Lent

Lent (the word means Springtime) is one of those religious observances of the Christian Church worldwide that I did not experience in my youth.¹ Although some churches in the Anabaptist tradition do observe it,² the Baptist church of my youth did not (First Baptist Church, Greenville, Mississippi, 1940-52). On the other hand, the small Baptist church that I now attend (Grace Baptist, Gladstone, Missouri) does observe it—ashes and all.³

            In the fourth century the church invented Lent institutionalizing it with prayer, fasting, and almsgiving as its basis and incorporating these religious acts into the Easter celebration of the resurrection of Jesus. Lent has been practiced as 40 days of self-denial, altruism, and spiritual renewal preceding Easter. The Lenten season is promoted as a time of religious renewal, incorporating, as it does, personal contemplation, simple living, and personal honesty. It begins on Ash Wednesday and extends 40 days to resurrection Sunday (this year April 20). The church modeled the 40-day period on Jesus' temptation by Satan in the Wilderness (Mark 1:12–13; compare Matt 4–11/Luke 4:1–13 from the Q tradition). Only Matthew describes it as a period of fasting, however. Luke says that he did not eat during this period. Mark says nothing about food. The difference between not eating and fasting is that fasting has a religious connotation.

            The earliest date for the observance of Lent in Christianity is 325 CE, following the Council of Nicaea, although the custom of fasting in connection with Holy Week goes back to the second century.⁴ Thus, Lent, as such, was not a part of the religious practices of the earliest first-century Jesus-gatherings as reflected in the genuine Pauline letters, for example. Nevertheless, fasting and prayer as a religious exercise were part of the Israelite tradition and hence were practiced in Judea during the time of Jesus (Luke 2:37). In fact, "the practice of fasting is found in all religions" and was "spread across the whole of the ancient world."⁵

Matthew gives a litany of criticisms attributed to Jesus as to how some practiced praying and fasting in Matt 6:1–18. One of these criticisms can easily be applied to the modern Christian practice of Lent, specifically with respect to marking one's face with ashes to indicate that one is observing the Lenten practice of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving:

And when you fast do not look dismal, like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces that their fasting may be seen by others. Truly I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you fast anoint your head and wash your face, that your fasting may not be seen by others but by your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you. (Matt 6:17–18).

Do some make a parade of their almsgiving? Jesus criticized that practice, as well (Matt 6:1-4).⁶

Another aspect of Lent, mentioned earlier in this essay, is that of self-denial, likely derived from the idea of denying oneself food. The earliest Jesus-followers did practice a kind of self-denial, but it wasn't like the Lenten practice of denying oneself of a few things one enjoys for a short period, like giving up beer or not eating sweets, for example. Paul described his commitment to Christ as an all-consuming life-commitment; everything else by comparison he considered trash, loss, rubbish (Phil 3:7–11; Luke 9:23–24). Compared to Paul's idea of self-denial, the contemporary observance of Lent pales in comparison—the personal sacrifices are too little, the time frame too short.

Charles W. Hedrick
Professor Emeritus
Missouri State University

¹en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lent

²https://www.britannica.com/topic/Anabaptists. Greenville First Baptist belonged to the Southern Baptist Convention.

³Grace Baptist Church belongs to the American Baptist Convention.

⁴https://groundworkonline.com/blog/a-short-version-of-the-long-history-of-lent

⁵J. Behm, "νῆστις" [nēstis, fasting], vol. 4.26 in G. Kittel, ed., Theological Dictionary of the New Testament (G. Bromiley, trans.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1967).

⁶Hedrick, http://blog.charleshedrick.com/search?q=Alms

When did Jesus stop talking?

It sounds like a trick question, right? Nevertheless, I will attempt to show you that it is quite serious. When Jesus died by crucifixion at the hands of the Romans somewhere around 30,¹ his early followers believed that God restored him to life and the three authors (whoever they may have been) of the canonical gospels (which Christians today affirm as God’s Word) conclude their gospels with resurrection narratives.² All but Mark end their gospels with a series of post-crucifixion appearances of Jesus in which Jesus (back to the land of the living) speaks. None of the sayings of Jesus in these appearance stories, however, are regarded by historians as sayings of the historical man, Jesus.³

            Later followers of Jesus (30-70), before the canonical gospels began to be written, apparently believed that resurrection appearances of Jesus confirmed that Jesus had, in fact, been raised from the dead. See Paul’s statement (1 Cor 15:3-8) that after the crucifixion Jesus had appeared to Cephas (Peter), to the twelve (disciples), more than 500 people on one occasion, James, all the apostles, and even to Paul himself. And the voice of the living Jesus continued to be heard through the mouths of prophets whom, as it was believed, God had appointed to speak in the name of the Lord in the gatherings of Jesus followers (1 Cor 12:10, 28).⁴

The early Christian prophet was an immediately-inspired spokesperson for God, the risen Jesus, or the spirit who received intelligible oracles that he or she felt impelled to deliver to the Christian community or, representing the community, to the general public.⁵

The most intense period of early Christian prophecy was roughly 30-70 before sayings of Jesus were incorporated into gospels.⁶ During this period prophets circulated among gatherings of Jesus followers and, when prompted, spoke the Word of the Lord to their contemporaries (Didache 11:3-13:7). Hence, the oral tradition about Jesus’ sayings and doings contained both sayings of the (dirty-footed) historical man and sayings of the (spiritually?) resurrected Lord. Such sayings entered the stream of Christian oral tradition, which was the resource used, in part,⁷ by the authors of the canonical gospels in narrating the teaching and deeds of Jesus reported in their gospels.⁸

            A case on point is a saying of the resurrected Lord spoken by the early Christian prophet, John the revelator:

Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me. (Rev 3:20 RSV)

Should this saying be regarded as spoken by Jesus? John regards it as part of the revelation of Jesus Christ (Rev 1:1), which came to him through the Lord’s angel (Rev 1:2) while he was in the Spirit on the Lord’s Day (Rev 1:11) as a part of a “letter” to the Jesus gathering in Laodicea (Rev 3:14). If you regard it as a saying of Jesus, should it be accorded equal weight with sayings that came out of Jesus’s own mouth? The big question, however, is how does one sort out sayings in the gospels that probably came from the Lord’s own mouth from sayings that may have come from an early Christian prophet or the creative imagination of the evangelists?

Charles W. Hedrick
Professor Emeritus
Missouri State University

¹Jesus was crucified at some point within the Prefecture of Pontius Pilate, Prefect of Judea, 26-36: Tessa Rajak, “Pontius Pilatus,” Oxford Classical Dictionary (3^rd ed., 1999), 1220.

²Mark 16:1-8; Matt 28:1-8; Luke 24:1-12; John 20:1-10.

