to combine Griesbach’s theory of the secondary origin of Mark with
Schleiermacher’s _Diegesentheorie_, the latter answering to his method of
treating the sections separately. But whereas Schleiermacher had used the
plan of John’s Gospel as a framework into which to fit the independent
narratives, Strauss’s rejection of the Fourth Gospel left him without any
means of connecting the sections. He makes a point, indeed, of sharply
emphasising this want of connexion; and it was just this that made his
work appear so extreme.
The Synoptic discourses, like the Johannine, are composite structures,
created by later tradition out of sayings which originally belonged to
different times and circumstances, arranged under certain leading ideas so
as to form connected discourses. The sermon on the mount, the discourse at
the sending forth of the twelve, the great parable‐discourse, the polemic
against the Pharisees, have all been gradually formed like geological
deposits. So far as the original juxtaposition may be supposed to have
been here and there preserved, Matthew is doubtless the most trustworthy
authority for it. “From the comparison which we have been making,” says
Strauss in one passage, “we can already see that the hard grit of these
sayings of Jesus (_die körnigen Reden Jesu_) has not indeed been dissolved
by the flood of oral tradition, but they have often been washed away from
their original position and like rolling pebbles (_Gerölle_) have been
deposited in places to which they do not properly belong.”(43) And,
moreover, we find this distinction between the first three Evangelists,
viz. that Matthew is a skilful collector who, while he is far from having
been able always to give the original connexion, has at least known how to
bring related passages aptly together, whereas in the other two many
fragmentary sayings have been left exactly where chance had deposited
them, which was generally in the interstices between the larger masses of
discourse. Luke, indeed, has in some cases made an effort to give them an
artistic setting, which is, however, by no means a satisfactory substitute
for the natural connexion.
It is in his criticism of the parables that Strauss is most extreme. He
starts out from the assumption that they have mutually influenced one
another, and that those which may possibly be genuine have only been
preserved in a secondary form. In the parable of the marriage supper of
the king’s son, for example, he confidently assumes that the conduct of
the invited guests, who finally ill‐treated and slew the messengers, and
the question why the guest is not wearing a wedding‐garment are secondary
features.
How external he supposes the connexion of the narratives to be is clear
from the way in which he explains the juxtaposition of the story of the
transfiguration with the “discourse while descending the mountain.” They
have, he says, really nothing to do with one another. The disciples on one
occasion asked Jesus about the coming of Elijah as forerunner; Elijah also
appears in the story of the transfiguration: accordingly tradition simply
grouped the transfiguration and the discourse together under the heading
“Elijah,” and, later on, manufactured a connexion between them.
The tendency of the work to purely critical analysis, the ostentatious
avoidance of any positive expression of opinion, and not least, the manner
of regarding the Synoptists as mere bundles of narratives and discourses,
make it difficult—indeed, strictly speaking, impossible—to determine
Strauss’s own distinctive conception of the life of Jesus, to discover
what he really thinks is moving behind the curtain of myth. According to
the view taken in regard to this point his work becomes either a negative
or a positive life of Jesus. There are, for instance, a number of
incidental remarks which contain the suggestion of a positive construction
of the life of Jesus. If they were taken out of their context and brought
together they would yield a picture which would have points of contact
with the latest eschatological view. Strauss, however, deliberately
restricts his positive suggestions to these few detached remarks. He
follows out no line to its conclusion. Each separate problem is indeed
considered, and light is thrown upon it from various quarters with much
critical skill. But he will not venture on a solution of any of them.
Sometimes, when he thinks he has gone too far in the way of positive
suggestion, he deliberately wipes it all out again with some expression of
scepticism.
As to the duration of the ministry he will not even offer a vague
conjecture. As to the connexion of certain events, nothing can, according
to him, be known, since the Johannine outline cannot be accepted and the
Synoptists arrange everything with an eye to analogies and association of
ideas, though they flattered themselves that they were giving a
chronologically arranged narrative. From the contents of the narratives,
however, and from the monotonous recurrence of certain formulae of
connexion, it is evident that no clear view of an organically connected
whole can be assumed to be present in their work. We have no fixed points
to enable us to reconstruct even in a measure the chronological order.
