Tag: James Crossley

2010-05-22

Why Christianity Happened: Origins of the Pauline Mission” (reviewing ch. 5 of James Crossley’s book)

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by Neil Godfrey

Filed under: Biblical Studies, New Testament
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Arkansas Mass Baptism 2nd effortEarlier I reviewed chapter 2 of Why Christianity Happened by James Crossley, and here I look at his final chapter (5), “Recruitment, Conversion, and Key Shifts in Law Observance: The Origins of the Pauline Mission“.

I was curious to understand what Crossley had to say in favour of a social history approach to explaining how antinomian Pauline Christianity can be explained if the earliest Christian movement began among circumcising, sabbath-keeping, synagogue-worshiping, food-law observant Jews. Crossley seeks to explain Christianity’s origins through socioeconomic paradigms. Social history, he argues, is where the truly historical explanations lie.

Paul’s views on the law and justification by faith can thus be seen as an intellectual reaction to and justification of a very down-to-earth and messy social problem. (p.172)

I fully agree with attempting to explain Christian origins in secular terms and according to the models of the social sciences and socioeconomic models where possible. Unfortunately, his attempt to explain the origins of the Jesus movement through the Lenski-Kautsky and Hobsbawm observations of how certain social movements arise flounders on the absence of evidence, or misapplication of Gospel evidence, as discussed in my earlier review of chapter 2.

The problems facing Crossley’s explanation in that chapter, and in chapter 5 which I will address here, arise from the default assumption that the narrative outline of the Gospels and Acts is grounded in genuine history. Although he treats these texts as if their narratives contain allusions to the real historical origins of early Christianity, he at no time justifies this assumption. (See “footnote in the box at end of this post for further discussion of this point.)

The trap laid by the assumption of the historicity of Gospels-Acts

When Crossley (or any) historian locks himself into the Gospel-Acts’ narrative paradigm of Christian origins he is stuck with just a single form of Christianity and must find a way of explaining how so many extremely variant forms of Christianity Continue reading “Why Christianity Happened: Origins of the Pauline Mission” (reviewing ch. 5 of James Crossley’s book)”

2010-05-20

Okay, just one more early-dating of Mark critique, but quickly

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by Neil Godfrey

Filed under: Biblical Studies, New Testament
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Image by Toban Black via Flickr

(response to recent comments on the earlier post “Dating Mark Early”)

Crossley presents three specific arguments to date Mark before 40 ce:

  1. the way he wrote about the disciples plucking corn on the sabbath could be interpreted by the unwary to mean that Jesus was abolishing the sabbath; but since other arguments “establish” this was not the case, the ambiguity in Mark’s narrative “demonstrates” that he wrote at a time when all Christians would have understood that Jesus plainly did not abolish the sabbath — and therefore at a time when all Christians were taking sabbath keeping for granted — i.e. before 40 ce.
  2. the way he worded Jesus’ saying in the divorce controversy appears on the face of it to mean that divorce is not allowed under any circumstances; but since it can be argued that Mark’s Jesus was always a stickler for the biblical law, and the biblical law did allow for divorce, it is “clear” that Mark did not mean his audience to read his words literally, but to assume that Jesus “meant” to allow for divorce for “the obvious reasons” anyway — and this also “proves” that Mark wrote very early before any divorce discussions arose in the church — i.e. before 40 ce.
  3. the way Mark chose his words in describing the handwashing controversy left it open for later readers to think that Jesus was declaring all foods clean, thus abolishing the biblical food laws; but since on other grounds it can be argued that Mark’s Jesus always observed biblical laws on principle, we can infer that Mark was writing at a time when his audience took this for granted and understood Jesus was not abolishing the food laws at all. — i.e. even earlier before 40 ce.

Any one of these arguments, Crossley admits, may not be persuasive for all readers, but together they become an argument of “cumulative weight” and therefore much stronger. The maths proves it: 0+0+0=3.

