Jesus of Nazareth: What He Wanted, Who He Was

12. Joachim Jeremias collected the precise findings; cf. his New Testament Theology, Part 1: The Proclamation of Jesus, trans. John Bowden (London: SCM, 1974), 257–76, at 260. In his search, however, Jeremias looked for instances that are certainly authentic and his method was much too mechanical. He separated out a number of logia in which the parallel tradition has “I” instead of “Son of Man.” These should instead be discussed case by case. Cf. the lists in Martin Hengel and Anna Maria Schwemer, Jesus und das Judentum (Tübingen: Mohr, 2007), 534–41.

13. This does not exclude the possibility that within the transmission of the Jesus tradition the Son of Man title could be replaced by an “I” or the reverse, that “Son of Man” could be introduced in place of an “I.” Cf., e.g., Matt 16:13, differently Mark 8:27.

14. Cf. 1 En. 45:3-6; 46:1-6; 48:2-7; 49:2-4; 61:5-62:16; 71:13-17; 4 Ezra 13.

15. Cf. Rudolf Bultmann, Theology of the New Testament (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2007), 9; also, e.g., Günther Bornkamm, Jesus of Nazareth (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1995), 176; Ferdinand Hahn, The Titles of Jesus in Christology: Their History in Earliest Christianity (Cambridge: James Clarke, 2002), 23.

16. Cf. Matt 5:25-26; Mark 9:43-48; Luke 12:54-57; 13:1-5, 25-27; 16:1-8; 17:26-30.

17. For this whole literary genre, see Martin Hengel, Was Jesus a Revolutionist? (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1971), 4–9.

18. A literal translation of Matt 10:34 would be: “I have not come to cast peace, but the sword.”

19. At least the first and second antitheses (Matt 5:21-22, 27-28) are regarded by many scholars as authentic. There is no genuine parallel among the rabbis for Jesus’ “but I say to you.”

20. Mark 2:1-12; Luke 7:36-50. This corresponds to Jesus’ table fellowship with toll collectors and sinners. In Mark 2:5, the most important text, Jesus does say to the lame man “your sins are forgiven,” that is, “they are forgiven you by God,” but it is Jesus himself who asserts it and thus acts authoritatively.

21. Cf. Matt 24:43-44; Luke 12:40; 1 Thess 5:2, 4; 2 Pet 3:10; Rev 3:3; 16:15.

22. For the following interpretation, see Tim Schramm and Kathrin Löwenstein, Unmoralische Helden. Anstössige Gleichnisse Jesu (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1986), 50–53. Previously C. H. Dodd, The Parables of the Kingdom (New York: Scribner, 1961), 126, had exegeted the text in the same sense.

23. Interpreters disagree about who it is that is entering the strong man’s house. Is it God, or Jesus? Cf. Michael Theobald, “’Ich sah den Satan aus dem Himmel stürzen…’” BZ 49 (2005): 174–90, at 189–90. But the two are really inseparable. Obviously Jesus himself conquers and binds Satan, but he does it “in the power of God” (cf. Luke 11:20).

Chapter 20

1. The problem at Chalcedon was the relationship of the two “natures” in Christ, that is, the relationship of divinity and humanity. That Jesus Christ is true human and true God is already stated in the New Testament, especially in the Christology of the Gospel of John.

2. English: The Religion of the Earliest Churches: Creating a Symbolic World, trans. John Bowden (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2000), 41–60.

3. For the signs required to confirm the ascension, cf. Gerhard Lohfink, Die Himmelfahrt Jesu. Untersuchungen zu den Himmelfahrts– und Erhöhungstexten bei Lukas, SANT 26 (Munich: Kösel, 1971), 45–50.

4. Cf. Carsten Colpe, “Jesus und die Besiegelung der Prophetie,” BTZ 4 (1987): 2–18; idem, Das Siegel der Propheten: historische Beziehungen zwischen Judentum, Judenchristentum, Heidentum und frühen Islam, ANTZ 3, 2nd ed. (Berlin: Institut Kirche und Judentum, 2007), 12–16; 200–203.

5. Cf., e.g., Isa 25:6-8 or Ezek 43:1-7. Exod 29:45 could also be mentioned here, if the text is read eschatologically on the canonical level.

6. For these instances, see Adolf Deissmann, Light from the Ancient East: The New Testament Illustrated by Recently Discovered Texts of the Graeco-Roman World (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1965 [orig. pub. 1909]), 343-45.

7. See Marius Reiser, “Hat Paulus Heiden bekehrt?,” BZ 39 (1995): 76-91.