Review of Introduction to the New Testament

RBL 07/2012 Puskas, Charles B., and C. Michael Robbins An Introduction to the New Testament 2nd edition Eugene, Ore.: Cascade, 2011. Pp. xx + 374. Paper. $43.00. ISBN 9781606087855. J. Samuel Subramanian University of Nebraska at Omaha Omaha, Nebraska An Introduction to the New Testament is a useful survey text of the progression of early Christianity in its historical setting. The book seeks “to answer fundamental questions, such as, In what type of language was the New Testament written? How reliable is our New Testament text? How do we interpret the New Testament? Why are there only twenty-seven books in the New Testament? What type of translation should I read?” (xx). As such, the book deals with the overall growth of the early Christian community as reflected in the New Testament literature rather than a detailed analysis of each book of the New Testament. The book is divided into three parts: “The World of the New Testament”; “Interpreting the New Testament”; “Jesus and Early Christianity.” It also has two appendices: “The Formation of the New Testament Canon”; “English Translation of the New Testament.” Part 1, “The World of the New Testament,” consists of four sections. Section 1 deals with “The Greco-Roman Context of the New Testament.” Since the New Testament was written in Greek, it is important to set the New Testament against the background of Greco-Roman history, politics, and beliefs. The authors state, “It was into such an environment of cultural exchange, increased mobility, political stability, and of new hopes and fears that Christianity was born and developed” (26). Section 2 surveys “The Jewish World of the New Testament,” the world in which Jesus was born and raised. This section This review was published by RBL 2012 by the Society of Biblical Literature. For more information on obtaining a subscription to RBL, please visit http://www.bookreviews.org/subscribe.asp. not only provides the beliefs and practices of Judaism but also outlines a brief history of Judaism from the sixth century B.C.E. to the second century C.E., including the Roman occupation and the various groups within Judaism. Section 3 deals with “The Language of the New Testament,” discussing the history of the Greek language, the literary types of the New Testament books, and the emergence of the Septuagint. Section 4 covers “The Text of the New Testament” in relation to the manuscripts and the history of the transmission of the New Testament text. Part 2, “Interpreting the New Testament,” includes four sections. Section 5 explores “The Historical Methods of Criticism.” The modern historical method views the New Testament books as “intricate works with ingenious literary patterns and highly developed interpretations. Before these insights the Gospels were often understood as simple recollections of events merely set together and told in a very straightforward manner” (81). The diagram presented for the transmission of the Gospel tradition is set against the background of the multiple source theory in the composition of the Synoptic Gospels. The authors do not provide any alternative source theory, simply reinforcing the multiple source theory with Mark being the first written Gospel and Matthew and Luke deriving their sources from Mark and other special sources. Under the historical methods, three biblical critical methods—source, form and redaction criticism—are discussed with examples drawn from Mark, Matthew, and Luke. Again, under the discussion of the Synoptic Problem the authors argue for one source theory, namely, the Two Document or Four Document Hypothesis, without exploring any other viable hypotheses such as the Griesbach Hypothesis, which puts Matthew first, Luke second and Mark third. Section 6 explores “The Genres of the Gospels and Acts.” The Gospels are considered as ancient biographies and Acts as Hellenistic historiography. The authors make a general comparison of the Gospels and Acts against the background of ancient biographies and Hellenistic historiography, respectively. But the authors do not discuss the genre of the individual pericopes and assign them to a particular genre, such as myth, legend, or pronouncement stories (as evident in the works of Martin Dibelius). Although the authors note the birth story of Jesus found in Matthew and Luke as a biographical trait, they do not seem to recognize the birth story of Jesus as a myth with legendary overlay. Section 7 deals with “The Ancient Letter Genre.” Setting it against the backdrop of literary types of ancient letters such as personal, business, official, public, fictional, and discursive, the authors classify the letters of the New Testament according to their literary genres. Section 8 addresses “The Genres of the Apocalypse (Revelation) of John.” The authors discuss various genres found in the apocalyptic book of Revelation, such as