Here are some random thoughts I’ve been … thinking, while contemplating Jesus’s views of political and economic systems. They are not definitive thoughts, but explorations. What do you think? I would welcome your comments (on this post I probably won’t be answering questions, just observing responses).
Normally when someone opposes a political or economic situation, they want it to be reformed. We should move to a state-supported health care system; we should get rid of the electoral college; we should abolish the House of Lords; we should close the borders; we should … whatever, ad infinitum.
It has long been interesting to me that
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I agree that Jesus did not offer a programme for reforming Roman government or rebuilding society through political institutions. He expected God himself to establish the kingdom. But I hesitate over the stronger language of “complete indifference” to worldly concerns.
The acts you mention, feeding the hungry, welcoming the stranger, caring for the sick, visiting the lonely and helping the outcast, are not minor activities while people wait for God to act. In Matthew 25 they become matters of judgment. The Son of Man identifies himself with those in need, and those who failed to act are held responsible for that failure.
There is, of course, a debate about whether “the least of these” refers to all vulnerable people or more specifically to Jesus’ followers. But either way, the point remains that concrete care in the present world carries eschatological weight.
So perhaps we should distinguish two claims. Jesus may not have called his followers to reform the institutions of his age, but that does not mean the suffering created within those institutions was of no concern. Waiting for God’s kingdom was not indifference. It required people to live now in a way that showed what that kingdom was like.
Dear Dr Ehrman, regarding your recent podcast with Megan Lewis and the central theme of your book “Love Thy Stranger”, what is your take on the Ancient Greek concept of xenia and its similarity / relation to Jesus’ extension of the “love they neighbor” concept?
I deal with that in my book — it’s a very important questoin. Certainly Xenia was a major feature of social engagement in the classical Greek world. But, that kind of “welcoming and helping a stranger” applied to those strangers who were “like you,” in your same social and economic class. A good illustration involves Odysseus: when the royal family of the Phaeacians welcome him, it’s because they can tell what kind of powerful/royal person he is (just by his looks); when the suitors see him, they treat him like dirt.
Dear Dr Ehrman, I am no expert, so please forgive me if I am completely mistaken. It is my understanding that Augustine of Hippo invented the idea that baptism is essential for salvation and that unbaptised infants go to hell, where they suffer some, but not all, of its torments. This dogma held sway until the Middle Ages when it was deemed too harsh and replaced by the idea of limbo. Am I wrong to believe that Augustine’s theological dogma must have resulted in enormous suffering among Christians over nearly a millenium? Given child mortality rates at that time, countless parents would have lost an unbaptised child. Believing that child to be in hell seems bad enough, but assuming the parents were striving to be good Christians in order to be admitted to heaven, would this not add further suffering since they would believe that in achieving their aim they would never again see their unbaptised child?
Yes, the idea that a child would be tormented forever if they died before being baptized has created enormous pain for parents over the years, and still does. It’s a horrible idea.
and yet, nothing ever happened – the “Kingdom of God” never arrived. This should be a hint to all the reformers out there.
Of course, preterists, such as John Shelby Spong, argue that the messianic return happened. They point to Pentecost and say “That is what Jesus foretold.” Preterists say that the reason this event did not usher in a perfect world is due to the fact that it is still a work in progress. They point to the steady improvement in human lives, as outlined by Steven Pinker and others, as proof that Jesus was not lying when the Gospel writers have him say “Truly I tell you, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see that the kingdom of God has come with power.”
The problems are that (a) this is not what ancient Jews meant by the Kingdom of God and (b) it has never arrived “in power”
Luke 18:18-30 is interesting in this light. Selling all you own and giving the proceeds to the poor, whom you have of course joined, just isn’t as big a deal as it otherwise would be if God is soon to turn the whole universe upside down. In the face of imminent apocalypse, none of the things that daily preoccupy us would matter much any more, so we might as well get serious about whatever would benefit us post-apocalypse. And Jesus is here to tell us what that is. By the way, though, if absolutely everybody sold everything, who is it who would do the buying? Not everybody, I guess, can be a sheep. There must be at least a few goats for the plan to work.
