Resurrecting Jesus: The Earliest Christian Tradition and Its Interpreters

Resurrecting Jesus: The Earliest Christian Tradition and Its Interpreters. By Dale C. Allison. London: T & T Clark, 2005, xi + 404 pp., $34.95 paper.

This book by Dale C. Allison of Pittsburgh Theological Seminary is a sequel to his earlier volume Jesus of Nazareth: Millenarian Prophet (Fortress, 1998). Although entitled Resurrecting Jesus, the book is not in fact a monograph on the resurrection of Jesus. The chapters are based on a collection of lectures and essays on the historical Jesus and early Christianity, with the largest chapter being about the resurrection.

In chapter 1, "secularizing Jesus," Allison takes issue with the now-standard taxonomy of Jesus research running along the lines of first quest, no quest, new quest, and third quest. He points out that there never was a "no quest" period, with many British and Continental scholars active in Jesus research between the world wars. Allison also finds very little distinctive in the so-called third quest that sets it apart from earlier scholarship. It appears to me that Allison is correct to insist that modern Jesus research is highly complex and resists any neat taxonomy imposed upon it, and that there never was a "no-quest" period. However, in certain circles of the early twentieth century there was a mood that regarded historical study of Jesus as either methodologically impossible or theologically illegitimate. Also, the third quest may not contribute anything that is wholly distinctive (i.e. unprecedented), but it may possess qualities that are distinctive in the sense that they are characteristic of it (e.g. rejection of double dissimilarity, emphasis on eschatology, and emphasis on Jewish background). Allison is correct that we should not subject the past to a "chronological snobbery" in reviews of research (p. 14), but the first-second-third quest overview remains a helpful generalization for introducing students to twentieth-century NT study (see further Michael Bird, "Is There Really a 'Third Quest' for the Historical Jesus," Scottish Bulletin of Evangelical Theology, forthcoming). The chapter closes with an observation of how contemporary exegetes have a tendency to shy away from "traditional theological, Christological, and eschatological concerns" (p. 22) in favor of sociological and political interpretations. He responds that the early Christians were devoutly religious, even "otherworldly," and "more interested in prayer than in economics, in eschatological rewards than in Roman politics" (p. 23).

In the second chapter, "The Problem of Audience," Allison attempts to show that many of Jesus' rigorous commands were probably not intended for adherence by a wide audience but for his immediate followers (e.g. meager provisions permitted for mission in Matt 10:1-42) or for specific individuals encountered in specific situations (burial of father in Luke 9:57-60). This is a valid point with serious implications for NT ethics. At the same time, the fact that the evangelists sought to apply these teachings of Jesus to their contemporary audiences suggests that they thought them relevant to the fabric of Christian ethics and praxis.

"The Problem of Gehenna" is addressed in chapter 3, where Allison notes the tension in having Jesus speak of both God's love and the threat of eternal judgment. He is unconvinced that the warnings of judgment derive from additions to Q by its redactors or from the evangelists; the wide attestation of the theme in the Gospels makes it highly probable that Jesus spoke on judgment. The chapter interacts with reflections on hell from the Church fathers to classics of English literature. Allison evidently does not like the idea of hell, but as one who stands in the Christian tradition, he realizes that he is stuck with it. His answer is to regard "Gehenna [as] part of the Bible's mythological interpretation of human destiny" (p. 92). Traditional notions of hell are deconstructed by Jesus' teachings on love (p. 96), but hell is also a postulate of human responsibility and divine justice (pp. 97-99).

In chapter 4, "Apocalyptic, Polemic, Apologetics," Allison outlines the theological case for and against an apocalyptic Jesus. He surmises that an apocalyptic Jesus is effective in quashing old Liberalism, but it comes at a price since this kind of Jesus was mistaken about the imminent consummation of the kingdom. He admits that people can have ideological or personal reasons for preferring an apocalyptic Jesus over a non-apocalyptic one, but he cautions against the view that all portraits of Jesus are merely projections of the self (contrast with William Arnal, The Symbolic Jesus: Historical Scholarship, Judaism and the Construction of Contemporary Identity [London: Equinox, 2005J). Allison then describes the intellectual journey that led him to an apocalyptic Jesus and how it impacts his faith.

Allison begins chapter 5, "Torah, Urzeit, Endzeit," by noting that the diversity of approaches to the law in early Christianity is mirrored in the Jesus tradition, where Jesus is portrayed as law-observant but also as laying aside commandments on certain occasions. He concludes that with regard to the law Jesus was neither a liberal nor a conservative. Jesus' setting aside of several commandments (e.g. the Sabbath commandment) was indicative of a Jewish rhetoric that could radically reinterpret Scripture in order to make a point. It also grew out of situations where it was recognized that there could be conflicting demands in law observance, and it was finally rooted in the eschatological conviction that the kingdom was at hand and there would be a return to Edenic conditions, which would spell the end of several legal stipulations. Jesus never nullified the commandments as a whole and recognized that his actions were exceptional. Yet when law conflicts with the mission of the kingdom, the law itself must forfeit priority.