Jesus Seminar: Ideological arm of Westar Institute
By: Raúl Cajamarca Rodríguez
By: Raúl Cajamarca Rodríguez
Philosopher andTheologian
University Professor
Santo Tomás de Aquino Villavicencio, Meta –Colombia
Professor of Biblical Languages: Aramean, Hebrew and Greek
Seminario Mayor Nuestra Señora del Carmen
Phone: 315 235 98 79
Email: rraalcarro2007@gmail.com
Web: shalomiusfilosofico
Westar Institute is supported by membership dues, event fees and donations from thousands of friends—individuals and institutions alike—around the world,really the world socialist left
Associate membership in the Westar Institute is open to everyone who wants to stay abreast of developments in New Testament scholarship. Westar Associates alert scholars to public concerns and perspectives, insure that the technical language of scholars is translated into terms that can readily be understood by non-specialists, and serve as a sounding board for Seminar decisions.
Westar Institute is a member-supported, non-profit research and educational institute dedicated to the advancement of religious literacy. Westar's twofold mission is to foster collaborative research in religious studies and to communicate the results of the scholarship of religion to a broad, non-specialist public.
Until a few years ago, essential knowledge about biblical and religious traditions was hidden in the windowless studies of universities and seminaries—away from the general public. Such research was considered too controversial or too complicated for lay persons to understand. Many scholars, fearing open conflict or even reprisal, talked only to one another. The churches often decided what information their constituents were "ready" to hear.
Through publications, educational programs, and research projects like the Jesus Seminar, Westar has opened up a new kind of conversation about religion. This is an honest, no-hold-barred exchange involving thousands of scholars, clergy and other individuals who have critical questions about the past, present and future of religion.
Some of the principles guiding the work of Westar are:
All serious questions about religion—including biblical and dogmatic traditions—deserve research, discussion and resolution; no inquiry should be out of bounds.
The scholarship of religion should be collaborative in order to expand the base of decisionmaking, cumulative in forming and building on a consensus, and genuinely ecumenical
Religion and bible scholars should conduct their deliberations in public and report the results to a broad, literate audience in simple, non-technical language
Westar is not affiliated with any religious institution (that they say) nor does it advocate a particular theological point of view
These men are not scholars and it would be evident to even a child in grade school that they do not barely believe a word they read. Just because someone studies the Bible doesn't make them a scholar, especially if you don’t believe 90% of what it says. Imagine a doctor practicing medicine and does not believe almost all that he is taught. Who would want to go to him and trust him with their life? If a Doctor made as many mistakes and errors as they did in this program, they wouldn't be called doctors they would have their license revoked. They would be called charlatans. You wouldn’t go to a car mechanic if he practiced his trade as these so called Scholars practice their research!
Associate membership in the Westar Institute is open to everyone who wants to stay abreast of developments in New Testament scholarship. Westar Associates alert scholars to public concerns and perspectives, insure that the technical language of scholars is translated into terms that can readily be understood by non-specialists, and serve as a sounding board for Seminar decisions.
Westar Institute is a member-supported, non-profit research and educational institute dedicated to the advancement of religious literacy. Westar's twofold mission is to foster collaborative research in religious studies and to communicate the results of the scholarship of religion to a broad, non-specialist public.
Until a few years ago, essential knowledge about biblical and religious traditions was hidden in the windowless studies of universities and seminaries—away from the general public. Such research was considered too controversial or too complicated for lay persons to understand. Many scholars, fearing open conflict or even reprisal, talked only to one another. The churches often decided what information their constituents were "ready" to hear.
Through publications, educational programs, and research projects like the Jesus Seminar, Westar has opened up a new kind of conversation about religion. This is an honest, no-hold-barred exchange involving thousands of scholars, clergy and other individuals who have critical questions about the past, present and future of religion.
Some of the principles guiding the work of Westar are:
All serious questions about religion—including biblical and dogmatic traditions—deserve research, discussion and resolution; no inquiry should be out of bounds.
