MetaCatholic

It seems to me that all too often, conservative and liberal share the same assumption in talking about the gospels. Early writings are held to carry a higher degree of historicity. Today Dan Wallace offered an initial post on the modern history of critical appraisal and dating of John. The idea that John was of little or no historical use certainly grew strongly in parallel with movements to date it late into the second century. Wallace relates how manuscript dating put paid to that, since we have a fragment of John earlier than the mid-second century, and possibly considerably earlier, as many readers will know. I don’t know where he will go with this idea, but there are hints that just as arguing for its lateness went hand in hand with doubting its historical value, so arguing for its early composition will strengthen its historical value.

In the same way Markan priority is often equated (perhaps subconsciously) with Markan historicity. Part of the mania for Q seem likewise concerned with constructing an earlier and more reliable (and more reliable because earlier?) source than the Synoptics. Likewise, and in face of some of the pained arguments, whether Thomas can be dated to the first century is a different question from whether it gets us any closer to the historical Jesus.

On the one hand the idea that early is more likely to carry historical memory is a reasonable starting assumption with which to explore the evidence, but it can’t overrule the character of the evidence: rather the evidence must be allowed to challenge the assumption. Luke, for example, makes an explicit claim that he has done detailed research and an implicit claim that he has found other earlier accounts (Matthew and Mark) unsatisfactory. The more we recognize Mark’s theological agenda, the less we can use the criterion of embarrassment to argue for the certain historicity of, say, the disciples’ thickness.

The fourth gospel is problematic – both assessing it in itself, and considering it in relationship to the synoptics, and in the face of such a complex work, its probable first century dating can say little enough about its historicity.

written by doug

Nick Norelli persuades me that I should add Bauckham’s book to my reading list. But on the issue of the foot-washing I have a few questions.

Does Bauckham argue that Jesus at some point in his ministry washed the feet of one or more of his disciples, or does he argue that on the night he was betrayed Jesus washed the feet of the Twelve? It seems to me possible, in the light of the rest of the gospel tradition to make a case for the former being historical. These are, I think, very different questions. I am willing to entertain the possibility of the former. I am doubtful of the historicity of the latter.

There are serious questions to put against the historicity of the event as it is presented:

• The version in the Synoptics of the “institution of the Eucharist” (anachronism) is supported by Paul, our earliest witness. The foot-washing is effectively an alternate action, and although set at a meal, the meal content provided in our other witnesses is entirely omitted. Any account of John’s narrative has to as much account for this omission as explain this addition.
• John evidences a willingness to divorce historical events from their historical position to serve a theological agenda. His placement of the “cleansing of the temple” story evidences this most clearly. Historically it is easy to see this event as a proximate cause of the crucifixion, and very difficult to see the raising of Lazarus taking its place. John may well build on events recorded in the common Jesus tradition, but he does so in a most uncommon way.
• While there is evidence of a foot-washing ritual within the early Christian centuries, I am unaware of any evidence that places it so early as to have any chance of being independent of the Fourth Gospel. Isn’t it more plausible that churches that valued this gospel also valued this tradition?

Now it might be that Bauckham answers these questions, although I get the impression from Nick’s review that he doesn’t. But I think that they need answering before any claim to historicity is remotely persuasive.

written by doug

I don’t mean to pick on him particularly, but I feel obliged to haul Claude Mariottini over these metacatholic coals, pour encourager les autres. In an otherwise good post (read it), he says:

In late Judaism, the Messiah was considered to be God’s agent who would bring restoration to Israel. The New Testament used the title and applied it to Christ to designate him as the savior of the world. (my emphasis)

But if Judaism was late 2,000 years ago, what on earth is it now?

I am aware that this used to be a standard and commonplace phrase of a Christian scholarship that operated in complete isolation from Jewish scholarship, with a completely supercessionist theology, and quite commonly with an anti-Semitic ideology. But I had thought the phrase had been pretty much stamped out nowadays. I will put its use on this occasion down to carelessness caused by reading too many worthy but now ancient tomes of Christian scholarship on the Second Temple period.

I really think we ought to stop using the phrase “late Judaism” to describe something that has continued to flourish for 2,000 years after the period being described as “late”. It’s not even middle-aged at that point. Arguably, in any sense that we know it today, it’s not Judaism either, but a common ancestor of Christianity and Judaism.