I agree with Jesus’ pro-people anti materialistic philosophy, but his mistake was thinking God was soon, in his lifetime, going to bring His Kingdom to earth. So we’ve had to spend 2 millenia with things like slavery, unfair economic systems and church-sponsored authoritarians. But then if Jesus had spoken out more specifically against such things maybe the religion would not have taken hold? And then we’d still have the same problems!
Oh my goodness Bart. You may have just opened a big can of worms. You are asking people to actually try to think for themselves instead of being told what to think or being spoon fed what they are supposed to think. You actually want us to try to justify our biases and genetically programmed thought processes!! Shocking! And possibly bordering on treason and civil uprising!! We do not want to truly examine our beliefs because we might just discover that they might be wrong and that would be very psychologically damaging. Our fragile egos might get bruised and we would not be able to live with ourselves. Heaven forbid!! I would prefer to stay well ensconced in my warm personal comfort zone. My mind is made up, don’t confuse me with facts!
All this is said with tongue firmly in cheek. Your blog is designed for people who are open minded and tolerant of diverse ideas and willing to learn new stuff. Keep up the good work.
Thanks!
You mentioned three responses to suboptimal systems- reformation/transformation/abolition. That misses something fundamental (that Jesus understood better than anyone): The deepest problem isn’t the system, it’s the people who make it up. Even the best laws become tools of oppression if their enforcers are corrupt.
Instead, Jesus focused relentlessly on the human heart. The things you mentioned (following God’s will/repent) weren’t distractions from social change; they’re necessary preconditions for it. You don’t build a just society by replacing one institution with another. You build it by producing just people.
It’s too simplistic to say Jesus expected God to intervene in His time thus showed little interest in this current world. Throughout the Gospels, Jesus prepares his disciples to reign with him in God’s kingdom. He teaches how to judge rightly, exercise authority without domination, love enemies, forgive, and serve. Those aren’t merely private virtues; they’re qualities of rulers.
So yes, Jesus wasn’t calling to overthrow Rome. But neither was he indifferent to the future. He was forming the kind of people who could faithfully govern in God’s kingdom. But If you only change the system (Jesus followers for Rome), then the same broken hearts will eventually corrupt that system too.
In the Gospels Jesus frequently refers to himself as the Son of Man. Do you think that he saw himself as this figure? As such, would it mean Jesus believed that God would end Roman rule in Judea and put Jesus in charge?
Matthew references Enoch and Mark doesn’t. Is there a difference in how Matthew and Mark saw the Son of Man? Matthew presenting Jesus in a similar light to Enoch while Mark sees Jesus as more similar to the Son of Man in Daniel?
I do think Jesus thought God would put an end to Roman rule and install him as the king. But I dn’t think he saw himself as the son of Man (even though the Gospel writers do). In the passsages where he describes the son of man coming on the clouds in judgment he speaks of him in the third-person, as someone else; I think those are the son of man sayings he actually said.
I’m not sure I’m fully on board; I think Jesus favored a subversive approach of passive resistance to empire. As an example, in the Parable of the Talents, the hero is the third enslaved person, who refuses to enrich his wealthy owner (who himself admits that he reaped where he did not sow and gathered where he did not scatter). It is the same sort of passive resistance employed by enslaved Africans in the antebellum South, by Gandhi, by Oskar Schindler, by Rosa Parks, by Occupy Wall Street and by others who lack the power to change the system writ large.
I’d say the problem is that Jesus does not praise the slave but condemns him. He approves of the other two. The point of that parable appears to be that when the “lord” goes away his servants shoud work hard to promote his interests. It’s usually thought that presupposes a situation where Jesus has gone and his followers heed to make converts for him until the time he returns.
Thanks Dr Ehrman. From your hypothesis, I get a picture of Jesus as a kind of hippy dropout from the swinging 60s, albeit one with an agenda. It makes a lot of sense, but I don’t see him, in your scenario, as posing any threat to the Authorities. So the question arises, why did they need to crucify him?
