Credible & Crucifiable

Too often churches peddle a ridiculous, boring, impoverished, doctrinally neutered, lifeless Jesus and Gospel.

Tom Wright (quoting, he thinks Geza Vermes) made this powerful point in his recent conversation with James Dunn @ St. John’s College, Durham University.

You can download the conversations here

He said:

“…Jesus had to be both credible and crucifiable in 1^st century Galilee [i.e. Judaic / Roman culture]. You [couldn’t] have a Jesus that wandered around saying [and doing] the kinds of things that people would have found either incomprehensible, [irrelevant], or ridiculous, or just boring, or whatever. And so he has to fit into his context, but has to be sufficiently provocative for the crucifixion to be in a sense a natural consequence…” (Emphasis, mine)

Why is this a “powerful point”? Firstly, because it seems to me too highlight something important in terms of how we are church in our contemporary context – often we try so hard (often ‘driving’ under the influence of sociology) to “fit in” that the Jesus and Gospel we end up with is uncrucifiable (and thereby also “unresurrectable”) Secondly, it obliquely highlights why we need to recover theological and hermeneutical practice in the life of churches. The Jesus & gospel we communicate, and embody in our ecclesiology and missiology, are rarely critiqued (theology) and almost never translated (hermeneutics).

How do we tell and embody the Jesus-story such that the Jesus we represent in our contemporary contexts is both credible and crucifiable? What would make him credible (from a contextual point of view)? What would make him crucifiable?

Comments

[maggi]

great post, paul

[Arlen Hanson]

Paul,
Thanks for this. Great stuff to chew on for awhile. N.T. rocks! Peace.