prophecy, epistolary, narrative, symbols, and myths. The authors caution the readers of the mythical worldview of the Apocalypse: “Our discussion of myth in the book of This review was published by RBL 2012 by the Society of Biblical Literature. For more information on obtaining a subscription to RBL, please visit http://www.bookreviews.org/subscribe.asp. Revelation is not to be understood in a negative or denigrating light but in a positive and functional sense” (157). Part 3, “Jesus and Early Christianity,” has seven sections. Section 9 deals with reconstructing the life of Jesus in chronological order. Taking both the Gospel sources and Roman history, the authors reconstruct a tentative chronology of Jesus’ life. Section 10 outlines the issues involved in the quest for the historical Jesus. The authors address the cultural problem, the source problem, and the criteria of authenticity to establish the historical credibility of Jesus as presented in the Gospels. Section 11 surveys “The message of Jesus.” The dominant message of Jesus is focused on God’s reign, which is discussed under five themes: God’s present rule; the accomplishment of divine rule by God; the definition of human standards by God’s rule; the challenge of God’s rule; and the revelation of God’s rule as a merciful Father (185–94). Section 12 concerns the chronology of Paul’s life. The authors acknowledge the lack of historical sources available in reconstructing the chronology of Paul’s life: “The problems of Pauline chronology are similar to those in the study of Jesus. Evidence is sparse and scattered, and the sources are often dominated by literary and religious purposes” (195). The reconstructed chronology of Paul is derived from Paul’s letters, the Acts of the Apostles, and some second-century writings (205). Section 13 explores “The Major Phases of Early Christianity”: (1) before the destruction of Jerusalem in 70; (2) from 70 C.E. to the end of the first century; and (3) from the late first century to the early second century. In this section only the first two periods are discussed, leaving the reader to wonder if the third period was omitted or deferred to the next section, which deals with emerging orthodoxy. Under Phase 1 (30–70 C.E.), two major groups are discussed: rural itinerant charismatics and urban community organizers. Jesus of Nazareth and the Jesus-movement are grouped under the rural itinerant charismatics; Hebrew/Aramaic-speaking groups and Greek-speaking Jewish Christians are grouped under the urban community organizers respectively. Phase 2 (70– 95 C.E.) examines the groups in the following order: Markan Christianity, Matthean Christianity, Lukan Christianity, Deutero-Pauline Christianity, and Johannine Christianity. Because of the authors’ preference for Markan priority, Markan Christianity is discussed as the earliest form of Christianity. But a closer examination of Mark’s Gospel in comparison with Matthew and Luke could have placed Markan Christianity in the third place, as Mark exhibits a highly sophisticated Son of God Christology that was developed out of Matthew and Luke. Sections 14 and 15 survey “Emerging Christian Orthodoxy” in two parts: “false teachings” such as Gnosticism, asceticism, libertinism, realized eschatology, and docetism; the characteristics of emerging orthodoxy such as a fixed organizational structure, efforts to preserve the apostolic traditions, emphasis on confessions and creeds, the establishment of specific worship patterns, concern for normative Christian ethics, and the emergence of a distinct collection of sacred writings. This review was published by RBL 2012 by the Society of Biblical Literature. For more information on obtaining a subscription to RBL, please visit http://www.bookreviews.org/subscribe.asp. Among the two appendixes, “The Formation of the New Testament Canon” could have been placed at the very first in this volume. The readers have to wait until the very end of the book to learn about how the books of the New Testament came to be canonized, a topic that should be addressed at the very beginning. There are some aspects of this volume that invite critical attention. First, the authors discuss both the Greco-Roman and Jewish backgrounds in order to understand the development of Christianity. But the authors do not seem to fully integrate those backgrounds into the life of Jesus. For instance, the Greco-Roman world had heroes who were divinized (93). Heroes such as Hercules and Apollonius of Tyana were regarded as miracle workers who were believed to have attained immortality after death. In light of that, how does one understand the life of Jesus whose biography was written in Greek? Did the Gospel writers present Jesus as Hercules to the Greek readers, given the mythical and legendary Gospel sources? At least a short discussion of Jesus relating to Hercules would help readers to see the connection between those two divinized heroes. Further, the