Especially interesting is his discussion of the title “Son of Man.” In the
saying “the Son of Man is Lord also of the Sabbath day” (Matt. xii. 8),
the expression might, according to Strauss, simply denote “man.” In other
passages one gets the impression that Jesus spoke of the Son of Man as a
supernatural person, quite distinct from Himself, but identified with the
Messiah. This is the most natural explanation of the passage in Matt. x.
23, where he promises the disciples, in sending them forth, that they
shall not have gone over the cities of Israel before the Son of Man shall
come. Here Jesus speaks of the Messiah as if He Himself were his
forerunner. These sayings would, therefore, fall in the first period,
before He knew Himself to be the Messiah. Strauss does not suspect the
significance of this incidental remark; it contains the germ of the
solution of the problem of the Son of Man on the lines of Johannes Weiss.
But immediately scepticism triumphs again. How can we tell, asks Strauss,
where the title Son of Man is genuine in the sayings of Jesus, and where
it has been inserted without special significance, merely from habit?
Not less insoluble, in his opinion, is the question regarding the point of
time at which Jesus claimed the Messianic dignity for Himself. “Whereas in
John,” Strauss remarks, “Jesus remains constant in His avowal, his
disciples and followers constant in their conviction, that He is the
Messiah; in the Synoptics, on the other hand, there are, so to speak,
relapses to be observed; so that, in the case of the disciples and the
people generally, the conviction of Jesus’ Messiahship expressed on
earlier occasions, sometimes, in the course of the narrative, disappears
again and gives place to a much lower view of Him; and even Jesus Himself,
in comparison with His earlier unambiguous declaration, is more reserved
on later occasions.” The account of the confession of the Messiahship at
Caesarea Philippi, where Jesus pronounces Peter blessed because of his
confession, and at the same time forbids the Twelve to speak of it, is
unintelligible, since according to this same Gospel His Messiahship had
been mooted by the disciples on several previous occasions, and had been
acknowledged by the demoniacs. The Synoptists, therefore, contradict
themselves. Then there are the further cases in which Jesus forbids the
making known of His Messiahship, without any reason whatever. It would, no
doubt, be historically possible to assume that it only gradually dawned
upon Him that He was the Messiah—in any case not until after His baptism
by John, as otherwise He would have to be supposed to have made a pretence
upon that occasion—and that as often as the thought that He might be the
Messiah was aroused in others by something that occurred, and was
suggested to Him from without, He was immediately alarmed at hearing
spoken, aloud and definitely, that which He Himself had scarcely dared to
cherish as a possibility, or in regard to which He had only lately
attained to a clear conviction.
From these suggestions one thing is evident, namely, that for Strauss the
Messianic consciousness of Jesus was an historical fact, and is not to be
referred, as has sometimes been supposed, to myth. To assert that Strauss
dissolved the life of Jesus into myth is, in fact, an absurdity which,
however often it may be repeated by people who have not read his book, or
have read it only superficially, does not become any the less absurd by
repetition.
To come to detail, Jesus thought of His Messiahship, according to Strauss,
in the form that He, although of human parentage, should after His earthly
life be taken up into heaven, and thence should come again to bring in His
Kingdom. “As, moreover, in the higher Jewish theology, immediately after
the time of Jesus, the idea of the pre‐existence of the Messiah was
present, the conjecture naturally suggests itself that it was also present
at the time when Jesus’ thoughts were being formed, and that consequently,
if He once began to think of Himself as the Messiah, He might also have
referred to Himself this feature of the Messianic conception. Whether
Jesus had been initiated, as Paul was, into the wisdom of the schools in
such a way that He could draw this conception from it, is no doubt open to
question.”
In his treatment of the eschatology Strauss makes a valiant effort to
escape from the dilemma “_either_ spiritual _or_ political” in regard to
the Messianic plans of Jesus, and to make the eschatological expectation
intelligible as one which did not set its hopes upon human aid, but on
Divine intervention. This is one of the most important contributions to a
real understanding of the eschatological problem. Sometimes one almost
seems to be reading Johannes Weiss; as, for example, when Strauss explains
that Jesus could promise His followers that they should sit on thrones
without thinking of a political revolution, because He expected a reversal
of present conditions to be brought about by God, and referred this
judicial authority and kingly rule to the time of the παλιγγενεσία.
