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THE "AUTHENTIC" SAYINGS
OF JESUS
(A REVIEW AND CRITIQUE OF THE HISTORICAL JESUS)
BY AUTHORS OF THE EARLY 1990s
David G. Beshore
California Lutheran University
25 April 1993
" The historical in-depth exploration of the Jesus of
history is possible thanks to the New Testament sources, and necessary because of the
progress we have made in our consciousness of the problem. For Christianity is not based
on myths, legends, or fairy tales , and not just on doctrine (it is no "book
religion"), but primarily on a historical personality: Jesus of Nazareth, who is
believed as God's Christ. As we know, the testimonies in the New Testament-kerygmatic
accounts - do not permit us to reconstruct the biographical or psychological development
of Jesus - which also isn't even necessary. But they do make possible something that is
urgently demanded today for theological and pastoral reasons: to get a fresh view of the
original outlines of Jesus message, his way of life, his fate, and hence his person, all
of which has been so often painted over and concealed. Not a "reconstruction, but a
rediscovery of the Jesus of history".
from: Hans KUNG (7)
(Theology for the Third Millennium, P. 196, 1988)
"The whole history of these books is so defective and doubtful that it seems
vain to attempt minute inquiry into it: and such tricks have been played with their text
and with the texts of other books relating to them, that we have a right, from that cause,
to entertain much doubt what parts of them, form that cause, to entertain much doubt what
parts of them are genuine. In the New Testament there is internal evidence that parts of
it have proceeded from an extraordinary man; and that other parts are of the fabric of
very inferior minds. It is as easy to separate those parts, as to pick out diamonds from
dunghills. The matter of the first was such as would be preserved in the memory of the
hearers, and handed on by tradition for a long time: the latter such stuff as might be
gathered up, for imbedding it, anywhere, and at any time"
by Thomas Jefferson - 1814
1. PROLOG
The above quotes represent divergent views (a Christian scholar and a Founding Father
Deist) about the need to critically examine the source of Jesus deeds and sayings - that
have been expressed at different times during the last two centuries. My personal quest
started in February 1992 to attempt to understand why there were no writings recorded by
Jesus in the Bible's New Testament. I simply wondered "why is there no Book of Jesus
in the Bible?". Many clergymen and scholars, when asked this question have been
perplexed by this question and offered, in my opinion, stilted answers. Some stated that
Jesus was so divine that he could transmit his message at anytime through the chosen
disciples. Hence the Bible is truly his word as written by some of his disciples he
personally knew and blessed and through Paul, whom he didn't know but communicated to on
the road to Damascus through a blinding light and a voice that Paul heard. In researching
a better answer I have spent the last year-and-a-half trying to find 1) what Jesus really
said, 2) what he may not have said as claimed by others, and 3) what the various churches
(ancient and modern day).
Through this research and study, I have studied others who have had the same questions.
The questions actually first started as serious study with German Biblical scholars and
philosophers in the 19th century . Some say these critics were secular humanists out to
destroy the Bible as the inerrant word of God. Others would take the view that some were
inquisitive scientists who were trying the reconstruct the actual events of the life and
times of Jesus in order to better understand the Bible as a historical document.
2. THE QUEST AND THE FINDINGS
For this project I have chosen some of the current day biblical scholars and 1990s authors
(Crossan (1), Mitchell(2), Mack(3), Koester(4) and Meier(5) - Funk(6) is due to be
published in August 1993 and could not be reviewed for this study) to critically examine
the real message of Jesus. A message, if possible, without the dogma of the early and
latter day churches. Unexpectedly, this research has led to some fascinating insights into
the way the New Testament was written, the motives of its authors, and the life and times
of the people of Israel, the Jewish Diaspora, and Roman and Greek civilizations. This
research ,combined with the religion courses taken over the past year at California
Lutheran (World Religion - Dr. Sills and Jesus in Film and History - Dr. Streeter) and
several discussions with the clergy, has helped me draw several conclusions about who
Jesus was, why we revere him, and what he must have said.
I begin with one of the most scholarly books on the subject by Crossan and discuss two
other authors who have either developed a Gospel of Jesus or found original doctrine of
the Jesus people. I have also found researchers looking for evidence of the Diatessaron
(Gospel Harmony), written by Tatian in 172 C.E. which may have been a competitor to our
New Testament. Finally I conclude with the work of Meier who has summed up the rules of
historicity that most of the authors use and offer his view as being the best assessment
as to where we are in the 1990s with the quest for the historical Jesus and the Bible's
authenticity.
