Bart Ehrman's Jesus before the Gospels (Part 4)

After attacking the work of Birger Gerhardsson in chapter two of Jesus before the Gospels, Bart Ehrman then focuses on the work of Kenneth Bailey. From decades of work in the Middle East as a missionary, Bailey observed that small villages would tell and re-tell the stories of their community’s history. Only the most knowledgeable and senior members of the community were allowed to tell the stories. They had some degree of freedom to tell the stories in their own words, but the core of the stories had to be accurate or it was considered shameful, and the community would correct them in no uncertain terms. Bailey argued that this model would explain what we see in the Synoptic Gospels in which the core of the stories are the same, but minor details vary from Gospel to Gospel.

Ehrman argued that there was no evidence to show that early Christian communities functioned that way (72-73). Ehrman is right that there is no direct evidence for Bailey’s theory from Jesus’ time, but the value of any hypothesis is its explanatory power—and Bailey’s hypothesis has a lot of explanatory power. Some scholars would argue that Bailey’s theory (especially as refined and elaborated by James Dunn in Jesus Remembered) makes sense of what we see in the Synoptic Gospels better than any other theory ever proposed. At least Bailey’s sources come from Middle Eastern culture and relate to the transmission of history, unlike the Form Criticism model, on which Ehrman seems to rely, which was developed from relatively modern studies on how German folklore was transmitted!

Ehrman asks, “Are we to imagine that eyewitnesses fanned out and rooted themselves in every village of Palestine where someone told stories of Jesus?” (73). Ehrman adds, “according to the New Testament book of Acts, the disciples of Jesus stayed for the most part in Jerusalem once the church had begun after Jesus’ death” (73). Ehrman’s argument is apparently based on Acts 8:1 which says, “On that day a great persecution broke out against the church at Jerusalem, and all except the apostles were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria.” Notice that although the apostles remained headquartered, so to speak, in Jerusalem, believers were “scattered throughout Judea and Samaria” (Acts 8:1). So it is entirely possible—even likely—that those who were “scattered throughout Judea and Samaria” included eyewitnesses who “fanned out and rooted themselves in every village….”

And although the apostles remained headquartered in Jerusalem, that doesn’t mean they never left. Church leaders like Peter, John and Philip traveled throughout the region as well, ministering to churches as they went (Acts 8:25-26; 9:32-38; 10:24). When the church in Antioch got large enough, the apostles sent a representative (Barnabas) to oversee the church (11:22) and when a dispute broke out, representatives from Antioch went up to Jerusalem to discuss the issue with the apostles (Acts 15:1-4). In fact, after his second missionary journey, even Paul may have given account of his ministry to the apostles in Jerusalem (Acts 18:22). In other words, unlike some ancient version of the telephone game, the earliest church had apostles, teachers and other eyewitness who were able to keep the stories of Jesus from wildly spinning out of control. If someone was preaching things about Jesus that wasn’t accurate, there were apostles and eyewitnesses who would certainly correct the story.

Curiously, after seemingly mocking the idea of eyewitnesses in Judean, Samarian and Galilean villages, Ehrman then concedes that false stories would have been corrected. But he finds fault with that too:

Possibly when someone tells a story, someone else corrects him. In fact, that seems more than likely: it almost always happens when one person tells a story that someone else knows. Does this group context for telling the stories ensure that they are accurate? Actually, modern psychological studies suggests that just the opposite is normally the case” (Ehrman 75).

Ehrman says that cognitive psychologists have discovered that “when a group ‘collectively remembers’ something they have all heard or experienced, the ‘whole’ is less than the sum of the ‘parts” (75). In other words, if you interview ten people separately, you will get more information than if you interview them as a group. As proof, Ehrman cites “Collaborative and Social Remembering” by Rebecca Thompson (chapter 9 in Memory in the Real World by Gillian Cohen and Martin Conway, 3^rd ed. New York : Psychology Press, 2008).

Citing other research, Thompson stated that nominal groups (groups in name only, in which responses from individuals are added together) did better than collaborative groups (those that actually worked together as a group). Both groups did better than individuals. But Bailey is not talking about eyewitnesses collaboratively working together to remember something. Bailey is taking about someone retelling a story of a community’s history to a group that already knows the story well and is in a position to correct the story if the storyteller makes a mistake. Ehrman seems to be comparing apples to oranges.

Significantly, Ehrman leaves out a couple of other important aspects of Thompson’s article. First, one of the studies cited by Thompson found that when “when collaborating, individuals encoded to-be-remembered items together (in an episodic task) and they actually outperformed the nominal groups” (Thompson, Memory in the Real world, 260). Episodic memory is “recalling things that happened to you personally” as opposed to semantic memory which “involves factual information about the world, quite apart from whether you have personally experienced it” (Ehrman 18). In the case of Bailey’s theory, we are talking about episodic memory, i.e. personal memories of Jesus by the apostles or other eyewitnesses. So by way of application, if the apostles jointly remembered the words and deeds of Jesus during the 40 days they were together before Pentecost, that would increase their memory even above that of a nominal group.

Second, Thompson says “The accuracy of collaborative output has been detrimentally affected in certain situations and improved in others. Using a simulation of a police interrogation, Stephenson et al. (1986) reported an overall higher accuracy of the collaborating groups’ performance compared to individual performance” (Thompson, Memory, 253). The “higher accuracy of the collaborating groups’ performance” seems to contradict the Ehrman’s negative assessment of Bailey.

But all of this is actually a moot point. Ehrman began by asking, “Does this group context for telling the stories ensure that they are accurate? Actually, modern psychological studies suggests that just the opposite is normally the case” (Ehrman 75). As proof, Ehrman cites a quote from Thompson’s article that pertains to the amount of information groups or individuals remember but says nothing about the accuracy of what they remember.

For some reason, Ehrman didn’t quote from the part of Thompson’s article that addresses accuracy. For example, in one of the memory tests that showed lower accuracy, groups of people were shown a picture of “a common household scene, containing a variety of common objects.” They were only allowed to look at the picture for 15 or 60 seconds. When the groups collaborated together to recall what they saw, one member of the group deliberately “recalled” objects that were not there. This negatively affected the accuracy of the group’s memory as some of the other adopted that false memory (Thompson, Memory, 254).

One really has to wonder, however, whether 15 and 60 second showings of a picture in an artificial experiment for which nothing is at stake and in which false information is deliberately inserted, is analogous to memories of the life and teachings of Jesus by disciples whose lives were on the line. After all, Jesus had just been executed—his disciples had every reason to be concerned they could be next! Not only that, but an experiment in which people are asked to recall details of pictures of common items they had seen for less than 60 seconds, is certainly not comparable to the rememberances of Jesus’ apostles, or other eyewitnesses of Jesus (like some of the women) who traveled with him for up to three years and heard him preach, teach and explain the same or similar things over and over and over again! Besides, Thompson’s article presented no indication that the overall memories of the pictures were inaccurate, only that a few details had be deliberately inserted. 

Although Ehrman didn’t cite this part of Thompson’s article, it is important to keep this study in mind when you read of psychological studies that supposedly demonstrate the unreliability of memory.

Ehrman continues,

“But there are bigger problems with group memories. They are often more frail and faulty than individual memories—just the opposite of what you might expect. For one thing, if one person—say, a dominant personality—injects into the conversation an incorrect recollection or ‘distorted memory’ that others in the group do not remember, they tend to take the other person’s word for it. As one recent study has shown, ‘The misinformation implanted by one person comes to be shared by the group as a whole. In other words, a collective memory could become formed around misinformation. Misinformation shared by one person may be adopted by the rest’ (Ehrman, 75-76).

