In the history of NT research in the twentieth century nothing has been more dramatic than the rapid advance of Roman Catholic biblical studies.[1] The church that excommunicated Alfred Loisy in 1908[2] has increasingly affirmed the methods and results of historical criticism.[3] This affirmation is marked by a series of papal encyclicals and the remarkable ecumenical council, Vatican II. The situation at the beginning of the century was shaped by the encyclical Providentissimus Deus (1893) of Leo XIII. Although Leo affirmed the inspiration and inerrancy of Scripture, he permitted the study of the Bible in the original languages and the cautious use of historical method. In 1920, Benedict XV published Spiritus Paraclitus, which acknowledged that the truth of Scripture was confined to the religious elements of the text. The authorship of Scripture, according to Benedict, was divine and human, with the human writer as instrument of God. Pius XII’s Divino Afflante Spiritu (1943) is usually hailed as the Magna Carta of Catholic biblical studies. This encyclical gave more credit to the human author, acknowledging the role of the writer’s own faculties and powers. Pius encouraged the study of archaeology, biblical languages, text criticism, and hermeneutics. Attention was to be given to the ancient “modes of writing,” different from the kinds of speech used today. The Bible should be interpreted in the context of the ancient literature of the East.
Vatican II represents a giant step in the advance of Catholic research.[4] In 1959, Pope John XXIII astounded the hierarchy with the announcement of his intention to summon an ecumenical council, dedicated to the modernizing of the church. The council began in October of 1962, held four lengthy sessions, and finally finished its work in November, 1965. John died in the course of the council (1963), but was succeeded by Paul VI, who supported its continuation. The drama of the opening event is hard to exaggerate: some 2,700 bishops assembled under the splendor of the vault of St. Peter’s, clad in their vivid vestments, speaking a host of languages but united in the common Latin of the ancient church. The council produced sixteen major documents, of which the most important were four “constitutions.” For the study of the Bible the crucial document is the Constitution on Divine Revelation, adopted during the last session (1965) by a vote of 2,344 to 6.[5] This constitution was published as Dei Verbum. The most striking feature of the document was the conclusion that revelation did not have two separate sources, Scripture and tradition, but one: revelation is the Word of God, expressed in the person and work of Jesus Christ; Scripture and tradition witness together in presenting the Word. In regard to hermeneutics, the human author was recognized as the true author whose work should be interpreted by historical critical methods. “For the words of God, expressed in human language, have been made like human discourse, just as of old the Word of the eternal Father, when he took to Himself the weak flesh of humanity, became like other men.”[6] In the final section the constitution reads: “This sacred Synod encourages the sons of the Church who are biblical scholars to continue energetically with the work they have so well begun, with a constant renewal of vigor and with loyalty to the mind of the Church.”[7]
Biblical scholarship flourished in the wake of the council, but attacks from disgruntled critics continued. Much of this was dispelled with the publication of “The Interpretation of the Bible in the Church” by the Pontifical Biblical Commission in 1993.[8] This document has four main parts: methods and approaches, hermeneutical questions, characteristics of Catholic interpretation, and the interpretation of the Bible in the church. The document asserts that historical critical method is indispensable, since the Bible witnesses to revelation in history. At the same time the document acknowledges limitations of the method, including the questionable presuppositions of some exegetes and an overemphasis on the literal meaning to the neglect of the deeper, spiritual understanding of the text.
There are a host of worthy candidates who might serve as examples of European Roman Catholic scholarship—Pierre Benoît, Lucien Cerfaux, Stanislas Lyonnet, Otto Kuss, François-Marie Braun, and others—but time and space allow for only one. Born in Kattowitz, Upper Silesia, Rudolf Schnackenburg was educated at Breslau and Munich, where he completed his Habilitation in 1947.[9] He was ordained to the priesthood and in 1955 began teaching at Bamberg. From 1957 until retirement in 1982 he was professor of New Testament at Würzburg. Like an academic magnet, Schnackenburg drew students from around world, adopting a personal interest in their various topics of research. Schnackenburg lived a simple life, dominated by his scholarly research; on a typical day he worked from 5:30 AM to 11:00 PM. He was a man of the church and served on the Pontifical Biblical Commission. His scholarship was honored by his election as President of the SNTS.
Schnackenburg produced an abundance of critical, exegetical, and theological work.[10] Basic to his NT research is his understanding of revelation.[11] Schnackenburg observes that the belief that the Bible is a book of revelation raises the question of the biblical understanding of revelation. He finds a key in Heb 1:1-2, where the writer describes several aspects of revelation: it is spoken by God; it has been given in various ways; it has been given through prophets, and finally in the Son. The last point affirms Schnackenburg’s conviction that revelation is given in history. Also crucial for the understanding of revelation, according to Schnackenburg, is the biblical understanding of faith. Paul (in 2 Cor 4:3-4 and 1 Cor 1:18-25) says that revelation is hidden from some but open to others: those who respond in faith. Schnackenburg defines faith as a personal response of complete dependence on God. Schnackenburg believes revelation is given in tradition as well as in Scripture. He notes that revelation was transmitted in tradition before the writing of Scripture, and that revelation continues after the writing in the interpretation of Scripture.
This concern with tradition is typical of Roman Catholic scholarship, which displays a distinctive exegetical practice.[12] Schnackenburg notes that the encyclical Divino Afflante Spiritu (1943) affirmed the use of historical critical method. However, some practitioners of the method, according to him, have overemphasized the literal meaning of Scripture at the expense of the deeper spiritual meaning, the sensus plenior. Schnackenburg did not believe that commitment to tradition hinders the use of historical critical research. He agreed with Bultmann that exegesis without presuppositions is not possible; the Catholic exegete presupposes the faith and tradition of the church.
Schnackenburg’s major contribution to NT research is his massive multivolume commentary on the Gospel of John.[13] “I should like the commentary to make its contribution to the present state of studies,” writes Schnackenburg, “without abandoning Catholic tradition or the scientific method used by New Testament scholars of all confessions.”[14] He begins with an exhaustive (over 200 page) introduction concerning the historical-critical issues. He acknowledges that the author is primarily concerned with theology, but this does not mean that he provides no historical information. To be sure, the Fourth Gospel differs from the Synoptics, for instance in the presentation of long discourses that “cannot and do not intend to be historical reporting or a word for word record.”[15] Schnackenburg does not believe that the author used the Synoptics, but does think he knew early tradition. “All this suggests that behind John there is an older tradition, going back to ‘synoptic’ or ‘pre-synoptic’ times, with many contacts with the synoptic tradition, but still an independent one.”[16] In regard to the composition, Schnackenburg believes chapters 1–20 constitute a unity, but chapter 21 is a later addition.
In regard to the debated question of authorship, Schnackenburg begins with a theological affirmation. “From the theological point of view, therefore, the question of authorship really comes down to the ‘apostolic authority’ behind the Scriptures which were then recognized and proclaimed by the Church as inspired and canonical.”[17] As to the identity of the actual writer, Schnackenburg recognizes the weight of the late-second-century tradition in support of John, the son of Zebedee. He also believes that the elusive “beloved disciple” of the Fourth Gospel is this same John, and offers a hypothesis: the primary source of the tradition was John, but the evangelist was a disciple of John who eventually put the tradition in writing, using sources, probably including a “signs source”; a final redaction, incorporating chapter 21, was the work of a later member of the Johannine school. Schnackenburg believes that the language and style imply a Diaspora Jew who wrote a simple Greek colored by Semitic influence. He locates the religious background of the Fourth Gospel in the OT and Judaism with only incidental contacts with Gnosticism.
The main concern of the evangelist, according to Schnackenburg, is Christology from the perspective of realized eschatology. “In John, however, the strongest motive is the Christology, which shows the glory of the Logos still dwelling in the earthly Jesus, and the power of the exalted and glorified Lord already present in his word and work of salvation. In John, Christ is really the ‘eschatological present.’”[18]
As to the history of interpretation, Schnackenburg notes the extensive use of the Fourth Gospel by the gnostics in the second century. Among the orthodox the first clear dependence on John is seen in Justin and Tatian. Origen interpreted the Gospel allegorically, and a high point of theological exegesis is reached by Augustine. In the Enlightenment the authenticity of John was questioned. In recent times the commentary by Bultmann has been influential—an influence Schnackenburg largely resists.[19]
The commentary proper orders the material into two main sections: “Jesus Reveals Himself to the World” (chaps. 1–12); “Jesus in the Circle of His Own: Passion and Resurrection” (chaps. 13–20, plus the addition of chap. 21). The first section constitutes Volumes 1 and 2; the second is, Volume 3. The fourth volume (only in the German edition) includes expanded exegesis and additional excursuses.[20] Each pericope is preceded by an introduction, followed by the text in translation (including the Greek text in the first volume of the English edition), followed by verse-by-verse exposition. Space allows only a few examples.
Schnackenburg devotes sixty pages to the interpretation of the prologue (1:1-18). He believes the evangelist took up a hymn or poem and adapted it to his introduction. This poem, according to Schnackenburg, was composed by a Christian Hellenist. As adapted by the evangelist, the poem has three parts: the pre-existent being of the Logos, the coming of the Logos, and the incarnation of the Logos. Schnackenburg believes that in 1:1 the evangelist depicts the Logos without a body and stresses his divine nature. The climax of the poem is v. 14, which affirms the event of incarnation as historical happening. “The ἐγένετο announces a change in the mode of the being of the Logos: hitherto he was in glory with his Father (cf. 17:5, 24), now he takes on the lowliness of human, earthly existence; formerly he was ‘with God’ (1:1b), now he pitches his tent among men, and in human form in the full reality of the σάρξ, to attain once more the glory of his heavenly mode of being after his return to the Father (17:5).”[21]
John 2:1-11 presents “The Beginning of the Signs: The Miracle at the Marriage-Feast in Cana.” At first glance the account looks like a simple miracle story, but hints of a deeper meaning are scattered through the text: the enigmatic words about the “hour,” the great quantity of wine, the revelation of “glory,” and the response of the disciples. Schnackenburg does not believe the notice of “the third day” has symbolic meaning, nor does he find eucharistic symbolism in the text. The central meaning of the sign, according to Schnackenburg, is the self-revelation of Jesus as the Messiah; the wine represents the eschatological gift the Messiah brings. In a section in smaller print Schnackenburg notes alleged parallels in the myth of Dionysus, but he believes they have no significance for the interpretation of the Cana miracle.
Schnackenburg’s comments on “The Raising of Lazarus” (11:1-54) are found in Volume 2. He believes the account is based on a miracle story from the “signs source” and oral tradition the evangelist has shaped in order to present his theology, to point ahead to the resurrection of Jesus and the revelation of God’s glory. Schnackenburg believes the Synoptics do not include this miracle because they do not know it; the miracle belongs to the Jerusalem tradition, which did not make its way into the Galilean tradition used by the Synoptics. The theological climax of the story, according to Schnackenburg, is found in the conversation of Jesus with Martha, expressed in the declaration “I am the resurrection and the life” (11:25).
The powerful “I am” saying stands immovable at the beginning; only through Jesus is this life released and given to believers; he is not just the revealer, but also the giver of this indestructible life. But he is not the life-giver in his role as raiser of the dead on the “last day,” but as the giver of salvation in the present, in whom we must believe here and now.
The interpretation of the climactic story of the conversion of Thomas (20:24-29) is found in Volume 3. Schnackenburg believes this account was composed by the evangelist in order to encourage the faith of the members of the community who are unable to “see” the risen Christ. Before his conversion Thomas represents the weakness of the faith of the pre-Easter disciples; his conversion points to a faith that goes beyond seeing. Schnackenburg does not believe that Thomas actually touched Jesus, since only “seeing” is mentioned in the account. He concludes that “the Thomas pericope can be understood entirely in the light of the main objective of the evangelist, to lead his readers to a deepened faith in Christ.”[22] In regard to John 21, Schnackenburg writes, “The entire added chapter has been written from a pronouncedly ‘ecclesiastical’ point of view, from the viewpoint of the Church at the time when it was compiled.”[23]
Volumes 1 to 3 include eighteen excursuses. An example is “The Son of Man in the Fourth Gospel.”[24] At the outset Schnackenburg observes that the use of the title in the Fourth Gospel provides no material for the investigation of the question whether the historical Jesus applied it to himself. In John the title is used thirteen times, primarily to present Jesus as the figure who has come from heaven and ascends there again; he is the Messiah, the giver of life and the judge. “We must conclude that it was not through the synoptic tradition that the fourth evangelist arrived at his affirmations relating to the presence of the Son of Man, but by his own processes of theological reflection on the data.”[25] Schnackenburg does not believe that John’s usage reflects the image of the Primordial Man or the myth of the gnostic redeemer.