2.1 CROSSAN: THE HISTORICAL JESUS - THE LIFE OF A MEDITERRANEAN JEWISH PEASANT
(1991)
"IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE PERFORMANCE, not the word alone, not the deed alone, but
both, each indelibly marked with the other forever". So begins Crossan in the chapter
entitled "Overture" in his book The Historical Jesus. After this two page
Overture, Crossan boldly presents the 15 page "The Gospel According to Jesus".
In this Gospel we find no virgin birth narrative as we do in the Books of Matthew and
Luke. We also find no story of the resurrection. And where are the miracles that Jesus
himself could only perform, particularly raise the dead, heal the sick and make blind men
see. Could Crossan have made a mistake by leaving these most valued mystical stories about
the life and death of Jesus or is this his plan along with the rest of the critics of the
foundations of the Bible. In the remaining 500 pages of the book, Crossan describes his
methodology that has led to short and simple Gospel.
Can Crossan believe that Jesus was just a man without the divinity so often over
prescribed by the Bible, men of profound faith, and the mediaphiles on the Christian
Broadcast Network, and self-proclaimed evangelists. Or does he have an approach that
appeals to the men of reason , scientists, and modern philosophers - the modern day
secular humanist. What is his agenda ? - does Crossan show the truth or can we trust the
entirety of the Bible. How can several hundred pages written by the disciples and apostles
in the Bible be distilled down to a 15 page "performance" by a good and holy man
named Jesus who professes the best of human qualities, love and forgiveness can get you
closer to God and his Kingdom. Is Jesus just a man who can tell a spell binding story in a
few words and capture the essence of human existence. If this is all that there is, isn't
it enough! Has there been too much put into Jesus mouth and persona in order to seek
advantage and power over others. Was there a war or struggle behind the truth that
corrupted the original message of Jesus and was it easily done by claiming.
I believe, as will be shown in the following discussion, that Crossan has non-linear
methodology to determine what Jesus said by understanding the context in which the Bible
was written as well as the context of history in which Jesus lived. The two contexts are
profoundly different and must be defined with better tools of analysis. The tools that he
described have the sophistication to be applied to any criticism of any historical events.
However, as I will explain in later discussion I think his approach has several subjective
overtones which looses the objective nature of the methodology.
2.1.1 Crossan's Methodology
The Crossan methodology is simply this: Define a triple triad process - the campaign, the
strategy, and the tactics. The campaign is further defined with tools of anthropology,
history, and literature. For effective synthesis of the works of Jesus, each must be
considered and weighted equally. If in the process no weight can be support the triad as
substantial as the other two then the argument has less appeal historically and
authentically. Crossan is very serious about this triad weighting in his methodology - it
forms the foundation of his exhaustive works. Crossan believes that the literary problem
for Jesus is indeed the four Gospels of the Bible and he illustrates the problem by
describing the inconsistencies in the four Gospels by horizontal comparisons - as the
Germans had developed their form criticism techniques in the 19th century. Knowing that
literature existed about Jesus before the Gospels were written (70 - 100 C.E.) then how do
we find the original so to speak. How do we find the Classic Coke formula when so many
impostors and mimickers tried to tell us what Jesus did and who he really was. How does
one search through the cyclic layers of retention, development, and creation of novelists.
" Jesus left behind him thinkers not memorizers, disciples not reciters, people not
parrots".
Crossan's second triad focuses on the textual problem. The first step in the resolution of
text is inventory. That is to consider all literary sources - canonical, non-canonical,
and intercanonical. The second step is stratification - the positioning of each text in
time and chronological sequence with other documents. The third step is attestation. This
may loop back to inventory but tries to set up the basis that something is authentic if
several independent written or eye witness accounts say the same thing.
The third triad is based on the manipulation of the inventory. The first of the three
elements is the sequence of strata . He believes that the first strata must be the
beginning and a trajectory be developed through the second, third and fourth strata. An
event being reported closest to Jesus time has more weight than later writings. The second
element of this triad is hierarchy of attestation. This is simply defined as the fact that
multiple attestations in the first stratum are given higher weights that those that have
fewer attestations in the higher stratums. The final element is bracketing of singularity
- rejecting any single attestation at any stratum.
