Case Studies in the ‘Hermeneutic of Suspicion’: the Early Life of Jesus (Part 16)

So far in this series, we have made the case for a fair and judicious way for historians to explore and present the life story of Jesus of Nazareth. This is a way free from the kind of biases and philosophical prejudices that inevitably lead to what has been called “a hermeneutic of suspicion.”

The strange (and disappointing) thing is that even New Testament historians who are determined to adopt such a judicious method often lapse into an unwarranted degree of bias against much of the testimony of the gospel writers. For example, in The Historical Jesus: an Essential Guide, James H. Charlesworth rightly says: “Since our [multiple] sources assume a Jesus tradition is authentic, we also should assume a tradition is authentic, until evidence appears that undermines its authenticity” (p. 18). In other words, given the first or second-hand eyewitness basis of most of the gospel testimony, where the gospel writers present a largely common and coherent narrative, the burden of proof is on the sceptics. Yet Charlesworth often seems to violate his own principle. Consider the following examples.

1) On the birthplace of Jesus

Charlesworth raises the question of whether or not Jesus was really born in Bethlehem, since Jesus is never called “Jesus of Bethlehem,” but always “Jesus of Nazareth.” Mark 1:9 states “Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee,” so Charlesworth considers that “If Jesus came from Nazareth, he may have been born there” (p. 67; cf. Mt 21:11, Mk 6:1, Jn 1:45-46). The most convincing evidence he presents in favor of this possibility is that “Nicodemus is unable to reply to the charge that Jesus cannot be a prophet or the Messiah, because no prophet is to come from Galilee, which includes Nazareth” (p. 66; cf. Jn 7:52). Evidently, Nicodemus was unaware of any tradition that Jesus actually was born in Bethlehem in Judea. Charlesworth concludes, “It is impossible to be certain where Jesus was born … but the vast amount [sic] of independent evidence (multiple attestation and coherence) indicates that Jesus most likely grew up and was born in Nazareth, the home of his fathers” (p. 73). Moreover, Charlesworth quotes with approval the assessment of the evidence by one of his students:

“If we try to understand Matthew’s mentality, we come to know that Matthew has a special intention and motivation for his writings. He strives to inform his readers that Jesus fulfilled everything that is written in the Old Testament. So he claims that Jesus was born in Bethlehem to fulfill Micah 5:1. John and Mark, in contrast, are more coherent in their teachings and theology than Matthew, so it seems to me that Nazareth is the more probable place of his birth.” To what extent did this student show amazing honesty with history without sacrificing theology and Christology? (p. 66)

This student may indeed have shown “amazing honesty” and sincerity — but only by attributing amazing dishonesty to the author of St. Matthew’s gospel. The student also does not exhibit knowledge of all the pertinent facts. For example, that St. Matthew was under no pressure to invent a birth of Jesus specifically in Bethlehem is abundantly clear from the very next sentences in Charlesworth’s book (although Charlesworth fails to make the connection himself):

An examination of early Jewish texts indicates that the Messiah may be born in Bethlehem or elsewhere. He may even come directly from heaven or some other region. Certainly the Messiah does not have to be born in Bethlehem. (p. 66)

Reza Aslan came to a similar conclusion about this issue in his book Zealot (2014):

The passage from the gospel of John [Jn 7:25-44] … is a perfect example of the general confusion that existed among the Jews when it came to the messianic prophecies. For even as the scribes and teachers of the law confidently proclaimed that Jesus could not be the messiah because he is not, as the prophecies demand, from Bethlehem, others in the crowd argue that the Nazarean could not be the messiah because the prophecies say “When the messiah comes, no one will know where he is from” (Jn 7:27). (p.32)

Moreover, St. Matthew is not the only Evangelist who reports that Jesus was born in Bethlehem: St. Luke attests to this fact as well, and in Luke’s gospel the designation of Bethlehem as Jesus’ birthplace is not tied to any fulfilment of prophecy. Rather, according to St. Luke, Bethlehem was only the temporary residence of Mary and Joseph, who had journeyed there for the Roman census. This would also serve to explain why even St. Matthew and St. Luke, although they both report that Jesus was born in Bethlehem, continue to call him “Jesus of Nazareth” throughout their gospels: because it was surely not the Jewish custom to name a person after a birthplace that was merely “en route,” but after the permanent family home, which in this case, as both gospels tell us, was Nazareth. Finally, none of the early Christian writers outside of the gospels report that Jesus was born in Nazareth, and none of the early Jewish polemicists (who attack so many other aspects of the gospel accounts) cast doubt on his birth in Bethlehem. In short, the preponderance of the historical evidence still supports Bethlehem as the birthplace of Jesus Christ.