Schnackenburg also published commentaries on other NT books. He carries on his Johannine research in a sizeable commentary on the Epistles of John.[26] In the introduction he notes that 1 John is not a letter in the proper sense. He believes it was addressed to readers who were in danger of apostasy, the target of opponents who promoted a docetic Christology influenced by gnostic thought. Schnackenburg notes similarities with the Fourth Gospel but concludes that the authors are not the same.
Schnackenburg produced a two-volume commentary on Mark, addressed to the non-expert, concerned with the spiritual meaning of the text.[27] More attention is given to critical details in his commentary on Matthew.[28] Schnackenburg believes the author used Mark, the sayings source (Q), and oral tradition. Matthew, he thinks, was addressed to a Christian community in a city, probably Antioch. Schnackenburg rejects the traditional authorship by Matthew (Levi), and argues that the Gospel was written by a second-generation Hellenistic Jewish Christian after the destruction of Jerusalem, probably around 85 or 90. This author, according to Schnackenburg, is concerned with Christology and the history of salvation; he affirms the importance of the community, which he calls the “church.” An example of Schnackenburg’s exegesis is seen in his discussion of Matt 16:18-19. In response to Peter’s confession, Jesus designates Peter as the “rock” on which the church is built. “The foundation of the church, in this image, is not Peter’s faith, or Jesus’ messianic dignity, but the person of Peter himself.”[29]
Schnackenburg ventured into the epistles with his commentary on Ephesians, a contribution to the highly regarded ecumenical series, Evangelisch-katholischer Kommentar zum Neuen Testament (EKKNT), for which he, along with Eduard Schweizer, was the founding coeditor.[30] In the introduction Schnackenburg takes up the debated question of the literary form of Ephesians, and concludes that it is “a theologically-based, pastorally-oriented letter.”[31] He notes the shift in Catholic scholarship away from Pauline authorship; he believes Ephesians was written in the post-apostolic age, around 90. He thinks the author used Colossians, and transformed the central concern from Christology to ecclesiology. The commentary includes an important excursus, “The Church in the Epistle to the Ephesians.” “In the whole of the NT literature,” writes Schnackenburg, “there is nowhere an ecclesiology which is so extensively structured or which is revealed so effectively as that in the Epistle to the Ephesians.”[32] Schnackenburg discusses the various symbols of the church in Ephesians, for example, the image of Christ as the head of the body—a symbol that depicts the church as universal and cosmic.
Next to his commentary on John, Schnackenburg’s two-volume work on NT ethics is his most important publication. It was originally written in 1954, and an English translation was made on the basis of the second edition of 1962.[33] Schnackenburg’s extensively revised third edition is only available in German (and in Spanish translation).[34] The first volume deals with ethics “From Jesus to the Early Church.” According to Schnackenburg the point of departure is the proclamation of the coming kingdom of God and its basic demands. The announcement of the kingdom includes an ethical imperative: the hearer is called to respond to God’s mercy with acts of mercy; the eschatological rule of God demands acts of love in the present. Schnackenburg notes that Jesus calls persons to be his disciples, to accept the radical demands of the kingdom, to leave home and family, to take up the cross. The antitheses of the Sermon on the Mount, according to Schnackenburg, indicate that the commands of Jesus exceed those of the OT.
As to social issues, for example the relation to the state, Schnackenburg states that Jesus did not promote revolution; he believed the state had authority in its own sphere, but the duty to God was greater than obligation to the state. In the economic arena Jesus did not promote social reform but criticized the rich and identified with the poor. Schnackenburg notes that women played important roles in support of the ministry of Jesus.
Turning to the ethics of the early church, Schnackenburg believes the expectation of the parousia provided a motive for ethical obedience. The ethical teaching of the church stressed the imitation of Jesus: readiness to accept suffering and the life of selfless service. The center of the ethical demand is the command of love. “Agape is the distinctive mark of the Christian religion.”[35] The early Christians, according to Schnackenburg, grappled with the problem of life in the world. The church had its setting in a pagan society and called for distinctive ethical behavior. Schnackenburg finds Paul’s advice in Romans 13 to be surprising, but a counterview is offered by Revelation, advocating resistance to the demonic power of the state.
Schnackenburg’s second volume on ethics explicates the ethical teaching of the early Christian preachers. He notes that Paul’s ethic is grounded in his theology. Paul assumed the unsaved situation of humanity: Jews and Greeks under the power of sin. The turning point, according to Schnackenburg, is the action of God in Christ, which offers redemption and reconciliation by God’s grace, received by faith. This action of justification calls for ethical obedience; the imperative is grounded in the indicative of the new situation. The ethical imperative, according to Schnackenburg’s reading of Paul, reaches its high point in the law of Christ—the law of love that fulfills the whole law.
Schnackenburg believes a distinctive feature of Paul’s ethic is his idea of “conscience.” This idea, borrowed from popular philosophy, indicates that humans have a sense of judgment and responsibility. For the Christian, conscience is illuminated by faith, and faith calls for the response of love. Paul carried his mission into the pagan world and his message called people to turn from idols to serve the true God (1 Thess 1:9); Paul urged believers not to be conformed to the world (Rom 12:2).
In everything, not only the intimate life and practice of the apostle is apparent, but also a conscious effort to come into contact with the former pagans and to move them to new life in Christ. The apostle to the Gentiles wants, with human affection, to draw them to himself and win them for his gospel without abandoning its truth and ethical demand.[36]
After a chapter on Colossians and Ephesians, Schnackenburg proceeds to the ethical teaching of the Gospels. His concern is with the individual evangelists, and consequently he employs redaction criticism. In regard to Mark, Schnackenburg writes: “In a word: It is a call to following Jesus, and indeed, in the community of faith which knows itself obligated to the person of Jesus, to his example, to his way.”[37] Matthew insists that no part of the Law can fall away, but he understands the Law as fulfilled in the command of love. For Matthew the church is important, and the ethical life of believers is lived out in the community of faith. Luke recognizes the delay of the parousia but, as Schnackenburg points out, he instructs the believers to remain faithful in the meantime. “Summing up, one can say: Luke is the ‘social’ evangelist who takes up the message of Jesus for the poor, needy, sick, and oppressed, and sustains it in his communities.”[38] For John the call of God comes through the Son of God who has been sent into the world. Jesus, the revelation of God, is “the way, the truth, and the life” (14:6). According to Schnackenburg, John believes the command of love is the new commandment—new because it is embodied in the love of Jesus. In a chapter on the ethical teachings of the letter of James, Schnackenburg contends that there is no real conflict between James and Paul. For James, works emerge as a sign of faith, a concept not antithetical to the ethics of Paul. A single chapter reviews Schnackenburg’s understanding of the ethics of the remaining NT documents: 1 Peter, Hebrews, Jude, 2 Peter, and Revelation.
A concluding chapter views NT ethics within the horizon of today. Schnackenburg says that some observers suppose that the ethical instruction of the NT is irrelevant: it addresses a different situation and it does not deal with today’s issues. Schnackenburg, however, believes the NT ethic has continuing significance: it understands humanity from the perspective of faith; it understands the world as creation of God; it understands the community, the church, as the locus of Christian living. According to Schnackenburg the NT is concerned with the salvation of all human beings; it calls the church to service in the larger social community.
Along with his commentaries and his work on ethics, Schnackenburg devoted much attention to the life and teaching of Jesus. His most important contribution in this area is his book, The Person of Jesus in the Mirror of the Four Evangelists.[39] In this book he presents Jesus according to the faith of the evangelists.
My book, which has grown out of long years of research and reflection, is intended to be a stimulus to renewed consideration of the basic questions. It seeks to be of service to believing Christians who today have been made insecure by scientific research and critical discussion, so that they may hold fast to faith in the person of Jesus Christ as the bringer of salvation and Savior of the world.[40]
In the introduction Schnackenburg acknowledges that much can be known about the historical Jesus, but he insists that this sort of knowledge is not adequate for faith. Faith can be informed, according to him, by reflection on the view of Jesus presented by the christologies of the individual evangelists.
Schnackenburg believes the Christology of Mark is disclosed in the use of titles. “Son of God” is a title indicating the nearness of Jesus to God but, according to Schnackenburg, it does not refer to Jesus’ divine nature.
Ultimately his [Mark’s] Christology is oriented toward the “Son of God,” who at the same time reveals and conceals himself in the ministry of Jesus, and toward the “Son of Man” who goes his way through suffering and death to the resurrection and will one day prove to be the one coming in power and glory. The full confession is possible only in death (15:39) or after the resurrection (9:9).[41]
The high point of the Gospel of Matthew, according to Schnackenburg, is the confession at Caesarea Philippi (16:13-20). Here Jesus is presented as Messiah and Son of God. Matthew also used “Son of Man” in referring, according to Schnackenburg, to the future, apocalyptic role of Jesus. Matthew views Jesus as fulfiller of OT prophecy and as a moral teacher like Moses. Luke, according to Schnackenburg, presents Jesus as Savior, Messiah, and Lord: the proclaimer of good news to the poor, to sinners and to Gentiles. “From the standpoint of the Lukan picture of Christ, the prospect of the Parousia also gains importance: the resurrected Lord exalted to God will one day come, in spite of his noticeable delay in the age of the church, in order to bring to final fulfillment the work of salvation begun by him.”[42] Regarding the Fourth Gospel, Schnackenburg writes: “One must regard the Gospel of John as a Gospel writing that combines history and kerygma, historical reporting and believing interpretation. What is special is the christological view, which concentrates everything into one question: Who is the one speaking here and doing signs?”[43] The distinctive feature of John’s Christology, according to Schnackenburg, is his presentation of Jesus as the pre-existent, incarnate Logos.
In a final chapter Schnackenburg acknowledges that the four Gospels present Jesus in four forms but argues that they are united in their testimony to Christ. “Jesus Christ is the one sent by God who testifies to God’s otherness, his redemptive will, and his unchangeable devotion to humankind; he is the Savior of the world.”[44] Besides this major work, Schnackenburg published a number of books about Jesus written for the non-specialist, written to encourage faith.[45]
Related to his research on Jesus is Schnackenburg’s book on the kingdom of God, a work that employs historical critical work in the service of biblical theology.[46] After a discussion of the OT and Jewish background he gives primary attention to the kingdom of God in the preaching of Jesus. Jesus announced the imminence of the eschatological rule of God but also believed the kingdom was present in his own deeds.
Jesus did claim to be the Messias. This claim was sufficiently concealed to avoid misunderstanding, but it was evident enough for those who could understand. He claimed to be the Messias with a purely religious mission that was revealed in his preaching and salvific actions, and at the core of this was the near approach of the reign of God.x[47]
Jesus also emphasized the future kingdom and expressed his relation to it by the title “Son of Man.”
This “Son of Man” is no other that Jesus himself. For the present, in the form of humiliation and to a certain degree in concealment, he is fulfilling his Messianic tasks on earth. But then he will manifest himself to all the world as possessed of kingly dignity and divine power to establish in God’s name . . . God’s perfect, universal cosmic reign.[48]
In the last part of the book Schnackenburg discusses the understanding of the kingdom in early Christian teaching. Paul, according to Schnackenburg, used “kingdom” to refer exclusively to the future rule of God but viewed Christ as the present ruler over the church.
One and the same body of Christ that died on the cross and rose to the transfigured life is built up in a new manner in the Church by Christ, the head. It is in a real sense the “body of Christ,” the concrete body on earth of Christ, its head in heaven, truly “his” body, belonging to him as the physical body belonged to Jesus on earth and the glorified body of the Risen Christ, indeed “the” body of Christ, which is no second body in addition to the individual body of the transfigured Lord but is “mystically identified” with it.[49]
Schnackenburg published several other works directly concerned with the theology of the NT. A book on the current state of the discipline, originally published in French, affirms both the possibility and legitimacy of NT theology.[50] In this book he reviews the major representatives: the history of religion school, the advocates of salvation history, and the devotees of existentialist theology. He then turns to the main sections of the NT: the kerygma of the early church, the theology of the Gospels, the theology of Paul, and the theology of John. This discussion is carried further in lectures Schnackenburg presented at the University of Notre Dame in 1965.[51] Collections of various essays and lectures on theological themes have also been published.[52] Schnackenburg also wrote monographs on theological topics: on Paul’s understanding of baptism, on the NT concept of the church, and on the meaning of faith in the NT.[53]
In sum, Rudolf Schnackenburg demonstrates the dramatic advance of Roman Catholic NT research. He affirms the use of historical-critical method. He accepts the priority of Mark and adopts the 2DH. In his use of critical method and in his exegetical practice his concern is primarily with the theological understanding of the NT texts. Theological interpretation, according to Schnackenburg, is undergirded by serious reflection on the meaning of revelation and the nature of inspiration. Central to his theological concerns is the life and teaching of Jesus and the understanding of Christology. In this area his conclusions tend to be conservative; for example, he believes that the historical Jesus used the title “Son of Man” as a self-designation.
