A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus.

Volume One: The Roots of the Problem and

the Person by John P. Meier
Review by: Larry W. Hurtado
Journal of Biblical Literature, Vol. 112, No. 3 (Autumn, 1993), pp. 532-534
Published by: The Society of Biblical Literature
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532
Journal
of Biblical Literature
A
Marginal Jew: Rethinking
the Historical
Jesus.
Volume One: The Roots
of
the Problem
and the
Person,
by John
P. Meier. AB Reference
Library.
New York/London: Double-
day,
1991.
Pp.
xi + 484.
$25.
This is the first of Meier's
projected
two-volume
study
of "the historical
Jesus,
in which his aim is to offer what he calls "a limited consensus statement ... based
purely
on historical sources and
arguments,'
to
which,
in
principle,
scholars from
any perspec-
tive could assent as a fair statement of matters accessible to historical-critical
investiga-
tion
(pp. 1-2).
It is a
worthy
ambition,
but
probably
in fact unattainable. Meier has
crafted the work
ambitiously
for a
variety
of
readers,
including
students and "the
general
educated reader"
(for
whom the main
body
of the work has been
styled)
as well as
scholars
(whose
technical concerns are addressed in the voluminous notes which follow
each
chapter).
To
judge by passing
illustrative comments and the
space
devoted to
certain
questions (e.g.,
fourteen
pages
on
Jesus' "brothers"),
however,
the
"general"
readers often seem to be more
specifically
Roman Catholic and American. I cannot
do
justice
here to the
bibliographically
rich and discursive
chapter
notes,
which show
a scholar who has read
widely
and
thought vigorously
about his
subject.
In the overall
four-part
outline for the
work,
Part 3
(Jesus' "public ministry
proper"),
Part 4
(the "tragic
final
days,'
Jesus'
crucifixion and
burial),
and an
epilogue attempting
"initial
reflection,
both historical and
theological"
are all reserved for the
promised
second volume. The
present
volume under review here contains Parts
1-2,
which are
essentially
devoted to
questions concerning
the sources and the historical
setting
of
Jesus'
life. In other
words,
readers will have to wait for volume two to
get
the "meat
in the
sandwich,'
so to
speak,
and to see what Meier's
picture
of
Jesus actually
looks
like.
But,
though
the
present
volume is concerned
mainly
with
preliminary
and foun-
dational
matters,
their
importance
for historical
Jesus
research,
and the
vigor
and detail
of Meier's treatment of
them,
combine to make this book
deserving
of attention on
its own. Meier
explains
the term
"marginal"
in the title as a
mdidl,
"a tease-word" or
riddle intended to
signify
such
things
as
Jesus' insignificance
and
socially marginal
position
in his own time as an itinerant
prophet
executed
by
the
state,
as well as
Jesus'
dissonance with
teachings
and
practices
more characteristic of
Jewish religion
of his
time.
Distinguishing
his aim from "formal
sociological analysis"
or
"cross-cultural analysis
of
anthropology,'
both of which he characterizes as
heavily
concerned with the
testing
and
application
of theoretical
"models,'
Meier describes as his
goal
"the detection of
reliable
data,'
and
promises
"to
keep interpretation
to an absolute minimum"
(pp. 10-11)
in his
attempt
to assemble data for historical reconstruction of
Jesus
and his time.
Emphasizing
the limitations in the evidence available
(chap. 1),
Meier insists that
historical
scholarship
cannot reconstruct the "real"
Jesus (neither
the
totality
of his
thoughts, feelings
and
experiences,
nor a
"reasonably complete biographical portrait"
of
him).
Instead,
what is feasible is the "historical"
Jesus,
which Meier defines as the
Jesus
accessible
through
"the scientific tools of modern historical research"
(p. 25).
Chapters
2-5 deal with the various sources. The
major independent
sources are
judged
to be
Mark,
Q
and
John (chap.
2;
siding
with Dodd and Brown that
John
embodies some
independently
reliable
tradition).
