The Historical Christ and the Theological Jesus

by Dale C. Allison Jr.

Publisher:

Eerdmans

, 2009

Overview

In this volume, which he describes as “my personal testimony to doubt seeking understanding,” Dale Allison thoughtfully addresses ongoing historical-theological questions concerning Jesus. What should one think of the modern quest for the historical Jesus when there is such enduring discord among the experts, and when personal agendas play such a large role in the reconstructions? How much history is in the Gospels, and how much history does Christian theology require that there be? How does the quest impinge upon conventional Christian beliefs, and what might it contribute to contemporary theological reflection? The Historical Christ and the Theological Jesus is the personal statement of lessons that a respected participant in the quest has learned throughout the course of his academic career.

Key Features

• Addresses ongoing historical-theological questions concerning Jesus
• Discusses the importance of history as it relates to Christian theology

Contents

• Locating Jesus outside the Gospels
• ‘The witnessed one’: Jesus in Acts
• ‘To know or not to know’: Jesus in Paul
• ‘The ascended Christ’: Jesus in Deutero-Paul
• ‘The sacrificial high priest’: Jesus in Hebrews
• ‘The remembered teacher’: Jesus in James
• ‘The model Christian’: Jesus in 1 and 2 Peter and Jude
• ‘The apocalyptic Son of Man’: Jesus in the Johannine letters and Revelation
• The canonical Jesus

Top Highlights

“The correlations between personal belief and historical discovery must be endless. Jesus seems friendly to evangelical Protestantism in books written by evangelical Protestants, and he is a faithful Jew in books written by non-Christian Jews who want to reclaim Jesus.” (Page 16)

“Free him from what? From the ecclesiastical creeds and especially from the beliefs of the conservative churches of North America. Funk turned the historical Jesus into a wrecking ball with which to bash the walls of institutional, creedal Christianity.” (Page 18)

“I remain skeptical that we can very often show that any particular saying or story goes back to Jesus or does not go back to him. We need to quit pretending to do what we cannot do. The Gospels are parables. When we read them, we should think not that Jesus said this or did that but rather: Jesus did things like this, and he said things like that.” (Page 66)

“We necessarily see with our own eyes, and whenever we enter a text we cannot leave ourselves behind: the first person singular we always have with us.” (Page 19)

“It was only some time after my book on Q appeared in print that I opened my eyes to the obvious: I had created a Jesus in my own image, after my own likeness. Having enthusiastically preoccupied myself with the study of intertextuality for a decade, I had happily discovered that the Jesus of ancient Palestine was just like me, at least in one important respect. He may have been a first-century Jew and so in many ways a stranger and an enigma, but he was also skilled at setting up the sorts of intertextual dialogues that I love to unravel. So I had found Jesus, and he just happened to be a learned and admirable expositor, a man after my own intertextual heart.” (Pages 16–17)

Praise for the Print Edition

With his singular combination of learning, wit, honesty, and humility, Dale Allison here reflects on the theological limitations and implications of the study of the historian’s Jesus. Students at every level will find themselves instructed and even provoked by Allison’s comments, but they will also come away agreeing that ‘the unexamined Christ is not worth having.’

—Beverly Roberts Gaventa, distinguished professor of New Testament interpretation, Baylor University

In the last 125 years there have been five truly epochal thinkers who altered the course of Jesus research: Martin Kähler, Albert Schweitzer, Rudolf Bultmann, Ernst Käsemann—and the fifth one is Dale Allison.

—Scot McKnight, professor of New Testament, North Park University

The very title of Allison’s brief but engaging book signals that just as believers cannot be completely indifferent to the historical study of the Gospels without closing their faith to new challenges and insights, so historians, even if they are unbelievers, cannot escape the deeply theological nature of the life and teachings of Jesus. Allison is both refreshingly robust in his appraisals of the work of colleagues and disarmingly honest in his self-criticisms.

—Christian Century

Product Details

• Title: The Historical Christ and the Theological Jesus
• Author: Dale C. Allison Jr.
• Publisher: Eerdmans
• Publication Date: 2009
• Pages: 136
• Christian Group: Evangelicals
• Resource Type: Monographs
• Topic: Historical Jesus

About Dale C. Allison Jr.

Dr. Dale C. Allison Jr., Errett M. Grable professor of New Testament exegesis and early Christianity, has been on the faculty of Pittsburgh Theological Seminary since 1997. Before then he served on the faculties of Texas Christian University (Fort Worth, Texas) and Friends University (Wichita, Kan.).