Kitabı oku: «The Christ Myth», sayfa 11

Not because he so highly esteemed and revered Jesus as an historical personality did Paul make Christ the bearer and mediator of redemption, but because he knew nothing at all of an historical Jesus, of a human individual of this name, to whom he would have been able to transfer the work of redemption. “Faithful disciples,” Wrede considers, “could not so easily believe that the man who had sat with them at table in Capernaum, or had journeyed over the Sea of Galilee with them, was the creator of the world. For Paul this obstacle was absent.”³⁵⁷ But Paul is nevertheless supposed to have met James, the “Brother of the Lord,” and to have had dealings with him which would certainly have modified his view of Jesus, if here there were really question of a corporeal brotherhood. What a wonderful idea our theologians must have of a man like Paul if they think that it could ever have occurred to him to connect such tremendous conceptions with a human individual Jesus as he does with his Christ! It is true that there is a type of religious ecstasy in which the difference between man and God is completely lost sight of; and, especially at the beginning of our era, in the period of Cæsar-worship and of the deepest religious superstition, it was not in itself unusual to deify, after his death, a man who was highly esteemed. A great lack of reason, a great mental confusion, an immense flight of imagination, would be necessary to transform a man not long dead, who was still clearly remembered by his relatives and contemporaries, not merely into a divine hero or demi-god, but into the world-forming spiritual principle, into the metaphysical mediator of redemption and the “second God.” And if, as even Wrede acknowledges in the above-quoted words, personal knowledge of Jesus was really an “obstacle” to his apotheosis, how is it to be explained that the “First Apostles” at Jerusalem took no exception to that representation of Paul’s? They surely knew who Jesus had been; they knew the Master through many years’ continual wandering with him. And however highly they may always have thought of the risen Jesus, however intimately they may have joined in their minds the memory of the man Jesus with the prevailing idea of the Messiah, according to the prevalent theological opinion, even they are supposed to have risen in no way to such a boundless deification of their Lord and Master as Paul undertook a comparatively short while after Jesus’ death.

“Paul already believed in such a heavenly Being, in a divine Christ, before he believed in Jesus.”³⁵⁸ The truth is that he never believed at all in the Jesus of liberal theology. The “man” Jesus already belonged to his faith in Christ, so far as Christ’s act of redemption was supposed to consist in his humbling himself and becoming man – and no historical Jesus was necessary for that. For Paul also, just as for the whole heathen world, the man actually sacrificed in God’s place was at best merely a chance symbol of the God presenting himself as victim. Hence it cannot be said that the man Jesus was but “the bearer of all the great attributes,” which as such had been long since determined;³⁵⁹ or, as Gunkel puts it, that the enthusiastic disciples had transferred to him all that the former Judaism had been wont to ascribe to the Messiah; and that consequently the Christology of the New Testament, in spite of its unhistorical nature, was nevertheless “a mighty hymn which History sings to Jesus”(!).³⁶⁰ If we once agree as to the existence of a pre-Christian Jesus – and even Gunkel, apart from Robertson and Smith, has worked for the recognition of this fact – then this can in the first place produce nothing but a strong suspicion against the historical Jesus; and it seems a despairing subterfuge of the “critical” theology to seek to find capital, from the existence of a pre-Christian Jesus, for the “unique” significance of their “historical” Jesus.

Christ’s life and death are for Paul neither the moral achievement of a man nor in any way historical facts, but something super-historical, events in the supersensible world.³⁶¹ Further, the “man” Jesus comes in question for Paul, just as did the suffering servant of God for Isaiah, exclusively as an Idea, and his death is, like his resurrection, but the purely ideal condition whereby redemption is brought about. “If Christ hath not been raised, your faith is vain.”³⁶² On this declaration has till now been founded the chief proof that an historical Jesus was to Paul the pre-supposition of his doctrine. But really that declaration in Paul’s mouth points to nothing but the faith of his contemporaries, who expected natural and religious salvation from the resurrection of their God, whether he were called Adonis, Attis, Dionysus, Osiris, or anything else.

