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Paul and Jesus: The Problem of Continuity1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 February 2009

A. J. M. Wedderburn
A. J. M. Wedderburn
Affiliation:
St. Mary's College, St. Andrews, Fife
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Extract

The question of the relationship between Paul and Jesus has exercised scholars for the past century and a half, although J. Blank has argued that it is only since the beginning of this century that we can really speak of the scholarly treatment of the questions of ‘Paul and Jesus’ or ‘Jesus and Paul’.

Type
Research Article
Information
Scottish Journal of Theology , Volume 38 , Issue 2 , May 1985 , pp. 189 - 203
Copyright
Copyright © Scottish Journal of Theology Ltd 1985

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References

2 Paulus und Jesus: eine theologische Grundlegung (StANT 18, München, 1968), p. 66Google Scholar; cf. Bornkamm, G., Paulus (UB 119, Stuttgart, etc., 1969), p. 234Google Scholar; Furnish, V. P., however, traces the modern debate back to Baur, F. C. — ‘The Jesus-Paul Debate: from Baur to Bultmann’, BJRL 47 (1964/1965), pp. 342–381, esp. p. 342.Google Scholar

3 A fuller list can be found in Allison, D. C., ‘The Pauline Epistles and the Synoptic Gospels: the Pattern of the Parallels’, NTS 28 (1982), pp. 1–32CrossRefGoogle Scholar, here p. i;cf. too Kuss, O., Paulus: die Rolle des Aposlels in der theologischen Entwicklung der Urkirche (Auslegung und Verkündigung, III, Regensburg, 1971), pp. 440f.Google Scholar, for a different threefold division of the questions.

4 cf. his ‘The Significance of the Historical Jesus for the Theology of Paul’, Faith and Understanding (London, 1969), pp. 220–246, here esp. p. 241Google Scholar; Theology of the New Testament, I (London, 1952), pp. 238f.Google Scholar; and most recently his comm. ad loc. (KEK, Göttingen, 197610, ed. E. Dinkier).

5 Das Kreuz Jesu bei Paulus: ein Versuch, über den Geschichtsbezug des christlichen Glaubens nachzudenken (FRLANT 125, Göttingen, 1981), p. 232Google Scholar; cf. also Moule, C. F. D., ‘Jesus in New Testament Kerygma’ in (eds) Böcher, O., Haacker, K., Verborum Veritas (FS G. Stählin, Wuppertal, 1970), pp. 15–26, esp. pp. 17f.Google Scholar

6 I Cor. 7.10; 9.14; 11.23.

7 His knowledge of it is argued for by Stuhlmacher, P., ‘Jesus-tradition im Römerbrief? – Kine Skizze’, ThBeitr 14 (1983), pp. 241–250Google Scholar; which part he knew is the question handled by Allison, loc. cit. (n 2).

8 Thus Hübner, H., Das Gesetz in der synoptischen Tradition: Studien zur These einer progressive Qumranisierung und Judaisierung innerhalb der synoptischen Tradition (Witten, 1973Google Scholar) sees in Matt. 5.18; 23.2f. ‘judaistische’ traditions used by the evangelist and hopes that the use of the former as the key to interpreting Matt, is a thing of the past (p. 206); cf. Luz, U., ‘Die Erfüllung des Gesetzes bei Matthäus (Mt 5, 17–20)’, ZThk 75 (1978), pp. 398–435. here pp. 399, 405–8, 417Google Scholar.

9 cf. Luz, ibid., pp. 434f.

10 To that extent to speak of a progressive ‘Judaizing’ or even ‘Rcthoraisierung’ (Hübner, ibid., p. 238) of the Synoptic tradition would be an oversimplification: a ‘Judaized’ version could have existed from the start and indeed may well have been the original form of the tradition within the earliest church.

11 Yet the indefatigable Resch, A. (Der Paulinismus unddie Logia Jesu in ihrem gegenseitigen Verhältnis untersucht, TU N.F. 12, Leipzig, 1904, pp. 64–72Google Scholar) found many there too; plausible are perhaps II Cor. 10.1 (or both Matt. 11.29 and this passage reflect Hellenistic ethical teaching — cf. Barrett, C. K., A Commentary on the Second Epistle to the Corinthians, BNTC, London, 1973, p. 246Google Scholar); 13.1; Gal. 1.4 (cf. 2.20; or the Synoptic tradition has been influenced by this Pauline — or more general early Christian — theologoumenon); 4.6; 5.14, 21; 6.17.

