The Words of Jesus

What are the actual words spoken by Jesus? This question was prompted by my writing a previous [1]post in the first person as Jesus. This was not a conscious decision I made beforehand. It was something which simply happened when I began to write. I rather think now that had I pre-planned such a form for my post then I would have been too overawed to write a word. But the thought was also prompted by my noting that in my [2]King James Study Bible the editors had made the decision to print the entire text in black – except for all the spoken words of Jesus in the New Testament, which are printed in a confident red.

This textual colour choice might give Jesus’ words a certain authoritative conviction, but it also ironically invites the question: just how truly reliable are these as the actual spoken words of Jesus? To make one point clear: I am not one who subscribes to the theory that Jesus as a historical person did not actually exist. It might be an uncomfortable truth for some that we have no [3]independent verification outside of the gospels for his historicity, but that to me is not a reason in itself to call his existence into question, even if his actual nature might remain in the province of personal belief.

In the Gospel of Matthew, 8:4, having miraculously cured a leper, Jesus admonishes the man to tell no one what he has done. So how do we know about this incident, and what Jesus said to this man? Did the cured leper ignore Jesus’ wish and spread the news of what had transpired, and who had cured him? If there were other witnesses present who overheard Jesus’ words (and therefore were in a position to record and preserve them) then the words themselves were already public, making Jesus’ statement redundant. Either option demonstrates the uncertainty of the exchange, even its very unreliability.

"And Jesus put forth his hand, and touched him, saying, I will; be thou clean. And immediately his leprosy was cleansed. And Jesus saith unto him, See thou tell no man; but go thy way.." But how do we know this?

There are, of course, other such examples, not the least of which is the detailed exchange that took place between Jesus and Satan in the [4]wilderness. Clearly no one else was present to witness and record the incident, so how can we possibly know the actual words that were spoken – including those spoken by a supernatural being? And what actually were the last words spoken by Jesus on the cross? You can pick and choose, because three of the four gospels will tell you something different.

Both Matthew and Mark agree on what these last words were, having Jesus cry out in despair: “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” [5](Matthew 27:46 and Mark 15:34). Luke’s phrase is one of simple acceptance: “Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.” (Luke 23:46). John has Jesus utter the phrase of brief resignation: “It is finished.” (John 19:30). Not one of these three ‘last words’ phrases even remotely resembles the others. Clearly, while they might all be wrong, they certainly cannot all be right. Few examples of scripture contradicting itself focus our uncertainty more than these conflicting phrases. What they purport to be is not some mere conversational aside, but the actual last words uttered by Jesus in his earthly existence – words of no small moment for Christians everywhere.

Jesus’ actual appearance is a total unknown, and yet throughout history artists have portrayed him as he appears here. This portrayal of him has now become an entrenched aspect of Christian tradition: a tradition for which we nevertheless have no verification.

We are in a situation in which we are being forced to choose which contradictory Gospel account might be the more accurate version. Scholastically the problem does not present itself, as it simply demonstrates that the unknown writers of these gospels evidently were using different sources for their material. It only becomes a problem when scriptural authority is accepted as religious belief. Some light can be shed on the situation once we recognize that the four gospels were something of an experiment in literary form. The idea of weaving stories and apparent conversations together in a narrative to give them the ring of actual events was something of a novelty for its time. This contrasts with such a text as the ex-canonical Gospel of [6]Thomas, which makes no attempt at narrative, but rather presents an apparent conversation with Jesus in [7]instructional form. It has no ‘setting’ as such.

The first two pages of the surviving Gospel of Thomas, written in Coptic. It was buried along with other such texts in the Egyptian sands for sixteen long centuries before being discovered in 1945. Many such texts were destroyed in the purges ordered by Athanasius, the influential bishop of Alexandria, and deliberately burying them became a desperate way for those who valued them to ensure the texts' survival. Against all the odds, it worked.

This non-narrative form of the Gospel of Thomas is of particular interest because it appears to predate those [8]canonical gospels which derive certain common passages from it. This in turn strongly suggests that the original gospel writings were actually such non-narrative collections of ‘wise sayings’ (in this case, those of Jesus), which in turn implies that the narrative elements of the canonical gospels (the story lines, settings, miracles, etc.) were later additions which expanded upon these original collections of sayings.

Most of these collections have now been lost, but one source known simply as Q (from the German quelle, meaning ‘source’) is hypothesized from elements common to Matthew and Luke. It is possible that the authors of Q and Thomas were actually the [9]same person who therefore greatly influenced later gospel writers. This is because reconstructing Q from Matthew and Luke leaves only the sayings and teachings of Jesus, with no narrative elements: the same form as the Gospel of Thomas.

