Last week I had a couple of confessional moments about theological interpretation and the biblical studies academy. My soul, lifted from the experience, now wants to explore a bit more who this Jesus is that I think is worth following–not the academy’s Jesus, but the church’s Jesus.
And it begins with the inseparability of Jesus from Israel’s God.
There are a few things that this could mean. And some of them are (or at least should be) acknowledged by the academy at all times as well. For instance, the connection between Jesus and Israel means that Jesus was a Jew and must be understood (and understandable) as a first century Jew who spoke and acted among other first century Jews. (Though both church and academy have lost sight of this from time to time.)
But the church’s Jesus is not merely a historical religious phenomenon.
The church’s Jesus is the one in whom and through whom Israel’s God is bringing about the fulfillment of God’s promises to that people. And so, when we go to study the church’s Jesus we find that each of the four Gospels demands of us that we interpret the Jesus story as the culmination of the Israel story.
Matthew invites us to consider what we are about to see in Jesus as the end of the era marked by Babylonian captivity, the fulfillment of the covenant promises to Abraham, and the realization of God’s promise to David. The whole story of Israel as such is telescoped into a genealogy marked by these three: Abraham, David, Exile… Christ.
The point of the generations is not merely that time has passed or that history is being observed. In Israel’s story these moments are marked by the dramatically intervening hand of God–for deliverance, yes, but even more so for promise of a better future. The claim of the genealogy is that the God of Israel is at work again, and that this Jesus can only be rightly understood as the one in whom this story culminates (or, perhaps, the one who embodies the story within himself).
Analogously, Mark begins his Gospel with a declaration that all we are about to see is in answer to Isaiah’s Second Exodus. The way of the Lord is being prepared by John the Baptist–and that means that when we see Jesus we see the work of the God of Israel, the deliverance and restoration promised through the prophets is coming about.
Do you see how the Gospels take us into an interpretive field that can never be entered by the academy?
We’re talking here about Jesus in relation to God. We’re not merely talking about how to read the books well–though here, perhaps, we could agree even as an academic guild. But we are talking about who Jesus was and what the proper framework is for interpreting his ministry correctly. While “religious studies” must, as an academic discipline, seek to understand Jesus as like unto other turn-of-the-era religious phenomena, the stories of Jesus themselves demand a different starting point.
Jesus, claim the Gospels, is the one thing that the scriptures had prepared us for; he is the one event we were told to expect. Jesus is the fulfillment of Israel’s story, the great and saving act of Israel’s God.
And so when Luke begins with a declaration that the things he writes are things that “have been fulfilled among us,” when his story begins with an old barren couple conceiving a child and moves on to songs of promises fulfilled–the point in all is that we only know this Jesus rightly when we recognize that in his advent the God of Israel is at work again.
And when John begins his Gospel with the words that start all of scripture (in the beginning), we are being told that to understand this theos who is on the scene, we must first understand the theos who created the world and all things in it, according to the biblical narrative.
So when the church whose stories these are begins its creed with an affirmation of the God who created heaven and earth, they are giving a necessary (if insufficient) indicator of the identity of the Jesus from whom we derive our unique identity as a people. The church’s Jesus is the messiah sent and empowered by Israel’s God, by the creator God.
What the academy can never say is what the church must say first and foremost and most clearly, as Peter does in Acts 2: This Jesus was a man attested to by God.
By the One God.
By the God of Israel.
“Israel” is not merely a context within which Jesus makes sense, but also a narrative within which God was at work prior to Jesus and consummately at work through Jesus. This is the church’s Jesus. In part…
Hello Daniel,
I appreciate the ringing confession of the church. I wonder…what definition of the academy you employ. I understand that in the present context the academy has become something influenced by a very persistent drift toward sophistry. And yet there have been voices within and without the church who have engaged these sophist assumptions…though in some cases this has led to a cup of hemlock.
I regret the concession to the “academy” the confession of the church.
agree
I’m not sure the distance is as great as you imply here. Surely the Academy can engage with Jesus *thru the eyes* of the early church, which is to say, the Story of Jesus as a narrative reality in dialogue with the narrative of Israel’s God. It’s not necessary for the Academy to share the church’s claims about Jesus, but it does no harm to the work of academia to concede that the church is making claims, to describe those claims historically, and to interpret them within the literary and socio-cultural framework of Israel’s own story.
Indeed, how can one be doing work that is fair to, say, Luke as a text within a context, if one is unwilling to see Luke’s story as embedded within Israel’s story? Seems to me this would be part of the essential commitment of academic work, not an obstacle to it.
Or to put it more bluntly, I don’t think you exited the Academy in order to write this blog post describing the church and her texts.
Re. your conclusion: let’s hope not.
Jimmy, you’re right of course that at its best this is what happens. But it’s also interesting to note streams of academic scholarship that don’t see the value in the docs we’ve been given. I remember E. P. Sanders shaking his head in befuddlement as to why anyone would write a commentary that addressed why Jesus would be said to feel a certain way in a text–as if what the text says was of no value when performing any function other than leading us to the historical Jesus.
But the academy tends to do many things well. I’ll probably say more on that tomorrow.
Thanks for jumping in!
Amen and amen! I’ve appreciated these series of posts. It seems that you are going in the direction of looking at how the church and academy relate. Do you think this will be something covered more in-depth?