The work of Rudolf Schnackenburg reflects some particular Roman Catholic concerns. He stresses the importance of tradition for both the period before writing and for the later interpretation of Scripture. He insists that the honoring of tradition does not restrict the use of historical method, but in some areas tensions are evident. In observing the limits of the historical method Schnackenburg detects an inordinate concern with the literal meaning of texts, which misses the deeper meaning (sensus plenior) that God intends. Although this fuller meaning is thought to be visible from the perspective of faith, its relation to the literal meaning will remain a concern for subsequent Catholic exegetes. Schnackenburg has special interest in texts that present the importance of the church—texts like Matt 16:13-20 that affirm the primacy of Peter. He recognizes that interpretation without presuppositions is impossible. Although some of his presuppositions may seem arbitrary, this Catholic exegete does not hide, or pretend not to have, presuppositions—a commendable attitude.
A perceptive reviewer has remarked, “The era ushered in by Divino Afflante Spiritu became the wind beneath the wings of Fr. Raymond Brown.”[54] Brown was born in New York City, but moved with his parents to Florida in 1944.[55] He studied at St. Charles College in Maryland (1945–46), and held several degrees from various colleges and universities including the Catholic University of America (MA 1949), St. Mary’s Seminary in Baltimore (STD 1955), Johns Hopkins (PhD 1958). Brown was ordained to the priesthood in 1953 and became a member of the Society of St. Sulpice in 1955. He taught at St. Charles College and St. Mary’s Seminary before accepting a joint appointment at Woodstock College and Union Theological Seminary in New York. When Woodstock closed in 1974, Brown accepted a fulltime position at Union, where he remained until retirement in 1990.
Brown’s scholarship has been widely recognized. He was the first person to serve as president of all three major scholarly societies: the SBL, the Catholic Biblical Association (CBA), and the SNTS. Brown attended Vatican II as advisor to the archbishop of St. Augustine, Florida. He was appointed twice to the Pontifical Biblical Commission (1972–1978; 1996 to his death). Brown participated in the Catholic-Lutheran Dialogue (1965–73). He was awarded more than thirty honorary degrees. About him, Joseph Fitzmyer wrote, “Brown’s absolute dedication to the study of the written Word of God will never be forgotten.”[56] In spite of this dedication Brown was bitterly attacked by conservative Catholics. After retirement he lived and worked at St. Patrick’s Seminary in Menlo Park, California, until a heart attack claimed his life in 1998. “The singular achievements of this remarkable person are unparalleled by any Catholic biblical scholar in the twentieth century.”[57]
In view of the extent of Brown’s publications (over twenty-five major works and more the fifteen smaller books), attention must be limited to his works that are most important for NT research.[58]
Brown’s dissertation at St. Mary’s was The Sensus Plenior of Sacred Scripture.[59] In this work he investigates a hermeneutic that goes all the way back to the patristic writers: the view that Scripture has more than one, literal, meaning.
The sensus plenior is that additional, deeper meaning, intended by God but not clearly intended by the human author, which is seen to exist in the words of a biblical text (or group of texts, or even a whole book) when they are studied in the light of further revelation or development in the understanding of revelation.”[60]
Brown answers objections, for example, the charge that the sensus plenior goes beyond the meaning of Scripture. He replies that God is the ultimate author of Scripture, including revelation that the human writer does not fully comprehend. However, Brown insists that the fuller sense cannot contradict the literal. He says that “God must have willed that the fuller sense be contained in the literal sense. . . . Thus one is not permitted to indiscriminately use the sensus plenior to hang new doctrine upon.”[61]
Brown’s historical-critical work is exemplified by his An Introduction to the New Testament.[62] In the foreword he says that the book is not written for scholars. However, the casual reader who picks up this eight-hundred-page tome will not find it easy going. Actually Brown seems to assume the use of the book as a text. He supplies summary material in tables and boxes, and at the end of chapters a section on “Issues and Problems for Reflection,” and relevant bibliographies. He begins with a presentation on preliminaries. In discussing the way to read the NT, Brown surveys various methods, notably the historical-critical approach. He also notes special problems raised by varying views of revelation and inspiration. In contrast to those who find revelation in every word of Scripture, Brown sympathizes with those who accept inspiration but “do not think that God’s role as an author removed human limitations.”[63] The reader of Scripture, according to Brown, is not only concerned with what the NT books meant, but also with what they mean. This section on preliminaries also includes a discussion of the text of the NT and a review of its political, social, religious and philosophical backgrounds.
Part Two of Brown’s Introduction deals with the Gospels. In regard to the Synoptic problem, he adopts the 2DH. Brown says that “the existence of Q (without many of the added hypotheses) remains the best way of explaining the agreements between Matt and Luke in material they did not borrow from Mark.”[64] He summarizes the content and message of Mark. Concerning the critical problems, Brown notes the tradition of Papias concerning Mark and Peter in Rome and concludes that “ancient traditions often have elements of truth in a garbled form.”[65] Brown dates Mark in the late 60s or early 70s. Matthew, according to Brown, used Mark and Q as major sources; Matthew’s unique material is from other written and oral tradition. Regarding the author, Brown says that “it is best to accept the common position that canonical Matt was originally written in Greek by a noneyewitness whose name is unknown to us and who depended on sources like Mark and Q.”[66] In regard to Luke, Brown observes that over one-third of the material is peculiar to that Gospel. Brown also includes his discussion of Acts in this section. “Therefore, whatever history Acts preserves,” says Brown, “is put to the service of theology and pastoral preaching.”[67] He concludes that it is not impossible for Acts to have been written by a traveling companion of Paul, and that there is no reason why that person should have been anyone else than Luke. Brown concludes this section with his introduction to the Fourth Gospel, a topic that can be better treated in connection with his extensive research on the Johannine literature.
Part III of Brown’s Introduction turns to the Pauline letters. An introductory section deals with general issues in Paul’s life and thought. For the study of these issues, says Brown, the Pauline letters are the primary source, supplemented by a cautious use of Acts. Brown recounts Paul’s life as persecutor, his conversion, his missionary activity, his imprisonment and trip to Rome. As to theology, Brown detects questions that defy easy answers. Brown, in appreciation of Paul, depicts him in the setting of the grandeur of ancient Ephesus. “Yet here was a Jew with a knapsack on his back who hoped to challenge all that in the name of a crucified criminal before whom, he proclaimed, every knee in heaven, on earth, and under the earth had to bend.”[68]
Brown proceeds to investigate the letters according to the majority understanding of their chronological order. The earliest is 1 Thessalonians, written about 50–51 from Corinth. Galatians, probably written from Ephesus around 54 or 55, counters the claim of Judaizers (probably from Jerusalem) who are requiring the circumcision of Gentile converts in Galatia. Brown favors the North Galatian hypothesis. In regard to Philippians, he believes it to be a unity (not a composite letter) written from an Ephesian imprisonment. Philemon was also written from this imprisonment. Before his move to Ephesus, Paul had worked in Corinth (abut 50/51–52). From Ephesus, according to Brown, Paul wrote “Letter A” to the Corinthians—a letter that has been lost. Later Paul wrote 1 Corinthians (“Letter B”)—a unity that responds to opponents, whom Brown believes to have been people claiming a superior knowledge that led to libertinism. When Paul learned that this letter did not accomplish its purpose he made a quick trip to Corinth and back, the so-called “painful visit.” The visit, according to Brown, made the situation even worse, so that Paul responded with the letter of “many tears” (2 Cor 2:4)— “Letter C”; Brown believes this letter was lost. Paul left Ephesus, finally met Titus in Macedonia, and wrote “Letter D” (2 Corinthians). Brown considers 2 Corinthians to be a unity; the opponents addressed in 2 Cor 10–13, he believes, have recently arrived. Romans was written from Corinth in about 57/58. In this letter Paul, according to Brown, is preparing himself for his upcoming encounter with Jewish Christians in Jerusalem and clarifying his gospel for the Christians at Rome to enlist their support of his mission to the west.
Next Brown presents chapters on the pseudonymous or Deutero-pauline letters. He insists that pseudonymous documents were not fraudulent but were written in the name of an apostle with the sense of the authority of that apostle. As to 2 Thessalonians, Brown is himself unsure about the author, but with the majority he classifies it among the pseudonymous. Brown is also uncertain about the authorship of Colossians, but he believes the argument from theology against authenticity to be weighty. Brown notes that some 80 percent of modern scholars do not accept Ephesians as authentic. “A plausible theory, then, would be that on the basis of the undisputed Pauline letters and especially Col (which had been composed in the school earlier) someone in the Ephesian school of Paul’s disciples produced Eph as an encouraging portrayal of aspects of Pauline thought.”[69] Brown believes that all three of the Pastoral Epistles were written by the same author, who probably was not Paul. Brown says that “about 80 to 90 percent of modern scholars would agree that the Pastorals were written after Paul’s lifetime, and of those the majority would accept the period between 80 and 100 as the most plausible context for the composition.”[70]
The final part of Brown’s Introduction deals with other NT writings. He believes that Hebrews is a written sermon with an epistolary ending. The author was probably “a Jewish Christian with a good Hellenistic education and some knowledge of Greek philosophical categories.”[71] In regard to 1 Peter, Brown notes strong arguments against authenticity, but remains uncertain; if authentic it would have been written from Rome, 60–63, if pseudonymous, 70–90. Brown believes the high quality of the Greek argues against the authenticity of James. The authorship of Jude remains uncertain, but 2 Peter, according to Brown, is clearly pseudonymous. Brown sees Revelation in the context of apocalyptic literature. It was written, he thinks, by an otherwise unknown person named “John”—an individual not to be identified with the Johannine school that produced the Fourth Gospel. Brown dates Revelation during the reign of Domitian.
Brown’s Introduction includes two useful appendices: “The Historical Jesus” and “Jewish and Christian Writings Pertinent to the NT.” All in all, Brown’s book is a monumental accomplishment, carefully investigating virtually every critical issue from a moderate perspective. A special feature of Brown’s Introduction is the attention he gives to the message and theology of the NT documents.
Raymond Brown’s exegetical work is illustrated by his commentaries on the Johannine Literature and his massive studies of the birth and death of the Messiah. In the foreword to his The Community of the Beloved Disciple, Brown recalls his first seminar paper at Johns Hopkins on the Johannine Gospel and Epistles: “Little did I realize then that I was beginning a quarter-century love affair with the most adventuresome body of literature in the New Testament.”[72] Brown’s two-volume commentary on the Fourth Gospel was published in 1966 and 1970. At the time of his death he was working on a revised edition. The introduction was virtually complete and has been published, providing the reader with Brown’s final view.[73]
The new Introduction begins with an overview of Johannine studies. Brown notes the problems surrounding the question of the Gospel’s composition: differences of style, breaks and inconsistencies, material out of place. Brown’s own view about the development of the tradition and composition of the Gospel involves three stages. In the first, a disciple (who became known as the Beloved Disciple) witnessed the ministry of Jesus; he was not one of the Twelve (as Brown had suggested in the first edition of his commentary) but an unnamed disciple. In the second stage, which lasted for some decades, Jesus was proclaimed in the community; the Beloved Disciple played a major role; this was a period of oral tradition, but some writing may have been undertaken toward the end of this stage. The third stage had two aspects: (a) the writing of the bulk of the Gospel by the Evangelist—not the Beloved Disciple, but a member of the community of the Beloved Disciple; (b) the work of the Redactor (not the Evangelist) who added the prologue (1:1-18) and the epilogue (21:1-25).[74]
Brown does not believe John is dependent on the Synoptic Gospels. “John drew on an independent tradition about Jesus, similar to traditions that underlie the Synoptics.”[75] All the evangelists were theologians, but John, according to Brown, was the theologian par excellence. “[A]lthough I think that the Fourth Gospel reflects historical memories of Jesus, the greater extent of the theological reshaping of those memories makes Johannine material harder to use in the quest for the historical Jesus than most Synoptic material.”[76] Brown investigates influences on the religious thought of the Fourth Gospel. He rejects the notion that Gnosticism played a significant role. The Hellenistic influence on the Fourth Gospel, according to Brown, is largely by way of Hellenistic Judaism. John was also influenced by traditional Judaism, seen, for example, in the use of OT themes. Brown acknowledges that the Fourth Gospel engages in apologetics, especially against the “Jews” who refused to believe in Jesus. John’s polemic against the “Jews” has its meaning in the context of readers of the Gospel who had been expelled from the synagogue. “Regarding the Bible as sacred does not mean that everything described therein is laudable.”[77] Brown also believes that the Fourth Gospel included apologetics against Christians of inadequate faith. The main purpose of the Gospel, however, was to encourage believing Christians. “Thus John’s primary purpose of deepening the faith of believers has a secondary goal of thereby bringing others to make an act of faith.”[78]
Regarding the author, date, and place, Brown argues that the Evangelist, the principal writer, was a member of the Johannine community. The Redactor, another member of the community, added material and produced the final edition. As to the place of composition, Brown writes: “. . . in my judgment the Ephesus region fits the internal evidence of John best of all the proposals, and is the only site that has ancient attestation.”[79] He thinks the probable date of composition and redaction was 90–110.
