Archive for the ‘Biblical Expositions’ Category

My main university Web page that has been used by many thousands of folks over the years (the counter reset to zero at 1 million some years ago) has been moved. If you have linked it anywhere please note the change and update your records. I am working with our Web people at the university to see if there can be a “redirect” message:

The old URL was: http://religiousstudies.uncc.edu/JDTABOR/indexb.html

The new one is: http://religiousstudies.uncc.edu/people/jtabor/

This site contains a wealth of materials related to Jesus, Christian Origins, 2nd Temple Judaism, and the religion and culture of the ancient Mediterranean world. I use it in all my classes and welcome any of you who teach to make use of these materials so long as credit is given.

My special thanks to Prof. Dennis Duling for allowing me to make his masterful essays on the Jewish and Roman World of Jesus available, originally published in his co-written The New Testament: An Introduction, with the late Norman Perrin.Jewi

Was the Last Supper a Jewish Passover Seder? Millions of Christians who are happily and profitably discovering their “Hebraic roots” by studying, participating in, and even reenacting “Passover” services have equated it with the final evening meal Jesus had with his disciples. Indeed, many so-called “messianic” groups have developed an extensive interpretation of the traditional Jewish Passover Seder that finds all sorts of Christological meanings reflected in the ceremonies, including the death and resurrection of Jesus for the sins of humankind.

All four of our gospels report that Jesus ate a last meal privately with the Twelve, on the “night he was betrayed,” as Paul puts it. However, the Synoptics (Mark, Matthew, Luke) and John report things differently in so far as whether this meal took place on the night of Passover, or the night before. Although many have attempted harmonization, the differences in the two reports remain stark and and can not be ignored.  Scholars have exhaustively argued out every possibility pro and con.

I argue in The Jesus Dynasty (chapter 12 “Last Days in Jerusalem”) that the final meal was not a Passover Seder and offer a revised chronology in which Jesus dies on a Thursday, rather than a Friday, with the Passover Seder falling at the beginning of the 15th of Nisan, after sundown, Thursday night with that Friday, in the year AD/CE 30 being a “high day” sabbath, followed by the weekly Sabbath.

In a thoroughly comprehensive general article just published in the latest issue of Biblical Archaeology Review (March/April, 2010) titled “Was Jesus’ Last Supper a Seder,” Boston University professor Jonathan Klawans explores the issue in a clear and compelling way, concluding that the last meal of Jesus was most likely not a Passover Seder. I am pleased to say you can read it on-line here, but hope you will consider subscribing to BAR magazine as it continues to bring us quality articles of this type.

P.S. I hope my readers notice that I have chosen as a “Last Supper” illustration the etching by the incomparably great Albrecht Dürer in which the “beloved disciple” is sleeping as a small child, next to Jesus.

Tis the Season” love it or not but for an alternative take on Jesus’ birth, December 25th, and a different kind of “Silent Night” see my essay, just up on the Web at Bible&Interpretation, a site well worth a bit of browsing:

http://www.bibleinterp.com/opeds/xmas357921.shtml

I love this wonderful Armenian portrayal of the meeting of Miriam with her kinswoman Elisheva in the region of Ein Kerem in the “hill country of Judea,” west of Jerusalem. Note that the unborn babies are shown in situ as if by ancient ultrasound. According to Luke’s gospel the women were separated in their pregnancies by six months and Mary stayed with Elizabeth for three months, implying that she was attending at the birth of John/Yehochanan.

I have been thinking lately about the essential differences between Judaism and Christianity, or more properly, the kind of religion reflected in the Hebrew Bible and that of the Greek New Testament. I have long ago rejected as personal options the major contemporary manifestations of Judaism and Christianity — by that I mean the Mishnaic-Talmudic forms of the Classical Jewish faith that developed after Second Temple times, and the Orthodox Catholic versions of Christianity that developed in the West and East after Constantine. I am interested in religious and philosophical truth, but my training is that of an historian, so perhaps that is why I am drawn to the more ancient forms of these two faiths, i.e., the Hebrew faith as formulated by the Prophets and final redactors of the Hebrew Bible, and earliest Christianity as reflected in the New Testament. In considering these two “religions” or ways of thinking about God, the world and human purpose, I find that I am much more drawn to the former than the latter. Why is that so? What is it about the Hebrew Bible, even on a purely mythological level, that seems to draw me so? Conversely, what is it about early Christianity, especially the systematic interpretations of Paul or the Gospel of John, that puts me off so?

