UPDATE:
Wayne Coppins has offered some very helpful analysis of the quotation of Jens Schroeter with which this blog post ends. See "Jens Schroeter on the character of every historical (re)presentation."
I know we've talked a lot about Jens Schroeter on the blog, but I can't help discussing a little more the significance of his From Jesus to the New Testament. A little bit ago I was working through the Wayne Coppins English translation of the chapter, "On the Historicity of the Gospels" (chapter 6), of course catching little things that I missed in the German since it's not (obviously) my native tongue. At the end of working back through this, I was convinced all the more that history will remember Schroeter for ushering in a new stage of historical Jesus work. Some of this chapter appears in English in his contribution to Jesus Research: An International Perspective, but the full version is here and much more significant than the shortened version.
Schroeter presents an argument against two objections to the usage of the Gospels as historical sources, which he terms (1) the argument of material discrepancy and (2) the argument of literary fiction. The first asserts that the narrative categories that fill the Gospels emerged only in later Christianity, have no connections to Jesus, and are therefore useless for discussing the life of Jesus. It goes back at least to Strauss but comes into full bloom especially with Bultmann's form criticism. The second argues that, since the Gospels are clearly literary creations, we can assess them only in literary (not historical) terms. This goes back to Wrede but now finds full expression in narrative-critical works that refuse even to entertain the historical question(s).
As Schroeter indicates, especially the first argument led to a privileging of (1) sayings sources and (2) detached units of tradition in historical Jesus research, resulting in the narrative frameworks of the Gospels always being treated with suspicion historically and thus ruled out of historical Jesus questioning. Calling upon Ricoeur and others, Schroeter effectively blows up this entire discussion, bringing to an end not just (in my mind) the so-called Third Quest that was so dependent upon criteria of authenticity that they inherited from the so-called No Quest and New Quest, but all form-critically inspired stages of Jesus research that proceed only upon individual units of tradition detached from the narratives of the Gospels. Schroeter insists, rightly in my opinion, that sayings and isolated traditions alone can never be a starting point for historical Jesus research because the narrativizing of the past is distinctly where the linking of present and past occurs. In other words, only narratives truly allow one to ask historical questions.
He is at pains to point out that their status as narratives does not disqualify them from being historical and, by the same token, their status as historical narratives does not mean that they are necessarily historically-reliable narratives. In short, he insists that Jesus research going forward must consist of "the combination of narrative and history of Jesus" (129n.117), and I think this important insight is something that those who would want to continue using the form-critical criteria of authenticity (see the reviews of Jesus, Criteria, and the Demise of Authenticity by Blomberg and Evans [EQ 85.4: 364-66]) fail to understand. Historical Jesus research must proceed with critically approaching the past by taking account of the sources, including the narratives, that emerged from it. In other words, the starting point for historical Jesus research is the narrativized Gospels, not what historians supposedly recover from them. Furthermore, that this is the starting point in no way implies that it is the ending point of historical-critical research; but it is the starting point. I leave you with a great quotation from the close of Schroeter's essay:
"If, however, every historical presentation presents a combination of event and narrative, including the kind that is composed under the conditions of the historical-critical consciousness, then a present-day Jesus presentation also cannot simply disregard the narrative representations of the person of Jesus in the Gospels. Instead, it has to orient itself to them and put them together anew under today's conditions of knowledge. The result is not the 'real' Jesus behind the Gospels. The result is a historical presentation that claims to be plausible under current conditions of knowledge."
Ha, ha, I was reading J. Scroter's article in "Jesus, Criteria, and the Demise of Authenticity" only this morning! Had to re-write my conclusions to chap. 3 of "Gospel of the Lord."
ReplyDeleteVerrückt! (I'll have to check out Schroeter's book)
ReplyDeletescott caulley
But, Prof. Keith, isn't working with the narratives and sayings as isolated units just a further step along the lines of having already begun with the narratives?
