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The Memory of Jesus' Death and the Worship of the Risen Lord*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 June 2011

Helmut Koester
Helmut Koester
Affiliation:
Harvard University
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Extract

On the Ides of March of the year 44 BCE, the dictator of Rome, Julius Caesar, was assassinated. Nobody knew whether this would reconstitute the Roman Republic of old or would only usher in a new period of civil war like the one that had devastated not only Rome and Italy but also the provinces for many decades before Caesar's ascendancy to sole power.

Type
Research Article
Information
Harvard Theological Review , Volume 91 , Issue 4 , October 1998 , pp. 335 - 350
Copyright
Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1998

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References

1 My translation from Färber, Hans, ed., “Carmina, Oden und Epoden,” in Horaz Sämtliche Werke (Darmstadt:Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1982) 252–57 abbreviated.Google Scholar

2 On the question of the revival of this prophecy in the first century BCE, see especially the book of Norden, Eduard, Die Geburt des Kindes: Geschichte einer religiösen Idee (1924; reprinted Darmstadt:Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1958).Google Scholar

3 Isa 9:2–3, 6–7 (NRSV). On the reliance of Isaiah 7, 9, and 11 upon ancient Egyptian traditions, see Norden, , Geburt des Kindes, 51–52; Hans Wildberger, Jesaja (BKANT 10; vol. 1; Neukirchen: Neukirchener Verlag, 1972) 363–89Google Scholar; Roberts, J. J. M., “Whose Child Is This? Reflections on the Speaking Voice in Isaiah 9:5,” HTR 90 (1997) 115–29.Google Scholar

4 Dieter Georgi (“Who is the True Prophet?” in MacRae, George, Nickelsberg, George, and Sundberg, Albert, eds., Christians among Jews and Gentiles: Essays in Honor of Krister Stendahl [Philadelphia: Fortress, 1986] 100–126) has convincingly demonstrated the appearance of eschatological prophecy in the works of Virgil and Horace.Google Scholar

5 For the relationship of the appearance of the comet (the Sidus lulium) to the composition of the Fourth Eclogue, see Kienast, Dietmar, Augustus: Princeps and Monarch (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1982) 188. Norden (Geburt des Kindes, 152–54) points out that in the year 40 BCE the New Moon fell on December 25, the assumed day of the winter solstice, and that there is evidence that such an occurance was then considered to be very significant. This may explain why Virgil issued this poem in that particular year.Google Scholar

6 My translation from Johannes, and Götte, Maria, eds., Virgil: Landleben (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1995) 44–46.Google Scholar

7 Nagy, Gregory, Pindar's Homer: The Lyric Possession of an Epic Past (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990) 52–81.Google Scholar

8 Ibid, 61.

9 Ibid

10 See Zanker, Paul, The Power of Images in the Age of Augustus (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1988) 35 fig. 27a.Google Scholar

11 Ibid, 35 fig. 27c, 54 fig. 41.

12 Aeneid 6.788–804.

13 Ibid, 8.675–713.

14 The original is lost but can be reconstructed from a wall paiting on a house facade in Pompeii; see Zanker, Power of Images, 201–2. Zanker (p. 202) points out that “the young Trojan hero, barely out of Troy, is depicted as a future Roman, wearing not only Roman armor, but, as ancestor of the Julian clan, even patrician footwear.”

15 The Secular Games were introduced during the First Punic War in the year 249 BCE and repeated in 149 BCE, but not held in 49 BCE during the civil war. They were originally dedicated to the chthonic deities. Augustus, however, recalculated the chronology according to a onehundred-and-ten-year cycle and rededicated the games to the goddesses of Fate (Parcae), the birth goddess Ilithyia, Mother Earth, Jupiter, Phoebus (Apollo) and Diana. See Färber, “Carmina, Oden und Epoden,” 286–87.

16 Compare Kienast, Augustus, 99.

17 Excerpts from the translation by Passage, Charles E., The Complete Works of Horace (New York: Ungar, 1983).Google Scholar

18 The most famous of these “gospel” inscriptions comes from Priene and is dated to the year 9 BCE: Because providence that has ordered our life in a divine way … and since the Caesar through his appearance (πιϕανείς) has exceeded the hopes of all former good messages (εὐαγγέλια), surpassing not only the benefactors who came before him, but also leaving no hope that anyone in the future would surpass him, and since for the world the birthday of the god was the beginning of his good messages (῏Ηρξεν δ τῷ κόσμῳ τν δἰ αὐτν [sc. τν Σεβαστν] εὐαγγελίων ἠ γενέθλιος ἠμέρα το θεο] [may it therefore be decided that … ].

For the entire Greek text of the inscription see Dittenberger, Wilhelm, Orientis Graeci inscriptiones selectae (2 vols.; Hildesheim: Olms, 1960)Google Scholar no. 458 (2. 48–60). The text quoted above is found in lines 40–42. The Greek text of the portion of the inscription quoted above is conveniently reprinted with a brief commentary in Pfohl, Gerhard, ed., Griechische Inschriften als Zeugnisse des privaten und öffentlichen Lebens (Tusculum-Bücherei; Munich: Heimeran, 1966) 134–35.Google Scholar

19 The question of the day of Jesus’ crucifixion—on the day before Passover (according to the Gospel of John) or on the first day of Passover (according to the synoptic gospels)—cannot be discussed here. I am convinced that the Johannine chronology preserves the original date; compare John 18:28.