As an example, Ehrman cited a study that “found that 65 percent of the participants actually changed their views because of social pressure exerted on them (not necessarily consciously) by the group as a whole. About 40 percent of these errors were ‘persistent,’ that is, they became ‘permanent’ memories of those who actually did not at first have them” (Ehrman 76, citing Micah Edelson, Tali Sharot, Raymond Dolan, and yadin Dudai, “Following the Crowd: Brain Substrates of Long-Term Memory Conformity,” Science 333 (2011: 108-111)).

In this test, 30 participants were shown “an eyewitness-style documentary on a large screen in groups of five.” Three days later they took a memory test. Four days after that, they were given the same memory test, but this time they were deliberately misled, being told that four others in the group gave a different answer than they had. One week later they were given the same memory test again, but first they were accurately informed that they had been misled about the group’s answers.

The result was that the “participants conformed to the majority opinion in 68.3 +_ 2.9% of the manipulation trials, giving a false answer to questions they had previously answered correctly…When the social influence was removed (test 3), participants reverted to their original correct answer in 59.2 +_2.3% of the previously conformed trials (transient errors) but maintained erroneous answers in 40.8% (persistent errors). (Edelson et al., 108). The experiment demonstrated that social pressure can lead people to conform to the group. In the case of this experiment, the social pressure came when some test subjects were deliberately misled about answers from others in the group.

No one argues, however, that intruders had infiltrated the group of apostles and deliberately inserted false memories of Jesus, so this experiment has little if any relevance to Bailey’s theory. On the other hand, the social pressure discovered in this experiment is a double-edged sword that could cut both ways. In the experiment false information was deliberately communicated to the participant. Apart from an artificially concocted experiment, a more likely scenario would be that someone in a group mis-remembered something she saw and the group corrected her. The social pressure from the group may actually cause her to conform to the group’s accurate remembrance. This seems much more analogous to the scenarios proposed by Bailey in which everyone in the group knows the story so if the one telling the story changes the story significantly, the group will correct him.

In real life scenarios in which people are motivated to get the story right (these early Christians were, after all, basing their lives on accurate rememberances of the ministry and teachings of Jesus), it would seem that the social pressure may have actually served to preserve the accuracy of the stories of Jesus. Ehrman’s conclusion that, “It seems that the idea of a group ensuring the accuracy of traditions is not psychologically defensible” (76), is simply not warranted by the psychological evidence he cites in Edelson’s article.

These, of course, are not the only studies of eyewitness memories cited by Ehrman. I’ll discuss more of them in the next post.

Bart Ehrman's "Jesus before the Gospels" (Part 3)

In Jesus before the Gospels, Bart Ehrman asks the question, “wouldn’t Jesus’ followers have memorized his teachings and made sure that the stories about his life were not altered as they were told and retold” (66)? In a nutshell, his answer is no. Ehrman critiques of the work of Birger Gerhardsson who argued that Jesus’ followers would have memorized Jesus’ teachings just like the students of other Jewish rabbis (66). Ehrman discusses what he thinks are several problems with Gerhardsson’s views.

First, Ehrman points out that Gerhardsson gets his information about rabbinic teaching methods from about 200 years after the time of Jesus. Ehrman says Gerhardsson is “reading back into an earlier period information that we have for only a much later time” (68). That is true, since we don’t have much information about Jewish teaching methods during Jesus’ time. But on the other hand, it could be argued that Ehrman is thinking like a 21^st century American, not like an ancient Middle Eastern Jew. Things change rapidly in 21^st century America. Some things have been invented and have become obsolete just during the course of my own lifetime. Eight track tapes, for example, were invented, became obsolete, and were replaced by cassette tapes which have also become obsolete!

By contrast, things changed very slowly in the ancient world in which someone might live their entire life without any new inventions affecting their life in any way. So it is very probable that the use of memory by Rabbis’ disciples 200 years after Jesus’ time had not changed at all. How else would they learn other than memory? Books were very expensive in the ancient world so people often learned by memory. In fact, when the Pilgrims came to America in the early 1600’s, memory was still a big part of education. Two hundred years later in the early 1800’s, memory continued to be a big part of education. Why would we think it would be different from Jesus’ time to 200 years after Jesus’ time?

Ehrman also says that “there is nothing in the tradition to suggest that Jesus was a Rabbi in the later technical sense—or that anyone at all was in his day” (68). Before I went to Russia I was told that only Russian Orthodox clergy were allowed to be called Professors of religion. I taught a Christology class to seminary students. The fact that I couldn’t technically be called a “Professor” in the accepted Russian sense, did not make me any less of a professor in reality. Similarly, regardless of whether Jesus was a Rabbi in any later technical sense of the word, he was certainly a teacher and there is no reason to think that some of his students couldn’t or wouldn’t have memorized his teachings!

Finally, Gerhardsson responded to critics saying:

Many critics, however, believed and said that I simply tried to read back into the period before 70 the developed rabbinic techniques of about A.D. 200, and that I imposed the academic methods of the rabbis on the popular preachers of early Christianity; they rejected my whole argument, without further discussion, as anachronistic and inadequate. This is not a correct account of my standpoint or method; nor is it a fruitful way of discussing a complex problem (Birger Gerhardsson. Memory & Manuscript…with Tradition & Transmission in Early Christianity. Grand Rapids : Eerdmans, 1998, xiii).

The same criticism would apply to Ehrman. In fact, one of Gerhardsson’s critics, Jacob Neusner, a world-renowned expert in ancient Judaism, later took back his criticism. He even wrote the forward to a later edition of Gerhardsson’s Memory & Manuscript endorsing the book and explaining that he had previously not read it carefully enough (Gerhardsson, Memory, xxvii-xxix). Perhaps Ehrman would benefit by reading Gerhardsson more carefully.

Second, Ehrman points out that “the striking differences in the words and deeds of Jesus as reported in the Gospels is compelling evidence precisely that they were not memorized and passed along without significant change” (69). But just because I may memorize something does not mean that I just parrot what I memorized in my teaching and writing. I may summarize and synthesize what I had memorized and teach the essence of what I had memorized in my own words. In his massive book, Jesus Remembered, James Dunn argues persuasively that the earliest followers of Jesus re-told the core of stories about Jesus accurately and reliably, but in their own words. Dunn’s theory, which he defends admirably, has a lot of explanatory power when it comes to what we actually see in the Gospels. It can explain why the stories in the Synoptic Gospels are sometimes word-for-word identical as well as why they often have minor differences. It does not exclude the possibility of memorization.

Third, Ehrman says that Gerhardsson’s view “does not take seriously the realities of how traditions of Jesus were being circulated in the early church” (70). Ehrman says the stories about Jesus “had been in circulation for decades, not simply among disciples who allegedly memorized Jesus’ words and deeds, but also among all sorts of people, most of whom had never laid eyes on an eyewitness or even on anyone else who had” (70). 

Ehrman, of course, would explain away the facts that Luke claims to have been in touch with eyewitnesses (Luke 1:1-3), the Gospel of John claims to have been written by an eyewitness (John 21), and several early church leaders say that Mark got his information from Peter. But aside from that, Ehrman is simply parroting the old, discredited Form critical theory that the Gospel writers really knew nothing at all about Jesus and were simply collecting folk traditions about Jesus from all kinds of sources—regardless of whether those sources were reliable or not, or whether they actually knew anything about Jesus or not. This makes me think of some modern TV reporter with a microphone asking random people, “Who do you think Jesus was?”

As I mentioned in my first post (and I cited a few sources as examples), this Form criticism theory has been thoroughly refuted! Someone once commented that if Form Criticism was correct, the early disciples of Jesus must have all been raptured right after his resurrection since they apparently had no influence whatsoever on how Jesus words and works were remembered, taught and transmitted.