Let’s be clear. “Late Judaism” is a theological construct, not a descriptive one, when it is applied to the late Second Temple period, and in many people’s ears (including mine) it carries anti-semitic baggage. (I am not accusing Claude of that, but only of using a phrase carelessly. I am quite sure Claude didn’t mean to be insulting to contemporary Judaism at all.) Christians need to stop saying “late Judaism” and say something else.

written by doug

I want to pull a quick thread out of the comments on yesterday’s round-up. (You can skip below the quotes if you’re in a hurry.) In the course of the post I said:

Soloveichik says: “When someone asserts divinity, his interlocutor has only two options: Believe, obey, and worship, or back away slowly.” But did the historical Jesus assert such a thing, and what, in any case would it have meant in context?

Justin queried this in the comments:

You do not believe the historical Jesus claimed divinity? What do you make of John 10:30 or John 8:58?

I replied that I saw those verses as part of the evangelist’s creative meditation on the significance of Jesus, and then Michele of Reformed Chicks Blabbing asked in another comment:

How can you be sure? What is your proof? Are you denying that the interaction with the Jews took place? Or just the words that John attributed to Jesus.

Part of me was a bit surprised to be asked these questions, because I’m so used to reading and describing John as a highly creative narrative in my preaching and teaching as well as in my own thinking. The primary indicator seems to me to be style, and in particular the piecing together of two fairly obvious points:

• The style of Jesus’ speech in John is quite different from that of the Synoptic Jesus.
• The style of Jesus speech is of a piece with the style of the narrator.

The conclusion that the author is creatively writing Jesus’ speeches seems to me to follow fairly logically. This dovetails with the way in which the content and focus of these speeches are declarations – testimony – about Jesus’ identity and purpose. By contrast, in the Synoptics Jesus speech about himself is elliptical, ambiguous and riddled with riddles, and the main content is not himself, but the kingdom of which he sees himself as something like an inaugurating agent, a vehicle of the active presence of God restoring his people. (Begging about a million historical questions!) The rather strange conflict over exorcism that leads to the “blasphemy against the Spirit” saying (Matt 12:31 and parallels) is one of several texts that suggest Jesus saw this ambiguity as an intentional strategy to make space for God’s revelation.

Another pointer to the stylised nature of the dialogues in the gospel — well they’re often really monologues with prompts — is precisely at the heart of part of Michele’s question. Am I denying that “the interaction with the Jews took place”? This concept of “the Jews” is itself a highly stylised presentation. I do not think it can simply be explained by translating it as the “Judaeans” in contradistinction to the Galilean movement of Jesus. Its strangeness is well illustrated by the raising of Lazarus episode. Bethany, after all, is firmly located in Judaea, and the narrative seems fairly clear that is as as much the hometown of Martha, Mary and Lazarus as Nazareth is Jesus’. Yet, we read, “many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them about their brother.” (John 11:19) Quite frankly, however, you translate it, this makes little geographical or historical sense, and the descriptor “the Jews” has to be read as a phrase describing a collective character in the Johannine narrative. This character stands in for diverse real people who had real doubts and questions about, or conflicts with, Jesus. But the drawing of the character is also coloured by the conflicts experienced at the time the gospel was written. The conflicts themselves are therefore equally stylised representations.

Leaving aside all the complicated philosophical stuff that is too much for a simple brain like mine, one reason the C. S. Lewis style “mad, bad or God” apologetic doesn’t work is that Jesus didn’t run round saying all those “I am …” claims that he makes in John’s gospel. The speech of Jesus in the gospel is largely a stylised representation of Jesus’ significance, given narrative form within the newly established genre of gospel, and I think, intentionally to supplement at least one of those prior gospels.

written by doug

Comments can be found here on Episodes One, Two and Three.

Following Mark Goodacre’s comment, please note that this post contains cinematographic spoilers. (I hesitated to add a spoiler alert originally — it seemed a bit strange to say spoiler alert - Jesus is risen)

Perhaps the bravest decision taken in the BBC Passion was to give over one sixth of its broadcast time to the events following the crucifixion. At one level, this is setting oneself up for failure, so it was surprising that the production team and cast did as well as they managed to do.

