The Triumph of Christianity (7 page)

New Testament identifications and characterizations of a variety of individuals, both famous and obscure, also have frequently been confirmed. Commenting on the writings of Luke, the distinguished Frederick Fyvie Bruce (1910–1990) noted that a remarkable example of Luke’s accuracy “is his sure familiarity with the proper titles of all the notable persons who are mentioned in his pages. This was by no means such an easy feat.”
³⁵
In fact, Luke used the term
politarchs
to identify the officers or magistrates in Thessalonica. If correct, this term would apply only in this city, as it is used nowhere else in ancient literature. That turns out to be the case, and Luke has been “completely vindicated by... inscriptions” in Thessalonica.
³⁶
Many similar instances have been reported.

Turning to more specific identifications, an inscription discovered at Delphi in 1905 revealed that Gallio, a brother of Seneca the philosopher, was, in fact, proconsul of Achaia from July 51 to August 52 during which time Acts 18:12–17 says Paul was taken before him in Corinth.
³⁷
Acts 19:22 identifies Erastus as one of Paul’s helpers in Corinth and Romans 16:23 identifies him further as “the city treasurer.” That identification was deemed unlikely by scholars who were (mistakenly) certain that the early Christians were recruited from the lowest classes. But in 1929, archaeologists excavating a first-century street in Corinth unearthed an inscribed stone reading: “Erastus, Procurator and Aedile, laid this pavement at his own expense.” Among the duties of an Aedile was to supervise the financial affairs of the city.
³⁸
As might be expected, there have been many efforts to explain this discovery away; Justin J. Meggitt, for example, proposed that there probably were two Erastuses.
³⁹

A recently discovered ossuary identifies Caiaphas as the high priest who presided over the Sanhedrin when it condemned Jesus, just as the Gospels and Josephus maintained. An inscription found in Caesarea Maritima in 1961 identifies Pontius Pilate as governor of Judea precisely when the New Testament places him there. Moreover, accounts by both the Jewish historian Josephus and the Jewish philosopher Philo characterized Pilate as the callous figure depicted in scripture.
⁴⁰
As a final example, Acts 18:2 tells that Paul met Aquila and his wife Priscilla in Corinth and that this couple had recently come from Rome because the emperor Claudius had ordered all Jews to leave. This is entirely consistent with Roman accounts that Jews were banished from Rome at this time because of conflicts among them over Christ, as discussed in chapter 1.

Over and above these and many other specific examples of accuracy is the more general aspect, noted so effectively by the great Harvard scholar Henry J. Cadbury (1883–1974). Referring to Acts he wrote: “In itself it often carries its own evidence of accuracy, of intelligent grasp of its theme, of fullness of information. Its stories are not thin and colorless but packed with variety and substance.”
⁴¹
However, even though the New Testament has the proper feel for the places and the people of its time, and it is quite reliable as to geography, topography, and Roman and Jewish history, that does not mean, of course, that it is accurate as to the life of Jesus. But it does mean that efforts by Conzelmann and other “critical” scholars to disparage the Gospels as nothing but ahistorical fantasies, are themselves revealed as wishful thinking.

As for the accounts of Jesus’s ministry, at least Paul’s letters were written and the early Gospels appeared while there still were active Christians who had heard and seen Jesus—including members of his own family. Followers of Jesus who had been in their twenties at the time of the Crucifixion would only have been in their sixties when Mark began to circulate. Nor is it likely that Gospels were written quickly just before they were circulated rather than having been drafted over a period of years and circulated in pieces. In fact, some of the early church fathers reported that Peter played a significant role in composing Mark.
⁴²
Furthermore, the claim that the Gospel writers depended mainly on oral traditions now seems unlikely. Since some of the apostles could read and write, is it credible that they regularly heard Jesus teach and never wrote any notes? Indeed, Saul Lieberman (1898–1983) pointed out that it was the “general rabbinic practice” in those days for disciples to write down the teachings of their masters.
⁴³
In fact, it appears that the Essenes wrote down the words of their Teacher of Righteousness on waxed tablets.
⁴⁴
Why wouldn’t the Christians have done so too? I agree with Claude Tresmontant (1927–1997) that to believe they did not is “simply absurd.”
⁴⁵
This issue is treated at length in chapter 5. Here, the obvious conclusion is that the Gospels are a quite reliable report of the Christ story
as it was believed and told
by the original eyewitnesses—members of what is now known as the Jesus Movement.

The Jesus Movement

I
N THE WAKE OF
the Crucifixion there were perhaps as many as several hundred Jews who had seen and heard Jesus and who believed that he was the Son of God.
⁴⁶
Some of these followers organized to spread the “glad tidings,” forming what has come to be known as the Jesus Movement.
⁴⁷
The main group was in Jerusalem, and there probably were several subsidiary groups in Galilee.
⁴⁸
Within the year, a tiny congregation also had been gathered in Damascus and possibly another in Rome.
⁴⁹

For much of the twentieth century it was generally assumed that the most remarkable thing about the Jesus Movement is that we know almost nothing about it—John Dominic Crossan called this era (from about 33 to 70
CE
) the “lost years,” “the empty years.”
⁵⁰
This claim was justified by learned exposés that Acts and other New Testament reports are unreliable fantasies, written for theological, not historical purposes.
⁵¹
Since the activities of the Jesus Movement were almost entirely ignored except by the authors of various books of the Bible, if these books are discredited the Jesus Movement has no history.

However, as the historical material in the Bible has regained credibility, it has become obvious once again that, although we know far less about the earliest days of Christianity than we would like to know (and there are some matters—such as Christian growth in the East—about which we know very little), some revealing information about the early days of the Jesus Movement has survived. These sources allow glimpses of early Christianity in Jerusalem—its leaders, its worship practices, and the unrelenting persecution directed against it.