In the 80s a number of NT scholars (who were in college in the 60s!) did more or less portray Jesus that way. But I don’t seem him as a counter-culture type per se. In future posts I’ll explain that Jesus was not urging social change or an uprising, and wasn’t actually a threat to the government, but was known to be calling himself the future king and so they executed him for insurrection.
Jesus was wrong. The “don’t worry” attitude is how and why narcissistic lunatics become dictators of powerful countries. The present matters.
Imagine the following.
Jesus decides to petition Rome to be nicer to Jews.
Rome: “You know, you’re right. We’ll get out of your land and leave you alone. In fact, we’ll even help protect Israel.”
Jesus: “Wait. What?”
The Jewish Messiah prophecy needed the Jewish people to be oppressed. Jesus wanted change, yes, but the Big Kahuna type. Not Roman Reformation. I think the worse Rome was to Israel, the more Jesus took heart in his hopes of the prophecy being fulfilled.
I was raised by parents who were members of the Communist Party, but I have come to value democracy.
At the same time, democratic systems can deteriorate into mob rule or authoritarianism. Hitler’s rise through democratic institutions is a sobering example, and thinkers such as Aristotle and Ortega y Gasset warned about the dangers of politics driven by the passions of the crowd. The available data also suggest that populism—one possible distortion of democracy—tends to weaken economies rather than improve them.
This makes me think that the only truly ideal monarchy would be one ruled directly by a perfectly good God—not by human beings claiming to speak for God. If such a God exists, that kingdom may indeed be the ultimate ideal.
But while we wait for the coming of God’s kingdom, I reject the idea that we should ignore social problems—or even provoke war—in order to fulfill apocalyptic prophecy. I believe that God would instead ask us to feed the hungry, care for the sick, welcome the outsider, and relieve suffering wherever we can.
Of course, this may reflect my own theology more than the outlook of the historical Jesus.
I agree with your view of the Jesus we find in the Gospels. I also expect the Gospel portrayal is close to who he really was and what he believed. I also am confident the writers’ opinions, desires, and beliefs tainted their portrayal. Jesus did want to change one part of his society and that is the plight of the needy.
Please know how much I appreciate your using extracts from your book as you did in Post 2. I believe those extracts identify for us insights that you find most significant and which much of the book is written to present. I have read many of your books and go back often wondering if the parts I highlighted are the ones you also think are important.
Thank you!
A minor, somewhat off-topic, quibble: Karl Marx indeed advocated engaging in movements for change and thought incremental improvements were possible, if limited. He hoped that people (mostly workers) in these movements would eventually see the need for more fundamental change.
It’s true, though, that there is always debate among radicals more reform-oriented people and maximalists who fear that modest improvement would blunt the need for revolution. This sort of happened in developed Western countries in the 1950s with the success of unions and social democracy/welfare state.
I guess more in the Manifesto than in Das Kapital.
A more on-topic response than my comment about Marx: yes. Although I’m not scholar of the period with the languages, like you, I always thought that trying to derived social and political doctrines from what we are told about Jesus wouldn’t work – the end of time is coming soon, so why bother? In fact, the apocalyptic view assumes that the current evil powers dominating the earth are not reformable, but must be defeated in a giant battle. In the meantime, pay your taxes! (I have suspicion that that story was added.)
However, I do think (as you have argued) that there is in Jesus and also many of the Old Testament prophets concern for the poor and their oppression by rich, and similar social concerns. In later periods commentator have mostly de-emphasized those concerns and played up sexual anxieties about “harlots,” etc.
Hi Bart. Do you think that Paul was certainly on the right track with his teaching? Even though Paul never met Jesus and had very little interaction with the disciples he pretty much got Jesus’ apocalyptic message right. How do you account for this?
Do you mean “right” in the sense that his views about God/Christ/salvation were true? If so, then no — I’m an atheist and so I necessarily don’t think so. If hyou mean was he “right about Jesus’ message” I’d say partly yes and mainly no. He like Jesus was an apocalypticist expecting an imminent end/day of judgment. But he appears to have had that view before bedoming a follower of Jesus. He doesn’t say very much at all about what Jesus actually said and did, so it’s hard to know if what he knew was right or wrong. But his theology (e.g., Jesus death brings salvatino) is very different from Jesus’s views at their core.