The Hebrew Bible’s Ambiguity

As for the Hebrew Bible, the whole notion of the One, true and living Creator, the God of Abraham is most appealing. Humans are seen as mortal, made of dust. Consequently, death and human history are taken very seriously. They are made in the image of God, capable of reason and free choice, of good as well as evil. God reveals Divine laws, the “Way” for humankind; a way that brings blessings not curses. The human race is seen starkly in its wayward and sinful condition, yet there are those who love and follow this true God in the midst of it all. Their mission is to be a witness to the “nations” (non-believers) and to bring about the establishment of righteousness, justice, and peace on the earth. On an individual level, as in Psalms or Job, there is a lot of questioning after God. The ways of God are far from clear. There is certainly expectation of intervention, a longing for God’s help and care, but simplistic view of things is rejected. The Hebrew canon (with the exception of Daniel) essentially closes with this kind of ambiguity. Humans are to seek God, to live the ways of God on the earth, but much is left open, whether individual ideas of immortality or broader schemes of historical plans and purposes. The essential idea of the Shema is the heart of it all: God’s people are to acknowledge God’s nature, to love God, and to follow the ways of God revealed in the Torah and Prophets. Ecclesiastes shows clearly how many questions are simply left unanswered. True, the Prophets do offer many predictions of a restoration of Israel and even a transformed age to come. However, the texts themselves express lament-full doubts about when, and even whether, this will ever come (e.g., Psalm 89; Habakkuk). The Hebrew canon closes with II Chronicles 36:23 — “Let him go up” — which could bear some symbolic period: all if open, Israel’s future is still unwritten, and individuals are called to respond.

The New Testament’s Answers

The New Testament comes out of a wholly different milieu. First, it is part and parcel of the broad changes in religious thought that we know as “Hellenization.” It is characterized by a vast and expanded dualistic cosmos, an emphasis on immortality and personal salvation, i.e., on escaping this world for a better heavenly life. At the same time, and to be more specific, it is absolutely and completely dominated by an apocalyptic world view of things, whereby all will be soon resolved by the decisive intervention of God, the End of the Age, the last great Judgment, and the eternal Kingdom of God. In addition, the Christology that develops, even in the first century, is thoroughly “Hellenistic,” with Jesus the human transformed into the pre- existent, divine, Son of God, who sits at the right hand of God and is the Lord of the cosmos. The whole complex of ideas about multiple levels of heaven, fate, angels, demons, miracles and magic abound. It is as if all the questions that the Hebrew Bible only begins to explore — questions about theodicy, justice, human purpose, history, death, sin — are all suddenly answered with a loud and resounding “Yes!” There is little, if any, struggle left. There are few haunting questions, and no genuine tragedy or meaningless suffering. All is guaranteed; all will shortly be worked out. Of course, various attempts are made to reinterpret this early Christianity for our time, usually in terms of ethics or some existential core of truth. But early Christianity rests on two essential points, both of which resist easy demythologization: it is a religious movement built upon an apocalyptic view of history; and an evaluation of Jesus as a Hellenistic deity, i.e., a pre- existent divine Savior God in whom all ultimate meaning rests. If these are unacceptable in the modern world, or incompatible with the fundamental Hebrew view of things, then the whole system become difficult, it not superfluous. This is not to say that there are no similar problems with the Hebrew Bible, but fundamentally things are different. Even Daniel, that begins down the path of fantastic apocalyptic answers to hard human questions about the meaning of history, is somewhat vague about it all. That is one good reason Daniel was never included among the Prophets in the Jewish canon. Of course, the Hebrew Bible, like the New Testament, is framed around God’s intervention in human history: God calls Abraham, delivers Israel to Egypt, reveals the Torah at Sinai, gives the Land to the Israelites, expels them, promises to bring them back, etc. It is an interventionist story. And yet, in contrast to the New Testament, God is often silent, there are many dark areas, many unanswered queries, and much doubt and debate expressed about it all, even within the texts themselves. But more important, the two of the major problems for the later Hellenistic age–human mortality and theodicy, are left largely unaddressed.

My Attachment to Both Canons

I find myself drawn to these texts, these ideas and images, tempered through the sifting and sorting out that comes through historical criticism in an effort to separate myth and history. I want to neither devaluing the former or ignore the latter. The opening chapters of Genesis powerfully expresses any number of fundamental perceptions around which my own approach to human life is shaped. God as the “Power of all powers” (Elohim) orders the chaotic planet earth with humans, created from the, “dust of the earth,” but reflecting the image of the Elohim. Humans and beasts are given only “green herbs” to eat. It is only after the Flood that meat is allowed, when sin and violence had filled the earth. Are we to re-present to the world in this small way, this way of peace from which we have fallen? It is a powerful idea, as Isaiah himself knew when he spoke of the child’s leading the lion, the infant’s playing at the nest of the scorpion–“They will not hurt nor destroy on all My holy mountain, says the LORD” (Isa. 11:9). Human are to “dress and keep” the garden and have both the power and responsibility to exercise custody over the good earth, even in the world of “thorns and thistles” outside the gates of Eden. When it comes to the New Testament the cosmically triumphant theologies of Paul and John are dominant but running through the Gospel materials are layers in which one finds a Jesus wedded to the ethics and perspectives of the Hebrew Prophets, who surely not God, who is vulnerable and “human all-to-human,” and who, as Schweitzer puts it, throws himself onto the wheel of history in an effort to move things forward but is tragically crushed. Those contingent, conditional, and open-ended aspects of the Jesus story I find most compelling, and most in keeping with the Hebrew view of history and human possibilities.

A version of these thoughts was published in the Journal of Reform Judaism (Summer, 1990): 35-38. An interesting similar perspective by Harvard Hebrew Bible scholar Frank Moore Cross can be read at my TaborBlog.