My intent is not to endorse everything Gerhardsson wrote. I tend to think the model proposed by Baily and Dunn are closer to the truth. But regardless of whether Jesus’ disciples actually memorized his teachings or not, we need to remember that Jesus’ disciples were not like modern college students who may take a class from a professor one hour a day three times a week. Jesus’s disciples traveled with him, lived with him, and heard him preach and teach the same or similar things over and over and over again in villages throughout Galilee and elsewhere. Then, as they spent hours and hours walking along the roads or resting in the evenings, they had plenty of time to discuss these things since they did not have TV, radio, video games or even books to eat up their time. After two or three years of this, something was bound to sink in even if not by formal memory!

After the disciples were convinced that Jesus had actually risen from the dead, they began preaching and teaching about Jesus throughout the villages of Judea, Samaria and Galilee. Judging from what we can gather from Acts and some of Paul’s letters, they continued this leadership role for decades! The essence of what they taught was eventually written down in our Gospels which are the earliest extant records of the words and works of Jesus.

No one, of course, thinks Mark and Luke were written by eyewitnesses and whether Matthew and John were written by eyewitnesses is disputed. But contrary to Ehrman, there is no good reason to doubt, and very good reasons to believe, that the Gospels contain reliable—even eyewitness—records of the ministry and teaching of Jesus.

But are eyewitness memories reliable? I haven’t forgotten about the psychological studies on memory cited by Ehrman. We’ll get to them.

Bart Ehrman's Jesus before the Gospels (part 2)

In Jesus before the Gospels, Bart Ehrman cites numerous psychological studies demonstrating the unreliability of memory. As I read many of the research articles he cited, it occurred to me that the degree of reliability (or unreliability) in such memory studies is directly related to the specificity of the questions asked. The more eyewitness studies deal with minutia, the more unreliable memory will be seen to be.

For example, consider the case of the Jamar Clark shooting in Minnesota. Eyewitnesses differed on whether Clark was handcuffed in front, in back, on one hand or whether he was handcuffed at all. But none of the eyewitnesses (to my knowledge) disputed the central story: Clark beat up his girlfriend who called 911. She was treated in an ambulance while he was outside yelling. The police came and a struggle ensued resulting in Clark being shot and killed by one of the officers. Eyewitnesses differ on the details but agreed on the gist of the story.

Similarly, although scholars often delight in pointing out minor discrepancies in the stories regarding Jesus’ crucifixion, virtually all Jesus scholars (even the most critical) would acknowledge as historical fact that Jesus was tried by Jewish authorities and handed over to Pontius Pilate who had Jesus beaten and crucified. Most, I think, would even affirm that Jesus’ tomb was later found empty by some women and that early Christians came to believe that he had risen from the dead!

In the numerous research articles I read on memory, virtually all of the researchers seemed interested in demonstrating how terribly unreliable memory is. And yet each of the researchers cited by Ehrman presumably remembered where and how to eat breakfast, where and how to get to work, who their coworkers and colleagues were, how to communicate with them, how to operate their computers and word processing programs, where and when to eat lunch, how to get home, and the many, many minor cultural conventions necessary to understand daily interactions and to avoid offending others.

There are thousands and thousands of things we remember accurately every day, including things from our past. When we start failing to remember these things we get tested for various forms of dementia! But in spite of the fact that Ehrman gives two or three statements affirming the reliability of “gist memory,” the bulk of his book—and the research he cites—focuses on the times when memory fails leading to the impression that the Gospels are terribly unreliable (I’ll leave it to those who know him personally to conclude whether this impression was intentional or not). 

Many recent studies on the historical Jesus have shown that we actually can know quite a bit about Jesus as a person of history and that we have good reason to believe that the Gospels are quite reliable.

In future posts I will get down into the weeds of some of the memory studies Ehrman cites in his book.

Bart Ehrman's "Jesus before the Gospels" (Part 1)

The subtitle of Bart Ehrman’s new book, Jesus before the Gospels, summarizes the content in a nutshell: “How the earliest Christians remembered, changed, and invented their stories of the savior.” I plan to eventually write an article responding to Ehrman’s book but in the meantime I thought I’d just post some random observations. Here is the first.

It is important to note that conservative, Evangelical Bible scholars do not generally believe that the Gospels contain anything like word-for-word transcripts of Jesus’ teachings. With regard to Jesus’ teachings in the Gospels, scholars distinguish between ippsima verba (exact words) and ippsima vox (exact voice). Conservative scholars generally deny the first but hold to the second. Ippsima vox is the idea that what we have in the Gospels is the accurate sense or “gist” of what Jesus taught.

Ehrman’s view of how Jesus’ teachings were transmitted is that the Gospels contain “memories of later authors who had heard about Jesus from others, who were telling what they had heard about Jesus from others, who were telling what they heard from yet others. They are memories of memories of memories” (3). Ehrman is relying on an outdated model called “Form Criticism” which has been convincingly discredited (See for example, Paul Eddy and Gregory Boyd, The Jesus Legend. Grand Rapids : Baker, 237-268. See also Dale Allison, Constructing Jesus. Grand Rapids : Baker, 2010, 1-30.  N.T. Wright, The New Testament and the People of God. Minneapolis : Fortress Press, 1992, 418-435. James Dunn, Jesus Remembered, 125-133).

The fact is that Ehrman is actually just stating opinion (which I would argue is based on an outdated theory!). He simply does not know that that the Gospel writers “were telling what they had heard about Jesus from others, who were telling what they heard from yet others…” (3). Contrary to Ehrman and the critics, the writer of the Gospel of Luke claims to have heard from eyewitnesses (Luke 1:1-3) and the Gospel of John claims to have been written by an eyewitness. The second century Christian writer Papias confirms this. James Dunn (Jesus Remembered) and Richard Bauckham (Jesus and the Eyewitnesses) have argued persuasively that although the Gospels were not written by eyewitnesses, they are the product of eyewitness remembrances. Of course Ehrman tries to discredit these writers but I think he does so unfairly and superficially.

Jesus’ teachings were remembered by disciples who lived and traveled with Jesus, probably for up to three years, hearing him preach and teach the same messages over and over and over again as they went from village to village—explaining those messages in more detail when they were alone (remember, unlike modern college students, they didn’t have TV, radio, or video games to eat up their time--and books were too expensive)!

Did the disciples remember the exact words (ippsima verba) of Jesus? Not necessarily, though in some cases they may have (There is evidence from after the time of Jesus that some Rabbi’s had students who would use a form of shorthand to record their teacher’s instruction, and then commit that teaching to memory). Did Jesus’ disciples remember the essence or gist (ippsima vox) of what Jesus taught? Even Bart Ehrman concedes that “gist memory” can be accurate. He writes, “Our own memories are, on the whole, reasonably good. If they weren’t, we would not be able to function, or even survive, as human beings in a very complex world” (3). “Let me stress again: most of the time our memories are pretty good. Otherwise we couldn’t function as individuals or society” (20-21).

So I guess the bottom line is that in the process of writing a 326 page book leaving the impression that eyewitness memory in general and the Gospels in particular, are thoroughly unreliable, Ehrman throws in two or three statements here and there emphasizing that “gist memory” is actually “pretty good.” Evangelicals agree.

But what about Inerrancy, an idea Ehrman doesn’t address but would undoubtedly mock? How can the Gospels be without error if most of what they contain is just “gist memory”?  The answer is that something does not have be recited word-for-word to be accurate and without error. Summaries can accurate and without error too. Of course we can’t prove the Gospels are without error—Many Evangelicals take that on faith based on what Jesus teaches about Scripture and what Scripture teaches about itself—but there is no good reason to doubt—and very good reasons to believe—that the Gospels contain reliable memories of the words and works of Jesus, Bart Ehrman notwithstanding. More on this later.