The scholarship of religion should be collaborative in order to expand the base of decisionmaking, cumulative in forming and building on a consensus, and genuinely ecumenical
Religion and bible scholars should conduct their deliberations in public and report the results to a broad, literate audience in simple, non-technical language
Westar is not affiliated with any religious institution (that they say) nor does it advocate a particular theological point of view
These men are not scholars and it would be evident to even a child in grade school that they do not barely believe a word they read. Just because someone studies the Bible doesn't make them a scholar, especially if you don’t believe 90% of what it says. Imagine a doctor practicing medicine and does not believe almost all that he is taught. Who would want to go to him and trust him with their life? If a Doctor made as many mistakes and errors as they did in this program, they wouldn't be called doctors they would have their license revoked. They would be called charlatans. You wouldn’t go to a car mechanic if he practiced his trade as these so called Scholars practice their research!
The mistakes about Jesus Seminar
The Jesus Seminar, so-called, recently has been running out of steam. Its two flagship projects on the words of Jesus and the deeds of Jesus recently have been completed. The chairman, Robert Funk, has great agendas for reconstructing the whole of the first five centuries of Christianity, showing that the creeds and theology of St. Paul were mistakes. Funk wants to produce a very odd, thinned-down version of Christianity to replace traditional Christianity, but most of the significant members of the Jesus Seminar, like John Dominic Crossan and Marcus Borg, are not following his lead.
The reason for the popularity of the Jesus Seminar, at least for a short time, was not because it was brilliant, cutting-edge, top-notch scholarship. Rather, its popularity lay in that it was saying something many Americans wanted to hear. The Jesus Seminar sounded scientific, while appealing to the popular imagination. These scholars were saying there is a different way of construing Christianity, which is neither the right-wing Protestantism nor the right-wing Catholicism with which we grew up -- and it is certainly quite unlike televangelism.The Jesus Seminar teaches that there is a different way of being Christian, which just involves having Jesus as a kind of "guru figure," an interesting, savvy teacher who had some sharp things to say from time to time. Jesus made many people feel good about themselves and then left us to carry on with that same task. Obviously, such a presentation of Jesus Christ won't do. There are seven problems with this interpretation. Ultimately, though, the mistakes of the Jesus Seminar lead us away from the seminar itself to wider problems of biblical interpretation that have been unsettled for some time
Jesus and the Story of Israel
The first problem is the danger of a methodology that takes Jesus out of the context of the story of Israel. First-century Jews, for all their wide variety, were living within a story, a controlling narrative. It was the story of how Israel’s God would address, bless, and judge the world. They told that story in Scripture and sang it in their psalms. They retell their story in books like Maccabees; we see it in many texts from the first century -- and we see it lived at Qumran. The Jesus Seminar, however, and many others beside, have said that all we know about Jesus are fragmentary sayings -- a little nugget about this, a little wise saying about that, and a fragment of a parable here -- that do not actually retain the stories. These were all made up later! This is a de-Judaizing of Jesus, a phenomenon that happened originally in post-war German scholarship as a way to reconstruct Jesus as a great teacher about the kingdom of God. The present wrenching of Jesus from his Jewish context has happened for a very different reason. The great prophet of postmodernity, Frederich Nietzsche, deconstructed big stories into collections of aphorisms, little fragments to try to make sense of a life. The Jesus of the Jesus Seminar has become a Nietzschan Jesus who is deeply non-Jewish -- and actually deeply non-Christian. This is why the so-called Gospel of Thomas has been so popular, precisely because it gives you a set of detached aphorisms. It is what part of our culture wants. But, in the end, it is a lousy way of doing history.
