Bart Ehrman's Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium begins with the author giving numerous examples of people who have written books knowing exactly (give or take a year) when the world was going to end. He explains Edgar Whisenant's 88 Reasons Why the Rapture Will Be in 1988. Through mathematical calculation and worldly events that were predicted to occur by the Bible, this NASA rocket engineer was able to come to a conclusion that 1988 would be the year for rapture. Many Christians, however, were against his theory as the Bible states: "But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only." (Mt. 24:36) Yet, Whisenant had not predicted "the day and hour" but merely the year. Ehrman provides several more examples of apocalypticists. Why? He continues to travel back in time and provide examples that people in every generation thought that their generation would be when the end of the world would occur, even in the time of Jesus. Ehrman begins to convey his message in the search for the historical Jesus. Jesus was an apocalyptic prophet who was convinced that 'Doomsday' was going to arrive very soon, even in his own lifetime! The author argues that since John the Baptist was apocalyptic, his resurrection was apocalyptic, Paul of Tarsus was apocalyptic, then it only makes sense that Jesus was apocalyptic as well. Throughout the book, he examines topics such as how the Gospels got to be the way they are, what we know about the historical Jesus from Christian and non-Christian sources and examining the teachings of Jesus in context to the 1st century. Ehrman points out that Jesus was not unique in his apocalyptic message; Jesus was unique because of his resurrection. After proving that Jesus was concerned with the apocalypse, he goes on to illustrate that Jesus was wrong about the apocalypse. He does this by showing that the Gospels and other non-canonical writings may have changed Jesus' message from 'the end of days is now' to 'the end of days is soon'. By the end of book, Ehrman proposes that the best way to understand the life of Jesus historically and the Christian movement which continued his teachings is through analyzing Jesus as an apocalyptic prophet.
Before any of the authors begin to purport their idea of the historical Jesus, they inform the reader of which texts they will analyze in order to arrive at their conclusions. They explain why they believe the texts they chose are pertinent while describing their somewhat similar methodologies. John Dominic Crossan announces his technique and strategy in the epilogue of his book. He tells the reader that his main focus of texts and writings will be on the early stratum of the Christian tradition, which he believes to be between 30 and 60 CE. He also states that he will not develop any theories or hypotheses from single, independent attestations. Thus, Crossan believes that the greater number of independent attestations for a given saying of Jesus, the greater the possibility that the saying was actually said by Jesus himself. He focuses his attention toward the ‘Q Gospel’ and the Gospel of Thomas. The ‘Q Gospel’ comes from the German word Quelle, which means ‘source’; it is a hypothetical Gospel, which scholars believe once existed and thus explains why there is material that is common in both the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. The Gospel of Thomas is an independent, Gnostic Gospel that includes no narratives but only one-hundred and fourteen sayings of Jesus. The author is held under the assumption that canonical Gospels (those which are found in the New Testament), the Acts and Pauline writings do not represent the historical Jesus as they are of later writings and are the result of Christian ‘mythmaking’ about Jesus.
Bart Ehrman’s methodologies are not stated in his epilogue, but rather are described in a fair amount of detail over the first ninety pages of his book. He examines the validity of canonical and non-canonical writings and explores for any mention of Jesus in non-Christian sources – either Jewish or pagan. Ehrman also states that the ‘Q Gospel’ and the Gospel of Thomas are excellent sources to find the historical Jesus. Yet, he also adds a few more texts to his list. Firstly, he also includes the non-canonical text of the Gospel of Peter, but claims that the best sources are the canonical Gospels themselves. With a side note, he cautions the reader that the Gospels “represent traditions that were passed down by word of mouth, year after year, among Christians who sometimes changed the stories – indeed, sometimes invented the stories – as they retold them.” (Ehrman, p. 83) Similar to Crossan, Ehrman also states that historically accurate information is that which is only found in an independently attested number of sources.
