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Religious Book Store > Religious books beginning with J
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Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony |
Author: Richard Bauckham
Published: 2006-12-15 |
List price: $32.00
Our price: $21.12
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As of: December 03rd, 2008 09:09:33 PM
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Customer comments on this selection.
 This really happened...
In this ambitious work of scholarship, Richard Bauckham argues that the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and such extrabiblical accounts as those by Papias, Urgulanius, and Polycrates, derive from eyewitness accounts.
With respect to the Latin codex of Urgulanius, we are indeed dealing with someone who knows what he's talking about, albeit from a strictly pagan point of view. Ugulanius was the Roman centurion who managed the Passion on Good Friday. He was a monster of efficiency. By nine a.m., Jesus was already undressed, nailed down, hoisted up, and calling for a drink of water, while Urgulanius cast lots for Jesus' very nice, seamless cloak; which was won, however, by a common footsoldier; and that cloak was not seen again by Christians until the year 1202, during the Fourth Crusade, when the army of Pope Innocent the Third rescued it from the Ottomans (Mark 15:21-25).
Jesus was crucified along with two Jewish thieves. Jesus was nailed to the middle cross, which was a little taller than the other two. And the way I picture it, there was a very nice beam of sunlight coming down through a gap in the clouds and shining right on him.
The thief on the right is the one who repented at the last minute, in order to spend eternity in Heaven (Luke 23:33-43). But to the fellow on his left, Jesus said, "Depart from me, thou cursed fellow, into the eternal fire prepared for the Devil and his angels!" - which I thought was a cruel thing to say. For one thing, Jesus made Hell sound a lot scarier than it really is; and for another, the poor fellow couldn't "depart" if he wanted to, he was nailed down (Matt. 25:41).
By "the Devil and his angels" Jesus was referring, of course, to me and my two friends, Belial and Beelzebub. That's okay, I forgive him. And I wish that Jesus had likewise forgiven the poor devil who stole the loaf of bread and got nailed for it. What is so hard about an old-fashioned, "I forgive you," plain and simple?
Yahveh and Jesus, what a pair! Those two always think they have to come up with some goofy over-elaborate scheme, such as the Incarnation and the Crucifixion and the Vicarious Atonement - and then it's like, "Okay, NOW we can forgive you."
Would it have taken any skin off the Creator's nose, I wonder, just to FORGIVE His creatures for doing what He programmed them to do, such as eat and drink and copulate?
(As aside: The early Church had a Latin hymn called "The Vicarious Atonement," which I have rendered in modern English as follows:
There once was a God named "the LORD,"
Who loved to be praised and adored,
But He could not forgive
Or let anyone live
Until He nailed his Son to a board.
That whole "Vicarious Atonement" scheme is what the theologians at seminary school call "the science of soteriology." Here's what I call it: I call it the science of "too much time on Their hands." I don't know if you've ever read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, but whenever I read that part about Tom and Huck going to such absurd lengths to liberate Jim, who didn't really need liberating, I think to myself: Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn! These two characters remind me of Yahveh and Jesus, and the science of soteriology!)
Back to our story:
At high noon on Good Friday, the miracles started: God the Father and God the holy Ghost teamed up to extinguish the light of the sun.
For three hours, the entire solar system went pitch black. That did not, however, stop the cruel Jews and the Romans from telling stupid jokes (Luke 23:44-45): "Why was Jesus late for dinner?" said a voice, from out of the darkness. "He just got hung up!"
"Mary of Nazareth walks into a Bethlehem hotel," said another. "She hands the innkeeper six nails. She says, 'Can you put me and my boy up for the night?'"
"You didn't tell it right," said a third. "That's not how it goes. It's only three nails, and it's Jesus who gives a Centurion the nails, and he says, 'Got a vacant king-sized single?'"
(Note: That's just how it was with stories about Jesus, in those days: you never heard the same two versions of the same anecdote -- videlicet, the Gospels.)
There was still another story of the crucifixion, something about Jesus calling, "John, John!" ("What, Lord?") "I can see your house from here!" But that one cannot be true, either, because John's house was up north, in Bethsaida. Besides, by 2:00 p.m., when John first stood at the foot of the cross, Jesus could not see his own hand in front of his face. So you just have to be very careful before you believe some of those old stories.
- L.
Yay for this book
Unique perspective from a scholar. He takes a topic that is written about extensively and brings a new perspective to it (the eyewitness factor). Great read!
A scholarly assessment of New Testament chronology
This book, in my opinion, will become a classic reference to counter the flurry of books in the 1900's and recent times that have attempted to discredit first century authorship of the gospels and letters that make up the canon of scripture. The author has done a marvelous job at providing a well-researched and cited assessment of the facts, using internal and external analyses of the texts themselves and extra-biblical literature. Biblical scholars and enthusiasts will come away with a renewed appreciation of the historicity and authenticity of the gospels.
 Kind of disappointed
I heard many good things about this book, and Richard Bauckham is a terrific New Testament scholar, so I ordered it. His thesis is that the gospels are largely records of eyewitness testimony. He rejects the form critical conclusions of Bultmann and others, and argues that the gospels are more indebted to oral traditions and oral history.
He bases a lot of his views on the reliability of the early 2nd century church father Papias. Papias heard testimony from those who were with the first century Christians. He was told that the Gospel of Mark was a repository of the apostle Peter's memories. He also says that this gospel was the one with the least chronological order.
He also sees John as being the eyewitness testimony of the beloved disciple, who Bauckham takes to be John the Elder (not John the apostle, son of Zebedee).
Bauckham talks alot about the differences between personal memories and collective memories and relates this to the study of the gospels.
Bauckham also has an interesting chapter about the names in the gospels. He arrives at the dubious conclusion that Levi the tax collector in Mark's Gospel is not the same as Matthew the tax collector in Matthew's gospel, believing that the author of Matthew changed the name to apply Levi's story to a bona fide member of the Twelve apostles. Kind of strange.
It is more likely to me that Matthew changed his name from Levi to Matthew because the name "Matthew" is close to the word mathete, meaning "disciple," and Matthew wanted his name to reflect his changed status as a disciple of Jesus.
Other than that, the book was loaded with dense argumentation and analysis, and I had to really concentrate to follow the discussion. This is definitely not light reading. I recommend it to the scholarly Christian leader, but I can't see the average layperson reading it.
Much better reading is Bauchkam's book on the theology of Revelation, and his excellent commentary on 2 Peter and Jude, which is coming out again in a revised edition. I also enjoyed his book of the female witnesses of Christ - Gospel Women.
Accomplishes his goal, but tangential
Bauckham accomplished, in my opinion, his goal of demonstrating that the canonical Gospels contain eyewitness testimony and that the Gospels themselves indicate this in the same ways as Roman biographies of that period. I felt that he spent far too much time and energy though, presenting his theory as to the identity of the Gospel of John's "beloved disciple" - a point he admitted, early on, really had no bearing on recognizing eyewitness material in the NT. Also seemed to be a great deal of repitition of throughout the book. Bauckham makes some truly excellent points in this work, but he could have delivered them in a slimmer volume.
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