The reason for the popularity of the Jesus Seminar, at least for a short time, was not because it was brilliant, cutting-edge, top-notch scholarship. Rather, its popularity lay in that it was saying something many Americans wanted to hear. The Jesus Seminar sounded scientific, while appealing to the popular imagination. These scholars were saying there is a different way of construing Christianity, which is neither the right-wing Protestantism nor the right-wing Catholicism with which we grew up -- and it is certainly quite unlike televangelism.The Jesus Seminar teaches that there is a different way of being Christian, which just involves having Jesus as a kind of "guru figure," an interesting, savvy teacher who had some sharp things to say from time to time. Jesus made many people feel good about themselves and then left us to carry on with that same task. Obviously, such a presentation of Jesus Christ won't do. There are seven problems with this interpretation. Ultimately, though, the mistakes of the Jesus Seminar lead us away from the seminar itself to wider problems of biblical interpretation that have been unsettled for some time
Jesus and the Story of Israel
The first problem is the danger of a methodology that takes Jesus out of the context of the story of Israel. First-century Jews, for all their wide variety, were living within a story, a controlling narrative. It was the story of how Israel’s God would address, bless, and judge the world. They told that story in Scripture and sang it in their psalms. They retell their story in books like Maccabees; we see it in many texts from the first century -- and we see it lived at Qumran. The Jesus Seminar, however, and many others beside, have said that all we know about Jesus are fragmentary sayings -- a little nugget about this, a little wise saying about that, and a fragment of a parable here -- that do not actually retain the stories. These were all made up later! This is a de-Judaizing of Jesus, a phenomenon that happened originally in post-war German scholarship as a way to reconstruct Jesus as a great teacher about the kingdom of God. The present wrenching of Jesus from his Jewish context has happened for a very different reason. The great prophet of postmodernity, Frederich Nietzsche, deconstructed big stories into collections of aphorisms, little fragments to try to make sense of a life. The Jesus of the Jesus Seminar has become a Nietzschan Jesus who is deeply non-Jewish -- and actually deeply non-Christian. This is why the so-called Gospel of Thomas has been so popular, precisely because it gives you a set of detached aphorisms. It is what part of our culture wants. But, in the end, it is a lousy way of doing history.
The second problem that must be confronted is taking Jesus out of a Jewish apocalyptic worldview. In the first century, the book of Daniel was extremely influential, not because it was about the end of the world but because it was about how God was going to vindicate Israel and thus bring justice to the world. It was about God's future for the world, not how He would end it. The world is good; God made it, and He wants it to be redeemed. Jewish apocalyptic, properly understood, was about history reaching the climax of the kingdom of God. The Jesus Seminar has completely relativized and set aside this teaching because it does not like fundamentalism -- and it does not like 20th-century apocalyptic preaching. But the world of first-century Judaism is the world to which Jesus belonged. He, too, was telling, and living by, and retelling the story of the book of Daniel. But He did it to say that the kingdom of God was coming in and through His work and that of His followers, and especially in and through His own fate, which would be unique.
Messianic Movements
A third and very serious problem is that the Jesus Seminar takes Jesus out of the context of first-century messianic movements. It is often said that Jesus was not a would-be messiah at all -- Jesus did not think of Himself as messiah. Most of His first followers, we are told, did not think of Him as messiah. Don't believe it! Jesus belongs on the map of first-century messianic movements. There were at least a dozen messianic or quasi-messianic movements within 100 years before and after Jesus' life. Jesus said, "Many will come in my name saying I am the one," and "False messiahs will arise." Jesus knew that would happen and had happened. Some people have thought that the words "Jesus Christ" were Jesus' Christian name and Jesus' surname. Jesus is His personal name, the name He has in His human nature – Jesus of Nazareth. Conversely, Christos means "the messiah," the one who sums up God's purposes for Israel in Himself and brings them to their destiny. To be truly understood, Jesus must be viewed in the context of first-century messiahs. If you ignore that, you misunderstand and misread Jesus, and the apologetic and evangelistic task will suffer.
Messianic Movements
A third and very serious problem is that the Jesus Seminar takes Jesus out of the context of first-century messianic movements. It is often said that Jesus was not a would-be messiah at all -- Jesus did not think of Himself as messiah. Most of His first followers, we are told, did not think of Him as messiah. Don't believe it! Jesus belongs on the map of first-century messianic movements. There were at least a dozen messianic or quasi-messianic movements within 100 years before and after Jesus' life. Jesus said, "Many will come in my name saying I am the one," and "False messiahs will arise." Jesus knew that would happen and had happened. Some people have thought that the words "Jesus Christ" were Jesus' Christian name and Jesus' surname. Jesus is His personal name, the name He has in His human nature – Jesus of Nazareth. Conversely, Christos means "the messiah," the one who sums up God's purposes for Israel in Himself and brings them to their destiny. To be truly understood, Jesus must be viewed in the context of first-century messiahs. If you ignore that, you misunderstand and misread Jesus, and the apologetic and evangelistic task will suffer.