The first notable feature was to give some considerable time to the events of the Sabbath, with tensions running high around and among the disciples. Interestingly Thomas disappeared somewhat. At least I think he did – most of the apostles were rather hard to distinguish one from another. In his place as the leading dissenter came James – though I confess I’d need to watch it again to work out which James, or indeed, whether more than one James was conflated. This drama of the disciples’ reactions was interspersed with the different ways in which Pilate and Caiaphas likewise dealt with the aftermath, including a standoff between those child-hood friends Joseph of Arimathea and Caiaphas. This was one of the many ways in which the day of rest became a day of brooding tension: not at all implausible, and often quite fresh.

The second notable feature was not just that the team decided to handle the resurrection, but the low-key way in which they set out to film the un-filmable. Supernatural accompaniment was stripped away. The guards at the tomb had popped off for a bite to eat. There were no angels, and at the end no parting clouds of glory. Instead a stranger with hair and beard far tidier than Jesus starts a conversation with Mary Magdalene in the harshly lit desert surrounds of the tomb. (There’s no misty dawn in a garden either.) It is a different actor. Mary begins to see that he looks a bit like Jesus. She feels it is him, despite as much as because of what her eyes see. This also effectively creates an interesting tension for the viewer: will the resurrection be portrayed as wishful thinking or something more?

In the (upper?) room, Mary’s news is received to mixed reviews. James storms off, presumably with Cleopas, getting out of Jerusalem for Emmaus. Another different actor, different hairstyle and beard, draws near to them on the road and starts a conversation pointing to Isaiah’s prophecies. As he breaks bread and shares wine with them he almost repeats the words of the Last Supper. (This is clearly eucharistic as Luke intended, but more explicit). They look up, and the strange actor has been replaced with Joseph Mawle. Then the production cuts to their returning excitement back in Jerusalem and Jesus among them again. Many of the shots are reaction shots of the disciples, building up to a smiling Jesus leaning against a pillar. So not just the event but something of its impact and significance are conveyed.

This is perhaps the most interesting dramatic portrayal of the resurrection for a secular age that could have been managed. In some respects it has more power for being so naturalistic. It certainly beats the almost risible ending of Mel Gibson’s Passion, shot from behind the rising Jesus, seeing the world through a hole in his hand. Its weakness perhaps is in its ending. Jesus is talking to Peter, alone, beside the pool of Bethesda (I presume). Peter is now doing what Jesus had done earlier in the week, bathing the sick and treating them with compassion. Jesus both charges Peter to look after the others, and spread the news of forgiveness, and also promises to be with him to the end of time. Then he just wanders off into the crowds of a narrow Jerusalem street, until he’s lost from sight. It very nearly works, but feels a little too much like a petering out instead of a conclusion.

Otherwise this episode showed the same strengths and weaknesses as the previous parts. Overall, I think a balanced judgement must be more favourable than unfavourable. In many respects it makes brave and dramatically effective decisions about how to show something that is over-familiar to many viewers, and almost completely unknown to another potential audience. The modernising of the language is a key component of this, even it sometimes leads to overly creedal statements about Jesus being God’s only Son, and at least once to nonsense: “the gospel of good news” is a quite bizarre formulation. Visually it is always competent, and excelled itself both with the crucifixion and some of the panoramas. I disagree with their decision to effectively stage the crucifixion and burial in a desert panorama. It may have had metaphorical and iconic power, but it sat oddly with the otherwise detailed attention to history.

I also had some reservations about Joseph Mawle as Jesus. Whether it was his interpretation, the script, the direction or a mixture of all three, I remain unconvinced that he was a charismatic enough figure. He’s a good actor, though, and it was a competent and sometimes moving portrayal. Generally, I think I would say something similar about the whole cast, competent and sometimes moving. There was no obviously weak character, and no obvious standout portrayal either. The more sympathetic portrayals of Caiaphas and Pilate fitted well into this.

In the end, this was a very human story, and even the resurrection was a very human event. That may give it some real power to make people consider the story again with fresh eyes. It will undoubtedly please some and annoy others. It is probably better television than any attempt to flag up the supernatural would have been, but it equally meant that the secular reasons for the crucifixion had to be heavily laboured, and the significance of the resurrection underplayed. It remains, for me, a bit of a mixed bag, but one in which the good and original certainly outweigh my criticisms, and a project well worth having undertaken. Those involved are to be congratulated.

written by doug

The third part of the BBC Passion aired tonight (most appropriately). See my comments on parts one and two here. Generally I continue to feel pretty much as I felt about the earlier episodes: this is a bit of a mixed bag, with the good clearly outweighing the  — well not so much bad as odd, or even confused.

