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THE EARLIEST CHRISTIAN BELIEVERS KNEW NOTHING OF Jesus’ childhood because the earliest preaching—that of the apostles—had nothing to say about him prior to his baptism at about age thirty (Luke 3:21–23). This is the pattern reflected in the sermons in the Acts of the Apostles.1
Mark, writing the earliest of the four gospels, began his account of the Savior, not with Jesus’ early years, but with the ministry of John the Baptist (Mark 1:2–4). Even the Evangelist John, whose first words take his readers right up to the eternity of the Word’s relation to the Father (1:1–5), commenced his actual story by introducing the ministry of John the Baptist. Even before declaring that “the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us,” this Evangelist proclaimed, “There was a man sent forth from God whose name was John.” As far as history can discern, in short, the earliest apostolic witness contained not a single detail about Jesus’ life prior to the Baptist’s appearance at the Jordan.
In this respect, Matthew and Luke represent a dramatic difference because these two Evangelists have quite a bit to say about Jesus prior to the preaching of John the Baptist. This earlier material tells of Jesus’ miraculous conception, Zachariah and Elizabeth, Herod and the Magi, Jesus’ circumcision, Mary’s postpartum purification in the temple, the family’s flight into Egypt, and their visit to Jerusalem when the Savior was twelve years old.
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It is worth remarking that Matthew and Luke do not simply attach these earlier stories to the front of their gospels. On the contrary, each writer elaborates the material in ways consistent with the literary structure and theological interests of his gospel as a whole. Those interests explain why the perspectives in Matthew and Luke—notwithstanding what they have in common—are notably different.
Thus, Matthew’s account of the pagan Magi, who arrive in the Holy Land in order to adore the newborn Jesus, serves to introduce a theological theme important to this author—world evangelism—on which, in fact, his gospel will end: “Go forth and make disciples of all nations” (Matthew 28:19, emphasis added).
Luke, on the other hand, uses the early stories of Jesus’ life to set the stage for his pronounced “Jerusalem motif.” These accounts enable Luke to portray three scenes that take place in the temple, even before Jesus’ ministry begins (Luke 1:9; 2:27, 46). Moreover, Luke’s account of Mary’s song—the Magnificat—introduces some of the ideas programmatic of his gospel as a whole:
He has put down the mighty from their thrones,
And exalted the lowly.
He has filled the hungry with good things,
And the rich He has sent away empty. (Luke 1:52–53)
In these lines from Luke’s first chapter, we discern various motifs he will later take up in the Beatitudes and Woes (Luke 6:20–26); the accounts of Zacchaeus (19:1–10) and the poor widow (21:1–4); and the parables of the good Samaritan (10:25–37), the rich fool (12:13–21), the wedding feast (14:7–14), the two sons (15:11–32), the crafty steward (16:1–13), the rich man and Lazarus (16:19–31), and the Pharisee and publican (18:9–14).
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SOURCE?
There is an obvious problem attending these stories of Jesus’ birth and other early events. The problem, which is historical, is easily stated: Just where did Matthew and Luke discover the historical material that fills the first two chapters of each of these gospels? Since this material had not been part of the early preaching of the apostles, how did the two Evangelists know about it?
The only reasonable answer, it seems to me, is that the “source” was Jesus’ own mother, of whom we are told, “Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart” (Luke 2:19, 51). Later in the first century, when Matthew and Luke wrote, she alone was still alive to remember those details, which could have been known to no one else.
She was the living witness of the stories about herself and Joseph, the conception and birth of John the Baptist, the circumstances of Jesus’ conception, the trip to Bethlehem, the manger in the stable, the swaddling clothes, the angels and the shepherds, the Magi and their gifts, Herod’s reaction, Jesus’ circumcision, the presentation in the temple, Simeon and Anna, and the dramatic event that occurred when Jesus was twelve. It was from Mary that Matthew and Luke knew these narratives.
What does this early material tell us about Jesus as he grew up? Taking Matthew and Luke as guides, I feel confident in the suggestion that the Savior’s childhood and early experiences were chiefly shaped by two principal factors: his parents and his synagogue.
We are ready to look at these.
