Loading...Yesterday I posted the first in what will be a series of reflections on the earliest Christian Christologies (understandings of Christ). I began to outline what I take to be the earliest Christology of all. Jesus and his followers, I maintained, saw him(self) as a man and nothing more than a man (who was a great teacher, a prophet, and the future messiah of the coming kingdom – but human through and through, nothing else). But once these followers came to believe that he had been raised from the dead, they altered their view to begin to think that God had exalted him to heaven and made him his specially anointed one, his Son, who would indeed be the future messiah and who would bring in that Kingdom himself when he returned from heaven as the Son of Man.
And so, why do I think that this Christological view – that God made Jesus his Son at the resurrection, the one who reigns *now* (and so is already the “ruler” or the “anointed one” or the “messiah,”), and so is the lord of the kingdom (the LORD) already? It’s a complicated story.
A bit of personal background. I took my first PhD seminar at Princeton Theological Seminary before I was a PhD student. I was in the senior year of my Masters of Divinity program, and I knew I was going to apply to get into the PhD program for the following year. It was very competitive to get in, and I wanted the biggest leg-up I could get. Plus I was desperate to have some *serious* advanced training in NT (it may seem odd to an outsider, but you don’t really get that in most Master’s programs in the field; you get some, but it’s not all that hard-core).
That year one of the great professors of NT at Princeton Seminar, Paul Meyer, was offering a PhD seminar (for PhD students only), called “Creeds and Hymns in the NT.” I had taken a crazy-hard six-week crash-course in German the summer before at Princeton University, and so I could already read scholarship in German (where most NT scholarship had been and was being done at the time). And so I asked Prof. Meyer if he would make an exception to his rule not to allow MDiv students into his graduate seminars, and I somehow convinced him. So now I was in with the big boys. (And yes, they were all boys.)
It was a very difficult class for me, since I was not yet at the level of the others in the seminar. But it was absolutely exhilarating as well. The idea behind the class is a little hard to explain, since technically it had to do with the use of form-critical analysis to establish and analyze pre-literary units of tradition outside the Gospels. Ha! You almost need a PhD to understand what it was about (!). (Kind of like trying to figure out instructions on how to set up my wi-fi system….) So, well, I need to unpack that a bit. I’ll give it a try here.
Sometimes authors of the New Testament – like Paul and the author of Acts – would not simply compose what they were writing, but would also quote earlier pieces of Christian tradition that they were familiar with. And they would do that without telling their reader that this is what they were doing. In many instances they may well have not needed to tell their readers, since their readers would have been familiar with these traditions. It’d be like if I started saying ‘Twas brillig and the slithy toves did gyre and gimble in the wabe,” without being pedantic and reminding you that what I was quoting a bit of “Jabberwocky”. It might seem weird to you that I would do that, but in fact I sometimes do. When I’m very pleased about something, I will sometimes tell a correspondent on email: “O frabjous day, callouh, callay!” Or indicate that I am “chortling in my joy.” If they know their Alice books well enough, they will get the allusions.
And in part they are alerted to the fact that I am making allusions by the circumstance that suddenly I am using words that I normally don’t use, and that makes them think to consider whether I am picking up these words from somewhere else.
It’s easier to detect such things from made up words like frabjous, callouh, callay, and chortle, but in principle whenever I quote a poem without acknowledgment (e.g., from Emily Dickinson or Robert Frost or, well, J.R.R Tolkien) the difference in vocabulary and even rhythm may alert a careful reader to what I’m doing.
There are passages in the NT where the author – Paul, the author of Acts, the author of the Pastoral epistles, the author of Hebrews, etc. – appears to be doing something of the sort. That was a day and age, of course, when it was not necessary or customary or even normal to indicate the source of a quotation. You just quoted something and moved on, often incorporating it into your own writing without pause.
