Who Invented Jesus Christ?
About a week ago a good friend of mine posted his view on the teachings of Jesus. (I encourage you to go read his post, along with some of the comments, especially the dialogue between Danny and Doug.) Here’s my summary of his main claims:
Jesus of Nazareth was nothing more than your everyday apocalyptic rabbi. He was eventually believed to be the Messiah and Son of God after a lot of embellishment and revisionist history. This theological development can be seen in how the Gospels present Jesus’ teachings and resurrection—the later the Gospel was written, the more Jesus became Christ. That’s not quite the way Danny presents it, but I think it’s a fair summary.
Concerning the resurrection, it is true that John’s account includes many more details than Mark’s. The oldest ending we have for Mark has no post-resurrection appearances of Jesus. John has several, including one very famous and detailed account. So was all of that invented between the time Mark and John wrote?
That would have to assume that each of the Evangelists included everything they knew to be true about the resurrection (i.e., we have all the data about what each writer believed within their Gospels). But consider that only Matthew and Luke include the ascension. Does that mean that Mark had never heard of it, then Matthew and Luke invented it, and then John edited it out because he didn’t believe it? The inclusions and exclusions of the Evangelists were decisions they made as writers of theological narratives. They weren’t interested in writing almanacs, so they did not include every bit of data they believed.
We can know this is true because of what Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 15.3-7 about the death, burial, resurrection, and post-resurrection appearances of Jesus. Paul’s letter predates Mark’s Gospel and provides some of the most unbelievable details of Jesus’ resurrection, including that he appeared to over 500 of his disciples at one time. So Mark would have had that information available to him (he did travel with Paul for a while, after all). So at the time of Mark’s writing, Jesus was already believed to be the resurrected Son of God.
Well, perhaps Paul is the one who invented Jesus Christ, and not John. Actually, Paul’s account is not his own invention, but the inclusion of a creedal statement that was already widely believed before he wrote his letter. Paul is “passing on what he received,” a phrase that for Jews referred especially to the faithful handing down of sacred traditions.
So if Paul didn’t invent the account of the resurrection or the post resurrection appearances, where did this creedal formula come from? Let’s take a look at the timeline, which goes backward from John’s Gospel until the death of Jesus (the numbers are dates by year in the first century):
95: John writes his Gospel, claims to be an eyewitness.
85: Luke writes his Gospel, claims to have verified with available eyewitnesses.
80: Matthew writes his Gospel, traditionally believed to be an eyewitness.
70: Mark writes his Gospel, traditionally believed to reflect Peter’s eyewitness account.
55: Paul writes to the Corinthians, “What I received I also passed on to you,” followed by what most critics (including the Jesus Seminar) believe to be a preformed creedal formula. The statement is intended to show unity with the other Apostles’ teaching (see especially verse 11), not Paul’s invention.
50-51: Paul preaches to the Corinthians, delivers to them what he had already received.
49-50: Paul meets privately with the leaders of the church in Jerusalem fourteen years after his first meeting to “set before them the gospel that I preach… for fear that I was running or had run my race in vain” (Galatians 2.2).
35-36: Three years after his conversion, Paul goes to Jerusalem to meet with Peter and James.
32-33: Paul’s conversion on the road to Damascus. Jesus Seminar believes formula predates Paul’s conversion.
30: Death and resurrection of Jesus. James D. G. Dunn (Christian NT scholar) believes creedal statement was formed by fall of 30 AD.
The dating of Paul’s statement in 1 Corinthians 15, which provides details of the resurrection long before the writing of the Gospels, may not be “established fact.” But when the Jesus Seminar dates it before Paul was even a Christian, we can safely say scholarly consensus is that Paul did not invent it.
The force of this is to shrink the time within which legendary accretion must have taken place, and to remove at least one pillar in Danny’s argument that between Mark and John Jesus went from apocalyptic rabbi to resurrected Son of God. In reality, the confessional content of the Christian faith seems consistent throughout the first century, including the last 30 years. The most fantastic details of Jesus’ resurrection were already widely believed somewhere between six months to three years after the supposed event—that’s more than 35 years before Mark wrote his Gospel.
What about Paul’s statement in Galatians 1.12 that he got the gospel directly from Jesus, and was not taught it by any person? Does that mean he wrote the gospel and is responsible for inventing Jesus Christ?
Paul’s concern in Galatians to establish as historical fact his direct contact with Christ in receiving the gospel has more to do with establishing his legitimacy as an Apostle, as in 1 Corinthians 15. He intends to show independent corroboration of the gospel, an effort any naturalist could applaud, while also showing his complete unity with the other Apostles’ preaching. This is why he emphasizes both his direct experience of Christ as well as his preaching of the same gospel message.
Not only that, he places the preaching of the one true gospel above his own legitimacy as an Apostle. In Galatians 1.8-9 he curses anyone—including himself—who preaches a different gospel than what he delivered to them. And in 1 Corinthians 15.11 he says hearing and believing the one true gospel is more important than who preaches it. But what is clear is that Paul believed that he was preaching the same gospel, and he used the well-known formula to show his unity with the other Apostles, even though he first received the message from Christ himself.
So the historical picture looks like this: Jesus dies around 30 AD and his disciples believe he is raised from the dead. Within three years of that event a creed has been formed to guide orthodox Christian belief about what the gospel is, including accounts of five separate post-resurrection appearances. Shortly thereafter, Paul converts dramatically after claiming that Jesus appeared to him. In two separate meetings in Jerusalem, Paul meets with Peter, James, and John and they all determine together that Paul is preaching the truth about the resurrection.
Paul becomes a missionary and preaches this message to the Gentiles, sending letters to the Gentile churches later to ensure their spiritual growth. As the eyewitness generation begins to pass, Mark and others take the written and eyewitness accounts of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus and compose theological narratives that are true to what is already considered to be orthodox belief. Before he dies, John writes his Gospel, which includes some of the most mature reflections on the resurrection experience.
I’ll touch on Danny’s other point about the development of Jesus’ teaching within the Gospels a bit later. How clear was his message? Is there unity across the Gospels about his message, or do we have embellishment and revisionist history? How much disagreement was there on Jesus’ core message? Was Jesus wrong? I hope to get to these questions within the week.
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