Luke 1:57-80 Explanatory Notes (Birth of John the Baptist)

The Nativity of St. John the Baptist
Tintoretto

The Birth of John the Baptist
1:57 And the time was completed for Elizabeth, for her to give birth, and she begat a son. 58. And her neighbors and relatives heard that the Lord magnified his mercy with her and they were rejoicing with her.
Love rejoices with those who rejoice (Rom. 12:15). The promise to Zechariah is fulfilled. The miracle reaches its culmination in the birth of John the Baptist. The disgrace of Elizabeth being barren in that culture is removed and is replaced with great honor and favor from God. Notice again the way that Luke tells about the role that women play in the good news, something very striking for that day. 

59. And it happened on the eighth day they came to circumcise the child, and they were calling it by the name of his father Zechariah. 60. But, answering, his mother said, "No, but he will be called John." 61. And they said to her, "[There is] no one from your kindred who is called by this name."
According to Leviticus 12:3, a Jewish male was to be circumcised on the eighth day after his birth (cf. also Gen. 17:12). In keeping with a general theme in Luke-Acts, the family of John the Baptist are law-observant Jews. Everything is done decently and in order.

The tradition would have been to call the son after the name of the father. Different cultures have different practices with regard to naming. In some cultures, the name of the grandfather is passed on to the grandson. In American culture, there are no regular naming practices. Luke indicates that it would have been conventional for Zechariah to name his first-born son after himself. At the very least, the son should have been given the name of a relative.

Those at the temple are thus puzzled that they would name him John, but they are following the instructions of the angel (1:13). As we mentioned above, the name John indicated that God is gracious. God was gracious to Elizabeth and Zechariah in giving them a son when they were unable to conceive. And God was being gracious to Israel by giving them an opportunity to repent before the judgment. The gift of repentance was the gift of salvation, and John was its first messenger. 

62. And they were signaling to his father in relation to what he would want it to be called. 63. And having asked for a tablet, he wrote saying, "John is his name." And all marveled.

The story does not indicate whether Zechariah was aware that they had already asked Elizabeth about the name of the boy. We should probably assume that the two had communicated previously about what the angel had told him. Elizabeth and Zechariah are in complete agreement. The boy will be called John. Perhaps they expected Zechariah to countermand her. Perhaps they questioned whether the woman would be correct or have such a say. Both Elizabeth and Zechariah are in full submission to God, and it would seem she is taking the spiritual lead here, with Zechariah keeping up.

It is the nature of human society to establish rituals and patterns. It would be impractical to "reinvent the wheel" every time we came to a decision. The tendency of most people toward "conserving" the way we have always done things often protects society from the potential dangers of experimentation. It would seem God has implanted in humanity just the right proportions of "conservative" to "progressive," with most slowing things down but a sizable proportion moving things forward.

We see God intervene at various times in both ways. God often reminds us of his nature from all eternity, which will never change. We must hold on to that eternal past. At other times God shakes things up. He keeps us from getting stale. He moves us forward. Things are constantly changing. We will not thrive if we cannot adjust and adapt.

John the Baptist was God's interruption of the status quo of Israel, not least because the status quo was on the wrong track. God graciously stepped into history once again and shook things up. And the name of the boy that first symbolized that was "John."

64. And his mouth was opened immediately, and his tongue, and he was speaking, blessing God. 65. And fear came on all them living nearby, and in the whole hill country of Judea all these words were being talked about.

Zechariah has been punished sufficiently. The time for repentance is over. The time for rejoicing has arrived. Zechariah is now free of his doubts. The barren is now fruitful. She who was disgraced is now blessed. 

The power of God is a frightful thing. An elephant may like us, but its power can still squash you. God of course does not step on people by accident. Power is scary when we understand how vulnerable we are next to it. It is no wonder that the angel tells both Zechariah and Mary not to fear when he appears.

Rumors spread when there are omens of this sort. If Zechariah and Elizabeth live in the country already, the rumors did not have long to travel. Judea is the southern region of Israel where Jerusalem is. This is the area that Luke centers so much of his narrative around.

66. And all those who heard were themselves putting in their heart saying, "What then will this child be?" For even the hand of the Lord was with him.

As we already mentioned, the events surrounding a child's birth and youth were seen as indicators of what would happen in a person's adult life. When the people realize the spectacular nature of John's birth, they assume that God had great plans for the child in life. They would assume that God would do great things through him as a man.

Zechariah's Song

67. And Zechariah, his father, was filled with Holy Spirit and prophesied, saying...

The action of the Holy Spirit is a key theme of the Gospel of Luke as well as the book of Acts. One of the activities of the Holy Spirit is to bring words of prophecy to the people of God. Prophecy in this case is not about the far distant future but the future of those to whom the prophet speaks. In this case, the prophecy is not only for Zechariah and those around him, but for the early church through the voice of Luke.

Note that Zechariah is filled with the Holy Spirit even before the Day of Pentecost in Acts 2. W remember that the Holy Spirit was active in Old Testament as well as New Testament times. The Spirit comes on various individuals in the Old Testament (e.g., David in 1 Samuel 16:13; the prophet in Isaiah 61:1). The difference is that being filled with the Spirit becomes the norm of all God's true people after the Day of Pentecost. In the Old Testament, the Spirit seems to fill people more selectively for specific purposes.

68. ... "Blessed [be] the Lord, the God of Israel, because he looked upon [us] and made redemption for his people. 69. And he raised a horn of salvation for us in the house of David, his son, 

Zechariah's Song is sometimes called the "Benedictus" because it begins with the word "Blessed." Remember that Mary's Magnificat was also named after the first words of her song. To bless someone is to give it honor. Obviously, God does not need our praise, and we can add nothing to him, but we can honor him. To bless God is to give God the honor that it his do. Of course when God blesses us, the benefit is much more substantial!

Zechariah honors God for being faithful to his people. God's people needed to repent so that they could be reconciled to him. God was under no obligation to take them back. Yet, predictably because of his love, he has set in motion a plan of redemption again. They are in bondage again and need to be freed. God would "redeem" and free them again.

However, this redemption would be a final redemption. It would be a final salvation or rescuing of them from the consequences of Israel's sin. The "horn of salvation" would be the Messiah, the Son of God, the promised descendent of David. The phrase comes from 1 Samuel 22:3 and Psalm 18:2. Zechariah thus echoes the promises there. The worthy Lord would save Israel from its enemies.

70. just as he spoke through the mouth of the holy ones from the age of his prophets, 71. salvation from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us, 72. to do mercy with our fathers and to remember his holy covenant, 73. the oath that he swore to Abraham our father...

The salvation whose beginnings start with John was not unanticipated in the Old Testament saints and prophets. The echo of David is an example. Those with the eyes of the Holy Spirit, as they read the Scriptures, could have anticipated that God would raise his king and save his people from their enemies. Salvation for Luke is again far more corporate than individual. It is the salvation of Israel collectively and concretely that is in view. It is rescue from the political and spiritual enemies of Israel. 

In Acts 1:6, Jesus does not tell his disciples that they are wrong to look for the restoration of the kingdom to Israel. We would be wrong to think Luke (or Paul for that matter) believed God had forever abandoned them. It is rather a question of the timing. "It is not for you to know times and seasons that the Father set by his own authority" (Acts 1:7). 