The fact is therefore settled, that Paul knew nothing of an historical Jesus; and that even if he had known anything of him, this Jesus in any case plays no part for him, and exercised no influence over the development of his religious view of the world. Let us consider the importance of this: the very man from whom we derive the first written testimony as to Christianity, who was the first in any way to establish it as a new religion differing from Judaism, on whose teachings alone the whole further development of Christian thought has depended – this Paul knew absolutely nothing of Jesus as an historical personality. In fact, with perfect justice from his point of view he was even compelled to excuse himself, when others wished to enlighten him as to such a personality! At the present day it will be acknowledged by all sensible people that, as Ed. von Hartmann declared more than thirty years ago, without Paul the Christian movement would have disappeared in the sand, just as the many other Jewish religions have done – at best to afford interest to investigators as an historical curiosity – and Paul had no knowledge of Jesus! The formation and development of the Christian religion began long before the Jesus of the Gospels appeared, and was completed independently of the historical Jesus of theology. Theology has no justification for treating Christianity merely as the “Christianity of Christ,” as it now is sufficiently evident; nor should it present a view of the life and doctrines of an ideal man Jesus as the Christian religion.³⁶³

The question raised at the beginning, as to what we learn from Paul about the historical Jesus, has found its answer – nothing. There is little value, then, in the objection to the disbelievers in such a Jesus which is raised on the theological side in triumphant tones: that the historical existence of Jesus is “most certainly established” by Paul. This objection comes, in fact, even from such people as regard the New Testament, in other respects, with most evidently sceptical views. The truth is that the Pauline epistles contain nothing which would force us to the belief in an historical Jesus; and probably no one would find such a person in them if that belief was not previously established in him. It must be considered that, if the Pauline epistles stood in the edition of the New Testament where they really belong – that is, before the Gospels – hardly any one would think that Jesus, as he there meets him, was a real man and had wandered on the earth in flesh and blood; but he would in all probability only find therein a detailed development of the “suffering servant of God,” and would conclude that it was an irruption of heathen religious ideas into Jewish thought. Our theologians are, however, so strongly convinced of it a priori– that the Pauline representation of Christ actually arose from the figure of Jesus wandering on earth – that even M. Brückner confesses, in the preface to his work, that he had been “himself astonished” (!) at the result of his inquiry – the independence of the Pauline representation of Christ from the historical personality, Jesus.³⁶⁴

Christianity is a syncretic religion. It belongs to those multiform religious movements which at the commencement of our era were struggling with one another for the mastery. Setting out from the Apocalyptic idea and the expectation of the Messiah among the Jewish sects, it was borne on the tide of a mighty social agitation, which found its centre and its point of departure in the religious sects and Mystery communities. Its adherents conceived the Messiah not merely as the Saviour of souls, but as deliverer from slavery, from the lot of the poor and the oppressed, and as the bearer of a new justice.³⁶⁵

It borrowed the chief part of its doctrine, the specific point in which it differed from ordinary Judaism, the central idea of the God sacrificing himself for mankind, from the neighbouring peoples, who had brought down this belief into Asia, in connection with fire-worship, from its earlier home in the North. Only in so far as that faith points in the end to an Aryan origin can it be said that Jesus was “an Aryan”; any further statements on this point, such as, for example, Chamberlain makes in his “Grundlagen des neunzehnten Jahrhunderts,” are pure fancies, and rest on a complete misunderstanding of the true state of affairs. Christianity, as the religion of Christ, of the “Lord,” who secularised the Jewish Law by his voluntary death of expiation, did not “arise” in Jerusalem, but, if anywhere, in the Syrian capital Antioch, one of the principal places of the worship of Adonis. For it was at Antioch where, according to the Acts,³⁶⁶ the name “Christians” was first used for the adherents of the new religion, who had till then been usually called Nazarenes.³⁶⁷

