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Ben Witherington’s response to my essay is helpful in that it does more than just find fault: It begins to grapple with some fundamental issues.
My crucial claim is that a large majority of critical scholars share the Jesus Seminar’s basic view that the Gospels are a complex blend of fact and fiction. Witherington does not dispute this, though he wants to put the matter in slightly different words. The other issues he and I discuss are minor compared to this one, and our agreement on it is most significant. Though he agrees with me in principle, he is evasive when it comes to details. The only example he gives of an inauthentic gospel saying is a secondary version (Luke’s reworking of Mark) of the centurion’s exclamation. He specifically declines to identify any saying specifically attributed to Jesus as inauthentic. In light of my inference that Witherington’s quest for the historical Jesus “does not involve questioning the historical reliability of the gospel material,” we can only speculate on the motives for his silence.
Witherington also agrees that the Gospels contain fiction, but the only items he so identifies are the parables. That parables are fictions is an innocuous admission that sidesteps the real historical question: How many of these literary fictions are actually from Jesus and how many from the church? If evangelical scholars like Witherington were to answer that question and give reasons for their answers, much would be clarified. But until we get such “grocery lists” the discussion cannot really go forward.
Witherington objects to the seminar’s “casual” use of the terms “inauthentic” and “nonhistorical.” 026(Does he also object to the casual use of “authentic” and “historical”?) The seminar’s use of these terms is based on the findings published in The Five Gospels. There is nothing “casual” about a 553-page book that reflects over six years work by some 70 scholars. What is casual is Witherington’s assurance that “even if we cannot know exactly what was said [concerning specific sayings in the Gospels], we can suspect that the Gospels capture the essence of what was said.”
Witherington’s choice of words here is revealing: “we can suspect” really means “we can have faith.” But that is not critical scholarship. The very essence of a critical quest for Jesus lies in giving reasons to believe that the Gospels give us historical information in a given passage—reasons based on evidence, supported by arguments and grounded in a methodology that is made public for all to examine. That is what the Jesus Seminar provides. Others can dispute our evidence, disagree with our arguments and criticize our methods. That is fair and necessary. But if they want to contribute to the critical task, they need to spell out their own evidence, arguments and methods.
Witherington and I differ on other points as well.
I claim that most scholars agree that few, if any, of the sayings in the Gospel of John are demonstrably authentic. Witherington responds, “For the seminar to dismiss John as a source of historical information is cavalier and reckless.” In fact, Witherington expresses little disagreement with my assessment. He says many scholars hold that John contains “some authentic sayings.” This obviously implies that these same scholars hold that many sayings in John are not authentic. I say “few,” Witherington says “some”: There is not much disagreement here. My view is based on the nearly universal recognition that it is very difficult to demonstrate the authenticity of sayings found in only one gospel, as is the case for nearly all the sayings in John. So I stand by my claim.
But there is another point to be made. Witherington’s language suggests that the seminar never took John’s gospel seriously, that it was rejected in an off-hand fashion. In reality, the seminar took 139 votes on 73 separate sayings and pericopes in John over a period of more than five years. Our votes were preceded by comprehensive reviews of relevant scholarship, careful analyses of the gospel texts and general discussions. Our findings and the reasoning behind them are explained in the 70 pages that The Five Gospels devotes to John. There is nothing dismissive, cavalier or reckless about any of this.
Setting aside certain rhetorical excesses, the foregoing are areas of honest disagreement. But there are also several instances in which Witherington misrepresents me and the seminar.
Witherington states, for example, “Miller implies that the seminar’s critics want to restrict the body of evidence concerning Jesus to the Four Gospels—that they dismiss such extra-canonical texts as the Gospel of Thomas.” But I maintain the opposite: that “both the seminar and nearly all its critics agree that Thomas cannot be left out of historical Jesus research.”
Is it true that the seminar “has forced Thomas into the canon,” as Witherington asserts? Not at all! We include Thomas in The Five Gospels because it is indispensable to the task of recovering Jesus’ authentic sayings. But this is not “forcing” it into “the canon.” The seminar has never declared that Thomas is inspired by God—we don’t say that even about the canonical Gospels! Nor have we said that Thomas belongs in the Bible.
In calling my account of the seminar “revisionist history,” Witherington insinuates that I am deliberately altering an established history for religious or political purposes. He then cites some provocative statements made by Robert Funk—presumably to show what the history of the Jesus Seminar is really like—and points out that my tone and aim differ from Funk’s. Fair enough. I am proud to be associated with Bob Funk, but that does not mean that I agree with him on everything, or even on most things, or that I endorse all of his rhetoric. One of the seminar’s strengths is that it embraces strong differences of opinion and outlook. I am not revising history; all I am doing is telling it the way I see it.
Witherington’s comments about Polebridge Press suggest that the work of the seminar is of such low quality, or so far from the mainstream, that no reputable publisher would touch it. In fact, the seminar’s landmark book on the sayings of Jesus, The Five Gospels, is published by Macmillan. The paperback edition is being published by Harper, which will also publish our forthcoming volume on Jesus’ deeds, tentatively titled The Acts of Jesus.
Someone with Witherington’s learning and stature has a real contribution to make to the discussion. Unfortunately, his insinuations sometimes obscure issues in need of open debate. The rhetorical flourish in his final sentence—“caveat emptor”—comes after an accusation that the seminar is trying to “fool” (i.e., deceive) the public.
It also comes after Witherington quotes an anonymous German as saying that the Jesus Seminar could only happen in America—which I suppose is an insult. But I will choose to understand the words “let the buyer beware” in a different sense, as a call to evaluate the work of the Jesus Seminar critically, just as we should evaluate Witherington’s writings, biblical scholarship and, indeed, the Bible itself.
Ben Witherington’s response to my essay is helpful in that it does more than just find fault: It begins to grapple with some fundamental issues.
