Richard Bauckham

The Centrifugal Mission of the Church

/ davidsschrock

outreachHow should the church live, move, and have its mission?

In him we live and move and have our being
— Acts 17:28 —

 Just before this verse, Paul makes an important point about God’s relationship with the nations. He writes, “He made . . . every nation . . . to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him.”

The theological truth Paul posits is that God upholds the universe and directs the ways of history, and he establishes the boundaries of nations. Even with the back-and-forth of disputed territories, God is the determiner of the “allotted periods and boundaries.” Set in the context of redemptive history, this means that God dealt only with Israel for two millennia. Paul calls this “the times of ignorance” (v. 30). It was a time when the nations were without God’s law (Ps 147:19–20) and had to feel their way towards him, if they could.

Such was the wreckage after the fall. Adam’s sin led the human race into disobedience (Rom 5:18–19) and death (Eph 2:1–3). With no natural power to seek God (Rom 3:10–23), the nations were utterly lost, without hope and without God in the world (Eph 2:11–13). Yet, in his love, God initiated a course of action that would bring salvation to the world.

In Genesis 12, God chose Abraham to be the source of blessing for the world. Through God’s promise to him, God would bring an offspring to bless the world (Gal 3:16). Yet, in sending his Son there was and has continued to be confusion about how the nations would come to receive the blessing of God.

Here’s what I mean: In Israel, the confusion was a theological problem—how can an uncircumcised Gentile be saved? Today, it is a methodological problem—should we focus our mission on bringing people to church? Or should we go to them? Continue reading →

Bauckham’s Jesus and The God of Israel (pt. 2): Other Studies in NT Christology

/ davidsschrock

Bauckham, Richard. Jesus and the God of Israel: God Crucified and Other Studies on the New Testament’s Christology of Divine Identity. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008.

Chapters 2-8

Chapter 2 was first published in Out of Egypt, volume 5 in the Scripture and Hermeneutics series, and addresses the “problems of monotheism” in recent interpretation. Bauckham spends over twenty pages addressing current opponents of biblical monotheism (i.e. Nathan McDonald: monotheism as an organizing principle (Enlightenment); Robert Gnuse: monotheism as evolutionary model (history of religions)), and then appeals to early sources and the biblical canon to show how monotheism is understood biblically. Scripture reserves unique and unparalleled language for God. Moving from Old to New, Bauckham shows how NT texts like Rom. 28-30; 1 Cor. 8:1-6; John 10:30 use monotheistic texts from the OT in ways that preserve the singular nature of God and yet expand the application to include the identity of Jesus.

Chapters 3-5 consider three biblical concepts or themes that relate to the topic of monotheism and Jesus identity. Chapter 3 makes the case that El Elyon is not akin to the gods of Greek mythology, who exist in some kind of pantheon or divine council. Rather in the biblical witness, El Elyon refers to the God who is utterly transcendent, unique, and solely Divine. Bauckham distinguishes between ‘exclusive’ and ‘inclusive’ monotheism (108), and proves from texts like Deuteronomy 32:8-9 and other Jewish literature that the God of Israel is exclusively God. Moving from uniqueness in name and identity to uniqueness in worship, Bauckham considers the worship of Jesus in chapter 4. Since worship is absolutely reserved for God alone (cf. Ex. 20:1-3), it would be forbidden for Jesus to receive worship unless he was God. Bauckham points this out and then describes the historical records to prove how the early church unanimously worshiped Christ, proving again the mutual identification of Jesus and God. Finally, in chapter 5, Bauckham considers the “throne of God and the worship of Jesus.” Like in the last chapter, worship of Jesus proves his identification with God, but now Bauckham goes a step further highlighting the way Jesus shares in God’s throne. Speaking of Daniel 7, he writes, “the Son of Man participates in God’s unique sovereignty, and accordingly portrays him seated on the divine throne” (170). This OT vision is corroborated by the New Testament’s unique use of Psalm 110 and John’s apocalypse, where both indicate a kind of shared throne. Bauckham’s conclusion is that this again proves his thesis.

Finally, chapters 6-8 each look at a different NT author and the way they worked out Jesus divine identity. Chapter 6 looks at the apostle Paul; chapter 7 examines Hebrews; and chapter 8 finishes with a study of Mark. With Paul, Bauckham finds that his interpretations are unique and unprecedented in antecedent Jewish literature. Therefore, the kind of exegetical method he employed is not appropriated from his culture, but was revealed to him—probably on the road to Damascus, certainly by the Spirit of Christ. This interpretive novelty resulted in theological formulations of Christ’s divine Sonship that transcend Jewish contemporaries. The book of Hebrews is no different. From the “full divinity of the Lord” described in the opening chapters, to the heavenly mediation of his priesthood, to the simple ascription of Jesus unchanging nature (13:8), all of Hebrews points to Jesus identity as God. In chapter 8, Bauckham concludes with a brief exegetical consideration of Mark’s portrayal of the passion. He concludes once more that Jesus is identified with God in the book and that this theme reaches its zenith at the cross, where ironically as God fades in view, God’s son is revealing the very heart of God—“self-giving love.”[1]

