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 Disappointing Oct 18, 2009
James McGrath teaches religion at Butler University. I enjoyed enormously his theological research monograph John's Apologetic Christology (corresponding to his PhD in New Testament theology under the famous James Dunn), and liked quite much his scholarly theological book The Only True God: Early Christian Monotheism in Its Jewish Context (I very heartily do recommend both books).
So I was having good expectations about this book. But I am disappointed.
First of all this is in no way a scholarly book. It is not written for an academic readership nor in a academic manner, but it is a popular book that seems to aim at the evangelicals, who are not educated nor read in theology. Although he tries to go down to the level of the layman, his manner of speech is not so personal, but still feels like that of a professor. With this book he does not seem to be as gifted as Bart Ehrman in reaching out to a large audience.
In the first chapter McGrath explains that he has to work as a historian. In the third and last chapter presents a (unorthodox) view which is also frequent among New Testament exegetes regarding resurrection.
It is in the second chapter that McGrath shares his own contribution, a reasoning regarding the burial of Jesus according to his historical approach. Using knowledge about general Roman practices, he relies on the gospel accounts, but not in a positive manner, seeing them instead as fabrications which show that they were made up to cover up embarrassing facts. Actually I don't think see his view is new, and such a view is refuted (for lack of explanatory power, etc.) by William Craig in the last chapter of his book Reasonable Faith, 3rd ed. 2008. Craig takes into account the whole pictures and all the possibilities regarding a credible birth of Christianity and the reaction of its enemies.
But the best book on the issue The Final Days of Jesus: The Archaeological Evidence, 2009, is definitely not written by a theologian / religious scholar, but by a historian, the Israel-based archaeologist Shimon Gibson. Ironically this book may enrage theologian (who normally dismiss the John's gospel as historically worthless), as Shimon Gibson, being a historian / archeologist and no theologian, has no prejudice against the datation of the high christology of the fourth gospel, which contains many historical statements which have been archaeologically confirmed (which show an accurate knowledge of the culture and religion of Palestine at the time), and has a higher regard for it than for the synoptics... Shimon Gibson's book, also aimed at a popular readership, is also much more entertaining, yet strongly based on scholarship (long bibliography, and about 300 endnotes). Shimon Gibson has a chapter on the burial of Jesus (chap. 7), deals also with the issue of the trench grave, and as an authority on the subject, comes to quite other conclusions that McGrath. Strangely, it is Shimon Gibson the (apparently) non-Christian archaeologist, who gives support to the gospel account of John (and somewhat, more critically, to the synoptics), whereas it is McGrath, the Christian theologian, who debunks the gospel accounts and church traditions regarding the burial of Jesus. Both should then be praised for their intellectual honesty.
With all my apologies to McGrath, I recommend then Shimon Gibson's The Final Days of Jesus: The Archaeological Evidence instead of the present book (and some passages in Craig's Reasonable Faith). And if someone is looking for a treatment by other N.T. theologians of the same issue McGrath dealt with, I do recommend Craig Evans and N. T. Wright's Jesus, the Final Days: What Really Happened (2009), esp. Chap. 2 « The Silence of Burial ». James McGrath remains however a sympathetic author to me and I hope that he will produce excellent books again like his first two ones.
1 of 1 found the following review helpful:
 A Great Introduction to Higher Criticism and Faith Apr 20, 2009
I posted this review on my blog, http://www.shuckandjive.org/2009/04/dead-and-buried.html
James McGrath is the Associate Professor of Religion at Butler University and a prolific blogger at Exploring Our Matrix.
His short book is divided into five chapters,
1. Introduction,
2. Beyond Reasonable Doubt: How History Works,
3. Death Before Dishonor: The Burial of the Historical Jesus,
4. Jesus Beyond the Tomb: Matters of Death and (After)life,
5. Conclusion: Beyond History
In the introduction, James states the purpose of this book:
"This book will seek to clarify precisely how historical study works, and will argue that the very common approach of taking Biblical stories uncritically at face value, and using them as a reason for dismissing evidence not only from history but from science and other sources of knowledge, is fundamentally misguided." P. 8
In the second chapter, James covers a lot of ground, including the relationship between who Jesus was and who Jesus is (history and faith), how historians weigh evidence, authorship of the gospels, the synoptic problem, and the difference between a literary and an historical approach to the gospels. This is an excellent introduction to the basics of higher criticism. James writes that...
"...the New Testament Gospels do not give us direct access to firsthand accounts of eyewitness testimony." P. 35
Given that, how do scholars determine whether statements made by Jesus (or any of the characters) are historical reporting or literary creations? How do you know when the authors are giving us the facts or spin? That is why we need historical study:
"Historical study is not the only way of approaching the Gospel, and depending what one hopes to accomplish, it may or may not be the best way. But if one wants to ascertain what we can know about Jesus as a historical figure "beyond reasonable doubt," then historical study is the only way to accomplish that." p. 58
In chapter three, James makes his unique contribution by discussing the burial of Jesus. According to James, if there is one piece of data more reliable than all others, it is that the historical Jesus was executed.
