Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth (39 page)

Among those scholars who make a convincing case that Jesus began his ministry as a
disciple of John are P. W. Hollenbach, “Social Aspects of John the Baptizer’s Preaching
Mission in the Context of Palestinian Judaism,”
Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt
(
ANRW
) 2.19.1 (1979): 852–53, and “The Conversion of Jesus: From Jesus the Baptizer to
Jesus the Healer,”
ANRW
2.25.1 (1982): 198–200, as well as Robert L. Webb, “Jesus’ Baptism: Its Historicity
and Implications,”
Bulletin for Biblical Research
10.2 (2000): 261–309. Webb summarizes the relationship between John and Jesus thus:
“Jesus was baptized by John and probably remained with him for some time in the role
of disciple. Later, in alignment and participation with John and his movement, Jesus
also engaged in a baptizing ministry near John. Although he was still a disciple of
John, Jesus perhaps should be viewed at this point as John’s right-hand man or protégé.
While tensions may have arisen between John’s disciples and those around Jesus, the
two men viewed themselves as working together. Only later, after the arrest of John,
did a shift take place in which Jesus moved beyond the conceptual framework of John’s
movement in certain respects. Yet Jesus always appears appreciative of the foundation
that John’s framework initially provided for him.”

Regarding Jesus’s sojourn in the wilderness, one must remember that “the wilderness”
is more than a geographic location. It is where the covenant with Abraham was made,
where Moses received the Law of God, where the Israelites wandered for a generation;
it is where God dwelt and where he could be found and communed with. The gospel’s
use of the term “forty days”—the number of days Jesus is said to have spent in the
desert—is not meant to be read as a literal number. In the Bible, “forty” is a byword
for “many,” as in “it rained for forty days and nights.” The implication is that Jesus
stayed in the wilderness for a long time.

I disagree with Rudolf Otto, who claims that “John did not preach the coming of the
kingdom of heaven, but of the coming judgment of wrath”;
The Kingdom of God and the Son of Man
, 69. It is Otto’s point that John was concerned chiefly with the coming judgment
of God, what he calls “the Day of Yahweh,” whereas Jesus’s focus was on the redemptive
nature of God’s kingdom on earth. Yet even Jesus marks John’s activities as part of
the inauguration of the Kingdom of God on earth: “The Law and Prophets were [in effect]
until John; afterward, the Kingdom of God is proclaimed” (Luke 16:16).

Josephus’s description of the Galileans can be found in
The Jewish War
3.41–42. Richard Horsley expertly details the history of Galilean resistance, even
when it came to the “political-economic-religious subordination to the Hasmonean high
priesthood in Jerusalem,” in
Galilee: History, Politics, People
(Valley Forge, Pa.: Trinity Press International, 1995). Horsley writes that “the
Temple itself, temple dues, and rule by the high priesthood would all have been foreign
to the Galileans, whose ancestors had rebelled centuries earlier against the Solomonic
monarchy and the Temple. Thus the Galileans, like the Idumeans, would have experienced
the laws of the Judeans superimposed on their own customs as the means to define and
legitimate their subordination to Jerusalem rule” (51). Hence Luke’s assertion that
Jesus’s parents went to the Temple for Passover every year quite clearly reflects
a Lukan agenda rather than Galilean practices (Luke 2:41–51). See also Sean Freyne,
Galilee, Jesus, and the Gospels
(Dublin: Gill and MacMillan, 1988), 187–89.

On the distinctive accent of the Galileans, see Obery M. Hendricks,
The Politics of Jesus
(New York: Doubleday, 2006), 70–73. For the implications of the term “people of the
land,” see the comprehensive study done by Aharon Oppenheimer,
The ’Am Ha-Aretz: A Study in the Social History of the Jewish People in the Hellenistic-Roman
Period
(Leiden, Netherlands: Brill, 1977).

For more on Jesus’s family as followers, see John Painter,
Just James: The Brother of Jesus in History and Tradition
(Columbia: University of South Carolina Press), 14–31.

The Greek word for “disciples,”
hoi mathetai
, can mean both male and female disciples. Obviously the sight of unaccompanied women
following an itinerant preacher and his mostly male companions from town to town would
have caused a scandal in Galilee, and in fact there are numerous passages in the gospels
in which Jesus is accused of consorting with “loose women.” Some variants of the gospel
of Luke say Jesus had seventy, not seventy-two, disciples. The discrepancy is irrelevant,
as numbers in the Bible—especially evocative numbers such as three, twelve, forty,
and seventy-two—are meant to be read symbolically, not literally, with the exception
of the twelve disciples, which should be read both ways.