The faithfulness that God is showing to the present and future generation of Israel is God keeping faith with the earlier patriarchs and fathers of Israel, even back to Abraham. The relationship that God had with Abraham continued with Isaac and Jacob down to Moses and God's people to David and beyond. There is a continuity of God's people from age to age. God saving Israel is God keeping his promises to Abraham and David. 

God made a covenant with Abraham, a solemn commitment to bless his descendants. God keeps his promises. God made an oath that he would bless Abraham's seed. Hebrews 6:13-14 also mentions this oath, and Romans 4:13 remembers this promise. It is an act of God's mercy, since Israel does not deserve such grace.

74. "... to give to us to serve him without fear, having been rescued from the hand of enemies, 75. in holiness and righteousness before him all our days.

After rescue from their enemies, Israel could return to serving God without fear of judgment. What is the path that is without such fear? It is the path of holiness and righteousness. Righteousness for Luke is a life that actually walks right with God. 

Luke 10:27-28 make it clear what such a life of righteousness looks like. It is a life where one loves God will all his or her heart, soul, mind, and strength, as well as loving one's neighbor as one's self. When asked who one's neighbor is, Jesus tells the Parable of the Good Samaritan, indicating that one's neighbor is the person in need, even if it is someone to whom we do not want to show love.

If one belongs to God, one is holy, set apart to him. Only those who walk in righteousness are holy to God. To walk with God in righteousness as God's belongings is to walk in holiness.

Luke-Acts make it clear that walking in righteousness involves loving one's neighbor in very concrete ways. The Good Samaritan helps the man who has been mugged and needs physical help. The gospel is "good news for the poor," "freedom to prisoners," "sight for the blind," and the oppressed set free (Luke 4:18). Walking in righteousness for Luke certainly includes doing these sorts of things.

76. "And you, child, will be called, 'prophet of the Most High,' for you will go before the Lord, to prepare his ways, 77. to give knowledge of salvation to his people by forgiveness of their sins...

Mary's child will be called "Son of the Most High" (Luke 1:32). John the Baptist is then the "prophet of the Most High." The Most High here is presumably God the Father rather than Jesus, as it was in 1:32. The mention of preparing the way of the Lord is an allusion to Isaiah 40:3. The Lord in this case is thus Jesus. 

The way John prepares for Jesus is by leading the people of Israel to repent of their sins so that they might find forgiveness. Forgiveness of sins is the path to salvation from Israel's enemies. John the Baptist will show them the way.

78. "... through bowels of mercy of our God, in the [days] the dawn from high will visit us, 79. to shine upon those in darkness and to those sitting in the shadow of death, to guide their feet into the way of peace."

As we look at the "psychology" of the New Testament world, we see pictures from their day that are metaphorical to us today. We think today of the heart as a muscle, a pump that provides the body with blood and thus oxygen. But the biblical metaphor sees the heart as the center of our character and intentionality.

The bowels were the center of our longings and desire. Our bowels are the location of our kindness and compassion (e.g., Col. 3:12). Paul actually calls Onesimus his "bowels" in Philemon 12, an indication of his affection toward him. In Zechariah's Song, it is God whose "bowels" show Israel his affection. The result is God's mercy on them, giving them a chance for forgiveness.

The sun is currently down for Israel. They are in days of darkness. But John the Baptist signifies the coming of the sunrise, the dawn of light on God's people. 1:79 is an allusion to Isaiah 9:2: "The people walking in the darkness see a great light." Matthew also sees the mission of Jesus as fulfilling this passage in Matthew 4:16.

The path out of darkness is a path to peace. It is a path from the hostility and oppression of Israel's enemies to freedom and peace. The expression, "the way of peace," is probably an echo of Isaiah 59:8, a passage that Paul also echoes in Romans 3:17. Isaiah 59 is bemoaning the sins of Israel that have separated it from God. "None is calling for righteousness; none is pleading for truth" (Isa. 59:4). 

In short, Isaiah 59 says, they are walking in darkness. But the promise is that "the Redeemer will come to Zion" (59:20), a promise that Paul also echoes in Romans 11:26. The Redeemer will turn transgression away from Jacob. [1]   

80. And the child increased and was becoming strong in spirit, and he was in the deserted [places] until the day of his manifestation to Israel.

John the Baptist was destined to be manifested to Israel. His task would be to "prepare the way of the Lord," to prepare for the introduction of Jesus, the Messiah (cf. Luke 3:4; 7:27). Like Elijah, he would be a person who dwelt in the desert (Mal. 4:5; Luke 1:17). He was a Nazarite, who did not drink wine or strong drink (1:15). 

God prepares John for this mission. As he grows, he becomes stronger and stronger in his spirit, as well as his body. The child "increases." John was no doubt willing to serve God in the way God wanted him to serve. John was a willing participant in God's plan. God would not have chosen him if he had not known he would accept God's calling. 

[1] The Hebrew reads that the Redeemer will come "to those who turn from transgression in Jacob." Paul follows the reading of the Greek translation: "he will turn ungodliness from Jacob."

Luke 1:39-56 Explanatory Notes (Visit to Elizabeth)

The Visitation,
Jacques Daret

The Visit to Elizabeth
1:39 Having arisen, [1] Mary in those days went into the hill country with haste into a city of Judah. 40. And she entered into the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth.
We do not know exactly where Zechariah and Elizabeth are from, but it is not Jerusalem. They are from a "city of Judah," in the hill country. Mary's connection with them may suggest that Mary had a priestly lineage. In chapter 4 will we encounter the suggestion that she also had a royal one.

Hebrews 7 does not indicate that Jesus had a priestly lineage, but certainly as Christians we think of Jesus as prophet, priest, and king. The Gospels and Paul are explicit about his kingly role. Luke will explicitly call him a prophet. And Hebrews 7 calls him a priest, whether he descends biologically from Levi or not.

Elizabeth is sixth months pregnant, and Mary will stay with her till she is nine months pregnant. The Gospel does not say whether Mary stays all the way to the birth of John the Baptist. It is the first trimester of Mary's pregnancy.

41. And it happened as Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was full of Holy Spirit.
The model of Spirit-filling in the Old Testament is that the Spirit of God comes on individuals to give them the power to do specific tasks (e.g., Samson) or to prophesy (e.g., Saul). In such cases, the power of God's Spirit is not necessarily associated with goodness or godliness. On the Day of Pentecost, it will become normal for all of God's true people to receive the Holy Spirit and the expectation of godliness and purity will become universal for those filled with the Holy Spirit.

Elizabeth is still under the old covenant, although Luke does not make that pattern clear here. She is filled with the Holy Spirit and called for a special purpose, to give birth and raise "Elijah," who will prepare the way for the Messiah. Interestingly, we are never told that Mary gets "filled" with the Holy Spirit, but we can assume she is both because Jesus is greater than John the Baptist and the Holy Spirit has overshadowed her (1:35).

We have already seen in this chapter that the coming of the Spirit is not always connected to an act on the part of an individual. John the Baptist is filled with the Spirit from his mother's womb (1:15). The Spirit can come on a person before the person has any real understanding of the Holy Spirit. John the Baptist will later confirm his membership in the people of God. Elizabeth's faith in what God is doing through Mary confirms hers.