12 Paulus (RV 1, Halle, 1904), p. 104, repr. in (ed.) Rengstorf, K. H., Das Paulusbild in der neueren deutschen Forschung (WdF 24, Darmstadt, 1969), p. 69Google Scholar. Kümmel, W. G., ‘Jesus und Paulus’, NTS 10 (1963/1964), pp. 163–181, here pp. 164–66CrossRefGoogle Scholar, shows the dominance of this portrayal in Jewish studies.

13 Furnish, loc. cit. (n. 2), p. 359, traces this modification to W. Heitmüller, ‘Zum Problem Paulus und Jesus’, ZNW 13 (1912), pp. 320–37, here p. 330 = Rengstorf, ibid., pp. 135f. (the intervening influence of ‘Hellenistic Christianity’), yet aleady this insight seems clear in Harnack, A. v., History of Dogma, I (London/Edinburgh, 1897), p. 89Google Scholar, and What Is Christianity? (London/New York, 1904 3), p. 177.Google Scholar

14 Faith and Understanding (n. 4), p. 232.

15 Paulus und Jesus: eine Untersuchung zur Präzisierung der Frage nach dem Ursprung der Christotogie (HUTh 2, Tubingen, 1967 3).Google Scholar

16 Wrede, op cit. (n. 12), pp. 72ff. (repr. 67ff.); Schweitzer, A., The Mysticism of Paul the Apostle (London, 1931), pp. 220–226Google Scholar; cf. also more recently Strecker, G., ‘Befreiung und Rechtfertigung. Zur Stellung der Rechtfertigungslehre in der Theologie des Paulus’ in (eds) Friedrich, J., Pöhlmann, W., Stuhlmacher, P., Rechtfertigung (FS E. Käsemann, Tübingen/Göttingen, 1976), pp. 479–508Google Scholar, repr. Eschalon und Historic: Aufsätze (Göttingen, 1979), pp. 229–259.Google Scholar

17 op. cit. (n. 2), p. 227.

18 cf. Robinson's, J. M. review article ‘The New Hermeneutic at Work’, Interp. 18 (1964). PP. 346–359. here P. 348.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

19 op. cit. (n. 15), pp. 45, 48; cf. R. Bultmann, ‘ΔIKAIOΣYNH ΘEOY’, JBL 83 (1964), pp. 12–16, here p. 12, also his Theology, I (n. 4), pp. 284f. (yet he does not provide a uniform interpretation of the phrase — see p. 288 on Rom. 3.3–6; in the article he expressly rejects the idea that the same meaning is found throughout — this sense is simply the dominant one); Strecker, loc. cil. (n. 16), p. 258.

20 cf., e.g., Käsemann, E., ‘“The Righteousness of God” in Paul’, New Testament Questions of Today (London, 1969), pp. 168–182, esp. p. 168n.Google Scholar; Robinson, loc. cit. (n. 18), p. 349; see also Brauch's, M. T. app., ‘Perspectives on “God's Righteousness” in Recent German Discussion’ in Sanders, E. P., Paul and Palestinian Judaism: a Comparison of Patterns of Religion (London, 1977), pp. 523–542.Google Scholar

21 ibid., p. 173; cf. his An die Römer (HNT 8a, Tübingen, 1974 2), p. 269.Google Scholar

22 Just as the opposite, ‘condemn’, in a passage like Rom. 8.3 has not only a ‘declaratory’ sense of passing sentence, but also a ‘performative’ sense, of executing that sentence; it is the latter which the Law could not do; cf. C. E. B. Cranfield, The Epistle to the Romans I (ICC, Edinburgh, 1975), pp. 382f. citing F. Büchsel, , p. 951.

23 But cf. Wilckens, U., Der Brief an die Römer I (EKK 6/1, Köln/Neukirchen, 1978), pp. 279f.Google Scholar

24 cf. perrin, N., The kingdom of god in the teaching of jesus (london, 1963), p. 24Google Scholar, on Dalman's work; Jeremias, J., New Testament theology I: the proclamation of jesus (London 1971), p. 98Google Scholar. I call it a ‘healthy corrective’ also because a text like Lk. 17.20f. seems to warn us against a similar objectifying of God' kingdom.