After a detailed discussion of
Josephus's
testimonium
(chap. 3),
Meier concludes that a "core
statement,'
recoverable
by bracketing
later Christian
interpolations,
is authentic to
Josephus.
Other non-
Christian sources are deemed to offer us
nothing
of
any significance (chap. 4).
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Book Reviews 533
In
chap.
5,
Meier
engages
the non-canonical Christian sources. After
concluding
quickly
that the
agrapha
afford little
significant
data,
and that the
infancy gospels
are
"unpromising
material,'
Meier devotes the bulk of the
chapter
to Crossan's
theory
about
the
pre-Markan
material in the
Gospel of
Peter,
M. Smith's so-called Secret Mark, and
the
Gospel of
Thomas. In none of
these,
Meier
judges,
do we have reliable information
or
sayings independent
of the NT
(p. 140).
As for
identifying
authentic
Jesus
material
(chap. 6),
Meier
distinguishes
between
"primary
criteria" and
"secondary (or dubious)
criteria:'
For
Meier,
the
primary (and
more
useful)
criteria are five: embarrassment
(why
would Christians have invented
it), discontinuity (the
material cannot be derived
easily
from
Jewish
or Christian tradi-
tion), multiple
attestation, coherence,
and
Jesus' rejection
and execution
(he
had to
have
done/taught things
of the sort that account for his
being executed).
Meier insists
that none is a
"magic key"
and that even a careful use of them "in tandem" can
pro-
duce
only varying degrees
of
probability
for items of
Jesus
tradition.
Still,
he
opines,
such criteria are all we have
and,
used with
caution,
can
permit
us to make
necessary
(though always revisable)
historical
judgments.
Chap.
7 is a brief statement about the usefulness of research on the "historical
Jesus,'
in which Meier
puts
on "the hat of a
theologian" temporarily
to defend the
legitimacy
and
theological
usefulness of historical
Jesus
research
against
the
objec-
tions of "Bultmannians" and "fundamentalists"
Part 2
(chaps. 8-11)
deals with various
questions
about
Jesus'
historical
background.
In
chap.
8,
Meier discusses
Jesus'
name
(which suggests
that his
family participated
in a
"reawakening
of
Jewish
national and
religious identity" begun
in the Maccabean
period, p. 214), Jesus' birthplace (likely Nazareth),
his Davidic descent
(unprovable
but a
pre-Easter tradition),
the
virginal conception (an early
tradition
involving
a
judg-
ment
beyond
the limitations of historical
criticism),
and the
question
of
Jesus'
ille-
gitimacy (contra Schaberg,
Meier finds no evidence of the
charge
before the mid-second
century).
In
chaps.
9-10,
Meier deals with
Jesus' language
and education
("converging
lines
of
probability" suggest
he was literate in Hebrew and
Aramaic,
but
may
not have been
competent
in
Greek),
economic status
("at
the lower end of the
vague
middle" economic
range), family background (after
extensive
discussion,
concluding
that
Jesus'
"brothers"
were true
siblings), Jesus'
marital status
("celibate
on
religious grounds
the more
prob-
able
hypothesis"),
and
non-priestly position
in a
priestly-led religion.
It is a bit
strange
that there is no section on the
political background
of
first-century
Palestine. The notes
to
chap.
9 show that Meier has read on the
topic,
but his discussion of it is confined
to a few
paragraphs (pp. 282-83).
The last
chapter
is a detailed
attempt
to fix the
chronological parameters
of
Jesus'
ministry
as
exactly
as
possible.
The
"preliminary"
conclusion
quickly
reached is that
Jesus' ministry began
26-29 CE and ended 28-33 CE. There follows a
26-page attempt
to be more
exact,
mainly
concerned with the
day
of
Jesus'
execution
(Meier argues
for the
superiority
of the
Johannine chronology
and sees the last
supper
as "a solemn
farewell meal
...
just
before
Passover"),
and with the
length
of his
ministry ("two years
and a few
months"). Beyond
these basic matters, Meier concludes, it is difficult to be
more
precise
in a
chronological
framework for
Jesus' ministry. Consequently,
he tells
us in his
concluding words, his discussion of
Jesus' ministry
in volume two will be
arranged topically.