42. And she called out with a great cry and said, "Blessed [are] you among women and having been blessed [is] the fruit of your womb!
Elizabeth recognizes Mary's honor among women. God has shown her favor and honored her. Blessedness is honor language, something it is difficult for Western minds to understand. Picture a room of people clapping while giving a standing ovation. 

Yet blessing goes beyond honor for something you do, although you can do things that bring you honor. Blessing is a gift of favor. A person can be blessed without doing something. They can be favored by God beyond their faithfulness. 

Mary is a faithful young woman, yes, but there were no doubt many faithful young women at that time. She is favored and honored and blessed beyond them not only because she was faithful but because God chose her beyond her faithfulness. She is blessed among the faithful. She is highly favored by God, chosen to do something no other woman in history will ever do.

The fruit of her womb is obviously blessed beyond all other humans. As Christians, we believe that Jesus was the eternal second person of the Trinity, God himself come to earth. We have the benefit of the Gospel of John and centuries of unpacked Christian understanding. In that light, the greeting seems like an understatement. Of course Jesus is worthy of honor! 

43. "And why to me [is] this, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For, behold, as the sound of your greeting came into my ears, the baby in my womb leaped in rejoicing!
The baby John the Baptist leaps in the womb as a sign of what Mary represents. Mary is the "mother of my Lord." This is the first time in the Gospel of Luke that Jesus is referred to as "Lord," although he has already been referred to as the "Son of God" (1:32, 35). The title has been used ten times previously in the chapter but in every case in relation to God the Father.

Acts 2:36 will use "Lord" and "Messiah" as royal titles like "Son of God" and locate Jesus' assumption of them most poignantly after his resurrection from the dead and exaltation to God's right hand in heaven. That moment is like Jesus assuming the throne of the cosmos. The use of the term Lord in relation to Jesus comes especially from Psalm 110:1--"The LORD said to my Lord, 'Sit at my right hand.'" 

45. "And blessed is the one who has believed that there will be a fulfillment to the things that have been spoken to her from the Lord!"
Elizabeth's words began with a blessing to Mary and here they end with that same blessing again. Mary is the one on whom God has not only shown unmerited favor and blessing. She is the one who has believed or had faith in the things spoken to her by the angel.

There is a tendency in Protestantism to make faith and works into opposites or contradictories. The New Testament knows nothing of that. The favor shown Mary is not earned but her actions are consistent with that favor. She is worthy without deserving. Her honor fits her faithfulness although she could have never earned it.

Grace is unmerited favor. We think of it especially when God forgives our sins. It does involve a "work" of sorts, because we normally "trigger" grace by our prayers and faith. [1] Blessing is a specific kind of grace, not one that relates to our sin but to our faithfulness. It is God's gift beyond our faithfulness.

Mary's Song
46. And Mary said, "My soul magnifies the Lord, 47. and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior...
This is the "Magnificat." Both Luke's Gospel and Acts are filled with songs and sermons. Magnificat is the Latin for "it magnifies." This hymn has been set to various music over the centuries.

This hymn is in the style of Hebrew poetry, which utilized "parallelism." The most basic form of parallelism is synonymous parallelism, where you say something and then say it again in similar terms. So "my soul magnifies the Lord" is very similar in meaning to "my spirit rejoices in God my Savior."

This parallelism helps us with interpretation. For example, if we wonder which "Lord" Mary is thinking of, the mention of "God my Savior" in the second suggests she is thinking of God the Father. Interestingly, expressions that describe God the Father and Jesus the Son are often interchangeable, sometimes making it difficult to determine which is in view. Jesus is the "Savior, Christ the Lord" (2:11), but God the Father is also our Savior and the LORD.

The word soul would be difficult to interpret without the parallel. In the Old Testament and Hebrew, "soul" refers to the whole living being, so we would be tempted to translate this verse as "My person magnifies the Lord." But the parallel of the word spirit suggests Mary is referring to her inner being rather than her whole person, a part of her rather than the whole. 

Her soul in this case is her truest self inside, who she really is. It is the essence of her personhood, the part of her that makes choices. It is the part of her where the longings that aline with her choices come.

That inner essence of her praises the Lord and rejoices in God's goodness. God alone is deserving of worship, and she gives God some small bit of what God deserves--God's "worth-ship." God alone is truly worthy of our honor, praise, and glory.

48. "... because he looked upon the humble state of his servant girl. For, behold, from now all generations will bless me.
God in himself is worthy of our praise. Yet we can also praise God in the context of things he has done. Mary magnifies God not only for who God is but for what he has done in relation to her. All generations will now "bless" her, give her praise and favor. And to this day her prediction has come to pass.

One of the major themes of the Gospel of Luke is an emphasis on God's favor toward the poor. God seems to have chosen Mary not least so that he could exalt the humble. He intentionally did not choose a famous or wealthy girl. He did not choose a woman of privilege from a powerful family. It is clear from the rest of Mary's song that he chose her in part specifically to take someone who was marginal in society and exalt her.

We will see time and time again in Luke that Jesus targets those on the edges of society. He targets the "sick" not the "healthy." He focuses on the "lost sheep," the poor. He ministers to those society does not see, like women and the sick. He looks on Mary in her "humble state" and exalts her above the most "significant" of people in that day, including the Herods and Pilates.

The parallelism here is more "synthetic" rather than synonymous. The second line builds on the first one. God favored a humble girl, therefore, all generations will call her blessed.

49. "... because the Powerful [One] did great things for me--and holy is his name-- 50. and his mercy [reaches] into generations and generations to those who fear him.
The parallelism of these two verses centers on the fact that God is a God who does great things for his people. He has done something great for Mary and blessed her--she will be the mother of the Messiah. Similarly, God's mercy reaches to generation after generation to those who "fear" him like Mary did. And of course his mercy continues to our generation today.

Three characteristics of God are featured in these two verses. God is powerful. God's name is holy. God is merciful. The first two with out the last would definitely be fearful, and we are to "fear" the Lord. God is a God who can "fry us alive." An elephant may mean us no harm, but we might "fear" it if it is prancing around. A million volt fence would have nothing against us, but we would not dare touch it. 

God is all-powerful. There should be a healthy fear of him. His name is holy. It is set apart from all other names. To say that something is holy is to say it belongs to God and should be treated special, not like something that is common or ordinary. To say God is holy is to say that God is God and as a result to fall on our faces in unworthiness.

Yet God is a God of mercy. God wishes us well. As one of my Old Testament professors once said, "The God who can fry me alive loves me." As God we should fear him. As God has revealed himself to us, we need not.

51. "He performed strength with his arm. He scattered the proud in the intention of their heart.
The alignment of God with the humble instead of the proud becomes clearer and clearer as we proceed through the song. Pride was specially offensive in the ancient world, because it suggested that a person was on the same level as the gods. A proud person was just asking for a god to put them in their place by knocking them down a notch.

God is the one with true strength. The proud might be tempted to think themselves strong or lofty. They might make plans thinking that they are in control of their fate. But the intentions of their hearts cannot bring blessing or certainty of outcome. It is God's arm that performs strength. The "arm of the Lord" is a theme in the later chapters of Isaiah (e.g., Isa. 53:1). 