Finally, Crossan develops a numbering system that indicates the relative weight of a
message, or unit, with respect to other units. The number system consists of two numbers
in brackets, example [1/4]. The first number represents the strata layer and the second
the number of attestations. Thus a number of [1/6] would have a much higher weight than
[4/1] for example. Actually [4/1] would be considered a singularity and according to the
third element in the third triad would be rejected. Further, Crossan makes this numbering
system a bit easier, by providing a + for those he thinks were said by Jesus, a - for
those he thinks were not said by Jesus and ± for those that don't really matter anyway.
2.1.2 The Inventory
The first half of the book Crossan relies heavily on Josephus writings Jewish Wars and
Jewish Antiquities in setting the context of the Jewish way of life under the domination
of the Romans and the influence of Greek culture. Very little discussion is about Jesus
until the second half of the book. Crossan's rationale in discussing some of the major
works of Jewish life from 50 to 70 C.E. is to develop one of the strata into which the
belief in Jesus begins to be solidified into teachings of churches. He depicts the life of
a Cynic which has Greco-Roman heritage, the foundations of magic versus religion, and the
classless and oppressive lifestyles of the Jews. Although he describes the lifestyles of
the Sadducces, Pharisees, Zealots, and Sacarii in the Jewish culture he believes these
were more related to sects of the Jewish religion who had their own political agendas.
These sects attracted Jews with different economic means, but their were only two classes
which existed in the society - those that were below the subsistence level and those that
were more comfortable. Crossan notes that nearly 75% of the live births had died by the
time they had reached 26 years of age. Only 3% reached their sixties. It is against this
background that Crossan describes the Roman politics and taxation of the Jews.
In the second half of the book (which finally get to the point), Crossan addresses the
writings about Jesus through the methodology of layered strata and multiple attestations.
All works are used - particularly the Gospel of Thomas and the Sayings of the Q (Common
scripture source to Matthew and Luke but not to Mark and John). The sources mentioned in
his book appendix are shown in Figure 1 - my derivation of the linkage between the
layered-in-time, i.e. strata of documents mentioned in Crossan's book. Of particular note
is that Crossan believes there are other primary source documents like the Cross Gospel,
which have no record of authenticity, that the disciple authors used to develop the
Gospels in the New Testament. I have also noted in the diagram what is canonical and
non-canonical. From this figure one immediately notes that all canonical documents are
based on non-canonical documents, with exception to the Pauline doctrines. Also, most of
the 2nd century documents are based on both canonical and non-canonical teachings. From
the diagram, one is struck with the question as to why did the four Gospels and the
Pauline letters become the Word of God and become accepted as canon.
2.1.3 Most Likely and the Least Likely Jesus Deeds and Sayings
I have summarized in Table 1, what Crossan believes or doesn't believe are the authentic
accounts of Jesus life (along with the other authors). I have used the time strata of
Crossan to help organize the "themes" that scripture ascribes to for all the
authors. I will use Table 1 in the conclusion section of this paper to make a summary.
2.1.4 Conclusions About Crossan
In summary, I have concluded that Crossan has determined that only 15-20% of the New
Testament sayings and deeds of Jesus are indeed "authentic". Crossan is
struggles with the concept of the divinity in Jesus as have the ancients since _______..
He does not believe in the resurrection accounts of Jesus, the divine accounts of his
Baptism, nor his ability to predict his demise and eventual death.
2.2 MITCHELL: THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO JESUS (1991)
Mitchell (who has a Judeo-Zen background) provides a different and less cumbersome
methodology to find the real meaning of Jesus. He bases his work on what Jefferson called
"internal evidence" - the evidence provided by the words themselves. He
describes the authentic he says: "...when I use the word authentic, I don't mean that
a saying or incident can be proved to originate from the historical Jesus of Nazareth.
There are no such proofs; there are only probabilities." Jesus signature revolves
around the themes of generosity, compassion, impartiality, serenity. Gone is the Jesus who
preaches hellfire and damnation. Forgiveness is a sign showing us the nature of the
Kingdom. Jesus performed most of his great works among the poor and outcasts.
