Jesus Before Christianity

1
Jesus Before Christianity

• Recovering a more authentic picture of Jesus life

2
Context and Purpose

• Written 1976
• Content What can we know about Jesus
  historically?
• Central his preaching on the Kingdom of God
• How do his actions bring the Kingdom?
• Purpose What does this mean for people today?
• Example El Salvador

3
What do we know about Jesus?

• Born around 4 BCE Crucified around 30 CE
• Observant Jew from Galilee
• Similar to and different from John the Baptist
• Gathered disciples and preached about the Kingdom
  of God
• healed, exorcised demons
• Invited many to eat with him

4
What was going on in Jesus lifetime?

• Roman occupation
• Competition among Jewish groups
• Apocalypticism
• Catastrophic event, bringing judgment
• End of world, beginning of new world
• Honor and shame society

5
Kingdom of God

• Turns expectations upside down
• Like prophets call for justice
• A new time when Gods justice would rule
• Focus on liberating people from what binds them
  (salvation)
• Disease, demons, social judgment, poverty
• New kinship
• Radically egalitarian
• Welcomed children (the insignificant)

6
Contrasts

• Salvation as after death vs. breaking into the
  world now
• Religion or politics vs. religion AND politics
• Divinity vs. humanity
• Superhuman vs. supremely human
• Suffering as redemptive vs. need to alleviate
  suffering out of compassion
• Example El Salvador
• Killed by Jews vs. killed by Romans
• insurrection

7
Divinity

• Christian doctrine Council of Chalcedon (451)
• Jesus is fully human and fully God
• Of the same being as the Father (Council of
  Nicea, 325)
• Cannot separate or confuse his divine and human
  natures
• Emerges out of worship practice
• Pray to Christ
• Cannot violate monotheism (Judaism)
• This belief comes from the people not imposed by
  the emperor

8
Questions

• What characteristics of Nolans sketch of Jesus
  are significant for world problems today?
• What does it mean to have faith in Jesus,
  according to Nolan?
• Belief in divinity
• P. 166 what are our preconceived ideas of what
  God is like?
• P. 170 need to read the signs of our times

9
Characteristics of Religion

• Defining the Sacred
• What is it?
• How is it beyond ordinary experience?
• How is in manifested in human experience?
• How does it order human life?
• Transcendence vs. immanence
• Prophetic, sacramental, or mystical?
• Doctrine of incarnation and sacraments