BOOKS BY AND ON BENEDICT

Some reviewers have chosen to do a chapter-by-chapter commentary on JON. This is what Scot McKnight does in his blog, Jesus Creed, having started to file his comments on the book while he was on a trip to Italy two weeks ago - during which, incidentally, he visits all those lovely and historic little towns and cities around Siena, stirring up much nostalgia for me.

The first blog was written on May 28, and the last one posted here, on June 26 - where he gets halfway through the book.

McKnight is a New Testament scholar and the author of 20 books on religion. I get the impression he is an evangelical Christian but I haven't checked out which denomination. More biographical info at the end of this post...


The Pope's Jesus 1

Books about Jesus attract me, but when the Pope (Benedict XVI) writes a book on Jesus, I'm doubly interested. So, I'll do a series - and it is really nice to kick it off while we are in Italy.

Big ideas first.

"It goes without saying that this book is in no way an exercise of the magisterium, but is solely an expression of my personal search for the face of the Lord (cf. Ps 27:8). Everyone is free, then, to contradict me. I would only ask my readers for that initial goodwill without which there can be no understanding' (xxiii-xxiv).

We've had many authors whose books we have reviewed enter into the conversation. So, if you know the Holy Father personally, send him our way!

The Pope sets his book into the conversation of historical Jesus scholars, and his foreword gives a sketch - a nice one - of that discussion. His interlocutors are dated (Schnackenburg, Bultmann, et al) but he is clearly aware of what is going on. His sparring partners, however, are clearly Roman Catholic and European; I'm not sure he's in touch with the explosion of scholarship of the Third Quest - and here one thinks of EP Sanders, G Vermes (who wrote a tough review of this book), Dom Crossan, M Borg, and NT Wright. (This harms the book, but not fatally.) [Compare this statement with what Cardinal Lehmann - himself no mean scholar - says in the preceding post. Of course, Benedict knows these sources: they represent precisely the tendency he sets out to oppose and refute with his book. If he does not agree with their piecemeal Jesus, what is the point of citing them individually? His arguments are directed against all of them equally. He does pay tribute to John Meier's work - and is there a more objective 'Third Quester' than Meier out there? .]

Benedict's method is lucid and much needed: it is canonical (he routinely sweeps through the Bible to illustrate the meaning of something in the Gospels) and it is theological. And there are four dimensions to how the Pope proceeds, and each is needed and each sheds light - even if most historical Jesus scholars would deem his points 'non-historical Jesus.'

1. The book is theological - it is not simply historical; it does not subject any evidence to any kind of critical test. Instead, he reflects and contemplates on the theological significance of a given event or teaching of Jesus.

2. The book is densely christological - instead of sticking to no more than can be known of a human figure who was Galilean, 1st Century, Jewish, and charismatic, this book explores the dense christology that a given event or teaching reveals. What began again afresh in the days of Ben Meyer's brilliant The Aims of Jesus is taken to a higher level in the Pope's book.

3. The book is (no surprise here) ecclesiological - this book unpacks everything in an ecclesial direction. Jesus established the Church, and the kingdom is unfolded in the direction of the Church. Along this line, Benedict regularly inserts an insight - theological, pastoral - from the Fathers of the Church.

4. The book is cruci-centric - baptism, temptations, Beatitudes - from beginning to end, Benedict's interpretation leads him directly to the Cross. In fact, the Cross casts its shadow back onto every event in the life of Jesus and every teaching because, as he puts it, you can't understand any of it until you understand it from the Cross.

The Pope's Jesus 2

In his Introduction, Pope Benedict XVI emphasizes Jesus's unmediated contact with the Father, and this will emerge throughout his Jesus of Nazareth. Our concern today is his treatment of the baptism of Jesus (chp 1).

The choice to be baptized is understood as "an expression of an unrestricted Yes to God's will, as an obedient acceptance of his yoke" (17). Taking on a recapitulation theory for Jesus's mission, he says this: "Jesus loaded the burden of all mankind's guilt upon his shoulders; he bore it down into the depths of the Jordan" (18). Thus, the Baptism - and many have said this, but very few historical Jesus scholars say it today - "is an anticipation of the Cross."

For our part: "To accept the invitation to be baptized now means to go to the place of Jesus's Baptism. It is to go where he identifies himself with us and to receive there our identification with him" (18).

He explores biblical texts and has a nice little survey of the Lamb of God theme.

The Pope's Jesus 3

Chp 3 in Pope Benedict XVI's book, Jesus of Nazareth, concerns the temptations of Jesus - and this chapter reveals his theological and canonical method.

"Jesus has to enter into the drama of human existence, for that belongs to the core of his mission; he has to penetrate it completely, down to its uttermost depths, in order to find the 'lost sheep,' to bear it on his shoulders, and to bring it home"(26). And it is an "anticipation that condenses into a single expression the struggle he endured at every step of his mission" (27).

Each temptation anticipates the cross. The primacy of God is central to the temptations of Jesus and what the devil offers Jesus diminishes that primacy of God - even the bread of social justice can diminish the primacy of God. "Only when power submits to the measure and the judgment of heaven - of God, in other words - can it become power for good. And only when power stands under God's blessing can it be trusted" (39).

He finds an apt analogy in Barabbas and Jesus on trial - "two messiah figures, two forms of messianic belief stand in opposition" (40). The Cross stands as an alternative power.

The temptations are about this: "God is God, that God is man's true Good" (45).