There were a few particularly striking visual and dramatic notes. The temporary storage of Jesus in a dungeon = covered hole in the ground, between Sanhedrin trial and being taken before Pilate, was both the most interesting, historically plausible, and dramatically effective liberty the script took with the gospel narratives. The actual placing of the cross in its socket, shot from above as a bird’s eye view of the crucifixion was extremely well done, as was the visual composition of the moment of death, framed as the climax of an exchange of glances from Jesus to Mary, to the heavens.

One feature that any Jesus film brings home is the difficulty of narrating the terse stories of the gospels over anything like a sufficiently dramatic time span when portrayed on the screen. This was part of the effectiveness of the imprisoning of Jesus in a kind of well in Caiaphas’ courtyard. It gave a sense of time passing to the events, without seriously elongating the trial scenes with invented dialogue.

On the negative side were some jarring moments. There is a tendency throughout the script to assume that phrases like “Son of God” have the benefit of several centuries accrual of Christian meaning, and the attempt to put “terse Biblish” into more expansive and explanatory everyday English sometimes heightens this tendency to read Christian doctrine in. “”When I’m gone, do this to bring me back among you” is, shall we say, a rather controversial interpretation of “Do this in remembrance of me.”

I felt further disconnected by the way in which this Last Supper scene is fairly full of Johannine statements similarly translated, as Jesus tells the disciples: “If you have seen me, you have seen God”. Dramatically this Johannine Jesus segues extremely oddly into the very distressed and distraught Jesus of the Synoptics’ Gethsemane scene. It is one of the perils of harmonisation that elements belonging to one story do not sit comfortably in another. The anguished Jesus of Mark inhabits a very different world to the total control exerted by John’s Jesus.

Despite the attempts of the Telegraph and others to create a synthetic row over the crucifixion scenes, I have to say that in most respects this was extremely traditional, not to say conventional. I can’t make up my mind whether Mary kisses the cross as a surrogate for being unable to reach her son’s feet, or whether it felt like the shadow of later devotion. Most of the traditional words are (albeit reworded) included. The oddest exception for anyone who knows the story is that “Father, forgive them …”, rather than the promise of paradise, comes as the response to the “penitent thief”. The supposedly controversial portrayal of the means of crucifixion seemed both plausible and convincing, and I really liked the matter-of-fact, detached but not unsympathetic, professionalism of the Roman soldiers going about their tasks. (The non-leg-breaking scene and dialogue was particularly well done, and the mild liberty with John’s narrative was fresh and original — as far as I know.)

I’m not quite so certain why they chose to make such a fuss about “historical reconstructions” here, however. If I were being nit-picky, I would want to point out the way in which a loincloth still preserves Jesus’ modesty in this production, to say nothing of the extraordinary distance from the city we seem to have gone for the place of execution. There’s not much point crucifying someone that far off the beaten track. And what was that titulus doing in Latin only? Latin that the taunting brigand and fellow crucifyee appeared to be able to read.

Those are, to be fair, minor quibbles, but it would have been nice to see this kind of background historical reconstruction being more consistent, even if narrative harmonisation is almost inevitable. Generally, I remain impressed by a production that manages to inject some real notes of freshness into such a well known story, while, I think, making it accessible to those who might hardly know it at all.

written by doug

Tonight’s episode of The Passion was a short half-hour. (I fear that its start and end points seemed more dictated by the TV schedules than by any strong dramatic framing of the narrative.) Overall I don’t think I’ve significantly changed my views from yesterday’s opening reaction. I am beginning to appreciate some of the benefits of the way the script avoids traditional language: it does serve to really clarify things and make you think. It does have its drawbacks, however, and I think for me they became more obvious around comments on sacrifice, the Law and the sins of the world. The latter is not only hallowed by centuries of Christian tradition, but in the way in which it was used seemed to me to be historically implausible, and rather detached from any of the ways sacrifice, Law and sin might make sense in Second Temple Judaism.