That certainly is in sharpest contradiction to tradition, according to which Christianity is supposed to have arisen in Jerusalem and to have been thence spread abroad among the heathen. But Luke’s testimony as to the arising of the community of the Messiah at Jerusalem and the spreading of the Gospel from that place can lay no claim to historical significance. Even the account of the disciples’ experience at Easter and of the first appearances after the Resurrection, from their contradictory and confused character appear to be legendary inventions.³⁶⁸ Unhistorical, and in contradiction to the information on this point given by Matthew and Mark, is the statement that the disciples stayed in Jerusalem after Jesus’ death, which is even referred by Luke to an express command of the dead master.³⁶⁹ Unhistorical is the assemblage at Pentecost and the wonderful “miracle” of the outpouring of the Holy Ghost, which, as even Clemen agrees, probably originated from the Jewish legends, according to which the giving of the Law on Sinai was made in seventy different languages, in order that it might be understood by all peoples.³⁷⁰ But also Stephen’s execution and the consequent persecution of the community at Jerusalem are legendary inventions.³⁷¹ The great trouble which Luke takes to represent Jerusalem as the point whence the Christian movement set out, clearly betrays the tendency of the author of the Acts to misrepresent the activity of the Christian propaganda, which really emanated from many centres, as a bursting out of the Gospel from one focus. It is meant to produce the impression that the new religion spread from Jerusalem over the whole world like an explosion; and thus its almost simultaneous appearance in the whole of Nearer Asia is explained. For this reason “devout Jews of all nations” were assembled in Jerusalem at Pentecost, and could understand each other in spite of their different languages. For this reason Stephen was stoned, and the motive given for that persecution which in one moment scattered the faithful in all directions.³⁷²

Now it is certainly probable that there was in Jerusalem, just as in many other places, a community of the Messiah which believed in Jesus as the God sacrificing himself for humanity. But the question is whether this belief, in the community at Jerusalem, rested on a real man Jesus; and whether it is correct to regard this community, some of whose members were personally acquainted with Jesus, and who were the faithful companions of his wanderings, as the “original community” in the sense of the first germ and point of departure of the Christian movement. We may believe, with Fraser, that a Jewish prophet and itinerant preacher, who by chance was named Jesus, was seized by his opponents, the orthodox Jews, on account of his revolutionary agitation, and was beheaded as the Haman of the current year, thereby giving occasion for the foundation of the community at Jerusalem.³⁷³ Against this it may be said that our informants as to the beginning of the Christian propaganda certainly vary, now making one assertion, now another, without caring whether these are contradictory; and they all strive to make up for the lack of any certain knowledge by unmistakable inventions. If the doctrine of Jesus was, as Smith declares, pre-Christian, “a religion which was spread among the Jews and especially the Greeks within the limits of the century [100 B.C. to 100 A.D.], more or less secretly, and wrapped up in ‘Mysteries,’” then we can understand both the sudden appearance of Christianity over so wide a sphere as almost the whole of Nearer Asia, and also the fact that even the earliest informants as to the beginning of the Christian movement had nothing certain to tell. This, however, seems quite irreconcilable with the view of a certain, definite, local, and personal point of departure for the new doctrine.³⁷⁴ The objection will be raised: what about the Gospels? They, at least, clearly tell the story of a human individual, and are inexplicable, apart from the belief in an historical Jesus.

The question consequently arises as to the source from which the Gospels derived a knowledge of this Jesus; for on this alone the belief in an historical Jesus can rest.

II
THE JESUS OF THE GOSPELS

However widely views may differ even now in the sphere of Gospel criticism, all really competent investigators agree on one point with rare unanimity: the Gospels are not historical documents in the ordinary sense of the word, but creeds, religious books, literary documents revealing the mind of the Christian community. Their purpose is consequently not to give information as to the life and teachings of Jesus which would correspond to reality, but to awaken belief in Jesus as the Messiah sent from God for the redemption of his people, to strengthen and defend that belief against attacks. And as creeds they confine themselves naturally to recounting such words and events as have any significance for the faith; and they have the greatest interest in so arranging and representing the facts as to make them accord with the content of that faith.

(a) The Synoptic Jesus

Of the numerous Gospels which were still current in the first half of the second century, as is well known, only four have come down to us. The others were not embodied by the Church in the Canon of the New Testament writings, and consequently fell into oblivion. Of these at most a few names and isolated and insignificant fragments remain to us. Thus we know of a Gospel of Matthew, of Thomas, of Bartholomew, Peter, the twelve apostles, &c. Of our four Gospels, two bear the names of apostles and two the names of companions and pupils of apostles, viz., Mark and Luke. In this, of course, it is in no way meant that they were really written by these persons. According to Chrysostom these names were first assigned to them towards the end of the second century. And the titles do not run: Gospel of Matthew, of Mark, and so on, but “according to” Matthew, “according to” Mark, Luke, and John; so that they indicate at most only the persons or schools whose particular conception of the Gospel they represent.