I am honored to report that I was given a full page interview with photo in the cover story (translated: “What Really Happened in Bethlehem?) of the December 15, 2008 issue of Profil magazine.  Profil is the #1 newsweekly of Austria, also read widely in Germany, equivalent to Time or Newsweek. An image of the cover and the full interview, in German reproduced here. You can click on the images to zoom in and enlarge or download the PDF file link at the bottom.

Download the PDF link here: Profiltabor

Although there are examples of the Covenant God made with all Israel through Moses at Horeb/Sinai being “renewed” at various points (e.g. Deuteronomy 29:1; 2 Kings 23:1-3), the “New Covenant” of which Jeremiah speaks (31:31-34) seems to stand out in terms of how it is both described and placed in context.

If one reads carefully that historical context, namely chapters 30-31 of Jeremiah, it is abundantly clear, both by the descriptive content and the timing indicated (“At that time” “in that day” “the days are coming” etc.), that this is a singular, unique, event that has not come about or transpired as of yet but is to take place in a specific time when all the Tribes of Israel are gathered together back in the Land, with Judah and Israel becoming one, etc. This event is spoken of in all the prophets with a consistency and a specificity that rivals any other theme or subject in the Hebrew prophets, and is particularly evident in Ezekiel 37, that also mentions this “new” covenant, using different words. This seems quite clear that this vision of the future was the one anticipated by Jesus in speaking of a New Covenant, based on his saying in the Q source about having chosen the Twelve and appointing them as “apostles,” i.e., delegates, so they would eventually, in the coming Kingdom of God, sit on “twelve thrones ruling the twelve tribes of Israel” (Luke 22:28-30). Although there is a sense that one might still refer to this as a “renewed” covenant, it seems to stand out as different from the various “renewals” in the previous history of Israel, so that it is understood, by analogy at least, like a divorce and a remarriage, with all Twelve tribes (the house of Israel and the house of Judah) regathered to the Land and united under the Branch or Davidic Messiah. That said, there is only ONE covenant with Israel, as the Psalmist says, commanded to a “thousand generations,” thus the abbreviation O.T. could perhaps more rightly refer to the Only Testament, rather than the “Old” Testament.

Given this historical context one must pause over Paul’s ideas that the “new covenant” spoken by Jeremiah has come through his ministry, in contrast to the ministry of death that Moses instituted, that those who read the “old covenant” are blinded until they turn to Christ, or that the glory Moses experienced at Sinai is or has faded (2 Corinthians 3). The “last” Prophetic word we have on the level of the Hebrew Prophets is to “Remember the Teachings of My Servant Moses,” and that appears to take us to final days, characterized by the appearance of Elijah (Malachi 3/4). Rather than fade, the “glory” Moses experienced, that was the very Kavod of HaShem, will be renewed and enhanced in the time of which Jeremiah speaks. If one just reads Jeremiah 30-31 one does not find Paul’s ideas, that is, including his “heavenly Christ” who brings eternal life to those who accept him (with the rest blinded and hard of heart), or anything he says in 2 Corinthains 3 (and one really needs to include chapters 4-5 to get his full views here) referred to or predicted. There seems to be zero correspondence, other than the catchword “new covenant.”

This is not to say that the images of putting the Torah in the heart, or having a “new heart,” that Paul makes use of, are not found in the prophetic passages that speak of the “new covenant” and its operation. They lie at the heart of things, but they are nothing new, in that these very possibilities and potentials are all at the center of the covenant Moses made with Israel. Moses constantly tells the ancient Israelites to circumcise the heart, to have hearts of flesh not stone, and to put the Torah within. This is repeated constantly in the Psalms and Prophets as well. This is nothing “new” that comes with Paul and his “heavenly Christ.” It is at the heart of the Sinai/Horeb revelation always, and people in so-called “Old Testmant” times always had access to the Holy Spirit, a truly spiritual conversion, the Law written in the heart, etc. Grace, forgiveness, and a bonded friendship with the Creator through the Holy Spirit has always been offered freely to human beings, and all the more so through Moses’s covenant with Israel. Paul’s view of a “fleshly” and “spiritual” dichotomy is well known to us in all the hellenistic dualistic systems of thought of the ancient Mediterranean world, particularly the Platonists, Pythagorians, and to some extent the Stoics. That is why he thinks what one “eats or drinks” or observing “days” has nothing to do with the “real” inner person, or that God does not care for “oxen” when he says not to muzzle an animal threshing grain, but really has in mind his “new covenant” ministers being supported financially (1 Corinthians 9:3-12). Another response to Paul’s question–Does God care for oxen? is a resounding “yes,” as the Torah addresses ALL aspects of human life on planet earth.

A central issue when it comes to Paul is not whether he was a good guy or a bad guy, sincere or insincere, or even whether the ethical principles of the Torah are abrogated or carried through into the “new covenant” as he understands it. I have no doubt that Paul thought he was living in the “end times” and would live to see all that Jeremiah spoke of come about, at least in some “spiritual” way, since he had given up the idea that what he calls “fleshly” Israel mattered anymore. The real issue is whether one, Jew or Gentile, can have a right relationship with God by grace through faith, as Abraham had, by turning directly in repentance and faith, without the requirements of “accepting Christ” and receiving “eternal life” through the blood of the cross, as the exclusive new “way of salvation.” This is where “Christianity,” at least as viewed by Paul, parts with Judaism, and for that matter, with a plain reading of the Hebrew Bible, both Torah, Prophets, and Writings. And yet for Paul, centering everything on God offering his divine Son as a sacrifice for sins is the heart of his “new covenant” ideas. If one then turns back and reads Jeremiah 30-31 there is little to no correspondence between what Jeremiah says and the ideas Paul expounds that he calls the “New Covenant.”