Wonderfully stated, thank you!
“The church’s Jesus is the one in whom and through whom Israel’s God is bringing about the fulfillment of God’s promises to that people.”
Israel’s God was never only the God of Israel. Nor were the promises only to Israel.
Davey,
This is what I don’t get about Paul!? Why does he just skip right over the Noahide Covenant in his synopsis of the overall salvation story in Romans 5??! If Paul’s Christological point is to recapitulate creation’s original intent/functionality — thus rhetorically deploying the Second Adam motif — then why the hell does he fail to mention the founding precedence which gave legal grounds to that of the Abraham Covenant in the first place? More importantly, the Noahide Covenant serves as quite the counterpoint to that of the Mosaic Covenant: eat any moving creature you’d like (hoofs and all); no mention of keeping the blasted sabbath; and, moreover, the creation mandate is reiterated, applying TO ALL OF HUMANKIND, a calling which is grounded in the imago Dei, which unmistakably is Paul’s central theme in Colossians 1.
If Paul is attempting to wed Gentile and Jew into one body of discipleship thereby recreating creation anew, then you’d think citing the Noahide Covenant would be “the nuts,” “the ace up his sleeve,” “the trump card,” as Torah daringly, courageously tells a story before its own story (of Israel), prior to that of the election of Israel — thus detribalized and cosmic. I mean, any OT scholar worth their salt will tell you that the prophetic canon was in the business of destablizing Judah’s and Israel’s arrogant domestication of God as “Israel’s God,” notably Jeremiah (which is the tradition that Jesus implicitly takes on.)
Hmmm… Paul may have been on to something when he himself made the disclaimer that he wasn’t a “trained speaker,” for clearly his topos could have been, I daresay, a bit better here in Romans 5. Citing the Noahide Covenant would have done wonders for his argumentation, no?
Nobody in the NT seems to care much about the Noahide covenant. For some reason that’s more important to the schematization of modern covenant theology than it seems to have been to the first Jesus followers.
That was my point.
Good point…
I don’t think an appeal to Noah or the Noahide covenant would advance Paul’s argument in Romans overmuch. What does the covenant promise? Largely, to ensure a path not to be taken – ‘uncreation’. And then some repetition of earlier themes, more or less summed up in Adam. (Of course, there is what Daniel might call the Baconian provision.)
Appeals to Noah–implicit or explicit–seem to be more in relation to certain minimal requirements for Gentile Christians (Acts 15?) rather than the basis for a call for Jew-Gentile unity.
The Noahide covenant is just a “repetition” of earlier themes which are “more or less summed up in Adam??” That is far from being the least bit accurate — perhaps an Idol of the Marketplace
The pact is built upon not a blithe, mere “repetition” of earlier themes, rather it majestically recapitulates the exposition of imago Dei/creation mandate (Gen. 1:26-28) and the development of the complex, symphonic parshah (Gen. 1-6), thus adding a profound nuance in the very good creational fabric amid the fallen state of things.
Is Haydn’s notable recap of “The Representation of Chaos” exposition in his oratorio The Creation just a “repetition” which is “more or less” summed up in the opening? Your’re killing me Ian.
– And just what is new in this recap you ask?? Indeed, you’ve failed to notice one of the most profound statements in all of Scripture here embedded in the Noahide pact: God sanctions HIMSELF. God’s characterization is thus dynamic, empathizing with and responding to the actions of history, creating plausibility for Jesus’ eventual tabernacling in the flesh.
Why are Christians so squeamish and glib about the OT’s worth and value, especially since it tempers the NT?
To wit, this new wrinkle is like Haydn’s famous (or infamous, depending on who you talk to) “displaced” dominant pedal which he included in the recap — it just doesn’t seem to belong.. A Mischmasch.
Thanks for the reply, sir. Maybe a bit of overkill in the face of a very brief comment which, on reflection, looks inadequate to me in *this* respect: I much prefer your description “The pact is built upon not a blithe, mere “repetition” of earlier themes, rather it majestically recapitulates the exposition of imago Dei/creation mandate (Gen. 1:26-28)” to what I said – one word ‘repetition’ – yes, that seems rather lacking in light of your comment.
Nonetheless, no, I don’t think I fail to see God’s sanction against himself: I was referring to that but perhaps too blandly for your liking. My main point was in effect saying it is of no surprise to me at all why Noah does not appear in Paul’s letter to the Romans. As wonderful as the recapitulation may be, the original notes strike me as more suited to his purpose.
I don’t see how anything I said is squeamish about the OT. And it’s worth aplenty. Yes, indeed, for sure.
There are different strands in the OT, some particularist, some universalist. Also these strands are reflected outside the OT writings. In Paul’s treatment, Abraham was a gentile, the Law came in on the side, and there was a greater obstacle (the Law) to Jews being saved than gentiles.
They were to Israel, even if they were for the world.
I appreciate where you’re coming from, Daniel. Perhaps we could say that the church must approach the gospels (at least) as participants (much the way Mark & Matthew may have viewed their role), while the academy approaches these texts as observers. This also articulates another important role for the church, vis-a-vis the academy, which is to read these ancient texts for today just as much as for its 1C context.
His name is not “Jesus,” as it was at a time several thousand years ago. His name is Christ Jesus, the Son of the Father, who together are united with the Holy Spirit, comprising the Triune God, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.