Before I begin, let me say that I do believe Jesus has a sense of humor, and that He no doubt enjoyed Himself on many occasions while here on earth. He was the one who made the "best wine" for a wedding party, after all. So the idea of Jesus laughing is not one I am uncomfortable with.
As I read the Gospel of Judas, I was struck by how often the author of that treatise describes Jesus as laughing. Usually when Jesus laughs, He is laughing at the misconception of the disciples or of Judas, and His laughter seems to be somewhat derisive. It also struck me that a number of those events have Jesus laughing at the concepts held by the orthodox church of that time.
Now, the author of Judas doesn't always appear to have a firm grasp on the orthodox faith of the second century. There seems to be some bouncing around between Christian and Jewish thought, and a few of the times it's hard to say just what the author has Jesus laughing at. This is sometimes due to gaps in the manuscript of the text, and the reconstructions needed to try to fill in as many blanks as possible. Still, there seems to be a gap between what this author considers orthodoxy to teach and what we see in other authors of the second century.
No doubt at least some of this is also due to the unsettled nature of orthodox theology in the second century. While we look back and piece together the commonalities of the writers we have to try to understand what the early church believed, some of the formulations of later times have not yet been worked out. The church, under periodic persecution and with no central organizational structure, was more concerned with survival and evangelism than with producing anything approaching what we might today call a systematic theology.
This fluidity has been used by some to posit that there were multiple Christianities, and that what we today call "orthodoxy" just happened to be the winning form. The authors who contribute essays to the volume I have been reading fall into that camp to a greater or lesser degree. They believe that the Gospel of Judas is a major discovery that shows us what an alternative Christianity looked like.
My take on the presentation of Judas is exactly the opposite. The use of a chronological framework that appears to work around the Passion week accounts of the canonical gospels and the very fact that the author tries to make orthodox thought the foil to the more "exalted" Gnosticism he presents tell me that there was on at least some level an "orthodoxy" that stood opposed to the ideas presented in this treatise. There apparently were some core beliefs that were widespread enough that they touched the locale in which this author wrote.
I don't have the time at present to do so, but it might make for an interesting study (no doubt already done somewhere if I could find it) to try to work out the theology to which the Gospel of Judas is a Gnostic reaction. It certainly appears to me that it is something along the lines of the orthodox, catholic faith we see in the writers of the second century, which was more fully developed in the writings of Irenaeus at the end of that century. It certainly would not be a theology at which Jesus would laugh; I suspect His mirth might be more aptly expressed at those scholars who two millennia later would find a fragmentary Gnostic gospel more exciting than the gospel accounts of Jesus' life.
Showing posts with label Gospel of Judas. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Gospel of Judas. Show all posts
Saturday, June 25, 2011
Monday, June 20, 2011
Curiously Uncritical
I have been reading the Gospel of Judas, with several supporting essays, from the National Geographic publication of 2006. I recall the hype that surrounded the publication of this work, and the claims that this was the most significant archaeological find of the past half-century. I confess that I am seldom swayed by popular clamor over Biblically-related discoveries, whether the promotion comes from liberal or conservative circles. I find it's best to allow some time for careful, scholarly assessment and critique.
What I found most intriguing in this book was not the text of the Gospel of Judas, which perhaps deserves further study but appears to be a more or less typical Gnostic treatise. It was comments in the essays that piqued my interest. In particular, the essays by Marvin Meyer and Bart Ehrman expressed opinions and ideas that demonstrated a marked contrast in the way they handled ancient material.
When writing about the books of the New Testament, these essays follow the general lines of mainline Protestant scholarship. The dates given for the NT documents are relatively late, and Ehrman in particular states that some of these books were not written by the authors claimed for them. They adopt the critical view of the NT that is accepted among their peers, while allowing no attention to conservative scholarship.
Yet when their attention is turned to Gospel of Judas, their critical stance mysteriously disappears. A date in the early-to-mid-second century is accepted to match the conclusion that this is the Gospel of Judas mentioned by Irenaeus, even though the match is far from exact. The possibility of textual emendations or alterations is almost summarily dismissed as unlikely. The portrait of Judas, while not claimed as historical, is accepted a giving insight into the place of Judas in Jesus' inner circle, while the accounts in Matthew and Acts are subtly questioned.
This leads to a question that I think is seldom if ever asked about "critical scholarship": why are scholars more skeptical of the canonical writings than of non-canonical writings? While I can't speak with certainty, I believe that this attitude is the result of a fundamentalism of liberalism that is every bit as real as the fundamentalism of conservatism. There are simply some beliefs that are accepted and no longer questioned, with contrary arguments ignored or dismissed,
This may seem harsh, and certainly puts me outside the so-called "mainstream" of Biblical scholarship. Yet we must take it into account when examining Biblical and historical discussions. Too often evangelical scholars are belittled due to their positions on Biblical authority, while liberal scholars are portrayed as open to whatever the evidence says. This is not an accurate assessment of either side; both have their fundamental beliefs that are accepted based on each scholar's own studies, and both need to be examined in light of all evidence. (I know that their are those on both sides who simply accept what they are taught and hold it without much examination, but I am more concerned with the realm if scholarly debate.)
So it is important to understand that our assumptions and presuppositions can color our views no matter where we fall on the theological spectrum. While it is comfortable to simply accept a few favored authors, a broader perspective will help us avoid letting what we believe to be colored too strongly by what we want to be true without examining it.
What I found most intriguing in this book was not the text of the Gospel of Judas, which perhaps deserves further study but appears to be a more or less typical Gnostic treatise. It was comments in the essays that piqued my interest. In particular, the essays by Marvin Meyer and Bart Ehrman expressed opinions and ideas that demonstrated a marked contrast in the way they handled ancient material.
When writing about the books of the New Testament, these essays follow the general lines of mainline Protestant scholarship. The dates given for the NT documents are relatively late, and Ehrman in particular states that some of these books were not written by the authors claimed for them. They adopt the critical view of the NT that is accepted among their peers, while allowing no attention to conservative scholarship.
Yet when their attention is turned to Gospel of Judas, their critical stance mysteriously disappears. A date in the early-to-mid-second century is accepted to match the conclusion that this is the Gospel of Judas mentioned by Irenaeus, even though the match is far from exact. The possibility of textual emendations or alterations is almost summarily dismissed as unlikely. The portrait of Judas, while not claimed as historical, is accepted a giving insight into the place of Judas in Jesus' inner circle, while the accounts in Matthew and Acts are subtly questioned.
This leads to a question that I think is seldom if ever asked about "critical scholarship": why are scholars more skeptical of the canonical writings than of non-canonical writings? While I can't speak with certainty, I believe that this attitude is the result of a fundamentalism of liberalism that is every bit as real as the fundamentalism of conservatism. There are simply some beliefs that are accepted and no longer questioned, with contrary arguments ignored or dismissed,
This may seem harsh, and certainly puts me outside the so-called "mainstream" of Biblical scholarship. Yet we must take it into account when examining Biblical and historical discussions. Too often evangelical scholars are belittled due to their positions on Biblical authority, while liberal scholars are portrayed as open to whatever the evidence says. This is not an accurate assessment of either side; both have their fundamental beliefs that are accepted based on each scholar's own studies, and both need to be examined in light of all evidence. (I know that their are those on both sides who simply accept what they are taught and hold it without much examination, but I am more concerned with the realm if scholarly debate.)
So it is important to understand that our assumptions and presuppositions can color our views no matter where we fall on the theological spectrum. While it is comfortable to simply accept a few favored authors, a broader perspective will help us avoid letting what we believe to be colored too strongly by what we want to be true without examining it.
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