Rosear H. Guypry RECONSTRUCTING JESUS Geo The rewards of N. T. Wright's historical recovery of Jesus are great: but he raises more questions than he answers. fa the past several years, New Testament scholar Tom Wright thas stepped forward as the most scintillating champion of belief thar the canonical Gospels, at least the first three of them, give usa reliable record of what Jesus of Naz- sreth actually said and did, A modern-day. Saine George, Wright slays the dragon of skepticism with a fair chat leaves even ant antagonist lke John Domin: ie Crossan marveling at his ability to capeivate a critical audience. Thus the glowing descrip- seminars: “Internationally acclaimed as today’s most exciting comm tsicator and most inspiring interpreter of escament” as well as “most pop- tar rue in he Unity of Ono Faculty of Theology.” No longer lecturing, in Oxford, Wrights jets here, there, and everywhere from the deanery at Lichfcld Cathedral to make his ease before scholarly elites and popular auslinces alike. He has become a one-man show and, nor without reason, the darling of many conservatives, ‘So Jesus and the Victory of God, which ‘elaborates Wright's views is bound to acta lorof atten ne 2inaseres the Question jected co nun t0 1, The New Testa mont andthe People of God, occupied itself mainly with background and method. Later volumes will rake up the Gospel of Join through the Book of Revelation. above all, the leters of Paul. In adtion to dhe volume under review, I will ake some accoune of Wright's earlier published work With 2 sweeping and imaginative proposal,_Jene and ibe Victory of God wears te figure Of Jesus as portrayed in the synopric Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Lake Arguably, nevertheless, and despite some sel-description to the contrary, the weat- iment docs not represent biblical theology ina strict sense, For Wright is not interest cd in the synoptic portrayals of Jesus for their own sake so much as for whae they can tel us about the Jesus of history who stands behind them. As already implied, ‘Wright ses litle difference berveen those portrayals and the historical Jesus, so that for the most par biblical theology and his- tory merge into each other. But this merg- fr promps, in turn, another merger, that Of the plural Jesuses of Matthew, Mark, and Luke into one synoptic Jesus. Thus the distinctive lineaments of the various portrayals are blurred almost to the vanish- ing poine; Wrighe's main incerest remains historical eather than biblical, and historici- ty is insulated againse the doubts chat dif- ferences between the Synoptis often raise (fo say nothing about greater differences berween these Gospels and the Gospel of John). ‘To some, the insulation will seem facile insofar asthe neglected differences fll into pattems, suggesting that other than-histor- ical concerns led the evangelists to write vnhistorically more often than Wright concedes. Repeatedly, for instance, he explains differences beeween parallel say- ings of Jesus as due to Jesus’ own varia tions, spoken on more than one occasion, and neglects the significant fact that, throughout, the sayings in Matthew tend toward rigorism, those in Luke toward thumancness, and s0 on. Given his main interest, though, Wright stats appropriately with the nine= reenth-century quest of the historical Jesus and moves next ro the new quest inaugu- tated in 1953 by Erase Kisemann and cevived moce recently by the Jesas Sem- inar. Wright’ skewering of that seminar and its construction of a nenapozalypti, almost non Jewish Jesus occupies consid” erable spae and shows Wright a hisjoust- ing best. Lastly, he associates himself ith the thi quest, represented also by E. Sanders and others who, on the whole, value smnopic historicity higher than docs the Jesus Seminar and sce the historical Jesus a solidly Jeish in outlook. The rest ‘of Wrights book is devoted to speling out the deri ofthat oudook. What a they? They are, Wrighe proposes, that, ‘whereas the Jews regarded themieles a3 stil iving in exile because of Roman dom- ination, Jesus announeed that the divinely promised and long-awaited restoration was under way, (So he appeared less 8 teacher of wisdom than a prophet.) Ac cording to him, moreover, the regoration vvas taking place in and theough his mir istry. How so, given that he was not throwing off the Roman yoke? ‘Well, Jesus had redefined the problem of Jewish exile and its solution. The prob- Jem by, notin Roman domination, but in the Jews satanclly inspired zea vo fice themselves from it by armed revolution instead of carrying out their divinely appointed rask of leading Gentiles co ‘worship the one true God. The solution lay in tepentance from that nationalistic sin and in bei in Jesus as the fea poine (of a renewed people of God that included Victory of God BYN.T. Weight Fortress 761 pp; $65, haroacke $38 pepertack Jewish outeasts and Gentiles. As such a focal point, Jesus spoke and acted mes- sianially as well a prophericlly, hough neither for him nor forthe Jews did mes- siahship entail deity To renew God’s people more incl sively, Jesus also redefined the Torah along lines of merey and forgiveness as ‘opposed to Israelite ancestry, food laws, and such lke. The temple he redefined in rerms of himself and his followers. And so it became unnecessary to obtain forgi ness through offering. sacrifice at the temple in Jerusalem, to observe Mosaic restrictions on diet, or to observe other practices demarcating Jews feom Gentiles. No wonder that the leaders—Torah- centered Pharisees and vemple-centered chief priests alike—opposed Jesus. He was dismantling the main symbols of Jewish national identiey! Tr did not take ‘omniscience for him to see the opposi tion mounting; so he made his lst jour ney to Jerusalem under the conviction that there he would be put to death andthus suffer the great tribulation that was expected to befall Iseael just before God usheeed in his kingdom. ‘Then Jesus did something that galva- nized his 5, especially the chief priests. He physically assaulted the satifi- ‘Gal system of worship that rook place in the temple, The assault was no mere attempt at reformation. No, it was an acted-out prophecy of judgment, of coming dest tion. And reports came that Jesus ad pre- dicted such destruction verbally, t00. In fact, he had. Earlier warnings of coming wrath had dealt, not with the eternal judgment of indivicual sinners hereafter, but with God’s using the Romans to judge the Jewish mation here and now for their insurrectionism. More recently and specifically, Jesus had cleared the ground fora redefined temple by predicting that the old, corrupt one would be destroyed within & generation, Furthermore, this desteuction would rmake obvious that he and the renewed people of God now constituted the true temple, that God had renurned (0 it, and that for his renewed peopl, the exile, the real one, had ended, ‘What to do with Jesus? Get rid of him, naturally, and use the Romans to do so. Hii constant tlk of Goe’s kingdom and his own kinglke deeds and words could bbe misrepresented as insurrectionary. The Romans crucified Jesus as King of the Jews, then. Only it was nor so easy 10 get fd of him He rose from the dead. That event, oo, Wright teas as historical, not as fictional or eschatologically ‘excluded from critical investigation Finally, Jesus came again at the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple in AD. 70. Not in the way a traditional view of the Second Coming has it, of course. All that language about the sun's darkening, the moon's turning to blood, the stars” fall ing, and the Son of Man's com- ing in clouds derives rom the Old ‘Testament, where it is used meta oval noctodecrbe ancndtothe space-time universe, but to invest human events with theological significance. “Thus, alk of celestial dsasers painted the destruction of Jerusalem and the tem- plein colors of divine judgment, and see- ing the Son of Man coming in clouds meant a recognition that the destruction ‘both demonstrated Jesus’ having already ascended t0 God's right hand, as distinct from descending to earth in the future, and vindicated God's renewed people sil 178 CHRISTIANITY TODAY: AFRIL 27,19 living on earth. So Jesus did not make a chronological mistake when he said that everything would happen before the con- temporary generation passed away. Every: thing did happen, right on schedule. For the events of AD. 70—the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple—were all that Jesus was predicting, and they rook place ‘within a generation of his prediction, Furthermore, those events marked the vie~ tory of God over those who had engi- neered the death of his con Jesus (hence the ttl of Wrights book). here is much to leaen from this reson struction of the historical Jesus, and we may laud Wright for some sterling contributions: his ealing attention to the neglected motif of exile and return; his maintaining Jesus’ Jewishness; his defend ing Jesus’ messianic self-consciousness (though self consciousness of a uniquely divine sonship gets shortchanged); his resisting che separation of faith from his- tory; his enlarging the historical base of four knowledge concerning Jesus; and his sharpening our tools of historiography’ especially his developing a criterion of double similariy-cum-double dissimibar- ity: what is credible in fistcentury Ju ddaism and as a stating point for Chris- tianity, bu sufficiency unlike both tobe a mere reflection, i likely historical But there is also