The Obligatory Jesus Mythicism Post

A couple of weeks ago I waded into an ongoing discussion on James McGrath’s blog concerning “Jesus mythicism”—a topic I know next to nothing about. But a comment I made on one of McGrath's posts on the topic has since been reposted (in whole or in part) on several other blogs (for example, here), and so it seemed appropriate to reproduce that comment here, along with further reflections and elaborations.

For those unfamiliar with the topic, “Jesus mythicism” refers to the Christ myth theory that's currently enjoying a fair bit of popularity among web pundits (especially those hostile to Christianity)—the theory, roughly, that Jesus is a mythical figure constructed by the early church for its own purposes, and that there really was no "historical Jesus" at all.

As someone who isn’t an historian, and hence not schooled in the academic standards of that discipline, I’m not at all qualified to speak to the merits of the arguments put forward by some of the more prominent contemporary mythicists, such as Earl Doherty (The Jesus Puzzle ). But one thing philosophers do for a living is make distinctions, and as I was reading some of the conversations on this topic it seemed to me that it might be helpful to clearly lay out a range of alternative views concerning how the Jesus Christ represented in Church teachings and scriptures is correlated with an historical figure.

One commentator on McGrath's post suggested to me a strategy for laying out such alternatives when he asked, “If it could be shown that there was an actual historical person named Arthur Pendragon, wouldn’t we still think of King Arthur of Camelot as a myth?” Here’s what I said in my comment:

Contrast the following claims:

(1) There was an historic king of the Britons named Arthur, and his life was exactly as described by Sir Thomas Malory in _Le Morte d’Arthur_.

(2) There was an historic king of the Britons named Artur whose impact was sufficiently great that, after being slain by a usurper, those loyal to him would gather secretly to swear allegiance to his bloodline and share stories about him—stories said to come from Artur’s closest thanes. The earliest writings from these communities are by a priest more interested in the meaning of Artur’s life than the details of it. But after a few decades, several followers attempted to write accounts of Artur’s life and sayings based on what their respective communities had preserved. While not historically accurate, they offer clues for anyone wanting to understanding the historic King Arthur.

(3) There was an historic king of the Britons named Artur whose impact was sufficiently great to prompt storytelling about him. This storytelling became quickly severed from actual historic events, becoming interwoven with the creative fancies of bards whose interest lay more in telling colorful tales than in preserving history. Eventually these stories evolved into the legendary figure we now know as King Arthur. But the King Arthur we encounter in the inherited legends has little similarity to the historic figure that inspired the original storytelling.

(4) There was no historic king of the Britons who gave rise to the King Arthur legends. Instead, this figure was wholly an invention of bards interested in creating colorful tales—although the first bard to invent the first King Arthur story borrowed a few of his plotlines from divergent bits of recent events he’d witnessed in his travels, and decided to name his hero “Artur” because he had some vague memory that there was some king by that name who’d lived a generation ago.

Your question gestures to claim (3). As I understand it, Earl Doherty and his followers are making a claim akin to (4) with respect to Jesus. Fundamentalists embrace something akin to (1). Most biblical scholars I know are closer to (2) but allow for elements of (3). The case of (3) is interesting. If we accept it, is there a sense in which there is an “historic Arthur”? I’d say yes, but only in the sense that there is an historic figure who prompted the storytelling—and I’d be quick to add that the character in the stories bears little resemblance to the historic figure. (2) offers more room for dispute about which details are historical.

In subsequent commentary on this set of alternatives, one blogger took issue with positioning biblical scholars in the intellectual space between (2) and (3), saying that the biblical scholars he finds most reliable fall somewhere between (1) and (2). Again, not being an historian versed in the merits of scholars who work in this area, I cannot speak to what view dominates among the best scholars in this area—but as far as my lay impression goes, it appears to fall in the rough vicinity of (2). (I should also note that, in my original comment, I wasn't attempting to make an authoritative pronouncement about where most biblical scholars fall on this issue, but was, rather, simply offering my anecdotal experience with respect to biblical scholars I know).