And so how do we today detect where an author is doing that? It’s tricky, but there are some instances in the New Testament – in fact a lot of instances, enough to fill a full semester PhD seminar with them – where it happens. The way you establish that someone (Paul, or whomever) is doing that is by looking at passages that have a different rhythm to them, and/or a vocabulary that is unusual for that particular author, and/or themes or points of view that are otherwise unattested for that author or (even better) that appear to stand at odds with what that author says elsewhere, and/or that (as passages) do not actually fit very well into their literary contexts. And, well, there are other things you look for.
You can’t really do it without having a fairly good mastery of the Greek of the New Testament. But scholars have worked on this kind of thing for decades, and there are passages of the NT that almost certainly represent just this kind of thing, quotations of earlier traditions (for example statements of faith/creeds, poems, and so on) that are not cited as being earlier traditions, but almost certainly are.
As I’ll point out in my next post, some of the earliest of these traditions in the judgment of a solid consensus of critical scholarship embody statements about Christ. And the earliest of these represent just the kind of exaltation Christology I was speaking about in yesterday’s post. More on this in tomorrow’s post![/mepr-show]
In the Tanakh He was lamb of God, Redeemer, Messiah, Lord, the Anointed One, the Branch, Messenger of the Covenant, Wonderful Counselor etc.. He lived before he came to the earth. He was born in poor circumstances. He was despised and rejected of man. His own people wouldn’t recognize him. He gave His life for His people. He would be crucified and his enemies part lots for his raiment. His disfigurement would startle kings. He would see the blessings of his dying. His people would mourn when they see their Messianic King is the same lowly man they pierced. He would be believed upon of the Gentiles. The Jewish nation would end with His coming.
In the NT surviving records take us back about 20 years after his death. It’s clear from Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians that his readers were familiar with the story of Jesus. Luke quotes Matthew and Mark, and he died with Paul about mid ’60’s after writing first Luke and then The Acts. So the synoptics were probably written in the ’30’s and ’40’s, First Century AD. Many of the readers were alive in the days of Jesus.
Luke didn’t write Luke or Acts, which were both written well after Mark (c. ~70 CE).
If you actually read Bart’s work (or that of pretty much any biblical scholar) you’d know this.
Or at least know that that is a common view. (!)
The very, VERY, earliest traditions must have been oral and circulating in Aramaic among people who were not literate. Has anyone examined the process by which such traditions would appear in written Greek– would they have been first transcribed into a barely literate Aramaic and then into Greek and in the process cleaned up a bit and made more graceful and poetic? Or is it more likely to have been from oral Aramaic directly into written Greek? Or, an oral Aramaic tradition into an oral Greek tradition and then into written Greek? I’m assuming there could have been illiterate Greek speakers.
Oh yes, it’s a much studied topic. I deal with aspects of it in my book Jesus before the Gospels. Short story: as soon as stories about Jesus circulated outside of Israel, they were told in Greek (since alsmost no one spoke Aramaic); those are the forms of story the Gospels writers inherited.
The Aramaic to Greek interface looks like it might be a rough one. I mean, to give a good translation from Aramaic to Greek would require an almost scholarly knowledge of both languages, I would think. In most cases it seems likely that the initial translations would have been less than scholarly in quality. I mean, If I had a good working knowledge of English, and only a crude knowledge of German, translating a story I heard in German into English might produce some surprising results. I recall Samuel Clemens doing a translation of his jumping frog story into French and then back into English. The results are hilarious.
Is/are there an area/areas of study that focuses on colloquialisms or regional usages of words in antiquity, or was the Greek that was used/survived more formal/homogeneous? I know even in the context of speaking with other Americans from different regions can reveal fascinating tidbits of vocabulary and grammar to which I am unaccustomed. If it exsists, do scholars use these words/phrases/constructions to attempt to determine where a particular author was from or perhaps where that author was educated?
The ancient forms of the language divided into numerous dialects (Ionic, Doric etc.); the Koine was widely spread at a much later date, and it is hared do determine an author’s region at the time of the NT based on grammar and vocabulary.
So what is your opinion of the famous passage in 1 Cor 13 then? Pauline poetic flight or quote?
I flip a coin on it once a week.