25 Or, in the words of Meyer, B. F., The Aims of Jesus (London, 1979), p. 131Google Scholar, an ‘“order of things” to which men could be admitted and from which they might be excluded’, citing Dalman, G., The Words of Jesus Considered in the Light of Post-Biblical Jewish Writings and the Aramaic Language (Edinburgh, 1902), pp. 106–121.Google Scholar

26 Jesus and the Language of the Kingdom (London/Philadelphia, 1976), pp. 33, 197Google Scholar; he uses ‘symbol’ as distinct from ‘sign’, using the terminology of Ricoeur, P., The Symbolism of Evil (Boston, 1969)Google Scholar, in which the former has ‘a set of meanings that can neither be exhausted nor adequately expressed by any one referent’; Wheelwright, P., Metaphor and Reality (Bloomington, 1962)Google Scholar, similarly distinguishes ‘steno-symbols’ from ‘tensive symbols’ (esp. pp. 94–8).

27 Perrin, ibid., pp. 31, 33.

28 Breech, J., The Silence of jesus: the Authentic Voice of the Historical Man (Philadelphia, 1983), P. 45.Google Scholar

29 See jeremias, Theology (n. 24), p. 102 (Dalman, op. cit. (n. 25), p. 101, notes that in the Targumim ‘kingdom of God’ was used ‘to avoid the thought that God in person should appear on earth’). Note the parallelism of, e.g., 1QM 12.7f.: ‘you … in the glory of your kingdom … the King of glory …’.

30 cf. Jüngel, op. cit. (n.15), pp. 196f. ($6); Meyer, op. cit. (n. 25), p. 162; Riches, J., Jesus and the Transformation of Judaism (London, 1980), pp. 99, 106, 170Google Scholar. Breech, ibid., p. 53, puts it rather the other way round: the Lord's Prayer is addressed to the power to which Jesus elsewhere refers as God's kingdom (cf. p. 62).

31 cf. Jüngel's critique of the categories in which the problem of the kingdom of God as present or future is usually discussed — e.g. ibid., pp. 154, 173, 181, 288f; in this he is followed by Weder, H., Die Gleichnisse Jesu als Metaphern: traditions - und redaktionsgeschichtliche Analysen und Interpretationen (FRLANT 120, Göttingen, 1978), e.g. p. 282.Google Scholar

32 On ‘God's kingdom’ as power cf. Jüngel, ibid., pp. 169, 187f, 196.

33 Riches, op. cit. (n. 30), pp. 153f., argues that what God gives to those who will receive it is ‘his own gracious and merciful presence’ with them; on God's kingdom as a gift cf. also Meyer, op. cit. (n. 25), p. 132.

34 Questions (n. 20), p. 174; Paulinische Perspektiven (Tübingen, 1969), p. 145.Google Scholar

35 Herold, G., Zorn und Gerechtigkeit Gottes bei Paulus: eine Untersuchung zu Röm. 1.16–18 (EHS.T 14, Bern/Frankfurt, 1973), pp. 172fGoogle Scholar, stresses the close relationship of and : the one can replace the other (cf. II Cor. 3.8f.; Gal. 3.5f.) and both refer both to God's nature and to God's gift which claims those to whom it is given; he compares Stuhlmacher, P., Gerechtigkeit Gottes bei Paulus (FRLANT 87, Göttingen, 1966 2), p. 222Google Scholar — ‘The Spirit is the renewing power of God's righteousness’ — and Heidland, H. W. in TDNTIV, p. 292 (294 in Ger.).Google Scholar

36 To this extent the ‘transformation of language' to which Riches refers (op. cit. — n. 30) and the techniques which Paul employs to achieve it are more obvious than in Jesus’ teaching: e.g. qualifying genit. and adj. (Rom. 10.3), genitives (Rom. 3.27; 8.2), adjectives and prepositional phrases (Phil. 3.9).