I would hypothesize (and try to defend as plausible) a much more radical interpretation: that the NT is through-and-through political. It is relevant that in tribal societies in general, *there is no conceptual distinction* between religion and politics (as distinct from sacred vs. profane). Jesus’ teachings envision a transition (for both Israel and Rome) from quasi-tribal societies (social structure (at that time awkwardly) predicated on familial relations) to one based upon a different political metaphysics. What was de jure was no longer de facto. It is no accident then that Jesus repeatedly disvalues familial bonds. Fully articulating and defending that is a major challenge – one that requires defending, inter alia, an ontological analysis of such concepts as ‘spirit’, ‘demon’, ‘powers of the air’, ‘soul’, ‘resurrection,’ ‘god’ and more – and then arguing that these analyses illuminate the texts in new and detailed ways. No easy task! If such an analysis is to prove plausible, one would expect many new textual dots to be connected by the result. IMO this is in fact the case.
One further comment here. There is another option besides passivity and armed rebellion. It is sedition: sell your opponent (in this case Rome) on the advantages of a new ideology to solve a problem they themselves desperately need to solve. The problem? Making sense, practically and jurisprudentially, of their own empire. The Romans tried – e.g. Virgil – but failed (unfortunately, the ruling family he lionized promptly collapsed, and coup d’etat filled the vacuum). So much for that idea – predicated upon kinship or something like it. Roman government was a mess – also at the ideological level. As I understand it, the Caesars wanted desperately to claim the old title, Rex’ but couldn’t find a legal justification for that claim. Is this correct?
I don’t know that that’s true. Rex was a four-letter word to Romans as a rule, and starting with Augustus the emperors were able to assert the authority of the rex without the title.
I think this is a good articulation of what I have always thought Jesus believed, both when I was a believer and afterward.
I think that was well stated. And, I think it can still be a valid way to conduct one’s life. Though, it is good to fight for positive change even if you are very unlikely to suceed.
Thanks for the post.
The “real” Jesus emerged as the protege of John the Baptist who might have been 20 years older. Young Jesus suggested a second site on the Jordan River to be located in Samaria. This site allowed access from Galilee, Phoenicia, and the Decapolis. Two staff members from John were dispatched to baptize while Jesus exhorted the people. This arrangement existed for a decade. It was JOHN’S BAPTISM. Herod Antipas arrested and beheaded John. Jesus and the staff members from John moved to the northern shore of the Sea of Galilee. The water ritual of immersion (simulate the dyeing of wool) was quietly abandoned without explanation. The decision NOT to baptize untethered JOHN’S BAPTISM from a single location or from a location with water. Jesus went mobile.
To answer your question: JESUS and ACTIVISM. Jesus reduced it to the human equation: THE GOLDEN RULE. Later, this is the DIVINE LAW OF LOVE (AGAPE). Don’t be a narcissist. Don’t be a sociopath. Don’t be an Empath. Don’t be evil. Don’t be a doormat for evil, either. Don’t enable evil. Edmund Burke said, “For evil to triumph, the Good People must do nothing.” Jesus was an activist against EVIL.
I do not agree that Jesus is presented as a theocrat. The Kingdom of God is represented by Jesus as people being kind and caring toward each other. Summarized by the Shema and the Golden Rule. Not the list of rules in the law which caused great friction in the historic setting. And forgiveness. It’s wartime literature, except Paul.
The intended audience of the NT spoke Greek and were assimilated Hellenists. Except Revelation whose authors were slaves to Torah. Only one book is intended for a Torah-zealous Jewish audience. All are intended for an audience aware of apocalyptic hope because that’s what caused the wars. Only a minority of Jews rose up against Rome. The majority resided in Pax Roman countries. The New Covenant exempted Jews from Torah and reflects the majority Jewish view at the time.
I read Jesus as a literary creation of Hellenized Roman Jews like Paul, the only verified author, who opposed the Jewish minority who opposed Rome.
