Vorkosigan

I got these off Amazon as a Christmas present to myself. Here is my review:

********
Tbe Jesus Myth G.A. Wells
Deconstructng Jesus Robert M. Price

Reading Wells is like listening to a lecture from a professor emeritus, extremely learned, tightly argued but peppery, and somewhat defensive in his old age. Reading Price, on the other hand, is like going to a bar to have a drink with a good friend who has a broad range of knowledge across many cultures, great taste in beer, and a fabulous record collection. Welcome to the 21st century, as Old Mythicism gives way to the New View.

For those of you who have been following the Historical Jesus debates, The Jesus Myth will present little that is new. Wells recapitulates many of his old arguments, while responding to his critics by showing how they have misrepresented his position and his arguments, and how they themselves do not understand the issues in a critical way. Wells revisits all the non-Christian references to Jesus and concludes, once again, that they are worthless. He reviews the two references in Josephus again, and concludes, once again, that they are interpolations. Once again he reviews that lack of evidence in Paul, and the differing views of Jesus there. Two "new" sections look at the problems of Christian ethics, and the silliness of "critical scholars" who think that miracle claims can be justified. While these are interesting, they will not be fresh to people who think critically about Christianity and the supernatural, and they are only of peripheral interest to the HJ debates. I find it hard to justify their presence in this volume.

What The Jesus Myth shows is how much Wells remains an establishment writer working within accepted mainstream bounds. Far from being a radical, Wells is simply mainline scholarship taken to its ultimate limit, engaged in dialogue with his critics, and with copious references to topical writings. He accepts much that is normative in NT historical scholarship, and but for his "radical" view that Jesus is a composite figure, could easily be mistaken for another conservative apologist drone, grinding out defenses of the position that Paul's companion Luke authored Acts, or that the Tomb was really empty. Wells is the last in a long line of men like Robinson, Loisy, and Drews, scholars who trod the mainstream paths to show where the mainstream had gone wrong.

If Wells is a coelacanth, surviving long beyond his time, Price is mutant, the bastard offspring of Dutch Radicalism and 19th century historical skepticism fathered on modern views of myth and religion, cultured in a test tube medium of pop culture and current events. Whereas a few paragraphs of Wells will take us through a number of thinkers who have commented on the topic in question, a few paragraphs of Price might do that, along with tossing in references to Batman Forever, Sufiism, and literary theory, while bouncing back to the great 19th century skeptics for inspiration and insight. Deconstructing Jesus is a dense book, thick with ideas and references, but it clips along with a deftness and humor that the ponderous Wells could never hope to match.

A key difference between the two works is that while Wells is replying to his critics, Price is replying to, and building on, his intellectual allies. Price spends a considerable portion of the book interacting with the ideas of Burton Mack, then moves on to the mythological analysis of Rene Girard. Whereas Wells, in the tradition of NT scholarship, stays within the Mediterranean, the first few centuries of the Christian era, and above all, within the Jewish context, Price explodes these constraints. Drawing on a vast number examples, from Islamic writings on Jesus to modern experiences with religious movements like the Lubavitchers, Price shows that the Jesus movement was afflicted with internal conflicts that were an important impetus in the creation of the various myths and legends about its founder.

More importantly, Price forthrightly addresses the need for alternative history. Rejecting the "Big Bang" approach that assigns Christian origins to a set of events centered around the death of Jesus, Price identifies this as a ex post facto origin myth. Instead, he concentrates on the development of the multiple lines of Jesus belief, and dates the emergence of the orthodox view to later struggles between the various sects that would combine to form modern cult.

By comparison, a major weakness of Wells' view is that he does not do enough to provide an alternative formula of Christian origins. He does argue that Jesus is a composite figure built up out of two different traditions, the Galilean and Pauline, but his exploration of this is cursory and unsatisfying. Price goes into great detail to establish the Cynic origins of the Q document, and draws on key modern scholarship to demonstrate the diversity of Early Christianity.

The major strength of Price's work is his demolition of the neat apologetic walls built around Jesus by scholars anxious to preserve the "uniqueness" of Christianity, walls to which Wells more or less defers even while attempting to peer over them. For there is an extensive comparative aspect to Deconstructing Jesus that is entirely absent from Wells. Wells' comparisons -- to those of Hellenistic and pagan saviors -- are those still within the accepted confines of the debate as it has stood for the last hundred and fifty years. But Price ranges far and wide. In addition to a much more extensive discussion of the material from pagan stories that compares to the Jesus Myth, Price also compares the early Christ movements to known historical examples like Islam and the modern Lubavitcher movement:

• In January 1998 David Berger, an Orthodox rabbi, charged that for the Lubavitch mainstream, "The Lubavitcher rebbe is becoming God." He pointed to Lubavitch writings calling Rabbi Schneerson the "Essence and Being of God enclothed in a body, omniscient and omnipotent." Another proclaimed of the rebbe that "his entire essence is divinity alone."(p. 236)

I might add that since the book was published, numerous articles have appeared in the media documenting Lubavitcher attributions of miracles to their rebbe. As a comparison to early Christianity, a better parallel could hardly be found.