Theological issues Brown discusses include ecclesiology, sacramentalism, and eschatology. In regard to the last, he thinks John presents both a realized and a future eschatology. Brown gives attention to Christology, but he insists that “Johannine Christology never replaces theology.”[80] According to Brown, the Wisdom motifs from the OT and Jewish literature provide the background for understanding John’s Christology. He writes that “the Wisdom Literature offers better parallels for the Johannine picture of Jesus than do the later Gnostic, Mandaean, or Hermetic passages sometimes suggested.”[81] John, according to Brown, stresses the historical, incarnate Wisdom.
The massive shape of Brown’s commentary on the Fourth Gospel means that only a few samples of his exegetical work can be presented. The format is that of the Anchor Bible: first an English translation is printed, and this is followed by notes (attending to words and phrases, verse by verse), general comments and detailed comments.
Brown titles the prologue (1:18) “The Introductory Hymn.” A few examples of his notes are illustrative. In v. 1 he discusses the phrase was God. He objects to the use of “divine” and affirms the translation, “the Word was God.” In v. 11 Brown offers a note on To his own. Since the neuter is used, Brown takes the phrase to mean “to his own home,” that is, the promised land or Jerusalem. The phrase his own people (in the same verse) is masculine and means the people of Israel. In v. 14 the Greek term translated only Son means “of a single kind”; Brown says there is little justification for the translation “only begotten.” In his general comment, Brown discusses the relation of the Prologue to the rest of the Gospel. He believes it was an independent poem, composed in Johannine circles and added to the Gospel. In the detailed comments he discusses the content of the hymn as ordered into four strophes. The first discusses the Word with God and stresses what the Word does. The second presents the role of the Word in creation. The third describes the Word in the world; Brown believes these verses (10-12) already assume the action of the Incarnate One. The fourth strophe presents the community’s share in the Word become flesh. In becoming flesh, says Brown, the Word has not ceased to be God.
Following the Prologue, the next main section of the Fourth Gospel is “The Book of Signs.” Brown’s exegesis of this section begins with “The First Sign in Cana of Galilee—Changing the Water to Wine” (2:1-11). His notes consider, among others, the following terms and phrases. In v. 14, woman is an expression Brown believes does not express rebuke or lack of affection, although it is a peculiar usage for a son addressing his mother. He thinks the six stone water jars (v. 6) represent the levitical laws of ritual impurity. In his comments (there is no distinction here between general and detailed), Brown observes that of the seven signs in the Fourth Gospel only this one has no parallel in the Synoptics. The background of the story, he insists, is not to be found in the Dionysus festival but in the miraculous gifts of oil by Elijah and Elisha (1 Kgs 17:8-16; 2 Kgs 4:1-7). Brown believes that beneath the sign there is a basic narrative that reflects the customs of the time: the wine supply was dependent on the gifts of the guests; the mother’s suggestion may imply that Jesus and his poor disciples have not provided the gift. Brown reflects on theological motifs hidden in the account. For example, the wedding reflects the symbolism of the messianic days, apparent in the word of the headwaiter (NRSV: “steward”): “Everyone serves the good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the guests have become drunk. But you have kept the good wine until now” (John 2:10).
The last and greatest sign is presented in 11:1-44, “Jesus Gives Men Life—the Story of Lazarus.” In the notes Brown discusses the phrase fallen asleep (v. 12). Although this expression is widely used in Hebrew and Greek as a euphemism for death, the disciples misunderstand and take the remark literally. The reference to four days in v. 17 indicates, according to Brown, that Lazarus was truly dead; the rabbis held the opinion that after death the soul hovered around the corpse for three days. The phrase in v. 33, shuddered, moved with the deepest emotions (NRSV: “he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved”) has been a persistent problem for exegetes. The word Brown translates “shuddered” usually means to express anger, but it is not clear where Jesus’ anger was directed. In his general comments Brown rejects the view that this narrative is a fictional composition. “From the contents of the Johannine account, then, there is no conclusive reason for assuming that the skeleton of the story does not stem from early tradition about Jesus.”[82] The distinctive feature of the Johannine account, according to Brown, is the view that the raising of Lazarus was the cause of the death of Jesus (11:45-53). In the detailed comments Brown investigates various sections of the narrative. Verses 17-27 present Martha greeting Jesus. She makes exalted statements about Jesus as Lord, but she does not really understand. She displays knowledge of the Jewish doctrine of the resurrection, but Johannine eschatology stresses the conquest of death by the present reality of Christ. In discussing Mary’s meeting with Jesus (vv. 28-33) Brown suggests that the anger Jesus expresses is directed at Satan, the ruler of the realm of death. The prayer Jesus offers at the tomb (11:41-42) expresses a typical Johannine theme: Jesus does nothing on his own; he does only the will of the Father. Brown makes a final comment on this last sign: “What is crucial is that Jesus has given (physical) life as a sign of his power to give eternal life on this earth (realized eschatology) and as a promise that on the last day he will raise the dead (final eschatology).”[83]
Raymond Brown also wrote an extensive (over 700-page) commentary on the Johannine Epistles.[84] The introduction alone is almost 150 pages. In this section Brown discusses problems of authorship. He believes all three Epistles were written by the same author, who was not the writer of the Fourth Gospel. As to the order of writing, Brown thinks the Epistles were written in the canonical order (1, 2, and 3 John) and all three were written later than the Gospel of John. He offers a theory of the composition of this literature, more fully explained in his The Community of the Beloved Disciple, described below. The date of 1 John, Brown thinks, is around 100. The author writes in a community that has house churches within and nearby, probably Ephesus.
The Prologue to 1 John (1:1-4) provides a sample of Brown’s exegesis. In the main he follows the same format and method as in his commentary on the Fourth Gospel. His notes on this section are extensive. For v. 1, from the beginning, he finds several possible backgrounds, for example, the usage in Gen 1:1 or the incarnation as beginning. Brown concludes that a reference to the beginning of the ministry of Jesus is most likely. In his comments he observes that this prologue echoes that of the Gospel of John. Brown says that “the Prologue sets the tone for I John in terms of a polemically exclusive claim, namely, that the proclamation about Jesus made by the author represents the authentic Gospel stemming from a true witness to Jesus, and those who refuse to accept it have communion with neither Father nor Son.”[85] The “we” of the prologue, Brown believes, represents the Johannine school, loyal to the Beloved Disciple.[86]
Related to Brown’s commentaries and important for his understanding of the Johannine literature is his book, The Community of the Beloved Disciple,[87] in which he traces the phases of development of the Johannine community. The first includes the time before the writing of the Fourth Gospel. In this phase the original group, made up of Jews who had accepted Jesus as the Messiah, was formed under the leadership of the Beloved Disciple. The group developed a high Christology, but they were joined by a second group that held an even higher Christology. Brown believes this latter group included converts from the Samaritans and had affinity with the Hellenists of Acts 6. Phase Two is the time of the writing of the Gospel. Brown believes it possible to identify seven groups in this period: (1) the nonbelievers (these include those designated as “the world”); (2) the “Jews”; (3) adherents of John the Baptist; (4) crypto-Christians (Christian Jews remaining in the synagogue); (5) Jewish Christians of inadequate faith; (6) Christians of the apostolic faith (like Peter, loyal to Jesus but different from the Johannine group, followers of the Beloved Disciple); (7) the Johannine Community (the group of the Beloved Disciple and the Presbyter of the Johannine letters). Phase three is the time when the Epistles were written—the period of Johannine internal struggles. Brown believes all three letters were written (ca. 100) by the Elder, who had become the leader of the Johannine School. In this period, according to Brown, a schism occurred. A group of secessionists went out of the Johannine community. Brown says that “the secessionists believed that the human existence of Jesus, while real, was not salvifically significant.”[88] They also believed, according to Brown, that ethical behavior was not important for salvation and that realized eschatology supported their claim to a special position. Phase Four is the time of Johannine dissolution: the Johannine group merged into what Brown calls the “Great Church”; the secessionists merged into Gnosticism.[89]
Brown’s monumental exegetical achievement is seen in his two massive works on the birth and death of the messiah. In the foreword to The Birth of the Messiah he states his purpose: “I am primarily interested in the role these infancy narratives had in the early Christian understanding of Jesus. . . . It is the central contention of this volume that the infancy narratives are worthy vehicles of the Gospel message; indeed, each is the essential Gospel story in miniature.”[90]
Brown expresses his sensitivity in interpreting the tradition about Mary. “As a Roman Catholic myself,” he says, “I share their faith and their devotion; but it is my firm contention that one should not attempt to read Marian sensibilities and issues back into the New Testament. . . . I see no reason why a Catholic’s understanding of what Matthew and Luke meant in their infancy narratives should be different from a Protestant’s.”[91]
In his introduction, Brown observes that the infancy narratives are concerned to answer a christological question: How is Jesus understood as Son of God in relation to his birth? Brown notes that the accounts in Matthew and Luke agree at several points, but there are major differences. He concludes that “it is unlikely that either account is completely historical.”[92] Brown begins with an investigation of the Matthean Infancy Narrative. He supports “the thesis that Matthew composed the infancy narrative as an integral part of his Gospel plan.”[93] In presenting his exegesis Brown follows the format of his other commentaries: Translation, Notes, Comment.
In regard to the genealogy (1:1-17), Brown’s note on Matt 1:5 deals with the phrase Salmon was the father of Boaz by Rahab; Brown points out that Rahab lived at the time of the conquest, two centuries before Boaz. Regarding 1:16, Jacob was the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary; of her was begotten Jesus, called the Christ, Brown reviews textual variants including the reading of the Sinaitic Syriac: Jacob was the father of Joseph, and Joseph, to whom the virgin Mary was betrothed, was the father of Jesus, called Christ. In his commentary Brown says that Matthew’s purpose was to present Jesus as Son of David, son of Abraham. Brown wonders why four women were included in the genealogy: Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, and (Bathsheba) the wife of Uriah. He believes their inclusion has two features: there is something unusual about their relation to their partners, and they play an important role in God’s plan. Brown compares Matthew’s genealogy with that of Luke. He notes that in the sections where the two overlap, Luke has fifty-six names whereas Matthew has only forty-one. Both genealogies cannot be historically correct. Brown says that “Matthew’s intention [is] to show that Jesus is the Davidic Messiah, and Luke’s intention [is] to show that Jesus is the Son of God.”[94] “There is not the slightest indication in the accounts of the ministry of Jesus,” writes Brown, “that his family was of ancestral nobility or royalty.”[95]
The most important section of Matthew’s birth narrative is 1:18-25 on “The Conception of Jesus.” Brown’s note on v. 18 deals with betrothed. He points out that betrothal involved two stages: the exchange of consent before witnesses; the taking of the bride to the groom’s family home. In the narrative in Matthew, Mary and Joseph are between the two stages. In his comment Brown says that Matthew is concerned with who Jesus is: he is son of David, but more important, he is conceived as Son of God. Brown insists that the begetting of Jesus was not sexual but represents the agency of God’s creative power. In regard to the quotation of Isa 7:14 in v. 23, the use of the term alma (“young woman”) in the Hebrew text does not predict the virgin birth of a future messiah but a child from David’s line, to be born in Isaiah’s time. The LXX, which uses the term parthenos (“virgin”), refers to a woman who is now a virgin but will in the future conceive. Nothing in the Hebrew or Greek, says Brown, is concerned with the manner of conception. Brown points out that virginal conception is found in both Matthew and Luke; he believes it belongs to the pre-Gospel tradition.