Donald Trump very obviously says thing that are not true only to manipulate public sentiment. Paul faked apocalyptic sentiment for the same reason – marketing non-Torah Jewish ideas to assimilated Jews and their associates empire-wide.
Hello, Russellonius: You wrote, “Paul faked apocalyptic sentiment – ” That statement is eerily true because Paul did not write either of the letters to the Thessalonians. Paul did not write any of the Pastoral letters, either. Three separate groups produced numerous pseudepigraphal forgeries. By the way, Josephus was correct about the Jewish War of 70 CE. It was not the popular revolt of the Jewish people under Roman oppression. The seeds were planted before the Romans arrived. The Hasmonean Dynasty was a perpetual civil war. Don’t blame the Nabateans, the Parthians, the Herodians, or the Essenes. Blame the Zealots, the Fourth Philosophy. You wrote, “I read Jesus as a literary creation . . . ” Josephus wrote about James, the brother of Jesus. James was the leader of the followers of Jesus. You wrote, “. . . the Jewish minority [Torah-zealous] who opposed Rome.” The Pharisees and the Herodians controlled the people, and neither opposed Rome. Rome was better than the illegitimate Hasmonean Dynasty. You are correct that the authors of Revelation was not the Apostle John. Donald Trump in 2028! (Just kidding!) Keep believing mainstream media, right? Have a good day.
Jesus was clear about justice, mercy, faithfulness (Mt 23) as pre-eminent over formality and legality. Mt 25, Jesus made it plain that how I actively reduce suffering of hunger and incarceration.. Especially in our privileged society and legal system I ought to prevent hunger in the first place, and prevent injustice before it occurs. Whether its hundreds (that we know of) innocent people in prison; or something as simple as oppressive local governments imposing fines and restrictions, ridiculous licenses, etc. that keep people from bettering theirselves from living hand to mouth or even hunger, homelessness. Spending money on church buildings that are vacant half the time (or more!) when the sole purpose of the assembly (some people call ‘church’) is edification of other believers – not worship and worship ‘teams’ or evangelism. Edification – edification – edification couldn’t have been plainer in the episTle to the Corinth, and essential for the problem of unity in that assembly.. Maybe hereabouts too.
How we understand Jesus as an activist or reformer is probably best seen in whatever he intended with the attack on the Temple. I do think that was a historical event. It was probably a bigger thing than even what Mark describes because Matthew, Luke, and John progressively downplay and distance the event, and Mark probably did the same from what actually happened. I don’t think Mark invented this event–maybe to show Jesus’ distinct break from the Temple after 70 CE–because Mark goes out of his way to show Jesus is not aggressive or violent. Mark had to include the Temple attack probably because it was too well known to ignore. And Jesus probably did say, “I will destroy this temple made with hands, and in three days build another, not made with hands” and Mark says, No, what he actually said publicly in the Temple was Isa 56:7 and Jer 7:11 (Mark 11:17) and what he actually said privately about the Temple was Mark 13:2. I wonder if by violently attacking the Temple, Jesus thought he could incur God’s kingdom and judgment as in Mal 3:1-5, especially the second half of Mal 3:1.
I, personally, make a distinction between prioritization and “petty indifference”. So, I vote, I engage in political discussion, pay taxes, and I happen to be born and work in a pro-capitalist (and increasingly, anti-social-program) culture. All I can do is prioritize my own decisions, and vote my conscience, and let The World (and the worldly) continue along its preordained path. The “rise of darkness” will continue, in its own way. I think it is more about what you worship, and “where your heart is”.
Where I can, I vote for national healthcare (which would save billions if not trillions annually), for example. I vote for regulation, where regulation makes collective social sense, for separation of church and state…even though I’m religious there’s multiple religions here.
The apocalyptic bias is, IMO, metaphorical (I’m more in the N.T. Wright camp). I just think that Jesus was demonstrating a “Heaven first, faith first” approach in a very heavy acted out metaphor that only he could do. (Luke 22:36.) . The two swords are a foreshadow of the cross itself & metaphor. We must help to bring about the “World to Come” during “this generation” (an aion). Jesus knew the long spacetime duration.