An Evaluation of Bart Ehrman’s Historical Jesus
A version of this article was originally published in

Bibliotheca Sacra (April-June, 2001)
Dennis Ingolfsland

Bart Ehrman, professor of religious studies, Hellenistic religion, and New Testament at the University of North Carolina, has recently published Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium.[1] In this book he presents his methods and conclusions regarding the historical Jesus using three primary criteria for ascertaining which of Jesus’ sayings and actions recorded in the New Testament are authentic: independent attestation, dissimilarity, and contextual credibility.[2]

Independent attestation occurs when two or more independent sources attest to the same event or saying. For example, if source A copied, summarized or even alluded to source B in a specific event, the two sources would not be considered independent attestation for that event.

The criterion of dissimilarity, according to Ehrman, states that if a saying of Jesus recorded in a particular gospel is dissimilar to what other Christians were saying about Jesus when that gospel was written, the saying is more likely to be genuine. Similarly, if a saying does not support a Christian agenda, or if it appears to work against a Christian agenda, it is more likely to be genuine.

The criterion of contextual credibility asserts that traditions are more likely to be reliable if they conform well to what is known of the historical and social situation of the time.[3]

According to Ehrman, when these criteria are applied to the study of Jesus the following picture emerges: Jesus was a Jewish apocalyptic prophet whose message centered on a future kingdom of God that would be free of poverty and oppression. Jesus taught his followers to seek this kingdom above all else and to behave now as they would in the kingdom. This meant not only loving God above all else but also loving one’s neighbor and even one’s enemies. Jesus spoke of a coming judgment upon the religious leaders of his day and this is what led to his execution.

While many aspects of Ehrman’s presentation of Jesus make good sense of the biblical data—for example, the importance of loving God and others, Jesus’ preaching of a future kingdom having no poverty or oppression, and the preaching of a future judgment – he has not adequately dealt with the issue of Jesus’ self-understanding.

On the other hand, Ben Witherigton, professor of New Testament at Asbury Seminary and a research fellow at Cambridge University, has done and excellent job of discussing Jesus’ self-understanding using the same kinds of standard historical-critical criteria that Ehrman uses. By combining the insights of Witherington’s book “The Christology of Jesus” with the insights of Ehrman’s “Jesus, Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Mellennium” the picture that emerges is remarkably similar to that presented in the Gospels.

Ehrman’s View of Jesus

The Apocalyptic Jesus

Ehrman views Jesus as a strongly apocalyptic figure, i.e. one who believed that God would one day conclude human history in a dramatic visible way. Ehrman’s view is somewhat of an update of the apocalyptic view of Jesus espoused by Albert Schweitzer, which Ehrman says is “a view of Jesus that has been maintained for most of the present century by the majority of critical scholars in both the United States and Germany.[4] Since our earliest sources—the documents of the New Testament— and the majority of critical scholars have presented Jesus in an apocalyptic light,[5] Ehrman asks why some recent scholars[6] have interpreted Jesus in a non-apocalyptic way. Those who view Jesus as non-apocalyptic generally see him as someone who was concerned with life here and now with little or no concern or belief in the end of human history.

First, Ehrman points out that those who advocate a nonapocalyptic Jesus believe that the earliest nonextant sources, like Q,[7] portray Jesus in nonapocalyptic terms. Ehrman, however, points out that Q actually supports an apocalyptic view of Jesus. To avoid this problem, nonapocalyptic interpreters postulate multiple redactions of Q and arbitrarily relegate all the apocalyptic Q material to later editions.[8] Ehrman argues that this tactic goes beyond what is actually known.[9] While the existence of Q is widely accepted even among Evangelical scholars, we must never forget that Q is only a hypothesis—one that has been increasingly called into question.[10] I think Ehrman’s point is that it is a very weak argument to postulate multiple editions of a hypothetical document, conveniently relegating evidence for an apocalyptic Jesus to later editions—and then to use this as evidence to support a non-apocalyptic view of Jesus.

Some of those who advocate a nonapocalyptic Jesus date apocryphal documents such as the Egerton manuscript, the Gospel of the Hebrews, and parts of the Gospel of Peter even before the canonical Gospels.[11] This, according to Ehrman, is overly speculative, since there are no good reasons to date these documents in the first century.[12]

Since the nonapocalyptic view of Jesus does not stand up to close scrutiny, Ehrman asks whether the apocalyptic view holds up when examined by specific historical criteria. His answer is yes, for some of the following reasons. First, the fact that Jesus held an apocalyptic worldview is strongly and multiply attested in the earliest sources, including Mark (1:13–24, 27, 30), Q ( = Luke 17:24; 26–27 / Matthew 24:27, 37–39; and Luke 12:39 = Matthew 24:44), M ( =Matthew 13:40–43), L ( =in Luke 21:34–36), and later in the Gospel of John.[13]

Second, Ehrman the apocalyptic view of Jesus is supported by the criterion of contextual credibility. The fact that there were numerous apocalyptic Jews in first-century Palestine is seen in the Dead Sea Scrolls, 2 Baruch, and Josephus.[14]

Third, both John the Baptist before Jesus and the early church after Jesus were unquestionably apocalyptic in their views.[15] The question is which makes more sense historically, 1) that Jesus shared John’s apocalyptic views and passed them on to his (Jesus’) disciples or 2) that Jesus rejected John’s apocalyptic views and for some reason Jesus’ disciples rejected Jesus’ views and reverted back to the apocalyptic views of John. In light of the fact that an apocalyptic Jesus meets the criteria of multiple independent attestation and contextual credibility, and in absence of convincing evidence to the contrary, it is preferable to postulate continuity between John, Jesus, and the early church as far as apocalyptic expectation is concerned.

The Message of Jesus

According to Ehrman, Jesus’ message centered on the priority of the kingdom of God.[16] The parables show that Jesus believed the kingdom had both present and future aspects,[17] but when Jesus spoke of the kingdom of God, He was often referring primarily to a literal kingdom in which God will rule (e.g., Matt. 19:28; cf. Luke 22:30; including Q material in Luke 13:23–29 = Matthew 8:11–12).[18] Though the kingdom is “small and inauspicious” in the present, it will one day exist in power and glory (Mark 4:26–29, 30–32; Q material in Matt. 13:33 = Luke 13:20).[19]

Jesus said this future kingdom would be marked by several “role reversals.” For example the people of God who were suffering and oppressed would replace the forces of evil who were then in power (Matt. 20:16; Mark 10:29–31; Luke 13:29–30). Those who were in poverty would be wealthy in the kingdom. These role reversals would occur after the imminent (Mark 8:38–9:1; 13:33–37; Q material in Matt. 24:43–44 = Luke 12:39–40; 12:45–46 / Matt 24:48–50 ; M material in Matthew 25:13; L material in Luke 12:36) coming of universal judgment (Mark 13:24–25) by the Son of Man (Mark 8:38; 13:24–27; Luke 17:24; 26–27, 30 cf. Matt 24:27, 27–29; Luke 12:8–9; cf. Matt. 10:32–33; Luke 21:34–36; Matt 13:24–30; 36-43; Matt 13:47–50)—someone other than Jesus, according to Ehrman—in which even the temple itself would be destroyed (Mark 13:2; 14:58; 15:29; John 25:19).[20]

For Jesus, absolutely nothing was more important than loving God and seeking His kingdom. Jesus likened the kingdom to a treasure that was worth more than one’s very life (Matt. 13:44–46).[21] So this present life should be a matter of indifference at best,[22] which is why Jesus taught that His followers should not be concerned about food or clothing.[23] In fact, even one’s closest loved ones were to be considered secondary to the kingdom (Q material in Luke 14:26 = Mt 10:37).[24]

For Jesus, putting the kingdom first involved obedience to the principle found in the Law of Moses that one should love God above all else and love one’s neighbor as one’s self. Jesus’ devotion to the Law is well attested (Mark 10:17–22; Q material in Luke 16:16 = Mt 5:18; M material in Matt. 5:17, 19–20; John 10:34–35), but unlike some of the Pharisees, Jesus did not emphasize legal minutiae. Unlike the Sadducees, Jesus did not place supreme importance on the temple, and unlike the Essenes, Jesus did not teach the maintenance of purity by isolation from others.[25] One thing that distinguished Jesus from various Jewish sects was His insistence that the command to love one’s neighbor took precedence over other laws and practices.