Other features of Brown’s exegesis of the Matthean birth narrative can be viewed in summary. He believes the magi from the east symbolize Gentiles who receive the message the Jewish leaders reject. Matthew’s account is supported by Scripture: the importance of Bethlehem is reflected in Mic 5:2, the trip to Egypt fulfills Hos 11:1, and the slaughter of infants recalls Pharaoh’s execution of male infants. Brown points out that a flight to Egypt is not mentioned in the accounts of the ministry of Jesus and that it contradicts Luke’s narrative of Mary and Joseph’s return to Nazareth. He concludes:
The dramatis personae may be exotically costumed as Eastern potentates and as a Jewish king and priests, and for that reason they are not easily forgotten. But beneath the robes one can recognize the believers of Matthew’s time and their opponents. And, indeed, a perceptive reader may even recognize some of the drama of the Christian proclamation and its fate in all times.[96]
Turning to the Lukan Infancy Narrative, Brown deals with a longer text. Material about the annunciation and birth of John the Baptist will not be not reviewed here. The most important section of Luke’s account considers “The Annunciation and Birth of Jesus” (1:26-38). In his comment on this section Brown devotes over ten pages to “virginal conception.”[97] He argues against the theory that the virginal conception was added to an earlier account. He discusses the logic of Mary’s question, “How can this be?” (1:34). Brown believes the question makes good sense, since the following verse answers it: it explains how the child was to be conceived. Luke’s meaning, according to Brown, is that Jesus is Son of God by means of his virginal conception. Brown argues that conception by the Holy Spirit is not sexual but a reflection of creation, which was accompanied by the overshadowing of the Spirit (Gen 1:2).
Other features of Luke’s account can be reviewed in summary fashion. In regard to the canticles that decorate Luke’s narrative, Brown believes they were pre-Christian, composed by the Jewish Christian anawim (the “Poor Ones”) and inserted into Luke’s narrative. The account of the birth and naming of Jesus (2:1-21) includes the census, which Brown regards as unhistorical; there was no worldwide census under Augustus, and the census under Quirinius took place ten years after the death of Herod. The annunciation to the shepherds in the region of Bethlehem, Brown believes, is reminiscent of the city of David, the shepherd king. Brown points out that the announcement of the angel of the Lord presents the child in kerygmatic terms: Savior, Messiah, Lord. Regarding the account of the boy Jesus in the temple (2:41-52), Brown’s note on v. 50, they did not understand, reviews various attempts to explain why the parents, who had witnessed miracles, did not understand. Brown solves the problem by taking the text literally: Mary and Joseph did not understand what Jesus meant when he said: “Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” The question, according to Brown, goes beyond the temple to an emphasis on Jesus’ vocation. Mary, though she did not fully understand, “treasured all these things in her heart.”
Brown’s Birth of the Messiah contains nine appendices. Two examples can illustrate these additions. In regard to the “Birth at Bethlehem,” Brown asks if it is historical. Although both Matthew and Luke agree, Brown notes problems. There is no mention of Bethlehem in the later account of the life of Jesus in the Gospels, and there is considerable evidence that Nazareth was his home town. Brown’s appendix on the “Virginal Conception” updates the research of his earlier book, The Virginal Conception and Bodily Resurrection of Jesus.[98] In the earlier book he expressed considerable skepticism. “In short, the presence of the virginal conception in the infancy narratives of two Gospels carries no absolute guarantee of historicity.”[99] Also in the earlier book Brown rejects the belief that the sinlessness of divine sonship depends on supernatural conception. Brown says that “it is difficult to argue that in order to be free from original sin Jesus had to be conceived of a virgin.”[100] In the appendix to the Birth of the Messiah, Brown has moved to the right. He does acknowledge that the main concern of Matthew and Luke was not history but theology. However, Brown does not believe that the silence of the rest of the NT or the view that the virginal conception compromises the humanity of Jesus are major impediments to the doctrine. He concludes: “I think that it is easier to explain the NT evidence by positing historical basis than by positing pure theological creation.”[101] The virginal conception is “an extraordinary action of God’s creative power.”[102]
Brown’s Death of the Messiah is even more formidable—interpreting texts from all four Gospels, presented in two hefty volumes with a total of 1,313 pages.[103] “In sum,” says Brown, “from every point of view the passion is the central narrative in the Christian story.”[104] He also says in the preface that the research and writing took ten years and that “the time consumed has been the most enriching of my life.”[105] In his introduction Brown points out that his purpose is “to explain in detail what the evangelists intended and conveyed to their audiences by their narratives of the passion and death of Jesus.”[106] The introduction also discusses the role of history, noting that the evangelists were not eyewitnesses but heirs of a tradition. In regard to the role of theology, Brown observes that each evangelist had his own perspective.
In this commentary Brown presents the material as a drama. He treats the material from all four Gospels in parallel, prefacing each major section with a bibliography. In the format of the exegetical sections Brown first presents his own translation (intentionally literal), followed by comments (discussion of what the evangelists intended to say), and analysis (questions of historicity, composition, sources; some sections do not include the analysis). The sort of material included in the notes of Brown’s earlier commentaries is found in the abundant footnotes.
In Act I, “Jesus Prays and Is Arrested in Gethsemane,” Scene One is entitled “Jesus Goes to the Site and Prays There.” The “Prayer in Gethsemane” (Part Two) is presented in Mark 14:35-36; Matt 26:39; Luke 22:41-42. On the use of abba (only in Mark), Brown agrees with scholars who find no evidence for the use of this term as address to God in pre-Christian or first-century Judaism. He points out that Jesus did not say “Abba, ho Pater,” that is, he did not address God as Father in two languages. Since the exact phrase is used in Gal 4:6 and Rom 8:15, Brown believes the Pauline usage reflects a Hellenistic Christian prayer formula.
Act II presents “Jesus before the Jewish Authorities.” In an introduction to this section Brown deals with the background of the Jewish trial. This introduction includes a discussion of “A Sanhedrin’s Competence to Condemn to Death and Execute.” Brown concludes that Jews had the right in some religious cases, but in others they handed the person over to Rome. In this same introduction Brown includes a discussion of “Responsibility and/or Guilt for the Death of Jesus”—an issue that leads him into a discussion of anti-Judaism in the passion narrative. Mark depicts the Jewish leaders handing Jesus over to Pilate, who yields to the crowd, but Brown detects no emphatic anti-Judaism. Matthew (27:25), on the other hand, presents the Jewish people and their descendants as guilty; Pilate washes his hands. Luke reduces the opposition of the Jews, noting that some of the crowd followed and supported Jesus. Throughout the Gospel of John, the “Jews” are depicted as opposing Jesus, but this reflects a later time when the Johannine community had been expelled from the synagogue. Brown believes the issue should be discussed in terms of “responsibility,” not “guilt.” He also points out that it was a violent time. Those who opposed Jesus supposed they were doing God’s will; the dispute was Jews against Jews, not Jews against a Christian Jesus.
Scene One of Act II includes two sections on the proceedings of the Sanhedrin. The second considers “Questions about the Messiah, the Son of God” (Mark 14:60-61; Matt 26:62-63; Luke 22:67-70a). In Brown’s comments he indicates that the main issue of the texts is the question by the high priest, “Are you the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed One?” Brown believes that Mark’s use of the surrogate, “Son of the Blessed,” indicates the Jewish context of the question. Matthew changes the expression to “Son of God.” In the analysis section Brown states the crucial question as: Was Jesus called Messiah before his resurrection, and if so, by whom? He reviews various theories and concludes that it is likely that Jesus’ opponents believed he or his followers claimed that he was Messiah. Brown also believes it is very likely that during his lifetime some of Jesus’ followers thought or confessed him to be Messiah. Jesus was ambivalent, according to Brown, because he had his own understanding of the Messiah’s role and because he believed the role of the Messiah was in God’s hands. In regard to the title “Son of God,” Brown concludes: “. . . there is reason in the Gospels, read perceptively, to think that unlike ‘the Messiah,’ the title ‘the Son of God’ was not applied to Jesus in his lifetime by his followers or, a fortiori, by himself.”[107]
Act III deals with the most decisive part of the proceedings: “Jesus before Pilate, the Roman Governor.” Part One of the Roman trial is the “Initial Questioning by Pilate” (Mark 15:2-5; Matt 27:11-14; Luke 23:2-5; John 18:28b-38a). As to historicity, Brown’s comment observes that the evangelists are not presenting legal reports or eyewitness accounts but, he believes, they do give accounts that preserve a historical kernel: Pilate sentenced Jesus on the charge of being king of the Jews. Brown thinks that the question, “are you the king of the Jews?” and the answer: “You say so” are the earliest elements of the tradition. Brown notes that Luke adds, “He stirs up the people by teaching throughout all Judea, from Galilee where he began even to this place”—words that provide the reason for sending Jesus to Herod. John’s account expands even more, with episodes that occur inside and out of the Praetorium. John also notes that the Jews did not enter in order to avoid impurity that would have prevented them from observing the Passover, implying, according to Brown, that the Last Supper was not a Passover meal. In his appearance before Pilate, Jesus insists (three times in John 18:36) that his kingdom is not of this world.
In Act IV, Scene One, “Jesus is Crucified and Dies.” Part Three presents “Last Events, Death” (Mark 15:33-37; Matt 27:44-50; Luke 23:44-46; John 19:28-30). Brown’s comment discusses the darkness at the sixth hour. He thinks the evangelists probably understood this literally, although the apocalyptic Day of the Lord is described as a day of darkness. In regard to Jesus’ death cry, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mark 15:34), Brown argues at length for the literal interpretation of the text: Jesus really felt forsaken. Brown also points out that this is the only place in the Gospels where Jesus is described as praying to “God.” Brown believes this quotation from Ps 22:1 represents the oldest tradition of the last words of Jesus—a tradition Brown accepts as historically true.
A select sample of Brown’s other works includes his historical studies. His book, The Churches the Apostles Left Behind, presents witnesses to the apostolic tradition in the post-apostolic period.[108] The “Pauline heritage in the Pastorals,” according to Brown, is concerned with church structure and the pastoral qualities of the officials. Brown believes that the “Pauline heritage in Colossians /Ephesians” responds to doctrinal dangers and promotes a high Christology and ecclesiology. The “Pauline heritage in Luke–Acts,” according to Brown, stresses the work of the Spirit in the life of the community. In the “Petrine heritage in 1 Peter” he notes how the Israelite idea of the people of God is taken up and applied to the church of Gentile Christians. Brown discusses the “Heritage of the Beloved Disciple in the Fourth Gospel,” namely, a community of people personally attached to Jesus. Ecclesiology in this Gospel, according to Brown, is swallowed up in Christology. Concerning the “Heritage of the Beloved Disciple in the Epistles of John,” Brown notes the appearance of schism. The “Heritage of Jewish/Gentile Christianity in Matthew” affirms, Brown believes, a high respect for authority. He concludes: “Taken collectively, however, these emphases constitute a remarkable lesson about early idealism in regard to Christian community life.”[109]
Brown’s An Introduction to New Testament Christology provides an example of his theological research.[110] The book is concerned with the Christology of Jesus and that of the NT. In the introductory section he points out that Christology is concerned with the nature of Jesus and the role he played in the divine plan. Brown discusses various approaches to the problem and advocates a scholarly, moderate conservatism. Regarding Jesus’ Christology, Brown counsel’s caution: the accounts presuppose the resurrection; on the one hand, attitudes should be avoided that reject the supernatural at the outset, and on the other, views that compromise the humanity of Jesus should be rejected. As to the knowledge of Jesus, some texts, Brown believes, show that he shared the limits of human knowledge while others suggest that he possessed extraordinary knowledge, for example, foreknowledge. “In summary,” says Brown, “it is difficult to decide about Jesus’ foreknowledge of his passion, crucifixion, and resurrection. Modern criticism would cast serious doubt on a detailed foreknowledge.”[111] In regard to his proclamation of the kingdom of God, Jesus viewed himself as playing a unique role. “Jesus is the eschatological figure through whom God’s final salvation breaks through, but his relationship to the one whom Israel calls God is so uniquely close that his followers had to find titles different from the designation that had been used for previous actors in God’s plan.”[112] In regard to messiahship Brown concludes: “Finally, I would judge it probable that Jesus never clearly or enthusiastically accepted the title in the sense in which both followers and opponents proposed it for him.”[113] Jesus, according to Brown, did refer to God as Father and himself as Son, implying a unique relationship.