The lost text known as Q can be extrapolated from the contents common to the gospels of Matthew and Luke. While Q has never been found, its one-time existence is entirely plausible, and is a reminder that all such texts which we now have, both scriptural and ex-canonical, are simply those which have survived both the willful destructiveness of orthodox purges and the rigors of time. 

All of these gospel texts, whether they happen to be canonical or whether they are from other sources, and whether those sources are approved by orthodoxy or not, contain detailed and sometimes extended passages purported to be the actual words spoken by Jesus. On the face of things, it would seem to be stretching all credulity to presume that a scribe happened to be on hand on each and every occasion to record exactly what was being said, and any texts that might have been written at the time have been lost to history. What we have instead are only near-contemporary texts dating in some cases from [10]decades after the events which they describe.

So how can we so confidently take for granted that these words of Jesus are indeed what is claimed for them? It is, as with all such situations, a matter of faith. And perhaps it is so that, as I imply in my own previous post The Mystic Marriage, the words of Jesus need not be a matter of any historical record, but are any words, said by anyone, anywhere, at any time, which are truly spoken from the heart.

Hawkwood 

“As we say down here when we preach, it is written in red letter. It is in my King James Bible, and that is what I go by, the King James Bible.” ~ Serpent handler [11]Pastor Andrew Hamblin, Tabernacle Church of God, LaFollette, Tennessee.

  

Notes:

[1] Please see my post The Mystic Marriage.

[2] The King James Study Bible, pub. Zondervan.  Printing the spoken words of Jesus in red is commonly encountered in Bibles, although such a two-colour print run adds to the expense of production. 

[3] The Jewish historian Flavius Josephus (right), who switched his allegiance to the Romans, is often cited as an independent source which confirms Jesus' historicity, although the passages in his text which appear to refer to Jesus are thought to be later additions by an unknown hand, evidently with an agenda to provide such backdated independent confirmation of Jesus’ existence. The actual historicity of Jesus is naturally a very gnarly question to answer. The occupying Roman forces, normally such scrupulous bureaucrats, leave no record. This is mysterious in itself, considering the potential threat that such a person would have been to the stability of Roman occupation. Jesus was, after all, tried for sedition against the state. There is one possible reference by the Roman historian Tacitus to an unnamed messiah, but historical certainty is something else. 

[4] Please see my post The Good Satanist.

[5] Both Matthew (which copies from Mark) and Mark agree that after uttering these words Jesus ‘cried with a loud voice’ (Matthew 27:50, Mark 15:37) before dying. This statement has been used as something of a let-out clause by those striving to give the four gospels an internal coherence (as do the editors of my King James Study Bible, which is the Apologist approach to scriptural scholarship), and who for this reason claim that this ‘loud cry’ actually was the short phrase referred to in John. Such a claim is clearly unverifiable and speculative, and still leaves the discrepancy with Luke’s version (in which Jesus does not cry out) unexplained. My own instincts tell me that the phrase in John, "It is finished", if it was said at all. would have been uttered in a last gasp: one of almost whispered resignation. Can you really imagine these modest words being yelled out at max volume? 

[6] ‘Thomas’ is not a name, but a term meaning ‘twin’. This might mean that he was a true reflection – a ‘mirror’ – of the teachings of Jesus, or rather more mysteriously, that Jesus indeed had a twin, a second Self: a can of mystic worms which I might open in a future post. This to me is explanation enough of why this particular gospel never made it into the canon: if there is one thing that orthodoxy apparently abhors, it is mysticism, and the Gospel of Thomas is replete with statements which read more like Zen koans. It will by turns delight, intrigue and shock, and we need to put in some spadework to unearth the deep wisdom that is contained there.

[7] In this sense, the Gospel of Thomas is in the form of a catechism: instructions on faith or doctrine written in a question-and-answer format, as if the reader is in conversation with the writer.

[8] The famed ‘Doubting Thomas’ episode in John 20:24-29 suggests a calculated ridiculing of Thomas, and other passages in John imply a deliberate refutation of the ideas which the Gospel of Thomas expresses. Since this key incident in John's Gospel of Thomas’s skeptical encounter with the risen Christ is virtually ignored by the other three gospels, it is reasonable to conclude that this is a fictive incident which was written into the narrative to serve John’s anti-Thomas agenda, with John portraying Thomas as the ultimate agnostic.

[9] Since the Gospel of Thomas is considered to be a Gnostic text, and since the Q source must have been similar to Thomas - even perhaps by the same person - it logically follows that the amount of Q shown in my above 'pie-slice' diagram is a telling indication of just how much Gnostic influence still remains in the canonical gospels. The responses of Jesus in Matthew 8:20-22 are wholly Gnostic in their nature. "Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man has nowhere to lay his head." (Matthew 8: 20, R.S.V.) "Foxes have their dens and birds have their nests, but the son of man has no place to lie down and rest." (Thomas 86).