On another discussion thread, only part of my taxonomy was reproduced—the articulation of (3) and my comment to the effect that if (3) were correct, then the Jesus of the stories would have little resemblance to the historical figure. The discussion that followed seemed to take me as endorsing (3) and therefore as arguing for the conclusion that we can’t learn much about the historical Jesus by studying the Bible.

But this was not my intent. So, in order to help fend off confusion or misunderstanding, let me share a bit about my own view, for what it’s worth. Let me stress again, however, that I am not an historian. I have not systematically evaluated the arguments of Jesus mythicists, nor do I have the credentials to do so. My own view is thus based on impressions that are far less scientific. As such, it is a very tentative position at best.

In outline, my view is that the stories in the gospels have an origin that falls somewhere in a range between (2) and (3). Now both (2) and (3) make room for narratives that are of dubious historicity. The difference is that in the case of (2), the community is intending to preserve stories about a real person that they think are true because those stories are meaningful to them, and there is at least an intent to faithfully pass them on. In the case of (3), something else has come into play--a set of interests that go beyond preserving and perpetuating received stories. In the case of the King Arthur analogy, it's the bards' "interest in telling colorful tales." In the case of gospel writers, it would likely be the interest in making a theological point.

But such an interest can come in degrees. In some cases it is relatively minor, so that the narrative is to a great extent an attempt to faithfully retell an inherited anecdote about the life of one's hero, but there are flourishes of detail that are added (perhaps unwittingly) to emphasize one's theological position. As Bart Ehrman has argued more than once (in my judgment rather convincingly), the portrait we get of Jesus in Mark is decidedly different from the one we get in Luke. Luke's Jesus endures His crucifixion and the time leading up to it with something like serenity, whereas Mark's Jesus seems instead to face it with anguish, even despair. Luke's Jesus models how someone assured of God's providence faces the worst conceivable trials and tribulations (Luke 23:46: "Lord, into your hands I commend my spirit"). Mark's Jesus stands in solidarity with our suffering, even experiencing that pervasive sense of being abandoned by God (Mark 15:34: "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?").

But while I get the clear sense that both are theological storytellers, telling the story in ways intended to make their own distinctive theological points, I also get the sense that (at least much of the time) they mean to be weaving together an overall portrait of Jesus that relies heavily on "true stories" about Him preserved by the early church--stories that they wanted to put into their narratives in part so that they could be preserved in that form.

Let me clarify what I mean with another analogy. I'm part of the community of AVP (Alternatives to Violence Project) facilitators. AVP organizes and runs nonviolence workshops in prisons and a range of community settings all over the world, and one of our organizing philosophical concepts is something called "transforming power" (or "TP"--a non-coercive power that can transform negative personal and interpersonal dynamics into positive ones, and which feels less like a power that we exercise and more like one that works through us). Facilitators have their own "TP raps," talks about transforming power and their own understanding of it, informed by stories of TP at work.

There's one particular story that's well known in the AVP community because it so beautifully exemplifies what TP is about...and because it appears in the manual which facilitators use to put together "basic" level workshops. The manual includes several examples of TP raps from some of AVP's pioneers, including that of Fred Feucht. And his rap contains a story about a woman named Marge Swan. According to Feucht, Marge Swan was heading home from the library one evening, walking through Central Park with an arm load of books, when a man approached her aggressively. She turned to him and dumped her books in his arms, expressing gratitude for his timely arrival. He proceeded to walk her home, carrying her books for her. When they got to her building she took her books back from him, thanking him again for his help, and he said something like, "Lady, that's not what I meant to do."

This story was told by one of the facilitators in my basic workshop, and it made such an impression that I've been telling it ever since (meaning for the last twenty years). But although I've been aware that the story comes to AVP largely through Fred Feucht's TP rap in the AVP Basic Manual, I never looked carefully at Fred Feucht's seminal account...until today, when I dug out my basic manual to see what Fred's version looked like.