³The empty tomb stories, resurrection appearances, and ascension of Jesus are not printed at their narrated place in each of the gospels but handled in a separate section in the back of R. W. Funk and the Jesus Seminar, The Acts of Jesus (HarperCollins, 1998), 449-95.

⁴http://blog.charleshedrick.com/search?q=early+Christian+prophets

⁵M. E. Boring, “Prophecy (Early Christian),” Anchor Bible Dictionary (1992). 5:495-502.

⁶Although the oral tradition was still influential into the second century.

⁷Matthew, Luke, and John also drew from other written texts, and their own creative imaginations. None of them were eyewitnesses to what they reported.

⁸Hedrick, When History and Faith Collide, 127.

Jesus said: "Love Your Enemies"

In this most outlandishly stated, mind-boggling, aphorism Jesus says “Love your enemies.”¹ Such a statement prompts me to ask,

Now wait a minute Jesus, do you mean that I should respond with love to someone who wants to destroy me? Love them like I love those closest to me in whose behalf I would gladly do anything humanly possible? Or do you simply mean that I should treat them kindly and humanely? Actually loving an enemy could well get another loved one, or myself, injured or killed.

            The saying, “love your enemies,” enters the stream of the written Jesus traditions through the now lost (or hypothetical) Gospel Q² The earliest the saying appears is the second half of the first century, (arguably) copied independently at different times from Q by Matthew (5:44) and Luke (who uses it twice, Luke 6:27, 35). The raw statistical records of the voting of the Jesus Seminar do not agree and hence send mixed signals as to whether the aphorism originated with Jesus.³ In the Five Gospels, however, two of these sayings are colored red and one (Luke 6:35) is colored pink.⁴ The color red/pink accords the saying the status of having probably originated with the historical man, Jesus of Nazareth (as opposed to it being a saying from an early Christian prophet, or borrowed from elsewhere and attributed to Jesus).

            By contrast, in the Israelite tradition, one is directed to love one’s neighbor (Lev 19:18), who is identified as a fellow Israelite (Deut 15:2-3). Israelites also have the obligation to help enemies (Exod 23:4-5) and treat them humanely (Prov 25:21).⁵ Even the stranger or alien in the land is to be treated as a native of the land (Lev19:33-34). The Israelite tradition sets a high ethical standard for the Israelite to follow, without enjoining the extraordinary, perhaps even preposterous (that is, utterly absurd or ridiculous), injunction to love the enemy. On the other hand, In Ps 139:21-22 the psalmist says that he “hates the enemies of the Lord.” That is to say, the Lord’s enemies are his enemies too, but even hating the Lord’s enemies is excluded by the unqualified assertion of Jesus. People who love their enemies, from their own perspective, have no enemies. Nevertheless, those whom one previously regarded as an enemy may not reciprocate that sentiment and may still regard you as an enemy anyway, even though you love them.

            Matthew and Luke, however, offer a practical interpretation of the radical saying of Jesus by which one can treat enemies humanely and religiously without actually loving them (Matt 5:43b: “pray for those who persecute you”; Luke 27b: “do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you”). Their suggestions for understanding the radical saying effectively explain the saying in actions that one can perform without becoming sentimental.

            The saying itself and its interpretation by the evangelists raise the following two questions: Do I heed the radical call of Jesus to an unconditional love for all God’s creatures regardless of their attitude toward me or may I follow the more practically minded evangelists and simply treat enemies humanely? And if I decide the former, how am I supposed to make myself love someone who is sworn to destroy me?

Would someone please advise me?

Charles W. Hedrick
Professor Emeritus
Missouri State University

¹For the definition of an aphorism see Hedrick, “Aphorisms of Jesus,” Wry Guy Blog: August 9, 2020, note 1: http://blog.charleshedrick.com/2024/08/aphorisms-of-jesus.html

²For a brief discussion of Q, see Hedrick, When History and Faith Collide. Studying Jesus (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1999; 2^nd printing, Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock,2013), 95-109.

³The reason I say that is because the aphorism was classified both certain and doubtful at the same meeting. See “Voting Records,” Foundations and Facets Forum 6.3-4 (September/December 1990), 245-352.

⁴Robert Funk and Roy Hoover, eds., The Five Gospels (New York: Macmillan, 1993).

⁵https://jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/5756-enemy-treatment-of-an

Jesus Remembered: A Gadfly on Israelite Religion

There is a rhetorical question, often asked: Why would anyone want to kill someone who wandered around the community telling charming stories, reminding neighbors to love one another, healing the sick, exorcizing evil spirits, and even supporting the Roman tax paid to Caesar (Mark 12:17)? The answer may lie simply in the fact that Jesus was remembered by the tradition, in part, as a critic of the religion in which he was reared, before he became, in the faith of the later Jesus gatherings, the savior of the world and much later, the second person in a divine trinity.

In the pronouncement stories Jesus is often quoted being critical of aspects of his own religious tradition.¹ A pronouncement story in the gospels is a brief narrative told for the purpose of housing a saying attributed to Jesus. For example, in Mark 2:23-27, Jesus is challenged by the Pharisees because his disciples “harvested” grain and ate it on the sabbath day, violating sabbath restrictions (Exod 20:8-11). Jesus replies that even David broke a taboo by eating consecrated bread (1 Sam 21:1-6), lawful only for priests to eat. The Sabbath was meant to serve humankind rather than being an ornery chore.

In another pronouncement story (Mark 3:1-6) Jesus attends a synagogue and met there a man with a withered hand. People watched him to see what he would do. He asked them, is one allowed to do good on the Sabbath? And he healed the man. His critics then conspired to destroy him. Both of these stories put Jesus in the position of challenging a basic aspect of the institutional religious tradition of his day, sabbath observance.

            Mark 11:15-19² is a story of Jesus in the Jerusalem Temple creating a disturbance by chasing-out the vendors and shoppers and saying that the religious philosophy allowing such practices has turned God’s house from a house of prayer into a hangout for crooks (Isa 56:6-8). It resulted in the chief priests and scribes planning on getting rid of him for challenging the institutional religion.