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THE FATHER
Jesus’ family bore Joseph’s name. Although Matthew and Luke testified that Joseph was not Jesus’ biological father, it was through him that both Evangelists traced Jesus’ family lineage (Matthew 1:1–16; Luke 3:23–38). Jesus inherited the messianic title “Son of David,” not from Mary but from the man who served him—literally—in loco patris.2
Jesus “was supposed” (enomizeto—Luke 3:23) to be “the son of Joseph,” Jeshua Bar Joseph (John 1:45; 6:42). When he first addressed the citizens of Nazareth, those in the synagogue inquired, “Is this not Joseph’s son?” (Luke 4:22).
Matthew provides an instructive variation on this question: “Is this not the craftsman’s son?” (Matthew 13:55). The underlying Greek noun here, usually translated as “carpenter,” is tekton, a term including any sort of builder, craftsman, or skilled worker—even a blacksmith. A tekton was someone who constructed and fashioned things with his hands.
In short, Joseph taught Jesus those cultivated manual talents summarized by George Eliot as the inheritance bequeathed from a craftsman father: “the mechanical instinct, the keen sensibility to harmony, the unconscious skill of the modeling hand.”
Joseph passed these technical skills on to Jesus, who was also known as a tekton. A tekton was a man with talented hands, and Jesus’ hands could heal the sick and injured! Mark surely recognized the irony of calling Jesus a tekton in the context of his miracles and teaching: “And what wisdom is this which is given to him, that such mighty works are performed by his hands. Is this not the tekton?” (Mark 6:2–3, emphasis added).
What more did Jesus learn from Joseph? Let me suggest that he also found in Joseph an ideal son of Abraham—that is to say, a man who lived, as Abraham did, by faith.
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Consider the calling of Joseph. Every vocation is unique—in the sense that the Good Shepherd calls each of his sheep by its own proper name—but there was something supremely unique in the vocation of Joseph, who was called to be the foster father of God’s Son and the protector of that divine Son’s virgin mother. Joseph’s vocation was not only difficult; it was impossible! In a sense, Joseph had to figure it out as he went along, simply following God’s call, as best he could, wherever it led. He was obliged to leave the heavy lifting to God.
With so distinctive and demanding a vocation, Joseph might be excused, if, on occasion—the flight into Egypt, for instance—he felt anxious and insecure. The evidence, however, indicates that this was not the case. Joseph was not a person given to anxiety. He appeared, rather, as a man of extraordinary serenity. We find Joseph in five scenes in the gospel of Matthew, and every single time he is sound asleep (Matthew 1:20–24; 2:12, 13, 19, 22). Whatever troubles Joseph endured, they did not include insomnia.
Perhaps we see Joseph’s mark on Jesus—particularly the example of his serenity and simple trust in God—when we contemplate a later New Testament scene:
Now when they had left the multitude, they took Jesus along in the boat as he was. And other little boats were also with him. And a great windstorm arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that it was already filling. But he was in the stern, asleep on a pillow. (Mark 4:36–38)
THE MOTHER
Most of what we know of Jesus’ mother comes from the gospel of Luke, where we learn of God’s message to her, conveyed by the angel Gabriel, inviting her to become the virgin mother of his Son. In Luke we learn, too, of her acceptance of God’s plan for her life, the miraculous conception of that Son through the power of the Holy Spirit, Mary’s visit to Elizabeth, her meeting with the old couple in the temple, and the later incident when Jesus was lost in Jerusalem for three days.
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In all these stories, the most significant fact about Mary was her consent to God’s invitation. Absolutely everything else recorded in the four gospels depended on that consent.
Mary’s “Be it done unto me according to your word” (Luke 1:38) was also the first step along the road to Jesus’ “Not my will, but Yours, be done” (22:42).
I believe the correspondence between these two verses indicates, likewise, the important spiritual mark of Mary on her son. It was from her that he learned to respond in faith to the call of God, not counting the cost. Their destinies were inextricably entwined in the mystery of redemption.