37 Thus, in my opinion, at least in Mk 10.2–12 (see Braun, further H., Spätjüdisch-häretischer und frühchristlicher Radikalismus: Jesus von Nazareth und die essenische Qumransekte, BHTh 24, Tübingen, 1957, II, p. 6 and n. 1, 15)Google Scholar; Rom. 10.5ff.; Gal. 3.11f. While the first may not entail more than a downgrading of parts of the Law, as ‘concessions’ (cf. Harvey, A. E., Jesus and the Constraints of History, London, 1982, p. 48Google Scholar, appealing to Daube, D., ‘Concessions to Sinfulness in Jewish Law’, JJS 10, 1959, pp. 1–13CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Berger, K., Die Gesetzesauslegung Jesu: ihr historischer Hintergrund im Judentum und im Allen Testament I: Markus und Paraltelen, WMANT 40, Neukirchen, 1972Google Scholar, who traces parallels to the view of commandments being enacted because of ‘hardness of heart’ — pp. 16ff. — and apocalyptic and Hellenistic Jewish concepts of ‘law’ which largely limited its content to belief in one God and various social commandments and virtues — esp. pp. 38ff), but may nevertheless, within the context of Jesus' ministry, imply a more radical critique, Paul's use seems to go further: parts of the Law encourage a wrong, even fatal (Rom. 7.10), misuse of it.

38 II Sam. 8.15 = 1 Chron. 18.14; I Kgs 10.9 = II Chron. 9.8; Ps. 72.1–3; Prov. 16.12; 25.5; Qoh. 5.8f; Is. 9.7; 32.1ff. Jer. 22.2f, 15; 33.15; Ezek. 45.9, etc.

39 Ps. 9.7f.; 96.13; 97.2; 98.9; 99.4, etc.

40 cf. Keck, L. E., A Future for the Historical Jesus: the Place of Jesus in Preaching and Theology (London, 1972), p. 223Google Scholar: ‘from jesus’ style, no less than from his words, one infers the conception of God's kingdom of which it is the reflex'.

41 op. cit. (n. 30), p. 146; cf. Meyer, op. cit. (n. 25), p. 160.

42 cf. Schrenk, G. in TDNT II, p. 195.Google Scholar

43 cf. Käsemann, Comm. (n. 21), p. 126: ‘a divine power that grasps us’, but surely the Spirit does not just assure us of that love, but, as he also sees, ‘grasps us in the centre of our personality and makes us entirely …its own’, as a loving power and a power that is love.

44 e.g., Rom. 3.24; 5.20; I Cor. 15.10.

43 Rom. 1.5; 5.17; 12.3, 6; 15.5; I Cor. 1.4; 3.10, etc.

46 e.g., Rom. 5.2 (contrast Gal. 5.4).

47 On Jesus as God's representative and agent cf. Harvey, op. cit. (n. 37), ch. 7.

48 Rom. 14.17; I Cor. 4.20; 6.gf.; 15.50; Gal. 5.21; cf. I Thess. 2.12; II Thess. 1.5.

49 The approach adopted by Bruce, F. F., Paul and Jesus (London, 1977), p. 17Google Scholar; indeed the term was probably used in gentile mission — probably by Paul himself (cf. Gal. 5.21).

50 Pace Riches, op. cit. (n. 30), p. 40.

51 Tuckett, C. M., ‘I Corinthians and Q’, JBL 102 (1983), pp. 607–619Google Scholar, has shown that the likes of J. M. Robinson and H.-W. Kuhn were probably wrong to trace many of the Corinthians' views to their use of ‘Q’, but grants that a text like I Cor. 4.8 (or 13.2) is good evidence of their use of Jesus-traditions. On the background to 4.8 cf. my ‘The Problem of the Denial of the Resurrection in I Corinthians XV’, NT 23 (1981), pp. 229–241, here pp. 233–6.

52 e.g., Bultmann, Faith and Understanding (n. 4), pp. 233–5; Jüngel, op. cit. (n. 15), p. 272; W. G. Kümmel, loc. cit. (n. 12), pp. 180f.; cf. also Kuss, op. cit. (n. 3), pp. 446f.

53 cf. Kümmel, ibid., p. 180.

54 cf. Gal. 3.6 (also Rom. 9.31; 10.3) E. P. Sanders, op. cit. (n. 20), p. 205, reminds us that for Judaism ‘being righteous is not the goal of a religious quest’; hence this is properly regarded as Paul's verdict reached retrospectively on his life in Judaism.

55 (a) Rom. 3.1–8 (esp. 5); chs 9–11; (b) 3.8; 6.1.