52. "He brought down powerful rulers from thrones and exalted humble [ones].
Rulers are among the proud. You probably know the saying, "Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." It is indeed difficult not to let power go to your head. Often you do not realize it until the time comes to step down from power. Many struggle to give up power and do so too late, after they have begun to unwind the legacy of their good years. Others try to resort to immoral means to try to maintain power after their time is up.

God is always in power. Rulers fall at God's hand, yet he remains forever enthroned. Meanwhile, God loves to exalt the lowly. David was the least of Jesse's sons when God anointed him. God loves to take the lesser and make it the greater.

53. "Those hungering he filled with good [things], and those who are wealthy he sent away empty.
This verse may sound downright socialist, but we should resist interpreting the New Testament through modern lenses and categories. Nevertheless, the statement means what it seems to say to us. The Gospel of Luke repeately emphasizes God's favor on those who lack and his general displeasure with those who have too much.

The economy of the ancient world was quite different from ours. They dealt more with goods, with coinage less central to the world's operations. The basic unit of Greek money, the drachma, was linked to a day's wage, and a day's wage was largely linked to the subsistence needs of a day. Your average person lived from hand to mouth.

Those who stored wealth were unusual and often thought as a more grandiose kind of thief. An old Arab saying suggests that, "every rich man is either a thief or the son of a thief." It is no surprise that the New Testament has very little positive to say about the wealthy. The Gospel of Luke is especially this way, all the more striking since it is dedicated to Theophilus, who was probably a wealthy Roman official.

Mary celebrates that God reverses the fortunes of people in this world. God is portrayed as a sort of divine Robin Hood, who takes from the rich and gives to the poor. There is no sense that the wealthy deserve or actually own their excess. There is a sense that it is unjust for anyone to be hungry. God is a God who sets these imbalances straight.

54. "He helped Israel, his servant, mercies to be remembered, 55. just as he spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and his seed forever."
Lest we take these comments in an overly individualistic way, Mary's song ends with a reminder that all these words have to do with the restoration of Israel. God is keeping his promises to Abraham long ago. In Israel, all were meant to prosper. None were meant to be knocked off track into poverty or abject humility. Israel was never meant to be overcome by powerful outside political forces.

In Jesus God was remembering the faithful of the past. In Jesus God was showing mercy to Israel to bring everything back into balance. The lost sheep will be found. The poor and humble will be brought back to economic health. Those who have hoarded power and wealth will be brought down to size.

56. And Mary remained with her about three months, and she returned to her house.
Mary stays with Elizabeth up until the time she is ready to deliver. Luke does not say that she is there when Elizabeth gives birth, but the months add up to nine. Perhaps there is something symbolic here. John the Baptist is preparation for Jesus. When Jesus begins, John the Baptist ends. So Mary leaves as the preparation ends, and John the Baptist begins.

[1] aorist participle, feminine nominative singular

[2] Theologically, both Wesleyans and Calvinists believe that there is grace prior to our prayers, faith, and repentance. This construct makes sense, although it goes beyond what the biblical texts say.

"Almost-Followers" of Jesus at Ephesus

Still filling in gaps in my Acts book... less than 4000 words from the target!
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Acts tells us about several very interesting events during Paul’s stay at Ephesus. The first is an encounter he has with some more followers of John the Baptist, like Apollos had been. They have been baptized in the manner of John the Baptist. They are expecting the Messiah to come.

But they have not believed specifically on Jesus. Most importantly, they have not received the Holy Spirit. So Paul has them baptized in the name of Jesus. They receive the Holy Spirit. They even speak in tongues, as on the Day of Pentecost and like the first Gentiles who become believers.

Luke probably was making a point to his audience and to a group that must have continued to exist at least till the end of the first century. The Gospel of John traditionally comes from Ephesus as well, perhaps in the 90s. When we look at the way it talks about John the Baptist, it seems to distance him from Jesus.

The Gospel of John does not tell about Jesus getting baptized by the Baptist. It tells of Jesus’ disciples baptizing concurrently with him, and John immediately sends his followers to Jesus once he arrives on the scene. John the Baptist even denies being Elijah in John 1:21, something Jesus says he is in Matthew 11:14.

Why would the Gospel of John downplay John the Baptist in this way? Could it be that it was trying to make it clear to the followers of the Baptist at Ephesus that Jesus was the only way? Was the Gospel of John implying that it was not enough to follow the Baptist’s message or have the baptism of John the Baptist? You needed to follow Jesus and be baptized in Jesus’ name. “He must become greater; I must become less” (John 3:30).

These followers of John the Baptist were thus "almost-followers" of Jesus. They understood a good deal about the good news, but they had not sealed the deal. Some of them even had a fervor about what they knew. But they did not quite know enough.

There may be some in the church today who are also “almost-followers.” They may know a lot about Christianity. They may even have a zeal about what they know. But they are lacking the crucial element, the power of Jesus within them. Do they have the love of God poured out in their hearts? Do they have a form of godliness but not the power of a Spirit-led life?

We also hear about another group of “not-quite followers” at Ephesus. This is a group of Jewish exorcists. They go around casting out demons...

Reflections on John the Baptist

Follows on yesterday.
_________
Probably the thing that strikes me most about John the Baptist is how much differently things must have seemed to him than they seem to us.  Our understanding of John as the "opening act" before Jesus arrived is crystal clear.  John was also clear that the messiah would follow him, but John probably wasn't expecting the messiah to get crucified.

John probably was looking for the almost immediate restoration of Israel as a political kingdom with its own king.  It didn't happen.  Even after Jesus rose from the dead, his followers were still expecting this sort of kingdom (Acts 1:6).  It still hasn't happened some two thousand years later. [1] Some of the New Testament may still look to such a kingdom of Israel after Christ returns (e.g., Rom. 11:26).

Later Christians took John's message and made it universal, which may very well be what God wants us to do as well.  For example, John's message was not directed at non-Jews.  It is doubtful the thought ever popped into his head that a Gentile might get baptized.  We now see his message of baptism played out in Christian baptism, where we prepare not for the restoration of Israel but we act out our inclusion in God's kingdom.

For the moment, this kingdom is not political but is a spiritual kingdom.  We live in two kingdoms, the kingdom of our God and the kingdom of this world.  Our loyalty is solidly to the first, and we choose it over the second when the two are in unresolvable conflict.  But we also live in the second kingdom and we render to Caesar what is Caesar's.

The situation with baptism is slightly different than it was with John.  When the movement started, no one was baptized.  He called all Israel to baptism, even those trying to keep the covenant.  After all, he was looking to the repentance of a whole people, even more than mere individuals.  This is one reason we can participate in confessions of sin in church even when we have not intentionally done wrong all week--it is a corporate confession of the church as a whole.

Now of course we have children born into families of faith.  Some thus would have them baptized as children, to claim them for Christ from the very beginning, knowing of course that they will have to appropriate that act personally as well later.  Others focus on the individual and want the child to wait until he or she can understand at least a little of what baptism signifies. The eternal destiny of the child is of course something separate from these debates.

When we look at how differently our situation is than John's, it is a bit sobering to wonder how much of what we think we have figured out might be a little off on the details or out of perspective.  Certainly most of us as Christians will believe that something unique was happening at the time of Jesus, a new revelation that will never come again.  Someone might also point out that we now have the New Testament, which transcends the misunderstandings of any one early Christian.