much to question, ‘Most of ie has to do with the possibility that Wright presses his thesis 00 far, makes it all-encompassing when, in fat, ‘validly covers only one aspect of Jesus ‘ministry. In other words, ean all the syn- ‘optic and related texts tolerate the con- trolling story of reinterpreted exile and restoration that Wright places on them? For example, cin the prodi- gal son, who wanted distance and ‘wasted his substance in riotous living, repeesent Israel, who did ‘not want to go into exile and had no substance to waste there? Or can the sower’s sowing of good seed stand for God's causing true Jf israel to return from exile, even though Jesus describes as good, not any seed, but soil? Why are Jesus’ sheep scattered when he is seeuck? Is not the striking of the sep herd supposed to effect the opposite, their being gathered fiom exile? How is i that the elect are not gathered till after the great tribulation —tha ie, till after the Jewish War of AD. 66-74, in Weights ‘view—if Jesus was already gathering them from their exile 40 years earlier? How is it that Paul put “our gathering cogether to him’ nor el farure “coming of our Lord Jesus Chaise"? How is it thar James and Peter addeessed the recipients of their epistles as exiles in the Diaspora rather ‘han as returnees from it ‘According to Wright, Jesus thoughe that in his Passion he would suffer the {great ceibulation vicariously and thereby ‘enable his followers living in Judea to ‘scape the coming Roman slaughter, as they later did by fleeing Jerusalem before its destruction Is not this restriction of the benefits of his suffering to Judean dis- ciples coo severe? Does not his expanding 1 “all” the addeess of his command, “Watch,” imply a larger group? The de struction benefited disciples outside Judea by putting a stop to persecution emanat- ing from there, yer this benefit did not derive from Jesus suffering but from that ‘of unbelieving Jews; and the benefit was crased bg shifito Roman persecution. Treatise the pea ub Jation for his disciples, why did he puc it alr the abomination of desolation and link ie with ther later experience rather than with his own immediate experience? [And how is ie that he called on them to take up their crosses and folow him? OF what di their restoration fiom exile con- siscif they were not only going to continue living under Roman domination but also endure persecution for Jesus’ sake? Does ‘not answering tha thet restoration con- sisted in deliverance from the sin of insu- rectionism spirittalize the restoration in a ‘way analogous tothe doetrine of “abstract sxonement” on which Weight pours scorn? Does not most of Jesus’ pacific teaching have to do with nonretaliation against Jewvsh persecutors rather than with nonre- bellion against Roman overiords? Does it not turn seriptural emphasis upside down to ineerpree the plural “sins” that people epentantly confessed as pi: marily the singular sin of nationalistic insumrecionism, only secondarily of indi vidual’ sinning in various ways that Jesus discusses at length in his moral teaching? ‘And has not Wright's fixation on rede- fined exile and restoration likewise led hhim to ignore and even deny Pharisaic legalism a an object of Jesus critique? If Jesus’ charge that the temple had become “a den of robbers” meant cha it had become “2 den of revolutionaries,” why did Jesus drive ou che buyers and sellecs of sacrificial animals and birds? In what way did their activity represent insurrectionism? And if Jesus meant to do away with the temple and its sacrificialworship, why did he tell a danse leper 10 go show himself co the priest and offer the things commanded by Moses? Why did Jesus say to offer your pift at the altar after reconciliation with your brother? ‘Why dic Jesus clear the outer court of the ‘temple to enable Gentiles to pray there? Why should we regard the mountain being cast into the sea as Mount Zion, where the temple was located, when that ‘mountain has not been mentioned in the context, when the Mount of Olives has been mentioned recently, when “this mountain” refers more naturally to the Mount of Olives, right where Jesus and his disciples were located, than to Mount Zion in the distance, and when he hardly ‘meant that the destruction ofthe temple ‘would happen because some disciple of his was actaaly going to tlt Mount Zion ‘t0-be thrown into the sea? If in speaking of judgment to come Jesus did not refer to the last judgment bb to the destruction in A.D. 70, what are we 10 make of the Ninevites'and queen of the south’ being raised in the judgment With the men ofthis generation”? Did he think che Ninevites and queen would rise fiom the dead at the destruction? And in what sense did the destruction fulfil the judgment of “al the