ReplyDeleteYes and no. Yes, in the sense that that's where you would first find them. No, in the sense that many interpreters would reject the meaning-in-context of the saying and attribute to it a different context, thus producing a different meaning, and thus enabling a construction of the historical Jesus that is detached from the earliest understanding of that saying. The question is whether the sayings and individual units are, so to speak, portable when formulating historical Jesus theories; whether historical Jesus theories must orient themselves to the meaning-in-context of the saying or the saying is free to be oriented in any alternative direction.
DeleteLet me clarify that last point. Obviously, a saying or detached tradition CAN BE oriented in any alternative direction that the historian chooses. The question is whether this is methodologically appropriate.
DeleteI would beg to disagree, Prof. Keith. One does not find isolated units in the gospel narratives. Rather, one finds such units always in relation to other units. In Mark's Gospel any given unit comes after one and before another. One of form criticism's several mistakes is that it did not pay adequate attention to the fact that the situation of a unit in a given gospel can reveal much about what the author intended to communicate through the unit. This "disagreement" is really a quibble of course, for it is just a stronger articulation of your "No" to John's question.
DeleteAnd, for historical interest, John is also a student of Anders Runesson, and for his doctorate doing some quite interesting Synoptic source criticism. This is high praise indeed, for prior to encountering his work I never expected to use "interesting" and "source criticism" in the same sentence.
Jonathan, this is the most confusing disagreement/agreement I've had in a while. :) I think I'll just say, "Thanks." I only meant "yes," however, in the sense that scholars CAN pull traditions out of their context. As my "no" goes on to say, though--and I think you agree--this is not methodologically appropriate.
DeleteLet me make some comments to see if I have understood you correctly, then you can comment.
DeleteWe can think of sayings and narrative traditions in two ways: (1) where meaning is derived from the whole (from Mark if they are in Mark, from Luke if they are in Luke, etc.) and from the immediate contexts which surround the traditions (this will be because, as Dr. Bernier says, tradition units are found always found in relation to others); and/or (2) where meaning is derived from the tradition itself (as far as this is possible) without any appeal to the surrounding narratives and sayings (even though in some sense they are a part of the larger context). The question becomes what is the most methodologically appropriate, insofar as HJ studies is concerned. Schröter seems to think that 1) is the correct point of departure even to the point that attempting to proceed by 2) is just wrongheaded. It’s unclear to me, however, whether once having set (1) as the point of departure, one can then proceed to (2) after obviating whatever issues one has to obviate. I’m assuming this is what you think about what Schröter is saying. Correct me if I’m wrong or I’m missing something.
We might also think that meaning is derived from what we know of 2nd Temple Judaism, as we understand it from writers such as Philo, Josephus, Pseudepigrapha, DDS, etc., but this it seems can be applied to either of the two approaches.
Now, certainly an aspect of Memory Theory will have us believe that the idea of what can be recalled does not extend much longer than the time frame for a saying or brief narrative episode. At least, phenomenologically speaking, that is how it appears. One operation of our complex memory system (the one which I think we are most concerned with) is episodic. Our memories “record” short portions of the totality of what I call “my conscious experience.” Or even if everything is “recorded” it is often only aspects of the whole that are accessible and not the whole. When we do HJ studies, and because we presuppose to some degree that the question concerns what is historical, thereby requiring us to take seriously ideas of how memory works, and the possibility that these narrative and sayings units stem from recollection, we, it seems, have to think of the sayings and narrative units as a memory-esque experience, which will entail thinking about them with the same kind of isolated-ness that we get with memories. Whether or not meaning can be derived from narrative-context, it seems that if we are going to consider the historical value of Jesus (his sayings, his deeds, thing which were done to him), we will have to presuppose sayings- and episodic-isolated-ness, which was then concatenated (into the oral- and written gospel-form). The narrative-context and the meanings derived from such contexts are something developed, something artificial, and not initial.