In one place in his book, The Date of Mark’s Gospel, he says that the first two arguments are the strongest case; but elsewhere he says the third is the strongest. I’ve dealt with one part of #1 here, and will deal with #3 in this post. Continue reading “Okay, just one more early-dating of Mark critique, but quickly”

2010-05-11

A common meaning behind Gospel of Mark’s cornplucking and divorce controversies

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by Neil Godfrey

Filed under: Biblical Studies
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Though Crossley and Casey have written many thousands of words to show how these two episodes (sabbath cornfield dispute and divorce controversy) can be used to date Mark before 40 c.e., I find their arguments circular, convoluted and ultimately speculative. If I thought they had a widespread impact I would take the time to address them in more detail than I did in my earlier post on their early dating of Mark.

Meanwhile, I find if I read these passages as they are worded now, and within the broader context of the gospel’s message itself, and try very hard to avoid reading them through third century rabbinic writings or speculative Aramaic sources or other gospels written later than Mark, I can see something in them that I think is very interesting.

They both share the theme of a call for disciples to return to how things were at the very beginning of creation. In this they share a message found in certain gnostic type writings. (Mark also shares the syzygies or paradoxes found in some gnostic type sayings (e.g. the blind see, the dead live, etc), although Mark fleshes them out into narrative form.)

Example: In the sabbath cornfield dispute, Mark has Jesus pronounce that “the sabbath was made for man and not man for the sabbath.” This is in response to Pharisees accusing Jesus’ disciples of violating the sabbath by plucking corn, and as a follow-up to the analogy of David being allowed to eat the shewbread sacred to the priests. It seems to me as if this is suggesting that for all the Mosaic or other rules that might have come to historic or contemporary importance, what Jesus wants is for people to accept things how they were meant to be, and how they were, back at the beginning. God gave the sabbath for mankind, and the Son of God had come now and wanted everything how it was meant to be from the start. Continue reading “A common meaning behind Gospel of Mark’s cornplucking and divorce controversies”

2010-04-21

Chomsky, Crossley and the betrayal of an independent approach to historical Jesus studies

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by Neil Godfrey

Filed under: Biblical Scholars, Biblical Studies
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Noam_chomsky
Noam Chomsky

It is easy for theologians and biblical scholars to wear prophet mantles and appear to be courageously attacking the sins of the established powers. There can be an easy smugness in identifying one’s position with “the conscience” of the guild, the church, the public or nation. “Speaking Truth to Power” loses some of its awe when one finds the Power in turn rewarding its “gainsayers” with various honours and security of status. The game was played out without embarrassment from either side in Australia when one of its most socially and environmentally regressive Prime Ministers, John Howard, recommended a prominent social justice advocate cleric, Peter Hollingworth, to the Governor-Generalship, and awarded a leading environmentalist, Tim Flannery, Australian of the Year.

So it was with a little hope, but not too much, that I approached biblical scholar James Crossley’s book, Jesus in an Age of Terror, that opens with the following quotation from Noam Chomsky’s The Responsibility of Intellectuals:

It is the responsibility of intellectuals to speak the truth and to expose lies. This, at least, may seem enough of a truism to pass over without comment. Not so, however. For the modern intellectual, it is not at all obvious.

Unfortunately, Crossley himself falls into the trap of joining other religion scholars who boast of critiquing imperialist, racial and class-warfare themes while in reality missing the heart and soul of Chomsky’s message. As a consequence Crossley becomes yet another brick in the wall of the establishment power he critiques only superficially.

