The chair of the SBL group, "Jewish Christianity," is also the editor of a book called Jewish Christianity Reconsidered--Matt Jackson-McCabe. This week I read his chapter entitled "What's in a Name? The Problem of 'Jewish Christianity.'" In this chapter he overviews the question of what exactly scholars mean by the term, "Jewish Christianity." Here is a review of the players:
Johannes Munck (1959-60)
Although later than most of the figures below, Munck uses "Jewish Christianity" in reference to to the Jerusalem community associated with James, Peter, and John (13). McCabe pin points one difficulty with this approach when he says, "there is presently no single text that a general consensus of scholars would attribute to the early Jerusalem community" (12).
F. C. Baur (1878) and the Tübingen School
For Baur, Jewish Christianity referred to those early followers of Jesus in Jerusalem like Peter, John, and James who did not recognize the universal scope of Jesus' message but limited it to the Jews. So they followed "simply a new and stronger form of the old Messianic expectations" (16, McCabe quoting Baur). So for Baur, Paul was the real beginning of Christianity, and following Hegel's dialectic, the synthesis of Jewish Christianity with Pauline Christianity was "catholic Christianity."
Adolf von Harnack (1896)
For Harnack, Jewish Christianity was not really Christianity at all but those Jews who never recognized the universal scope of Christianity but retained a "national" focus on Israel (18). Unlike Baur, Harnack believed that Peter eventually came to agree with Paul and at that point "ceased to be a Jewish Christian" (19, McCabe quoting Harnack). Harnack did not believe that there are any surviving texts from the category of "Jewish Christian." I'm not sure what he would do with the Gospel of the Ebionites.
Albrecht Ritschl (1857)
In contrast to Baur and Harnack, Ritschl's approach was much more nuanced and, in my opinion, was more helpful. Take the following terms:
Jüdische Christenthum--"Jewish Christianity"--any text or group at the intersection of Christian faith and Jewish practice--a very general term that covers most of early Christianity, including Paul
Judenchristenthum--"Judaeo-Christianity"--Christians who believed that the Mosaic law was the essence of Christianity, thus a law observant form of early Christianity more "conservative" than Paul
judaistisch--"Judaic"--anything influenced in a general way by Judaism in the Second Temple Period--like apocalyptic material in the gospels
alttestamentlich--"Old Testament-ish"--things influenced not by Second Temple Judaism but by the Old Testament in the Protestant sense, thus in distinction from judaistisch.
In my opinion, Ritschl's description of what he called Judenchristenthum stands closest to what most contemporary scholars mean when they refer to Jewish Christianity. "Jewish Christianity" thus refers to Christian Jews who observed the Jewish Law more carefully than Paul, as typified by Peter, James, and Jerusalem Christianity (I regret that I'm at home and don't have Dunn's Unity and Diversity in the New Testament handy to give you his definition with the usual caveats).
As McCabe puts it, "the use of the term 'Jewish Christianity' to denote groups or texts that combine veneration of Jesus with practice of Jewish law remains very common" (22).
Hans Joachim Schoeps (1949)
Schoeps used Christology as a dividing line between "Great Church" Jewish Christians and "extremist" Pharisaic Jewish Christians who would become the Ebionites of the second century, for whom Jesus was only a prophet and messiah (23-24).
For me Christology is the primary issue when considering the "parting of the ways" between Judaism and Christianity as distinct religions. Larry Hurtado, for example, sees the worship of Jesus in a manner that is heterodox for Judaism very early. As such, he would seem to date the parting of the ways very early also. I generally think that it is probably not until the Gospel of John that we are beginning to see a form of Christianity that is coming very close to crossing this line. In any case, I am arguing that Hebrews doesn't cross that line yet.
Jean Daniélou (1964)
From the standpoint of Christian faith, Daniélou's use of the term "Jewish Christianity" is just fine. For him it is "a category of Christian groups and texts marked simply by a recognizably Jewish discourse" (24, McCabe's description). In other words, it is basically "phase one" of Christianity that ends mid-second century. The Hellenistic is the second phase and the Latin phase is of course the lead up to Nicaea.
Daniélou's use of the term is very loose. It does not, for example, help us to distinguish between "Judaizers," James and Peter, Paul, and antinomians in the early church.
Gabrielle Boccaccini (1991), Anthony Saldarini (1994), Daniel Boyarin (1999)
A number of recent scholars, including myself (forthcoming book on Hebrews), have returned to an old phrase in the light of recent discussions of the "parting of the ways" between Judaism and Christianity: "Christian Judaism."
This phrase had been used a century ago by people like Harnack and Fenton J. A. Hort (1894) in reference to the Judaizing "Christians" with whom Paul sparred--in other words, individuals who were not "truly" Christians. I do not, however, use the phrase in this way. Nor do I use it in the manner of Boccaccini and Boyarin. For Boccaccini, Christianity has never stopped being a form of Judaism.
For Boyarin, "Christian Judaism" refers to Christianity up until the fourth century (i.e., Nicaea). I'm not sure I could go with Boyarin here, as the rhetoric of Ignatius and Justin Martyr in the second century seems so anti-Jewish that I can scarcely use the phrase of them. But I hear what Boyarin is saying, and I will likely be reviewing some material from his book, Border Lines (2004), later this month.
McCabe of course does not define "Jewish Christianity" by the end of the chapter, for that is what the book is all about. Next Friday I plan to mention the most interesting points of the rest of the book.
But I will give you my position on this issue in relation to Hebrews:
- I refer to the form of Christianity of all the NT books, with the possible exception of John and Revelation, as "Christian Judaism."
- There are two primary factors in this distinction for me. The first is of course Jewish ethnicity. The leaders of this "Jesus movement" were Jews. I have somewhat awkwardly referred to Gentile converts to this movement as Gentile "Jews." In any case, I find it less problematic to call them "Gentile Christians" since such a description is less likely to import the false assumptions that the phrase "Jewish Christians" usually does--namely, that they belonged to a new religion.
By this definition, like Daniélou, I don't make distinctions between Judaizers, James, Paul, and others in the early church (although I do distinguish Jew from Gentile). It's not that I don't feel free to make such distinctions. I simply do not use the phrase "Jewish Christianity" or "Christian Judaism" to do so. - The more important criterion is the matter of Christology. To me, monotheism is the ultimate dividing line between Jewish faith and "other." I don't think any of the NT books, with the possible exception of John and Revelation, violate orthodox Jewish monotheism. In my opinion, however, Nicaea does. The reason why I "hear" Boyarin is the fact that, in some respects, Arius does not yet seem to "violate" Jewish monotheism. But to call him a "Christian Jew" seems ridiculous to me.
McCabe's chapter provides an excellent conceptual framework for sifting through 150 years of scholarly literature. The summary I've given above would not have been possible apart from his very helpful sorting.
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