“Jesus, therefore, certainly expected to restore the throne of David, and,
with His disciples, to rule over a people freed from political bondage,
but in this expectation He did not set His hopes on the sword of human
followers (Luke xxii. 38, Matt. xxvi. 52), but upon the legions of angels
which His heavenly Father could give Him (Matt. xxvi. 53). When He speaks
of the coming of His Messianic glory, it is with angels and heavenly
powers that He surrounds Himself (Matt. xvi. 27, xxiv. 30 ff., xxv. 31).
Before the majesty of the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven the
nations will submit without striking a blow, and at the sound of the
angel’s trumpet‐blast will, with the dead who shall then arise, range
themselves before Him and His disciples for judgment. All this Jesus did
not purpose to bring about by any arbitrary action of His own, but left it
to His heavenly Father, who alone knew the right moment for this
catastrophic change (Mark xiii. 32), to give Him the signal of its coming;
and He did not waver in His faith even when death came upon Him before its
realisation. Any one who shrinks from adopting this view of the Messianic
background of Jesus’ plans, because he fears by so doing to make Jesus a
visionary enthusiast, must remember how exactly these hopes corresponded
to the long‐cherished Messianic expectation of the Jews; and how easily,
on the supernaturalistic assumptions of the period and among a people
which preserved so strict an isolation as the Jews, an ideal which was in
itself fantastic, if it were the national ideal and had some true and good
features, could take possession of the mind even of one who was not
inclined to fanaticism.”
One of the principal proofs that the preaching of Jesus was
eschatologically conditioned is the Last Supper. “When,” says Strauss, “He
concluded the celebration with the saying, ‘I will not drink henceforth of
the fruit of the vine until I drink it new with you in my Father’s
kingdom,’ He would seem to have expected that in the Messianic kingdom the
Passover would be celebrated with peculiar solemnity. Therefore, in
assuring them that they shall next partake of the Feast, not in the
present age, but in the new era, He evidently expects that within a year’s
time the pre‐Messianic dispensation will have come to an end and the
Messianic age will have begun.” But it must be admitted, Strauss
immediately adds, that the definite assurance which the Evangelists put
into His mouth may after all only have been in reality an expression of
pious hope. In a similar way he qualifies his other statements regarding
the eschatological ideas of Jesus by recalling that we cannot determine
the part which the expectations of primitive Christianity may have had in
moulding these sayings.
Thus, for example, the opinions which he expresses on the great Parousia
discourse in Matt. xxiv. are extremely cautious. The detailed prophecies
regarding the Second Coming which the Synoptists put into the mouth of
Jesus cannot be derived from Jesus Himself. The question suggests itself,
however, whether He did not cherish the hope, and make the promise, that
He would one day appear in glory as the Messiah? “If in any period of His
life He held Himself to be the Messiah—and that there was a period when He
did so there can be no doubt—and if He described Himself as the Son of
Man, He must have expected the coming in the clouds which Daniel had
ascribed to the Son of Man; but it may be questioned whether He thought of
this as an exaltation which should take place even in His lifetime, or as
something which was only to take place after His death. Utterances like
Matt. x. 23, xvi. 28 rather suggest the former, but the possibility
remains that later, when he had begun to feel that His death was certain,
his conception took the latter form, and that Matt. xxvi. 64 was spoken
with this in view.” Thus, even for Strauss, the problem of the Son of Man
is already the central problem in which are focused all the questions
regarding the Messiahship and eschatology.
From all this it may be seen how strongly he had been influenced by
Reimarus, whom, indeed, he frequently mentions. It would be still more
evident if he had not obscured his historical views by constantly bringing
the mythological explanation into play.