Jesus himself offers something dead center in terms of reflecting the Hebrew Bible and its “way of salvation.” His well known story of “justification” given by Jesus in Luke 15 and the lost son who comes home, requires only the father’s gracious acceptance of a son who is truly broken up over his past wrong behavior. Even more to the point, the tax collector of Luke 18 who bowed his head, struck his breast, and said “God be merciful to me a sinner.” This is the one Way of turning to God that one finds consistently in the pages of the Hebrew Bible.

Two verses from the Hebrew Bible come to mind in this regard:

Psalm 145:18: “The LORD is near to all who call upon him, to all who call upon him in truth.”

Isaiah 56:6-7: “Seek the LORD while he may be found; call upon him while he is near; let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the LORD, that he may have compassion on him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.”

The Hebrew means to seek truly/sincerely, and it not referring to a set of “truth” in terms of religious dogmas and doctrines. These texts are bedrock and they cut through any theological or complex systems of religious dogma. They are relational not systematic. Many seminaries have courses called “Systematic Theology” and most all are complex expositions of Paul’s teachings, with all the ins and outs. These verses seem to skirt that whole arena, even though they are addressing a similar question–How can one come to know God, be forgiven, and walk with him?

One important characteristic of the Prophets is that they are on the whole relational and almost completely non-systematic, so even a fool, yea a wayfaring man, will not stumble on the path. They sketch out in fairly plain language the “vision” of things for the “days to come,” and along the way, with the Prophets commenting on their own day and time, they offer avenues toward repentance and return to their contemporary hearers, and thus by extension, to readers down through the ages.

One might refer to this understanding of God and God’s relationship with humanity as “Abrahamic Faith,” taking one back to the pivotal and foundational “faith” of Abraham as reflected in the accounts of Genesis 12-22 in particular. I write a bit about this in a very preliminary way in the Conclusion to my book, The Jesus Dynasty, but for those interested in this subject there is much more in an older work of mine, long out of print, but now again available titled Restoring Abrahamic Faith.

This is an informal post sent to me by e-mail from Wendy Pond. I asked her for her permission to pass it on. This matter of sorting out the Marys in the three anointing scenes in our gospels (Mark/Matt; Luke, and John) is a complex one. I have shied away from identifying Mary “called Magdalene” with “Mary of Bethany” in John, and also leaned toward the idea of two pair of sisters named “Mary and Martha,” one in the Galilee and another in Jerusalem/Bethany (Luke 10 & John 11 being a different family) but I remain open and consider this matter unresolved. Here is Wendy’s take on things:
Luke seems purposefully to juxtapose the introduction of Mary Magdalene (as exorcised of 7 demons in 8:1-3) with the woman of the city identified as a sinner in 7:37-38 who washed Jesus’ feet with her tears, wipes them with her hair and anoints his feet – perhaps to cause intentional blurring/association of MM with the sinful woman of the city, i.e., to obscure/demote/sully any close relationship MM might have had with Jesus and thus her important status as part of Jesus’ inner circle of disciples.

Further to this, the act of washing and anointing the feet so intimately as done in Luke would be expected to be performed only by a man’s wife or servant/slave. It would have been considered sinful for any non-attached woman to do this to a man (especially in front of witnesses!). If the author of Luke was intentionally distancing MM from Jesus, he would have known this (whether he was Jewish or Gentile, I think!), so if, from Luke’s original knowledge or source, MM actually had performed this act and was close to Jesus such as wife/companion, but Luke did not wish to present her as such, Luke would have had to paint her as a sinner – even if he didn’t name her – therefore he made the association by juxtaposing 7:37-50 with 8:1-3. (“Woman from the city” could also be a true remnant from an early source descriptive of MM – from Magdala or another large, possibly Hellenized/pagan – “sinful” – city.)

I will add that within that Jewish-Mediterranean culture, when women were traveling with men, it would have been assumed they were either wives, sisters, daughters or servants/slaves, i.e., attached to the men as family/household/property, and a man meeting a mixed group of travelers on the road would likely never even bother to ask another man about the relationships of women traveling with him. The fact that Jesus’ group had independent women traveling with them was probably highly unusual, and why Luke mentions it 8:3 – maybe he couldn’t avoid/omit it. Once again, Luke associates MM with these important, independent women (wealthy? and/or had left their families/husbands?) who provided for Jesus/the group from their means. But was MM truly independent – as in, unattached, no relation to Jesus at all other than spiritually/part of the movement? Luke has sandwiched MM between these two vignettes, and has painted her as a woman who was (at least formerly) ill/mentally unstable, on top of it all.