Would that we knew a fraction as much about the mission effort devoted to the East. The initial activities of the Jesus Movement beyond Palestine probably were mainly directed eastward to Syria and Persia, which is consistent with the fact that following his conversion, Paul spent more than a decade as a missionary in that area. It is reflective of our ignorance that we know nothing about what Paul accomplished during these years or even where he actually went. Indeed, the conclusion that there were vigorous mission efforts to the East is mostly inferred from the impressive extent of Christianity in this area by the second century, for almost nothing survives about how this success was achieved, or by whom.

On the other hand, thanks to Acts, remarkably informative details have survived about how Paul went about conducting his missions in the West. Unfortunately, we know very little about the rapid spread of early Christianity across the empire in which Paul played no part, and we know almost nothing about what went on during the approximately twenty-year period between the Crucifixion and Paul’s arrival in the West. For example, we probably shall never know how Christianity arrived in Rome. The celebrated Arthur Darby Nock (1902–1963) suggested that we know nothing of the formation of the earliest congregations in the West, including the one in Rome, because they were the result of “the migration of individuals,”
⁵²
not of organized missions. All we know for certain is that the Romans still regarded Christians as Jews when they expelled them from the city in 49 for rioting over “Chrestus,” and according to Suetonius these disturbances were chronic.
⁵³
We also know that subsequent to this crisis the Christians probably ceased attempting to participate in the synagogues and withdrew into house churches. By the time that Paul wrote to the Romans (about 57
CE
) there were “at least seven house churches in Rome,”
⁵⁴
including one meeting in the home of Priscilla and Aquila, following their sojourn in Corinth.

Perhaps the most neglected aspect of the early days of the Jesus Movement is the important part played by Jesus’s family, and on this there is far better information than might be expected.

The Holy Family

T
HE PRIMARY DIFFICULTY FACING
all religious prophets and founders is credibility—how to get others to believe their claims. Consequently,
successful
religious innovators are not isolated loners, but are
well-respected members of primary groups
for the simple reason that it is far easier to convince people who love and trust you, than to convince strangers. Thus, contrary to Mark 6:4 that a prophet is without honor in his own country and among his own kin, the most famous religious innovators began by converting their immediate families and friends.
⁵⁵
Moses began with his wife and father-in-law, followed by his brother and sister. Zoroaster’s first converts were his wife and her uncle. Muhammad’s first convert was his wife, then her cousin, and then his adopted son, four daughters, and assorted family retainers.

Contrary to the traditional teaching, but fully in keeping with the comments by Paul and many early church fathers, the same applies to Jesus. Matthew 13:55–56 and Mark 6:3 and 15:40–47 report that Jesus had four brothers (named James, Joses, Judas, and Simon according to the book of Mark) and an unknown number of sisters—one of them named Salome (Mark 15:40; 16:1). Paul (1 Cor. 9:5) asked: “Do we not have the right to be accompanied by a wife, as the other apostles and the brethren of the Lord and Cephas?” The clear implication here is that Jesus’s brothers traveled with him, at least some of the time. This is supported by Acts 1:14 when not long before the Crucifixion the apostles gathered in Jerusalem, and “All these with one accord devoted themselves to prayer, together with... Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brethren.” It should be noted that here and elsewhere there is no mention of Joseph in Gospel accounts of Jesus’s ministry. It is assumed that Joseph died sometime after he and Mary found Jesus in the temple at age twelve (Luke 2:41–46) and before Jesus began his ministry. Perhaps as a surrogate for Joseph, Jesus’s uncle Clopas also was one of the disciples as was his wife Mary,
⁵⁶
although neither was one of the twelve.
⁵⁷

Not only did his family often travel with Jesus; they were counted as equal to the apostles and remained well known and active in the early church.
⁵⁸
Indeed, according to Clement of Alexandria (ca. 160–215), following the Ascension, none of the apostles claimed leadership of the church, but deferred to the Lord’s brother, “James the Righteous.”
⁵⁹
After James was stoned by the Sanhedrin, Simeon, Jesus’s cousin and the son of Clopas, succeeded to leadership in Jerusalem. Jesus’s two grandnephews Zoker and James “were also leaders of the Palestinian Jewish Christian community around the end of the century.”
⁶⁰
In all, the early Jesus Movement was quite a family affair.

As for the famous denial of his family by Jesus as reported in Mark 3:33, the early church father Tertullian dismissed it as a misinterpretation. When told, “Your mother and your brethren are outside, asking for you,” Jesus is quoted as responding, “Who are my mother and my brethren?” Then, gesturing to those who sat listening to him, Jesus added: “Here are my mother and my brethren! Whoever does the will of God is my brother, and sister, and mother” (Mark 3:32–35). Tertullian explained that Jesus used this device to stress the kinship of faith, not to deny family feelings.
⁶¹
In addition, Origen (ca. 185–251) dismissed as figurative the claim that “a prophet is not without honor, except in his own country, and among his own kin.” If taken literally and generally, Origen noted, “it is not historically true,” citing the many prophets of the Old Testament who were honored in their local communities. “But,” he continued, “figuratively interpreted, it is absolutely true for we must think of Judea as their country, and... Israel as their kindred.”
⁶²
He then pointed out how different the history of Israel would have been had their “country” truly honored the prophets.

Although Jesus’s family was prominent in the early church, the memory of them soon went into eclipse because of the developing tradition that not only was Mary a virgin when she bore Jesus, but that she remained one for life. As this doctrine of the perpetual virginity of Mary emerged in the second century,
⁶³
the brothers and sisters of Jesus were at first transformed into cousins and eventually ignored altogether. But blood relatives or not, the Christian “holy family” played a significant role in the life of the early church, first in Jerusalem and then probably mainly in the East.