Brown turns to the christologies of the NT writers. He finds christologies expressed in terms of the resurrection and second coming: Jesus will return as Son of Man, risen and exalted. Other early Christians express christologies in terms of Jesus’ public ministry. In these Brown detects a tension between the exalted messiah and the lowly servant. Finally, Brown investigates christologies that focus on the pre-ministry, for example, “conception Christology” and “pre-existence Christology.” Brown concludes that the Christology expressed in the Nicene Creed is faithful to the direction of the christologies of the NT. “How impoverished would be our understanding of the revelation in Christ had the earlier ways of speaking about the identity of Jesus been erased in favor of the Nicene formulation!”[114]
In sum, Raymond E. Brown was a NT scholar of exceptional ability. In the quantity and quality of his work he was certainly one of the best of the second half of the twentieth century. Brown was master of all the skills of the discipline: linguistic, grammatical, historical—all in the service of theological understanding. He was the master of a huge quantity of secondary sources, and his own writing is marked by clarity and grace. Brown was not a great innovator; he was heir and conveyor of the critical tradition. In the history of NT research, few have done it better.
Some scholars are noted for producing one particular book. This is true of John Meier. But what a book!—a work of four giant volumes crammed with meticulous detail, carefully argued, loaded with hundreds of pages of notes. John Meier’s A Marginal Jew is one of the most important books on the historical Jesus in the history of NT research.
Meier was educated at St. Joseph’s Seminary, Dunwoodie, Yonkers, New York (BA 1964), the Gregorian University in Rome (STL 1968), and the Biblical Institute in Rome (Doctorate in Sacred Scripture, 1976); the last two degrees were awarded summa cum laude. Meier has held professorships at St. Joseph’s Seminary and The Catholic University of America, and is currently Professor of New Testament in the Department of Theology at the University of Notre Dame. He has lectured widely across the country.
Early in his career Meier made an important contribution to research on Matthew that provided a foundation of his monumental work on the historical Jesus. Meier’s Law and History in Matthew’s Gospel is essentially his doctoral dissertation, written in Rome, 1974–75. “The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the meaning of the programmatic statement on the Law in Mt 5:17-20 in the light of the antitheses that follow (5:21-48) and in the larger context of Mt’s theology of salvation-history, eschatology and Christology.”[115] Meier adopts the 2DH and believes the Gospel of Matthew was written in Greek, toward the end of the first century, possibly in Antioch. In contrast to most scholars who view the author of Matthew as Jewish Christian, Meier writes: “We are inclined to think that it is more probable that the final redactor of Mt was a Gentile Christian.”[116] Meier gives attention to the relation of Matthew’s community, a church in transition, to the church’s Jewish tradition. “Here, then, more than anywhere else, we can appreciate Mt’s theology of salvation-history as a hermeneutical key, the key he uses to preserve yet reinterpret strict Jewish-Christian tradition for his changing community.”[117]
Meier believes the staring point for investigating Matthew’s history of salvation is to be found, on the one hand, in texts like 10:5-6 that command the disciples to “go nowhere among the Gentiles” and, on the other, in Matt 28:16-20, which commands the disciples to “go . . . and make disciples of all nations.” Meier writes: “The great turning point in the schema is the death-resurrection seen as apocalyptic event, the definitive breaking in of the new aeon.”[118] Meier proceeds to an analysis of tradition and redaction in Matt 5:17-20. He presents a careful study of each verse and comes to the conclusion that “Mt has done a masterful job of welding together disparate Jewish-Christian material to create a unit that speaks his own mind, makes a rich and profound statement on the Law, addresses the pastoral needs of his church, and introduces the all-important antitheses.”[119] Meier takes up the question whether the antitheses (5:31-48) nullify the interpretation he has given to the preceding section and concludes:
Jesus stated in 5:17-20 that he had an eschatological mission with regard to the Law and the prophets. Despite what is to follow in the antitheses, Jesus warns his disciples not to imagine that his mission involves total destruction of Law and prophets. Rather, his mission is a positive one: to give both Law and prophets their prophetic eschatological fulfillment, a “fulfillment” that “spills over” the top of the old vessel, a completion that transcends the letter (Mt 5:17).[120]
Related to his work on Matthew, Meier later coauthored with Raymond Brown a book on Antioch and Rome.[121] Meier wrote the section on Antioch. He describes the history of the Antioch church in three periods. The first generation (40–70) is depicted in Galatians 2 and Acts 11–15. In this period the members of the church took a new name, “Christian.” The period also saw disputes among Peter, Paul, and James. The main source for the second generation (70–100) is the Gospel of Matthew, which Meier believes was written in Antioch, about 80 to 90. In this period the church was facing struggles within and opposition from outside. Matthew solved the problem, as Meier had argued in his dissertation, by a theology of salvation history—a theology of the past, present, and future triumph. The third generation was after 100. In that period Ignatius supported a rigid hierarchy, while the Didache promoted a more primitive structure. Meier believes the leadership in the early second century struggled to reach a middle position. He concludes that the church at Antioch made an important contribution to the ongoing life of the Christian community.
The first volume of Meier’s A Marginal Jew has the subtitle The Roots of the Problem and the Person.[122] In the introduction Meier makes clear what he means by the “historical Jesus”: “a scientific construct, a theoretical abstraction that does not and cannot coincide with the full reality of Jesus of Nazareth as he actually lived and worked in Palestine during the 1st century of our era.”[123] This sort of study demands rigorous objectivity. “In what follows I will try my best to bracket what I hold by faith and examine only what can be shown to be certain or probable by historical research and logical argumentation.”[124] As to the title, AMarginal Jew, Meier points out that Jesus was on the margin in many ways: his teaching came into conflict with the main religious teachings of the day and he was executed as a criminal.
Volume One, as the subtitle suggests, is divided into two parts: “The Roots of the Problem,” and “The Roots of the Person.” In the first part Meier attends to the problems of sources and method. The main source is the four Gospels of the NT. In studying this material Meier identifies three main sources: Mark, Q, and John (which, according to Meier, contains, historical tradition). Turning to the sources outside the NT, Meier notes the paucity of material. “This simply reminds us that Jesus was a marginal Jew leading a marginal movement in a marginal province of a vast Roman Empire.”[125] Meier makes a meticulous analysis of the data in Josephus and concludes that the longer reference to Jesus in Jewish War is a Christian interpolation and a shorter one in Jewish Antiquities is probably authentic. Meier also reviews pagan writers, including Tacitus and Suetonius, and investigates the agrapha, which, he believes, contribute almost nothing to the picture of Jesus. Meier is equally skeptical of the apocryphal gospels and documents like the so-called “Secret Gospel of Mark.” Concerning the Nag Hammadi texts (NHC), Meier believes they represent second-century compositions that are dependent on the Synoptic Gospels. “Since I think that the Synoptic-like sayings of the Gospel of Thomas are in fact dependent on the Synoptic Gospels and that the other sayings stem from 2nd-century Christian gnosticism, the Gospel of Thomas will not be used in our quest as an independent source for the historical Jesus.”[126] Meier concludes that the search for the historical Jesus is almost wholly dependent on the canonical Gospels, with a few references in the later NT and a small amount of material from Josephus.
Meier believes that the crucial aspect of method in the search for the historical Jesus is the delineation of the criteria of authenticity. He identifies five primary criteria: (1) the criterion of embarrassment (or contradiction), that is, material that was embarrassing or that created difficulty for the church: for instance, the baptism of Jesus by John; (2) the criterion of discontinuity (or dissimilarity), that is, words or deeds of Jesus that cannot be derived either from Judaism or the early church: for example, Jesus’ teaching about divorce;[127] (3) the criterion of multiple attestation, that is, material that is found in more than one independent source (Mark, Q, M, or L) or in more than one literary genre (e.g., parable, aphorism, miracle story): for instance, the words of Jesus over the bread and wine at the Last Supper; (4) the criterion of coherence (or consistency or conformity), that is, material that correlates with the database achieved by applying the previous criteria; (5) the criterion of rejection and execution, that is, information about Jesus that is consistent with the historical fact that he met a violent death at the hands of Jewish and Roman officials.
In view of the complexity involved in the quest for the historical Jesus, Meier asks: why bother? He offers four reasons. The quest shows that Christ cannot be reduced to a cipher or symbol; he was a particular person. It also opposes docetism and affirms the humanity of Jesus. The quest also shows the error of domesticating Jesus. Finally, it indicates that Jesus cannot be coopted to serve our programs.
Part Two of the first volume of A Marginal Jew probes the “Roots of the Person.” Meier investigates the beginnings. The name Jesus is a shortened form of Joshua, which means “YHWH helps,” or “May YHWH help.” In regard to the birth and lineage of Jesus, Meier notes that the information is found only in two places in the NT and that the accounts are not entirely consistent and are shaped by theological concerns. “A major theological point made by the Infancy Narratives thus becomes clear; what Jesus Christ was fully revealed to be at the resurrection (Son of David, Son of God by the power of the Holy Spirit) he really was from his conception onward.”[128] Concerning the place of Jesus’ birth, Meier concedes that Matthew and Luke agree on Bethlehem; however, he concludes that this is not a historical fact but a theological affirmation. The virginal conception is mentioned only in Matt 1:18-25 and Luke 1:26-38. Like Brown, Meier contends that virginal conception does not suggest sexual union but the action of the Holy Spirit. As to historicity, Meier says: “Taken by itself, historical-critical research simply does not have the sources and tools available to reach a final decision on the historicity of the virginal conception as narrated by Matthew and Luke.”[129] He concludes that during the reign of Herod the Great, around 7–4 BCE, a Jew named Jesus was born, most likely in Nazareth, who during his lifetime was recognized as descendent of David.
Meier turns to an investigation of the interim between the birth of Jesus and the beginning of his public ministry, a period of thirty-two years that are virtually unknown and unknowable. Meier believes Jesus’ main language was Aramaic, and that he probably had some knowledge of Hebrew. On the basis of the accounts of Jesus’ debates with Scribes and Pharisees, Meier surmises that Jesus could read and interpret Scripture. Jesus, according to Meier, was a woodworker, and as such was situated at the lower end of the middle class. In regard to the immediate family of Jesus, Meier thinks that Joseph probably died before the beginning of Jesus’ ministry. Mary, whom Meier estimates to have been about fourteen when Jesus was born, bore at least six other children and lived into the early days of the church.[130] There is no evidence that Jesus was married, and some Jewish leaders, like the prophets, chose celibacy. Meier believes the text “there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven” (Matt 19:12) has its setting in the celibate life of Jesus. After carefully analyzing all the data concerning chronology, Meier concludes that Jesus was born about 7 or 6 BCE; he was baptized and began his ministry in 28 (at about the age 33 or 34); he carried out his ministry, which lasted two years and a few months, in Galilee and Jerusalem; he celebrated a farewell meal (not a Passover) with his disciples on Thursday, April 6, and was crucified on Friday, April 7, when he was about 36 years old.
Meier, who cannot resist the lure of alliteration, subtitles his second volume Mentor, Message, and Miracles.[131] Part I of this volume deals with John the Baptist whom Meier labels (inappropriately) “Mentor.” First Meier discusses “John without Jesus: The Baptist in His Own Rite.” The historical existence of the Baptist is confirmed by Josephus, but the infancy stories about John are even more problematic than those about Jesus. Meier believes a few features may be gleaned from the account in Luke: John was the son of a priest who later rejected his filial duty to become an anti-establishment prophet. Meier investigates a first block of material from Q (Matt 3:7-12; Luke 3:7-9, 15-18). In the first part of this material John is presented as “an eschatological prophet tinged with some apocalyptic motifs.”[132] In the second he is described as expecting the “stronger one” yet to come. Mark 1:1-8 depicts John in the wilderness proclaiming baptism as a sign of repentance. Meier believes this rite should be understood in relation to the eschatological drama. According to him, “Jesus’ being baptized by John is one of the most historically certain events ascertainable by any reconstruction of the historical Jesus.”[133] Meier believes this to have been a decisive turning point in the career of Jesus—his decision to dedicate his life to mission. Jesus accepted John’s eschatological message and remained, for a time, in John’s circle. Meier calls John and Jesus the “eschatological ‘odd couple.’ ”[134]
Meier then turns to Jesus’ view of John. Here a second block of material from Q contains three units. According to the first (Matt 11:2-6//Luke 7:19-23), John sends his disciples to Jesus to ask if he is the one to come. Jesus does not answer, but calls attention to events that, according to Meier, reveal that the day of the Lord has started to come. In the second unit (Matt 11:7-11//Luke 7:24-28) Jesus depicts John as prophet and more. The third (Matt 11:16-19//Luke 7:31-35) includes the parable of the children playing in the marketplace. According to Meier the parable depicts John and Jesus: John demands repentance and judgment; Jesus presents the joyous life of the kingdom.