While Mark does not identify the woman, John identifies her as Mary, sister of Lazarus and Martha, and both annointing accounts take place in Bethany. In both accounts, “some” present (disciples? other guests?) or Judas Iscariot complain/s about the waste of the costly spikenard, but no-one complains about how sinful or shocking it would have been for a woman not related to Jesus to perform such an intimate act (any form of touching!), especially the case in John where, again, the act involves Mary wiping Jesus’ feet with her hair! Clearly the authors of both gospels wished to emphasize the act of anointing the Messiah, but I believe any close relation the woman/Mary had to Jesus was quietly omitted from the story – the fact that there is no shocked reaction from the men in attendance to this intimate act is the loud, red flag, and it seems to indicate that those in attendance either knew or just assumed the woman/Mary (especially Mary in John) was closely related to Jesus. (That, or Jesus’ disciples and friends just accepted the fact that Jesus had an unusually open, egalitarian and casual attitude/approach toward all women – which I do believe at any rate.) I think I pointed this out in an earlier email to you, but in contrast, in the account of the Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well (John 4:27), the disciples are rather surprised to find Jesus talking to a strange woman; a man would never bother – a woman was unimportant or it wasn’t even proper. But in the annointing account with Mary, no surprise at all – why? Because Jesus’ and Mary’s relationship may have been omitted.

I believe Mary of Bethany in John is the same as the woman in Bethany in Mark 14:3-9 (clearly in that she wipes his feet with her hair – a memorable scene in deed!), and same as the woman in Luke 7:37-50, and she is Mary Magdalene. And she would have to have been Jesus’ wife or close/intimate companion. Luke unwittingly connects the dots with Mark and John, ID’ing her as MM, even though he tries to paint her in the worst light. Matthew doesn’t even mention her until the crucifixion! It’s why MM is at the tomb (with Jesus’ mother – the 2 most important women in his life, in that order!) to anoint Jesus’ body – she was his wife/companion, the first person to whom he appeared, and why none of the gospel authors could omit her completely from the story. Thus we have:

(A) Woman in Bethany – Mark
(B) Sinful woman of the City; wipes J’s feet with hair – Luke
(C) Mary of Bethany; wipes J’s feet with hair – John

Because A and C are the same (it’s doubtful 2 anointings took place in Bethany), and because B and C are also likely the very same, highly memorable story (intimate/sensual wiping of Jesus’ feet with the hair – again, it’s not likely to have happened twice with different women!), then A and B must also be the same woman. Luke connects the dots to Mary Magdalene. Luke also put the anointing story much earlier in Jesus’ mission and turns it into a moving story about forgiveness of sins rather than the anointing of the Messiah before his death – a way of downplaying Messianism vs. Son of God or the Jewishness of Jesus? What’s also amazingly odd is that Mark omits the woman’s name even tho’ he cannot erase/omit Jesus’ words about her – his proclamation that “what she has done will be told in memory of her.” A woman to be remembered the world over with no name….

There is a most intriguing stained glass window in the Kilmore church (“Church of Mary”) in the village of Dervaig on the Scottish Isle of Mull. The scene shows a Jesus figure in a most intimate pose with a woman named Mary who appears to be pregnant. Under the figures is a quotation from Luke 10:42 “Mary hath chosen that good part which shall not be taken away from her.” I want to thank Jennifer Duba-Scanlan, a colleague I know through e-mail, for pointing this out to me, as well as calling my attention to the Keith Akers post on the Talpiot tomb that I mentioned recently.The Web site to which I was referred understands the “Mary” in the image to be none other than Mary Magdalene, but Luke’s account (10:38-42) is set in an unnamed village, presumably in the Galilee, in the home of two sisters–Martha and Mary. It is a story unique to Luke in which the sister Mary is commended for her desire to “sit at Jesus feet” and listen to his teaching, presumably with the male disciples, while Martha attends to household serving.

**Wendy Pond just pointed out to me that the text actually says that “Martha welcomed Jesus into her house,” when “they,” namely the Jesus entourage, came to a certain village. It does not say that Mary lived there, but just that Martha had a sister called Mary. It is possible that this “Mary” has been traveling with the group, suggests they stop at her sister’s house for a meal and rest, and she has developed the practice of gathering and sitting with the men. Even though Luke introduces these women as if they are “new” to the story, it is clear from the way Jesus speaks to them in the core tradition that he knows them both well. The “good portion” that Mary has chosen appears to be her desire to hear and learn the words of the Teacher.

The scene raises a most interesting question. Who is this particular “Mary,” in Luke’s story and is she possibly to be identified with “Mary of Bethany,” in Jerusalem, mentioned only in the gospel of John, who also has a sister named Martha and a brother named Lazarus? This is the Mary who anoints the feet of Jesus (11:1-2). The answer is neither easy nor obvious, despite the similarity of names. Are there two pair of sisters named “Mary and Martha” or just one?

Other than Jesus’ mother Mary, there are two other intimate Marys in Jesus’ life about whom we have narratives–Mary Magdalene and Mary, sister of Martha. One of the most puzzling challenges in our New Testament gospel traditions is to sort through the various stories regarding these two (or three?) Marys, and the ways in which they intersect with the stories of Jesus being “anointed” before his death. Here are the bare facts in outline form:

• Mark (14:3-9) contains the core story of Jesus being anointed by an unnamed woman at Bethany two days before Passover while reclining at a meal in the house of “Simon the leper.” The woman pours an alabaster flask of expensive oil over his head. Jesus accepts her gesture, defends her against those to call it a waste, and says that “she has anointed my body beforehand for burial.”