In the end, there are points where Bauckham overstates his case and the steady drum he beats becomes drone-like.  Yet, this weakness only complements his greatest strength, which is convincingly proving his point and expounding his thesis—“the inclusion of Jesus in the unique divine identity” (19).  The reader, this one at least, comes away from the book feeling very compelled by his argument–Jesus shares the Divine Identity with the Father.  (I must insert here that Andrew Chester, in his book Messiah and Exaltation, is less convinced than this reader by some of Bauckham’s handling of Jewish literature–no doubt because he knows this material much better than I.  See Jim Hamilton’s book review, especially his notes on chapter 2, for a synopsis–or take out a loan and buy the book, $200+).

In all his biblical research, his arguments touch on many systematic doctrines—Christology, Theology Proper, and Theological Hermeneutics, being a few—yet, staying in his field of expertise, he has not interfaced his conclusions with doctrinal formulation. In this way, his conclusions seem to be most directed toward the biblical exegete. Therefore, there is much that can and should be done with this data to integrate it with other more philosophical and theoretical Christologies. Applications for Trinitarian research and theological method are only two possibilities. Moreover, how does the Holy Spirit fit into the paradigm?  And, how does this Christology of identity interface or improve functional and ontic Christologies?  Bauckham wants to dismiss these categories, I would prefer to reform/inform with more biblical data.

On the whole, Bauckham’s book is a fine work. He is a meticulous scholar, whose biblical theological insights are well-researched and spiritually-enriching. I look forward to the completion of his project on this subject.

[1] Here again, I hesitate, because I am not sure what Bauckham is saying about God (i.e. Theology Proper). Much of his language does not distinguish God the Father and God the Son; it only speaks of God and Jesus. This kind of generic language for the cross is unhelpful, because it was God the Son, alone, who died on the cross. Ironically, while Bauckham, in his whole presentation, is comparing Jesus to God, I recall little Trinitarian notions of Son and Father. It is primarily Jesus (the man) and God (the divine).  But I will not fault him greatly, because his work is intentionally exegetical, not systematic.

Bauckham’s Jesus and The God of Israel (1): God Crucified

/ davidsschrock / 1 Comment

Bauckham, Richard. Jesus and the God of Israel: God Crucified and Other Studies on the New Testament’s Christology of Divine Identity. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008.

Chapter 1: God Crucified

Richard Bauckham is an insightful and well-published New Testament scholar from the United Kingdom. In Jesus and the God of Israel, he expands his shorter 1998 work, God Crucified: Monotheism and Christology in the New Testament. Yet, this current volume is still not the detailed work he promised in the preface to his early work. Instead, it is a set “of working papers on the way on the way to that book” (xi). Nevertheless, its contents richly defend and develop the thesis of God Crucified, which states “that the highest possible Christology—the inclusion of Jesus in the unique divine identity—was central to the faith of the early church even before any of the New Testament writings were written, since it occurs in all of them” (19). The rest of the book goes on to explicate this thesis and to prove its truthfulness from many New Testament authors with answers to many contemporary objections. (Today we are only addressing the first chapter).

In chapter 1, Bauckham raises the debated question: How did Jewish monotheism coexist with or evolve into New Testament Christology? To introduce his subject, Bauckham highlights two contemporary approaches to answering this question. The more traditional approach maintains “strict” monotheism, but has minimized the claims of Christ in the New Testament, while revisionist approaches expand divinity to include “intermediary figures” who possess a “semi-divine status” (2).  The latter approach affirms Jesus deity, along with a host of other supernatural beings.  Bauckham contends against both methods. While agreeing with the notion of strict monotheism, he does not conclude that Jesus is somehow lesser. The goal of the whole book is to show Jesus divine uniqueness.

The first section of the chapter is spent tracing the historic “strict” monotheism of Second Temple Judaism and the way in which intermediaries function. His historic analysis shows its divergence with New Testament Christology, and sets up the second part of his introductory argument.  In section two of “God Crucified,” Bauckham advances an approach built on the progressively revealed, mutual identity of YHWH and Jesus Christ. He writes of this approach:

I shall concentrate on illustrating a way of reading the texts which puts the whole question of the character of the New Testament Christology in a new light. In this argument, the understanding of Jewish monotheism which I have propsed will funation as the hermeneutical key to understanding the way I which the New Testament tests relate Jesus Christ to the one God of Jewish monotheism… In this way, they develop a kind of Christological monotheism which is fully continuous with early Jewish monotheism, but distinctive in the way it sees Jesus Christ himself as intrinsic to the identity of the unique God (19).