[10] The scriptural texts most nearly contemporary with the events of the crucifixion are specific letters of Paul. Intriguingly, although he lived within the same generation, Paul himself shows little interest in the historical Jesus. Rather, he is impassioned about establishing the new beliefs on an Apostolic Gentile basis, and steering them away from a direction which tied them to a tradition of Jewish customs and prophets which was the focus of James. The four canonical gospels were believed to have been written within the first century, which nevertheless makes their authorship a retrospective one relating events which were not witnessed first-hand by their unknown writers. The oldest gospel is not Matthew, but Mark, which, like Q, has elements common to both Matthew and Luke, and from which the writers of these two gospels also evidently drew for source material.

[11] Quoted in: Snake Salvation: One Way to Pray in Appalachia, by Elizabeth Dias, Time, September 9, 2013. Please see my post They Shall Take Up Serpents.

Sources:

Elaine Pagels: Beyond Belief: The Secret Gospel of Thomas. Random House, 2003. Professor Pagels’ title contains the complete text of the Gospel of Thomas, as well as a comprehensive examination of both its content and the historical setting and aftermath, including emerging doctrinal conflicts of the early Church which were contested by a number of individuals who sought to shape Christian doctrine to their will. Not the least of these was Irenaeus, the bishop of Lyons, who decided that only four of the many gospels then in circulation should be included in scripture – and then only the four of his personal choosing. Yes, it really was a single individual who decided for himself that he had the right to make such a momentous decision – and then made it.

The top image is a detail from the painting Christ and the Sinner, by Henrik Siemiradki. The third image is a detail from the painting Christ Crucified, by Harry Anderson. In the notes: Crucifixion, by Thomas Eakins. The Incredulity of Saint Thomas, by Caravaggio. Saint Paul in Prison, by Rembrandt. Other graphics created for this post by Hawkwood for the © David Bergen Studio.

The Gospel According to Somebody

In my contacts with them I have often-enough been taken aback by the apparent lack of knowledge shown by Christians about the background of their own faith. Much seems to be taken for granted, and there is a general acceptance that ‘things are the way they are’. So if you who are reading this consider yourself a Christian, can you (for example) say why there are four gospels, and who wrote them? Well, this is not a quiz – although you might ask yourself whether or not you know the answer. After all, it does concern the very foundations of the beliefs which you hold. Let’s first mention what the respective answers are not. There are not four gospels because these were the four that were written, and neither are they by Matthew, Mark, Luke or John.

The four gospels were certainly not written as part of a cohesive Testament. They were among a whole collection of many such texts from the 1st- and 2nd-centuries, and in their day were not even the most popularly read, as is often presumed. No, the reason why there are now just four gospels in the New Testament is because of the vigorously-enforced personal opinions of a single individual.

Irenaeus of Lyons

In the 2nd century, Irenaeus, the Bishop of Lugdunum (now Lyons) in what was then Roman Gaul, wrote a massive multi-volume work with the no-nonsense title Against Heresies. For this particular bishop, there were rather too many gospels for his liking, and so he set about doing some judicious canonical pruning. Out went all the gospels and other texts that he personally considered to be wanting, until just four remained: the four canonical gospels as we know them today. Why four? Irenaeus himself tells us his reason: [1]“…for there are four zones in the world and four principal winds.” Yes, that really was this man’s logic behind his decision.

So of course the burning question has to be: who decided that Irenaeus had the necessary authority single-handedly to make these sweeping root-and-branch changes which virtually remodelled Christianity at that time? Well.. he did, actually. He was, after all, a bishop. And only a religious experience by either a bishop, a priest or a deacon carried any spiritual weight. Because bishops, priests and deacons were directly descended from, and therefore had the authority of, the original disciples (a process formally known as Apostolic Succession), which is why only these three hierarchies of the Church were qualified to know about such things. So all authority rested with orthodox them, and you as a member of the laity had to toe the party line.

An English translation of the opening words of Against Heresies, which shows clearly enough the style of Irenaeus’ invective. I have read enough to know that his text continues in the same emotive style.

So it’s a no-brainer that all beliefs which did not accept this hierarchical structure of the Church were branded by Irenaeus as heretical. Now, a cynical soul might think that Irenaeus was driven by motives that perhaps had as much to do with preserving his own power base as they had to do with any religious fervour. Because if all had equal rights before God, and if all individual spiritual experiences were equally valid, then what need for a bishop? And indeed, Irenaeus directed his most toxic invective against such groups as the [2]Christian Gnostics, who openly advocated this egalitarian approach to their faith, and who certainly did not need a bishop to tell them where things were at.