For example, while Jesus may have agreed with Pharisees about such legal matters as tithing and abstaining from work on the Sabbath, legal technicalities were never to take precedence over the Law’s command to love one’s neighbor by helping the poor or easing human suffering (Mark 2:27; Q material in Luke 11:42 = Matt. 23:23). And while Jesus joined the Pharisees and Sadducees in worshipping at the temple, not even the temple itself was as important to Jesus as love for one’s neighbor (M material in Matthew 9:13; 12:7).[26]

Jesus was particularly insistent that loving one’s neighbor included the needs of the poor, the sick (Matt. 25:31–46), and socially outcast like women (Mark 7:27–28; 14:6–9; Luke 10:38–42; John 4:7–26; 11:20–27) and children (Matt. 18:9; Mark 9:37, 42; 10:14; Luke 9:48).[27] Jesus’ command to love others extended even to enemies. In fact Jesus’ command to forgive one’s enemies is one of His most strongly attested teachings (Mark 11:25; Q material in Luke 11:4 = Matt 6:12; Luke 17:3 = Matt 18:15; L material in Luke 17:4; 7:40–43; M material in Matt 18:22–35).[28]

Jesus expected His followers to prepare for the kingdom at once—which meant that they were to behave in the present as they would in the kingdom. Since there would be no war in the kingdom, Jesus’ followers were to abstain from all violence now. Since the kingdom would have no poverty, Jesus’ followers were to help the poor now. Since there would be no oppression or injustice in the kingdom, Jesus’ followers were to treat all people with fairness and justice now. Since there would be no hatred in the kingdom, Jesus’ followers were to serve others lovingly now.[29]

Ehrman emphasizes that Jesus’ teachings were not designed to bring about long-term social change in society—because in Jesus’ view there would be no time for such change to be brought about. The Son of Man would come soon and set up the kingdom, and preparing people for this event was “at the heart of Jesus’ ethics.”[30] Preparing people for the kingdom also involved offering salvation to sinners—the corrupt, self-centered and godless—who needed to repent and live in light of the role reversals in the coming kingdom.[31]

Jesus believed that this message of the kingdom was good news and He actively called people to

live in the present in light of the future. Jesus spoke of this good news as a light on a hill that should not be hidden (Matt. 5:14–16; Mark 4:21).[32] Those who saw the light needed to abandon everything to proclaim and live the message in preparation for what was about to take place. Indeed, laborers are needed (Matt. 9:37; Luke 10:2; John 4:35), and Jesus Himself led the way.[33]

Jesus’ kingdom teachings were not difficult to understand, but they required absolute commitment, and no one should begin the journey before counting the cost, because it would cost everything (Luke 14:28–33)![34]

The Actions of Jesus

Ehrman points out that context determines meaning, and that the apocalyptic context of Jesus’ teachings provides clues to the meaning of His actions.[35] For example Jesus’ reputation as an exorcist is widely attested (Mark 1:21–28; 32–34, 39; 3:9–12; 5:1–20; 7:24–30; 9:14–29; M material in Matt. 9:32–34; L material in Luke 13:10; Acts 10:38),[36] but His exorcisms were not merely acts of compassion. Jesus was manifesting the power of God over the forces of evil in the present, in token of the total destruction of evil in the kingdom.[37]

Likewise, Jesus’ reputation as a healer is also widely attested (e.g., Mark 5:35–43; John 11:38–44).[38] But His healings were not simply acts of kindness. They were a foretaste of the kingdom in which there would be no disease or disabilities (Matt. 11:4–5; Luke 7:22).[39]

Another well-attested tradition concerns Jesus’ association with women. Women accompanied Him on His journeys (Mark 15:40–41; L material in Luke 8:1–3),[40] engaged in discussions with him (Mark 7:24–30; John 4:1–42), and supported him financially (Mark 15:40–41; Luke 8:1–3). Women were with Jesus even at His death and were the first to proclaim that he had risen from the dead (Matt. 27:55; Mark 15:40–41; Luke 23:49; John 19:25; Matt. 28:1–10; Mark 16:1–8; Luke 23:55–24:10; John 20:1–2).[41]

Some have interpreted Jesus’ association with women as if He were advocating a “radically egalitarian society.” [42] But since Jesus was not attempting to reform society—which was doomed for destruction—it is more likely that women were attracted to Him because of His apocalyptic message about the reversal of roles in the kingdom. Those who were at the low end of the social ladder, such as women, would be elevated in the kingdom. The fact that Jesus expected His followers to implement these changes in the present also explains why women and other social outcasts of his time would be among His followers.[43]

Jesus’ Death

Ehrman emphasizes that many historical reconstructions of Jesus’ life fail to establish a plausible link between Jesus’ life and message, and His death. Why, for example, would anyone crucify a Jewish rabbi who taught people to love God and be good to each other?[44] Although attested tradition shows that Jesus often clashed with Pharisees over the proper interpretation of the Law (Q material in Matt. 15:14 = Luke 6:39; 14:5 = Matt. 12:11; 23:23 = Luke 11:42; verse 52 = Matt. 23:13; L material in Luke 13:15; Mark 2:25–26; 7:19–23, John 7:22–23)[45] and that His message was met with widespread rejection (Mark 3:21, 31–35; 6:1–6; Matt. 13:53–58; Q material in Luke 10:13–15 = Matt. 11:20–24; John 4:4; 7:5),[46] these controversies were not what led to Jesus’ crucifixion. The religious leaders understood that Jesus’ message meant they would be recipients of judgment by one whom Jesus called “the Son of Man.” According to Ehrman, this is what led to Jesus’ execution.[47]

The Romans, of course, cared nothing for Jewish doctrines of the sensibilities of the Jewish religious leadership. They were concerned about the charges that Jesus considered Himself to be a king of the Jews (Mark 15:2, 26; John 18:33; 19:19). According to Ehrman—and contrary to many scholars of the Jesus Seminar—it is almost historically certain that some people thought of Jesus in these terms during his lifetime. Otherwise it would be hard to explain why after his death, his followers taught that he was the Messiah, because Jews did not expect a Messiah to raise from the dead. It was because of this royal claim that Pontius Pilate sentenced Jesus to crucifixion.[48]

Jesus’ Resurrection and beyond

According to Ehrman, although the resurrection of Jesus is highly attested,[49] it is still highly problematic. He says the earliest accounts of Jesus’ resurrection are impossible to reconcile.[50] And he says that since historians can only establish what probably happened and since miracles by their very nature are highly improbable, historians cannot conclude that Jesus rose from the dead.[51] Ehrman notes, however, “It is a historical fact that some of Jesus’ followers came to believe that he had been raised from the dead soon after his execution.” Ehrman points out that Christianity did not develop because of Jesus’ death. If there had been no subsequent belief in the resurrection, Jesus’ death would have likely been viewed as just another of a long line of tragic incidents, but it would not have been interpreted as an act of salvation and it is unlikely that a new religion would have developed.[52]

Jesus’ followers then concluded that Jesus had not only been raised, but had also been exalted to heaven and would one day return.[53] Christians soon began to identify the Son of Man in Daniel 7 with Jesus Himself.[54] Therefore, when Christians spoke or wrote of Jesus, they began to change what Jesus said about a coming Son of Man, using the first-person singular to make it refer to Jesus (Matt. 10:32; 16:13; Mark 8:27, 38). Before long, Jesus was being proclaimed as the Christ, the unique Son of God, and the Savior of the world. And a new religion was born.

Evaluation of Ehrman’s Work

Jesus’ Self-Understanding

One of the strengths of Ehrman’s book is that he is generally consistent in applying his historical criteria. It is therefore somewhat surprising that Ehrman failed to be consistent in his assessment of Jesus’ self understanding. Three areas are particularly noticeable.