2.2.1 Most Likely and the Least Likely Jesus Deeds and Sayings
Mitchell presents a 26 page Gospel of Jesus - see Table 1 for those themes that Mitchell
believes are authentic. Although Mitchell takes the high ground and does not explicitly
state what he rejects in the New Testament, I have used the Crossan outline to assess what
Mitchell has dispelled. This gospel begins with Jesus being baptized by John the Baptist -
like the Gospels of Mark and John there is no virgin birth. Jesus gathers his disciples
and performs miracles on the sick and diseased. He teaches great truths through stories
called parables. Jesus addresses those who are blessed - the poor in sprit, the grieving,
the merciful, the pure in heart, the peacemakers. Jesus is called before the high priests,
who give him to the Romans. Pilate sentences Jesus to death and he is crucified. There is
no story of his resurrection.
2.2.2 Conclusions About Mitchell
During the rest of the book, Mitchell provides supporting evidence of the authenticity of
the messages that he has extracted from the Bible. He claims that the Sermon on the Mount
never took place but was a collection of sayings by Jesus that was collected by Matthew.
In the final chapters of the book are words of famous people of history on the subject of
Jesus. The list includes Spinoza, Jefferson, Blake, Emerson, Thoreau, Tolstoy, Nietzche,
Shaw, Gandhi, and Maharashi. This is an interesting list of political leaders,
philosophers, and Eastern religious leaders.
It appears important to Mitchell to find the Jesus that matches his concepts of a religion
of peace and serenity. These concepts are biased through his preference for the Eastern
religions -- those that believed that man can achieve during his lifetime the state of
Godliness. He rejects the supernatural qualities of Jesus -- with the exception of his
healing powers.
2.3 MACK: THE LOST GOSPEL - THE BOOK OF Q (1993)
This recent book by Mack, attempts to find the Gospel of Jesus through the early writings
about Jesus which are found in the Q, or Quell (meaning source in German), source that
both Matthew and Luke used in writing their Gospels. Mack starts "Once upon a time,
before there were gospels of the kind familiar to readers of the New Testament, the first
followers of Jesus wrote another kind of book... their book contained only his teachings.
Mack believed that what was most important to his early followers was the body of
instructions that were inculcated in the Jesus movement. He claims that the myth of
crucifixion followed by resurrection formed in northern Syria and Asia Minor - the first
Christians. The remarkable thing about the people of Q is that they were not Christians.
They did not think of Jesus as a messiah or the Christ nor did they regard his death as
divine, tragic, or a saving event. In short, they did not form a cult of Christ. The
people of the Q were Jesus people.
Interestingly, Mack believes that not all of the Q sayings can be attributed to Jesus,
because of the subject of some of the sayings resemble a reflection on an earlier saying
and cannot be ascribed to the times of Jesus. Thus build a three layer stratification of
the Q sayings - Parts 1,2, and 3. Mack mentions the works of Kloppenborg, Q Parallels, as
being the standard reference of the Q studies in America as well as the International Q
Project and the Q Project of the Society of Biblical Literature. He also reviews the view
of Jesus by Schweitzer, Bultmann, Bornkamm, Dodd, and Robinson. Robinson in 1971 connected
the Q sayings and the Gospel of Thomas (a noncanonical book found in the Nag Hammadi
codices). Robinson concluded that the Q sayings were a common form of Wisdom teachings, or
sapiential instruction, during that time.
Mack, later in the book, after presenting two versions of the Q, revisits Galilee as being
the home of the people and congregation of the Q. Although most Christians might believe
that everyone in Judea was Jewish, a short geography and history lesson would suggest that
Galilee was a fringe community, consisting of neither a plurality of Jews, Samaritans, nor
Syrians. Thus Jesus grew up in a mix of cultures and was probably influenced by them. In
short the region was heavily influenced by Hellenistic customs and beliefs. This influence
is being substantiated by archeological findings. Also there is very little evidence of
the presence of the Pharisees.
2.3.1 Most Likely and the Least Likely Jesus Deeds and Sayings
Of the 62 verses of the Q, the three layers of the Q can be summarized as follows:
• Layer 1 - Primary instructions addressed to the community: characteristic of the
Greek tradition of the Cynic philosophers - a call for individuals to live against the
mainstream using unconventional behavior.
• Layer 2a - Judgmental sayings that address "this generation": prophecy
according to the Hebrew Bible, steeped in Jewish traditions and customs and social classes
• Layer 2b - Instructions to the community in the light of the judgmental sayings
addressed to "this generation".