One detail that I’d only half-noted yesterday, but seemed more obvious today, was the preference for referring to Judaeans rather than Jews. It’s particularly noticeable on Caiaphas’ lips. A number of social-scientific critics can be heard punching the air in glee.

What becomes far more obvious in this episode is Jesus’ determination and planning. Some will doubt that historically he saw things in this way. What comes over very strongly is not simply his embrace of the coming execution, but his careful orchestration in planning for it. Yesterday, his determination to fulfil prophecy by entering the city on a colt was very clear and rational. This clearly upset at least one blogger (HT Dave Walker) who seems to think it is unscriptural to suggest that Jesus intentionally fulfilled prophecy. Apparently it only counts if you don’t know you’re doing it.

For me, however, this is a considerable strength. It was further developed today by the way in which the story clearly hinted that Jesus had both planned the Upper Room as a secret venue well in advance, and was busy making sure Judas didn’t find out about it in time to abort it by an early betrayal. The very human characterisation of Jesus, and the very blatant political manoeuvrings of and constraints on Caiaphas and Pilate, might seem to lead one towards a sense of inevitability about the crucifixion. Jesus’ determined planning, and his apparent orchestration of events, prevents any sense of inescapable tragedy. The drama seems to be quite clear that crucifixion is not an inevitable accident of historical forces impacting on a naive man, but a very deliberate thing indeed. If at times Jesus’ teaching sounds naive (and the non-biblical language makes it seem perhaps more so than it should), this event planning is far from naive.

This is a fascinating balancing act in the script and action, and introduces a very satisfying, and I think broadly accurate three-dimensional portrayal of what has too often been interpreted as a one-dimensional drama (whether that dimension is social or theological). In that respect it is certainly growing on me.

written by doug

It’s difficult to review something when you’ve only seen a third of it, so these can be no more than a few preliminary comments on The Passion, whose first episode aired tonight. (Well, technically, last night now). I must confess to finding it something of a mixed bag.

Things I liked included

• the sense of bustle, dirt and crowding around Jerusalem
• the actual portrayal of slaughter and blood being cleaned up (admittedly on a small scale) bringing home something of the reality of temple sacrifices
• the grounding in the political relationships of Roman Judaea
• the way in which Jesus was often lost in the crowd: plenty of things went on that disregarded his presence
• the confusion and mixed attitudes of the disciples
• the adherence to Mark’s account for the “cleansing of the temple” on the day following the entry to Jerusalem, resisting the dramatic temptation to which Matthew and Luke, together, I think, with every previous Jesus film, succumbed
• the grounding of Pilate and Caiaphas in relationships other than their dramatic one with Jesus
• the visual portent of the crosses / gibbets Jesus and the disciples pas on their way between Jerusalem and Bethany makes the cross loom less as prophecy and more as grim reality

What I wasn’t particularly impressed by

• the opposition of Law and compassion, which seemed to be Lutheran Paulinism filtered by late Romanticism
• the almost gnostic repeated emphasis on the kingdom of God being within sat oddly with the very human and political portrayals
• the very human (almost “mere man”) portrayal of Jesus jarred when set alongside statements such as “I’m his (God’s) only son” (the story was over-heavy on Jeremias’ omnipresent Father language), or the Virgin Mary’s seemingly overt confession of the virginal conception
• the rewriting of Jesus’ teaching which lost poetic resonances and rendered it rather anodyne (however commendable the attempt to avoid Bible English)

One or two things jarred: why, for example, was Joseph of Arimathea black? More importantly, I couldn’t help wondering how much of this would make sense to someone who didn’t know the story. While a lot of the backdrop was filled in in brief allusions to the Galilean ministry, other things remained without explanation. Someone who didn’t know the story would be very hard-pressed to understand anything at all of the conversation between Mary (BVM variety) and Jesus, or the dramatic tension in the closing moments of this episode’s dialogue, where Jesus asks Judas what is in his heart.

But one the whole, the positives, so far, seriously outweigh the negatives, and it looks set to shape up as one of the better renditions of the story on screen, especially with the moody and often claustrophobic lighting giving a sense of gathering peril and clouds of confusion. I look forward to catching the remainder.

written by doug

In one of those occasionally serendipitous coincidences of blogging, three different posts today interlock.