"The brute fact that Jesus was executed by crucifixion is essentially beyond doubt. If there was anything normally would have automatically excluded someone from serious consideration as having been the Messiah, it was being executed by the foreign power ruling over the Jews." P. 63
An executed Messiah (Christ) would need to be explained at least. Historians say it is probable that Jesus was thought of by some as a Messiah before his death and his execution created an embarrassment that needed to be explained. Paul and the Gospels were put into service to explain this oddity. Therefore historians are confident that a crucified messiah is not something you create, but an historical reality you try to understand.
"All in all, the Gospels give us a core of historical information (Jesus was crucified) overlaid with theological interpretation, and further development of the narrative based on elements drawn from the Jewish Scriptures." P. 65.
So we have him dead. How do we get him alive again? What happened to his body? Each Gospel has a narrative of going to the tomb and finding no body. What is a reasonable conclusion? In addressing that question James evaluates the Gospel accounts, Paul's witness, and ancient burial practices (including burial practices of criminals executed by the Romans). Executed criminals if buried at all were buried in a common grave. This is probably what happened to Jesus, as the earliest gospel, Mark, tells us. Joseph of Arimathea (who is not a disciple) takes the body and puts it in a tomb.
"Burial in a common grave for criminals was itself dishonorable, even though not nearly as much so as being denied burial altogether. For this reason, later Christians considered it important to honor Jesus by giving him as honorable a burial as possible in their literary depictions of the event." P. 77.
The empty tomb narratives are not historical reportage. Neither are they fabrications out of whole cloth. They are literary elaborations on an historical event. Apparently, Jesus' body wasn't where it was supposed to be when the disciples went looking for it. How do you explain a missing body? Ask your local police detective. Would a detective assume that God raised it from the dead and it is wandering around your neighborhood? A police detective would find a more mundane answer and if unable to determine the mundane answer would leave the case open rather than say God did it. This is how an historian approaches the question of Jesus' body and claims of resurrection as well. That is as far as history can go.
"...since most religious believers would agree that resurrections are both unusual and improbable events, for that very reason no historian will ever be able to say "the body was probably missing because God raised Jesus from the dead." P. 95
An empty tomb narrative proves nothing. It does however, show that the missing corpse coupled with personal visions (as attested by Paul), and experiences of a mystical nature by his followers led them to affirm that Jesus was in a very real sense, alive. That is the mystery of resurrection faith that James discusses in his final two chapters concluding:
"Resurrection faith, we have suggested in this book, was not born from historical deductions regarding the whereabouts of a body, but from life-transforming religious experiences. For those of us who have had such experiences, faith is not primarily (if at all) a matter of doctrines but of what we can only speak of in symbolic terms as a life-transforming relationship to the ultimate. When the focus of Christian faith is placed there, then the possibility of keeping faith about humble trust rather than arrogant claims to certainty becomes realistic." P. 142
This is a fine book that helps those grappling with these early texts and the central claims of faith to discover an approach that nurtures both mind and heart and sacrifices neither. I would recommend this book for both religious and non-religious people. It would make a fine text for your book club or church school class.
1 of 2 found the following review helpful:
An Excellent Starting Point Nov 18, 2008
In The Burial of Jesus: History and Faith, James McGrath provides a well-written introduction to a number of topics that many people will not have seen, but should nonetheless be aware of if they wish to understand the Bible in terms of the social and political contexts of its time. Concepts of the interplay between history and faith, the uncertain authorship of the Gospels, and the Synoptic Problem are topics that the average Christian of any (or no) denomination is unlikely to encounter unless he goes out and deliberately looks for them. McGrath gives a high-level overview of these subjects, and then ties them together with a case-study of the details of Jesus' burial as provided by the Gospels, demonstrating how the details of this event were embellished over time subsequent to their description in the earliest Gospel, Mark.
The use of Jesus' burial as the example here is an interesting one, as many discussions of Gospel inconsistencies focus on the differences between the Crucifixion accounts or the Resurrection accounts, ignoring the small but crucial matter of what happened in between. Comparing the Gospel accounts to contemporary Jewish burial customs gives clues about how far removed culturally, geographically, and temporally the Gospel writers were from the events they portrayed, and comparing the accounts to one another gives clues to how those accounts may have been embellished over time. Both comparisons illustrate the challenges inherent in literal, inerrant interpretations of the Biblical texts.
The only notable omission from the book is the lack of an index or list of references. McGrath's work here shows some echoes of the work of Bart Ehrman, the late Raymond E. Brown, and perhaps the late Bruce Metzger, all of which would be valuable resources for a reader interested in further explorations of New Testament studies.
Overall, The Burial of Jesus: History and Faith gives an excellent and very readable introductory treatment to several important topics in modern Biblical scholarship, and is highly recommended for anyone seeking a place to start gaining a deeper understanding of the Bible in the contexts from which it evolved.
Thoughtful and Challenging Oct 27, 2008
You can't use the right tools for the wrong job. You can't open a paint can with a Phillips screwdriver, you can't cut a steak with a butter knife, you can't pull a shot of espresso in a percolator, and you can't make historical claims about the bible using theological methods. That's the most important thing I learned from this book.