The thought of the supernatural realisation of the Kingdom of God must
also, according to Strauss, be the starting‐point of any attempt to
understand Jesus’ attitude towards the Law and the Gentiles, so far as
that is possible in view of the conflicting data. The conservative
passages must carry most weight. They need not necessarily fall at the
beginning of His ministry, because it is questionable whether the
hypothesis of a later period of increasing liberality in regard to the law
and the Gentiles can be made probable. There would be more chance of
proving that the conservative sayings are the only authentic ones, for
unless all the indications are misleading the _terminus a quo_ for this
change of attitude is the death of Jesus. He no doubt looked forward to
the abolition of the Law and the removal of the barriers between Jew and
Gentile, but only in the future Kingdom. “If that be so,” remarks Strauss,
“the difference between the views of Jesus and of Paul consisted only in
this, that while Jesus expected these limitations to fall away when, at
His second coming, the earth should be renewed, Paul believed himself
justified in doing away with them in consequence of the first coming of
the Messiah, upon the still unregenerated earth.”
The eschatological passages are therefore the most authentic of all. If
there is anything historic about Jesus, it is His assertion of the claim
that in the coming kingdom He would be manifested as the Son of Man.
On the other hand, in the predictions of the passion and resurrection we
are on quite uncertain ground. The detailed statements regarding the
manner of the catastrophe place it beyond doubt that we have here
_vaticinia ex eventu_. Otherwise the despair of the disciples when the
events occurred could not be explained. Yet it is possible that Jesus had
a prevision of His death. Perhaps the resolve to die was essential to His
conception of the Messiahship and He was not forced thereto by
circumstances. This we might be able to determine with certainty if we had
more exact information regarding the conception of the suffering Messiah
in contemporary Jewish theology; which is, however, not available. We do
not even know whether the conception had ever existed in Judaism. “In the
New Testament it almost looks as if no one among the Jews had ever thought
of a suffering or dying Messiah.” The conception can, however, certainly
be found in later passages of Rabbinic literature.
The question is therefore insoluble. We must be content to work with
possibilities. The result of a full discussion of the resolve to suffer
and the significance attached to the suffering is summed up by Strauss in
the following sentences. “In view of these considerations it is possible
that Jesus might, by a natural process of thought, have come to see how
greatly such a catastrophe would contribute to the spiritual development
of His disciples, and in accordance with national conceptions, interpreted
in the light of some Old Testament passages, might have arrived at the
idea of an atoning power in His Messianic death. At the same time the
explicit utterance which the Synoptists attribute to Jesus describing His
death as an atoning sacrifice, might well belong rather to the system of
thought which grew up after the death of Jesus, and the saying which the
Fourth Gospel puts into His mouth regarding the relation of His death to
the coming of the Paraclete might seem to be prophecy after the event. So
that even in these sayings of Jesus regarding the purpose of His death, it
is necessary to distinguish between the particular and the general.”
Strauss’s “Life of Jesus” has a different significance for modern theology
from that which it had for his contemporaries. For them it was the work
which made an end of miracle as a matter of historical belief, and gave
the mythological explanation its due.
We, however, find in it also an historical aspect of a positive character,
inasmuch as the historic Personality which emerges from the mist of myth
is a Jewish claimant of the Messiahship, whose world of thought is purely
eschatological. Strauss is, therefore, no mere destroyer of untenable
solutions, but also the prophet of a coming advance in knowledge.
It was, however, his own fault that his merit in this respect was not
recognised in the nineteenth century, because in his “Life of Jesus for
the German People” (1864), where he undertook to draw a positive historic
picture of Jesus, he renounced his better opinions of 1835, eliminated
eschatology, and, instead of the historic Jesus, portrayed the Jesus of
liberal theology.
IX. STRAUSS’S OPPONENTS AND SUPPORTERS
_David Friedrich Strauss._ Streitschriften zur Verteidigung meiner
Schrift über das Leben‐Jesu und zur Charakteristik der
gegenwärtigen Theologie. (Replies to criticisms of my work on the
Life of Jesus; with an estimate of present‐day theology.)
Tübingen, 1837.
Das Leben‐Jesu, 3te verbesserte Auflage (3rd revised edition).
1838‐1839, Tübingen.
_August Tholuck._ Die Glaubwürdigkeit der evangelischen
Geschichte, zugleich eine Kritik des Lebens Jesu von Strauss. (The
Credibility of the Gospel History, with an incidental criticism of
Strauss’s “Leben‐Jesu.”) Hamburg, 1837.
_Aug. Wilh. Neander._ Das Leben Jesu‐Christi. Hamburg, 1837.