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534
Journal
of Biblical Literature
The
arrangement
of his
work,
his
approach,
rhetoric and his conclusions on
many
matters are different from the other
big
1991 book on
Jesus
in
English by J.
D. Crossan
(The
Historical
Jesus:
The
Life of
a Mediterranean
Jewish
Peasant
[San
Francisco:
Harper
Collins]).
When Meier's second volume
appears
a more detailed
comparison
will be
inevitable and
justified.
In this
first volume, however,
it is clear that Meier has
given
us a
major
statement of
approach
and
findings
on various
questions preliminary
to
a
portrait
of
Jesus' ministry.
Maps
of
Palestine,
a Herodian
family
tree,
a list of
first-century
Roman
emperors,
a list of abbreviations and indices of
"scripture" (no
index of non-canonical
material),
authors and
subjects
follow.
Larry
W.
Hurtado
University
of
Manitoba,
Winnipeg,
Manitoba, Canada,
R3T 2N2
Friihjiidische
Briefe:
Die
paulinische Briefe
im
Rahmen
der
offiziellen
religi6sen
Briefe
des
Friihjudentums, by
Irene Taatz. NTOA 16.
Freiburg: Universit~itsverlag;
G6ttingen:
Vandenhoeck &
Ruprecht,
1991.
Pp.
128.
Sfr.
32.
Taatz's book has two
primary purposes: (1)
to characterize a
type
of
Jewish epistolary
tradition which
conveyed
authoritative instructions to
Jewish
communities,
especially
communities in the
diaspora;
and
(2)
to demonstrate that Paul's letters
belonged
to
the same
epistolary
tradition.
After
preliminary
remarks,
the remainder of
Taatz's
book is divided into three
main
parts.
The
first
(part "A") provides
a
relatively
brief
compendium
of ancient
Jewish
letters. The second and
longest part (pp. 18-101) analyzes
five bodies of
Jewish
letters:
(1)
two
introductory
letters in 2 Macc
(1:1-2:18); (2)
the
Jeremiah-Baruch epistolary
tradition;
(3)
rabbinic
letters;
(4) correspondence
of the
Elephantine colony
in
Egypt;
and
(5)
Bar Kokhba letters. In the
final part ("C")
Taatz first summarizes what has been
learned about a discrete
Jewish epistolary
tradition from letters
analyzed
in the book's
second section
(part "B")
and then
shows,
through
formal and material
similarities,
how Paul's letters
fit
this broader
epistolary type.
Taatz
says
the authoritative
("official") epistolary
tradition,
used to direct and console
Jewish diaspora
communities,
had its
origin
in
Jeremiah's
letter
(cf. Jeremiah 29),
which
was sent to
Jewish
exiles in
Babylon.
This
precedent
was
enlarged
in the
fifth
century
BCE when
Jewish military
colonists on the island of
Elephantine
in
Egypt
wrote to
Jerusalem, requesting permission
to rebuild their
temple. Though
most of the
remaining
letters of this
official/religious type,
between
Jews
in the homeland and in
diaspora
communities,
are
considerably
later than the
Elephantine
and
Jeremiah correspondence,
Taatz
suggests
that a certain
similarity
of function characterizes the whole.
The letters all intended to serve the same fundamental
purpose, namely,
the
strengthening
of the
partnership
of
Jewish
motherland and
diaspora.
Until
destroyed
in 70
CE,
the
temple
cult and the office of
high priest
in
Jerusalem
constituted the
authoritative center which facilitated the
Jewish people's unity.
As the locus of com-
munity
definition,
Jerusalem
sent
official
letters to
diaspora
communities. In addition
to various
spiritual
connections,
several
practical
necessities connected the
diaspora
to
Jerusalem: payment
of the half-shekel tax to the
temple, required annually
of all
males from the
age
of
twenty; pilgrimages
to
Jerusalem
to celebrate the
great
feasts;
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