August 2, 2006
[The Letter of James][1] is so saturated w/ Judaism that Martin Luther thought it ought to be excluded from the canon. In particular James 2:24--"You see that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone"--has always been a problematic text for Pauline theologians._James_, Hebrews and the Gospel according to Matthew are the documentary artifacts of the community usually referred to as "Jewish Christianity," those first converts who were, like Jesus, observant Jews, and remained observant even after the announcement of the Kingdom of God. Several such communities, called by various names--Ebionites, Nazoreans etc.--are mentioned in early texts, and seem to have coexisted w/ several apocalyptic Jewish sects that stressed purity, righteousness and the coming Kingdom. Over a period of about 70 years, from 65 CE to 135 CE, these communities (and most of the Jewish population of Judea) were killed or driven into exile by an empire that lost patience w/ the violent politics of Judea. The catastrophic events of that time bear considerable responsibility for the spotty nature of the surviving documentary record, and ensured that at the end of the day Pauline Christianity would have the evangelical field largely to itself.-- [Popular New Testament scholarship][2] is a lot of fun. It's vy tendentious, as good scholarship often is, and in the normal course of things each of the leading lights of the discipline is associated w/ a particular interpretation of the data, which they defend against attacks from other scholars holding differing opinions, often w/ great verve and occasionally w/ a snarl. I have but dipped my toe into this rich pool of knowledge, but it doesn't take long to get a handle on the various factions and arguments.The most balanced and enjoyable of the books I've read is [_From Jesus to Christianity: How Four Generations of Visionaries & Storytellers Created the New Testament and Christian Faith_][3], by L. Michael White, the Classics and Christian Origins chair at the University of Texas. White is thoroughly mainstream. He dates late--he puts many essential Christian texts in the first half of the second century--and he has his doubts about the authorship of the Pauline corpus outside Romans, Galatians, and the two Corinthian letters, but he cites conservative scholars w/ approval and his book shows great respect for the archeological data and great respect for the texts. Best of all, From Jesus to Christianity is refreshingly free of the controversialist polemic that's so much a part of the discipline. Highly recommended as an overview of a rapidly changing field.And then there is Robert Eisenman's massive [_James the Brother of Jesus: The Key to Unlocking the Secrets of Early Christianity and the Dead Sea Scrolls_][4]. Eisenman is a celebrated scholar of the [Dead Sea Scrolls][5], the rich trove of ancient texts discovered near Qumran, on the northwest shore of the Dead Sea. Among the scrolls are texts from every book of the Tanakh--the Hebrew Bible--except Esther and Nehemiah, along w/ a number of noncanonical texts such as the Book of Enoch. Also discovered in the caves near Qumran were a number of previously unknown documents, some of them apparently related to a separatist Jewish sectarian community commonly thought to be Essene; these scrolls include the "Community Rule," the "War Scroll" and the "Damascus Document." These texts do not identify their authors or intended audience, which has left much room for debate. For many years the scrolls were kept secret, under the control of a small group of aging bureau-scholars who refused access to most outsiders. Eisenman played a major role in making the scrolls public, for which he deserves thanks from the academy and from the whole world.[Eisenman][6] is among the most prominent controversialists in New Testament studies. He thinks the first Christian community in Jerusalem was a legalistic, nationalistic, Temple-centric variant of Judaism led by James, the brother of Jesus, in perpetual conflict w/ the assimilationist Herodian establishment, and that James' assassination in the mid-60s CE sparked the Jewish Revolt that led to the sack of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple. It is this doctrinaire James, and this xenophobic (and ultimately revolutionary) community, that Eisenman thinks were Paul's opponents. This position necessarily implies a schism in the Jerusalem Christian community in the mid-60s, as tradition holds that Christians abandoned the city to seek refuge in Pella in the run-up to war. Under Eisenman's interpretation, another part of that Christian community, under the leadership of James and his successors, remained in Jerusalem to face the Romans.I think Eisenman makes a plausible case for a Jamesian Christian community in Jerusalem, and had he stopped at that, his book would not be the lightning rod it is. But Eisenman goes much further. Because he dates the Dead Sea Scrolls later than the current scholarly consensus and believes that some of the material is related to early Christianity, Eisenman draws repeated comparison between the figure of James and that of the "Teacher of Righteousness" in the Scrolls. Most scholars disagree w/ the dating and the identification. Eisenman insists that his identification of a Jamesian Christian community in Jerusalem is independent of theory that some of the Scrolls describe that community, and that may be, but his book is so saturated w/ Qumran citations and Scrolls exegesis that it's nearly impossible to separate his theory about James from his theory about the Scrolls._James the Brother of Jesus_ is the first of what has been announced as two books discussing Eisenman's theories regarding the composition and practices of the early Church. Presumably the second volume will specifically address issues only hinted at in the first, such as whether or not Eisenman believes that Paul is the "Spouter of Lies" attacked in some of the Qumran documents. In any event I hope the second book is more reader-friendly than the first, which is tortuously circuitous and extraordinarily repetitive. It is nonetheless a valuable, if occasionally maddening, discussion of the political and religious landscape of Judea in the first century.