There are a number of problems that can be found in both of the author’s arguments concerning the historical Jesus, mainly that of John Dominic Crossan. First, I shall take a look at the texts which Crossan deems to contain true depictions of Jesus. He focuses primarily on the ‘Q Gospel’ and the Gospel of Thomas. However, this is wherein lies the problem. The ‘Q Gospel’ to this date has never been discovered and the contents of the document are mere educated guesses. Crossan metamorphesizes the ‘Q Gospel’ into one that supports his arguments. He constantly refers back to the Gospel of Thomas. Yet, the Gospel of Thomas is believed to have been written between 100 and 140 CE. The only text which exist and originate between the years 30 and 60 CE are the Gospel of Mark and the Pauline epistles, however, Crossan deems these to be ‘Christianized myths’ and considered irrelevant. Although these criticisms seem minor, the texts which he has carefully chosen are essential for his analysis and if were removed from the list of texts that he deems credible, they would invalidate his conclusions. Throughout Crossan’s book, he argues from a broad, general point and leads to a specific when trying to prove a point. For example, I will analyze Jesus’ supposed non-burial as he focuses on it extensively. The author says that most of the people who were crucified around the time of Jesus were never buried which is enough evidence for Crossan to argue that Jesus himself also was not buried. By Jesus never have been buried, the author is able to extrapolate his theory and declare that the resurrection is a fictitious event. The burial of Jesus is mentioned in all the Gospels as well as a few of the letters written by Paul. Most of these texts are not only written in Crossan’s relevant spectrum between 30 and 60 CE, but are also independent attestations (which he claims is the best way to learn about the historical Jesus). However, Crossan never takes any of these writings into consideration or thought.
In Ehrman’s book, I was not able to find as many problems with the clarity of his arguments or whether his conclusions were valid in comparison to Crossan. The author does acknowledge other scholarly views, whether traditional or unorthodox, yet, does not state his own opinion on their ideas. For example, Ehrman provides an opinion from a biblical scholar stating Jesus spoke of the ‘Son of Man’ in the third person, insinuating that He wasn’t referring to Himself, but rather a completely different person. The biographer’s thesis of the apocalyptic Jesus fades in and out throughout the book and at times it is hard to follow which element he is trying to prove as he skews off on tangents. One of the major strengths of Ehrman is his commitment to his methodology and by him doing this, proves to the reader that his conclusions are more valid and well-founded. After reading the book in its entirety, one is convinced that Jesus was an apocalyptic prophet. However, he does not go into enough depth into explaining the apocalyptic Jesus that he has established. Ehrman states that Jesus made apocalyptic predictions that he claimed would happen in His time and did not come true. Yet, this is where he concludes his theory. If Jesus’ predictions did not occur within his lifetime, does this mean that Jesus was a false prophet? It seems that Ehrman is afraid to indulge in any unorthodox theories.
Crossan concludes his ‘Revolutionary Biography’ by recognizing that “there will always be divergent Christs built upon them, but I argue, above all, that the structure of a Christianity will always be: this is how we see Jesus-then as Christ-now.” (Crossan, 200) He further purports that Christians in every generation should make their own judgement about the historical Jesus and on that basis decide what Christ means to them in their own time. Finally, he proposes “that the dialectic between Jesuses and Christs (or Sons, or Lords, or Wisdoms) is at the heart of both tradition and canon, that it is perfectly valid, and that it has always been with us and probably always will be.” (Crossan, 200) It is no surprise that Ehrman concludes his book with the fact that Jesus was a first-century, Jewish apocalypticist. Ehrman is convinced that Jesus anticipated that the end of time would occur during His own lifetime and that people needed to repent. Obviously, if Jesus’ message was to be taken literally, then He was wrong. Ehrman maintains that from his historical perspective, it is evident that there is a big difference between the apocalyptic Jesus and the Jesus as seen today. The apocalyptic Jesus “urged his followers to abandon their homes and forsake families for the sake of the Kingdom that was soon to arrive.” (Ehrman, 244) The Jesus of today, on the other hand, is seen as a strong advocator of ‘family values’.
Although I found Crossan’s book to be very interesting, his arguments were not able to convince me that the resurrection was a myth and that the miracles of Jesus never took place. I found Ehrman’s depiction of the historical Jesus more convincing. Whereas Crossan seems to limit his approach to the ‘Q Gospel’ and the Gospel of Thomas (which are non-canonical), Ehrman, on the other hand, used numerous sources (canonical and non-canonical) in support of this thesis that Jesus was an apocalyptic prophet. To substantiate, for instance, that the end of the world was imminent according to Jesus’ teachings, Ehrman demonstrates this argument through the Gospel of Mark (Mk 13:33-37), Matthew and Luke’s ‘special sources’ (Mt 25:13, Lk 12:36) as well as the ‘Q Gospel’. A similar methodology is used to demonstrate that Jesus had women followers and that “woman followers were the first to believe that Jesus’ body was no longer in the tomb (Mt 28:1-10; Mk 16:1-8; Jn 20:1-2; G. Pet. 50-57).” (Ehrman, 189) Many books to date have been written attempting to analyze and depict Jesus and many more will probably be written in the future. These books will only be as good as the skills of the authors in using convincing methodological approaches. In my estimation, Bart Ehrman’s Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium was an excellent attempt at same.
