Near Emmaus

Tag Archives: Craig A. Evans


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The Great Commission from the Son of Man

imgresCraig A. Evans on Matthew 28:18-19 in Matthew (NCBC), 483:

“Jesus states, ‘All authority on heaven and earth have been given to me” (v. 18). Reference to being given authority in heaven and on earth recalls the Son of Man in Dan 7:13-14, who in heaven was given ‘authority’ and authority later claimed ‘on earth’ (cf. Matt 9:6, ‘the Son of Man has authority on earth’; Matt 21:23, ‘By what authority are you doing these things, and who gave you this authority?’; Matt 7:29, ‘he taught them as one having authority’). The heavenly authority of Jesus is such that he even commands angels (cf. Matt 16:27, ‘the Son of man is to come with his angels in the glory of the Father’; 24:31; 25:31, ‘the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him’).

“The ‘authority’ here in Matt 28:18 probably alludes to the authority granted to the ‘Son of Man’ in Dan 7:14: ‘And royal authority was given to him…his authority is an everlasting authority’ (NETS). The risen Jesus can speak of his authority ‘in heaven’ because that is where the authority was granted –in heaven and in the very presence of God. The claim to have authority ‘on earth’ recalls Jesus’ earlier demonstration that he indeed does possess this authority, which he announced on the occasion of healing the paralyzed man (cf. Matt 9:6, ‘the Son of Man has authority on earth’).”

Quite the imagery: the Son of Man figure receives authority from the Ancient of Days and authoritatively commissions his disciples to make disciples of all the nations. In Daniel 7 the Son of Man figure is given the Kingdoms. Jesus has been given the Kingdoms, so he instructs his disciples to inform the Kingdoms that there has been a change. This seems to be underpinned by Psalm 2 as well where God choses his King and the nations prepare their defense against him, yet in this Gospel the King expects his disciples to find loyalist among the nations who will declare their allegiance to the King.

 

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Videos from St. John’s College

Craig A. Evans sent me an email informing me that he has been interviewed in a video by Tim Hull of St. John’s College, Nottingham University (see below). This is one of many videos that go back a few year. Some people that have been interviewed include Richard Bauckham, James D.G. Dunn, Paula Gooder, Larry Hurtado, Walter Mobley, Ian Paul, Graham Stanton, Anthony Thiselton, and  N.T. Wright. Also, there are many videos discussing great scholars of the past such as Barth, Bultmann, Frei, Moltmann, Pannenberg, Rahner, Ricoeur, Schleiermacher, Wittgenstein, and others. I’ve seen some of these floating around the internet in the past. The collection can be accessed here. Gain a preview from the video of Evans here:


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Craig A. Evans’ sermon on Mark 2:1-12

Craig A. Evans delivered a sermon on Mark 2:1-12 at New Minas Baptist Church as part of a series titled, “Christmas in Question”. He addresses the historicity of the person of Jesus, the reliability of the Gospels, what this text says about Jesus, and how we should think about Jesus in a world where novel ideas about his person swirl about us every day.

You can listen to it here.


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Even more on Morton Smith and Secret Mark.

About a week ago Craig Evans wrote a piece titled “Doubting Morton Smith and Secret Mark” for the website The Bible and Interpretation. It was greeted with a response from James McGrath titled “Secret Mark vs. Secret Morton” where McGrath expresses his hesitancy to say that Smith created the forgery (if it is a forgery). On this blog Evans wrote a response to McGrath’s response which we titled “More on Morton Smith and Secret Mark” to which McGrath has written another response. In his most recent response McGrath argues that it is most likely a coincidence that Smith expressed certain views that were conveniently confirmed when he “discovered” Secret Mark in the Mar Saba Monastery in the Judean Desert.

I asked Evans if he wanted to write another response at this time, but he preferred that we point readers in the direction of an article where he has already written on why he finds it unlikely that this was a mere “coincidence” (juxtaposing ‘innocent’ and ‘suspicious’ coincidences). So I’ve decided to link to the article. It is titled “Morton Smith and the Secret Gospel of Mark: Exploring the Grounds for Doubt”. It is the paper he presented at the York University Conference. The most relevant pages regarding what McGrath has written will be pp. 22-24.

I am thankful to both Dr. Evans and Dr. McGrath for having been willing to discuss this subject openly online. It has benefited all of us students to learn more about Morton Smith and Secret Mark.


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Rembrandt and the Jewish Jesus

Rembrandt, Supper at Emmaus

I just came across an interesting article written by Lloyd Dewitt on the Huffington Post (07.25.2011) about the art of Rembrandt van Rijn. It is titled “Rembrandt and the Jewish Jesus”. The gist of the article is that Rembrandt showed great innovation in painting a Jesus that he thought was more like the Jewish Jesus of history than the “the Christ with the high forehead, shallow feminine features, long nose and narrow mouth familiar from early Christian and Byzantine icons”. It is worth reading if you are interested in art and/or historical Jesus studies?