John, thanks for this response. I'll do my best to give an answer that doesn't require a book chapter. I'm not sure whether you've understood me (or Jens) entirely rightly, but I'm fairly confident that your statements about memory here would not reflect the interests of social memory theory. I'm unaware of any social memory theorists who would describe memory as a function whereby the past is "recorded." Cognitive memory theorists might be interested in this, but not social memory theory. In social memory theory, what can be recalled and the process by which it is recalled are very different from the types of statements you make here, which essentially deal with the immediate reproduction of past reality, or at least the individual's "conscious experience" of past reality. Social memory theory would speak to these things, but also has in its view much longer, culture-wide commemorative processes. It should also be said that social memory theory is not necessarily antithetical to approaching the Jesus tradition as short, pithy statements. Both Samuel Byrskog and Ruben Zimmermann have done some interesting work in this regard, in many ways affirming some of the seminal insights of the source and form critics.
DeleteThe issue for Schroeter and me concerns not the tradition-historical aspects of how the tradition developed, but how one uses the tradition, in all those complex relationships, in order to approach the past. Does one need to explain historically how early Christians came to attribute to the tradition one meaning in making historical judgments or can one simply dismiss whatever interpretation early Christians offered offhand and assume that one can approach the past by some means other than the narrative frameworks of the Gospels? Both processes can come to yes and no answers, but we suggest that the first is historiographically the most important way to proceed.
See also Anthony's respnse to Lollo below.
DeleteDo you mean that we can't extrapolate any historical information from gospels, like Jesus crucified by Pilate and so on?
ReplyDeleteLollo, I imagine that Prof. Keith will want to answer for himself. But I don't mind taking a stab at this one.
DeleteI think that an important problem here is the function that "facts" play in historical reconstruction. I think that previous models have attempted to compile a list of absolute (or relatively absolute) certainties by which all other information must be measured.
For example: Jesus was crucified (fact), therefore he must have X; or could not have Y; or he must have been a Z.
But if facts themselves are constructions that emerge from interpretive frameworks, this changes the function of interpretation in the process of assessing historical data. For example, the statement that Jesus "was crucified" is necessarily built upon grammatical, political, socio-economic, etc factors and unless those factors are framed so that the symbols function, the "fact" cannot be function.
So rather that starting with bare facts and then assessing the value of the interpretations, EVERYTHING must be assessed as interpretive reconstruction (sorry for the all caps). With this in mind, the early(iest) interpreters of events are to be privileged at times. At other times, later interpreters are to be privileged. In either case, was are always "extrapolating" as you say.
So, yes. We can extrapolate historical information from the Gospels. We all do - even those who think that we're dealing with historical fictions. But facts do not exist independently from interpretation.
-anthony
"For example: Jesus was crucified (fact), therefore . . . he must have been a Z." I see what you did there ;-)
Deleteglad somebody noticed.
Delete-anthony
What Anthony said.
Delete
ReplyDeleteThanks for your superb answer to my naive question! I've tried to put it simple to go straight to the point.
I understand it's a matter of epistemology, especially when you say that "facts do not exist independently from interpretation." I couldn't agree more , and I think that such statement is valid not just for historical studies but also for what we call "exact sciences", like physics.
By chance, I have just found an interesting article on the web, here below a short quote and the link:
<<...Science's "objective" world "is but an interpretation of the world of our immediate experience" (ANGEN, 2000, p.386)...>>
http://www.qualitative-research.net/index.php/fqs/article/view/1299/3163
I hope they make the work by Schroter available in an ebook version, as that's my preferred method of study. By the way, I'm about 1/3 of the way through Jesus, Criteria, and the Demise of Authenticity. I'm intrigued by it and learning a lot.