In his conclusion of this first part of volume 2, Meier affirms the significance of John’s eschatology for Jesus and the importance of John for understanding Jesus. He says that “almost every topic that remains to be treated in this work on the historical Jesus is somehow touched on in Jesus’ sayings about the Baptist.”[135] At this point Meier adds an excursus on Q. He accepts the existence of Q but rejects complex theories. Meier believes all Gospel exegetes should begin each morning by reciting a mantra: “Q is a hypothetical document whose exact extension, wording, originating community, strata, and stages of redaction cannot be known.”[136]
Part II of Volume 2 is entitled “Message.” Here Meier investigates the meaning of the “kingdom of God.” In the introduction he observes that the authenticity of the kingdom sayings is confirmed by the criterion of dissimilarity: the phrase “kingdom of God” is rarely used in Judaism and in the NT outside of the Gospels. Meier points out that “kingdom” here means “rule” or “reign”; it does not refer to territory, and eschatology is an important component. In the OT the phrase is rarely used, but God’s kingship of Israel is frequently mentioned. The prophets envisaged the restoration of the kingdom, and Daniel depicted the future coming of the kingdom of God. Meier says that “by the time of Jesus, the symbol of God’s kingship/kingdom has acquired many facets and dimensions. Eternal, present, and future expressions of God’s rule can sit side by side within the same work.”[137] Meier proceeds to investigate uses in the OT pseudepigrapha and in the Dead Sea Scrolls. He concludes that reference to the kingdom is absent from some, mentioned in some, and given significant attention in some, but it is not a dominating theme.
Following on from this, Meier discusses Jesus’ understanding of the kingdom. Basically, he believes it means “God coming in power to rule.” Meier contends that the idea of the kingdom is central to the proclamation of Jesus, but not to contemporary Jewish writings. He reviews sayings of Jesus that refer to the future coming of the kingdom. These include the word from the Lord’s Prayer, “Your kingdom come” (Matt 6:10//Luke 11:2). This petition, according to Meier, refers to the eschatological coming of God as king. “In short, when Jesus prays that God’s kingdom come, he is simply expressing in a more abstract phrase the eschatological hope of the latter part of the OT and the pseudepigrapha that God would come on the last day to save and restore his people Israel.”[138] Meier believes Jesus’ saying at the Last Supper about drinking wine in the kingdom of God (Mark 14:25) is authentic and refers to his death and the future coming of the kingdom. According to Meier, Jesus did not give a deadline for the time of the coming; Meier believes the texts (Matt 10:23; Mark 9:1; 13:30) that give a time limit are a creation of the church. In sum, Meier contends that Jesus proclaimed an eschatological coming of the rule of God in the imminent future but did not give a timetable. “Any reconstruction of the historical Jesus that does not do full justice to this eschatological future must be dismissed as hopelessly inadequate.”[139]
Meier turns to sayings of Jesus that indicate that the kingdom is already present. He attends to the three main sayings: first, Luke 11:20 (Matt 12:28), “but if it is by the finger of God that I cast out the demons, then the kingdom of God has come to you.” Meier believes Luke has the more original form of this Q saying and that the verb means “has come” or “has arrived.” “Jesus does present his exorcisms as proof that the kingdom of God that he proclaims for the future is in some sense already present.”[140] The second major text is Luke 17:20-21: “the kingdom of God is in the midst of you.” The third is Mark 1:15, “the kingdom of God has come near.” Meier believes this is an authentic saying but does not think it can be used to support realized eschatology.
Besides these three main texts, Meier also reviews sayings about the presence of salvation, for example, the beatitude that expresses blessings on those who now see what the prophets had longed to see (Matt 13:16-17//Luke 10:23-24), a Q saying Meier accepts as authentic. In conclusion, Meier thinks Jesus believed that the kingdom was in some sense present, seen especially in the actions of Jesus, particularly his exorcisms. “The most significant sayings of Jesus about the kingdom’s presence contain references to significant actions of Jesus that communicate or symbolize this presence.”[141]
The understanding of the kingdom in relation to the actions of Jesus leads Meier into the third main part of volume 2: “Miracles.” At the outset he discusses the question of miracles and the modern mind. A miracle, by Meier’s definition, is an unusual event that has no reasonable explanation or cause; it is the result of an act of God. “Hence it is my contention that a positive judgment that a miracle has taken place is always a philosophical or theological judgment. Of its nature it goes beyond any judgment that a historian operating precisely as a historian can make.”[142] Consequently, he concludes that the questions of the historical interpreter must be kept modest. For example: are the reports about the miracles inventions of the church, or do they go back to the time of Jesus? Did Jesus perform startling actions that his contemporaries and followers believed to be miracles? What did the supposed miracles mean to Jesus, his disciples, and other observers in the context of his ministry?
Meier turns to miracles and ancient minds. When one looks at the world of Jesus one sees that miracles were a feature of the landscape. Nevertheless, Meier argues that many of the alleged parallels to the miracles of Jesus are different and late. Some observers, for example, have confused miracles with magic. The Gospel miracles involve a personal relationship, make use of intelligible words, and show a relation to the kingdom. In magic, the action involves a manipulation of supernatural forces, makes use of ritual recipes, and is related to no larger purpose. Jesus’ actions are never described in the NT in terms of magic, and the charge that Jesus was a magician is not made until the time of Justin. Meier presents a lengthy excursus on “Parallels to the Gospel Miracles.”[143] The excursus investigates alleged parallels with such ancient figures as Apollonius of Tyana, Ḥoni the Circle-Drawer, and Ḥanina ben Dosa. Meier also discusses miracles attributed to humans in the Dead Sea Scrolls and in Josephus, and miracles attributed to Vespasian. He reviews problems related to the terminology of the “Divine Man” (theos anēr) and “aretology.” In none of these examples does he find genuine parallels to the miracles of Jesus.
Meier takes up the global question of the historicity of Jesus’ miracles. He deals with the basic question: Did Jesus perform acts that were considered miracles by himself or by his audience? Meier answers in terms of the major criteria. Most important is the criterion of multiple attestation; all the sources—Mark, Q, M, L, John, and Josephus—witness to the miracles. Miracles are also confirmed by the criterion of coherence: miracle accounts cut across the sources and form critical categories to create a consistent whole. The criterion of discontinuity comes into play when one views the total pattern of the behavior of Jesus. “Still more to the point: the overall configuration, pattern, or Gestalt of Jesus as popular preacher and teller of parables, plus authoritative interpreter of the Law and teacher of morality, plus proclaimer and realizer of the eschatological kingdom of God, plus miracle-worker actualizing his own proclamation has no adequate parallel in either the pagan or the Jewish literature of the time.”[144] The criterion of embarrassment is seen in the charge that Jesus performed miracles by Beelzebul. The criterion of rejection and execution is seen in the fact that there is no evidence that miracles were a cause of the crucifixion.
Meier proceeds to an investigation of various types of miracles attributed to Jesus. In regard to exorcisms, he discusses seven examples and concludes that some of them were historical. The case of the possessed boy (Mark 9:14-29) may, according to Meier, represent epilepsy. In regard to healings, Meier discusses cases of paralysis, blindness, and so-called “leprosy.” For many of these the criterion of multiple attestation comes into effect, and in the case where Jesus spits in the eyes of the blind man, and the cure requires a second attempt (Mark 8:22-26), the criterion of embarrassment is obvious. About blind Bartimaeus (Mark 10:46-52), the only recipient of a healing in the Synoptics identified by name, Meier says that “the Bartimaeus story is one of the strongest candidates for the report of a specific miracle going back to the historical Jesus.”[145] In short, the various criteria support the belief that Jesus performed healings.
Meier then turns to the raising of the dead. Stories of this phenomenon are affirmed by multiple attestation, but the question for the historian is: do the reported events go back to the life of Jesus? The Markan tradition preserves the account of the raising of the daughter of Jairus (Mark 5:21-43). Meier detects evidence of early tradition in the use of Aramaic, and notes that Jairus is the only named petitioner for a miracle in the Gospels. He concludes that “the Jairus story does reflect and stem from some event in Jesus’ public ministry.”[146] In regard to the raising of the son of the widow of Nain (Luke 7:11-17), Meier says that “I incline (with some hesitation) to the view that the story goes back to some incident involving Jesus at Nain during his public ministry.”[147] The Johannine tradition presents the startling account of the raising of Lazarus (John 11:1-45). Meier attempts to reconstruct the earliest form of the tradition: the message sent to Jesus and his remaining where he was for two days; a short dialogue with the disciples, and Jesus goes to the tomb of Lazarus; a short dialogue with Mary, and Jesus calls Lazarus, who comes forth. Meier believes the earliest version goes back to tradition prior to the writing of the Gospel and reflects an incident in the life of Jesus. He contends that the story was not a creation of the evangelist but “the question of what actually happened cannot be resolved by us today.”[148]
Finally, there is a treatment of the so-called nature miracles. Among the most familiar examples are walking on the water (Mark 6:45-52; Matt 14:22-27; John 6:16-21) and stilling the storm (Mark 4:35-41). Meier believes both of these stories were creations of the early church. Concerning the changing of water to wine (John 2:1-11), Meier finds the account filled to the brim with theological motifs; he believes it to be a creation of John or the Johannine school. As to the feeding of the multitude, Meier points out that it is the only miracle reported in all four Gospels, and is even mentioned twice, with variations, in Mark and Matthew. Meier believes this miracle has its roots in history.
In my opinion, the criteria of both multiple attestation and coherence make it likely that, amid the various celebrations of table fellowship Jesus hosted during his ministry, there was one especially memorable one: memorable because of the unusual number of participants, memorable also because, unlike many meals held in towns and villages, this one was held by the Sea of Galilee.[149]
“In sum,” says Meier of the miracles as a whole,
the statement that Jesus acted as and was viewed as an exorcist and healer during his public ministry has as much historical corroboration as almost any other statement we can make about the Jesus of history. . . . His miracles-working activity not only supported but also dramatized and actuated his eschatological message, and it may have contributed to some degree to the alarm felt by the authorities who finally brought about his death.[150]
Volume 3 carries the subtitle Companions and Competitors.[151] In the introduction Meier declares that Jesus must be understood in relation to others. Part I considers “Jesus the Jew and His Jewish Followers.” Meier begins with the multitude, pointing out that all the sources—Mark, Q, M, L, and Josephus—report that Jesus attracted large crowds. He then narrows the circle and discusses the relation of Jesus to his closer followers. He notes that the “Twelve” meet the criteria of multiple attestation and discontinuity: the term is never used by the early church for self-designation, and never by Paul. “In sum, Mark, John, Paul, probably L and probably Q give multiple attestation from independent sources that the Twelve existed as an identifiable group during the public ministry.”[152] The Twelve were symbolic of the re-gathering of the Twelve Tribes of Israel in the eschatological time. As to the identity of the Twelve, Meier points out that the various lists contain names of persons about whom almost nothing is known.
Meier turns to the three disciples who constitute an “inner circle.” James is never mentioned without John, his brother. He was martyred under Herod Agrippa (Acts 12:1-2), and James is always mentioned first. In regard to John, five persons have been collapsed into this individual: the son of Zebedee, the Beloved Disciple, the author of the Fourth Gospel, the author of three Johannine Epistles, and the seer of Revelation. Peter is always named first in the references to the inner circle and in the listing of the Twelve. He was a Jewish fisherman to whom Jesus gave the nickname Cephas. Meier believes a case can be made for the historicity of Matt 16:17-29 and Peter’s confession, but he accepts the argument that the text is post-Easter. As to the account in Mark (8:31), he writes: “While Mark may not have created the three predictions of Jesus’ passion, death, and resurrection out of whole cloth, in their present form they are most likely the product of early Christian preaching and catechesis.”[153] Meier, however, accept the historicity of Peter’s denial, noting its support by multiple attestation and the criterion of embarrassment.
Next Meier considers the relation of Jesus to competing groups, beginning with the Pharisees. Using the major sources—the NT, Josephus, and rabbinic literature (applied with caution)—he presents a minimalist sketch of the Pharisees. They were, he believes, a religious and political group of devout Jews concerned with the study and practice of the Law; they accepted the tradition of the elders and believed in the resurrection. As to the relation of Jesus to the Pharisees, Meier notes that the polemical material from Matthew and John reflects the post-resurrection conflict between Judaism and Christianity. Mark depicts Jesus in conflict with the Pharisees over marriage and divorce. The Markan Jesus also pronounced “woes” on the Pharisees. Meier believes some of this to be historical; he also points out that Jesus’ conflict with the Pharisees was not a major factor in his execution.