Why historical Jesus studies?

Well, Dr. Craig A. Evans wrote his first guest post for this blog earlier today (see here) and one of the more prominent points that he made was that the great contribution of the Third Quest was “a recovery of the Jewishness of Jesus and his world.”

What is it about the Jewishness of Jesus that we find so important? Obviously, we regret that the Quest for the Historical Jesus and the New Quest both yanked Jesus away from first century Palestine into a variety of other contexts. I think this is problematic for Christians whose views of Jesus have been shaped as much if not more by places like Alexandria, Rome, Nicaea, Constantinople, Paris, or Moscow than Nazareth, Bethany, or Jerusalem. We are beginning to notice that while the continual evolution of our understanding of Jesus may not be bad, it is incomplete unless we recognize, as the Apostle Paul wrote, that “when the fullness of time had came, God sent forth his Son, born of a woman, born under the Law”. (Gal 4.4) Even as we develop a Christology we must remember like the great Apostle that it is based on Jesus of Nazareth who came to us in real humanity, through a real birth, into a real world, at a real point in history. Even if we meditate deeply on Jesus being the Logos of God who has always been with God, and one with God, he is still made known to us first through a kenosis so real that to ignore the historical Jesus seems to be the first misstep in forming any Christology.

As I think about the various gospels that are read today one thing that greatly differentiates Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John from “gospels” like Peter, James, Judas, and even Thomas is the Jewishness of the narrative, the interaction with the Jewish Scriptures, and the Jewish earth on which it all takes place.

So whether one is describing Jesus through paint like Rembrandt, or historical research like Evans, one should never make a Jesus who is not a child of Abraham, a child of David, born in Bethlehem, raised in Nazareth, preaching in Galilee and Jerusalem, and crucified in the land before his people. This is the Jesus of history and faith. It is the Jesus who was the “word made flesh” who “tabernacles in our midst” who “existed in the form of God” yet who did not “regard equality with God a thing to be grasped”.

See also: Mark Goodacre, NT POD 49: What is the Third Quest for the Historical Jesus?


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The future of historical Jesus studies.

Recently Prof. James Charlesworth of Princeton Theological Seminary asked several scholars this question: “What is the future of historical Jesus research?” We will be posting abbreviated versions of the answers given by Dr. Craig A. Evans (who was one of the scholars addressed) on this blog the next three Thursdays.
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Guest Post: Dr. Craig A. Evans

Question 1: Is the Third Quest for the historical Jesus over? What are the most interesting and promising future perspectives in the field? What problems require further analysis?

The Third Quest, as defined in the 1980s, is over. The Third Quest will be remembered as a recovery of the Jewishness of Jesus and his world. This recovery included important archaeological work and the publication of the remaining Scrolls from Qumran’s fourth cave. For some of its contributors, the Third Quest was a reaction to the theologically-driven New Quest, which was insufficiently historical in perspective and simply did not take into account adequately the world of Jesus and his first followers. As the next phase in Jesus research gets under way, I do not expect this sort of reaction to take place. The New Quest is dead and gone. There will be little or no interaction with it in future studies. In contrast to the New Quest phase, the Third Quest laid a foundation on which future studies will build.

Cultural and contextual studies of first century Jewish Palestine will continue and will provide the setting in which the next phase of Jesus research will be undertaken. I say this because archaeological discoveries in the last two decades of the twentieth century exploded dubious theories—many of them oriented in a Greco-Roman, minimal-Jewish or non-Jewish direction. For example, the theory that Jesus was influenced by Cynic philosophy in nearby Sepphoris, where supposedly Cynicism and other forms of Hellenistic thought flourished, has been shown, in the light of excavations in the 1990s, to be very improbable. The physical remains of culture, dating to the period prior to 70 CE, reveal a Sepphoris that was Torah observant and a Sepphoris in which there was no significant non-Jewish presence. Ongoing publication and study of the many scrolls from Qumran have led to similar results. The old idea that exalted epithets such as “Son of God” or “Son of the Most High” applied to Jesus reflect Greco-Roman thinking, rather than Jewish thinking, has been seriously challenged by the Aramaic fragment, 4Q246, in which an eschatological figure is described with these very terms. Moreover, the idea of a Messiah figure, whose appearance brings healing, resurrection of the dead, and good news for the poor—concepts that define the identity and ministry of Jesus—is now attested in 4Q521. Indeed, the idea of a figure who acts in the very place of Yahweh himself, in fulfillment of Isaiah 61 and an expected eschatological jubilee, is attested in 11QMelchizedek.

Archaeological and literary discoveries such as these will lead the way in the future. This work is far from finished. Less than 10 percent of the sites relevant to the life of Jesus have been excavated and tens of thousands of papyri, inscriptions, and other ancient texts have yet to be published and analyzed. The Third Quest moved scholarly discussion in the right direction. The next phase will build on its success and correct its mistakes