical “voice-print” informs the narrative structure of 31 of the 34 parables of Jesus handed down to us in the synoptic gospels, it therefore constitutes the original structure of Jesus’ authentic teachings on the kingdom of God.
The radical paradoxes at the heart of Jesus’ parables on the kingdom of God embody and express a deeper internal discord than the teachings of any other religious founder or tradition (Thomas Altizer). Simply put, the kingdom of God is a world with a void of meaning at its core, where “he who finds the meaning loses it, and he who loses the meaning finds it…”(Dom Crossan) In other words, these radial paradoxes can never be properly resolved, their spectral un-decidability is something we have to learn to live as they continually decentre us and put us into question, while exposing us to the disruptive novelty of the event that is harbored in Jesus’ call for the coming of God’s kingdom. (Jack Caputo)
By inviting their hearer’s to relinquish their quest for either a secure, stable meaning or some hoped for final reconciliation, the paradoxical poetics of Jesus thereby enact a rupture that opens up a gap in our meaning-making systems, while provoking us with the haunting specter of “doubt against all security” (Crossan). That is, the parables shatter the basic co-ordinates of our dominant cultural narratives or world-space – but not simply as a transitional moment or phase leading us to a new or higher dawn. Instead, we are exposed to a fundamental antagonism at the heart of things, an irresolvable tension without any proper resolution, which is itself a direct expression of the very meaning of the Kingdom. (Peter Rollins) This means that we are called to embrace life in a world without stable, secure grounds or ultimate guarantees, in a permanent eschatological challenge that never settles into a stable or settled structure. By consistently deploying such radical paradoxes to detypify the self-evident façade of the commonly accepted world, the parables of Jesus therefore remind us that sometimes we have to violate out cherished traditions in order to save them, just as those who want to preserve their tired and worn out traditions usually end up destroying them…
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paradoxrocks said
So here’s the briefest possible summary of my reconstruction of the original (earliest) oral teachings (the parables) of Jesus. I would love to hear your thoughts and feedback here – and especially what Bart’s readers consider to be the primary critical and scholarly objection to this claim…
There’s really probably only one person who posts regularly on the forums who could give you the type of critical feedback you want. The rest of us fall into the category of what I guess I’d call advanced lay people, lay people, mythicists and conspiracy theorists. 
“what would the parables of Jesus look like if we extracted from them all subsequent moral and theological embellishment over the past two millennia”
First, Gmatthews is correct. I can not for the life of me recall the name, but I am sure we are thinking of the same person.
Dale Allison observed that ” it was Jesus’ habit to say shocking and outrageous things for the sake of effect..,*
So how do we filter out other voice prints or “all subsequent moral and theological embellishment over the past two millennia,”
* Handbook for the Study of the Historical Jesus
How to Marginalize the Traditional criteria of authenticity pg 13
gmatthews said
There’s really probably only one person who posts regularly on the forums who could give you the type of critical feedback you want. The rest of us fall into the category of what I guess I’d call advanced lay people, lay people, mythicists and conspiracy theorists.
I thought you said “this isn’t the place for conspiracy theories”.
Paradox,
The best way to move forward is to view the New Testament Gospels as polemical story-telling, with no interest in accuracy or history. If you want real spirituality, go to the living Masters (John 6:40, 9:4-5). ** you do not have permission to see this link **
Don’t let anyone tell you the New Testament is information. It is DISinformation. It was all about money, power, and coverup.
Well I guess the that not only the best but the one and only guy that can shed some insight here is Bart, and I would be very surprised if he’s the type to go hiding under his desk in the face of a challenge… Truth be told, I’m actually a little anxious that Bart has been harassed by amateurs making ill-informed and grandiose claims about the “secret teachings” of Jesus so many times now that he’s not even taking the insight into the paradoxical mind of Yeshua seriously. So just for a little further encouragement here’s some historical evidence from outside the NT canon.
For many people today the scandalous memory of Yeshua as he walked the dusty roads of Galilee nearly two thousand years ago is almost completely lost in the fog of history. As a result, it has become increasingly plausible for modern skeptics, secular atheists and postmodern conspiracy theorists alike, to not simply deny the traditional Christian claims regarding the divinity of Christ, but to assert that this 1st century Nazarene rabbi never existed in the first place. According to the proponents of this view, Christianity is nothing more than an ancient myth wholly invented by the early Church communities, an elaborate fantasy-construction almost completely stolen from the pagan religions prior to it, and then propped up by centuries of theological propaganda.
However there is one precious piece of historical evidence for the actual flesh and blood existence of Yeshua, a textual fragment from outside the received New Testament canon that not only testifies to the historical existence of this 1st century charismatic Jew, but also details some strikingly specific features that disclose what this Yeshua was like as a flesh and blood historical figure. Josephus (c. 37 – c. 100), a Jewish historian for the Roman Empire and a vehement non-believer, in a much discussed passage called the Testimonium Flavianum, writes:
“About this time came Yeshua, a wise man, (if indeed it is appropriate to call him a man). For he was a performer of paradoxical feats (paradoxôn ergôn poiêtês) a teacher of people who accept the unusual with pleasure, and he won over many of the Jews and also many Greeks…”** you do not have permission to see this link **
While virtually all historians agree that this text has been tampered with by later Christian writers and apologists,** you do not have permission to see this link **Now, if we may grant the historical authenticity of just this one fragment of Josephus’ non-Christian extra-canonical testimony, then we find that Yeshua was a 1st century Jewish rabbi (teacher) who spoke in “paradoxôn ergôn poiêtês”, i.e. Yeshua was a paradoxical poet.