As to the Sadducees, Meier presents “a few clear lines in a fuzzy portrait.”[154] They were not, according to Meier, a large group, but they included members of the aristocracy with connections to the high priests. The Sadducees rejected the traditions of the elders, honored the Pentateuch, and did not believe in the resurrection or apocalyptic theology. According to Mark 12:18-27, Jesus disputed with them about the resurrection; this is the only reference to the Sadducees in Mark’s Gospel. Jesus’ argument rests on Exod 3:6, where God says, “I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob,” a text that implies a continuing and present relationship: God is the God “of the living.” Meier argues from discontinuity (there is no other use of Exod 3:6 for the resurrection) and coherence (citing other texts where Jesus speaks of resurrection) that “the debate with the Sadducees over the resurrection in Mark 12:18-27 does reflect an actual incident in the ministry of the historical Jesus that took place, naturally enough, in Jerusalem.”[155]
Finally, Meier presents the relationship of Jesus to other groups. About the Essenes he writes: “‘What does the NT directly say about Jesus’ relation to or interaction with the Essenes and/or Qumran?’ the answer must be brutally brief: nothing.”[156] There were, of course, points of contact, for instance, a concern with eschatology. Meier concludes that this comparison shows that Jesus and his followers were one group among various religious expressions of the time: eschatological groups with distinct lifestyles in conflict with the Jewish establishment. He also discusses the Samaritans, whom he considers a marginal group straddling Jewish and Gentiles worlds. Meier cautions against considering the “scribes” as representing a party somehow related to the Pharisees; instead, the term simply denotes persons engaged in the profession of writing. Meier believes the Herodians, probably officials of Herod Antipas, to be of no significance for the historical Jesus. The Zealots, in Meier’s opinion, were not important until the time of the Jewish revolt.
At the end of the volume Meier incorporates the new data into the expanding picture of Jesus. From the beginning he had been on the margin of the Jewish establishment. Whereas other religious leaders were educated, Jesus did not have the benefit of formal study. Jesus emerges as an Elijah-like prophet who selected the Twelve to represent the restoration of the people. He disputed with competitors like the Pharisees and Sadducees.
Volume 4 of A Marginal Jew may be the most important.[157] This volume bears the subtitle Law and Love. In the introduction Meier affirms what for him is basic: the historical Jesus is the halakic Jesus, that is, Jesus must be understood in terms of his relation to the Law. At the outset Meier acknowledges the difficulties in dealing with Jesus and the Law. He says he is convinced that “although I may not be right in my position, every other book or article on the historical Jesus and the Law has been to a great degree wrong.”[158] Meier notes various difficulties in regard to the issue. In the main these relate to the failure to distinguish Christology or faith in Jesus from the quest of the historical Jesus. He emphasizes the distinction “between Christian moral theology and ethics on the one hand and Jesus’ teachings about the Jewish Law on the other.”[159] Meier also believes confusion has resulted from a misunderstanding of the meaning of the Law. In particular, there has been an attempt to draw a distinction between the “ritual” and the “moral” law.
Meier explores the issue by taking up specific examples of Jesus’ teaching about the law. He begins with divorce and considers the sayings in chronological order. In 1 Cor 7:10-11, Paul presents a saying of the Lord against divorce that he, Paul, will alter in his own teaching. Meier proceeds to the Q tradition (Matt 5:32//Luke 16:18), which he reconstructs as follows:
1a) Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another
1b) causes her to be involved in adultery,
2a) and whoever marries a divorced woman
2b) commits adultery.
He comments: “I might note here that this succinct and balanced rhetorical bombshell, which explodes all traditional views of divorce in the Jewish Scriptures and Palestinian Judaism, would not be unworthy of the masterful wordsmith named Jesus. Hence it is not surprising that many commentators consider this Q version to be the most primitive form of the divorce saying in the NT.”[160] Meier contends that the historicity of Jesus’ opposition to divorce is confirmed by the criteria of authenticity. “The most important single conclusion of our investigation is that the criteria of multiple attestation, of discontinuity and embarrassment, and of coherence all argue for the historicity of Jesus’ prohibition of divorce.”[161]
Next, Meier discusses Jesus’ teaching about oaths. He notes that in the history of Judaism the first step toward the regulation of oaths was not taken until the Mishnah. In reviewing the NT, Meier notes the parallel between Matt 5:34-37 and Jas 5:12. He believes the earliest forms show parallelism.
| Matthew 5 | James 5 |
| 34b: Do not swear [at all] | 12b: Do not swear |
| 34c: either by heaven | 12c: either by heaven |
| 35a: or the earth | 12d: or by the earth |
| 12e [or by any other oath] | |
| 37a: But your speech must be “yes yes, no no.” | 12f: But your yes must be a yes and [your] no [must be] a no. |
Meier believes the simple form represented by both texts, goes back to the historical Jesus. He writes: “I conclude that the prohibition of oaths can take its place alongside the prohibition of divorce as a second example of the historical Jesus’ revocation of individual institutions and/or commandments of the Mosaic Law.”[162]
Meier turns to the observance of the Sabbath. The OT pseudepigrapha and Qumran texts provide examples of many prohibitions. As to Jesus’ relation to the Sabbath, Meier discusses actions of Jesus that might have seemed to violate the Sabbath. Some miracles, he notes, provoked no dispute. Meier believes that the miracles that did cause disputes are not historical. He concludes that “in all four Gospels, we have not a single narrative of a Sabbath dispute occasioned by a healing that probably goes back to the historical Jesus.”[163] Meier believes the story about the plucking of grain on the Sabbath (Mark 2:23-28) is a composition of the early (pre-70) Jewish church. In regard to the two sayings attached, he thinks that “the Sabbath was made for man” (v. 27; RSV) probably goes back to the historical Jesus, while “the Son of man is lord even of the sabbath” (v. 28) does not. Meier concludes that, although supported by multiple attestation, the reports concerning Jesus and the Sabbath are largely a product of the early Christian-Jewish conflict.
Meier also investigates Jesus’ relation to purity laws. In the discussion of ritual purity in Mark 7:1-23 he finds most of the saying attributed to Jesus to be inauthentic. Only the word about “Corban” in vv. 9-13 has any claim to historicity, on the criterion of dissimilarity. “In short, Jesus’ studied indifference to ritual impurity must be seen within the larger framework of his claim to be the charismatic prophet of the end time.”[164]
Meier then widens his focus to include a consideration of the “Love Commandments of Jesus.” He begins by an analysis of the double command of love in Mark 12:28-34. According to this text Jesus quotes two passages commanding love: Deut 6:5 (love of God) and Lev 19:18 (love of neighbor). Meier acknowledges that Mark develops this tradition for his own purposes, but he believes the tradition originates with Jesus. He also calls attention to Mark’s inclusion of the reaction of a scribe (vv. 32-34). “We have here the very rare case of an early Christian tradition willing to portray positively a Jewish teacher who agrees with and praises Jesus, but who does not follow Jesus as a disciple (at least within the story).”[165] Meier argues for the authenticity of the double command mainly on the basis of dissimilarity: this combination of the two texts is not found elsewhere in the OT, the Qumran texts, the OT pseudepigrapha, Philo, Josephus, or the early rabbis; the double command of love is not found elsewhere in the NT. Meier also reviews the command to love enemies found in the Q tradition (Matt 5:44; Luke 6:27, 35). Again arguing from dissimilarity, Meier notes that the command of love of enemies is not included in the texts that do not have the double commandment or in the Greco-Roman philosophers. “Our argument that this command goes back to Jesus thus rests on discontinuity.”[166]
The conclusion to Volume 4 is extensive. Meier calls attention to positive insights that have taken shape. Most important is his insistence on seeing Jesus as a Jew in his Jewish setting; Jesus is a halakic Jew. “Whatever the errors of Volume Four of A Marginal Jew, and no doubt they are many, this volume at least rejects a major academic failure of Jesus research: mouthing respect for Jesus’ Jewishness while avoiding like the plague the beating heart of that Jewishness: the Torah in all its complexity.”[167] Meier believes that the investigator of the historical Jesus must take seriously the result of Jesus’ engagement with Torah, for example, his prohibition of divorce and his emphasis on love. Meier cautions against efforts to find a unifying principle or system, for example, the double command of love. In contrast to a studied synthesis, Jesus’ moral pronouncements, according to Meier, are ad hoc—the pronouncements of a charismatic leader like the expected Elijah. There is, according to Meier, a fusion of Law and eschatology in the message of Jesus, but Jesus does not explicitly ground his legal pronouncements in the presence or imminence of the coming of the kingdom. Meier ends with a promise: “Having wrestled with and gained some insight into the enigma of Jesus’ teaching on Torah, we must turn our attention in the next volume of A Marginal Jew to the three outstanding enigmas: the riddle-speech of Jesus’ parables, the riddle-speech of his self-designations, and the final riddle of his death.”[168]
What can one say in looking back over the work of John P. Meier? At first sight the reviewer is overwhelmed by the magnitude of his research. The four hefty volumes contain a total of 2,792 pages, and a fifth is yet to come! Meier’s work is comprehensive, treating all the major and relevant minor issues. The magnitude of his work is also apparent in his extensive notes; the notes on Chapter 36 (vol. 4) on “The Love Commandments of Jesus” extend to seventy pages. These notes testify to Meier’s mastery of an enormous number of secondary sources and his command of languages, both ancient and modern. Within the major text Meier displays mastery of the methods of historical criticism: text criticism, knowledge of the historical setting, tradition criticism, form and redaction criticism, and theological sensitivity. Meier makes a good case for his designation of Jesus as A Marginal Jew. This title notes that Jesus lived and taught on the margin, but most of all, that Jesus must to be understood as a Jew in his Jewish setting.
Despite its length and depth, Meier’s book on Jesus is a joy to read. He writes clearly and with occasional humor. Where does Meier stand, one may ask, in the various quests of the historical Jesus? He certainly does not belong to the “new quest” or the “third quest,” and he is diametrically opposed to recent studies of Jesus that view him against the Hellenistic background as wandering Stoic or Cynic teacher. Is it too much to say that Meier supports the revival of the old quest?—certainly not the quest Schweitzer chronicled, whereby the resulting Jesus is a reflection of the scholar. No, Meier’s Jesus is a marginal Jew, accommodated to no ancient or modern portrait. What resonates with the old quest is Meier’s unswerving devotion to the historical critical method. What is new is that he does it well—better than most of his predecessors and contemporaries.
The three scholars reviewed in this chapter illustrate the increasing vitality of Roman Catholic biblical research; they represent only a sample of a larger group.[169] These scholars demonstrate that historical critical work can be accomplished from the perspective of a faith commitment. They employ the methods of lower and higher criticism. Although they reflect the traditional Roman Catholic concern with the Gospel of Matthew, they accept the priority of Mark. They continue their loyalty to tradition, but this allows a degree of freedom in the interpretation of Scripture. The “liberal” critic may be suspicious of the sensus plenior, but the search for the deeper meaning of the text is not unfamiliar to the devotees of the new hermeneutic. Although the Catholics tend to be conservative in criticism and exegesis, their results—in contrast to excessive skepticism (e.g., the Jesus Seminar, discussed in the next chapter)—may be all the more convincing. Their critical and exegetical work is consistently directed to the theological meaning of the text. Their boundless energy, their dedication of time, and the magnitude of their productivity represent a model to be emulated.
793-6. Abbott, Documents, 121. ↵
793-10. For bibliography (1937–88) see Merklein, Neues Testament und Ethik, 590–97. ↵
793-12. Rudolf Schnackenburg, “Der Weg der Katholischen Exegese,” in ibid., 15–33. ↵
793-14. Gospel According to St. John, 1: 3. ↵
793-21. Gospel According to St. John, 1: 267. ↵
793-29. Gospel of Matthew, 159. ↵
793-35. Sittliche Botschaft des Neuen Testaments, 1: 214. ↵
793-40. Jesus in the Gospels, x. ↵
793-57. Witherup, “Biography,” 254. ↵
793-62. Raymond E. Brown, An Introduction to the New Testament, ABRL (New York: Doubleday, 1997). ↵
793-72. Raymond E. Brown, The Community of the Beloved Disciple (New York: Paulist, 1979), 5. ↵
793-75. Introduction to the Gospel of John, 104. ↵
793-84. Raymond E. Brown, The Epistles of John, AB 30 (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1982). ↵
793-87. Raymond E. Brown, The Community of the Beloved Disciple (New York: Paulist, 1979). ↵
793-101. Birth of the Messiah, 527–28. ↵
793-108. Raymond E. Brown, The Churches the Apostles Left Behind (New York: Paulist, 1984). ↵
793-111. New Testament Christology, 49. ↵