But if we're honest with each other, Christians probably disagree more with each other today over what the Bible means than the early Jesus followers disagreed with each other.  It calls for a certain humility.  And it calls us back to first principles.  Jesus would both express and model the two basic principles of Christian life, to which all our specific beliefs must submit.  These are the twin principles of complete surrender to God's will, which more than anywhere else is seen in the second principle of concretely loving all others as we would normally want others to treat us.

[1] While a nation of Israel is currently restored, it is not a kingdom that affirms Jesus as messiah, which from a New Testament perspective would be an essential part of a truly restored Israel.

After John the Baptist...

Continued from here.
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We know what happened to John.  Herod Antipas arrested and then beheaded him.  Rulers don't take nicely to those who announce that another king is coming who is going to replace their kingdom with a better one. In Matthew, Mark, and Luke, which are sometimes called the Synoptic gospels, Jesus does not start proclaiming the kingdom until John is arrested.

But the impact of John the Baptist seems to have continued for decades after he died. For example, there were some people who were still following his teaching at Ephesus in Acts 18-19.  The first is Apollos in Acts 18:24-28.  He is instructed in the "Way of the Lord" and proclaimed the coming of Jesus, but was only aware of the baptism of John. Apparently, John the Baptist must have proclaimed "the way of the Lord."  It is interesting that both Isaiah 40 and Malachi 3 use the word "way."  These are the passages the gospels remember in relation to John's prophetic ministry.  So it is not a stretch to say that John must have proclaimed quite literally "the Way of the Lord" as one of his key messages.

Followers of the Way were thus individuals who believed John's message--whether they believed in Jesus or not.  Apollos could be a follower of the Way and know very little about Jesus.  What he knew was John the baptizer's prediction that the "anointed one," the messiah, was coming.  The Gospels also remember this message as part of what John proclaimed: "The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals" (Mark 1:7, NRSV).

Acts 19:1-7 reinforces this interpretation.  Paul finds certain "disciples" at Ephesus.  These individuals only know the baptism of John.  They do not seem to know much of anything about Jesus.  When Acts calls them "disciples," it must not mean followers of Jesus but followers of the Way, followers of the movement started by John the Baptist.

For Acts, receiving the Spirit is the big distinction between the two movements.  The Jesus movement was part of the Baptist movement.  Both were followers of the Way.  But the Jesus movement believed Jesus was the messiah John predicted, and it involved the Holy Spirit.  Jesus' followers received the Holy Spirit.  At some point, John's baptism became distinguished from baptism "in the name of Jesus," so much so that Paul has the followers of the Baptist get re-baptized so they will receive the Holy Spirit in Acts 19.

The Gospel of John indirectly supports interpretation.  One of the intriguing features of the Gospel of John is the extent to which it downplays John the Baptist in relation to Jesus.  John never actually mentions John baptizing Jesus.  John's presentation implies that the Baptist's mission is basically over once Jesus arrives (e.g., 1:36-37; 3:30).  Only John's gospel tells of Jesus' followers baptizing at the same time as the Baptist.  Finally, in contrast to Matthew 11:14, the Gospel of John denies that John the Baptist is Elijah (1:21).

Why would the Gospel of John downplay John the Baptist so much more than the other gospels?  A possible answer is that, as we see in Acts 18-19, there were followers of John the Baptist at Ephesus who not only did not follow Jesus. There may have been followers of the Way there who opposed the Jesus movement, who opposed the idea that Jesus was the messiah.  John and Acts are thus written in such a way as to make it clear that Jesus is the one John predicted. [1]

So not only did John proclaim the coming judgment of God and the potential restoration of political Israel.  He was one of those Jews who also predicted the coming of a king to rule Israel in this coming kingdom, the messiah. [2] In preparation, he called Israel to repent and to wash themselves in the Jordan, symbolizing the washing and forgiveness of their sins.

What a massive movement he must have started!  We do not know much about it apart from those of his followers who went on to believe Jesus was the messiah John was predicting.  But at the time his movement must have paralleled that of Jesus and may have been even bigger.  Some in this movement of the Way may have known very little about Jesus at all.  It must not have been clear at the time that John endorsed Jesus as the one he predicted.

In fact, we can read passages like Matthew 11:2-6 as the Baptist himself having some uncertainty.  John is in prison but sends some of his followers to ask Jesus if he is the one.  The things he is doing make him a prime candidate.  But John must not have been entirely certain. [3] Perhaps John was expecting Jesus to be more "political" and "military" than he was.

What is clear is that all four gospels see Jesus' ministry in continuity with that of the Baptist.  In Matthew, Mark, and Luke, Jesus is baptized by John, which indicates that Jesus at least mostly endorsed John's message.  As many Jesus scholars have argued, this fact has enormous implications for how we understand Jesus' own mission and message. [4]  We must understand Jesus' words not as wise sayings a philosopher might say but as words said against this historical background.

[1] The incident in Acts 19 is thus not about entire sanctification (as many holiness revivalists preached in the late 1800s/early 1900s).  Still less is it about the necessity of tongues as evidence of truly being converted (certain Pentecostal groups).  Acts 19, including its added evidence of tongues, was originally a polemic against followers of John the Baptist who did not believe Jesus was the messiah.

[2] Again, if we have to pick a Jewish group his message best fits, it would be the Essenes.

[3] This scene has of course given rise to much speculation as to John's motives, especially if you bring Luke 1 and John 1 into the conversation.

[4] One of the first to point out this fact was A. E. Harvey, Jesus and the Constraints of History E. P. Sanders' Jesus and Judaism then built on this approach.

Jesus Begins 2

... continued from yesterday.
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John was baptizing people, dipping Jews in the river Jordan to symbolize the washing of their sins.  I would have heard the message: we Jews need to prepare ourselves for what is coming.  We need to clean ourselves to be ready or else we'll be swept up in the judgment along with everyone else.

Such ritual washings were of course a normal part of Jewish life.  There were miqvaot around Jerusalem, for example at the temple.  You purified yourself before offering sacrifices.  The Essenes at the Dead Sea had a miqveh at each entrance to their camp.  You walked down one side unclean and came up the other clean.  If I had seen John as an onlooker, I probably would have pegged him to be an Essene of some sort.

What was different about John's baptism is that he wasn't dipping people as usual.  His baptism wasn't something you did each year or each month.  This was a preparation for a one time event, the coming judgment of God on the world in preparation for the restoration of Israel, God's coming kingdom.

Part of that message was a new king, a new "Son of David" to resume ruling Israel just like the kings of old.  This "anointed one" or messiah (Christ in Greek) was an intimate part of the restored kingdom.  It may take a little doing to get into the heads of the people alongside the Jordan and what they were expecting in a messiah because not everyone was.

First, the people by the river were not expecting the messiah to be divine in the normal sense of that word.  True, there were Old Testament texts that referred to kings like Solomon as the "Son of God" (2 Sam. 7:14) and other texts that used very exalted language of the kings of Judah on various occasions (e.g., Ps. 2:7; 45:6-7; 89:27; 110:1).  But no one took these verses to mean that the king was literally a god or that the messiah would be a god.  They took it poetically.

