The Historical Jesus vs. the Christ of Faith: A Critical Review

Introduction

Jesus as a religious icon and the central figure of one of the largest religious movements in the world is secure, but the role, meaning, and even existence of the historical Jesus is more problematic. This figure is explored by Mark Allan Powell (1998) in his book Jesus as a Figure in History, where the author considers how historians have treated the question of the historical Jesus — facts of his life that can be verified and similar issues separate from faith. Christians accept the reality of Christ on faith, while historians look for documentary evidence that Jesus lived and that some or all of the facts offered about his life are correct. The issue cannot be simply defined even by those relying on faith, given that the story of Christ differs from one gospel to the next in certain key details.

Powell cites historian Martin Kahler on the separation between "the Jesus of history" and "the Christ of faith" (p. 4). Powell admits that many Christians would find this distinction unsettling because they see Jesus as a spiritual figure, and if that image is changed by historians, they fear they will lose their faith in the representation of Jesus. However, it is a real distinction and one that infuses much of the historical analysis of the question of the reality of Christ.

Hierophanies of the sacred are found in things or persons through which the sacred is manifested. Hierophanies are, metaphorically speaking, windows through which the believer apprehends the holy. They might also be called sacraments — points of contact between the divine and the human. There are innumerable hierophanies. They are themselves treated reverently and sometimes fearfully, for they are the loci through which divine power is mediated. Sacred power is seen as dangerous in all religions, and so these loci of power are considered dangerous as well.

History of Jesus and Sacred Time

Different conceptions may be used as hierophanies. Time as hierophany shows that the holy is manifested or revealed in time. Sacred time is fulfilled time — a moment in which the sense that life might be simply one pointless, directionless series of events is transcended. There are different ways of conceiving of time, but many are cyclical, repetitive, and rhythmic, suggesting a dimension to existence that is continuous and unbroken. In the Christian conception, time is linear and unique. Time in this view is a series of non-reversible events arranged along a straight line, and the fullness of time is experienced in events and personalities rather than in the rhythm of nature. The fullness of God's disclosure was thus embodied in the person of the historical Jesus.

In today's modern society, most people take their beliefs to a higher level in order to understand Jesus and themselves on a spiritual plane, which makes them open to new ideas about religion. From that perspective, religion is not just about finding an understanding of Jesus; it is also about finding one's own spirituality, which helps a person to accept and develop self-knowledge. This is why many Christians do not want to hear what historians have to say about Jesus — they see him solely as a spiritual being and do not wish to consider that Jesus was once a historical figure before he became the religious figure in whom they place their faith.

Historians generally are not attempting to support faith as much as they want to demonstrate how Jesus fits into the history of his time. Powell notes that many historians make the distinction between the two forms of Jesus — historical and religious — on the basis of chronology: the historical Jesus would have been a real person living at a specific time, while the religious figure would have evolved from the stories told about him and from the acts and beliefs of his followers as they formed the Christian church in the centuries after his death. Powell himself, however, makes the distinction on a different basis. He describes the Jesus of history as but one part of the larger Jesus of story, meaning Jesus was an everyday man — a living human being — before he was known as a religious figure in the Christian faith. As Powell writes, "The story of Jesus begins before anything that can reasonably be identified as historical and continues long after everything that can be identified as historical. The Jesus of story is the larger entity of which the Jesus of history is but a part" (p. 9).

In all reality, people are spiritual beings who have religion as their foundation for becoming complete on a higher level.

The Quest for the Historical Jesus

The quest for the historical Jesus has returned and is currently generating more publications than at any time in the history of scholarship. The central issue is the question of what can be reliably asserted about the person of Jesus on the basis of historical evidence alone — apart from the imposition of a faith perspective. This is sometimes explained to general audiences by asking: "What would it be appropriate for a teacher to say about Jesus in the public schools?" Most Christians in the United States recognize that it would not be appropriate for such a teacher to tell students that Jesus was born of a virgin; though believers may accept this as Christians, it is a conclusion of faith rather than of historical research. That Jesus was crucified, however, or that he befriended outcasts and taught a radical ethic of love — these are matters that virtually all scholars, Christian or not, accept as indisputable facts of history (Powell, 1998, Issues in Jesus Research and Scholarship).

Historical Jesus studies have also brought new attention to the oft-ignored apocryphal gospels, such that many parishioners are now hearing of these works for the first time. A certain sensationalism attaches to the phenomenon when these volumes are touted as "secret gospels" that the church has tried to keep hidden from the public. In fact, they are readily available in theological libraries but are of less interest to the general public than conspiracy theorists would have us believe. The only apocryphal gospel that any scholar regards as conveying authentic information about Jesus is the Gospel of Thomas. All other apocryphal gospels are studied for what they reveal about later Christianity, not for what they say about the historical person of Jesus. This is a rare point on which virtually all scholars of all persuasions agree. Furthermore, the Gospel of Thomas is not thought to reveal anything authentic about Jesus that would counter traditional concepts — at most, it enhances those concepts with similar, parallel material (Powell, 1998, Issues in Jesus Research and Scholarship).

Powell tells the story of the historical treatment of Jesus in chronological order, beginning as historians "discover" Jesus — something that developed somewhat late in history because Jesus had previously been treated solely as a religious figure, or his historicity was simply assumed and traced to the gospels. After the Enlightenment, historians took greater interest in finding the historical Jesus, meaning finding evidence of Jesus outside the gospels, though often using the gospels as a starting point. As Powell notes, many historians sought to impose some broader concept on the idea of the historical Jesus, such as "Jesus as social reformer" or "Jesus as mystic." Many writers sought to fill in the gaps left by the gospels with projections of what Jesus thought and did, which is not a truly historical approach to the subject.

Another tendency noted by Powell — with reference to historians such as Paulus from the seventeenth century — was to impose a rationalist explanation on the accounts of miracles attributed to Jesus. The different accounts cited throughout Powell's book are described as novelistic narratives, scientific analyses, mythical depictions, and so on.

Conclusion

These different contemporary visions of Jesus are filled out even more as Powell discusses the six different contemporary accounts he features in his book. Powell does not see any of the accounts as definitive and notes that the search for the historic Jesus continues and will develop into different visions of the man over the coming decades. He analyzes the different accounts and discerns certain issues of importance. First, the question of sources remains vital — not only finding sources but determining their value and gleaning what they have to say on the subject and how it relates to other accounts. This leads to the second issue, that of criteria: how it is determined that a given source is credible and has something worthwhile to add to the debate. The third issue is approach — meaning how historical research should proceed and how it should be analyzed.