nations,” a judgment issuing in “cera le” for “the sheep” and “eternal punishment” foc “the goats.” noe in temporal survival and death a5 in AD. 70? Did the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple really exhaust Jesus’ warnings of judgment? ‘Does the accusation that Jesus said he would destroy the temple and in three days build another one form “the rock of history” on which, ironically enough,” we may stand? Is'not the irony rather that Wright cakes as rock solid a testimo- fay whose wording difers seriously from passage to passage and whose description a false he feeely admits? Solid but slip- pery? How can the house built on the tock be “a clear allusion 0 the temple,” that is “the true temple” built by Jesus, when the wise man who builds that house is a person who “hears and does” Jesus’ words, not Jesus himsel? Can it be that no first-century Jew would take Daniel 7:13 as the Son of ‘Man's descent from heaven? What of John 3:13, “And no one has ascended into heaven except the one who descend ced from heaven, the Son of Man”? Does not Wright's way of saving Jesus from ‘making ¢ mistake about the occurrence of “all these things” within a generation ‘come atthe price of subverting the natur RECOMMENDED READING Frederica Mathewes-Green, National Public Redio ‘commentatar and author of Facing East: A Pilgrim's Journey inte the Mysteries of Orthodoxy (Herper- ‘SanFrancisco) THE REVOLT tm fed up. Are you fod up? Let's secede. ‘There are times when that looks lke a prety good lastcitch svategy. Novelist Walker Perey suggested that Christians and defenders of tattered morality would eventually gather in the icticious town of Lost Cove, ‘Tennessee, and leave the rest ofthe world to continuo its handbasket journey. In The Revolt (Word, 1996, 425 pp.; $12.99, paper ist-time novelist Susan Wise Bauer has relocated that encampment to the state of Virginia—or rather the Commonveatth of Virginia, which fles the brand-new flag of the Reformed ‘American States. In this lively political thiler, Baver has assembled a cast of characters who actually move the plot by force oftheir character: psychologically complex fig- ures make decisions, and make mistakes, that make things happen. Its 8 shing change from the puppetiction that dominates this genre—indeed, {from most modern fiction, ‘Another quality that sets The Revolt apart from most ofits classmates is that itnever loses touch with believable reality—in part because Bauer has done an extraordinary amount of nuts-and-bolts research. The plotlines include a love story, paramilitary plotting, panicky White House strategy sessions, and behind- enemy-lines detective work at risk of death, There is something for everyone in this novel, and its all refreshingly well done. Give The Revolt to your favorite Clancy or Grisham fan. Is just the thing to educate a palate. al meaning of Jesus’ other eschatological pronouncements? TE Paul agiced with Jesus by refering the Day of the Lord to the desteuction ‘of Jerusalem rather than to the end, as Wright avers, how is it that Paul made that day an object of watchfulness and source of comfort for Christians living far coffin Greece, and described the day 35 one in which the Lord himself will descend from heaven, the dead in Chest wiles, and living Cheistians willbe caughe up together With them to meet the Lord in the a? How can Wright allow that Paul was describing Jesus’ return to eath yet aff that Pal thought of the Day ofthe Loc as encaling intermediate destruction rather than ial rerum? ‘Weight also avers that Iter Christians invented the doctrine of Jesus? return because they could not conceive that he was resurected if not t0 join those who will yet be resurrected to populate the coming new earth. But where isthe eve dence for any puzzling over the problem Cf Jesus absence ftom the new earth Someone hit on the solution of a reruen? For that mate, why could not Jesus i self have followed the line of reasoning that Weight ascribes ro latee Chestians? Maybe Wright can answer these and similar questions. Tris a compliment to him that his writing provokes them, but because the questions are serious, they need not only answers, bue convincing ‘ones, Otherwise, readers who are undee- standably eager to celebrate Wright's demolition of the Jesus Seminar and its anemic Jesus might think twice before accepting the Jesus that Wright has reconstructed asan alternative. Robert H. Gundry is Kathleen Smith Profesor af egw Suds et Waenont College m Sanus Barbar, California. He iste ahor of commentaries on Mattoo and Mark and ter scholarly works. His most recent book, ‘writen foray audience, Firs the Anti chest: Why Christ Won't Come Before the Antichrist Does (Bakr Book Howse) (CHRISTIANITY TODAY: APRIL 27, 1998 79.