Even as Simeon prophesied that Jesus was “destined for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign of contradiction,” the old man took care to warn Mary, “Yes, a sword will pierce through your own soul also” (Luke 2:34–35). This prophecy was mainly fulfilled on Mount Calvary, where “there stood by the cross of Jesus his mother” (John 19:25), loyally adhering to him unto the end. For this reason we find Mary—in the New Testament’s last mention of her—gathered with the other Christians in the Upper Room, awaiting the coming of the Holy Spirit (Acts 1:14).
The message Mary received through Gabriel foretold mysterious things about the coming child:
He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Highest; and the Lord God will give him the throne of his father David. And he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end. (Luke 1:32–33)
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It is beyond doubt that Mary understood she was becoming the mother of the Messiah, because such was the message these words conveyed. Yet, what did it all mean in practice? Where would it all lead?
Mary surely derived a further sense of her son’s destiny when, at her greeting, the unborn infant in Elizabeth’s womb suddenly “leaped for joy” (1:44). Then, at Jesus’ birth, more angels appeared, this time to tell the shepherds,
Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people. For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Lord Messiah. (Luke 2:10–11)
What did all this portend, and what further was the Messiah’s mother to do? There is nothing in the Sacred Text to suggest the Messiah’s mother understood these things very clearly. (Do we?) All we know for certain is that “Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart” (Luke 2:19).
For the rest, she walked in faith and thereby taught her son to walk in faith. Gradually, day by day, “the child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom; and the grace of God was upon him” (Luke 2:40), but not much happened that was extraordinary.
Indeed, Jesus seemed so ordinary a child that Mary and Joseph were quite stunned when, at age twelve, he suddenly asked them, “Did you not know that I must be about the things of my Father?” (2:49). Even then, however, Jesus “went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was subject to them” (2:51). That is to say, things promptly returned to normal.
Year followed year, and Jesus remained at home with Joseph, eventually taking over the workshop when Joseph passed away. Nothing out of the ordinary happened, as far as we know. If Jesus really was the Messiah, there was no outward sign of it. We may imagine Mary was content, living in company with her son, who was dutiful and conscientious. It is difficult to imagine she was unaware of his piety and love of study, but Holy Scripture does not comment on it.
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Then one day, Jesus announced that he was going to see his cousin John, who was preaching and baptizing in the Jordan Valley. He left his mother at home in Nazareth, and when he returned some time later, everything had changed.
THE SYNAGOGUE
Everyone who knew him was aware that Jesus had no formal training as a rabbi. He was a workman. Unlike Saul of Tarsus, Jesus had not been privileged to study “at the feet of Gamaliel” (Acts 22:3) or some other leading rabbinic scholar of the time. Indeed, when the Savior—at about age thirty (Luke 3:23)—commenced teaching in the Galilean synagogues (4:15), his neighbors expressed no little consternation about it: “How does this man know letters, never having studied?” (John 7:15).
It would be wrong, on the other hand, to ascribe an absolute sense to their low assessment of Jesus’ education or fail to consider its context. That is to say, the wonderment of Jesus’ contemporaries was prompted by his ability to hold his own in debate with—and even prevail over—the recognized rabbinical experts of his day. His townsfolk did not mean Jesus was unfamiliar with Sacred Letters.
There is no doubt that Jesus was literate, for we find him reading, and there is every reason to believe he learned the Scriptures as did any other young man from a working-class Galilean family: at the local synagogue. Normally, in fact, in a small town such as Nazareth, copies of the Scriptures, or any other books, were available only at the synagogue.
Now, Luke testifies that Jesus attended normal assemblies at the synagogue each Sabbath, “according to his custom” (Luke 4:16). As it happens, we know a thing or two about this “custom” (eiothos) of weekly synagogue attendance, and what we know precludes any fancy that it was a thing taken lightly—a perfunctory minimum observance.
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On the contrary, regular attendance at the local synagogue required a very substantial commitment of effort and time: first, it occupied most of the Sabbath. Flavius Josephus, a Jewish historian contemporary with the New Testament, spelled out the details for his Roman audience:
We spend every seventh day in the study of the customs (ethon) and Law, regarding concern for these things to be important—like everything else—so that we may avoid sin.3
In short, everyone familiar with the Judaism of the day was aware that “Moses had throughout many generations those who preached him in every city, being read in the synagogues every Sabbath” (Acts 15:21). Besides the Sabbath, the two weekly fast days—Monday and Thursday (Didache 8.1; Luke 18:12)—were also occasions for public Scripture readings in the synagogue.