First, as noted earlier, Ehrman insists that Jesus believed in a coming Son of Man who was someone other than Himself. Ehrman holds this view in spite of the fact that the tradition equating Jesus with the Son of Man is supported by the criteria of multiple independent attestation.

Ehrman would undoubtedly point out that not even the criteria of multiple independent attestation can be applied mechanically but must be balanced with other criteria. So, for example, though the resurrection is independently attested in multiple sources, Ehrman does not believe Jesus actually rose again because dead people just don’t come back to life after three days. Even if we were to grant Ehrman’s point here for the sake of argument, there are no such overriding considerations with regard to Jesus’ self-understanding. In other words, there is nothing impossible or necessarily improbable with the working assumption that Jesus could have thought of himself as the Jewish Messiah or even the Son of Man referred to in Daniel 7.

In The Christology of Jesus, Witherington argues that the theory that distinguishes Jesus from the Son of Man does not hold up. He points out that “nowhere else in the gospel tradition is there so much as a hint that Jesus expected a successor.”[55] Witherington also quotes I. Howard Marshall as saying that the theory which separates Jesus and the Son of Man requires the
“peculiar conclusion—that a proper response to Jesus now will lead to some favored status with a hitherto unknown Son of man. But why should this be the case if Jesus and the Son of man are not one and the same or if the connection is never made clear. In short, this theory raises more problems than it solves and is based on too little evidence.”[56]

Witherington notes that the theory that Jesus thought of the Son of Man as someone other than Himself might be thought of as being supported by only four passages (Matt. 19:28; Mark 13:26; 14:62; Luke 12:8–9),[57] whereas the vast majority of Son of Man sayings clearly identify Jesus with the Son of Man.

The four passages that supposedly support the distinction between Jesus and the Son of Man do not actually assert that there is a distinction; they simply leave the identity of the Son of Man ambiguous. On the other hand, Witherington points out that Luke 9:58, a passage that identifies Jesus with the Son of Man, is held by most critical scholars to be authentic. As Witherington notes, if only one saying in which Jesus identified himself as the Son of Man is authentic—and Luke 9:58 apparently does so—the view that makes a distinction between Jesus and the Son of Man would be shown to be a failure.[58]

The consistent application of Ehrman’s own criteria, therefore, leads to the conclusion that Jesus thought that he himself was the Son of Man of Daniel 7, who would sit at the right hand of the Father and rule over an everlasting kingdom.[59]

Second, the tradition about Jesus riding into Jerusalem on a donkey in fulfillment of Zechariah 9:9 is supported by the criteria of multiple independent attestation (Mark 11:1–10 and John 12:12–15). Even so, Ehrman argues that this event is probably not historically accurate because Jesus was not arrested immediately.[60] But this is no proof that the event did not happen. The Gospels record that the Jewish leaders were concerned about the wide following Jesus commanded, and it is very plausible, therefore, that they might have proceeded carefully about the arrest of Jesus. The consistent application of Ehrman’s criteria would lead to the conclusion that Jesus did enter Jerusalem riding on a donkey and that He was deliberately presenting Himself as Israel’s King, a role Zechariah 9:9 seems to apply to Yahweh Himself.

Third, Ehrman argues that though the Lord’s Supper is supported by the criteria of multiple independent attestation (Matt. 26:26–29; Mark 14:22–25; Luke 22:15–20; 1Cor. 11:23–26) it is difficult to know how much of that event is historical since it seems “so heavily ‘Christianized’ with the doctrine of the saving effect of Jesus’ death.”[61] But as Witherington points out, “The idea of a human sacrificial death atoning for sin seems to have been very much alive in Judaism during Jesus’ era.”[62] The Lord’s Supper therefore meets both Ehrman’s criteria of multiple attestation and contextual credibility. Consistent application of Ehrman’s criteria leads to the conclusion that the Lord’s Supper is historical and that Jesus saw His death as having salvific significance, not unlike that portrayed in Isaiah 53.

More Than a Prophet

Using the criteria of independent attestation does not lead to conclusions about Jesus that differ wildly from the church’s traditional understanding. In fact, it can easily be shown that Jesus thought of Himself as more than a prophet:

Jesus not only claimed that he personally could grant forgiveness of sins but that he would one day “return” to separate his people from the rest and execute judgment on the nations, something presumably only Yahweh could do. He taught that those who would be his followers must be devoted to him above all else, which to the Jewish mind would probably have been a clear violation of the first commandment. He also seemed to have taught that people's eternal destiny would depend on their relation to him. Teachings like this would certainly account for the accusations of blasphemy leveled at Jesus.[63]

Witherington follows standard historical-critical methodology, focusing mostly on Q and the Gospel of Mark to demonstrate that Jesus thought of Himself as more than an ordinary human being.[64] For example Witherington points out that Jesus actually considered Himself above the Torah (e.g., Mark 2:18–28; 7:15). [65] Witherington also demonstrated that the phrase “Amen, I say to you,” which occurs numerous times in all four Gospels,[66] shows that Jesus spoke not just as a prophet of God, but as one speaking with His own divine authority and power.[67] According to Witherington Jesus believed that it was God’s will that He die as a ransom for many,[68] but that He would be vindicated after His death, coming in the clouds of heaven to judge the world, as indicated by Daniel’s vision of the Son of Man.[69] Jesus thought He was bringing about the eschatological blessings promised by Isaiah (Q material in Matt. 11:2–19 = Luke 7:18–35) and may even have seen Himself as the embodiment of divine wisdom.[70]

Is it historically possible that a Jesus, a first-century Jew, could have come to think of himself as the very embodiment of Yahweh? This can be answered in the affirmative for these reasons.

First, it is important to note that the appearance of gods as human beings was well known in contemporary Greek thought, and recent studies have asserted the widespread influence of Greek thought in Galilee. Second, one need only remember the story of Yahweh’s interaction with Abraham in Genesis 18 to know that the idea of God appearing to people as a human being was not foreign to Judaism either. Third, it was not unusual in the ancient world for a human being to think of himself as the embodiment of a god.[71] True, such thinking would have been unusual for a Jew and especially for a peasant, but the idea that God could become human was well known. Therefore the idea that Jesus thought of himself as “one with the Father” is not only supported by the criteria of multiple independent attestation but it is also contextually credible.

Explanation for Jesus’ Death

Ehrman makes the point that many historical reconstructions of Jesus rise or fall on their explanation of Jesus’ death. As Ehrman asks, why crucify a Jewish rabbi who taught people to love God and be good to each another?[72] Ehrman’s point is well taken. Whoever proposes a historical reconstruction of Jesus must take seriously that facts that the Jewish leadership wanted him dead and the Roman government agreed with their demands. There were numerous religious reformers and cynic sages in the ancient world but that didn’t automatically lead to a death sentence. But while Ehrman makes an excellent point, his own explanation for Jesus’ death is not convincing.

According to Ehrman, the Jewish leaders arranged Jesus’ execution because He taught that they would be recipients of God’s judgment.[73] But just predicting God’s judgment on the temple establishment does not seem to have been sufficient reason in itself for His execution, since the Essenes, too, threatened the temple establishment with God’s judgment. Besides, Ehrman’s view does not explain the tradition that Jesus was charged with blasphemy. A more historically probable explanation for Jesus’ death is that He thought of Himself as fulfilling Jewish prophecies about God coming to His people as their Shepherd and King. If Jesus taught these things to others, such teaching could have unquestionably led to charges of blasphemy by Jewish leaders. It would have been a very small step to turn such charges of blasphemy into charges of sedition before Pilate.