With this framework in place, Bauckham moves through the second section (and really the rest of the book) showing how Christ takes on the identity of Israel’s God. At the end of the section, after testing biblical texts against his “hermeneutical key,” Bauckham posits “identity” as the way to go forward in Christological formulation. Against functional and ontic Christologies, he contends:

A Christology of divine identity will take us, I suggest, beyond the fundamentally misleading contrast between ‘functional’ and ‘ontic’ Christology as categories for reading the New Testament texts. In my view, these categories have proved inadequate to the task of illuminating the texts, not least because they do not reflect an adequate understanding of the way Jewish monotheism understood God (30).

This appeal to identity leads into Bauckham’s third and final section in chapter 1, where he argues that God’s identity is revealed in Jesus Christ in new and greater ways than the Old Testament. Still, in this new revelation the veracity and consistency of the Old Testament revelation is unquestioned. The God of Israel who revealed himself in the Exodus has now become the God of Jesus Christ, and the God who is Jesus Christ, who is revealed most completely on the cross (52-53).[1] Bauckham calls this kind of divine recapitulation, “consistency and novelty,” and it proves very useful in putting the OT monotheism together with NT Christology and Trinitarian thought.

The rest of the book builds on this opening chapter, thus the reason why so much attention has been given to it here. However, even before moving on, there are two questions that arise from Bauckham’s model. First, how much is his chapter, “God Crucified,” shaped by Moltmann’s book of similar name, The Crucified God? Is it possible that the God that Bauckham describes, while being clearly monotheistic, is yet a panentheistic God (cf. John Cooper, The Other God of the Philosophers)? I am totally supportive of understanding the God of Israel through the full revelation of Jesus Christ (cf. Heb. 1:1-3), but when he begins to appeal to theologians like Moltmann who make the cross to be the place where Deity dies and reveals himself, I hesitate. 

Second, is his dismissal of functional and ontic Christology necessary and/or helpful? Perhaps for NT exegesis it is helpful to delimit Christology to identification, but for systematic theology, these questions cannot be ignored. Even if at points we admit uncertainty or ineffability, we still are within our epistemic rights to ask questions and make assertions of function and ontology. Overall then, his attention to divine identity is helpful and, as he demonstrates in chapters 2-8, exegetically faithful and theological fruitful…but (and this is the theologian coming out) this YHWH-Christ identification must help us formulate ontological and functional components of Christology as well, not deny them carte blanche.

On the whole, I think Bauckham’s proposal is very helpful.  We will pick up the rest of the book tomorrow.

Sola Deo Gloria, dss

[1] Bauckham goes on to appeal to Luther’s “theology of the cross” and Moltmann’s The Crucified God as representatives of this kind of thought, namely that God has revealed himself most completely in Jesus’ death.

Worship Tests Truth :: Doctrine Determines Doxology

/ davidsschrock / 1 Comment

In Richard Bauckham’s book Jesus and the God of Israel (2008), the British NT scholar quotes John MacIntrye to make his final appeal that the worship of Jesus in the early church signifies a first-century consensus that Jesus was God, and that the notion of Jewish monotheism included Jesus.  Though Bauckham’s presentation deals with the history of theology, his point bears personal inquiry and application for those in the church today.  Here is the illuminating quote:

[We] shall not be satisfied with any christological analysis which eliminates from its conception of who he [Jesus Christ] is all valid basis for an attitude of worship to him.  It is on this very score that humanistic interpretations [read: the Jesus Seminar, Protestant liberalism, and strands of the emergent church] of the person of Jesus Christ fail, that they present to us someone who cannot sustain human worship; admiration, perhaps, even a sense of wonder at the courage he had in the face of danger and death, but never worship.  That is given only to God.

Theology that does not purify and empower doxology is false!  For worship is a telling litmus test for doctrine; and the veracity of any truth-claim must always generate worship.  Remember, believers worship in spirit and truth (John 4:24), and if our worship is weak, the cause may be the truths we believe.

Sadly, this worship-doctrine connection is often overlooked.  Many Christians have substandard beliefs about God and wonder why they struggle to have a quiet time.  They assume that their failing worship requires a newer and more sensational experience, but in truth, their hunger for God lags, because they have tasted vaporous imitations and turn again to empty substitutes.  Moreover, they, we, buy into the latest fads in evangelicalism, without considering how these new spiritualities of theological notions might impact their worship.  But as we are created to worship, surely, true truth must convince the mind and move the heart. 

So, the next time you encounter something about Jesus the Christ, ask yourself, is this a vision of God that will fuel my worship.  If the answer cannot be quickly affirmed, reconsidered the matter, and take pause before buying into the speaker, the system, or the soundbite.  Instead, return to the Scriptures to see the inspired revelation of God, Jesus Christ, who is the glorious Son of God, the eternal lamb, the desire of the nations, and the only one who can sustain a lifetime of white-hot worship.  Fill your heart with truths about Jesus, for nothing else will satisfy (cf. John 10:10).

May our worship purify our theology, and may all of our theology fuel worship.

Sola Deo Gloria, dss