In the synagogues of Palestine, these public readings, following a common lectionary based on the calendar of Jewish festal seasons, were measured out so that the entire Pentateuch was completed every three and a half years. To these were added selections from the rest of the Hebrew Scriptures. Eventually some of this material was determined by particular feast days: Esther at Purim, the Song of Solomon at Passover, Ecclesiastes at Sukkoth, Ruth at Pentecost, and so on. We are uncertain, however, if—or how much—these patterns were fixed in Jesus’ time.
After the public reading in Hebrew, the Scriptures were repeated in translations in the common spoken language—Aramaic in Palestine, mainly Greek elsewhere—so that God’s Word would be understood by the people. Since our first example for this practice of a public reading in translation comes from the early postexilic period (Nehemiah 8:1–8), it appears that the pattern commenced during the mid-sixth century BC—the Babylonian Captivity—when the local synagogue became the defining and essential social institution in Jewish life.
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Nor was biblical study in the synagogue restricted to public readings on three days during the week. The Mishnah testifies that the Scriptures were constantly maintained in the synagogue—under supervision—so that at any time a literate person with sufficient leisure might come and study them. According to Jerusalem’s Ophel Inscription (contemporary with the New Testament), the synagogue was to provide adequate facilities to “read the Torah and teach the commandments.”
For this reason, the synagogue was called the beth hasepher, the “house of the book.” It was chiefly a place of study, where primary attention was given to the Torah and the other Sacred Writings. That is to say, the culture of the synagogue was literary; it was text based, a pursuit of the ketubim, the sacred grammata identified as God’s Word.
Indeed, often enough it was at the synagogue—in special rooms or a courtyard or an attached building—that a young Jew learned the art of reading. It seems likely that Jesus learned to read in that setting.
When Luke tells of Jesus’ return to Nazareth, he describes the town as the place where Jesus—according to the New King James Version—“had been brought up” (Luke 4:16). The Greek expression here is tethrammenos, literally “had been nourished,” an expression referring to Jesus’ nurture as a child. Inasmuch as “Jesus increased in wisdom and stature,” however, this early nourishment should be understood as both physical and spiritual. That is to say, in returning to the synagogue at Nazareth, Jesus was coming back to the place where his soul had been fed during all those years of his youth. Moreover, the institution of the synagogue remained important to him throughout his life.4
In our own age, when most Bible reading is done at home and privately, it seems important to stress the social setting of Jesus’ study of Holy Scripture. The synagogue context, a setting inherited from Israel’s history, provided the atmosphere in which the youthful Jesus, reading the Sacred Scrolls, took possession of his own identity as a child of Abraham and a partaker of the Mosaic covenant.
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Consequently, we need to consider more carefully what these Sacred Writings meant to Jesus as he matured. They were an indispensable element of his experience in the flesh.
JESUS AND THE SCRIPTURES
Someone who embarks on writing a biography—especially of a statesman, a religious leader, a philosopher, or a literary figure—should be prepared to cite the “influences” brought to bear on the conscience and thinking of his subject. We commonly expect this in a biographical account.
Thus, for instance, if I were to write a life story of Russell Kirk, I should devote some consideration to his early and very serious study of the Stoic, Marcus Aurelius. The calm and clarity of Kirk’s thought—by his own admission—owed a great deal to his careful examination of ancient Stoicism.
We must admit, however, that such an approach to biography does not work quite so well for understanding Jesus! Although he certainly read Isaiah and Daniel, it is legitimate to doubt that the Savior of the world read Isaiah and Daniel the way Macaulay and Acton read Johnson and Burke. I, for one, find it difficult to picture adolescent Jesus looking up suddenly one day from a page of Job or Chronicles and exclaiming, “Wow, what an insight! That really does make sense!”
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Jesus was not “working out” a religious theory. He was taking possession of his own identity. This was a process of growth, and Jesus’ study of the Hebrew Scriptures was integral to that growth. He did read books, and he learned from them. The works of Moses, David, Jeremiah, and the others truly contoured his mind and conscience. The mental horizon of Jesus, as we discern it in the four gospels, took shape during those long years at Nazareth, where—Luke tells us—he went to the synagogue “according to his custom.”