• John (12:1-8) recounts that six days before Passover, also at Bethany, Mary, sister of Martha and Lazarus, anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped them with her hair. Jesus defends her in a similar manner but says that she should keep the ointment “for the day of my burial.”

• Luke (7:36-40) relates a separate story, much earlier in Jesus’ career, in which an unnamed “sinful woman” anoints Jesus’ feet with an alabaster flask of ointment, wetting them with her tears and drying them with her hair. Jesus tells this woman that her sins are forgiven. The story is strangely juxtaposed, in the immediate verses following, with Luke’s first reference to “Mary called Magdalene” from whom seven demons had gone out. Does Luke intend to imply that Mary Magdalene was a “street woman,” a sinner, and thus healed by Jesus of demonic influence?

These appear to be three separate scenes of anointing, with important differences in content and setting, yet somehow related or “intertwined.” Many scholars have suggested that behind the three accounts lies a single core story, but the consistent elements are rather bare: Jesus is anointed with a costly ointment by a woman; the woman is criticized by others, but defended by Jesus.

In subsequent Christian tradition Luke’s “sinful woman” was indeed identified with Mary Magdalene, who was in turn, quite often, identified with “Mary of Bethany,” sister of Martha. However, since we know of “Mary of Bethany” only in the gospel of John, and she seems clearly distinguished from Mary Magdalene, this identification does not seem to stand up–in John at least. But to further complicate matters, it is indeed Mary, known as Magdalene, who does go to the tomb early Sunday morning with the intention of “anointing” Jesus body for burial–so somehow that motif is connected to her, on one level or another.

The anointing stories in John and Mark are close enough, despite differences of details, to be related. The story in Luke seems to stand independently, and could well be a way of introducing Mary Magdalene. However, the Mary, sister of Martha, in Luke 10, is not so readily identified with Mary of Bethany–who clearly lives in Jerusalem. In fact, it seems hard to make such a case. She could be just “another Mary,” or it is possible, as in the stained glass window in the Kilmore church, that she was indeed the one known as Mary, “the one called Magdalene.” What most characterizes her in this story is that she is a woman among the male disciples, strong and confident of her place of “sitting at the feet” of the Rabbi. It is certainly interesting that this image of Mary as the one who conveys the message of Jesus is the dominant image one finds in subsequent non-canonical traditions about Mary Magadalene, as Jane Schaberg and others have so ably pointed out.

I remain convinced, for reasons I will soon explore in this Blog, that the ossuary inscription in the Talpiot tomb that Rahmani read as “Mariamene also known as Mara,” is the best interpretation of the names, however, as many are now suggesting, if it does indeed read “Mariam and Mara=Martha,” referring to two women, they would indeed most likely be sisters. Given the complexity of our evidence above it is entirely possible that Mary Magdalene did have a sister named Martha.

For some years now I have made the point to my students that the earliest Christian teaching about the “resurrection of the dead” was not so much about the dead “living” again in some state, but rather an affirmation about the participation of the dead, along with the living, in the events of the “last days.” In other words, it was a thoroughly “apocalyptic” subject and concept. It had to do with “whether” and in “what state” those in the community who had died would participate in the events of at the “end of the age,” when Jesus returned from heaven.

Today we might tend to associate “resurrection of the dead” more with the question of “life after death,” that is, the matter of whether death is the “end” or whether humans who die “exist” or somehow go on in another realm. That was not the issue among the early Christians, nor among many if not most Jews and Greeks in Roman times. In both Jewish and Greco-Roman culture it had become exceedingly common to affirm the life of the departed soul, either in Sheol or Hades, with either reincarnation or “resurrection of the dead” at the end as a way of “coming back” to the world of the living.

Last year I published here two fairly extensive Blog posts dealing with “What the Bible Says about Death, Afterlife, and the Future, that can be easily assessed, Part I and Part II, so I won’t repeat all of that dense history and exposition of biblical texts here. What I want to do here in this post is get at this matter of participation, as a way of clarifying what was at state for the earliest followers of Jesus in affirming “resurrection of the dead,” either that of Jesus, or of those of the community who had “fallen asleep,” to use Paul’s metaphor for death (1 Thessalonians 4:13).

This way of looking at resurrection of the dead would then distinguish it from the bare idea of resuscitation, that is a person who has recently died being revived. The Greek word translated “resurrection,” is anastasis and its literal meaning is “to stand up, to rise.” It does not necessarily refer to the dead, but it is used in Greek literature quite generally for anything from setting up a statue to literally standing up before one’s superiors. In contrast, in English today, “resurrection” means to revive something/someone that is dead, whether literally or metaphorically (e.g., the resurrection of a cause).