It was perhaps the Essenes who first starting expecting God to anoint some special people in the process of restoring Israel.  Some of their key documents look forward to two "messiahs," two anointed ones.  One would be the new king of Israel.  The other would be the new priest of Israel.  But the group called the Sadducees weren't necessarily looking for a new king.  For them, Israel had done just fine with the high priest basically in charge for five hundred years.

As for the rest of Israel, from time to time revolutionaries would crop up, probably with hopes of turning out to be the new "anointed one" of Israel.  Acts mentions some of them. [1]  A book called Psalms of Solomon, especially chapter 17, very strongly hopes for a messiah to come and destroy the Romans. [2] But we really can't say how prevalent the expectation of a messiah was at the time John baptized.  Obviously he believed that a king was coming.

And here it is important to recognize that the Jews at the time of Jesus largely didn't read the verses of prophecy you might have learned in Sunday School the way we do.  The New Testament authors, by and large, read the Old Testament "spiritually" rather than for what the words originally meant.  It was only after the fact that Christians saw most of these Old Testament verses the way we do now.  In other words, it was not at all obvious to everyone either that a messiah was coming and certainly not that he would come in the way Christians now believe Jesus did...

[1] E.g., Acts 5:36-37; 21:38.

[2] It was written not long after the Romans defiled the temple and took over Israel in 63BC.

When Jesus was baptized...

So following from Sunday, I start the book over.  Thanks to everyone for things I had missed or needed to be sure to cover under other headings!
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We don't know the exact year. Luke 3:1 says it was the 15th year of the Roman emperor Tiberius, around the year AD29. John "the baptizer" started baptizing people in the river Jordan just a few miles east of Jerusalem.  Of course dating things is really complicated in the ancient world, so this is not a slam dunk.

Tiberius was the second Roman emperor (AD14-37), after Augustus (31BC-AD14).  You probably remember that Augustus was emperor when Jesus was born.  You've probably heard the verse at least at Christmas, "In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken" (Luke 2:1).  Our best guess is that Jesus was born sometime around 6-4BC because Matthew 2 says Herod (the Great) was still king, and Herod the Great died in 4BC.

That means that Jesus would be about thirty, maybe a little older, when he showed up at the Jordan River to be baptized by John (Luke 3:23; cf. John 8:57).  It is a little irritating not to know these things for certain, but that's just the way it is with the evidence we have.  People can get really angry when you mention uncertainty about things they've seen in every Christmas play since childhood. But the gospels do not always say exactly the same thing when it comes to minor details, so we just can't know for sure on some of these questions. We just have to deal with it.

What was John doing out there in the middle of nowhere, baptizing?  Jesus presumably came all the way from Galilee to see him, to participate.  It’s about a three day journey.  Jesus must have agreed with most or all of what John was saying to go through and get baptized by him.

The gospels tell us that John the Baptist was preaching a “baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins” (e.g., Mark 1:4).  The Jewish historian Josephus, as we would expect, presents John’s message in more general terms.  John was urging the crowds to become more virtuous. [1]

It's hard for us to get into the heads of John or the crowds.  We've heard so much in church and other places.  What would we have thought if we had been in those crowds who came to see John and maybe get baptized?

I think we would have heard something distinctly political both in John's message and symbolic action of baptism.  It is no coincidence that a new Herod, Herod Antipas, arrested John and eventually beheaded him.  He was no fool.

For example, where was John baptizing?  He was baptizing on the east side of the Jordan River, right around the place where Joshua had led Israel to occupy the land.  In the light of the rest of John's message, it was all too easy to see that John was preparing Israel for its restoration as a free kingdom.

The goal of repentance was to get the hearts of Israel ready for the return of God's kingdom on earth in Israel.  It is again no coincidence that the gospels remember John in the light of Old Testament passages like Isaiah 40:1-3.  While New Testament authors do not always read the Old Testament in context, the context of Isaiah fits John's message very well indeed: "a voice of one calling in the wilderness, 'Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him'" (Mark 1:3, quoting Isaiah 40:3).

The original context of Isaiah 40 was the return of Israel from captivity in Babylon.  Babylon had destroyed Jerusalem and taken many Israelites back as slaves.  But in 538BC, a new conquering king--Cyrus, king of Persia (cf. Isa. 45:1)--let those Jews who wanted to return go.  Isaiah 40 originally was about making a straight line through the desert home to Jerusalem from Babylon.  Flatten the hills, lift up the valleys, and straighten out any crooked roads because we're going home! [2]

So if we were there with John by the Jordan, I think we would have heard similar overtones in what he was doing.  In a sense, Israel is still in exile.  The Romans are in control.  These texts in Isaiah point toward Israel regaining its independence and being restored (cf. Acts 1:6).

John probably also criticized the current leadership of Jerusalem.  His message of repentance was a message of hope for those who participated.  But it was a message of judgment for everyone else, including the current leaders in Jerusalem and people like Herod Antipas.  For them it was a message of impending doom...

[1] Antiquities 18.5.2.

[2] Accordingly, in its original context, the Lord Isaiah has in mind is Yahweh, the LORD, rather than a king.  However, as we will see, it was perfectly legitimate for the New Testament authors to read the Old Testament in a "spiritual" way that differed from the original meaning.

Followers of the Way (4)

This section would end the investigative part of the first chapter of The Essential Jesus, titled "The Baptism of John."  I probably won't blog the last part of the chapter, "Life Reflections."
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We can speculate further about the nature of John the baptizer's message by looking at what became of those who followed his teaching, in the decades long after he was beheaded.  We hear about such followers at Ephesus in Acts 18-19.  The first is Apollos in Acts 18:24-28.  He is instructed in the "Way of the Lord" and proclaimed the coming of Jesus, but was only aware of the baptism of John.

This scenario only makes sense if John the Baptist proclaimed the way of the Lord, if this expression goes back to him.  In making this connection, it is interesting that both Isaiah 40 and Malachi 3 use the word "way."  These are again the passages that the gospels remember in relation to John's prophetic ministry.  So it is not a stretch to say that John must have proclaimed quite literally "the Way of the Lord" as one of his key messages.

Followers of the Way were thus individuals who bought into his message--whether they believed in Jesus or not.  Apollos could be a follower of the Way and know very little about Jesus.  What he knew was John the baptizer's prediction that the "anointed one," the messiah, was coming.  The Gospels also remember this message as part of what John proclaimed: "The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals" (Mark 1:7, NRSV).

Acts 19:1-7 reinforces this interpretation.  Paul finds certain "disciples" at Ephesus.  These individuals only know the baptism of John.  They do not seem to know much of anything about Jesus.  When Acts calls them "disciples," it must not mean followers of Jesus but followers of the Way, followers of the movement started by John the Baptist.

For Acts, receiving the Spirit is the big distinction between the two movements.  The Jesus movement was part of the Baptist movement.  Both were followers of the Way.  But the Jesus movement believed Jesus was the messiah John predicted, and it involved the Holy Spirit.  Jesus' followers received the Holy Spirit.  At some point, John's baptism became distinguished from baptism "in the name of Jesus," so much so that Paul has the followers of the Baptist get re-baptized so they will receive the Holy Spirit in Acts 19.