So when Luke also tells us, “Jesus increased in wisdom and stature,” it is wrong to imagine his growth was unrelated to what he read—any more than his increase in stature was unrelated to what he ate (Luke 2:52).
Luke is our chief source on this matter. In fact, he is the Evangelist who describes Jesus reading and interpreting Isaiah near the very beginning of his public ministry (Luke 4:16–21). In the thirteenth century, when Bonaventure of Fidanza crafted his long and detailed commentary on the gospel of Luke, he prefaced that work by a discourse on the scene of Jesus reading Isaiah in the synagogue at Nazareth. For Bonaventure, this story of Jesus reading in the synagogue was the true key to understanding the Gospel According to Luke.
Bonaventure’s approach showed great insight into Luke’s intention, I believe; the correct understanding of Jesus—the task of Christian theology—is rooted in Jesus’ self-understanding, and Jesus’ self-understanding was inseparable from his reading of the Hebrew Scriptures.
Nonetheless, to speak of the “influence” of the Hebrew Scriptures on Jesus’s mind dramatically transcends our normal use of that expression. The Law and the Prophets shaped his self-awareness in an unparalleled way because the Savior found in those writings his identity, vocation, and mission. His grasp of those texts—an understanding at the root of Christian theology—is the very substance of Jesus’ “self-regard.” It was in studying the Hebrew Bible that Jesus became convinced, “I must be about the things of my Father” (Luke 2:49).
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What David and Isaiah wrote, then, was not something different from who Jesus knew himself to be and what his Father summoned him to do. Later on, in the very act of sending the apostles out to evangelize the world, Jesus “opened their understanding, that they might comprehend the Scriptures” (Luke 24:45). The proclamation of the gospel was to include the incorporation of the Hebrew Scriptures. Christian theology begins with—and is inseparable from—understanding the Old Testament as Jesus understood it. I will return to this consideration later, when we examine the Savior’s revelation to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus.
The gospel of Luke indicates, moreover, that this understanding increased in Jesus. It did not happen all at once, because human understanding always takes time. Jesus took personal possession of the Hebrew Bible as he lived and ministered, as he suffered, died, and rose again. As events unfolded in his life—and particularly when he “endured such contradiction of sinners against himself ” (Hebrews 12:3)—Jesus grasped ever more explicitly the meaning of God’s Word. These books governed his life and destiny.
THE SON’S SELF
Thus, when Jesus read of Isaac’s burden in Genesis, the paschal lamb in Exodus, the sin offering in Leviticus, David’s opprobrium in Samuel, the “pierced side” in Zechariah, the Suffering Servant in Isaiah, and the persecuted just man in the book of Psalms, he found himself, text by text, to be in all of them. They were components of who he knew he was. Already, at age twelve, he had begun to grasp that these themes had to do with “the things of my Father” (Luke 2:49).
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I believe it is misleading, however, to inquire “when” with respect to Jesus’ self-knowledge. Self-knowledge is not objective. One does not acquire it as “information,” like the study of biology or business law.
Self-knowledge is an extension and activity of the self; it is, by definition, subjective. It is necessarily tautological—that is to say, self-knowledge is its own cause. The knowledge of one’s self is inseparable from being oneself.5
It is important not to “objectify” Jesus’ self-awareness and then try to determine at what point—“when?”—he acquired the knowledge of his identity. Self-knowledge is intrinsic to, and an extension of, self-being. His consciousness of his identity came from his identity.
Self-knowledge, however, does take place in a process of growth. It is historical, like all components of human consciousness. Human self-knowledge is an ongoing “event.”
The four gospels indicate Jesus’ maturing self-knowledge at certain documented points in his life. Prominent among these were the incident in the temple when he was twelve, his baptism at age thirty, the miracle at Cana, and, perhaps a year or so later, the dramatic awareness of his redemptive destiny. This last was the resolve of that internal moment when “he began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. He spoke this word openly” (Mark 8:31–32, emphasis added).
It is time, now, to examine two early scenes that disclosed Jesus’ growing self-awareness.