Jesus Remembered: Christianity in the Making v. 1 [Hardcover]

If it's a hefty and richly probing expert scholarly study into the subject you want, here it is. This is a heavy duty volume on studying what may be known, and how it may be known, about the actual historical Jesus. The author, James Dunn, is a hugely respected new testament/biblical scholar, immensely learned. At 900+ pages of content, this book dives into what can be known about Jesus historically. Gets into sources, methods, past historical "Jesus Quests", literary issues and also examines the events and meanings of most aspects of Jesus' life, actions and significance. A tremendous amount of research and learning undergirds the author's work in this book. Provides a richly detailed and intense exploration of Jesus studies as mentioned above. Clearly written, chapters are well laid out. Contains immense footnotes and a rich bibliography. The author is very realistic in his approach and conclusions. He doesn't come at it from a liberal stance or a conservative one. He really seems to be striving to let the evidence and sound historical investigation do the leading, which is the value of this book, whatever agreements one may or may not have with any of the specifics.

Dunn's approach is really simply that of an historian, and as such, he approaches what may be known of Jesus, by recognizing that what we have in the written gospel accounts, is the rememberances of Jesus' earliest followers. He approaches the whole subject with an historian's spade, and executes very sober spadework all along the way. With this being the case, Dunn probes the content of what they left behind in their writings, and just makes a whole lot of historical sense as to the content, and the compilation of that content. In other words, since Jesus left no writings himself, the closest we can get to him historically is through the memoirs of his earliest followers. But these memoirs are composites of oral tradition, having made their way into written form, and they are compacted versions of that as well. The memoirs of Jesus that made their way into written form, come to us from a development of the initial impact Jesus made on many of his contemporaries, and on through to the forms and modes those memoirs took on as they settled into writings. With a truly masters hand, Dunn treats this subject with historical sobriety, showing the layers of what most likely lay behind the rememberances of the Jesus memoirs.

In my opinion, after reading many Jesus study books, I think Dunn's work is one of the most realistic treatments of what may be known about the Jesus of history, the Jesus of whom his impact has left its stamp on history in the new testament gospel accounts.

I should like to add that Dunn's work will possibly strike a nerve here or there with conservatives/fundamentalists and also with liberals as well. Dunn just doesn't seem to be interested in pedaling either side. He doesn't even seem interested in simply playing a middle ground. He really seems to be a keen historian of the Jesus from history past. At any rate, Dunn's work must be reckoned with by anyone wanting to be well informed on Jesus studies. Serious study by a serious scholar for serious inquirers.

For a much much smaller dose of Dunn's thinking see his little work: The Evidence For Jesus, and also: A New Perspective on Jesus. Some other top notch Jesus study books of high caliber are: Who Is Jesus by Thomas Rausch; Familiar Stranger: An Introduction To Jesus of Nazareth by Michael McClymond, The Christology of Jesus by Ben Witherington; The Original Jesus by Tom Wright; Jesus and His World by Peter Walker; Lord Jesus Christ: Devotion to Jesus in Earliest Christianity by Larry Hurtado; and Especially the chapters on Jesus in Stanley Porter and Lee Martin McDonald's excellent textbook, Early Christianity and Its Sacred Literature; and Jesus,Symbol of God by Roger Haight.

James Dunn's massively documented "Jesus Remembered" is the first of a planned trilogy on the first 120 years of Christianity. He starts off with of his discussion of the Jesus tradition, and what we can know about the historical Jesus. After his discussion of the past two centuries of Jesus research Dunn gets down to his new approach to the question. Much of the study of the historical Jesus has dealt with texts; Mark, Q, Matthew and Luke and their own unique sources. Dunn argues that the differences between these sources cannot simply be viewed as theological redactions. Instead they often relied on oral tradition. Dunn has looked at how oral traditions develop and notices that while stories passed orally often change in details ("performance variations") the essential core of the story often remains unchanged for a long time. Although Dunn says several times that the best we can hope for is what Jesus' followers remembered about him, he often believes that if a tradition fits his oral history paradigm given above it is most likely to have originated with Jesus himself.