The word paradox (paradoxôn), literally means “against” (para) “orthodoxy” (doxa); and to be against orthodoxy makes one a heretic.
From this rare vantage point external to both the theological embellishments of the first gospel authors and the political agendas of the early Christian communities, the historical Yeshua therefore looks have been a heretical Jewish poet, one who spoke in shocking or mind-bending paradoxes, while attracting unconventional followers who joyfully received his unusual, counter-intuitive teachings.
Significantly, the “paradoxical poetics” of Yeshua, first evidenced here in a tiny fragment of Josephus’ rare historical testimony, is also the defining characteristic of the parables of Yeshua, i.e a poetics of paradox (paradoxôn ergôn poiêtês) lies dormant in the New Testament gospels, hidden in plain sight, as the restless call and provocation that constitutes Yeshua’s central proclamation of the kingdom of God.
paradoxrocks said
Well I guess the that not only the best but the one and only guy that can shed some insight here is Bart, and I would be very surprised if he’s the type to go hiding under his desk in the face of a challenge… Truth be told, I’m actually a little anxious that Bart has been harassed by amateurs making ill-informed and grandiose claims about the “secret teachings” of Jesus so many times now that he’s not even taking the insight into the paradoxical mind of Yeshua seriously. So just for a little further encouragement here’s some historical evidence from outside the NT canon.
Bart doesn’t participate in the forums so unfortunately he doesn’t see the ill-informed and grandiose claims, as such, I wouldn’t say he’s harassed. He gets that enough in other venues I’m sure. He used to rarely post when he first opened the forums, but it’s been a very long time since I’ve seen a post by him. I doubt he even reads these posts any longer.
Robert Wahler said
Paradox,The best way to move forward is to view the New Testament Gospels as polemical story-telling, with no interest in accuracy or history.
Why is this the “best way, Bob. It’s a very large assumption that independent authors would all seek to misinform their readers.
What evidence can you offer to support this conclusion.
Assuming anything at the outset is to short circuit the entire inquiry. Very often historical data is compatible with various hypothesis
and so one has to see where the pieces fit best. This is to say the best way to move forward is with an open mind. Look at the claims being made, see what the experts are saying, etc. Recognize the extent of your own ignorance in evaluating what they say.
Let’s take a particular example from Luke that might help illuminate the situation. It is pretty certain that Luke’s census did not take place. Even if it did why would Joseph 1.) need to bring his pregnant wife along and 2.) Why would he need to travel to the birth place of his ancestors from a thousand years earlier? Inaccurate details don’t prove that Luke is “polemical story-telling, with no interest in accuracy or history.”
While we don’t accept Luke’s explanation of how Jesus was born in Bethlehem. The recent work by Stephen Carlson may give good reasons for how Jesus was born in Bethlehem ( Take a look at Brice Jones wst) . Now back to Luke’s credibility. One can’t make a judgement without considering what Luke may have had available to him for the composition of his Gospel. We know from his dedication to Theophilus that he was aware of other accounts that he seems to have thought were inadequate. Likewise, he would have whatever oral sources “eyewitnesses and servants of the word” ” handed on to us”. I doubt we can know the substance of such sources. We can at least assume the ” eyewitnesses and servants of the word” had an interest in the outcome of the stories; however, again relying on Luke’s account, it looks like he was composing his account for a Patron: someone paying his way. It seems unlikely that a person paying his way would just accept anything Luke chose to write.
I think we can safely say that Luke’s gospel is an “orderly account of what his sources were telling him.
A good question to consider is was Luke in a position to know about and get accurate details of the census he writes about
Hi Paradoxrocks. As far as where I am on the knowledge scale that gmatthews conveniently provided, I am on the very lay side. I have read and reread your posts and I truly find it hard to understand what you mean. I get lost in the purple prose of deconstructing the radical novelty of what in the world you are talking about. I can tell you have put heart and soul into your work, but could you please strip out the superlatives and render it in plain English for those of us who not able to follow the meaning of what you say? Thanks!
That’s absolutely fine Magpie, it’s my pleasure. The basic idea is pretty simple – Jesus spoke about the kingdom of God in a language of paradox. (Paradox means: a contradiction of conventional wisdom)
To briefly explain, we find the same narrative structure in all of the parables of Jesus. That is, we find the same “stable pattern of connections” within all of the parables of the historical Jesus that have been handed down to us in the synoptic gospels… The narrative structure at the heart of all of the parables of Jesus is what I call a “language of paradox”.
A paradox is simply the creative tension between two opposing perspectives. The parables of Jesus are paradoxical because they do not resolve this tension between opposites, they instead keep this tension between opposites open. That is, in the language of paradox that we find at the heart all the parables of Jesus, we see that each side of the binary opposition bleeds into the other, but the tension between them is itself not resolved. (the saved are lost, and the lost are saved, etc.)
Now, this language of paradox – the irresolvable tension between opposing perspectives that informs the narrative core of all of the parables, is a “source code” for the original oral teachings of the historical Jesus… or the authentic “voice-print” of Jesus, i.e. the “paradoxical heart” of the parables of Jesus is the authors signature, it stems from the historical Jesus himself, as he lived and breathed…
Moreover, this “paradoxical voice-print” that we find at the narrative core of all the parables of Jesus not only provides us with an insight into the language of the historical Jesus – and his experience of the kingdom of God… for those of faith – the language of paradox is also a glimpse into the very mind of God…
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