--The truth is we have little detailed information about the size, composition and politics of the first Christian community in Jerusalem, and not much more about the Jewish community. Some of the missing data fell victim to time (perishable media). Some of it was no doubt destroyed by later orthodoxy. But it ought not to be forgotten that a big chunk was certainly destroyed by the Romans. Those factors combined to produce one of the first consequential data extinctions on record. I am always optimistic that tomorrow will produce another buried jar, another codex in a bog, but at the end of the day we must accept that a substantial portion of the texts produced in the first century are gone forever, and will never be recovered.Popology suggests that early data extinctions are more far-reaching than later ones, and that the biggest one was probably that caused by the introduction of the printing press. It is nonetheless the case that the lacunae in the documentary record from the first century have proved to be of far more interest to scholars (of all varieties) than the lacunae in the fifteenth century record. Popologically speaking, the events in Judea in the first century are among the most significant events in the history of the species. [1]: http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=66&chapter=1&version=49 [2]: http://earlychristianwritings.com/theories.html [3]: http://www.harpercollins.com/book/index.aspx?isbn=9780060816100 [4]: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/other-editions/1842930265/ref=dp_ed_all/103-6541029-4603053?ie=UTF8 [5]: http://www.ibiblio.org/expo/deadsea.scrolls.exhibit/intro.html [6]: http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/15611.htm
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El_Borak (Bill Hoyt) says...
"the biggest one was probably that caused by the introduction of the printing press..."
If that's not the irony of ironies...
"But it ought not to be forgotten that a big chunk was certainly destroyed by the Romans."
And they didn't even need to destroy the physical texts...all they needed to do was destroy the infrastructure that maintained and perpetuated them. According to the Talmud, the Temple in Jerusalem had the source copies of the Tanakh, and we know that the professional circles of Judaism were headquartered in Jerusalem.
When Titus razed the temple mount in 70, he cut out the heart not only of Judaism (which was his intent, of course) but he also ripped the arteries out of the Jewish document perpetuation machine. Doubtless some Jews like Josephus, by switching rather than fighting, were able to salvage, and doubtless some took off for Alexandria early enough to salvage others.
Rome probably did more damage to more Jews in 135, though by then the Jews had doubtless created offsite backups. Hard lessons are long-remembered.
August 2, 2006 at 10:38 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
quinno (Patrick Quinn) says...
"According to the Talmud, the Temple in Jerusalem had the source copies of the Tanakh, and we know that the professional circles of Judaism were headquartered in Jerusalem."
A true bandwidth catastrophe.
I poked around the online material about the DSS/Qumran in the course of reading Eisenman. It's vy dense, and I find the debate about the texts to be a bit out-there, as it's my understanding that the dating is iffy and vy little is definitely known about the community that produced the documents. I was nonetheless struck by the suggestion that the Scrolls are in fact the library of the Temple (or a part of the library), hidden to protect it from Titus. That position is vy much a minority, but it's interesting and situationally plausible, because I think that once the defenders of Jerusalem realized that they were facing four legions, the coolest heads would've realized that the game was up--and made an effort to hide the docs.
Against that is the fact that no effort was made to hide any of the _other_ Temple treasures, which were rescued from the ashes and paraded through Rome as part of Titus' triumph, but it's still an interesting possibility.
Eisenman suggests that the Bar-Kochba War in 135 was actually an attempt at ethnic cleansing.
Given all this, and given that the Romans had vy little understanding of the differences between Jews and early Christians, it's remarkable that as much survived from both faiths as did.
August 2, 2006 at 11:03 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
lazz (anonymous) says...
Quinno, you are lighting my fire to get back into my bible readings ...
In the meantime, question:
In these dense readings, have you gathered up any thoughts as to the early notions of when the believers thought Jesus might return for Judgement Day?
Did anybody in the era put a figure on it, say, something like, "our lifetimes," or was it always left vague?