2) Other Aspects of the Early Life of Jesus

Granted that Charlesworth’s book was meant to be merely a “brief summary” of “the solid results of modern study into the life and times of Jesus” (according to the back cover), nevertheless, it is littered with statements that are surely historically contentious, and yet the reader is not properly informed of the debate that surrounds these topics. For example, on the Nativity stories in the gospels Charlesworth states, “in antiquity, many were hailed to be born of virgins” (p.44). Yet Raymond Brown, in his classic and massive study, The Birth of the Messiah (1977), came to precisely the opposite conclusion: “there is no clear example of virginal conception in world or pagan religions that plausibly could have given first-century Jewish Christians the idea of the virginal conception of Jesus” (p. 523).

On the basis of John 8:41 (“We were not born of fornication”) Charlesworth speculates that Jesus was charged during his lifetime with being a mamzer (that is, someone not conceived by married, Jewish parents). But John 8:41 need not be interpreted as a charge thrown at Jesus of legal or physical illegitimacy. Putting the verse in context, it immediately follows Jesus’ accusation that some of his Jewish listeners were spiritually illegitimate, and in that sense not true sons of Abraham (8:39-40). They protest in response “We were not born of fornication; we have one [spiritual] Father, even God.” Jesus replies that if God were really their spiritual Father they would not be seeking to kill him; thus, their true father spiritually is the Devil. In short, this passage is about “spiritual” parentage, and probably has nothing to do with physical or legal illegitimacy. The point is worth noting, because one of the reasons those in Jesus research often dismiss the gospel accounts of the virginal conception of Jesus as unreliable is that the Evangelists, writing in the mid-first century, may have felt compelled to invent a special, supernatural conception for Jesus to respond to Jewish accusations that he was a mamzer. In fact, there is no clear evidence of such Jewish charges that predates the early 2nd century.

On the account of the Roman census in St. Luke’s Nativity story, Charlesworth states:

The historian is suspicious of the accuracy of Luke’s use of a Roman census to date and locate Jesus’ birth. Such a census is not supported by the known habits of officials during the Roman Empire. It is impractical that all who were to be taxed would know precisely where they were born and were able to return there for taxation. Luke may have confused a census under Quirinius in 6 c.e. with Jesus’ earlier birth. (p. 65)

It is hardly fair to sum up in such a one-sided fashion the complex historical debate over the census account.

First of all, St. Luke does not specify that all the Jews had to return to the place of their birth; rather it would seem they had to go to the ancestral city of their particular tribe. Secondly, in a much-neglected work mentioned earlier in this web series, Jesus and His Story, Ethelbert Stauffer provided an in-depth defense of the main outlines of the Lukan account precisely on the grounds of ancient documentation of Roman methods of census-taking and taxation. Stauffer makes a distinction between an apographe (“enrolment,” the registration of taxable property or persons entailing an appearance at the registry office — the word actually used by St. Luke) and an apotimesis (a tax assessment requiring payment). The enrolment that required Mary and Joseph to journey to Bethlehem was likely of the former kind, and that could be why there is no mention in Luke of the armed rebellion that accompanied the apotimesis under Quirinius in 6 AD when the taxes actually had to be paid (and this could also explain why the ancient Jewish historian Josephus does not even bother to record the earlier, more peaceful apographe). Moreover, some scholars argue that Luke 2:2 legitimately can be translated as “This census took place before Quirinius was governing Syria,” which certainly makes sense if St. Luke meant to distinguish the earlier apographe from the famous apotimesis under Quirinius that led to such trouble not many years later. One major difficulty with Stauffer’s theory, however, is that there does not seem to be such a clear distinction in meaning between these two ancient Greek words, even in the New Testament.