Of these Gospels, again, that of John ranks as the latest. It presupposes the others, and shows such a dogmatic tendency, that it cannot be considered the source of the story. Of the remaining Gospels, which on account of their similarity as to form and matter have been termed “Synoptic” (i. e., such as must be dealt with in connection with each other and thus only give a real idea of the Saviour’s personality), that of Mark is generally regarded as the oldest. Matthew and Luke rely on Mark, and all three, according to the prevailing view, are indebted to a common Aramaic source, wherein Jesus’ didactic sermons are supposed to have been contained. Tradition points to John Mark, the nephew of Barnabas, pupil of Peter, and Paul’s companion on his first missionary journey and later a sharer in the captivity at Rome, as the author of the Gospel of Mark. It is believed that this was written shortly after the destruction of Jerusalem (70) —i. e., at least forty years after Jesus’ death (!). This tradition depends upon a note of the Church historian Eusebius (d. about 340 A.D.), according to which Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis in Asia Minor, learnt from the “elder John” that Mark had set forth what he had heard from Peter, and what this latter had in turn heard from the “Lord.” On account of its indirect nature and of Eusebius’ notorious unreliability this note is not a very trustworthy one,³⁷⁵ and belief in it should disappear in view of the fact that the author of the Gospel of Mark had no idea of the spot where Jesus is supposed to have lived. And yet Mark is supposed to have been born in Jerusalem and to have been a missionary! As Wernle shows in his work, “Die Quellen des Lebens Jesu,” Mark stands quite far from the life of Jesus both in time and place(!); indeed, he has no clear idea of Jesus’ doings and course of life.³⁷⁶ And Wrede confirms this in his work, “Das Messias-geheimnis” (1901), probably the clearest and deepest inquiry into the fundamental problem of the Gospel of Mark which we possess. Jesus is for Mark at once the Messiah and the Son of God. “Faith in this dogma must be aroused, it must be established and defended. The whole Gospel is a defence. Mark wishes to lead all his readers, among whom he counts the Heathens and Gentile Christians, to the recognition of what the heathen centurion said, ’Truly this man was the Son of God!’³⁷⁷ The whole account is directed to this end.”³⁷⁸

Mark’s main proof for this purpose is that of miracles. Jesus’ doctrines are with Mark of so much less importance than his miracles, that we never learn exactly what Jesus preached. “Consequently the historical portrait is very obscure: Jesus’ person is distorted into the grotesque and the fantastic”(!)³⁷⁹ Not only does Mark often introduce his own thought into the tradition about Jesus, and so prove perfectly wrong, and indeed absurd, the view held, for instance, by Wernle, that Jesus had intentionally made use of an obscure manner of speech and had spoken in parables and riddles so as not to be understood by the people;³⁸⁰ but also the connection which he has established between the accounts, which had first gone from mouth to mouth for a long time in isolation, is a perfectly disconnected and external one. At first the stories reported by Mark were totally disconnected with one another. There is no evidence at all of their having followed each other in the present order(!).³⁸¹ So that only the matter, not what Mark made of it, is of historical value.³⁸² Single stories, discourses, and phrases are bound into a whole by Mark; and often enough it may be seen that we have here a tradition which was first built up in the earliest Christianity long after Jesus’ death. Experiences were at first gradually fashioned into a story – and the miracle-stories may especially be regarded in this way. In spite of all these trimmings and alterations, and in spite of the fact that neither in the words of Jesus nor in the stories is it for the most part any longer possible to separate the actual from the traditional, which for forty years was not put into writing – in spite of all this, the historical value of the traditions given us by Mark is “very highly” estimated. For not only is “the general impression of power, originality, and creation” “valuable,” which is given in this account of Mark’s, but also there are so many individual phrases “corresponding to reality.” Numerous accounts, momentary pictures and remarks, “speak for themselves.” The modesty and ingenuousness(!), the freshness and joy(!) with which Mark recounts all this, show distinctly that he is here the reporter of a valid tradition, and that he writes nothing but what eye-witnesses have told him(!). “And so finally, in spite of all, this Gospel remains an extraordinarily valuable work, a collection of old and genuine material, which is loosely arranged and placed under a few leading conceptions; produced perhaps by that Mark whom the New Testament knows, and of whom Papias heard from the mouth of the elder John.”³⁸³