There can be no doubt that Jesus specifically designated twelve individuals to represent
the twelve tribes of Israel. However, there is much confusion about the actual names
and biographies of the Twelve. Thank God for John Meier, who presents everything there
is to know about the Twelve in
Marginal Jew
, vol. 3, 198–285. That the Twelve were unique and set apart from the rest of the
disciples is clear: “And when it was day, he called his disciples to him and from
them he chose twelve whom he named apostles” (Luke 6:13). Some scholars
insist that the Twelve was a creation of the early church, but that is unlikely. Otherwise,
why make Judas one of the Twelve? See Craig Evans, “The Twelve Thrones of Israel:
Scripture and Politics in Luke 22:24–30,” in
Luke and Scripture: The Function of Sacred Tradition in Luke-Acts
, ed. Craig Evans and J. A. Sanders (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993), 154–70; Jacob
Jervell, “The Twelve on Israel’s Thrones: Luke’s Understanding of the Apostolate,”
in
Luke and the People of God: A New Look at Luke-Acts
, ed. Jacob Jervell (Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1972), 75–112; and R.
P. Meyer,
Jesus and the Twelve
(Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1968).

For more on Jesus’s anticlerical message, see John Meier,
Marginal Jew
, vol. 1, 346–47. Meier notes that by the time the gospels were written there were
no more priests in Judaism. After the destruction of the Temple, the spiritual heirs
of the Pharisees—the rabbinate—became the primary Jewish opponents of the new Christian
movement, and so it is natural that the gospels would have made them appear as Jesus’s
chief enemies. This is all the more reason why the few hostile encounters that Jesus
is presented as having with the Temple priests should be seen as genuine. Helmut Merkel
expands on the division between Jesus and the Temple priesthood in “The Opposition
Between Jesus and Judaism,”
Jesus and the Politics of His Day
, 129–44. Interestingly, Jesus is seen in conversation with the Sadducees only once,
during a debate around the resurrection on the last day; Mark 12:18–27.

A comprehensive treatment of Jesus’s individual miracles can be found in H. van der
Loos,
The Miracles of Jesus
(Leiden, Netherlands: Brill, 1965).

For more on Honi and Hanina ben Dosa, see Geza Vermes, “Hanina ben Dosa: A Controversial
Galilean Saint from the First Century of the Christian Era,”
Journal of Jewish Studies
23 (1972): 28–50, and
Jesus the Jew
(Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1981), 72–78. For a more general study of miracle workers
in the time of Jesus, see William Scott Green, “Palestinian Holy Men: Charismatic
Leadership and Rabbinic Tradition,”
ANRW
19.2 (1979): 619–47. A very good critique of scholarly work on Hanina can be found
in Baruch M. Bokser, “Wonder-Working and the Rabbinic Tradition: The Case of Hanina
ben Dosa,”
Journal of Jewish Studies
16 (1985): 42–92.

The earliest work on Apollonius is the third-century text by Philostratus of Athens
titled
The Life of Apollonius of Tyana
. For an English translation, see F. C. Conybeare, ed.,
Philostratus: The Life of Apollonius of Tyana
(London: Heinemann, 1912). Conybeare’s book also includes a translation of a later
work on Apollonius by Hierocles titled
Lover of Truth
, which expressly compares Apollonius to Jesus of Nazareth. See also Robert J. Penella,
The Letters of Apollonius of
Tyana
(Leiden, Netherlands: Brill, 1979). For an analysis of the parallels between Apollonius
and Jesus, see Craig A. Evans, “Jesus and Apollonius of Tyana,” in
Jesus and His Contemporaries
, 245–50.

Research done by Harold Remus indicates no difference in the way pagans and early
Christians described either miracles or the miracle workers; “Does Terminology Distinguish
Early Christian from Pagan Miracles?”
Journal of Biblical Literature
101.4 (1982): 531–51; see also Meier,
Marginal Jew
, vol. 2, 536. More on Eleazar the exorcist can be found in Josephus,
Antiquities
8.46–48.

A survey of magic and the laws against it in the Second Temple period is provided
by Gideon Bohak,
Ancient Jewish Magic: A History
(London: Cambridge University Press, 2008). As in the fable of Rumpelstiltskin, there
was a general belief that knowledge of another’s name establishes a certain power
over him. Magical prayers quite often derived their power from the name of whoever
was being cursed or blessed. Per Bultmann: “The idea … that to know the name of the
demon gives power over it is a well-known and widespread motif.” See
History of the Synoptic Tradition
, 232. Ulrich Luz cites as a Hellenistic example the story of Chonsu, “the God who
drives out demons,” as an instance of demon recognition; “The Secrecy Motif and the
Marcan Christology,”
The Messianic Secret
, ed. Christopher Tuckett (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1983), 75–96.