            I am inclined to call the settings of such narratives about institutional religion housing an antithetical saying attributed to Jesus, stories about the criticism of institutional religion that portray Jesus attacking, gadfly-like, Israelite religion.³ Such stories are traditional. That designation means they were products of oral recall, at some point between the public career of Jesus (around 30 C.E.) and the composition of the Gospel of Mark (around 70 C.E.). Mark found the stories in the stream of oral tradition, having been remembered, and passed around orally for about 40-50 years, and eventually repeated to him. Mark edited them to his tastes, and perhaps invented others. The historical character of the settings of the three stories discussed above is mixed. The Jesus Seminar/Westar book on the Acts of Jesus judges the setting of Mark 2:23-28 as likely to be historical (printed in the book in pink); Mark 3:1-6 was printed gray (likely not historical). The incident in the Temple (Mark 11:15-19) is multi-colored, although all seem to agree that an incident in the Temple took place at which time when Jesus rousted vendors and shoppers from the temple; the incident is likely historical (pink) other aspects of the story are gray and black, historically questionable.⁴

I am arguing that the settings of these traditional stories about institutional religion have historical value in themselves for informing the reader about how the life situation of Jesus was remembered. The memory that produced the setting is historical whether or not the settings reproduce a particular occasion in the life of Jesus or the sayings they house are considered to have originated with Jesus. The settings are not husks to be discarded; they describe social contexts in which Jesus was remembered. Bultmann describes the value of the traditional settings for the stories in this way:

The individual controversy dialogues may not be historical reports of particular incidents in the life of Jesus, but the general character of his life is rightly portrayed in them, on the basis of historical recollection.⁵

In other words, in such stories Jesus harped about the religion of the Israelites.

Charles W. Hedrick
Professor Emeritus
Missouri State University

¹Vincent Taylor, The Formation of the Gospel Tradition (London: Macmillan, 1960), 63-87.

²Taylor refers to this narrative as a “story about Jesus,” 151, 179.

³R. Bultmann described the three stories I discussed above as controversy/scholastic dialogues. The History of the Synoptic Tradition (trans. John Marsh; Oxford, Blackwell, 1963), 11-69.

⁴The Jesus Seminar of the Westar Institute made a study of the stories about Jesus, evaluating whether the settings might be claimed to contain authentic memory of the time of Jesus: R. Funk, The Acts of Jesus. The Search for the Authentic Deeds of Jesus (San Francisco: Harper, 1998).

⁵Bultmann, History of the Synoptic Tradition, 50.

Reinterpreting the Christmas Mythology

The mythological¹ message of the first Christmas has endured for over two thousand years, surviving translation from ancient into modern culture, the attacks of hostile rationalists, the naiveté of biblical literalists, its crass commercialism in the marketplace, the self-serving interests of over-zealous pietists, and its amalgamation with other competitive holiday traditions (Santa Claus, Christmas trees, etc.).

            The story of the birth of Jesus has continued to capture the imagination of the most creative and able talent of Western culture. Under its influence artists have produced many of the masterpieces of our Judeo-Christian heritage (for example, Handel’s Messiah). We are still influenced by the Christmas myth in the twenty-first century. Motivated by the ancient story, we moderns have been led to acts of altruism, self-sacrifice, and charity that surprise even us. It is difficult to react with a bah, humbug attitude when we are bombarded with so much Christmas “magic” in the marketplace at this time of year. There is a grandeur, a nobility, associated with Christmas that stirs the slumbering cords of the highest human ideals. For that reason, the Christmas story has become “authentic” in our culture in a way that historical criticism cannot confirm, or even investigate.

Why do the biblical narratives describing Jesus’ birth still speak to modern human beings? It is not because of their philosophical sophistication, or technical excellence. It is because of the hope they hold forth. There are two different ancient Christmas narratives in the New Testament. One is found in Matthew (1:18-2:23) and the other in Luke (1:5-2:52). Mark does not know a birth narrative, and John has an “enfleshing” story (John 1:1-14), not a birth narrative. Many, even devout church people, have confided that they have difficulty accepting the believability of the miraculous elements in the narratives: virgin birth, angels, star leading the wise men from the east, etc. For many, these have become serious obstacles to faith (except for the “traditional believer”). Such miraculous elements, however, are common in the literature of antiquity, where they are used to validate the careers of great men. Compare for instance birth stories about Asclepius, Hercules, or Alexander the Great.

The real “miracle” of Christmas, however, lies elsewhere, in how it inspires us to treat one another. The Christmas narratives still remain relevant in our day, in spite of their mythic character, even in our Western rational culture. Each narrative expresses deep longings of the human spirit. Their promise rises above the insignificant language boundaries separating denominations, and even religions. They address two basic existential issues that concern human beings, regardless of heritage or creed. All of us want to believe what they proclaim is capable of realization in human life. They speak to our fear of human finitude and the apparent nihilism that ultimately surrounds our very existence (Luke 2:10-12). And they address the very deep human desire for peace in the world at all levels of human existence (Luke 1:76-79).

            Matthew proclaims that the humanity of a particular Jewish child born in a remote village of the Roman Empire, in a naïve and prescientific age, brings a forgiving God near to all human beings (Matt 1:21-23). The existential message of this mythical event is: your finitude need not be feared. Luke holds this mythical event forth as the hope of peace “among people of [God’s] good favor”² (Luke 2:14). The possibility of being liberated from the terror of our finitude and finding peace in a turbulent world is “good news” indeed. Such hope can bring quiet comfort to every human heart, and is worthy of celebration by all of us.³

Charles W. Hedrick
Professor Emeritus
Missouri State University

¹Myths usually involves the exploits of Gods and heroes.

²The translation “people of good will” is less likely.

³This essay began life in the late twentieth century as a Religion and Ethics Editorial in the Springfield, MO newspaper, The Springfield Newsleader. It was later published in Charles W. Hedrick, House of Faith or Enchanted Forest? American Popular Belief in an Age of Reason (Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2009), 72-73. It appears here again after heavy editing.

Pondering the "Messianic Secret" in the Gospel of Mark

In 1901 Wilhelm Wrede published Das Messiasgeheimnis in Den Evangelien (The Messianic Secret in the Gospels).¹ He argued that Mark’s attempts to conceal the identity of Jesus of Nazareth was Mark’s own design superimposed on the Jesus traditions that he received. Wrede called the concealment of Jesus’ identity the “Messianic Secret.” I tend to think of it as an incognito motif or the motif of the concealed king. C. M. Tuckett has summarized features of the Messianic Secret in the gospel as follows:

(1) Jesus explicitly commands the demons to be silent about his identity after exorcisms (1:25, 34; 3:11-12); (2) Jesus gives orders that his miracles are not to be publicized (1:43-44; 5:43; 7:36); (3) Jesus commands the disciples to be quiet about him (8:30; 9:9); (4) Jesus tries to keep his whereabouts a secret (7:24; 9:30); (5) Jesus gives private instructions only to a chosen few (7:17; 10:10); (6) the so-called “theory of parables (4:11-12) shows that in Mark, Jesus teaches in parables in order deliberately to hide his intent from the crowds; and (7) despite their privileged position the disciples in Mark regularly fail to understand Jesus (6:52; 8:17-21).²

Nevertheless, the secret is broken in Mark’s narrative at 1:44-45.

