I still find myself disagreeing with Vermes’ conclusions, though, and I worry that I’m disagreeing – not because he’s wrong, but because I am unwilling to consider that he’s right. I don’t want to be one who is committed to an idea without critical examination. But as I compare Vermes’ interpretation of the synoptic material with others I am reaffirmed in my expressed opinion that Vermes is cherry picking his facts, and not allowing the texts to speak for themselves.
To begin: Vermes disagrees with the idea of Rudolf
Bultman that “we can know almost nothing about the life and personality of
Jesus since the early Christian sources show no interest either."[ii] He believes (as do I) that it is possible to
approach the “Jesus of history” through the synoptic Gospels. We won’t learn all that we might want, but we
can at least learn something.
But here Vermes seems
to disparage the authors of the three synoptic gospels for not being “professional
historians in search of critical objectivity…”[iii]
As if that were even possible! Throughout this chapter on the Jesus of the
Synoptic Gospels (chapter 6) Vermes presents himself as an unbiased scholar sorting
through the stories and titles and teachings of Jesus in order to present to us
the true and historical “portrait of
Jesus intended by the Synoptics.”[iv]
But the Jesus he presents as the Jesus “intended
by the Synoptics” is stripped of most of what the synoptic gospels present.
Jesus struggle with the
various religious and political groups within Israel of the first century A.D. [v]
is radically diminished. Instead of
facing antagonism from the multiple factions of leadership, Vermes says that
the true, historical Jesus only faced opposition from the Temple authorities in
Jerusalem during the last week of his life.[vi] He dismisses any synoptic description of conflict
with the Pharisees saying, “…any substantial presence of the Pharisees in
Galilee in early first century A.D. is at best unproven and in general highly
improbable.”[vii]
That bold statement
took me by surprise – so I did a bit of digging and found that his assertion
isn’t as solid as he makes it sound. It
is, in fact, the complete opposite conclusion reached by other New Testament
scholars. Vermes is rather flatly
contradicted by the editors of the Anchor Bible Dictionary. “Since mark writes just before or after the
war against Rome, he is not anachronistically reading the later rabbis back
into Jesus’ life as Pharisees. His
traditions reflect the mid-1st century experience of the early
Christian community if not the experience of Jesus himself…Though we cannot be
certain that Mark and his sources give us a completely accurate picture of the
Pharisees as a strong community force in Galilee in the early and mid-1st
century, such a role in Galilean society for the Pharisees is intrinsically
possible.”[viii]
In another of his
incredibly absolute statements, Vermes declares that “…there is not a single
instance in Mark, Matthew, or Luke in which Jesus as ‘Lord’ is associated with
anything to do with divinity.”[ix]
How can he get away with this? He doesn’t
explain it. He doesn’t defend it. He
doesn’t acknowledge even the possibility that some of the uses of the title Lord in the synoptics might equate Jesus with God.
The resurrection of
Jesus (arguably the central point of the synoptic gospels) is rejected by
Vermes. He defends this by pointing out
that the idea of a resurrection is not frequently discussed in the Old
Testament and that “neither the authors of the Old Testament nor post-biblical
Jewish writers inferred that either the death or resurrection of Israel’s
messiah was expected in any way.” The upshot of this is that the disciples were
not “preconditioned by tradition or education to look forward to a risen
Christ.” [x] And to this point I can agree with
Vermes. [xi] But then he goes too far…
“…this lack of expectation patently conflicts with the claim repeated no less than five times in the synoptic Gospels that Jesus distinctly predicted not only his death but also his resurrection… One is inclined to conclude that the announcements concerning the resurrection of Jesus are later editorial interpolations”[xii]
“…this lack of expectation patently conflicts with the claim repeated no less than five times in the synoptic Gospels that Jesus distinctly predicted not only his death but also his resurrection… One is inclined to conclude that the announcements concerning the resurrection of Jesus are later editorial interpolations”[xii]
These later additions,
he claims are accompanied by “clumsy” explanations that he doesn’t believe-
Peter rebukes Jesus (Mark 8:32 – 33, Matthew 16:22 -23) and the disciples were
dim witted and unable to comprehend what resurrection from the dead meant (Mark
9: 10, 9:32, Matthew 17:23, Luke 18:34).
But this “clumsy” explanation is probably a fair defense of its
historical veracity – the criterion of embarrassment. Historical Jesus scholars accept that if a
story contains details about Jesus, his family, or his disciples that would
have proved embarrassing to the early church, the story was probably not
invented by the early church.[xiii]
(And Vermes uses this defense to
support other parts of his interpretation…)
The combination of the
fact that the disciples weren’t preconditioned to accept a suffering and dying
and resurrecting messiah with the likelihood that they were dim witted and
unable to comprehend Jesus’ predictions of his death and resurrection seem to make
the synoptic accounts more historically plausible – not less.
But for Vermes, the
Jesus presented in the synoptics is a wandering prophet/ preacher, like Elijah
and Elisha, who performed miracles and exorcisms. And nothing more. For Vermes this is the only portrait of Jesus
that has any historical credential of truth.[xiv]
But at the same time that he declares this portrait to be historically
acceptable he sweeps away any foundation for this portrait. The various miracles described in the synoptic
accounts are dismissed as exaggerations, and legends. The miraculous cures are attributed to
psycho-somatic or nervous illnesses, the exorcisms to mental illness[xv],
and describes those raised from the dead as “probably only comatose.” [xvi]
I don’t understand how Jesus as miracle worker and exorcist can be accepted as
historical – but the foundation for that reputation swept away as
a-historical. If you accept the portrait
of Jesus as a miraculous healer as accurate – then you should also accept the
miracles – if only as evidence of the reputation.
In the end, the Jesus
that Vermes describes as the Jesus “intended by the Synoptics” is really nothing more
than the Jesus that Vermes intends. He
excludes the (admittedly conflicting) infancy accounts in Matthew and
Luke. He prunes away the accounts of the
resurrection. He discards the miracles. And whether these things can be ‘proven’ historically or not, to present any
interpretation of Jesus that excludes this material as the “portrait of Jesus
intended by the Synoptics,” is disingenuous.
The portrait of Jesus intended by the Synoptics included
it. If Vermes doesn’t believe it, that’s
fine. But he shouldn’t present his Jesus
and tell us that this is what the authors of the synoptic gospels really meant.
[i]
Vermes, Geza The Changing Faces of Jesus, Viking Compass, New York, NY,
2000.
[ii] Quoted
on page 158.
[iii] Page
157
[iv] Page
221
[v]
Vermes consistently uses B.C and A.D. instead of BCE and CE – probably because the
book is written for a popular audience…
[vi] Page
179
[vii] Page
179
[viii]
Freedman, David Noel The Anchor Bible Dictionary: Volume 5. Doubleday, New York NY. 1992. Page 295-6
[ix] Page
201
[x]
Vermes, page 182 - 183
[xi]
For an interesting article on this point, see Thom Stark’s The Death of Richard Carrier’s Dying Messiah
[xii]
Vermes page 183-184
[xiii]
Le Donne, Anthony Historical Jesus: What Can We Know and How Can We Know It.
William B Eerdman’s Publishing Co. Grand Rapids
MI, 2011. Page 45
[xiv]
Vermes page 207.
[xv] Page
172
[xvi] Page
174
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