Which leads to --- as Christianity was forming, in the first and second centuries, and the first generation was dying off without witnessing a return of the Savior --- such a controversial notion that is the bedrock of the faith --- was Christianity suddenly perched at a perilous moment? Without the momentum of history and tradition, it might have been a bit unsettling when the perspective began to settle in that, well, perhaps this is truly an indefinite matter ...
And in terms of your discussions, I interested to know how they have might fought those messages in the days after their greatest communicators had died but before the thorough creation of church infrastructures ...
August 2, 2006 at 11:59 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
quinno (Patrick Quinn) says...
Bill is probably (certainly) more qualified than I to speak to how early Christianity thought about the imminence of the Second Coming. My impression is that--given the absence of specific information from Jesus--there existed a range of opinions on the subject. Paul at times seems to think that that the parousia will occur vy shortly, and at other times seems to think that it will occur in an indefinite future.
I think that the deferral of the parousia provided an opp'ty for controversialists to attack the legitimacy of the Christian revelation as early as the second century (maybe earlier, I've only scanned this stuff), but I haven't seen much evidence that it shook the faith of the majority of believers. The citations I have seen are about published debates between scholarly Jews and Christians, and scholarly Greeks and Christians.
August 2, 2006 at 12:25 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
quinno (Patrick Quinn) says...
I encourage you to read along, Lazz. Certainly the texts are more interesting than my take on them, and I'm liking the New American Standard xlation more and more.
August 2, 2006 at 12:26 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
El_Borak (Bill Hoyt) says...
"Bill is probably (certainly) more qualified than I to speak to how early Christianity thought about the imminence of the Second Coming..."
The problem with trying to discover that is that the texts we have are the texts we have, and therefore trying to discover what Paul or others thought is a matter of interpolating from scant writings on the subject. Everyone has the same access to that, but everyone also imports his own expectations.
But while I don't doubt that the early Christians expected Christ *could* come any time, I do doubt that most of them - or at least most of the apostles, churches then and now get caught up, so to speak - expected it immediately, even in their lifetimes.
There are a couple reasons for that:
Point 1: The apostles *did* ask about Jesus establishing his kingdom before the Assumption (Acts 1:6) and Jesus told them they had to preach to the whole world first. Even if they assumed the whole world was just Rome and its satellites, it would not take long for them to figure out the job was going to take a while.
Point 2: Jesus used his return as a euphemism for "a long time." After Jesus told Peter that someday he would be crucified (John 21:18-9) Peter changed the subject to John and Jesus told him to mind his own business and if he wanted John to stand around "until I come", he would do just that. John reports that, "This saying went abroad among the brethren, that that disciple should not die" (21:23) The saying that John reports (and debunks) shows that while some may have (mis)used the statement to presume an immediate return, John is careful to set the record straight. It also shows that the Gospels were in some cases reactions to the stories, but that's a different issue.
Point 3: Jesus made it plain in the Parable of the Talents, which follows immediately after the destruction of Jerusalem prophecy and his teachings about his return, that the master goes away for 'a long time'... which also accounts for the repeated warnings to be vigilant. It's not hard to remain vigilant when you expect something to happen immediately. Only after a long time of nothing happening does the real danger arise.
Finally, I think we need to differentiate between 'hope' and 'expectation.' While the early Christians had a hope for the soon return (as we have today) that does not require the expectation that it will be so. I think a lot of people are sloppy and confuse those two points.
August 2, 2006 at 1:19 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
lazz (anonymous) says...
Outstanding, Bill, THANKS
August 2, 2006 at 1:32 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
El_Borak (Bill Hoyt) says...
"I think that the deferral of the parousia provided an opp'ty for controversialists to attack the legitimacy of the Christian revelation as early as the second century..."
And I think there might have even been some of that in the first, as Peter (2Pet 3:3-4) points out "Scoffers will come in the last days...asking, 'Where is the promise of his coming? For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.'" In other words, "It's been a long time guys, give it up."
I can't imagine Peter bothering to write about scoffers unless his audience was experiencing just that kind of opposition. In fact, he says he's writing to get them to "remember" (3:1) so they've probably been over this ground before.
I think we can expect that there were probably those Christians who "set dates" and like their brethren today, rightly deserved the ridicule that came their way when those dates passed. But I doubt Peter's in that group, he already knows he's not going to see it and has for 3 decades or so. I also can't help but think Peter reveals his personal opinion is it will be a long time when he says that for God a thousand years is as a day and that God is patient...