To these features must now be added an additional feature: Mark’s omission in chapters 1-14 of Jesus’ identity as son of David and legitimate heir as King of Israel, which appears as a standard element of early “Christian” beliefs about Jesus in the later gospels.³ Recognition of the Messianic Secret has endured as one of the most successful achievements of critical New Testament scholarship.

The motif that Jesus was a king in disguise, which Mark uses, is known elsewhere in ancient literature. For example, Julius Caesar disguises himself in a Wild beast’s skin and wanders among his troops observing and listening to them.⁴ Nero in a slave’s disguise (so as to be incognito) wandered the streets of Rome to brothels and taverns with his comrades.⁵ Odysseus, King of Ithaca, was changed beyond recognition by Athena to return home and rescue his palace from the profligates who had been courting his wife Penelope. Athena changed his physical appearance so that he appeared as an aged disreputable vagabond clothed in disgusting rags.⁶ Zeus was King of the Graeco-Roman Gods. He frequently disguised himself to consort incognito among human beings by changing his appearance. His two most famous liaisons were with Leda, where he changed himself into a swan,⁷ and with Europa, where he changed himself into a tame bull.⁸ Of these examples, mentioned just above, Mark, writing in the late 60s/early 70s of the first century, would most likely have been familiar with the latter two. Attesting to the popularity of the myth of Europa, in his novel, Leucippe and Clitophon, Achilles Tatius (2nd century) describes his hero seeing a painting of Europa and the Bull, which is described in the novel in great detail.⁹

The images of Leda and the swan and Europa and the bull were ubiquitous in the ancient world. They appear on ancient coins, statuary, pottery, mosaics, wall frescos, paintings, objects of art etc. For example, Sidonian and Roman coins depicted an image of Europa and the Bull.¹⁰ Mark could scarcely help from being aware of the myths and the images. If Mark were aware of the myths and images, he was also aware of the incognito motif. In other words, the incognito motif, or the motif of the disguised king, in Mark may well be simply a literary feature inspired by Graeco-Roman myths.

Guessing at motives is always a risky business, but were I to hazard a guess about Mark’s motives in applying the incognito motif to the Jesus traditions, I would think that he likely did it out of a sensitivity for the political situation in Judea 66-73 CE. These were simultaneously the dates for the composition of the Gospel of Mark, the time of the first Jewish war prompted by the Jewish rebellion against Roman rule, and the subsequent Roman destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple.¹¹ During such a tumultuous time in Judea, Jewish followers of Jesus would scarcely need any additional reasons for Rome to notice them. There is a later tradition that they fled the city before the war to the nearby city of Pella in the Decapolis (compare Mark 13:14).¹²

Charles W. Hedrick
Professor Emeritus
Missouri State University

¹William Wrede, The Messianic Secret (Greenwood, SC: Attic Press, 1971).

²C. M. Tuckett, “Messianic Secret” in The Anchor Bible Dictionary 4.797.

³Hedrick, “Did Jesus Claim to be King of Israel?” Wry Thoughts about Religion Blog, April 19, 2021: http://blog.charleshedrick.com/

⁴Tacitus, The Annals, 2:13.

⁵Tacitus, The Annals, 13:25

⁶Homer, Odyssey, 13.363-434.

⁷Robert Graves, The Greek Myths (2 vols. in 1; New York: George Braziller, 1959), 1.206-207 (62a).

⁸Graves, Greek Myths, 194-195 (58b-c).

⁹S. Gaselee, ed., Achilles Tatius (Cambridge and London: Harvard and William Heinemann, 1961), 1.1-2 (pp. 3-9).

¹⁰For images of such a coin see: https://www.google.com/search?source=univ&tbm=isch&q=sidon+coin+image+with+Europa&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwj-gYepjpXwAhUBHM0KHfWaDSYQjJkEegQICBAB&biw=1458&bih=675 Here are also two from the period of the Roman Republic: https://www.coinarchives.com/a/results.php?results=1000&search=europa+and+bull

¹¹L. I. Levine, “Jewish War (66-73 C. E.)” in The Anchor Bible Dictionary 3.839-45.

¹²Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, 1.3.5.

Did Jesus claim to be King of Israel?

The short answer is that there is no saying attributed to Jesus in the canonical gospels in which Jesus claims to be the King of Israel. The theory and practice of religion, however, is not an exact "science"; hence, the answer to this question, like all things in religion, depends on whom you ask. So, I will put the question to the author of the Gospel of Mark. All references to Jesus as king in Mark appear in chapter fifteen in connection with a hearing before Pilate and the crucifixion. At that hearing the first question Pilate asks Jesus is: "Are you the King of the Judeans?" (15:2, Ioudaiōn). Jesus responds evasively: "so you (sing.) say" (15:2). Pilate chides him for failing to give a direct answer to the question in view of the numerous charges brought against him (15:3-4). But Jesus remains silent (15:5). Pilate is astonished at his refusal to answer the question directly.

            Pilate appears to attribute the information that Jesus claimed to be a king to the Judean people themselves (15:9, 12). The soldiers ironically mocked him as King of the Judeans (15:18) and the inscription of the charge against him read simply "The King of the Judeans" (15:2). That the kingship of Jesus in Mark is an idea that came from the Judean people is confirmed by Mark 15:36, when the chief priests and scribes mock him saying, "Let Christ, the King of Israel, come down from the cross" (15:32). By this mocking statement the religious leaders expanded the area of his kingship to include the whole of the traditional borders of Israel.

During the career of Jesus, Idumea, Judea, and Samaria constituted an Imperial province, governed by a Roman procurator (Pontius Pilate). The son of Herod the Great (Herod Antipas) governed at Rome's behest as tetrarch of Galilee and Peraea, and another of Herod's sons (Philip) governed at Rome's behest as tetrarch of the area east of the upper Jordan from Mt. Hermon to the Yarmuk River.¹ The only actual king over the area was Caesar. Therefore, if Jesus were a claimant to the throne of Israel, he would have been in competition with Caesar Augustus for the status of king (as noted in John 19:12).

Mark reports no sayings in chapters 1-14 where Jesus overtly claims to be king and there are no sayings with a political edge to them. "King" Herod Antipas did not fear Jesus as a rival (6:14-29), and apparently not even the Judean people were thinking of him as a king (8:27-30). At the entry into Jerusalem the exulting crowd did not refer to him as a king (11:9-10). There are only two sayings attributed to Jesus in Mark that have political content. One is a factual statement about the power of rulers (10:42) and in the other Jesus supports the paying of taxes to the Roman government (12:13-17). Where then in Mark 1-14 does the idea that Jesus claimed to be King originate in order to account for that specific charge in the hearing before Pilate in chapter 15?