In the version I've been telling, Marge Swan and her would-be attacker chat as he carries her books for her. That detail isn't in Feucht's account. But it's a good fit with the broader themes of my TP rap. Chatting symbolizes a non-threatening human connection and a mutual recognition of fellow humanity. It's a way of turning the nameless stranger behind you in the grocery line into something more than that. And so, without even realizing I was making it up, I added in that little detail.

But it's quite possible that others add conflicting details. Because of its history, there are many Quakers involved with AVP. Quaker worship is characterized by silence, and there's a strong sense of the transforming power that silence can have. I've heard TP raps that dwell on this point--including discussions of how silence can be a way to clear away the crud that separates us from one another. And I could certainly imagine an AVP facilitator introducing the Marge Swan story into a TP rap in which "the power of silent presence" has been an important theme. Maybe the facilitator envisions Swan and her would-be attacker walking together in silence, simply aware of each other as fellow human beings. And this imagined detail, because it symbolically expresses a point about TP that the facilitator wants to communicate, works its way into the story.

Now I've never met Fred Feucht, let alone Marge Swan. I have no idea how Fred Feucht knows of Marge Swan's story. Did she tell it to him herself, or did he get it second-hand? What details, if any, did he get wrong? Did Marge Swan chat with her would-be attacker, or did they walk together in silence?

I don't know. But when I share Marge Swan's story during AVP workshops and elsewhere, my intention is to pass on a true story--not one I know first-hand, but one that's been preserved within the AVP community, in part because of its capacity to exemplify an important idea that unites members of that community. And the story's truth matters, because a common charge leveled against advocates of nonviolence is that it doesn't work. Here, in the story of Marge Swan, is a case in which it did. The story is preserved in part because here is a real live case of nonviolent methods actually working in the real world to transform a potential crime into a positive human exchange. That's a major reason why this story was preserved within the AVP community. But, as with all such stories, the details vary with the storytellers...sometimes because of simple errors, sometimes because of the broader philosophical or theoretical purposes that motivate the storytelling.

When I read the Synoptic Gospels, many of the stories within them read like that, at least to me. Many don't, but many do. And that's why I'm inclined to treat many of the stories told in the Synoptic Gospels as primarily stories whose origins are of type (2), with elements of (3) creeping in when the theological aims of the authors are particularly at stake.

The Gospel of John is a more complex case, insofar as John’s project seems to be primarily theological. As I read John, his aim is to develop a theology of Jesus by using the “gospel” literary genre, and this theological aim is far more significant to him than the aim of recounting the events of Jesus’ life as accurately as he can. As such, for example, he happily puts into Jesus’ mouth extended theological interpretations of the significance of Jesus’ life and ministry—things it would be hard to imagine being said by the Jesus we encounter in Mark.

This is not to say that the events recounted by John are all or even primarily fabrications—but it does mean, for example, that where John differs from the Synoptics on historic details (such as the timing of the crucifixion relative to Passover), the explanation may lie in John’s theological objectives and the symbolic resonance he achieves by telling the story as he does.

The result is a Jesus who is “mythologized,” not in the sense that John’s Jesus has no foundation in an historical individual whose story parallels the one John tells, but in the sense that John’s narrative is more concerned with theological symbolism than with factual details. As such, my view is that John's Gospel falls more in the vicinity of (3) than (2). That said, I must confess that it's my favorite gospel, precisely because it is the most theological. It may not be good history, but that's not its aim.

For the historian who is concerned with factual details, the question then becomes a matter of sifting through the theological and political aims of the writers, as well as getting past the simple errors that accrue when a narrative is passed down orally within a community for a generation before it’s first committed to paper. While that is going to be hard work, and while that work may very well lead to an understanding of the historical Jesus that differs in many ways from the gospel portraits, I find myself highly skeptical of those who think that once this work is done they’ll find that there’s no historical figure there at all. Once again, however, I must stress that I'm no historian, and these are merely intuitive impressions.