Israel's God and Rebecca's Children: Christology and Community in Early Judaism and Christianity

Chapter 1: How We Talk about Christology Matters

1 Chapter 1 How We Talk about Christology Matters A miscellany of categories and descriptors has come to dominate our discussions of Christology over the years, labels and definitions we have inherited from our predecessors: “adoptionist,” “high” versus “low,” “subordinationist,” “incarnational,” and so forth.1 While there is nothing inherently wrong with such theologically sympathetic labels, I fear that they have done more to hamper our understandings of early Christology and its development from the New Testament to Chalcedon than they have aided us. They represent post-Nicene mentalities and, in essence, have boxed us into artificial Catholic and Protestant corners. If a Christology has been described as “adoptionist,” it also has been understood to be “low” because, by the definition of “adoptionist,” Jesus is not God, but is a man adopted by God at his baptism. Because it is found in our earliest gospel, Mark, we tend to see this Christology as early and connect it with “low” christological titles such as “prophet” and “Messiah.” If we talk about “incarnational” Christology, we frame it as “high” because, by the definition of “incarnational,” God becomes the human Jesus. Because it is discovered in our latest New Testament gospel, John, we tend to view it as a “later” development and associate it with titles like “Logos” and “Sophia.” As for the material that does not fit neatly into either of these categories —Paul’s testimonies, the virgin birth stories, and angelic associations —we just do not seem to know what to do with it. So we attempt to carve out some kind of in between language to include it—“preincarnational ,” “on the verge of divinity,” “angelomorphic,” “theomorphic,” “functional,” “ontic,” and so on. Then we have that really thorny evidence that has been nearly impossible to manage in this model— early April D. DeConick 2 April D. DeConick references suggesting devotion to Jesus and early passages attributing the divine Name to Jesus. This evidence has sparked heated debates about whether such a thing as “early high Christology” could have existed, a discussion entirely dependent on the works of Alan Segal and Larry Hurtado to whom this volume and this essay are dedicated.2 This discussion has stressed the old model to the point of fracture. Furthermore, the model completely fails us in our discussions of second, third, and fourth centuries Christology. If the Ebionites, for instance, are adoptionist, then what do we do with the fact that they believed without reservation that Jesus was God? Or Arius? He is explicit in his letters that even though the Son will always be a Son subordinate to the Father and a creature like the angels, he is still God. The construction of an alternative model is needed, I believe, to move us beyond the fractures and corners that have trapped us. Rather than making the starting point of this new model (as it was with the old) definitions sympathetic to post-Nicene theology, I think the new model must be built coherently and consistently out of the textual evidence gleaned from New Testament period literature. At the same time, it must make sense out of the later christological debates that led to Chalcedon, debates largely trying to explain the biblical evidence in terms beyond the biblical. When this is done, it is evident that certain geographical centers developed peculiar christological descriptors that were attended by equally peculiar soteriologies, so that it becomes possible to reconstruct three metaparadigms that dominated the Christian landscape for centuries (and frankly still do). The Impulse toward Christology What exactly happened between the years immediately following Jesus’ death and the composition of John’s gospel is anything but certain. What is most certain, however, is that Christianity either was initially very diverse or became so very quickly. I tend to favor the latter because the literary evidence supports the fact that most, if not all, of the varieties of early Christianity formed post-Jerusalem, including the Gospel of Thomas and Quelle.3 The only references I know that might marshal some evidence for pre-Jerusalem forms of Christianity are found in Mark 9:38–41 and Acts 18:24–19:7. The first is a reference to a nondisciple casting out demons in Jesus’ name and presumes an apocalyptic worldview . In Acts, we are told about Apollos, a native Jew from Alexandria, who brought a version of Christianity to Ephesus that taught a baptism How We Talk about...