Sunday, July 23, 2006
Kingdoms apocalyptic and sapiential
Among scholars who study the "historical Jesus," there seem to be two views. Bart Ehrman calls Jesus an "Apocalyptic prophet" who expected the imminent end of history. Earthly, human kingdoms and empires would be no more, and God's imperial rule would commence, and this would happen real soon now. You have to search no farther than your television to find people still expecting it!
John Dominic Crossan, however, argues for a sapiential kingdom of God, in which "the Kingdom of God is within you." According to this view, the kingdom is similar to the Buddhist nirvana. According to a Zen saying, "Nirvana is Samsara fully realized; Samsara is Nirvana rightly understood."
Now what interests me is that two such scholars and historians as Ehrman and Crossan could come to such diametrically opposite conclusions. Maybe Christianity and the teachings of Jesus are susceptible of both interpretations, like the trick drawing that is either of a young or an old woman, depending on how you look at it.
Even if Jesus did not expect the imminent end of history, Paul and other early Christians did. This is confirmed by scholarly criteria such as multiple attestation. But later new testament texts, as well as the Coptic Gospel of Thomas, downplay the imminent aspect of the kingdom. Maybe early Christians got tired of waiting and turned to ideas from hellenistic and Jewish mysticism, hence Gnosticism.
So a task for further research: the extent to which ideas from the East, like the Hellenistic Indo-Greek and Greco-Buddhist kingdoms influenced early Christianity. The last Indo-Greek Kingdom was overturned in 10 a.d. It is quite possible that Buddhist missionaries scattered along the Silk Road to Antioch and Sephoris, where early Christians would easily have come in contact with them.
John Dominic Crossan, however, argues for a sapiential kingdom of God, in which "the Kingdom of God is within you." According to this view, the kingdom is similar to the Buddhist nirvana. According to a Zen saying, "Nirvana is Samsara fully realized; Samsara is Nirvana rightly understood."
Now what interests me is that two such scholars and historians as Ehrman and Crossan could come to such diametrically opposite conclusions. Maybe Christianity and the teachings of Jesus are susceptible of both interpretations, like the trick drawing that is either of a young or an old woman, depending on how you look at it.
Even if Jesus did not expect the imminent end of history, Paul and other early Christians did. This is confirmed by scholarly criteria such as multiple attestation. But later new testament texts, as well as the Coptic Gospel of Thomas, downplay the imminent aspect of the kingdom. Maybe early Christians got tired of waiting and turned to ideas from hellenistic and Jewish mysticism, hence Gnosticism.
So a task for further research: the extent to which ideas from the East, like the Hellenistic Indo-Greek and Greco-Buddhist kingdoms influenced early Christianity. The last Indo-Greek Kingdom was overturned in 10 a.d. It is quite possible that Buddhist missionaries scattered along the Silk Road to Antioch and Sephoris, where early Christians would easily have come in contact with them.