Another theory holds that there were in fact two different men named Quirinius who had leadership roles in Palestine or its environs in that era, one after the other (Quirinius was a relatively common name in the Roman Empire). Archaeologist Jerry Vardaman has found a coin with the name of Quirinius on it in micrographic letters. This Quirinius was apparently proconsul of Syria and Cilicia from 11 BC until just after the death of Herod. Since historians have already established that there was a Quirinius in charge of levying taxes on Judea in 6 AD that led to riots by the Jews, these could be two different people. On this reckoning, Luke’s words about an enrollment taking place “when Quirinius was governor of Syria” would be exactly right, as he was referring to the first Quirinius.

There is yet another theory, which one can find spelled out in The Ignatius Catholic Study Bible New Testament (2010 edition, p. 109). Many scholars believe that Herod actually died in 1 BC, not 4 BC. Some of the early Christian writers date the birth of Jesus between 3 and 2 BC. Moreover, there is also considerable evidence that in 3-2 BC everyone in the Roman Empire was required to swear allegiance to Caesar Augustus as “Father” of the Empire. Thus, the registration described in Luke 2:1 may have involved an enrollment for swearing this oath, and not a census and assessment taken for the sake of taxation. The Ignatius Study Bible concludes:

This would mean that Jesus was born between 3 and 2 BC, the enrollment of Joseph and Mary was a registration of their loyalty to the Roman Caesar, and the documentation of the oath was organized and implemented in Judea by Quirinius several years before he was made the official governor of Syria. This reconstruction not only eases the chronological tensions in Lk 2:1-2, it helps confirm Luke’s reliability as an historian as well as the early Church’s reliability as a channel of historical traditions.

however, there are two difficulties with this scenario, (1) that on this theory in the light of the inscription on Vardaman’s coin, and depending on the actual date of Herod’s death, there would have been two men named Quirinius who were in governing roles over the Syria-Judea area at the same time. Not impossible, but highly unlikely. Moreover, (2) the Ignatius Study Bible explanation does not mention how Quirinius pulled off a general taxation of the people of Judea in 6 AD without having had a general enrollment and assessment for taxation first (an assessment which was often done by the Romans many years in advance of the actual collection of taxes, because it was such a huge and cumbersome procedure, as Stauffer’s research shows). At least the other scenarios allow that the census mentioned in St. Luke’s gospel provides evidence that there was indeed an original enrollment and assessment for taxation purposes in Judea, the precursor to the social unrest of the collection of those taxes around 6 AD.

Other arguments for and against the scenarios offered here certainly can be advanced. The point is that Charlesworth should have given some indication that there is much more than one side to the census debate.

Another example: Charlesworth claims, “The most impressive evidence against Jesus being a carpenter is the observation that not once does he include in his graphic speech and parables any analogy from the carpentry shop” (p.71). But as Charlesworth himself points out, the Greek word for carpenter in Mark 6:3, tekton, could also include “house-builder” or even “craftsman.” Thus, the Greek word usually translated as “carpenter” was not exactly the equivalent of the modern English word, which normally refers to a maker of furniture. We do in fact have a parable from Jesus about the wise and foolish house-builders (Mt. 7:24, Lk. 6:47-49).

Finally, Charlesworth contends, “Before its editing by the Evangelist, the story of the marriage at Cana may have preserved a tradition that Jesus was being married” (p. 83). However, Charlesworth does not present a shred of real historical evidence for this, or that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene, or to anyone else. Serious historical research should deal with probabilities based on evidence, not possibilities based on speculation.

What is going on here? Why does Jesus research still tend to lapse into this kind of “hermeneutic of suspicion” of the gospel accounts of the life of Jesus, even when (otherwise excellent) scholars like Charlesworth consciously strive not to do so?

We will explore some answers to this important question in future articles in this series, but first we will need to look at a few more case studies of the epidemic of the “hermeneutic of suspicion” that still plagues historical Jesus research.

Next Time: More Case Studies of the ‘Hermeneutic of Suspicion’: The Temptations in the Desert

Robert Stackpole, STD
©The Mere Christian Fellowship, 2017