So what does Dunn conclude from his approach? First off, Dunn himself is a Christian and on page 879 affirms the resurrection. So it is important to point out how much of Christian belief Dunn has to leave by the wayside. The Gospel of John's narrative is not reliable, nor the claims it makes for his quasi-divine status. There is little to support the infancy narratives. There is little evidence that Jesus supported a mission to the gentiles. Contrary to the gospels, there is no evidence that Jesus saw himself as any kind of messiah. (The term does not even appear in Q.) Nor is there much left of the "Son of Man," except for a few uncertain eschatological allusions. Indeed, Dunn argues, Jesus did not claim any title for himself. Jesus may have believed that he was going to die, but he did not believe he was dying to redeem the sins of the world. "If Jesus hoped for resurrection it was presumably to share in the general and final resurrection of the dead." There is astonishingly little support for what Jesus' last words were. At the same time, Dunn is sceptical of the historical value of the Gospel of Thomas and his frequent comparisons with the synoptic materials strongly suggest that it followed, not preceded them. Dunn is also properly sceptical of the Kloppenborgs' belief that one can separate Q into convenient layers. There is an especially good section that shows that the Hellenistic background of first century Galilee has been much exaggerated. There is little evidence that Sepphoris had many gentiles and plenty of evidence of the four indication of Jewish religious identity (stone vessels, absence of pork remains, Jewish burial customs and Jewish bathing customs).

There are problems with Dunn's oral tradition model. As one proceeds one wonders whether such incidents as contradictory traditions about Capernaum, the parable of the wicked tenants, Jesus' quarrels with Pharisees over eating grain on the Sabbath, the triumphant entry into Jerusalem or the claim that Jesus spoke of destroying the temple really do go back to Jesus. The possibility of a parti pris, on both the gospel authors and of Dunn himself, has to be considered. Looking back at Dunn's model of an oral tradition one notes a flawed analogy. Dunn gave an example of an Arabian peasant village, where once the community agreed on a story they stick to it. But the early Christian community were not (simply) isolated peasants. They were actively trying to convert their fellow countrymen, and ultimately with little success. In other words, unlike the Arab villagers, their story faced constant challenge from non-believers and this had to affect its development.

There are other weaknesses. There is a certain squirming as Dunn admits that Jesus believed in an imminent eschatological climax that, of course, did not happen. "Putting it bluntly, Jesus was proved wrong by the course of events." Then he goes on for four pages trying to argue that we shouldn't be too concerned about his. This is not so much a "consistent eschatology" or a "realized eschatology" as a neutered eschatology. Dunn's account of the resurrection is better in discussing the weaknesses of Christian tradition that in defending them. He argues that Jewish traditions agree on an empty tomb, without pointing out that such traditions were composed centuries afterwards, were clearly a response to the gospels, and have no independent value in themselves. Dunn also argues that the fact that Jesus' tomb was not venerated is proof that the Christians knew it was empty. But this is not convincing. Aside from the fact that there is some evidence of veneration, if Christians could honor the cross Jesus died on, they could venerate the place he was resurrected. Unless, of course, they didn't know where he was buried. Trying to argue that Jesus received a proper burial, Dunn notes that there is an example of a crucified body receiving proper burial, but forgets to add that it is the only such body found in all of Palestine. On the other hand Dunn notes all of the weaknesses of the tradition: the link of Jesus' resurrection to a falsely imminent general resurrection, confusion as to what sort of Jesus the witnesses were seeing, a persistent theme of failure of the witnesses to recognize Jesus (in Matthew 28:17 the disciples are seeing him in Galilee yet "some doubted," not just Thomas), confusion as to where they were seeing Jesus (in Jerusalem and Galilee? On earth or in heaven?) But on the whole the research is thorough, the bibliography voluminous and there is much in this book that will provoke and stimulate the reader. This is a book one should take the trouble to read.

James D.G Dunn reminds me of the apostle Paul in that he writes some things that are hard to understand. His books are almost always heavy, weighty, academic tomes.

And even though he has made his mark in recent years in Pauline scholarship, I thought he did a nice job with this study of Jesus' life. He comes through as a moderately conservative scholar. He is doubtful about the historicity of the stories surrounding the Nativity and Birth of Jesus, but he holds that most of the sayings and deeds of Jesus go back to him.

At the end of the book, he affirms his belief in the resurrection of Jesus as well.

This book is not as interesting as Ben Witherington's book "The Christology of Jesus," nor is it as engrossing as Craig Blomberg's "Jesus and the Gospels." But the book is more detailed than either of these and it gives a concentrated look at Jesus from the moderately conservative British camp. Recommended.