As before, I have shown how the sayings of the Q compares with Crossan and Mitchell. The
Gospel of Q starts with the appearance of John the Baptist, then follows with the
temptation story in the wilderness, Jesus teachings, instructions for Jesus' movement,
confidence in the Father, judgment of this generation, pronouncements against the
Pharisees, possessions, parables on the Kingdom, community rules, and the final judgment.
Again, there are no stories of Jesus virgin birth nor his resurrection after crucifixion.
What is also missing in the Q are the stories about the disciples. In short the Q source
appears to be a doctrinal account of Jesus and not historical.
2.3.2 Conclusions About Mack
The Q source, because of its early origins (at least predating Matthew and Luke in 80-90
C.E) and not known to Mark, was once believed to be an authentic source by the Germans.
The source did not contain accounts of the virgin birth, the resurrection, the following
by the disciples, nor much other historical information. However the Q researchers today
have concluded that it is the early doctrine not of Christian Jews, nor Jewish Christians,
but probably the people of Jesus who had a mixed culture in Galilee. The community rules
(code of conduct and morals) were more important than the divinity of Jesus. This is a
good scholarly work and tries to frame the sayings in time as well as space, as shown in
Figure 3.
2.4 KOESTER: ANCIENT CHRISTIAN GOSPELS - THEIR HISTORY AND DEVELOPMENT (1990)
Koester begins with a definition of the word Gospel and takes nearly 50 pages to describe
the nature of the canonical and non-canonical Gospels. He performs an excellent
compilation of what Crossan calls the "inventory" of Jesus sayings. He discusses
the contents of the canonical Synoptic Gospels, the Q sources, the Gospel of Thomas
(noncanonical), as well as second century harmonization authors such as Clement, Martyr,
and Taitian's Diastessaron. Unlike Crossan, however, Koester is only interested in
presenting the facts of these historical documents - particularly their authorship, the
time and place of their writings. He performs a good deal of time on the Gospel of Thomas
and comparisons of this gospel with the Synoptics and the Q. He mentions Crossan's works
and agrees with Crossan on several "conflation" of several sources performed by
the writers of the New Testament gospels. Koester also does an excellent job of comparing
the Synoptics with one another. He provides background of the Gnostics and their
teachings, possibly with the Gospel of Thomas, and probably with the book of John. Koester
discussed the Dialogue of the Savior, see Figure 1, at length in comparisons.
I found the discussion of the harmonization of the Gospels conducted during the second
century C.E. to provide much insight to the development of the New Testament canon and
possibly to the formation of the Gospels themselves - which can be viewed a form of
harmonization. Like the Gospels and particularly the Gospel of Q, no direct manuscript of
the Diatessaron exists. Only references to it are used to reconstruct its content and
fragments from codices , in date from the 3rd to 19th centuries. This document probably
competed with the New Testament until it canonization in 300-400 C.E.
2.4.1 Most Likely and the Least Likely Jesus Deeds and Sayings
Again, Koester's book is more of an historical account of Jesus' sayings and less of a
methodology to determine the authenticity of a saying. Out of Koester's book I chose the
Taitian's Diatessaron (a harmony written in 172 C.E.) to be a good compilation for the
authentic sayings of Jesus - believed to originally have been written in Syrian. Taitian
was a student of Justin Martyr and assembled a collection that included the Synoptic
Gospels, the Gospels of John and Thomas, the Gospel of the Hebrews and other non-canonical
writings. Because only limited witnessing (accounts) are mentioned in Koester, I have not
made a comparison of the messages in the Diatessaron tradition. It, like the each of the
Gospels, reflects the theology and praxis of its locale. Because it is a harmonization,
one finds some changes in the language from the original writings of the Apostles. The
document was controversial, as was most second century compilations, and were obviously
eventually rejected by the church in favor of the apostolic Gospels and Paul's Epistles.
Current research of the Diatessaronic tradition focuses on three rules aid in the search
for what was in the Diatessaron:
• a reading should be found in both the Eastern and Western witnesses
• the reading should be absent from all Diatessaronic sources
• the source should come from "Life of Jesus" genre
Current sources include the Eastern and Western witnesses:
Eastern
• Ephrem's Commentary (373 C.E) - Greatest Father of the Syrian church
• Arabic Harmony - Arabic translation of the Diatessaron (1043 C.E.)