Likely it originated with the early Christian belief that Jesus was descended from David and is frequently referred to in the canonical gospels as the "son of David," who was the divinely anointed King of Israel (2 Sam 22:51; Ps 18:50). Hence, they gave him the title Christ, that is, "the Anointed One." It is the general view of the New Testament that Jesus was the son of David; that is, he was a descendant of David, the King of Israel (Matt 1:1, 6, 16; 9:7; 12:23; 15:22; 20:30-31; 21:9, 14; 22:42; Luke 1:31-33; 18:37-38; Mark 10:47-48; Rom 1:3; 2 Tim 2:8; Rev 5:5, 22:16). There was apparently a political component to this belief—the disciples are reputed to have believed that he would restore the kingdom to Israel (Acts 1:6; Luke 24:21). The author of the Gospel of John described Jesus as the King of Israel (1:49; 12:13) who was descended from David (7:42) and provides a specific prophecy to that effect (12:12-15).

Oddly, in Mark Jesus is referred to as son of David only twice (10:47-48). That raises the question: would those two appellations be enough to evoke for the general reader the early Christian expectation that Jesus, the Anointed (i.e., the Christ) is the king of Israel in order to account for the heavy emphasis on his kingship in chapter 15? Or is something else going on in Mark? Has Mark, perhaps, deliberately downplayed for political reasons this general early Christian belief in the first fourteen chapters of Mark so as not to raise the ire of Rome?² The two instances that he is called son of David (10:47-48) would not necessarily raise the ire of Rome, however, for others are also described as a "son of" David, that is, a descendent of David with no inevitable regal expectations (Joseph, for example: Luke 2:4). The two references to Jesus as the son of David might, however, be enough to evoke the early Christian belief in a clandestine way for the knowledgeable reader (cf. Mark 13:14). How do you as a reader of Mark account for Mark's failure to provide in the first fourteen chapters an occasion for this specific charge in chapter 15?

Charles W. Hedrick
Professor Emeritus
Missouri State University

¹G. E. Wright and F. V. Filson, eds., The Westminster Historical Atlas to the Bible (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1956), Plate XIV and p. 92. A tetrarch was a ruler over a fourth part of a region.

²Another likely possibility is that Mark was not a careful writer. See Hedrick, "Conceiving the Narrative: Colors in Achilles Tatius and the Gospel of Mark," pages 177-97 in Ronald Hock, et al., eds, Ancient Fiction and Early Christian Narrative (Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1998), 186-97.

How is Jesus the Son of God?

This essay aims to be a brief summary of Christology in the New Testament and unfortunately it is longer than my blog essays usually are.

My title is awkwardly stated, unclear, and imprecise. Nevertheless, it must be so stated in order to accommodate the numerous contradictory ways that the New Testament responds to questions about Jesus' divine sonship. The question that my title appears to ask concerns the nature of Jesus: what in his nature makes divine sonship possible? Another way of putting the question asks about the process of his becoming son of God: How is it that Jesus came to be son of God? The first question is appropriate for one text; the second question is appropriate for others. Just figuring the right question to ask about Jesus' divine sonship reveals a fundamental divide in the New Testament incapable of a satisfactory resolution.

            A big part of the problem is that no New Testament text ponders the character of Jesus' divine sonship in an extended essay. A reader must track the issue through the texts searching here and there for fragments of the authors' ideas on the issue and then match them up with related ideas, sometimes from other texts.

            There appear to be in New Testament literature at least four distinct ways that early followers of Jesus explained his divine sonship.

Jesus is Chosen by God to be God's Son

            Mark presents Jesus to the reader as a fully grown man. He was a follower of John the Baptizer (1:4-9) and a skilled craftsman (6:3), who was part of a family unit having a mother and brothers and sisters (3:31-35; 6:3). At his baptism by John he has a private vision in which "the heavens are torn apart" and a voice directly addresses only him "from the heavens, You are my beloved son" (1:9-11; cf. Ps 2:7; Luke 3:22; Heb 1:6; 2 Pet 1:17).¹ Jesus makes the affirmative claim that he considers himself to be son of God (14:61-62). Hence, one is led to conclude that Mark presents Jesus as a human being whom God chooses to be his son at his baptism. In Mark what divine sonship appears to mean is that Jesus has authority over nature, disease, and evil spirits.

Jesus is born son of God

            This view of Jesus' divine sonship is held by the authors of Matthew and Luke who present to the reader two different narratives of his birth. In Matthew the reader is told that Mary has conceived a child from a holy spirit (Matt 1:18, 20) in fulfillment of what the Lord spoke through the prophet Isaiah (Matt 1:23): a young woman will give birth to a child who will be named Emmanuel (Isaiah 7:14). What this means, Matthew takes from the name of the child, which being interpreted is "God with us" (Matt 1:23). Even though the divine sonship of Jesus is acknowledged by the demonic world (8:29), recognized by his disciples (14:33), publicly announced to the people assembled at his baptism by John (3:16-17) and to his inner circle at the transfiguration (17:1-8), Jesus still evades the question of the high priest: "tell us if you are the Christ, the son of God"; Jesus evades the question (26:62-64). Matthew, however, presents the child to the reader as the son of God (Matt 16:16) by virtue of his divine conception and birth, but does not explain the appellation "son of God" further.

            Luke's imagery about the birth of the child is more graphic than that of Matthew. An angel announces to Mary that the Lord is 'with you'" (1:28), which greatly upset Mary (1:29). The angel replies do not be afraid "for you have found favor with God" (1:30) and clarifies that she will conceive and bear a son and name him Jesus (1:31). This child will be great and called "son of the Most High" (1:32). Mary asks how does that happen because she has not "known a man" (1:34). The angel responds in language mildly evocative of a physical encounter:

A holy spirit will come upon you and power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore, the child being born will be called a holy son of God. (1:35, italics mine)

Powers of the demon world acknowledge his divine sonship (4:41; 8:28). It is announced to Jesus in a private vision at his baptism (3:21-22) and to his inner circle at the transfiguration (9:35-36), where a heavenly voice calls him "my son the Chosen One." Nevertheless, Jesus twice publicly evades the question of his divine sonship (22:66-71).

Jesus is Inherently the Son of God

In the Gospel of John two things are immediately clear. The first is that there never was a time when Jesus was not the divine son of God. In the poetic section on the Word at the beginning of the gospel (1:1-18) the Word is identified as the "one and only from the Father" (1:14) and the "one and only God in the bosom of the Father" (1:18). Thus, he is inherently divine. What I mean by inherently is: "Involved in the constitution or essential character of something; belonging by nature."² Or as the Revised English Bible puts it:

In the beginning the Word already was. The Word was in God's presence and what God was, the Word was. He was with God at the beginning. (1:1-2)

The second clarity of John is that the author insists that Jesus is not "a" son of God rather he is the "one and only" son of God (1:14, 18; 3:16,18). The only passage in which the appellation "the son of God" appears in John without the article "the" (ὁ) is John 10:36, while in the synoptics it appears frequently without the article.