Conclusion

Many elements in Ehrman’s view of Jesus are convincing, 1) his conclusion that Jesus was a Jewish apocalyptic prophet, whose message centered on the kingdom of God in which there would be no poverty, illness, or oppression. 2) That for Jesus, absolutely nothing was as important as loving God and seeking His kingdom. 3) That Jesus called His followers to behave now as they will in the Kingdom, and this meant not only loving God above all else but also loving one’s neighbor and even one’s enemies. 4) That Jesus’ exorcisms and healings were not only acts of compassion; they were designed as a foretaste of His coming kingdom.

While these aspects of Jesus as presented by Ehrman are compelling, Ehrman’s views are inconsistent and incomplete. Witherington, N. T. Wright, and others have shown that Jesus saw Himself as more than a Jewish prophet. Jesus spoke as one who was above the Torah and the temple, one who could speak on His own divine authority and could forgive sins. He thought of His death as having salvific significance, consistent with Isaiah 53, and He believed He would return as the coming Son of Man, who would judge the world and rule over the kingdom of God, as seen in Daniel 7.[74]

That Jesus actually presented Himself as King, Son of Man, and Savior is a matter of history that has been well established by using the same historical criteria Ehrman used to present his own compelling view of Jesus.

But if someone—even in the first century A.D.—actually thought of himself in such lofty terms, why would anyone believe him? Would not someone like that be dismissed as crazy? First, it must be noted that most people did not believe Jesus. Some thought He was a blasphemer, others thought He was demon-possessed, and some thought He was insane.[75] The gospel sayings that record these views about Jesus meet the criteria of embarrassment which asserts that it is unlikely that early Christians would have made things up about Jesus that were not flattering or were even embarrassing. It is very unlikely that early Christians would have fabricated sayings about people thinking Jesus was insane or demon-possessed. If Jesus, therefore, taught that he was the fulfillment of prophecies about Yahweh coming to his people, the charges of blasphemy, demon possession or even insanity are what we might expect. This increases the historical probability that Jesus thought of Himself as more than just a Jewish prophet.

Those who did believe what Jesus taught about Himself probably did so for several reasons. First, they believed because of the compelling nature of His teaching. It was not the resurrection alone that convinced them that Jesus was the Messiah and Son of God. As Wright noted, “…for someone who had been certifiably dead to become alive again would mean that the world was indeed a stranger place than one had imagined; it would not at all justify a claim that the person to whom this odd event happened was therefore the saviour of the world, the ‘son of god’, or anything else in particular.” [76]

In other words, the earliest followers of Jesus believed that he was the Messiah and Son of God because that is what Jesus taught about himself. Their belief in the resurrection was the confirmation of what Jesus had already taught.[77]

Second, those who believed in Jesus did so because of His miracles. In Jesus’ day no one denied that He did amazing signs and wonders, but people differed in their view on the nature and source of those powers. Jesus’ enemies thought He was a sorcerer or that He did miracles by the power of Satan. His followers were well aware of traveling sorcerers but countered that no one has ever done miracles like these before! Third, those who believed in Jesus did so because they were absolutely convinced that He had risen from the dead. This is a fact that even Ehrman concedes.[78] Fourth, those who believed in Jesus did so because they were convinced that He had actually fulfilled prophecies in the Jewish Scriptures about a coming Messiah and about Yahweh coming to His temple and visiting His people.[79]

Ehrman was right in insisting that for Jesus, love for God and His kingdom is to be the highest priority. Ehrman referred to Matthew 10:37 and Luke 14:26 to show that for Jesus, the kingdom was more important than one’s closest relatives and loved ones.[80] But these verses actually present Jesus as saying that people must love Him—not just the kingdom— more than anything or anyone else. What Ehrman misses is that for Jesus, putting the Kingdom of God first also meant putting the King first—and Jesus believed that he was that King, the fulfillment of Jewish prophecies about Yahweh coming to his people![81]

With teachings like this, it’s no wonder that Jesus’ enemies said he was crazy or demon possessed. It’s no wonder that the religious leaders sought to have him executed for blasphemy. It’s no wonder the Romans would crucify him for sedition. And it’s also no wonder that those who believed in Jesus would give their lives for him and await his return. According to the gospels, Jesus once asked Peter, “But who do you say that I am?”[82] Consistent application of strict historical criteria has made those words just as relevant today as when Jesus first spoke them.