• Persian Harmony - 1547 C.E.
• Syriac Versions (Sinaiticus, Curetonianus, Peshitta, and Palestinian Syriac
Lectionary)
• Old Armenian and Old Georgian Versions of the Gospel
• Manichaen Documents
• Miscellaneous fragments and Arabic and Karsuni manuscripts
Western
• Codex Fuldensis and the Latin Harmonies (546 CE)
• Old High German harmonies: Codex Sangallensis (830 CE)
• Vetus Latina, Novatian, and the Roman Antiphonary
• Liege Harmony (437 CE) - most important Western source
• Medieval Italian Harmonies (1400-1500 CE)
• Middle English Pepysian Harmony (1400 CE)
A work of the Diatessaron may be considered a witness where the Vetus Latina and the Vetus
Syra agree against the Greek. However, since large passages of the Diatessaron now contain
direct passages from the New Testament, most research is investigating where the witnesses
agree with one another but differ from the New Testament.
2.5 MEIER: A MARGINAL JEW - RETHINKING THE HISTORICAL JESUS
Meier says: " All too often, popular books on Jesus pick and choose among the Gospel
stories in a haphazard way, the authors deciding at any given moment that what strikes
them as reasonable or plausible is therefore historical. More technical books usually
enunciate rules fro judging the Gospel material ("criteria of historicity"), but
the rules sometimes seem to be forgotten when the Gospel pericopes are treated in detail.
Meier breaks down the material about Jesus into three time strata:
Stage I (28-30 CE) What comes from Jesus
Stage II (30-70 CE) Oral Tradition of the Church
Stage III (70-100 CE) Editorial Work (redaction) of the Evangelists.
He offers a simple set of five (5) primary and four (4) rules for testing the criteria of
authenticity of the accounts of Jesus life and criticizes those who develop complicated
methodologies. The five primary rules are:
1. The Criterion of Embarrassment or Contradiction - those that would have created
difficulty for the early Church (an example is the Baptism of a sinless and superior Jesus
by John)
2. The Criterion of Discontinuity (also labeled dissimilarity, originality, or dual
irreducibility) - those that cannot be derived from Judaism or the early Church after him
3. The Criterion of Multiple Attestation (cross-section) - those sayings that are attested
in more than one literary source.
4. The Criterion of Coherence (or consistency or conformity) - Items that fit with the
first 3 Criterion have a good chance of being historical (they convey to message of Jesus
- not necessarily the words of Jesus)
5. The Criteria of rejection and Execution - what historical words and deeds of Jesus can
explain his trial and crucifixion as "King of the Jews". The recognition that
Jesus did threaten, disturb, and infuriate people. The Jesus whose words and deeds would
not alienate people, especially powerful people, is not the historical Jesus.
The secondary (or dubious) Criteria are:
6. The Criterion of Traces of Aramaic - This criteria points to Joachim Jermias who point
to traces of Aramaic (the language that Jesus spoke) vocabulary, grammar, syntax, rhythm,
and in the Greek version of saying of Jesus as signs of an authentic sayings. Meier states
that this criterion has serious problems because many of the Christian Jews also spoke and
wrote in Aramaic.
7. The Criterion of Palestinian Environment - sayings that reflect the culture of the
first century affirms Jesus sayings. As for the reasons of Criterion 6, Meier says that
this criterion has similar problems.
8. The Criterion of Vividness of Narration - This criterion proposed by some is saying
that liveness and concrete details are themselves proof to historicity. Meier correctly
states that this would make many good novels of historical value.
9. The Criterion of the Tendencies of Developing Synoptic Tradition - the form critics ,
like Bultmann thought they could isolate the laws of development within the Synoptic
tradition. This approach looks for commonalty only among the Books of Mark, Luke and
Matthew for historicity. An example is the Q source as being the authentic works of Jesus.
Meier disagrees that this trajectory analysis back to the oral tradition can be done.
10. The Criterion of Historical Presumption - anyone who claims that a saying is authentic
must bear the axiom that the burden of proof lies on anyone who tries to prove anything.
There are difficult cases in which earlier or later accounts do not lend any authenticity.
Meier claims that the Synoptic Gospels which were written after 70 CE cannot be proven any
more accurate than earlier accounts such as those written by Paul in 50 CE).