            The Word "becoming flesh" (1:14) in the Gospel of John is not describing a birth. It is an "enfleshment" of the primal Word, who was from the beginning (1:1-2). The description is akin to a pre-Pauline hymnic section, where describing Jesus Paul states:

Although he was in the form of God,

Did not regard equality with God

As something to be exploited

But emptied himself,

Taking the form of a slave,

Being born in the likeness of men.

And being found in form as a man,

He humbled himself…(Phil 2:6-8)

In other words, he wasn't a human being but only temporarily took human form.

Enfleshment was a manifestation of a temporary condition (1:14) that did not affect his essentially divine character.

Jesus becomes a Child of God through Faith

Literary fragments of such a view survive, hinting at what may have been the case—if these fragments ever became fully developed and then were simply swept into the dustbin of history by a rising orthodoxy, and forgotten. One hint that there may have been such a such a view of Jesus is the appearance of a rare appellation for Jesus that survives in Acts (3:15; 5:31) and Hebrews (2:10; 12:2). Jesus is called archēgos, which has usually been translated "pioneer" in the New Testament.³ He is a pioneer, according to the author of Hebrews, in that "it was fitting that he…in leading many sons to glory, should make the pioneer of their salvation perfect through [his own] sufferings" (Heb 2:10): that is to say, suffering perfected him as the pioneer of a Way of faith. Hence, Jesus was not the perfect son of God who suffered "in our behalf" (Rom 5:8). His own faith and confidence in God (Gal 2:16) and perfection through suffering qualified him to lead the Way to glory for many other sons of God (Heb 2:10). It is in this way that Jesus became the firstborn among many brothers (Rom 8:29).

            A second hint is found in the Pauline correspondence, when Paul refers to followers of Jesus being "justified through the faith of Jesus" rather than being justified "through faith in Jesus." That is to say: it was what Jesus believed that mattered rather than what people believed about him:

…a person is not justified by works of the law but through the faith of Jesus, even we have believed in Christ Jesus in order to be justified by the faith of Christ and not by works of the law…(Gal 2:16).⁴

A third hint lies in Luke's description of a sect called "the Way" (Acts 9:2; 19:9, 23; 22:4; 24:14, 22). The name likely derives from members of the group describing themselves as following the way of the Lord or God (Acts 13:10; 18:25-26) or the Way of life or salvation (Acts 2:28; 16:17). Nothing else is known of this group. Nevertheless, if these references to the Way are historical and not Luke's creation, the Way appears to have been an early nascent movement around Jesus growing out of Israelite traditions.⁵

Conclusion

It will depend on who is drawing the conclusions. There are two institutions that have an interest in this material, the institutional church and critical New Testament scholarship.⁶ Let me draw two conclusions in the form of challenges to both. For the institutional church the question becomes how can deference continue to be rendered to the dominance of Pauline Christology in the face of such diversity? On the other hand, scholarship has long been aware of the diversity of ideas in New Testament Christology. For my colleagues the question becomes, has that diversity grown larger? Is the recognition of another kind of "Christology" valid?

Charles W. Hedrick
Professor Emeritus
Missouri State University

¹See Metzger, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, 112-13. The Western reading adds to Mark 1:11: "This day have I begotten thee." In Matt 3:17 the voice from the heavens addresses the crowd: "This is my beloved son."

²Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary (1990): s.v. inherent.

³Other ways it has been translated is leader, ruler, prince, instigator, originator, founder, author. See Danker/Bauer, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature (Chicago, 2nd ed., 2000).

⁴See Arthur Dewey et al., The Authentic Letters of Paul. A New Reading of Paul's Rhetoric and Meaning (Polebridge Press, 2010), 65-66.  In recent years Gal 2:16 has been mistranslated as "faith in Christ."

⁵See Hedrick, Wry Thoughts about Religion Blog: "The Gospel of Mark and the Way, a Sect reported in Acts," Monday, January 11, 2021: http://blog.charleshedrick.com/search?q=the+way

⁶If Hector Avalos is correct in his assessment of contemporary biblical scholarship, there may be three institutions concerned with the material. Avalos describes what he calls an ecclesial-academic complex in the field of biblical studies, in which "much of biblical scholarship still exists as part of a commitment to specific religious traditions and bears an apologetic subtext." See Hector Avalos, "Review of Charles W. Hedrick, Unmasking Biblical Faiths." Review of Biblical Literature 2020, by the Society of Biblical Literature.

The Gospel of Mark and the Way, a Sect reported in Acts

Luke reports that some early followers of Jesus were referred to as members of a sect called “the Way” (o odos [ο οδος], Acts 9:2; 19:9, 23; 22:4; 24:14, 22).¹  The name likely comes from their description of themselves as following the way of the Lord or God (Acts 13:10; 18:25-26) or the Way of life or salvation (Acts 2:28; 16:17). Luke describes a Jew (Ioudaios) named Apollos “who had been instructed in the Way of the Lord.” After hearing him speak in the synagogue, Priscilla and Aquila (Acts 18:18; Rom 16:3) took him aside and “expounded to him the Way of God more accurately” (18:25, 26). That Luke describes Apollos as a Jew well-informed about the scriptures but as needing further instruction (he knew only the baptism of John) suggests that his initial introduction to the “way of the Lord” was independent from the group represented by Priscilla and Aquila. Luke even has Paul claim to be a follower of the Way (24:14; cf. 13:10), describing him as a persecutor of the members of the sect (9:1-2) before his conversion (9:1-19). In short, Luke seems to suggest that the Way is a very early description of a nascent “Christian” movement growing out of Israelite traditions.² That being the case, might there be some evidence in our earliest gospel (Mark) about this group?

I have elsewhere described Mark’s gospel narrative, which includes the gospel Jesus proclaimed (Mark 1:14-15a),³ as “the official ‘gospel’ statement of Mark’s church.” Mark’s gospel is “the proclamation of the public career, death, and resurrection of Jesus ‘in behalf of many’” (Mark 10:45).⁴ The question becomes does Mark reflect any awareness of an incipient movement or message, reflecting the brief reports in Acts?