Dr. Neanders auf höhere Veranlassung abgefasstes Gutachten über
das Buch des Dr. Strauss’ “Leben‐Jesu” und das in Beziehung auf
die Verbreitung desselben zu beachtende Verfahren. (Dr. Neander’s
report, drawn up at the request of the authorities, upon Dr.
Strauss’s “Leben‐Jesu” and the measures to be adopted in regard to
its circulation.) 1836.
_Leonhard Hug._ Gutachten über das Leben‐Jesu, kritisch bearbeitet
von D. Fr. Strauss. (Report on D. Fr. Strauss’s critical work upon
the Life of Jesus.) Freiburg, 1840.
_Christian Gottlob Wilke._ Tradition und Mythe. Ein Beitrag zur
historischen Kritik der kanonischen Evangelien überhaupt, wie
insbesondere zur Würdigung des mythischen Idealismus im Leben‐Jesu
von Strauss. (Tradition and Myth. A Contribution to the General
Historical Criticism of the Gospels; with special reference to the
mythical idealism of Strauss’s “Leben‐Jesu.”) Leipzig, 1837.
_August Ebrard._ Wissenschaftliche Kritik der evangelischen
Geschichte. (Scientific Criticism of the Gospel History.)
Frankfort, 1842.
_Georg Heinr. Aug. Ewald._ Geschichte Christus’ und seiner Zeit.
(History of Christ and His Times.) 1855. Fifth volume of the
“Geschichte des Volkes Israel.”
_Christoph Friedrich von Ammon._ Die Geschichte des Lebens Jesu
mit steter Rücksicht auf die vorhandenen Quellen. (History of the
Life of Jesus with constant reference to the extant sources.) 3
vols. 1842‐1847.
Scarcely ever has a book let loose such a storm of controversy; and
scarcely ever has a controversy been so barren of immediate result. The
fertilising rain brought up a crop of toad‐stools. Of the forty or fifty
essays on the subject which appeared in the next five years, there are
only four or five which are of any value, and even of these the value is
very small.
Strauss’s first idea was to deal with each of his opponents separately,
and he published in 1837 three successive _Streitschriften_.(44) In the
preface to the first of these he states that he has kept silence for two
years from a rooted objection to anything in the nature of reply or
counter‐criticism, and because he had little expectation of any good
results from such controversy. These essays are able, and are often
written with biting scorn, especially that directed against his inveterate
enemy, Steudel of Tübingen, the representative of intellectual
supernaturalism, and that against Eschenmayer, a pastor, also of Tübingen.
To a work of the latter, “The Iscariotism of our Days” (1835), he had
referred in the preface to the second volume of his Life of Jesus in the
following remark: “This offspring of the legitimate marriage between
theological ignorance and religious intolerance, blessed by a sleep‐
walking philosophy, succeeds in making itself so completely ridiculous
that it renders any serious reply unnecessary.”
But for all his sarcasm Strauss does not show himself an adroit debater in
this controversy, any more than in later times in the Diet.
It is indeed remarkable how unskilled in polemics is this man who had
produced a critical work of the first importance with almost playful ease.
If his opponents made no effort to understand him rightly—and many of them
certainly wrote without having carefully studied the fourteen hundred
pages of his two volumes—Strauss on his part seemed to be stricken with a
kind of uncertainty, lost himself in a maze of detail, and failed to keep
continually re‐formulating the main problems which he had set up for
discussion, and so compelling his adversaries to face them fairly.
Of these problems there were three. The first was composed of the related
questions regarding miracle and myth; the second concerned the connexion
of the Christ of faith with the Jesus of history; the third referred to
the relation of the Gospel of John to the Synoptists.
It was the first that attracted most attention; more than half the critics
devoted themselves to it alone. Even so they failed to get a thorough
grasp of it. The only thing that they clearly see is that Strauss
altogether denies the miracles; the full scope of the mythological
explanation as applied to the traditional records of the life of Jesus,
and the extent of the historical material which Strauss is prepared to
accept, is still a riddle to them. That is in some measure due, it must in
fairness be said, to the arrangement of Strauss’s own work, in which the
unconnected series of separate investigations makes the subject
unnecessarily difficult even for one who wishes to do the author justice.