The fourth problem, which again is not limited to the Jesus Seminar, is the attempt to reinvent Jesus as a wandering cynic teacher. The cynics were a school of philosophers who called themselves cynics, the Greek word for dog, because they went around barking and snapping at the heels of the righteous, religious, and respectable. They were socially subversive, living counter culturally to thumb their noses at the establishment. Crossan, in a dangerous phrase in his book “The Historical Jesus” (1991), refers to Jesus and His followers as "hippies in an age of Augustine yuppies. I think he has probably regretted that phrase.
Controversial Figure
Controversial Figure
The fifth problem presented by the scholarship of the Jesus Seminar lies in exactly the opposite direction -- and it, too, is quite prevalent in some circles. It is the concept of the "noncontroversial Jewish Jesus." To be historically credible, you have to picture a Jesus who is both comprehensible and crucifiable within first-century Judaism. That, simply stated, is a problem history must always deal with. Jesus was not simply a nice Jewish boy who taught nice Jewish truths about God and general truths about the kingdom to other Jews and who would have been horrified to think of a Church established in His name, with people worshiping Him and having a special meal where they broke bread and said that it was His body. This has been stated again and again.Often, the people saying this have been from among our own selves and who still, in some measure or other, consider themselves Catholic, Protestant, or whatever. They have lived all their lives with a docetic Jesus, that is a Jesus in fairyland, going about wearing a halo. When such people study history, they discover that Jesus was a Jew! They discover that it was exciting to be a first-century Jew; much happened in that historical epoch and we can understand much about Jesus. If we are to be true to historical data, we arrive at a Jesus who is both comprehensible and crucifiable within the world of Judaism. Frankly, that is a most difficult task in a post-Holocaust world, when what we say is scrutinized and can result in the retort, "I think your Jesus is anti-Semitic; you must make sure your Jesus is not anti-Semitic." But, how can one truly arrive at a Jewish Jesus who is anti-Semitic? Such an invention would be nonsensical. Rather, what you have in Jesus is critique from within, which is the noblest, oldest, and most Jewish form of critique.
The sixth problem to confront is a new and very powerful myth of Christian origins, one envisioning Jesus as a type of cynic teacher. Such a Jesus neither thought He would die a redemptive death nor rise bodily from the dead. The early Church, in turn, became divided between those who followed Jesus the cynic teacher and those who invented this thing called Christianity. When they invented Christianity (which evolved into Paul and then into the Gospels that we have in the canon), they were inventing something more socially and politically comfortable, in contrast to the quite dramatic and subversive cynic or Gnostic teaching that Jesus actually gave. It is only then that we see the Church settling down at the end of the first generation into the steady line of thought that would take them to the settlement of Constantine when the Church became part of the empire. This, then, was when they had achieved their aim. This account of Christian origins is historically mistaken at every point.
The seventh problem is that most reconstructions of Jesus, including those most traditional, have great difficulty in integrating Jesus' public career with His death and resurrection. The creeds tell the story of Jesus as though His public career did not exist. Born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried and on the third day raised -- what happened to the bit in the middle? Were Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John wasting their time telling us about Jesus' public ministry? Does it matter for our faith? The creeds happened for certain specifiable, historical, doctrinal, and theological reasons. But they do not tell the whole story. Indeed, in some of today's liturgies, we have developed ways of telling the story that put the Gospels back in. Yet, still when we think of Jesus first being born of a virgin, we talk of the incarnation; when we think of Him teaching about the kingdom, we talk about social justice and ethics; and when we think of Him dying on the cross, we talk about atonement. But we never integrate the picture.