Using the Way passages in Acts as background, there are several statements in Mark’s narrative that may reflect an awareness of the Way as a particular religious movement. Mark uses the same terminology as Luke to describe that religious lifestyle: “Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight” (Mark 1:3; cf. Acts 13:10); Way of the Lord (Mark 1:3; Acts 18:25); Way of God (Mark 12:14; Acts 18:26). Mark has one story (12:13-17) in which the Judean religious authorities try to trap Jesus. The authorities describe him as “teaching the Way of God in accordance with truth” (12:14), presumably an ironic contrast with their own understanding of “the way of God.” While the authorities are insincere in the statement as the rest of the story shows, their statement does present a contrast between the Way (that is the religious lifestyle) taught by Jesus and that of the Jewish authorities.

Mark’s narrative begins with quotes from the Septuagint (Mal 3:1 and Isa 40:3). Mark changes the statement in Mal 3:1 from me to read thy: “Behold, I send forth my messenger, and he shall survey the way before me.” Mark 1:1: “Behold I send my messenger before thy face, who shall prepare thy Way. In Malachi the speaker is God referring to himself; in Mark the speaker is Mark referring to Jesus/the Lord. In Malachi the way is the way of the Law (Mal 1:8-9 LXX), but in Mark the Way is the “Way of the Lord,” Jesus (1:3).

Finally, Mark frequently uses the image of travel in the narrative in a literal sense, referring to people in travel mode as being in the road, or on their way to some destination (2:23; 4:4, 15; 6:8; 8:3, 27; 9:33, 34; 10:17, 32, 46, 52; 11:8). At least, one of these common expressions for travel could be metaphorical. There are already several other metaphorical uses of o odos in Mark (1:2, 3; 12:14). The story of Blind Bartimaeus seems be another instance of a metaphorical use.⁵ This use of o odos (10:52) turns the Bartimaeus story into an account of a lifestyle change. Jesus restores his blindness by saying “Go; your faith has made you well.” Bartimaeus did not leave, however, but followed him in the Way (10:52). The question is: might this be an allusion to the Way [of truth] taught by Jesus or is it a statement that Bartimaeus travelled along behind Jesus on the road for a bit?

How does it seem to you?

Charles W. Hedrick
Professor Emeritus
Missouri State University

¹J. McKenzie, Dictionary of the Bible (Macmillan, 1965), s.v. “the Way”: “This usage does not appear elsewhere and has no known antecedents.”

²Mackenzie, Dictionary, 924.

³Mark says Jesus proclaimed the following gospel: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near,” or “Time is up; God’s sovereign rule is about to begin!” “Repent and believe the gospel” (1:15b) is the response demanded by Mark’s community to the gospel Jesus proclaimed.

⁴Hedrick, “Parable and Kingdom. A Survey of the Evidence in Mark,” Perspectives in Religious Studies 27 (Spring 2000), 180-82 or Hedrick, Parabolic Figures or Narrative Fictions? Seminal Essays on the Stories of Jesus (Eugene, OR: Cascade. 2016), 27-30.

⁵See McKenzie, Dictionary, s.v. “Way,” for the metaphorical use of “way” in the Bible.

Was Jesus a Martyr?

I am not sure what is at stake in the above question, but it has become an issue of current interest in some scholarly circles. For example, some have claimed that the early Christian gospels have been modeled on martyr stories in antiquity.¹ The modern definition of martyr (the Greek word so translated is martus) is as follows:

1.  One who voluntarily suffers death as the penalty of witnessing to and refusing to renounce his religion.

2.  One who sacrifices his life or something of great value for the sake of principle.²

James Tabor, however, argues that the word “martyr” is nevertheless plagued by definitional problems but “simply put, martyrdom refers to the act of choosing death rather than renouncing one’s religious principles.”³ Marianne Blickenstaff, on the other hand, answers the question in my title by saying “in the New Testament (NT) the most noble martyrdom was that of Jesus whose resurrection became a symbol of God’s vindication of his righteousness and a promise of reward to those who remained faithful to his message.”⁴ It appears that the authorities cited above do not resolve the issue as to whether or not martus in the 1st century NT should be translated as an equivalent to the 2nd century act of Christian martyrdom (marturion).⁵

Oddly, in the NT the Greek word martus is rarely translated as martyr. Its usual translation is “witness.” Martus is used some 35 times in the New Testament in three different senses: a martus is one who bears witness in legal matters (Acts 7:58; Matt 18:16); or is one who affirms or attests, or testifies; that is, is a witness to something (Rom 1:9, Phil 1:8, 1 Thess 2:5); or is one who gives witness at the cost of one’s life (Acts 22:20, Rev 2:13, Rev 17:6). In the NT passages cited in this paragraph martus is translated as “witness” in the New Revised Standard Version and the Revised English Bible. On the other hand, in the Revised Standard Version out of all 35 instances only Rev 17:6 is translated as martyr. The rest are translated witness. In the New International Version, of the verses listed above only Acts 22:20 is translated as martyr. But they all translate Rev 1:5 (where martus is applied to Jesus) as “Jesus Christ, the faithful witness” (martus), rather than “Jesus Christ, the faithful martyr.”

            One way to address the question is to ask: How does Jesus appear in the Gospel of Mark? In Mark, Jesus is not depicted as a Christian, but rather he is depicted as a Galilean exorcist, thaumaturge, and healer, whose popularity with the masses (3:7-10) and his laxity in following the traditions of the elders (7:1-13) ran him afoul of the Judean religious leaders (3:6; 11:15-18; 14:1). He was arrested and tried by the temple priests who found him guilty of blasphemy (14:60-64) and they turned him over to the Roman authorities (15:1). Pilate had him crucified for political/religious reasons (15:26).⁶ He was not given an opportunity to bear a witness or recant before the authorities, as happened in the case of the Christian martyrs of the second century.⁷ Before the religious authority (the High Priest) he admitted that he believed himself to be the messiah, the Son of the Blessed One (14:61-62), a claim he did not make before the Roman authority (Pilate, 15:1-5). Mark seems to regard his death as predetermined (10:45; 14:33-36, 49), rather than as something he could avoid.

            He preached the good news of God that the Reign of God was imminent and that everyone should repent and believe his message (1:14-15), which announced the imminent end of the age (13:29-31). What he preached did not even come up in his trials.

            Was Jesus a martyr? It depends on how one understands and translates martus. Mark, however, does not depict him as a martyr in the traditional sense. What do you think?

Charles W. Hedrick
Professor Emeritus
Missouri State University

¹https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martyr#:~:text=The%20early%20Christians%20who%20first,a%20wide%20variety%20of%20people.

²Webster’s Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary (1990), s.v. “martyr.”

³Tabor, “Martyr, Martyrdom,” Anchor Bible Dictionary, 4:574.

⁴Blickenstaff, “Martyr,” New Interpreters’ Dictionary of the Bible, 3:822.