Here is Crossley’s ironically correct explanation of the Chomsky model of how mainstream media works:

The propaganda model shows that the press is not really an important tool of democracy and it is not really disagreeable, argumentative or subversive of political power, at least not in any significant sense. The function of the mass media is to provide support for the special interests that dominate the state and private activity. This is reflected in their choices, emphases, and omissions. It is the powerful who fix the assumptions of media discourse and decide what is allowed to be seen and heard, often with the support of academics. Disagreements reflect disagreements among the elites. Although individuals may hold very different views from the agenda of mass media, these views will not be seriously reflected in the overall agenda or agendas. (pp.3-4, Jesus in an Age of Terror)

Yet this is exactly the place where Crossley’s own supposedly “independent” studies of Christian origins find themselves. He shares with his more religiously interested colleagues the logically flawed historiographical and epistemological assumptions that sustain that guild’s reason for existence.

Everyone knows — it is a simple truism — that one needs independent verification of any narrative before making assumptions about whether it is factual or not. This, at least, may seem enough of a truism to pass over without comment. Not so, however. For the [many a biblical scholar], it is not at all obvious.

Continue reading “Chomsky, Crossley and the betrayal of an independent approach to historical Jesus studies”

2010-03-30

Biblical history, literary criticism and logical method

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by Neil Godfrey

Filed under: Biblical Scholars, Biblical Studies, Historical Methods and Historiography
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The comments originally sent to my previous post, and my replies to them, were lost. I have retrieved the comments of others but my own are lost (unless someone reading this did catch them in an email — if you can forward them to me that would be great, thanks — my address is in the contact info on the right margin.)

A big thanks and free virtual beer to the subscriber who was able to email me my original comment. It was written early in the morning when I was alert, unlike the ponderous and detailed response of this post that was written late at night at the end of a long day. My original brief response is now returned and reunited with the comments of the previous post.

Anyway, I am replying here more fully to James McGrath’s original comment on the off-chance that there are others also reading this who share his criticisms of my original post. James wrote in his first paragraph:

Two things, neither of which has to do with Crossley’s or Seeley’s arguments but which have to do with methodology. First, you wrote “Crossley does not like literary criticism when it counts against historicity (as it so often does).” I’ve never encountered a literary critic who considered their method as a means to answering historical criticism. Literary criticism treats a text as a piece of literature and sets aside historical questions. Historical criticism asks historical questions. To say that literary criticism counts against historicity sounds to me like utter nonsense, but perhaps you wish to clarify.

Literary criticism and history

Certainly. I was responding to what I understood were James Crossley’s views on the role of literary criticism in history. In my original post I quoted part of a sentence of his in Dating Mark that spoke negatively of those approaching historical questions from a literary-critical perspective, and this jells with what he writes in a book Crossley co-edited, Writing History, Constructing Religion:

Some historians have been completely unaccommodating to all things post-modern. One of the most famous critics was G. R. Elton who claimed that historians are, in a way, fighting for their lives in the face of ‘people who would subject historical studies to the dictates of literary critics’.

So it looks as though post-modernists and a few others do at least acknowledge an overlap between literary criticism and history. But I had only read that sentence of Crossley’s in its original context in his “Writing History, Constructing Religion” book after I published my blog post. I had originally encountered that quote in a context that led me to think Crossley himself was as opposed to the role of literary criticism in history as was Elton. But that is clearly not so, as I have since learned. Live and learn. Always check sources for oneself even/especially if they’re from your grandmother!

But literary criticism at some level is inevitable in the historical process — even in biblical historical studies.

If a historian reads a text as a factual historical account she is bringing to that text a certain literary-critical perspective or judgment. Conversely, if she reads it as a totally fictional piece of escapism, she is bringing to her reading a different literary-critical judgment. Neither perspective means that the text is 100% historical fact or 100% fictional. Actual historical data might still be a matter of a second-layer of judgment, but the initial literary-critical assumptions brought into play will inevitably steer the way a historian analyzes the text.