The Gospel of John indirectly supports and extends this interpretation.  None of the gospels are simply recording history.  They each present Jesus in a way that brings out particular themes and emphases. [6]  One of the intriguing features of the Gospel of John is the extent to which it downplays John the Baptist in relation to Jesus.  John never actually mentions the Baptist baptizing Jesus.  John's presentation makes it very clear that the Baptist's mission is basically over once Jesus arrives (e.g., 1:36-37; 3:30).  Only John's gospel tells of Jesus' followers baptizing at the same time as the Baptist.  Finally, in contrast to Matthew 11:14, the Gospel of John denies that John the Baptist is Elijah (1:21).

Why would the Gospel of John downplay John the Baptist so much more than the other gospels?  A plausible answer is that, as we see in Acts 18-19, there were followers of John the Baptist at Ephesus who not only were not Jesus followers.  There may have been followers of the Way there who opposed the Jesus movement, who opposed the idea that Jesus was the messiah.  John and Acts are thus written in such a way as to make it clear that Jesus is the one John predicted. [7] 

So not only did John proclaim the coming judgment of God and the potential restoration of political Israel.  He was one of those Jews who also predicted the coming of a king to rule Israel in this coming kingdom, the messiah. [8] In preparation, he called Israel to repent and to wash themselves in the Jordan, symbolizing the washing and forgiveness of their sins.

What a massive movement he must have started!  We do not know much about it apart from those of his followers who went on to believe Jesus was in fact the predicted messiah.  But at the time his movement must have paralleled that of Jesus, perhaps even been bigger.  Some in this movement of the Way may have known very little about Jesus at all.  It must not have been clear at the time that John endorsed Jesus as the one he predicted.

In fact, we can read passages like Matthew 11:2-6 as the Baptist himself having some uncertainty.  John is in prison but sends some of his followers to ask Jesus if he is the one.  The things he is doing make him a prime candidate.  But John must not have been entirely certain. [9]

What is clear is that all four gospels see Jesus' ministry in continuity with that of the Baptist.  In Matthew, Mark, and Luke, Jesus is baptized by John, which indicates that Jesus endorses John's message.  As many Jesus scholars have argued, this fact has enormous implications for how we understand Jesus' own mission and message. [10]  We must understand Jesus' words not as wise sayings a philosopher might say but as words said against this historical background.

[text box on the Jesus Seminar]

[6] As we will see more clearly in the second volume of this series.

[7] The incident in Acts 19 is thus not about entire sanctification (as many holiness revivalists preached in the late 1800s/early 1900s).  Still less is it about the necessity of tongues as evidence of truly being converted (certain Pentecostal groups).  Acts 19, including its added evidence of tongues, was originally a polemic against followers of the Baptist who did not believe Jesus was the messiah.

[8] Again, if we have to pick a Jewish group his message best fits, it would be the Essenes.

[9] This scene has of course given rise to much speculation as to John's motives, especially if you bring Luke 1 and John 1 into the conversation.

[10] One of the first to point out this fact was A. E. Harvey, Jesus and the Constraints of History **.  E. P. Sanders' Jesus and Judaism then built on this approach.

John the Baptist (3)

Previous posts in this series were 1) Looking for a Messiah and 2) The Restoration of Israel.

Into this context comes John the Baptist.  Of all the Jewish groups of the day, he looks the most like an Essene.  He is off in the desert wearing the clothes of a prophet like Elijah.  He is actually baptizing not far from Qumran, a conservative Essene community. [4]  He is preaching the approaching kingdom of God, the restoration of God's people.  Once again, of all the Jewish groups we know from the time, the Essenes most seem to have had this emphasis from time to time.

But many Pharisees probably did too.  Of course, most Jews in Palestine did not belong to any group of this sort.  At their peak, there may not have been more than 6,000 Pharisees and 4,000 Essenes.  Like today, most people were simply doing their best to get by, farming their land and feeding their children.  We should not think that the latest Pharisaic idea on purity made the average dinner conversation of your average Jew at the time, any more than philosophy is a big dinner conversation in most of our homes.

John arguably baptized at about the place where Joshua led Israel into Canaan.  In itself this speaks of the restoration of the nation.  The gospels remember him by way of texts like Isaiah 40:3-5.  Although New Testament authors did not always think of the original context of a passage when they quoted them, the context of Isaiah 40 fits John's situation well.  Isaiah 40 was originally a call to captive Israel in Babylon to come home from exile.  Be comforted, Israel, for God is calling you home.  Make a bee line through the desert.  Lower the mountains, raise the valleys, straighten out the road so that you can get home as quickly as possible.

Matthew, Mark, and Luke also remember John in relation to Malachi 3:1, whose context is a messenger who comes to warn that God is coming to judge his people and the temple in particular.  The Essenes in particular had serious problems with the high priests and temple administration of their day.  In fact, their very origins may very well have involved a split with the temple, with their founding leader coming out on the losing side of the argument. [5]

These two Scriptures alone give us a very plausible sense of what John the Baptist was doing there along the Jordan River.  He was a messenger announcing both the coming judgment of God on Israel for its sin yet also proclaiming its coming restoration as a nation.  The appropriate response was repentance for sin, accompanied by a symbolic washing in the river that symbolized Israel's transition from the wilderness to the land.  The baptism stood for washing their sins, with God's forgiveness accompanying.

The Jewish historian Josephus mentions John the Baptist. [6] As we would expect, he sterilizes his description somewhat, arguably softening some of the more nationalistic dimensions to John's message.  So John preached virtue, righteousness toward one another, and piety toward God.  Josephus removes the concrete element of Israel's restoration as a nation.  Even here, however, he mentions that John's baptism had a politically threatening element.  Josephus gives the potential for rebellion as the reason Herod Antipas put him to death.

John did not invent this sort of ritual washing.  You will find miqvaot all over Israel at the time.  These were baths for a person to purify themselves from all the different sorts of impurities found in Leviticus, like uncleanness from touching a dead body.  These were large enough to walk down into and be immersed, and probably "baptism" usually did involve immersion at the time.

However, a couple aspects of John's baptism seem quite unusual.  For one thing, John's baptism was not about ceremonial uncleanness.  It was a cleansing for sin, which would normally involve sacrifices in the temple.  Of course if John did not accept the current temple as legitimate, we can see how baptism for him and possibly at Qumran might arise as a temporary but appropriate substitute for sacrifice in the temple.

A second difference from the normal ritual washings is that John's baptism had somewhat of the nature of a one time event.  It is not that John necessarily would have refused a person who returned a second time but that the baptism was in preparation for the Day of the Lord, not an act to be repeated every time you sinned.  It was thus an "apocalyptic" baptism, one that related to soon coming, world changing events.

[4] There were many more Essenes than lived at Qumran on the northwest side of the Dead Sea.  The best scholarship on the subject now consider those who lived there to be just one group of Essenes--probably a more conservative and sectarian group than other Essenes who lived in cities.  Some Essenes married; some did not.  Think of how there are more and less conservative denominations within the same Christian traditions, such as the difference between United Methodist and Wesleyan or between Wesleyan and Bible Methodist.

[5] For an excellent overview of the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Essenes, see James VanderKam's The Dead Sea Scrolls Today.

[6] Josephus, Antiquities 18.5.2.