20 John 19:19; compare Mark 15:26 and parallels.

21 See Lohse, Eduard, Colossians and Philemon: A Commentary on the Epistles to the Colossians and Philemon (Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1971) 198–99.Google Scholar

22 See Koester, Helmut, Introduction to the New Testament, vol. 2: History and Literature of Early Christianity (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1982) 102–4; for the date of Galatians and Paul's chronology, see also Hans Dieter Betz, Galatians: A Commentary on Paul's Letter to the Churches in Galatia (Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1979) 9–12.Google Scholar

23 In the investigation of traditional materials in Paul's letters, scholars have emphasized the search for the earliest kerygma. See especially the headings of the subdivisions in Bultmann, Rudolf, Theology of the New Testament (New York: Scribner's, 1951): “The Kerygma of the Earliest Church” (33–62), “The Kerygma of the Hellenistic Church aside from Paul” (63–189). This almost exclusive focus on the proclaimed word, deeply rooted in the emphasis upon word and faith in the dialectic theology of the time after World War I, is, however, a poor hermeneutical instrument. The scholars of the history-of-religions school from the time before World War I knew better when they emphasized cult and ritual as constitutive parts of the formation of religious community. To such ritual belong the narrative of remembrance and the recourse to the language of tradition and scripture.Google Scholar

24 In that case one would expect the preposition παρά rather than πό.

25 For the understanding of the eucharist in 1 Corinthians, I am especially indebted to the groundbreaking essay of Bornkamm, Günther, “Lord's Supper and Church in Paul,” in idem, Early Christian Experience (ed. and trans. Hammer, Paul L.; New York: Harper & Row, 1969) 123–59Google Scholar; for the question of the understanding of π το κυρίου see Ibid, 130–32.

26 Mark 14:22–25 and parallels; 1 Cor 11:23–26. Nothing in these traditions indicates that Jesus’ last meal was a Passover meal.

27 See the stories about the feeding of the multitudes, Mark 6:30–44 and parallels; Mark 8:1–10; John 6:1–14.

28 The closest parallel can be found in the common meals of the Essene community. In addition, the Jewish meal prayers used by the author of the Teaching of the Twelve Apostles (Did. 9–10) indicate that eschatological expectations could be expressed in regular Jewish meal prayers.

29 The best detailed analysis of the eucharistic prayers of the Didache has been presented by Niederwimmer, Kurt, Die Didache (KEK Ergänzungsreihe 1; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1989) 173–209.Google Scholar

30 This is clearly stated in 1 Cor 11:23. For a discussion of the significance of the terminology of transmission, see Wegenast, Klaus, Das Verständnis der Tradition bei Paulus und in den Deuteropaulinen (WMANT 8; Neukirchen: Neukirchener Verlag, 1962) 52–70, 111–13.Google Scholar

31 The close connection of the Didache's eucharistic prayers with Jewish meal prayers points to a Jewish Christian community in Jerusalem or Galilee.

32 Did. 10.6. That Paul also knew this liturgical call (compare 1 Cor 16:22) confirms that the formulation of these eucharistic liturgies took place in a bilingual community in which Greek and Aramaic were spoken.

33 Did. 9.4.

34 Did. 9.2.

35 Bultmann, (The History of the Synoptic Tradition [trans. John Marsh; Oxford: Blackwell, 1968] 152 n. 1, 371) refers to the Kerygma as it is present in the predictions of Jesus’ suffering and resurrection in Mark 8:31; 9:31; 10:33–34 and in the speeches of the book of Acts. It is not possible, however, to assume that these formulas existed while a narrative of the passion was not yet in existence.Google Scholar

36 References to scripture in the letters of Paul usually point to larger contexts even if only one or two verses are actually quoted. This is especially evident in 1 Cor 10:1–11; 2 Cor 3; and Gal 4:21–31.

37 See also Gal 1:3–4: “from … our lord Jesus Christ who gave himself on behalf of our sins” (π … κυρίου ἠμν ᾽ Ιησο Χριατο το δόντος αυτν ὐπρ τν μαρτιν μν), and the discussion and the literature cited in Betz, Galatians, 37–43.

38 Psalm 22 (21 LXX) has been used in particular. Other psalms of lament, such as Psalm 69 (68 LXX), have also been used.

39 Nickelsburg, George W. E., “The Genre and Function of the Markan Passion Narrative,” HTR 73 (1980) 153–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

40 For the political meaning of the term κκλησία see Karl Ludwig Schmidt, “κκλησία” TDNT 3 (1965) 513–17. See also, Georgi, Dieter, Theocracy in Paul's Praxis and Theology (trans. David Green; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991).Google Scholar

41 Compare Gal 6:16; see also the reference to “Israel according to the flesh” (1 Cor 10:18), implying that the Christian community is the true Israel according to the Spirit.

42 On the attempt to derive the term εὐαγγέλιον from Deutero-Isaiah, see Gerhard Friedrich, “εὐαγγελἱζομαι” TDNT 2 (1964) 709–10. See also, Koester, Helmut, Ancient Christian Gospels (Philadelphia: Trinity, 1990) 2–3.Google Scholar

43 See the new charter for this community, apparently a baptismal formula, that demolishes the ethnic, social, and gender differentiations: “There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ” (Gal 3:28).