"How Jesus Became God"

Bart Ehrman is not the first person to address the issue of the divinity of Jesus.  He follows the footsteps of many who have pierced the naïve understanding of the biblical Jesus by rooting the scriptures within the context of history.

My interest in the fundamental issues of Christianity is attributed to my personal history. If it were not for my past allegiance to a religion in which I was raised, believing that I was a lucky person to have struck it rich by being a Catholic, I most likely would never have been interested in becoming a priest. Disillusionment can be painful but fruitful.

My understanding of Jesus never changed much from the time I first was indoctrinated with the Baltimore Catechism until my first year studying theology (I would have been 22 years old). All of sudden, like a bolt of lightening, one of our faculty teaching Scripture made clear that the Scriptures could not be read as history; essentially, it represented faith statements and beliefs, some sayings of which may have been literally spoken, but most often not.

I had to relearn my basic beliefs with a new and still undeveloped understanding of Christianity. The process was slow. For many years, even decades, I was able to translate what I heard and saw into a viable détente. At some point, the calibration no longer was possible. I could not continue being a Christian. (A prior posting [http://edwardjoseph.blogspot.com/2008/03/different-type-of-easter.html] gives a more detailed history as a believer/non-believer).

In “How Jesus Became God”, Ehrman traces the early history of Christianity with the benefit of the work of many scholars. No one book does better at addressing the transition between an itinerant preacher seeking a more just society in preparation for the imminent return of the “Son of God” (not him in his view) and later beliefs in his divinity.

The world was nearing its end. He was critical of all types of injustice, both by the Roman authorities and Jewish leaders. That he was identified as a rabble-rouser needing to be crucified is consistent with the practice of government.

Ehrman’s approach to working through the early history of Christianity is similar to many others. The one person who first interested me in the approach of understanding Jesus and early Christianity in the context of the existing society was Dominic Crossan. It became clear that Jesus did not see himself as God in any fashion. He was a product of the times when there were many advocating for repentance before the end of the world, e.g., John the Baptist, the Essene Community.

Jesus’ words raised the hopes of a few followers who hoped that he would share his power with them when the end came. His message was at the same time disturbing to the power structure of the time and that structure did him in.

Since the earliest documents of the New Testament, viz., the early letters of Paul, were written 20-25 years after the death of Jesus, it is at least understandable that a lot of stories were passed around the communities of people who endorsed Jesus, then as the person who was to return in the near future to establish the Kingdom of God, as promised in Jewish Scriptures. Initially, all the followers of Jesus were Jews. The believers came to share the “Good News” with pagans, initiating a debate whether these people had to first become Jews before being initiated in the community of Jesus. The Gospels were written 30-60 years after Jesus’ death. One can imagine how stories were told, retold and embellished or modified to accommodate a later belief.

Ehrman details the slow development of how the community of followers transitioned from a group of followers who were blown away by the tragedy of the crucifixion to an understanding that Jesus was God. 

If we understand the Jews were a distinct minority in the world, prior to and during Jesus’ life, who were believers in monotheism, it is fairly easy to understand the difficulty of assigning divinity to someone else. Reading many sections of the Jewish Scriptures, one can see how they too had ideas of “lesser gods”, e.g., angels. It took time to transition from the Jewish preacher to his being divine of any type. One can examine Mark, Matthew and Luke (again writing 30+ years after the crucifixion) and note how Jesus “became” God because he was exalted by God to be at “his right hand”. Just as Jesus never understood himself as God, the early Christians tried all sorts of ways to attribute a divine status to Jesus without altering their belief in One God. Ehrman labels this early type of Christology as “exaltation”, as opposed to John’s “incarnation” perspective, written a good 60 years after the crucifixion. Jesus was raised to become “Son of God, i.e., exalted, as opposed to John’s interpretation that the One God became man, i.e., incarnation of the pre-existing God into human form (with no real understanding of the problems of reconciling such an interpretation with the Jewish belief in One God).

And then, we have all sorts of differences identified during the next 200 years until there was a general agreement at the Nicene Council of how to interpret God. It is clear that Constantine need for aligning himself with Christianity was based primarily on strengthening his governmental rule. And with Christianity being established as the norm for the Empire, Christianity became a powerful force in its own right.

The ultimate conclusion of these various scholars is that it is impossible to base any divinity claims for Jesus on historical data. For those who choose to belief that Jesus is God, it is a decision that cannot be disputed with information. Belief structures are an entirely different process that seeking truth based on facts. Various theological scholars are believers, many others, such as Ehrman, are not. Regardless, it is always interesting to know more about our world, including religion.