Anastasis then, in its most literal meaning, as applied to the dead, simply means that a corpse lying prone, “gets up,” i.e. is resuscitated, or comes to life. Thus Jesus speaks to the corpse of a twelve year old girl was has just died, “Little girl, get up,” and “the girl got up (Greek verb eigeiro) and walked about” (Mark 5:41-42). He encounters a funeral procession for a young man, son of a widow, in the Galilean town of Nain, touches the bier, and speaks to the corpse: “Young man, I say to you, rise” and the dead man sat up and began to speak (Luke 7:14-15). In the most dramatic case, that of Lazarus, who had been dead for three days, Jesus commands at the door of the tomb, “Lazarus come forth,” and the deceased walks out still clothed in his grave clothes (John 11:43-44).

But none of these cases of “resuscitation” really match what the earliest Christians came to affirm more generally about “resurrection of the dead.” After all, presumably, these three individuals, brought back to life, eventually died again, and their resurrection “bodies” were physical, mortal, and subject to corruption.

To understand this earliest Christian affirmation of “resurrection of the dead” we have to go to the writings of the apostle Paul. He clearly expresses his views in three extensive passages on the subject: 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18; 1 Corinthians 15; and 2 Corinthians 5:1-10. These passages and what they affirm predate our gospels by several decades.

What Paul affirms is that since Jesus was “raised from the dead,” all those who “belong to him” will experience a similar resurrection at his appearance or “2nd coming” when he returns in the clouds of heaven at the end of the age. He makes it absolutely clear that the “body” Jesus has, as a result of his resurrection, is heavenly, spiritual, and incorruptible, that is, it is not “flesh and blood” (1 Cor 15:42-50). He understands that those who have died will experience a similar “resurrection,” in that they will be raised with incorruptible, spiritual bodies–not flesh and blood. Paul is not the least concerned with locating or otherwise preserving the rotting or decayed corpses of the dead, so they can be somehow revived like ghouls in the Michael Jackson video “Thiller.” He sees death as a “naked” state, in which one has shed the physical body like an old pair of clothes, only to be “reclothed” in a new heavenly “garment” or body that is incorruptible, non-physical, and has nothing to do with corruptible body that turns to dust” (2 Corinthians 5:1-4).

Christians later expanded this early affirmation of Paul to include all the dead, both good and bad, who would be brought forth from the realm of the dead (Hades/Sheol) to face the final last Judgment and a separation between those entering the heavenly Kingdom and those cast out into Gehenna. Thus we get texts such as the following:

Jesus declares that “the hour comes when all who are in their graves will come out–those who have done good to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of condemnation” (John 5:28-29).

Paul affirms with the Pharisees according to the book of Acts that he has “a hope in God that there will be a resurrection of the dead; both of the righteous and the unrighteous” (Acts 24:15).

The book of Revelation pictures a final scene at the end in which “the sea gave up the dead that were in it; and Death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and all were judged according to what they had done” (Revelation 20:13).

This idea is based on the clear affirmation in the book of Daniel, that at the end of the age, “Multitudes of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt” (Daniel 12:2).

In none of these early affirmations of “resurrection of the dead” is there a view of “resurrection” that would require the gathering of physical “dust” or decayed flesh or bones in some literal fashion, in order for God to raise the dead. In fact, that very absurdity is what caused Epicureans and Sadducees to scoff at the notion of “resurrection of the dead.” But as Paul makes clear, the objection of “How can God raise the dead?,” or “In what kind of body could they come?” is a foolish one, that limits the power of God as Creator. Paul’s answer is a simple one–God will give the dead an appropriate heavenly body as it pleases him (1 Corinthians 15:35-38).

The language about coming out of graves, Hades, or even the “sea,” is clearly metaphorical, not literal. It is a way of affirming the participation of those who have died in the events of the end.

This has important implications in understanding how the affirmation, first found in Paul, that “Jesus was raised from the dead” developed into the “empty tomb” scenarios, with appearances of Jesus’ resuscitated physical body as found in Luke and John, where Jesus eats, drinks, and is described as “flesh and bones.” Mark, know none of this, Matthew begins to move down that road, but not in any heavily apologetic way. There are historical and apologetic reasons that Luke begins to cast things in this “literalist” direction, early in the 2nd century CE.

Scholars are aware of the rich and diverse ways in which the term “Son of God” is used in the Hebrew Bible, in subsequent Jewish literature, and in the New Testament writings themselves, not to mention various non-Jewish texts (including inscriptions and coins) of the Greco-Roman period. Most of us who teach in the field of Christian Origins get asked from time to time by students or in public lectures, “Professor, do you believe Jesus was X.” Sometimes X is “Messiah,” other times it is “Divine,” but in my experience, most often, the question is “Do you believe that Jesus was the Son of God.” In good Socratic fashion one is tempted to reply, “Well what do you mean by the term ‘Son of God,’ and such a counter question is certainly more than subterfuge.

1) In the Hebrew Bible the precise phrase “son of God” does not occur, although the plural phrase “sons of God” (b’nai ‘elohim) occurs five times in the Masoretic text (Genesis 6:2,4; Job 1:6; 2:1; 38:7), likely referring to a group of “angelic” beings who comprise God’s heavenly court and are charged with the responsibility of overseeing, ruling, and reporting on human affairs. In Psalm 82:6 this group is directly addressed: “You are Gods, sons of the Most High all of you.” In the Dead Sea Scroll copies of Deuteronomy, the phrase “sons of God,” occurs two more times in the “Song of Moses,” also likely referring to these heavenly custodians of human affairs (Deut 32:8; 43), and these two additional references are also found in the Greek Septuagint, a translation of the Hebrew from the 2nd century BCE. There is also an Aramaic reference (bar ‘elahin) to such a heavenly being who is said to be like “a son of the Gods” in Daniel 3:25.