So if you insisted on sidestepping this religious chain of command, and believed passionately that all souls are free and equal, that you had the right to take the responsibility for your personal spiritual life and development, and that your own spiritual experience counted for as much as anyone else's.. well, then you were thinking the thoughts of a dangerous mind, because to Irenaeus this is what marked you out as a [3]heretic.  

And who wrote those four gospels? We simply do not know. Tradition attributes them to the eponymous four apostles, but tradition is not supported by scholarship. Some [4]sources, glimpsed indirectly through the lines of these texts, remain as shadowy unknowns, their identities lost to history. We can only say with certainty that the gospels were written by somebody. But Irenaeus we do know about, as the arbiter of the four gospels now in the New Testament. But the bending of others to his iron will came at a terrible human price, and that price was paid by the thousands of persecuted Gnostics, who thanks to Irenaeus’ unrelenting diatribes found themselves on the wrong side of what he personally had decided was correct to believe. Predictably, this man who directed such toxic invective against all whom he saw fit to disagree with, duly received sainthood, and is still regarded by many as a worthy father of the church.

And the eventual outcome of history? Scholarship now points to the fact that it was the [5]Gnostics’ version of Christianity that could have been closer to the original form of Christian beliefs, and it seems that Irenaeus merely created things in his own image.

Hawkwood 

PLEASE NOTE:
The top image has been created digitally to convey the idea of an unknown authorship for the Gospels. No Bible was actually defaced. I have various editions of the Bible on my bookshelf, and treat all of them with due respect.

Notes:

Eusebius of Caesarea

[1] J. Stevenson: A New Eusebius, 1957. Eusebius of Caesarea was a 3rd- to 4th-century chronicler of the early church, his Ecclesiastical History being his best-known work. Its reliability is now questioned by scholarship, and it is suspected that at least to some extent he fictionalised events. See also my previous post Anthony of the Desert: Life as Fiction for another example of fictionalised history created by another church father (Athanasius). Commissioned by Emperor Constantine to produce fifty Bibles, Eusebius took it upon himself either to include or exclude texts of his own choosing, based upon a shaky 'genuine to dubious' rating system of his own devising. Which, beyond the selection by Irenaeus, has had its influence upon the twenty seven books which now comprise the New Testament. As is the case with both Irenaeus and Athanasius (with whom Eusebius had contact regarding copied volumes of scripture), Eusebius was also elevated to sainthood.

[2] Even right here in the 21st-century, I read on a website (http://mb-soft.com/believe/txn/gnostici.htm) which purports to give an impartial account of the history of Gnosticism such florid (and distinctly unscholarly) invective as: "As Christianity grew within and without the Roman Empire, Gnosticism spread as a fungus at its root." and: "So rank was its poisonous growth that there seemed danger of its stifling Christianity altogether, and the earliest Fathers devoted their energies to uprooting it." It seems that the purging emotive rhetoric of Irenaeus lives on. And the use of the term 'Christianity' for the 2nd-century is a misnomer. At that time, the form of belief advocated by Irenaeus, which eventually became Catholicism, was neither more nor less legitimate than any other kind. But for the reasons given here (and for other reasons to which I shall be returning on this blog) it was the form which won, through sheer force of will - and also through the often relentless persecution and extermination of those other Christian beliefs which it perceived as its rivals.  

[3] Language can become a weapon, and purges and persecutions can result from labels. The word heresy simply means ‘choice’, meaning one’s personal right to choose one’s own beliefs, but Irenaeus effectively evolved the term negatively to imply something false and evil. Even now, thanks to Irenaeus, the term heretic has pejorative connotations to many, and the 4th-century eventually saw the criminalization of heresy punishable by death, with the Church in effect having the authority to pronounce sentence.

[4] A lost gospel text known as ‘Q’ (from the German Quelle, meaning ‘source’) can be inferred from the unknown authors of Matthew and Luke, who drew upon this lost text for their own writings.

[5] It is worth remembering that in it’s beginnings, Christianity had no church, no Bible, and it was not even called ‘Christian’. There were many, many different forms, some belonging more to the Hebraic tradition of the prophets, others more to the gentile authority of the apostles, and still others taking their inspiration from a broader base of spirituality which included the pre-Christian mystery schools. None of these was more ‘right’ than the other: they were just different. In scholastic terms, we have no reason to think that a Gnostic form of proto-Christianity was not the base out of which the early form of the religion grew. But history, as they say, is written by the victors, and it was the domineering and authoritarian will of early church fathers such as Irenaeus that triumphed to become the Catholic (meaning ‘universal’) church.