⁵Marturion in the NT is translated as testimony, witness, or proof, but in 2nd century Christian texts it tends to be translated as “martyrdom” and martus as “martyr.” See “The Martyrdom of St. Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna,” 2:312-45 in Kirsopp Lake, Apostolic Fathers (Harvard, 1965).

⁶Pilate, himself, raised the issue of Jesus claiming to be King, an idea that does not occur in the Gospel of Mark, except in 15:2, 9, 12, 18, 26, 32. It is however a theme in the Gospel of John (1:49; 6:15; 12:12-15). It appears that the Kingship of Jesus is introduced into Mark by Pilate, but he attributes it to the Judeans (15:12). Hence, “the inscription of the charge against him read: the King of the Judeans.” On the part of Pilate, sarcastically political; on the part of the Judeans, religious. The real reason for his crucifixion was the hatred of the Judeans that was enabled by the compliance of Pilate (15:15).

⁷For example, “Martyrdom of Polycarp,” IX-XI. The Roman Pro-counsel gave Polycarp the opportunity to recant his position: “Swear by the genius of Caesar, repent and say, away with the atheists.” “Take the oath and I let you go, revile Christ.” “Swear by the genius of Caesar.” But Polycarp declines every offer to recant.

Are Christians Saved by the Blood of Jesus?

The blood that Jesus is believed to have shed on the cross has inspired hymns (William Cowper, "There is a Fountain filled with Blood" 1772), has been made the subject of movie films (Mel Gibson, "The Passion of the Christ" 2004—garishly bloody), and if memory serves, evoked many (forgettable) sermons. It is striking, however, that the death of Jesus in the synoptic gospels is described as a bloodless event.¹ Jesus is struck, beaten, scourged, and crucified, but blood is not mentioned. John (20:20, 25) and the Gospel of Peter (6:1) allude, after the event, to his hands being nailed in the act of crucifying him. But the only actual mention of blood during the crucifixion comes in the Gospel of John when "one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once there came out blood and water" (19:34), prompted no doubt by the early Christian belief in prophecy (John 19:36-37; Zech 12:10)—so blood had to be spilled because it was prophesied. That the crucifixion was a bloody affair seems due to later Christian imagination, but not to the imagination of the evangelists who described the crucifixion.

How, then, did the idea that one "is saved by the blood of Jesus" enter into Christianity? It was not the only interpretation of the death of Jesus available to the earliest followers of Jesus. For example Phil 2:5-11, a pre-Pauline hymn, understands Jesus' death on the cross as an exaltation of Jesus with no reference to blood or even to the resurrection of Jesus. Acts 2:22-24, 32-33 interprets the significance of the death of Jesus as resurrection and exaltation; no blood is mentioned. The centurion present at the death of Jesus in Luke (23:47) described his death as the death of a righteous (dikaios) man, but the centurion in Mark (15:39) proclaimed his death as that of a divine man (theos anēr).

            In the earliest Pauline letter Paul describes Jesus' death as a "killing" (cf. Acts 2:23) rather than a crucifixion (1 Thess 2:14-16). He adds later, almost as an afterthought, that his death was "for us" (1 Thess 5:10); no blood is mentioned.² In the later Pauline letters, however, the "killing" of Jesus becomes the crucifixion of Jesus (1 Cor 1:23, 2:2, 8) and Jesus' blood, shed in our behalf, becomes essential in describing the salvation event (Rom 3:24-25, 5:9; 1 Cor 10:16, 11:24-27).

            Those writers of the New Testament who came later than Paul were also insistent that the blood of Jesus was essential for the salvation of human beings. The blood of Jesus appears in the deutero-Pauline essays as a standard feature in describing the salvation event (Eph 1:7, 2:13; Col 1:20; blood was added to Col 1:14 by a later scribe). The author of Hebrews is, perhaps, rather dogmatic about the necessity of Jesus' blood being shed when he writes, "without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins" (Heb 9:22; cf. 9:7, 9:12, 9:14, 10:19, 13:11-12).³ The necessity that the blood of Jesus be shed is well documented in the Apostolic Fathers (1 Clement 7:4; 12:7, 49:6; Ignatius to the Smyrnaeans 1:1; 6:1; To the Ephesians 1:1; To the Philadelphians Intro.; Barnabas 5:1).

            The earliest mention of the blood of Jesus appears in the liturgical tradition of the church. Paul inherited the blood idea through the liturgy being passed on to him in what he called the Lord's Supper celebration (1 Cor 11:23-26; see also Mark 14:24; Matt 26:27-28; Luke 22:20; John 6:53-56; Ignatius to the Philadelphians 4:1). The author of Hebrews (9:1-28) makes clear that the necessity of Jesus' blood being spilled came into the Christian tradition through the church's use of the Hebrew Bible as the Word of God (2 Tim 3:15-17). The ancient Hebrews believed that the life of any creature was in its blood. Yahweh had said to Moses:

For the life of the flesh is in the blood; and I have given it for you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls; for it is the blood that makes atonement, by reason of the life (Lev 17:11; cf. 17:14).

It is understandable that a primitive would come to the conclusion that the life of every creature is in its blood by observing that when exsanguination occurs the creature dies. Today, however, we know that life systems are more complicated. For example, one could argue from knowledge of the human circulatory system that the life of a human being resides in the heart, for the heart pumps the blood. One dies when the heart fails without one drop of blood being spilled. Or one might argue on the basis of the human respiratory system that life resides in the lungs, for the lungs oxygenate the blood that circulates oxygen throughout our bodies. In other words, the life systems of mammals are more complicated and the life of the organism is dependent on much more than its blood.

            One passage that confuses the issue is Rom 5:9-11, where Paul says that "we are now justified by his (Jesus) blood" and "now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life." So what saves the Christian, Jesus' blood or his life (resurrection)?

This has been a strange essay since to judge from the Bible God expects people to forgive one another without spilling anyone's blood (Col 3:13; Eph 4:32; Luke 17:3-4). Go figure! Apparently God (if God there be) expects us to do without spilling blood what s/he thought could only be done by spilling blood.

Charles W. Hedrick

Professor Emeritus

Missouri State University

¹I understand Matt 27:24-25 as being metaphorical, meaning that Pilate was not responsible for Jesus' death rather than as a description of the crucifixion that followed. This incident is not found in the other gospels.

²See Hedrick, "Paul's Cross Gospel and 1 Thessalonians," pgs. 113-15 in Unmasking Biblical Faiths. The Marginal Relevance of the Bible for Contemporary Religious Faith (Cascade, 2019).

³See also 1 Pet 1:2, 1:18-19; 1 John 1:7; Rev 1:5, 5:9, 12:11.