It is often asserted that Jesus’ cry abba, father, reflects the memory of the early church. This is how Jesus prayed.
Not only this, but several people have followed the line of argument that Jesus prayed like this not once, but every time he addressed God as “father”–referring to him as abba.
The prayer recurs in Paul. Twice.
Thus, the idea is that Paul’s churches participate in this historical memory, themselves participating in the unique form of prayer that Jesus himself taught.
But it strikes me that the opposite may explain the data just as well. 
Jesus only says abba once in the Gospels. It’s in Mark. And, it’s in a context where there is no other character around to hear him. In other words, this is one of the least likely places in the Gospel for a historical remembrance to be informing the story.
What if, rather than abba father being a historical remembrance that influenced the Pauline churches, the practice of the Pauline churches influenced how Jesus is depicted as praying in Mark 14?
I have no doubt that Jesus addressed God as “Father” before Paul came on the scene. There is the Lord’s prayer, after all, and other examples of Jesus so addressing God.
But in my study of the abba prayer, I have some concern that too much historical weight is being placed on a passage that can’t bear it. Is abba Jesus’ way of praying? Well, it is in the garden of Gethsemane, and it is in those who are being renewed after the image of this suffering son (Rom 8).
Thoughts?
Well Mark was a companion of Paul, so its certainly possible. I’m not sure I’m clear about how this change in perspective, if we agreed with it, should affect theology or praxis.
Even if we discard the Acts narrative as diegetic rather than factual, Paul is certainly an influential presence in Antioch. If the gospel we call “Mark” develops in the community at Antioch, for the community at Antioch, there’s every reason for that to be a plausible connection from Paul into Mark rather than the other way ’round.
Sometimes there’s a price to be paid for being a biblical scholar: we make an argument just because it seems better, or interesting to us.
A couple of (open) questions:
Does what Paul is saying in Rom 8 and Gal 4 actually make sense if his audiences don’t think Jesus referred to God as “Abba”? Isn’t the point that by crying “Abba” – rather than something else – those adopted as sons of God assume/participate in Jesus’ relationship to God? Otherwise, why would Paul’s audience think that crying out “Abba” was in any way significant?
Also, if you are convinced that Jesus referred to God as “Father”, in what language did he speak to God as such? Isn’t Aramaic, and the specific word “Abba” the only evidenced contender? Or did Jesus pray in Greek?
On your first point, Matt, I’d say it definitely still makes sense. The point is made from the larger context that their sonship is derivative of Jesus’. So without Jesus actually saying those words, or an audience thinking he did, they would still see their cry as an indication that they were sharing in Spirit or the crucified and resurrected Son. It doesn’t seem that this relies on a prior idea of Jesus using the particular word. Does Paul think Jesus used “maranatha,” when he says this in Aramaic at the end of 1 Corinthians?
But this does also get at the “both/and” possibility: it may have been part of the Jesus tradition, but Mark might still have gotten it from Paul or from a common source.
There are different ways to address God using the ab root: abbi, abbenu, ab, etc. In NT scholarship, much (I’d say too much) has been made of this particular form.
One can use “my father” (abba, abhi) or “our father” (Heb. abhinu, Aram. abhuna). In Aramaic and Hebrew, one doesn’t say just “Father” (ab) as a vocative. The actual possibilities in direct address are quite limited. And abba is actually unattested in first century texts, so that’s an extrapolation backwards from the Targums and rabbinic sources.
Daniel, thanks for another provocative and stimulating question. Last month I speculated the other way round, that Paul might have known a version of the Gethsemane story in his “passion narrative” whatever exactly that contained (http://dougchaplin.wordpress.com/2012/06/04/did-paul-know-the-gethsemane-story/) as, it would seem, the author of Hebrews may have done.
One datum that is hard to explain either way is that Paul only uses the “Abba” word in those letters where Jewish and Gentile tensions are to the fore and he is drawing most heavily on his justification language. Does that point to a unitive appeal to a pre-Pauline usage being more likely?
Certainly in Mark’s narrative, there is no witness present, but is the sleepiness of the disciples a Markan narrative motif shaping an earlier tradition of an anguished Jesus to his ends of the lone and misunderstood hero? I’m inclined to think we don’t always give Mark credit for reshaping his traditions to suit his narrative. Does the way you frame the question imply a binary opposition of either invented wholesale or transmitted verbatim?
Dr. Kirk,
When you memorize the letter of Romans what translation did you use? What do you recommend? NRSV? I’m so use to using the ESV but I am like the NRSV more and more.
Daniel, good for you for bringing this up. The bond between father and son is essential in our understanding of the gospel. (It’s also amazing to see just how accomodating koine greek is to this whole idea of relation.) Neither Jesus or Paul posited a list of God’s attributes as man’s confidence for dealing with God. A father doesn’t have to be good in himself to care about his own son or daughter. Even a bad father knows how to give good gifts to his own. Jesus never said the father of the prodigal was a good father. That’s not the point. He rejoiced because that which came forth from him had returned to him and in a sense, belonged to him once again. Other parables reiterate this theme. Over the years I have noticed theologians have a very difficult time saying “Father”. Everything is God or Jesus. However, for me, and I know others as well, in the course of an actual lived life, even the best theologizing dissinegrates in the face of a true bond between Father and son.