2) The anointed kings of ancient Israel were referred to as “son of God.” Samuel tells David that God has promised to make a covenant with him and his royal descendants will rule as kings forever. Yahweh declares, according to Samuel, “I will be a father to him, and he shall be a son to me” (2 Samuel 7:14). According to a later Psalm, the Davidic ruler will cry “You are my Father, my God, and the Rock of my salvation” and God will make him “the firstborn, the highest of the kings of the earth” (Psalm 89:26-27). This is the background of Psalm 2, where Yahweh says to the king, “You are my son; today I have begotten you.” Some scholars are convinced that this language was used in some kind of coronation ceremony, and various Psalms are classified as “royal Psalms,” in that they celebrate the reign of Israel’s King as Yahweh’s direct human agent (Psalm 45, 72, 110).

3) The people of Israel are called “God’s son.” Moses tells Pharaoh of Egypt “Thus says Yahweh, Israel is my firstborn son” (Exodus 4:22), and the prophet Hosea, looking back to that time, has God declare, “when Israel was a child I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son” (11:1).

4) In late 2nd Temple Jewish writings one who devoutly follows God is said to be his “son” (Wisdom of Solomon 2:16-18; 5:5; Sirach 4:10). For example, the various patriarchs such as Noah, Lamech, and Shem are addressed as “my son” regularly in 1 Enoch.

5) Julius Caesar, Augustus, Tiberius, and subsequent Roman emperors were regularly referred to as “son of God” (divi filius), on coins and inscriptions, as were a host of Greco-Roman “heroes” whom were called “divine men.” Some of these were said to have been “fathered” by a God, while others were honored for their extraordinary deeds. However, the terms “Lord,” “Son of God” and “Savior,” in the time of Jesus, was used rather widely in Greco-Roman materials to refer to such legendary, political, philosophical, or religious figures.

6) Adam, and by extension, all humankind, is called the “son of God” on the basis of being created in God’s image and likeness (Luke 3:38; Acts 17:26-29). This is akin to the general notion of God as Creator being “Father” of humankind.

7) Jesus at his baptism hears a voice from heaven that declares “You are my Son, the beloved, with you I am well pleased” (Mark 1:11). Mark records no birth narratives of Jesus at all. Matthew follows Mark here but there were versions his gospel in Hebrew that added the phrase “Today I have begotten you,” based on Psalm 2:7. This interpretation was referred to as “adoptionism,” meaning that Jesus was made and declared to be God’s son at his baptism when the Holy Spirit came upon him. Apparently such a view was held by some early Jewish followers of Jesus, associated with James the Just, the brother of Jesus, who came to be labeled in later years as “Ebionites.” We are told that they used the gospel of Matthew in Hebrew, but in a version that lacked the virgin birth story of chapters 1-2, that they believed Jesus had a human mother and father, and that he was designated (“adopted”) as God’s son at his baptism as an indication of being chosen and favored as Messiah.

8) Jesus is said to be the “son of God” based on his mother Mary becoming pregnant through the Holy Spirit, with no human father, as explicitly stated in Luke 1:35. This idea of no human father is found in both Luke and Matthew. Even though the gospel of John has no explicit account of the “virgin birth,” his statement about the “Word (Logos) becoming flesh and dwelling among us” likely reflects this same idea of incarnation–the Son of God born in the flesh (John 1:14).

9) Jesus declared to be the “Son of God” by his resurrection from the dead. This idea is most explicitly stated by Paul in Romans 1:3-4, where he says Jesus is a descendant (“seed”) of David in the flesh, but a “Son of God” in the Spirit. The same idea, including the quotation from Psalm 2:6, “You are my son, this day have I begotten you,” is applied to Jesus through his resurrection from the dead in Acts 13:33. We have no indication that Paul thought Jesus was born without a human father, indeed, he says that he was of the “seed” or lineage of king David, but his status as “Son of God” was, according to Paul, based on his resurrection from the dead.

10) According to Paul those followers of Jesus who have received the Holy Spirit are made “sons of God,” and indeed, Paul says that Jesus is “firstborn of many brothers” (Rom 8:14-17; 29-30). Paul uses the term “adoption” to describe this idea that one becomes a “son of God” and calls God Father upon receiving the Holy Spirit. The writer of Hebrew speaks explicitly of these “many sons of God” who are to come (Hebrews 2:10). John expresses a similar idea of an extended family of “sons of God” based on a new spiritual “birth” for those who united with Jesus (1:12-13).

Given this complexity and diversity what one might mean by calling Jesus the “Son of God” could range from an affirmation of Jesus as God’s favored choice as Israel’s anointed king, to ideas of a preexistent Divine being who is born of a woman with no human father, and thus “becomes flesh” (Incarnation), with ranges of views in between.