And at a more micro level, we can take the Temple Action of Jesus as a case in point. Seeley, Mack and Fredriksen all question the historicity of the Temple Act of Jesus. And they do so on the grounds that the narrative details of this pericope are best explained by broader literary-thematic interests of the author when compared with the rationales offered for it as an historical event. Fredriksen (as originally quoted here along with Mack et al) sums up the literary-critical basis for denying its historicity:

Actual history rarely obliges narrative plotting so exactly

If one can see an immediate tangible literary explanation for a detail in a narrative and has to balance the odds of its historicity against a number of layers of assumptions (with no visible means of support) of oral transmission, theological interests and genuine historical events, then what does Mr Occam advise?

I side with Seeley, Mack, Fredriksen and a few others I am sure who believe it is literary critics who beat the historicists in the detail of the Temple Action of Jesus.

In my original (previous) post I pointed to Crossley’s use of literary criticism in coming to his estimation that the author of Mark’s gospel was exaggerating with respect to point X rather than narrating a literal exact fact. Crossley, and no doubt most historians, acknowledge that some degree of literary criticism is necessary in order to sensibly determine what an author is really intending to convey.

So literary criticism works at several levels of reading in any text, and each one is to some extent unavoidable in any endeavour to assess the historical value of a text. We may not always be conscious that we are making literary-critical assumptions or judgments when we read a text, but it is always inevitable that we are in fact doing so whether we realize it or not.

Part Two of James’ comment

Continue reading “Biblical history, literary criticism and logical method”

2010-03-21

“Why Christianity Happened”. Reviewing chapter 2 of James Crossley’s book

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by Neil Godfrey

Filed under: Biblical Scholars, Biblical Studies, Historical Methods and Historiography, New Testament
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There’s a lot I like about James Crossley’s publications. I found myself relating in many ways to his views expressed in “Jesus in an Age of Terror”. We have a lot in common politically, and I share some of his views on the peculiar scholarship that Christian dominance of biblical studies has generated. I have  referred to his observation on the relationship between a scholarly emphasis on the Jewishness of Jesus and broader socio-political changes since World War 2 , alongside April DeConick’s similar views of the evolving treatment of Judas in the same context, and built on both of these to suggest a similar explanation for the post War changes in scholarly views on the evidence of Josephus for Jesus.

I have also appreciated his calls for far more involvement of traditionally nonbiblical methodologies to be applied to biblical studies. However, here I only go along with half his proposal. Crossley expects nonbiblical scholars to engage seriously with the insights of Christian scholarship (p. 33 of Why Christianity Happened). There are many insights worth serious attention.

What Crossley is calling for is an application of secular models and explanations for the origins of Christianity. A history of ideas and theology needs to take second place to hard economic and social realities as dynamics that explain Christianity. Fair enough, but I see a bigger problem with Jesus studies that Crossley overlooks.

What needs addressing are flawed methodologies and assumptions that would never be tolerated in historical studies of other academic disciplines, and that even Crossley appears to accept without question.

I get these out of the way first before going on to discuss the specifics of his socioeconomic explanation for the rise of Christianity.

The fallacy underlying nearly all historical Jesus studies

Hobsbawm on method

Crossley draws in part on insights of the renowned historian Eric Hobsbawm’s studies of bandits and bandit culture in South America. But Hobsbawm’s statements about methods for evaluating sources and determining whether or not a narrative (whether oral, written or even an eye-witness report) has any historical basis to it, ought to embarrass any and all biblical historians who study the Gospel narratives with the assumption they must contain some historical core.

In no case can we infer the reality of any specific ’social bandit’ merely from the ‘myth’ that has grown up around him. In all cases we need independent evidence of his actions. (p.142)

From p.24 of A Contra Corriente: a Journal on Social History and Literature in Latin America (2004)

Schweitzer on method

This echoes a remark by Albert Schweitzer about the presumption of historicity that cannot be brought to the Gospel narratives about Jesus simply because they lack “independent evidence” or external controls:

Moreover, in the case of Jesus,. . .  there are no data available in Jewish or Gentile secular history which could be used as controls. Thus the degree of certainty [of there being a historical basis to the narratives] cannot even by raised so high as positive probability.