Here's my favourite quote, which summarizes the general perspective of the work:
Biblical Christianity . . . takes fully seriously the differences between Biblical writings and the development between them, rather than forcing their divergent perspectives into the idolatrous straightjacket of a doctrine of Biblical inerrancy. (139-40)
There are some words in that quote that will make a lot of believers uncomfortable. How can Biblical inerrancy be idolatrous? Read the book and and find out! (Here's a hint: God is the only proper object of our faith.)
This book is essentially about two related issues, reflected by the title and subtitle of the work:
1. How should history and faith interact?
2. What happened to Jesus' body when he died?
I found the discussion of how faith and history interact more compelling than the primary focus: Jesus' burial. By the time the burial was directly discussed, it felt like a mere case study of McGrath's historical method. That's not a criticism, either. A well-reasoned argument of what happened to Jesus' body after his death may convince some people on that issue. However, when you give people the critical apparatus to make those sort of investigations on their own, you've equipped them to rethink their entire belief systems.
Although McGrath's conclusions on the second question (above) will disturb a lot of evangelicals, it's simply the logical outworking of his method. History and faith are different, but complimentary. McGrath refers to them as "necessary partners" (10). Listen to his words on the relationship between them:
The problem is that Christians often wish to make historical claims without having sufficient historical evidence, as well as at times confusing theological affirmations with historical ones. (97)
When you look at many of the popular apologetic works of the last century, you'll see this problem in action. Believers love to make historical claims based on their theological presuppositions. The use of real historical method can feel threatening, because it doesn't respect our theological safety zones. But is all truth God's truth, or not?
Faith may go beyond historical data, but it should never either ignore such information or be in contradiction to it. (20)
Admitting that we have partial historical data that is open to misinterpretation and restructuring, this statement holds. If we cherish a theological view that is clearly and obviously contradicted by the evidence, then the God--who is truth--demands we reconcile the dissonance. The case of Galileo and heliocentricity is a telling case study here.
This book will make people uncomfortable, but that's a good thing. If you're ready to question your assumptions and drop some defensive posturing from your faith, McGrath is a steady guide.
5 of 5 found the following review helpful:
When history and faith collide Oct 12, 2008
The author states that his book is historical rather than a work on faith. To a point it is exactly that but in the last few chapters his personal religious experience seems to trump historical (or scientific) inquiry. More on that in a bit.
Overall McGrath does a good job of laying out how history and historians work. He compares the work of a historian to that of a prosecuting attorney which is actually close to the mark. Generally speaking historians take the available evidence and attempt to make a case towards credibility. They consider such things as authorship, sources, interpretation, style, bias, and audience. In addition, when possible, historians prefer primary (aka original) sources to examine. However, even with original sources at hand it can be very hard to figure out "what really happened." Naturally, McGrath is quick to point this out when he discusses a modern-day parallel: the Kennedy assassination. Even with primary sources, eyewitnesses that are still alive, and film footage some historians still disagree on what happened during this event. Moreover, there is a fringe group of conspiracy theorists who pose all sorts of outlandish claims.
This is important to bring up when discussing an event that happened 2,000 years ago. Moreover, as McGrath is quick to mention: there are no primary sources that chronicle the death of Jesus. What we have are New Testament manuscripts that are copies of copies with no certainty at all of authorship. This is not to say we should discount their value altogether. However, it makes it much harder to get at real event. Still historians who study ancient history deal with this problem frequently. For example, the majority of historians who study Socrates believe he existed. Yet we've never found anything that he wrote. What we know of him is based on the writings of Plato and Xenophon. So it is not unreasonable to make a similar case towards the existence of a person named Jesus.
For the most part McGrath limits his historical examination of Jesus to the crucifixion and resurrection. He spends a lot of time discussing what may have happened with views ranging from the body being stolen to various tomb scenarios. However, he states on p. 61 that when considering the resurrection the tools of history can neither "confirm it or deny it". Here I would disagree. Historians frequently use their method to write opinions on what really happened. For example, both religious and nonreligious historians have attempted to make Abraham Lincoln their own. So too a historian could look at all resurrection events throughout human history and then speculate as to what is really going on. It could be that people do indeed rise (bodily or spiritually) from the dead or their might be a natural explanation. Regardless, bracketing out "religious experience" as something history or science cannot explain is artfully dodging the crux of matter: was Jesus the incarnation of God?
While I disagree with McGrath on certain points the book is interesting and does explore a facet of the Jesus story that is often overlooked: what happened between the death and alleged resurrection event. Moreover, rarely (if ever!) is the historical method covered in your typical Sunday sermon. Thus, McGrath's book will likely serve as an eye-opener for most Christians who base their faith primarily on that which which was taught to them at an early age. I also imagine that some Christians will discount McGrath as too liberal while others may be shocked and some might actually learn something or even have their faith reaffirmed.
As for personal religious experience validating Christianity; well, here I must part ways with the author. First, this notion is problematic for the thousands of people who never have had a "religious experience" (including this reviewer). Secondly, it does little to validate Christianity's truth claim when you have hundreds of competing religions with adherents who all cite the same thing!
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