In fact, Wells and Price show just how sterile the HJ debate has become. NT historical scholarship has begun to look like the ten sons of a peasant farmer subdividing the family land upon their father's death, and cutting it up as they pass it on to their children, where productivity can only be increased by ever more intensive farming of the same overtaxed plot of land. New movements, such as Crossan's turn toward comparative anthropology, are a vital impetus toward renewal in HJ studies. Price's refraction of early Christianity through identical moments in the history of other religions is a similarly fruitful one, and I look forward to the next step, a broad comparison between the Jesus cult and similar religious movements in other colonial situations.

In sum, I cannot recommend Wells at all. It is too advanced for an introductory work, but too simple for the experienced reader. Price I cannot recommend enough. There are many fresh perspectives and challenging ideas, as well as new information and arguments. In addition to all this, Price is an entertaining and engaging writer, whereas, I am sad to report, only the conscientious will finish The Jesus Myth.

Vorkosigan

Bede

Thanks for that Vork. I think your analysis of where Price and Wells are coming from is spot on, even if I disagree strongly with their conclusions. Perhaps Mr Kirby could put this review and your one on Eisenmann (and any others I missed) onto the Did Jesus Exist? site.

Yours

Bede

Bede's Library - faith and reason

Celsus

Excellent review on Price... haven't read Wells myself though.

Bede,

Would you care to share your arguments against Price?

Joel

Peter Kirby

I would be happy to publish the book review on "Did Jesus Exist?" with Vorkosigan's permission.

best,
Peter Kirby

Ted Hoffman

I, with Vork's backing hereby permit you to proceed with alacrity and publish it.

Bede

Essentially, Price adopts the most radical position on almost all the texts. This dispenses with any controls over his speculation and allows him to construct his own system. I think the radical position is simply wrong and bad history so consequently any conclusions that flow from it are bound to be flawed.

As the radical postion has been successfully challenged on these boards by Layman and others, I'll leave you to fill yourself in on the background to these arguments. It is hoped that Vork and I will be going head to head on Kirby's site as soon as our similarly packed diaries allow (in other words, don't hold your breathe).

Yours

Bede

Bede's Library - faith and reason

Vorkosigan

LOL. My schedule is clearing slightly after the 8 of March, when I finish my 300 page report for my client (vacation in the summer!). Hope to get started on longer article then. Ha! I have a new online class in Business Writing for my night students at Chaoyang, and the damn thing has turned out to be more work than the daytime classes! For crying out loud! I would be honored to be seen on Kirby's website, so permission granted.

You know Bede, I'd like to clear the air between us. I abused you most nastily over that article you wrote on methodology, and felt bad ever since. It was inexcusable. For what it is worth after all this time, you have my sincerest apologies.

Vorkosigan

Toto

What do you mean by "radical"? Do you mean "skeptical" or something else?

I don't recall Layman or others (successfully or otherwise) challenging any of Price's positions, other than appealling to authority. Could you be more specific?

Bede

Vork,

Thanks for your clearing the air but no apology was necessary when I have behaved pretty badly myself. I have enjoyed our more constructive relationship of late and hope we can continue along these lines.

Toto,

I can't remember if it is in Decon Jesus but Price was a big exponent of the 'we' as a literary convention theory which I believe Layman has effectively killed. I mean radical in the sense of 'Dutch radical school' or 'radical critick' which does also mean sceptical in the way you and I would understand each other. More in-depth analysis of Price will have to wait but many of the issues have been aired on these boards.

Yours

Bede

Bede's Library - faith and reason

Toto

Bede, I don't recall Robert Price discussing the "we" passages in Acts, and I don't see any entry in the index of Deconstructing Jesus. It's not the sort of argument that he would make. He does tend toward the Dutch Radicals, but I don't recall anyone discussing them on these boards recently.

But if you think that Layman has killed the issue, you are living in a dream world. Robbins appears to have dismissed the amateurs on Xtalk who criticized his theory as tone-deaf and stuck in an old paradigm, and except for Nomad and Layman, most of the rest of the list seems to have fallen over itself telling Robbins how brilliant he is.

Which is a pity, because I think that the issue of whether there was something you could call a literary convention in Hellenistic literature could have taken more discussion. But there's no point in discussing it without reading Robbins original article.