From page 401 of The Quest of the Historical Jesus, 2001, by Albert Schweitzer.

This basic principle is really simple logic and normal “street smarts” and should not even be controversial. But when it comes to the studies of Jesus, my experience tells me it is very controversial, so controversial that it is silenced and excluded from the discussion, or scorned and ridiculed if it intrudes.

Davies on method

It was controversial when applied to “Old Testament” studies by Philip R. Davies in 1992. Back then he argued in a ground-breaking monograph, In Search of Ancient Israel, that we need to confirm the events of the Bible independently of the Bible itself. This means comparing the Bible record with other historical records. It is naïve to take any book, the Bible included, at face value. We need supporting evidence to know when it was written and if its stories have any truth behind them. (See my outline of notes from Davies’ book on my vridar.info website.)

Schwartz on method

And I never tire of reminding anyone willing to listen that this basic method of determining historicity of a narrative was warned about way back in 1904:

only in special cases does there exist a tradition about a given literary production independent of the self-witness of the literary production itself; and that the person who utilizes a literary-historical tradition must always first demonstrate its character as a historical document. General grounds of probability cannot take the place of this demonstration.

from an academic paper delivered in 1904 by E. Schwartz: cited in a 1991 chapter by Luise Abramowski titled “The ‘Memoirs of the Apostles’ in Justin” pp.331-332 published in “The Gospel and the Gospels” ed. Peter Stuhlmacher.

The exceptionalism of biblical/Jesus studies

So why do nearly all historical Jesus or Christian origin studies begin with the assumption that the Gospel narrative, without any independent evidence or external control, contains evidence of real history?

How is it that scholars of biblical studies can get away with declaring a particular action or saying as “historical” ultimately on the basis that they can’t think of a reason why anyone would just make it up, or that it is so embarrassing (to somebody, usually the author, although we don’t know who the author was) it must be true?

How is it that in the case of the Gospels, scholars can determine what is “historical” solely on the basis of analyzing the narrative details themselves and comparing these details with what we know from independent sources of the geographic or other background setting of the narrative?

Can anyone imagine Eric Hobsbawm declaring a particular bandit to have been genuinely historical on the basis of this sort of analysis of a written narrative? Goodness, he had a reputation to maintain!

The need for independent attestation of the Gospel narrative does not exist with this area of biblical studies.

Why does it appear that biblical studies, in particular any studies relating to the Gospel narrative, are exempt from the norms that require independent witness to verify their historical status?

But this is just the beginnings of what I find lacking in Crossley’s attempt to find a socioeconomic cause for the birth of Christianity.

Peasant Unrest and the Emergence of Jesus’ Specific View of the Law

This is the title of Crossley’s second chapter, and where I begin with this post. This title indicates that there is something unique or special about Jesus’ particular view of the Law that can be directly explained as a response to the socioeconomic conditions of Galilee. However, in his explanation, he grants that the same “specific view of the Law” is one found “deeply embedded in the Pentateuch, biblical tradition, and post biblical tradition”. So I am forced to wonder what was so “specific” about Jesus’ view that requires a particular socioeconomic situation to explain.

Jesus’ view of the law reflected a key aspect of his general teaching: the immense problems that come with socioeconomic inequality. The relationship between socioeconomic reality and the Torah is quite explicit in such texts as Mark 10:17-22 and Luke 16:19-31. These related concerns are not difficult to find in Jewish law: they are deeply embedded in the Pentateuch, biblical tradition, and post biblical tradition. But why do such concerns run consistently and densely throughout Jesus’ teaching? Why specifically did Jesus’ concerns emerge when and where they did? These questions are crucial because Jesus emerged at a time and in a place of socioeconomic upheaval that eventually resulted in full-scale revolts against Rome. (p. 35)

Continue reading ““Why Christianity Happened”. Reviewing chapter 2 of James Crossley’s book”