One does not trust one’s eyes with this style of attempting to set up Mark as an even half-credible “historical source.” This attempt will remind us only too forcibly of Wrede’s ironical remarks when he is making fun of the “decisions as you like it” that flourish in the study of Jesus’ life. “This study,” says Wrede, “suffers from psychological suggestion, and this is one style of historical solution.”³⁸⁴ One believes that he can secure this, another that, as the historical nucleus of the Gospel; but neither has objective proofs for his assertions.³⁸⁵ If we wish to work with an historical nucleus, we must really make certain of a nucleus. The whole point is, that in an anecdote or phrase something is proved, which makes any other explanation of the matter under consideration improbable, or at least doubtful.³⁸⁶ It seems very questionable, after his radical criticism of the historical credibility of Mark’s Gospel, that Wrede saw in it such a “historical kernel” – though this is supposed by Wernle to “speak for itself.” Moreover, Wrede’s opinion of the “historian” Mark is not essentially different from Wernle’s. In his opinion, for example, Jesus’ disciples, as the Gospel portrays them, with their want of intelligence bordering on idiocy, their folly, and their ambiguous conduct as regards their Master, are “not real figures.”³⁸⁷ He also concedes, as we have stated, that Mark had no real idea of the historical life of Jesus,³⁸⁸ even if “pallid fragments”(!) of such an idea entered into his superhistorical faith-conception. “The Gospel of Mark,” he says, “has in this sense a place among the histories of dogma.”³⁸⁹ The belief that in it the development of Jesus’ public life is still perceptible appears to be decaying.³⁹⁰ “It would indeed be in the highest degree desirable that such a Gospel were not the oldest.”³⁹¹

Thus, then, does Mark stand as an historical source. After this we could hardly hope to be much strengthened in our belief in Jesus’ historical reality by the other two Synoptics. Of these, Luke’s Gospel must have been written, in the early part of the second century, by an unknown Gentile Christian; and Matthew’s is not the work of a single author, but was produced – and unmistakably in the interests of the Church – by various hands in the first half of the second century.³⁹² But now both, as we have said, are based on Mark. And even if in their representations they have attained a certain “peculiar value” which is wanting in Mark —e. g., a greater number of Jesus’ parables and words – even if they have embellished the story of his life by the addition of legendary passages (e. g., of the history of the time preceding the Saviour, of many additions to the account of the Passion and Resurrection, &c.), this cannot quite establish the existence of an historical Jesus. It is true that Wernle takes the view that in this respect “old traditions” have been preserved “with wonderful fidelity” by both the Evangelists; but, on the other hand, he concedes as to certain of Luke’s accounts that even if he had used old traditions they need not have been as yet written, and certainly they need not have been “historically reliable.” It seems rather peculiar when, leaving completely on one side the historical value of the tradition, he emphatically declares that even such a strong interest, as in his opinion the Evangelists had in the shaping and formation of their account, could not in any way set aside “the worth of its rich treasure of parables and stories, through which Jesus himself [!] speaks to us with freshness and originality” (!). He also strangely sums up at the end, “that the peculiar value of both Gospels, in spite of their very mixed nature, has claim enough on our gratitude”(!).³⁹³ This surely is simply to make use of the Gospels’ literary or other value in the interest of the belief in their historical credibility.

But there is still the collection of sayings, that “great authority on the matter,” from which all the Synoptics, and especially Luke and Matthew, are supposed to have derived the material for their declarations about Jesus. Unfortunately this is to us a completely unknown quantity, as we know neither what this “great” authority treats of, nor the arrangement of the matter in it, nor its text. We can only say that this collection was written in the Aramaic tongue, and the arrangement of its matter was not apparently chronological, but according to the similarity of its contents. Again, it is doubtful whether the collection was a single work, produced by one individual; or whether it had had a history before it came to Luke and Matthew. All the same, “the collection contains such a valuable number of the Lord’s words, that in all probability an eye-witness was its author” (!).³⁹⁴ As for the speeches of Jesus constructed from it, they were never really made as speeches by Jesus, but owe the juxtaposition of their contents entirely to the hand of the compiler. Thus the much admired Sermon on the Mount is constructed by placing together individual phrases of Jesus, which belong to all periods of his life, perhaps made in the course of a year. The ideas running through it and connecting the parts are not those of Jesus, but rather those of the original community; “nevertheless, the historical value of these speeches is, on the whole, very great indeed. Together with the ‘Lord’s words’ of Mark they give us the truest insight into the spirit of the Gospel”(!).³⁹⁵