ReplyDeleteApologies if my "disagreement" was unclear. What I am suggesting is that in fact one cannot pull out the isolated unit from its surrounding narrative context. Why is that? Well, because unit X is not just an assortment of phonemes and morphemes and lexemes but rather an assortment of phonemes and morphemes and lexemes that comes after unit W and before unit Y. As such, the very act of treating the unit in isolation from its narrative context transforms it into something new. I wonder also why we would privilege the level of the "unit." You are now not interpreting or analyzing unit X. It is a quibble however in that we end up at basically the same place, procedure-wise.
ReplyDeleteDr. Bernier,
DeleteMy answer would be that we can pull them out of those contexts because historically there is no way events proceeded and preceded in that manner (it defies the flow of experience). As such, historically speaking, contexts (and the potential meanings that arise because of them) must be considered secondary. If we have reason to believe that unit 1 is to be read in light of unit 2, which immediate follows it, we have to give reason for that association and why it is necessary. i.e., why has to be read it that way. Otherwise, it doesn't seem like breaking the units up is wrong at all, but actually to be preferred.
However, you guys are the experts . . . I'll let you correct me if I'm wrong.
Thanks to you both for making this such an interesting thread. I think I would nuance the point a bit differently. I think that focus and juxtaposition make it inevitable that we sometimes "isolate" certain passages in the NT.
DeleteFor example, if I juxtapose John 1 with my study of gnostic categories the two become mutually informative. Whereas if I juxtapose John 1 with Sirach 24, I might find a different range of meanings as the two passages play on upon another. I may well find that one of these relationships is more helpful than the other. I might find a different range of meaning on a number of levels depending on where I focus within the text. So isolating is just part of the process.
But, and this is crucial, the passage never leaves the whole of John. Whatever group of texts / concepts that I choose to employ to draw meaning from the passage, I am never free of the obligation to explain how the isolated passage relates to it's most immediate framing. I.e. I ought to use all the tools at my disposal to provide the best possible interpretation and this must involve an explanation of how a particular passage was framed in the narrative before me.
In short I don't see a necessary dichotomy between the work of historical criticism and literary criticism.
-anthony
I agree wholeheartedly with what Anthony has said here and I think I see where the emphasis that we can't take things out of their narrative contexts is causing confusion. Of course we can; we do it all the time. But our interpretations of those passages always should reflect those contexts, even when we remove them in our scholarly discussions (i.e., what Anthony said about it never really leaving the whole of John). In historiographical terms, I would add further that we can and must decide against the historicity of certain claims in the Gospels. That is, privileging their status as narratives and taking those narratives seriously as interpretations of the past doesn't require affirming their historical reliability. (This shouldn't need to be said, but I find that it often does.) But, we cannot, or at least should not, shortcut the path to these decisions. We must account for how early Christians came to think what they thought (and thus understand the word/saying/event in light of the narrativization[s] of it that we have in the sources) before making decisions about its possible reflection of past reality.
DeleteExcept for one minor point (not worth discussing), Prof. Le Donne, I can get behind everything you say here. I especially like your last point.
ReplyDeleteOh, absolutely, one can focus upon a given passage for heuristic purposes. As you observe, that's not quite the same as isolating said passage. It is still a passage that exists only within a given literary context. To proceed as if that literary context is inessential data will result inevitably in a distortion of that passage.
ReplyDeleteIt sounds like we're pretty close to each other on this one, Jonathan.
DeleteI wouldn't say that "passage that exists only within a given literary context." The word *only* is the problem here. Of course, it is a bit of literature that has a literary context. It also exists within other rubrics. We could both name a dozen. I would say that it *always* exists within a literary context.
Beyond this quibble, I might need you to unpack what you mean by "isolate.* ...what would be an example of isolating that would prohibit the interpreter from returning to the literary context at some other stage of exegesis? It seems like you're saying that if I isolate Jesus' saying about the Temple in Mark and then place it against a Qumran text, it would inevitably damage the whole of Mark... I must be missing something here. Your language seems a bit severe.
-anthony
Great quote, and fun thread. Shröter is going to play an important role in the first chapter of my thesis, on parables and their contexts.
ReplyDelete