Endnote 6 – The Son of Man

The Jesus Seminar nevertheless has found this saying to be inauthentic. See Robert W. Funk and Roy W. Hoover, The Five Gospels (New York: Macmillan, 1993), p. 80, where the phrase is inaccurately translated as “the son of Adam.” This Jesus Seminar publication simply assumes that the saying cannot be authentic because Jesus cannot have claimed so much authority for himself. In other words, a preconceived view of what Jesus would have said about himself has determined the judgment of what he did say about himself. Several of us who have participated in the Jesus Seminar, although we have appreciated the experience, have criticized our colleagues for voting along what seem to be ideological lines. Historical judgments should be based on an analysis of how traditions concerning Jesus developed, not on global assumptions regarding what he should have said or could have said.