From this set of prioritized criterion we see that Meier would not discount anything in
the New Testament or the non-canonical writings as being authentic or not. However from
his first six set of criteria he would agree that the multiple attestations developed by
Crossan are some of the more likely.
2.5.1 Most Likely and the Least Likely Jesus Deeds and Sayings
In Table 1, I therefore I have shown that Meier would agree in most cases with Crossan and
be neutral and disagree to those sayings and deeds that Crossan has rejected.
2.5.2 Conclusions About Meier
Meier in a more interesting way than the other authors tackles some of the more
fundamental issues that have surfaced in recent times - was Jesus married, was he
illegitimate, was he illiterate, was he really a poor carpenter, and what was his family
and environment considered to be that influence his thinking and nature. In all cases
Meier sides with the Biblical accounts in answering these questions and offers interesting
perspective.
3. SUMMARY
Investigating the original sayings of Jesus has been renewed in very recent times, just in
the past 20 to 30 years by more exhaustive analysis of canonical and noncanonical
writings. The comparison of the works of five author's works of the early 1990s has
provided a better understanding of the criticism currently taking place among the scholars
and the level of sophisticated tools being used to assess the authenticity of the Bible. I
side with Meier's perspective and the use and misuse of the ten (10 ) criterion in his
book. Any claim by anyone (by scholars, clergy, cult leaders, etc.) to have extracted the
original words must be treated with strong skepticism. In all this research, I am more
skeptical of current authors and their motives than I am of the writers of the New
Testament. These critics shed do render a service by shedding new light on the personality
of Jesus within the context of space and time.
With the exception of Paul's letters and the Gospel of Thomas, most writings were
generated after the destruction of the Jewish temple in Jerusalem in 70 CE. Extraction of
the Gospels by the authors of the 1990's present complicated methodologies to prove the
authenticity of a Saying of Jesus - through an interesting combination of anthropology,
archeology and textual criticism. In most cases they discount the virgin birth and the
resurrection of Jesus - which is beyond the rationalization of modern day humanists,
philosophers and scientists.
The arguments of the authors presented here are persuasive. These higher criticisms
probably confuse the educated as well as the non-educated and the non-believers. However,
it should not disturb those that have faith in Jesus message and deeds as proclaimed by
the good news of the New Testament. Evolution in Christianity will occur over time as more
documents are discovered and pieced together. However the process of disassembling the New
Testament to find the original must be done carefully and is currently beyond our level of
analysis, methods or our mental capabilities. The non-canonical writings add dimensions to
the Bible but I have not found any new awe-inspiring messages in the Gnostic writings of
the Nag Hammadi library (8,9,10,11) nor the other non-canonical harmonies of the second
century. After this long search, I have found no messages greater than the ones already
told in the Christian Bible. Our task therefore is to study its depth and meaning about
Jesus' life, while understanding its place in the historical and present day worlds.
By the way, the Book of Jesus has yet to be written by Jesus! - he left it that way.
REFERENCES CITED
1. Crossan J. D., The Historical Jesus - The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant,
Harper San Francisco, 1991.
2. Mitchell S., The Gospel According to Jesus, A New Translation Guide to His Essential
Teachings For Believers and Unbelievers, Harper Collins Publishers, 1991.
3. Mack, B.L., The Lost Gospel - The Book of Q and Christian Origins, Harper San
Francisco, 1993.
4. Koester, H., Ancient Christian Gospels - Their History and Development, Trinity Press
International, Philadelphia, PA, 1990.
5. Meier, John P, A Marginal Jew - Rethinking the Historical Jesus , The Anchor Bible
Reference Library, Doubleday, New York, NY, 1991.
6. Funk, R.W. and R. W. Hoover, Five Gospels, One Jesus: What Did Jesus Really Say? The
Scholars Red Letter Edition, Sonoma, CA: Polebridge Press, August 1993.
7. Kung, Hans, Theology for the Third Millennium, Anchor Books, Doubleday, 1988.
8. Robinson, J.M., The Nag Hammadi Library, Revised Edition, Harper San Francisco, 1988.
9. Barnstone, W. The Other Bible, Harper San Francisco, 1984
10. Rudolph, K. Gnosis- The Nature and History of Gnosticism, Harper San Francisco, 1984.
11. Pagels, E., The Gnostic Gospels, Vintage Books Random House, 1979
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