Jews expected a messianic figure like King David, a prophet, or an eschatological heavenly Son of Man (46). In light of those expectations, how was Jesus made to assume one or multiple roles in bringing about the deliverance for God’s people? Did the Jews of Jesus’ time see Jesus as a kingly or prophetic or eschatological figure? Or was Jesus believed to be such a figure later by his followers? The authors do not make a connection between Jesus and the fulfillment of the hopes of the Jewish people. Readers may expect to know if Jesus did or did not fulfill the essential characteristics of those Jewish figures. Second, the authors assume that most of the New Testament books were written by Jews (58). Although one would find some Palestinian sources or Palestinian context in the Gospels, the Gospels were written in Greek for the Greek audience. It is in that context the Gospel writers used the Septuagint rather than the Hebrew Bible to interweave different layers of sources to make it intelligible for the Gentiles. Apart from Paul, we have little evidence to prove the Jewish authorship of the New Testament writings. For instance, Matthew wrote, “from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah son of Barachiah, whom you murdered between the sanctuary and the altar” (Matt 23:35). According to the Hebrew Bible, it was Zechariah son of the priest Jehoiada who was stoned to death in the temple (2 Chr 24:20–21). There are many other instances in Matthew that contradict the parallel sources in the Hebrew Bible. It seems to suggest that the author of the first written Gospel was not a Jewish Christian, although he would have used some Palestinian written sources. Further, the authors do not discuss the authorship of each book of the New Testament. Perhaps a discussion of the question of authorship, place, and date of the New Testament writings could have provided adequate information of the ethnic origin of the New Testament writers. This review was published by RBL 2012 by the Society of Biblical Literature. For more information on obtaining a subscription to RBL, please visit http://www.bookreviews.org/subscribe.asp. Third, the authors’ discussion of the Synoptic Problem seems to be problematic (86–92). They seem to mislead readers into believing that the Two or Four Document Hypothesis is the only viable hypothesis and/or that other solutions of the Synoptic Problem are not viable. In fact, however, several other hypotheses are ably defended today, two of which were recently labeled “First Tier” hypothesis, the Farrer-Goulder Hypothesis and the Two Gospel (Neo-Griesbach) Hypothesis, by experts in the Synoptic Problem who themselves advocate the Two or Four Document Hypothesis. Of course, authors of textbooks or introductions dealing with the New Testament cannot be experts in every area of New Testament study, but such authors should at least research the recent literature in the field in order to discover what is, in fact, the current status questionis in an area in which such authors are not themselves researchers and experts. This is not just a problem of these authors but of many authors of these kinds of books. The authors do not propose any other alternative hypothesis but simply try to impose Markan priority upon the readers with only a passing remark (89 n. 14) to the Griesbach hypothesis. The three arguments that the authors state briefly for Markan priority are: (1) Why would Mark conflate Matthew and Luke to produce another Gospel? (2) Why would Mark omit most of the materials such as birth stories and postresurrection stories? and (3) What kind of religious author could Mark have been if he had copies of Matthew and Luke and omitted so much material from those two Gospels? They conclude, “The above problems support the view that Mark was the first Gospel and that Matthew and Luke used Mark independently. This hypothesis, for a majority of scholars, best explains the phenomena of similarities and differences between Matthew, Mark, and Luke (called the Synoptic Problem)” (89). I would like to draw attention to a scholarly work by David B. Peabody and the Research Team, One Gospel from Two: Mark’s Use of Matthew and Luke. A Demonstration by the Research Team of the International Institute for Renewal of Gospel Studies (Harrisburg, Pa.: Trinity Press International, 2002), which demonstrates with careful illustrations and color-coded Gospel texts in Greek on a separate CD ROM, as to how Mark could have creatively abbreviated both Matthew and Luke and produced a third Gospel for catechetical purposes in the early church. Peabody concludes The Markan overlay is a linguistic, stylistic, and thematic unity which is interwoven throughout the Markan Gospel. Most of this material would be attributed to the author of Mark on any analysis, so this allows us to ask again, from the perspective of the Two Source Hypothesis, as classically stated by