Looking for a Messiah

Although it's not official, I've got a green light to start work on a couple new books, on Jesus this time (this is not my sabbatical work, but on the side).  The first one I've tentatively called The Essential Jesus, although WPH will of course decide the real title if everything progresses. Chapter 1 will be "The Baptism of John," and the first section "Looking for a Messiah."  So here it begins.
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I suspect that many of us think that the Jews of Jesus' day were all waiting for the messiah, perhaps even that they expected the messiah to be God come to earth.  We think this way, no doubt, because we find places in the New Testament where a New Testament author hears the Old Testament fulfilled in the life of Jesus on earth. Our hindsight makes it seem obvious that Jesus was the messiah everyone had been waiting for.

But when we look at the history and what Jews were actually writing in the years prior to Jesus, the situation is more complicated. For example, it is not likely at all that any Jews were expecting God to come earth as a human.  In fact, there is only one Jewish text that can be interpreted to mean that a heavenly figure will come to earth as Israel's anointed king (DSS*).  And that is just one interpretation of a fragment from the Dead Sea Scrolls. [1] The texts that expect a coming "messianic" figure, they instead expect a human king to show up.

And we should also make it clear that the word "messiah" in itself simply means, "anointed one."  It does not have to refer to a king.  One of the programmatic documents of the Jewish community by the Dead Sea speaks of the "anointed ones" of Aaron and Israel (1QS)--that is, the "messiahs" of Aaron and Israel.  This community apparently looked for the coming of both a priestly messiah to restore the true purity of the temple and a royal messiah to return a proper king to Israel.

Most experts believe these documents belonged to a Jewish group known as the Essenes.  Many of them, it would seem, expected a messiah to come eventually who would be king of Israel.  This would be a human king--an extraordinary man, no doubt, but a completely human one.  It is not clear that a writing called the Psalms of Solomon is Essene (it could also be Pharisee), but it looks to a military king to come who will destroy the Romans and restore Israel's kingdom (Ps. of Sol. 17).

However, the Essenes (and the Pharisees) were only a tiny portion of all the Jews in the world.  Did the ordinary Jew farming his or her land have such thoughts, the "people of the land"?  Certainly there were discontented groups of men who revolted from time to time.  We call them revolutionaries but they were sporadic at the time of Jesus, not organized or belonging to some coherent group.  They did seem to put forward their leaders as potential king figures--completely human figures.

But the high priests and Sadducees were not looking for a messianic king.  They were pretty much in political control anyway, since the Romans ruled through them and their class.  Most Jews at the time of Christ did not even live in Jerusalem.  At the time, far more Jews lived outside of Jerusalem than inside and around it.  These are "Diaspora" or scattered Jews.  More Jews lived in a part of the city of Alexandria than lived in all of Jerusalem.

It is not clear at all that these Diaspora Jews were looking for a figure to arise to restore the political independence of Israel.  Philo, an educated Jew who lived in Alexandria, has virtually nothing to say about a potential king of this sort.  We find only a couple places in his massive writings that might allude to such a king, and we can argue that he only became marginally interested in such things after the emperor Caligula disgraced Israel by trying to set up a statue of himself in the Jerusalem temple.

So, yes, some Jews were hoping that one day God would raise a king up within Israel and that Israel by some means would become free of Roman rule and be independent again.  We can imagine that such fervor rose particularly during times of discontent or transition.  But those Jews who were looking for a messianic king at those times and in those groups were looking for an extraordinary human king who would restore the political independence of Israel.  They were not looking for God to come to earth or for the messiah to be a heavenly being. [2]

[1] The Dead Sea Scrolls were a large collection of scrolls found in some caves at Qumran by the Dead Sea.  They date to the century or so before Christ, and most experts think they belonged to an Essene community that was located there.

[2] And, truth be told, the New Testament authors did not read the Old Testament like a Bible teacher would have you read it today.  They were not wired to try to read the words inductively, using clues from the literary and historical context to figure out the most likely original meaning of the text.  Almost all the passages in which the New Testament authors heard the Spirit speaking about Christ are read in a "spiritual" way.  In other words, most of those passages were not originally predictions about Jesus but "fuller senses" found in the words through the eyes of the Spirit.

John the Baptist

In addition to more scholarly writing this Fall, I might (or not ;-) begin work on a couple books on Jesus that are on a popular level like my series of books on Paul:

Paul: Messenger of Grace (Thessalonians, Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians)
Paul: Soldier of Peace (Romans)
Paul: Prisoner of Hope (Ephesians, Colossians, Philemon, Pastorals--forthcoming, I hope, since it's already pretty much written and submitted)

So if I wrote a couple books on Jesus and the Gospels, the first chapter of the first book would be on John the Baptist and how he set the historical context for Jesus' earthly ministry.  Today I thought I would brainstorm what would be in that chapter.

1. For one, I think I would want the chapter to give some of the low down of exactly what Jews were looking for in a messiah--including how much they were actually looking for a messiah in the first place.  The Sadducees weren't looking for a messiah.  Not at all sure that Diaspora Jews were looking for a messiah (and that would be by far the majority of Jews at the time).

Hard to know exactly what the Pharisees were expecting because we don't really have any clear artifacts of their thinking, unless 2 Maccabees counts.  I think a reasonable case can be made that they would have seen a new king as part of the resurrection.

The Essenes were looking for a couple anointed ones--of Aaron and Israel.  That's an anointed king and an anointed priest.  "Messiah" simply means "anointed one" (Christ in Greek).  It was not always a title in as fixed a way as we now use it.  The Psalms of Solomon (is it Essene or Pharisee) looks for a very military messiah to kick the Romans out of Israel.

2. Many Jews were looking for the restoration of Israel.  N. T. Wright has conceptualized this as a return from exile.  As usual, I think he's on to something but overdoes it.  Nevertheless, we can point to a series of apocalyptic writings from 1 Enoch to the Dead Sea Scrolls that look to this sort of restoration in general.

3. Surely John the Baptist fits against this backdrop.  He is baptizing them--usually a recurring cleansing ritual, but he is making it a singular event of renewal, signing on to what God is doing.  Yes, it is framed in terms of the later half of Isaiah, which was originally about the return of Israel from exile.  Yes, he is looking for an anointed king to follow.  Is it Jesus, he asks himself after he was imprisoned.

It is a baptism of repentance, calling on Israel to purify itself so that God will see fit to do the rest.  He is perhaps deuteronomistic in thinking.  It is because of Israel's sin that God has allowed it to stay under foreign powers.  Perhaps he intentionally evokes the image of Elijah in the way he dresses, which also invokes overtones of Malachi.

Is he Essene?  Could be.  He baptizes near Qumran.  But even more powerful is the fact that he baptizes around where Joshua entered Canaan. There is thus the image of Israel retaking the land, of a new covenant, of return from exile and restoration (think Covenant of Damascus).

4. There are followers of "the Way" in Ephesus even in Paul's day apparently.  The way easily could refer to the line "prepare the way of the Lord," John the Baptist's movement.  But of course, one could thus be a follower of the way and not believe Jesus was the one who was coming.  Thinking of it this way explains how in Acts 19 there could be followers of the Way who did not know about Jesus or did not believe in Jesus.

Instead, the Gospel of John, probably written in part to address the ideas of this non-Jesus Baptist group, has Jesus identify himself with the words, "I am the way."  And that's that.

Just some notes of what the first chapter of a book with the working title, The Essential Jesus, might look like.