• First up was Michael Bird on Fact and Meaning in Biblical Studies
• Then came Matthew Montonini with a quote from Mark Strauss on the real Jesus and scientific historical enquiry.
• Finally there was Ben Witherington fisking of a book by a raving nut-job proponent of the view that Jesus was a myth not a real person. (I wish BW would stop SHOUTING and use lower case).

The existence of idiots (certainly in the etymological sense of that term) overturning the whole discipline of history in the service of their atheist polemic (I assume God knows where Mr Doherty got the history degree Wikipedia attributes to him, but Doherty’s website isn’t saying) — the existence of such idiots is at least one reason why historical Jesus research should be considered of value. The question is whether it can serve more than either an apologetic (on the one hand) or corrosive (on the other) purpose.

Is Strauss right to claim however, that

The historical Jesus – defined as knowledge about Jesus which can be attained through historical research – is a subset of truth about the real Jesus.

I’m not so sure. The problem lies in the definition. Strauss defines it in a way in which few other people seem to work in practice. Historical knowledge about Jesus is not that hard to come by, and has informed many different views of Jesus. However, most people usually mean somewhat more than historically informed interpretations. Fitting that knowledge into anything like a coherent reconstruction is more than possible, but the diversity, to say nothing of the incompatibility, of the various reconstructions suggest that “the historical Jesus” understood as a person in history, is less a “subset of truth” and more a mishmash of evidence and prejudice.

Some of the problem is in the discipline of history, which is always less scientific than it likes to present itself as. Hence, I think, the importance of Michael’s musings about “facts”. Historical facts are not really detachable from historical narratives, and hence come embedded in meaning. That meaning may or may not be the best interpretation of the events being described. The narration of facts always involves interpretation, simply because of what is included or omitted in the narrative sequence, however impartial the historian / narrator seems (or intends) to be. Facts without narration (implicit or explicit) are fairly useless.

The historian’s job is partly the evaluation of data, partly the mining of data, and partly the combination and configuration of data into information. The best historians both account for the most data, and present a persuasive narrative that converts it to information. History matters, and, for those who believe in the incarnation, should matter, but it is less as a “subset of truth” about Jesus, and more as rounding and fleshing out of the story with the best available data. The story (and for the believer that includes the church’s story and one’s personal story) needs to account for the data and be shaped by it, but the story also shows what the data means, and why it matters. Only when narrative and data are in an ongoing relationship, can we learn any information at all.

written by doug

A few days ago Nick Norelli posted about the impossibility of overrating Jesus.

I don’t think it possible to rate Jesus high enough.  There is no devotion we can give him, no prayer that we can pray to him, no song that we can sing to him, and no life that we can live in obedience to him, that he does not deserve.

In all sorts of ways I agree with him, but I want to suggest there are at least two ways in which people can in a sense overrate Jesus, one academic, one popular.

The academic way has generally fallen out of fashion, but hints of it still creep in here and there. This is the desire to identify the uniqueness of one or other bit of Jesus’ teaching. It is both what lead to an over-simple and mistaken use of the criterion of double dissimilarity in Jesus research, and seems at times to be guided by a form of anti-Judaism, separating Jesus from his people and his roots, and a form of anti-Catholicism, separating Jesus from his Church. I can’t help feeling that this outdated approach still informs the scholars associated with the Jesus seminar, and the Jesus Project (as proposed and scorned here and elsewhere last year). The desire to diesembody Jesus from his context and history seems to me to be one of essentially overrating and misconceiving his uniqueness.

The popular way is to so focus on Jesus whether as good teacher, wise guide, even God-in-flesh, that he is abstracted both from the Trinity and the Church. The popular “Jesus, yes; Church no” type of movement is one form (and however understandable, is simply wrong). More likely to mislead, however, are those forms of devotion to Jesus, both secular (wise guide / good moral teacher) and devotional, that so exclusively focus on Jesus that they give no space to Father or Holy Spirit. I sometimes fear this is reflected in some contemporary choruses. There is nothing wrong with a focus on Jesus in particular devotions, let me hasten to say. I would happily introduce Nick to, say, the Litany of the Holy Name. But Jesus also directs our attention to the Father. To do Jesus without the Trinity is to overrate and misconceive him.

written by doug