The Pope's Jesus 4

What did Jesus mean by the kingdom of God according to Pope Benedict XVI? In my judgment, the whole mission of Jesus is summed up when one clarifies what 'kingdom of God' means, and there are many who talk about kingdom but don't take the time to work through the Gospels to see what Jesus meant by it. Here's Benedict's statement:

"The question about the Church is not the primary question. The basic question is actually about the relationship between the Kingdom of God and Christ. It is on this that our understanding of the Church will depend" (49).

There are three basic views of kingdom today: the christological view (Jesus is the kingdom himself), the mystical view (the kingdom is in our hearts), and the ecclesiastical one (the kingdom is the society God wills).

He sketches the Liberal view of Harnack (individualism, moral behaviors), the eschatological view of Weiss (imminent and apocalyptic), and the 'regno-centric' or secularistic view (justice and peace).

The problem of the last view: God disappears. (And he's right on this; too often God does disappear.) Kingdom for Jesus is about God - not just peace and justice.

Again, he christologizes: kingdom is found in and through Jesus.


The Pope's Jesus 5

In the 4th chapter, Joseph Ratzinger, Pope Benedict XVI, discusses at length the Sermon on the Mount by focusing on two themes: the Beatitudes (today) and Jesus and the Law - the Torah of the Messiah. Once again, the Pope envelops the message of Jesus into the larger themes of the cross and christology.

What are the Beatitudes? (By the way, not enough think about this question: Are they a list of moral attributes? a list of those who were choosing to follow Jesus? a list of those whom Jesus said deserved the grace of God and who were being excluded?) Benedict XVI says they are 'eschatological promises', the transformation of values in light of the kingdom. What do you think the Beatitudes are?

Benedict XVI now becomes theological: "The Beatitudes are the transposition of the Cross and Resurrection into discipleship" (74). Would you accept this theological explanation of the Beatitudes?

The Poor: neither completely material nor completely spiritual.

The Meek: Christologically, we follow the one who showed us what meekness was by entering into Jerusalem to reveal the essence of the kingdom.

The Peacemakers: an invitation to become what the Son was.

The Mourners: one best understands this at the foot of the Cross. Mourning follows the shattering of hope and it also follows encountering truth that leads to conversion.

The Persecuted: this is eschatological for the joy may not come in this life. And persecuted for righteousness is being persecuted for being in communion with Jesus who is God's righteousness.

The Righteous: "those whose interior sensitivity enables them to see and hear the subtle signs that God sends into the world to break the dictatorship of convention"(91).

The Pure in Heart: this occurs only in following Christ and of becoming one with Christ.


The Pope's Jesus 6

A perennial issue about the teachings of Jesus is his relationship to the Law, and it comes up in ordinary church life today: What is our relationship to the Law? Some say, God's Word. We follow it. - But it's not that easy since no one practices the laws of Leviticus today completely. So, it's good to see what Benedict XVI has to say.

There is a brief discussion here - in essence, Jesus fulfills the Law by bringing an excess of righteousness. (He got close to moving into imputation issues, but didn't.) Jesus brings a New Torah. And here the Pope explores a topic that occupies his attention the rest of the chapter and throughout the book: Christology. The 'I' of the antitheses puts Jesus in the place of God.

The rest of the chapter explores how Jacob Neusner, in his A Rabbi Talks with Jesus, came to the conclusion that Jesus does things with the Torah that break the boundaries of Judaism. It could be said that Neusner witnesses an exalted christology shaping how Jesus treated the Torah, and this exalted christology is for him (Neusner is a Jew) unacceptable.

Torah now consists in following Jesus, which breaks down Torah and the community the Torah is designed to create. He examines Sabbath (Jesus says "I will give you rest"), 4th Commandment on parents and family (Jesus creates a new family), and compromise and prophetic radicalism (the redemptive trend of the OT - my words, but Benedict XVI is very similar; charts the path for Jesus's own radicalism). There is the pattern of a 'necessary historical evolution' of God's will as practiced in the world.

All in all, then, the Torah of the Messiah becomes a Torah of following the Messiah. Jesus is neither liberal nor rebel; he is the interpreter of the Torah as the Messiah.

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Scot McKnight is a widely-recognized authority on the New Testament, early Christianity, and the historical Jesus. He is the Karl A. Olsson Professor in Religious Studies at North Park University (Chicago, Illinois). Dr. McKnight obtained his Ph.D. at the University of Nottingham (1986).

Scot McKnight is a member of the Society of Biblical Literature and the Society for New Testament Studies. He is the author of more than twenty books, including the award-winning The Jesus Creed: Loving God, Loving Others (Paraclete, 2004), which won the Christianity Today book of the year for Christian Living. Recent books include Embracing Grace: A Gospel for All of Us (Paraclete, 2005), The Story of the Christ (Baker, 2006), and Praying with the Church (Paraclete, 2006). His newest book is The Real Mary: Why Evangelical Christians Can Embrace the Mother of Jesus. Other books include Jesus and His Death (Baylor, 2005), A Light among the Gentiles (Fortress, 1992), A New Vision for Israel (Eerdmans, 1999), Turning to Jesus (Westminster John Knox, 2002), Galatians (Zondervan, 1993) and 1 Peter (Zondervan, 1996), Interpreting the Synoptic Gospels (Baker, 1988), and he is a co-editor with J.B. Green and I.H. Marshall of the award-winning The Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels (IVP, 1992) as well as the co-editor, with J.D.G. Dunn, of The Historical Jesus in Current Study (Eisenbraun's, 2005). He regularly contributes chapter length studies to books and articles for magazines and online webzines. McKnight's books have been translated into Chinese, Korean, and Russian.