[1] Bart D. Ehrman, Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999).
[2] For other discussions on historical criteria as applied to the gospels see John P. Meier. A Marginal Jew. Vol. 1 (New York : Doubleday, 1991), 167-184. Robert H. Stein. Gospels and Tradition. (Grand Rapids : Baker, 1991), 153-187. E.P. Sanders and Margaret Davies. Studying the Synoptic Gospels. (Philadelphia : Trinity Press International, 1989), 301-344. N.T. Wright. The New Testament and the People of God. (Minneapolis : Fortress Press, 1992), 81-120. Ben Witherington. The Christology of Jesus. (Minneapolis : Fortress Press, 1990), 1-31.
[3] Ehrman, Jesus. 90-95.
[4] Ibid., x, 19. See Albert Schweitzer. The Quest for the Historical Jesus: A Critical Study of its progress from Reimarus to Wrede. Baltimore : Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998, 1910. Albert Schweitzer. A Psychiatric Study of Jesus. Magnolia, MA : Peter Smith, 1911.
[5] Ehrman, Jesus. 128.
[6] Although Ehrman doesn’t list specific authors, examples might be: John Dominic Crossan, 1991. The Historical Jesus: The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant. San Francisco : HarperSanFrancisco. 1994. Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography. San Francisco : HarperSan Francisco. Burton Mack, 1988. A Myth of Innocence: Mark and Christian Origins. Philadelphia : Fortress Press. 1993. The Lost Gospel: The Book of Q and Christian Origins., San Francisco : Harper SanFrancisco. 1995. Who Wrote the New Testament: the Making of the Christian Myth. San Francisco : HarperSanFrancisco. Marcus Borg, 1994. Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time; The Historical Jesus and the Heart of Contemporary Faith. San Francisco : HarperSanFrancisco. 1984. Jesus in Contemporary Scholarship. Valley Forge, PA : Trinity Press International. 1987. Jesus; A New Vision: Spirit Culture and the Life of Discipleship. Harper & Row. Robert Funk. 1996. Honest to Jesus: Jesus for a New Millennium. San Francisco : HarperSanFrancisco.
[7] The letter “Q” (from German Quelle, “source”) is sometimes used to refer to a hypothetical document that may have been used by Matthew and/or Luke, a document that was allegedly the source of approximately two hundred verses common to Matthew and Luke that are not found in Mark. Q can also be used, as it will be in this article, as shorthand for material common to both Matthew and Luke, without comment on the plausibility of such a historical document.
[8] See for example, Burton Mack. The Lost Gospel; The Book of Q and Christian Origins. (San Francisco : HarperCollins, 1993). John Kloppenborg. The Formation of Q: Trajectories in Ancient Wisdom Collections. (Philadelphia : Fortress Press, 1987).
[9] Ehrman. Jesus, 133.
[10] See David Laird Dungan. A History of the Synoptic Problem. (New York : Doubleday, 1999), 368-391. Alan J. McNicol. Beyond the Q Impasse: Luke’s Use of Matthew. (Valley Forge, PA : Trinity Press International).
[11] See John Dominic Crossan. The Historical Jesus; The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant. (San Francisco : HarperCollins, 1991), 427-429).
[12] Ehrman, Jesus. 134. For an excellent analysis of two non-apocalyptic scholars, Burton Mack and John Dominic Crossan, see Gregory Boyd, Cynic Sage or Son of God. (Wheaton IL : Victor Books, 1995). See also N.T. Wright. Jesus and the Victory of God. (Minneapolis : Fortress Press, 1996), 28-82).
[13] Ehrman, Jesus. 128, 137.
[14] Ibid., 134–135.
[15] Ibid., 139 (e.g., 1 Thess. 4:13–18; 1 Cor. 15:51–57).
[16] Ibid., 167–168.
[17] Ibid., 177.
[18] Ibid., 143.
[19] Ibid., 179–180. See also the gospel of Thomas, 9.
[20] Ibid., 145–148, 158–159. See also the gospel of Thomas, 71.
[21] Ibid., 167-168. See also the gospel of Thomas, 109, 76.
[22] Ibid., 167.
[23] Ibid., 167.
[24] Ibid. 130. See also the gospel of Thomas, 55.
[25] Ibid., 166.
[26] Ibid., 171-172.
[27] Ibid., 175–176. See also the gospel of Thomas, 22.
[28] Ibid. 173-174.
[29] Ibid., 181.
[30] Ibid., 162.
[31] Ibid., 151–152.
[32] See also the gospel of Thomas, 33.
[33] Ehrman, Jesus, 181.
[34] Ibid., 169.
[35] Ibid., 183–184.
[36] It is important to note that Jesus’ exorcisms were interpreted apocalyptically (e.g., Matt. 12:27 = Luke 11:19–23).
[37] Ehrman, Jesus, 198.
[38] See also Dennis Ingolfsland. “Q,M,L and Other Sources for the Historical Jesus.” Princeton Theological Review. 4:5 (October, 1997), 20. For excellent discussions on Jesus’ healings see John P. Meier. A Marginal Jew; Rethinking the Historical Jesus. Volume 2. (New York : Doubleday, 1994), 509-772. Graham Twelftree. Jesus the Miracle Worker. (Downers Grove : Intervarsity Press, 1999). Graham Twelftree. Jesus the Exorcist. (Peabody, MA : Hendrickson1993).
[39] Ehrman, Jesus. 180, 200.
[40] See also the gospel of Thomas, 114.
[41] Ehrman, Jesus, 188–189. See also the gospel of Peter, 50-57.
[42] For example John Dominic Crossan. The Historical Jesus. San Francisco : HarperCollins Publishers, 1991.
[43] Ehrman, Jesus. 190.
[44] Ibid. 208.
[45] See also the gospel of Thomas, 34, 39.
[46] Ehrman. Jesus, 200–205. See also the gospel of Thomas, 31.
[47] Ibid., 206, 208–209, 218.
[48] Ibid., 218.
[49] For specific attestation see Dennis Ingolfsland. “Q, M, L and Other Sources for the Historical Jesus.” Princeton Theological Review. 4:3 (October, 1997), 21-22.
[50] But see John Wenham. The Easter Enigma; Are the Resurrection Accounts in Conflict. (Carlisle : Paternoster, 1996) who provides a very plausible solution to the problem.
[51] Ehrman, Jesus, 227–228. For excellent contrary opinions on miracles and history, see John P. Meier. A Marginal Jew; Rethinking the Historical Jesus. Volume 2. (New York : Doubleday, 1994), 509-534. Graham H. Twelftree. Jesus the Miracle Worker. (Downers Grove, IL : Intervarsity Press, 1999), 38-53.
[52] Ehrman, Jesus.. 231. See also N.T. Wright. The New Testament and the People of God. (Minneapolis : Fortress Press, 1992), 399., who takes this argument one step further. Wright argues that if a person came back to life in the ancient world others might be convinced that the world was truly a strange place, but a resurrection alone was not likely to convince someone that the resurrected person was the Messiah or Son of God. If Jesus had not taught his disciples that he was the Messiah and Son of God, it is difficult to understand why belief in his resurrection would have automatically lead to that conclusion.
[53] Ibid., 233. See also Witherington. The Christology of Jesus, 175–176.
[54] Ehrman, Jesus, 233.
[55] Witherington, Christology, 257.
[56] Ibid., 257.
[57] Ibid., 257. Ehrman believes Matthew 19:28 is a church formulation. Mark 8:38 was not included since it is probably just a variant of Luke 12:8–9.
[58] Witherington; Christology, 257
[59] Daniel 7.
[60] Ehrman, Jesus, 210.
[61] Ibid., 215.
[62] See 4 Maccabees 6:27–29; 2 Maccabees 7:37–38; and Witherington, The Christology of Jesus, 252.
[63] Dennis Ingolfsland, “Q, M, L, and Other Sources for the Historical Jesus,” Princeton Theological Review 4 (October 1997): 17–22.
[64] Witherington, Christology, 29–30.
[65] Ibid., 65, 69, 80. E.g. Mark 2:18–28; 7:15.
[66] The phrase is highly attested at all levels: “thirteen times in Mark, nine in Q, nine in M, nine in L, twenty-five times in John” (Ibid., 187).
[67] Witherington, Christology, 189.
[68] Ibid., 252.
[69] Ibid., 262.
[70] Ibid., 51–52. Witherington notes that in early Judaism wisdom was viewed as a divine being expressing the mind of God to people and desiring to live with them, but who is rejected by people (Job 1, 28; Prov. 1, 8; Sir. 1, 24; 11QPs-a 18; Baruch 3–4, 48; 1 Enoch 42; 4 Ezra 5:2.
[71] For example, Ovid’s Metamorphosis (8.626-724) has a story about the god’s visiting an elderly couple. That this story was taken seriously by some is reflected in the book of Acts (14:8-15) when the people of Lystra welcomed Paul and Barnabas as gods. Some of the Caesar’s also seemed to think of themselves as divine or sons of gods.
[72] Witherington, Christology, 208.
[73] Ibid., Jesus, 206, 208–209, 218.
[74] Dennis Ingolfsland. “Q, M, L, and Other Sources for the Historical Jesus.” Princeton Theological Review. (October, 1997): 20-21. See also Ben Witherington. The Christology of Jesus. Minneapolis : Fortress Press, 1990. N.T. Wright. The New Testament and the People of God. Minneapolis : Fortress Press, 1992. N.T. Wright. Jesus and the Victory of God. Minneapolis : Fortress Press, 1996.
[75] These views meet the criterion of embarrassment, that is, it is highly unlikely that early Christians would have made up such things about Jesus had they not been true. In fact that these things are even recorded at all speaks volumes about the honesty and objectivity of the Gospel writers.
[76] N. T. Wright, The New Testament and the People of God. (Minneapolis : Fortress Press, 1992), 399.
[77] This is in stark contrast to many modern scholars who, following Wrede, believe that Jesus did not believe he was the Messiah or Son of God and that these ideas were only attributed to him by the church long after his death.
[78] See also E.P. Sanders. The Historical Figure of Jesus. (New York : Penguin Press, 1993), 10-11. E.P. Sanders is one of the world’s foremost Jesus scholars and, though not a Christian, is convinced that it is almost beyond dispute that Jesus’ earliest disciples believed they had seen him after his death (Sanders adds, “in what sense is not certain).
[79] While some prophecies were undoubtedly deliberately fulfilled by Jesus as a prophetic statement—such as riding into Jerusalem on a donkey—others were not under his human control, like his birth in Bethlehem. While most non-evangelical scholars assert that Jesus was probably born in Nazareth rather than Bethlehem, his birth in Bethlehem is supported by the criteria of multiple independent attestation while a Nazareth birth has no support at all. In fact, my suspicion is that the only real reason for denying Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem is because it fulfills prophecy. On a human level, however, which makes more historical sense, 1) that the early church made up a story about their King being born in a stable in Bethlehem, or 2) that Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem and his lineage from David (which is also supported by the criteria of multiple independent attestation) are among the factors that led to Jesus’ thinking about his own mission and ministry as Messiah.
[80] Ehrman, Jesus, 170.
[81] See for example, Isaiah 35:4-6; Zechariah 2:10-12; 8:3; 9:9-10; 12:8-10; 14:1-9. Ezekiel 34:11-25; 43:7 et al.
[82] Mark 8:27-29; Matthew 16:13-17; Luke 9:18-20.