Although I wouldn’t expect to come across it often, I don’t think “chortle” is a made up word, is it?
I don’t know if it first occurs in Jabberwocky of not. ‘Twas brillig and the slithy toves…. (On the other hand, one could argue that every word is made up!)
Jabberwocky is indeed its first appearance.
Etymology ascribes “chortle” to Lewis Carroll. Some suggest it combines “chuckle” and “snort.” Works for me!
Yes indeed. Most of the terms in Jabberwocky are combinations of one sort or another. He actually discussed it somewhere (that I’ve seen). I read an intersting biography of him once, but don’t remember the author.
How do scholars know these passages are quotations instead of interpolations ?
Because in most instances, even though the passages *themselves* are problematic as Pauline, he alludes to them in their contexts and appears to use them. So they appear to be important for his argument and therefore something he himself put into the text.
Ah, I’m homeschooling my grandson during the pandemic and he had to memorize Jabberwocky, so at least I would get those allusions! But allusions or quotations embedded in the NT – I’ll have to rely on you scholars for that.
Sounds like he’s getting a superior curriculum!
Thank you Dr Ehrman. But how do scholars know that the quotations are quotations and not later interpolations?
Because in most instances, even though the passages *themselves* are problematic as Pauline, he alludes to them in their contexts and appears to use them. So they appear to be important for his argument and therefore something he himself put into the text.
Thanks, Bart. Out of curiosity, is there any scholarship indicating whether the authors of the gospels of Mark, Matthew and John were familiar with Paul’s letters?
Yes, but I don’t know of anything written for a general audience. Joel Marcus, my friend and colleague who has done some guests posts before, wrote an important article, e.g., arguing that Mark’s Gospel shows close similarities to Paul’s letters.
really interesting stuff Bart; thank you.
What about Paul’s characteristic sign-off formulae? Obviously, if we are talking about the Trinity, the extended version at 2 Corinthians 13:14. But what about the more usual version; ‘The Grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with you”? Would you say this was particular to Paul; or does its form and style suggest it is something that he took over from other followers of Jesus?
When scholars isolate pre-Pauline traditions, they are not referrring to standard expressions that are commonly used by others, but with conscientiously composed statements of ideas, that almost invariably have poetic or creedal features.
Thanks Bart.
But then. suppose we go from sign-off formulae to greetings formulae; at Romans 1:7 we have “Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ”. And then again at 1 Corinthians 1:3; and so on in 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians and Philemon.
If these are indeed “standard expressions” of greeting; are they not also standard “statements of ideas”; specifically the idea that the names of the Lord Jesus Christ and of God the Father are to be invoked together in a form of blessing?
But as a creed perhaps; 1 Corinthians 8: 5-6:
“Indeed, even though there may be so-called gods in heaven or on earth—as in fact there are many gods and many lords — yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.”
Paul, I think, takes from this creedal statement that, although there are many divine beings encountered in Creation, the divinity of Jesus is wholly different; but uniquely is coupled with that of the “one God, the Father’.
Sure. But they are also modifications of standard ways of making epistolary beginnings and endings — they are not quotations of previously existing materials. But yes, 1 Cor. 8:5-6 has sometimes been considered pre-Pauline, poassibly with Pauline edits (as is true of Rom 1:3-4 and Phil 2:6-10 e.g.)
Please I would like to get your view on the Jesus of the Quran, Who he is. I see that he resembles your historical study on who Jesus is. Do you agree?
Nope. You probably know the Quranic view. I will be giving mine in my lectures this Sunday and next; and you can look up historical Jesus on the blog and you’ll see my discussions.
If I May Ask, what do you know about Islam? Is it your Disbelief in God that holds you back from considering it might be true? Or is it because it says Jesus wasn’t Crucified? Although its view of Who Jesus truly was ie ,being Just a Man and a Prophet and the Messiah, is very Much Accurate to what Jesus Actually believed who he was rather than the Christian version.
I”ve never found it convincing. But now that I’m an atheist, there is no point my asking if it is “true” religiously. It is, of course, one of the world’s great religions.