Such are the authorities for the belief in an historical Jesus! If we survey all that remains of the Gospels, this does indeed appear quite “scanty,” or, speaking plainly, pitiable. Wernle consoles himself with, “If only it is certain and reliable.” Yes, if! “And if only it was able to give us an answer to the chief question: Who was Jesus?”³⁹⁶ This much is certain: a “Life of Jesus” cannot be written on the basis of the testimony before us. Probably all present-day theologians are agreed on this point; which, however, does not prevent them producing new essays on it, at any rate for the “people,” thus making up for the lack of historical reliability by edifying effusions and rhetorical phrases. “There is no lack of valuable historical matter, of stones for the construction of Jesus’ life; they lie before us plentifully. But the plan for the construction is lost and completely irretrievable, because the oldest disciples had no occasion for such an historical connection, but rather claimed obedience to the isolated words and acts, so far as they aroused faith.” But would they have been less faith-arousing if they had been arranged connectedly, would the credibility of the accounts of Jesus have been diminished and not much rather increased, if the Evangelists had taken the trouble to give us some more information as to Jesus’ real life? As things stand at present, hardly two events are recounted in the same manner in the Gospels, or even in the same connection. Indeed, the differences and contradictions – and this not only as to unimportant things, such as names, times and places, &c. – are so great that these literary documents of Christianity can hardly be surpassed in confusion.³⁹⁷ But even this is, according to Wernle, “not so great a pity, if only we can discover with sufficient clearness, what Jesus’ actions and wishes were on important points.”³⁹⁸ Unfortunately we are not in a position to do even this. For the ultimate source of our information, which we arrive at in our examination of the authorities is completely unknown to us – the Aramaic collection of sayings, and those very old traditions from which Mark is supposed to have derived his production, gleanings of which have been preserved for us by Luke and Matthew. But even if we knew these also, we would almost certainly not have “come to Jesus himself.” “They contain the possibility of dispute and misrepresentation. They recount in the first place the faith of the oldest Christians, a faith which arose in the course of four hundred years, and moreover changed much in that time.”³⁹⁹ So that at most we know only the faith of the earliest community. We see how this community sought to make clear to itself through Jesus its belief in the Resurrection, how it sought to “prove” to itself and to others the divine nature of Jesus by the recital of tales of miracles and the like. What Jesus himself thought, what he did, what he taught, what his life was, and – might we say it? – whether he ever lived at all – that is not to be learnt from the Gospels, and, according to all the preceding discussion, cannot be settled from them with lasting certainty.

Of course the liberal theologian, for whom everything is compatible with an historical Jesus, has many resources. He explains that all the former discussion has not touched the main point, and that this point is – What was Jesus’ attitude to God, to the world, and to mankind? What answer did he give to the questions: What matters in the eyes of God? and What is religion? This should indicate that the solution of the problem is contained in what has preceded, and that this solution is unknown to us. But such is not the case. Wernle knows it, and examines it “in the clear light of day.” “From his numerous parables and sermons and from countless momentary recollections it comes to us as clearly and distinctly as if Jesus were our contemporary [!]. No man on earth can say that it is either uncertain or obscure how Jesus thought on this point, which is to us [viz., to the liberal theologians] even at the present day the chief point.” “And if Christianity has forgotten for a thousand years what its Master desired first and before all, to-day [i. e., after the clear solutions of critical theology] it shines on us once more from the Gospels as clearly and wonderfully, as if the sun were newly risen, driving before its conquering rays all the phantoms and shadows of night.”⁴⁰⁰ And so Wernle himself, to whom we owe this consoling assurance, has written a work, “Die Anfänge unserer Religion” (1901), which is highly esteemed in theological circles, and in which he has given a detailed account, in a tone of overwhelming assurance, of the innermost thoughts, views, words, and teachings of Jesus and of his followers, just as if he had been actually present.