Joseph Baumgarten discusses the relationship between illness and demon possession
and provides a host of references to other articles on the topic in “The 4Q Zadokite
Fragments on Skin Disease,”
Journal of Jewish Studies
41 (1990): 153–65.

Additional useful studies on magic in the ancient world are Matthew W. Dickie,
Magic and Magicians in the Greco-Roman World
(London: Routledge, 2001); Naomi Janowitz,
Magic in the Roman World
(London: Routledge, 2001); and Ann Jeffers,
Magic and Divination in Ancient Palestine and Syria
(Leiden, Netherlands: Brill, 1996). The word “magic” comes from the Greek term
mageia
, which has its roots in the Persian term for priest,
magos
. As in “the Magi.”

Contrary to popular perception, Jesus’s miracles were not meant to confirm his messianic
identity. In all the biblical prophecies ever written about the messiah, there is
no characterization of him as either a miracle worker or an exorcist; the messiah
is king, his task is to restore Israel to glory and destroy its enemies, not heal
the sick and cast out demons (indeed, there are no such things as demons in the Hebrew
Bible).

Justin Martyr, Origen, and Irenaeus are quoted in Anton Fridrichsen,
The Problem of Miracle in Primitive Christianity
(Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1972), 87–95. Perhaps the most famous argument
made about Jesus as a magician is Morton Smith’s controversial thesis,
Jesus the Magician
(New York: Harper and Row, 1978). Smith’s argument is actually quite simple: Jesus’s
miraculous actions in the gospels bear a striking resemblance to what we see in the
“magical texts” of the time, which indicates that Jesus may have been seen by his
fellow Jews and by the Romans as just another magician. Other scholars, most notably
John Dominic Crossan, agree with Morton’s analysis. See Crossan,
Historical Jesus
, 137–67. Smith’s argument is sound and it does not deserve the opprobrium it has
received in some scholarly circles, though my objections to it are clear in the text.
For parallels between the miracle stories in the gospels and those in rabbinic writings,
see Craig A. Evans, “Jesus and Jewish Miracle Stories,” in
Jesus and His Contemporaries
, 213–43.

Regarding the law for cleansing lepers, it should be noted that the Torah allows for
those who are poor to substitute two turtledoves or two pigeons for two of the lambs
(Leviticus 14:21–22).

For a clear and concise treatment of the notion of the Kingdom of God in the New Testament,
see Joachim Jeremias,
New Testament Theology: The Proclamation of Jesus
(New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1971). Jeremias calls the Kingdom of God the
“central theme of the public proclamation of Jesus.” See also Norman Perrin,
The Kingdom of God in the Teaching of Jesus
(Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1963) and
Rediscovering the Teachings of Jesus
(New York: Harper and Row, 1967). Perrin refers to the Kingdom of God as being the
very heart of the message of Jesus: “all else in his teaching takes its point of departure
from this central, awe-inspiring—or ridicule-inspiring, according to one’s perspective—conviction.”

According to John Meier, “outside of the Synoptic Gospels and the mouth of Jesus,
[the term Kingdom of God] does not seem to have been widely used by either Jews or
Christians in the early 1st century
A
.
D
.”;
Marginal Jew
, vol. 2, 239. The Hebrew Bible never uses the phrase the “Kingdom of God,” but it
does use “Kingdom of Yahweh” in 1 Chronicles 28:5, wherein David speaks of Solomon
sitting on the throne of the Kingdom of Yahweh. I think it is safe to say that this
phrase means the same thing as Kingdom of God. That said, the exact phrase “Kingdom
of God” is found only in the apocryphal text
The Wisdom of Solomon
(10:10). Examples of God’s kingship and his right to rule are, of course, everywhere
in the Hebrew Bible. For example, “God will reign as king forever and ever” (Exodus
15:18). Perrin thinks the impetus for the use of the word “kingdom” in the Lord’s
Prayer can be seen in an Aramaic Kaddish prayer found in an ancient synagogue in Israel,
which he claims was in use during Jesus’s lifetime. The prayer states: “Magnified
and sanctified be his great name in the world which he has created according to his
will. May he establish his kingdom in your lifetime and in your days and in the lifetime
of all the house of Israel even speedily and at a near time.” See
Kingdom of God in the Teaching of Jesus
, 19.