Streeter, “How did Matthew and Luke, while making independent use of Mark, manage to agree in omitting so much of the Markan overlay?” It is far more likely that we see in this overlay the compositional and theological work that this author, Mark, added to his newly edited form of the Gospel, one that he This review was published by RBL 2012 by the Society of Biblical Literature. For more information on obtaining a subscription to RBL, please visit http://www.bookreviews.org/subscribe.asp. composed primarily by drawing together from his predecessors, Matthew and Luke. (One Gospel from Two, 346). As a teacher of the New Testament I remain objective in presenting various hypotheses on the Synoptic Problem to the students I teach and let them decide on a hypothesis that best makes use of both internal and external evidence in order to arrive at a viable source hypothesis. As far as my own research into the Synoptic Problem is concerned, the Two Gospel Hypothesis (also known as the Neo-Griesbach Hypothesis) is the only hypothesis that systematically accounts for the compositional characteristics of Mark’s Gospel and takes into due consideration the patristic evidence that places Mark third in the compositional order of the Synoptic Gospels. The volume under review does not give a balanced view on the solutions to the Synoptic Problem. Failure to deal with the current state of the Synoptic Problem seems to show the authors’ weakness in addressing this very important issue in the study of sources of the Synoptic Gospels. Fourth, the authors only mention the message of Jesus, primarily Jesus’ teachings on the kingdom of God (181–94). One would also expect to have some kind of discussion of the acts of Jesus, such as the healing stories, Jesus’ dealings with the temple and the religious leaders, and his death on the cross. Although historians do not attribute some or all of the acts of Jesus recorded in the Gospels to the historical Jesus, a summary of what he did, as presented in the Gospels whether it is historically reliable or not, could help readers to appropriate a comprehensive picture of Jesus’ life, at least according to the Evangelists. Fifth, in constructing a chronology of Paul’s life the authors derive their information primarily from Paul’s letters and secondarily from the Acts of the Apostles. Although the authors compare Paul’s revelatory experience of the risen Christ mentioned by Paul himself in Gal 1:15–16 with the three comparable accounts found in Acts 9:1–9; 22:6–16; and 26:12–18, they do not seem to recognize the internal discrepancies within the three accounts in Acts. For instance, in Acts 9:7 it is stated that Paul’s companions “heard the voice, but saw no one,” whereas Acts 22:9 reports that Paul’s companions “saw the light, but did not hear the voice.” Again in Acts 9:4, only Saul fell to the ground, whereas in Acts 26:14 everyone, including Paul’s companions, fell to the ground. Further, in Acts 9:1–9 and 22:6–16 Paul was not given his commission right away, whereas in Acts 26:16– 18 Paul was given the commission to preach to the Gentiles in this same supernatural encounter with Jesus. These discrepancies seem to suggest that one cannot even compare the tales of Paul’s accounts of his revelation of Jesus Christ in Acts with Paul’s own retelling of what is presumably the same story in Gal 1:15–16. Probably Paul’s revelation was a slow process rather than an instantaneous and dramatic one as described in Acts. Since the author of Acts has his own theological agenda in telling the stories of the growth of the early church in an artistic way, there appear to be two versions of the chronology of This review was published by RBL 2012 by the Society of Biblical Literature. For more information on obtaining a subscription to RBL, please visit http://www.bookreviews.org/subscribe.asp. Paul’s life: one based on Acts and the other based on Paul’s letters. Any attempt to reconcile those two sources and arrive at one chronology of Paul’s life does not do justice to those sources, which are diametrically opposed to one another at important points. Additionally, the authors do not discuss Paul’s central message, as they did with Jesus. A separate section on Paul’s message might help readers to understand how Paul articulated the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. My critical analysis of this volume in no way diminishes my appreciation of its authors’ basic contribution to New Testament studies. The presentation and basic discussion of the topics make it a usable volume. As such, it is an appropriate volume that may be used as a supplementary text to a book that addresses systematically and historically all critical issues in the study of the New Testament. This review was published by RBL 2012 by the Society of Biblical Literature. For more information on obtaining a subscription to RBL, please visit http://www.bookreviews.org/subscribe.asp.