But as you mention, the ability of 'controversialists' to gainsay that expectation would continue to grow the more years passed.
August 2, 2006 at 3:32 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
ladylaw (Terry Bush) says...
On the topic of the "Second Coming" = who knows when, how, or why....
Having been literally obsessed, when in my adolescent and teen years, with the "End of the World" topic (and having been scared out of my wits by some things I was told about predictions by people like Nostradamus, see http://www.thelivingweb.net/prophecie...) I had more then my share of chances to read over anything about when and how the Messiah would appear (again, if you are Christian).
Thank all that is good or holy, some really saintly folks finally got across to me the futility of that kind of concern.
I sometimes still have to remind myself what it says in Matthew chapter 24 Only the Father knows the day and the hour; only he determines the moment of its coming. http://www.usccb.org/nab/bible/matthe...
But, most of the time, I now manage to leave attempts at predicting the future to the Deity, and simply try to do "my job" - Question (straight out of the Baltimore Catechism) Why were you created? Answer: To know, love, and serve the Lord, in this world and the next. Never mind how hard it is to know God....
August 2, 2006 at 4:14 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
kalcarloskals (anonymous) says...
How topical Dr. Quinn. I just spent the evening at the Kotel, reading Eicha (Lamentations) in honor of Tisha B'Av (Ninth day of the month of Av), the day of the Jewish calendar on which tradition puts the destruction of the first temple, second temple, Spanish expulsion, and just about any other disasterous event in that long list of disaterous events that make up Jewish history. A Jewish tradition believes that the Messiach (messiah) will reveal himself on Tisha B'Av at the Western Wall. No such luck this year. Of course there is a great deal of debate about what is the true nature of the Messiach, with theories ranging from the traditional, to multiple messiachot tied to specific events, to a messiach of Israel or Samaria that will come before the Messiach of Judea, David's line. We'll see who got it right. By the bye, reading the story of the Sacking of Jerusalem and the Temple by firelight, standing in front of the Western Wall of said Temple happens to be pretty intense.
August 2, 2006 at 4:47 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
quinno (Patrick Quinn) says...
Watch out for rockets.
This seems to be a good year for rockets.
August 3, 2006 at 6:44 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
kalcarloskals (anonymous) says...
No rockets in Jerusalem esp. the Old City; certain Muslim sites happen to be very close and you know what it's like sending unaimed rockets into civilian areas, you just don't know what they're gonna hit.
August 3, 2006 at 8:03 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
quinno (Patrick Quinn) says...
Watch out for Mel Gibson, too. He's been on a bit of a tear the past few days. Tequila, they say....
August 3, 2006 at 8:30 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
kalcarloskals (anonymous) says...
What are the stages of tequila drunk? I know you told me one time but I forgot exactly where anti-Semitism came in. Daily Show had a great line, bas. Betty Ford Center form his boozin', Henry Ford center for his Jew hatin'.
August 3, 2006 at 10:12 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
quinno (Patrick Quinn) says...
The Four Stages of Tequila
1. I'm RICH
2. I'm GOOD-LOOKING
3. I'm BULLETPROOF
4. I'm INVISIBLE
--
Press reports suggest that MG was well into Stage 3, but had not yet attained Stage 4.
August 3, 2006 at 10:30 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
bwoodard (Bill Woodard) says...
Quinno, methinks Mel just skipped Stage Four and went directly to the unavoidable and therefore uncodified Stage Five:
5. I'm ASSHOLIC
Which led, of course, to Stage Six:
6. I'm ARRESTED
August 3, 2006 at 4:06 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
quinno (Patrick Quinn) says...
Bill--
I think we'll have to add "I'm ARRESTED" to the official formulation, but it will have to be Stage 4, as invisibility is a transcendent state attained by only a select few, and it usually results in sudden, spectacular death and a Darwin Award nomination.
August 4, 2006 at 7:50 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
OhioJayhawk (anonymous) says...
I'd like to nominate this exchange for this week's "Threads Gone Wild" Award for Meritorious Tangentialism.
August 4, 2006 at 9:15 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
quinno (Patrick Quinn) says...
"Meritorious Tangentialism"
The story of my life, sigh....
August 4, 2006 at 9:27 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
OhioJayhawk (anonymous) says...
Tangentialism is both a virtue and a competition, as noted in the Gospel of Calvin (and Hobbes):
http://www.gocomics.com/calvinandhobb...
PJ
August 5, 2006 at 8:20 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )