beginning of Didon’s Life of Jesus. “If the author sometimes seems
to speak the language of his opponents, it is at once evident that
he has aimed at defeating them on their own ground, and he is
particularly successful in doing so when he confronts their
irreligious a priori theories with the positive arguments of
history.”
As a matter of fact the work is skilfully written, but without a
spark of understanding of the historical questions.
All honour to Alfred Loisy! (_Le Quatrième Évangile_, Paris, 1903,
960 pp.), who takes a clear view on the Johannine question, and
denies the existence of a Johannine historical tradition. But what
that means for the Catholic camp may be recognised from the
excitement produced by the book and its express condemnation. See
also the same writer’s _L’Évangile et l’Église_ (German translation,
Munich, 1904, 189 pp.), in which Loisy here and there makes good
historical points against Harnack’s “What is Christianity?”
226 Oskar Holtzmann, Professor of Theology at Giessen, was born in 1859
at Stuttgart.
227 This suggestion reminds us involuntarily of the old rationalistic
Lives of Jesus, which are distressed that Jesus should have injured
the good people of the country of the Gesarenes by sacrificing their
swine in healing the demoniac. A good deal of old rationalistic
material crops up in the very latest Lives of Jesus, as cannot
indeed fail to be the case in view of the arbitrary interpretation
of detail which is common to both. According to Oskar Holtzmann the
barren fig‐tree has also a symbolical meaning. “It is a pledge given
by God to Jesus that His faith shall not be put to shame in the
great work of His life.”
228 Isaiah lxii. 11, “Say ye to the daughter of Zion, Behold, thy
salvation cometh.”
229 “For Jesus Himself,” Oskar Holtzmann argues, “this discovery”—he
means the antinomy which He had discovered in Psalm cx.—“disposed of
a doubt which had always haunted him. If He had really known Himself
to be descended from the Davidic line, He would certainly not have
publicly suggested a doubt as to the Davidic descent of the
Messiah.”
230 Oskar Holtzmann’s work, _War Jesus Ekstatiker?_ (Tübingen, 1903, 139
pp.) is in reality a new reading of the life of Jesus. By
emphasising the ecstatic element he breaks with the “natural”
conception of the life and teaching of Jesus; and, in so far,
approaches the eschatological view. But he gives a very wide
significance to the term ecstatic, subsuming under it, it might
almost be said, all the eschatological thoughts and utterances of
Jesus. He explains, for instance, that “the conviction of the
approaching destruction of existing conditions is ecstatic.” At the
same time, the only purpose served by the hypothesis of ecstasy is
to enable the author to attribute to Jesus “The belief that in His
own work the Kingdom of God was already beginning, and the promise
of the Kingdom to individuals; this can only be considered
ecstatic.” The opposites which Bousset brings together by the
conception of paradox are united by Holtzmann by means of the
hypothesis of ecstasy. That is, however, to play fast and loose with
the meaning of “ecstasy.” An ecstasy is, in the usual understanding
of the word, an abnormal, transient condition of excitement in which
the subject’s natural capacity for thought and feeling, and
therewith all impressions from without, are suspended, being
superseded by an intense mental excitation and activity. Jesus may
possibly have been in an ecstatic state at His baptism and at the
transfiguration. What O. Holtzmann represents as a kind of permanent
ecstatic state is rather an eschatological fixed idea. With
eschatology, ecstasy has no essential connexion. It is possible to
be eschatologically minded without being an ecstatic, and vice
versa. Philo attributes a great importance to ecstasy in his
religious life, but he was scarcely, if at all, interested in
eschatology.
231 P. W. Schmidt, now Professor in Basle, was born in Berlin in 1845.
232 Otto Schmiedel, Professor at the Gymnasium at Eisenach, _Die
Hauptprobleme der Leben‐Jesu‐Forschung_. Tübingen, 1902. 71 pp.
Schmiedel was born in 1858.
Hermann Freiherr von Soden, _Die wichtigsten Fragen im Leben Jesu_.
Von Soden, Professor in Berlin, and preacher at the Jerusalem
Kirche, was born in 1852.
We may mention also the following works:—
Fritz Barth (born 1856, Professor at Bern), _Die Hauptprobleme des
Lebens Jesu_. 1st ed., 1899; 2nd ed., 1903.
Friedrich Nippold’s _Der Entwicklungsgang des Lebens Jesu im
Wortlaut der drei ersten Evangelien_ (The Course of the Life of
Jesus in the Words of the First Three Evangelists) (Hamburg, 1895,
213 pp.) is only an arrangement of the sections.
Konrad Furrer’s _Vorträge über das Leben Jesu Christi_ (Lectures on
the Life of Jesus Christ) have a special charm by reason of the
author’s knowledge of the country and the locality. Furrer, who was
born in 1838, is Professor at Zurich.
Another work which should not be forgotten is R. Otto’s _Leben und
Wirken Jesu nach historisch‐kritischer Auffassung_ (Life and Work of
Jesus from the Point of View of Historical Criticism). A Lecture.
Göttingen, 1902. Rudolf Otto, born in 1869, is Privat‐Docent at
Göttingen.
233 Schmiedel is not altogether right in making “the Heidelberg
Professor Paulus” follow the same lines as Reimarus, “except that
his works, of 1804 and 1828, are less malignant, but only the more
dull for that.” In reality the deistic Life of Jesus by Reimarus,
and the rationalistic Life by Paulus have nothing in common. Paulus
was perhaps influenced by Venturini, but not by Reimarus. The
assertion that Strauss wrote his “Life of Jesus for the German
people” because “Renan’s fame gave him no peace” is not justified,
either by Strauss’s character or by the circumstances in which the
second Life of Jesus was produced.
234 Von Soden gives on pp. 24 ff. the passages of Mark which he supposes
to be derived from the Petrine tradition in a different order from
that in which they occur in Mark, regrouping them freely. He puts
together, for instance, Mark i. 16‐20, iii. 13‐19, vi. 7‐16, viii.
27‐ix. 1, ix. 33‐40, under the title “The formation and training of
the band of disciples.” He supposes Mark, the pupil of Peter, to
have grouped in this way by a kind of association of ideas “what he
had heard Peter relate in his missionary journeys, when writing it
down after Peter’s death, not connectedly, but giving as much as he
could remember of it”; this would be in accordance with the
statement of Papias that Mark wrote “not in order.” Papias’s
statement, therefore, refers to an “Ur‐Markus,” which he found
lacking in historical order.
But what are we to make of a representative of the early Church thus
approaching the Gospels with the demand for historical arrangement?
And good, simple old Papias, of all people!
But if the Marcan plan was not laid down in “Ur‐Markus,” there is
nothing for it—since the plan was certainly not given in the
collection of Logia—but to ascribe it to the author of our Gospel of
Mark, to the man, that is, who wrote down for the first time these
“Pauline conceptions,” those reflections of experiences of
individual believers and of the community, and inserted them into
the Gospel. It is proposed, then, to retain the outline which he has
given of the life of Jesus, and reject at the same time what he
relates. That is to say, he is to be believed where it is convenient
to believe him, and silenced where it is inconvenient. No more
complete refutation of the Marcan hypothesis could possibly be given
than this analysis, for it destroys its very foundation, the
confident acceptance of the historicity of the Marcan plan.
If there is to be an analysis of sources in Mark, then the Marcan
plan must be ascribed to “Ur‐Markus,” otherwise the analysis renders
the Markan hypothesis historically useless. But if “Ur‐Markus” is to
be reconstructed on the basis of assigning to it the Marcan plan,
then we cannot separate the natural from the supernatural, for the
supernatural scenes, like the feeding of the multitude and the
transfiguration, are among the main features of the Marcan outline.
No hypothetical analysis of “Ur‐Markus” has escaped this dilemma;
what it can effect by literary methods is historically useless, and
what would be historically useful cannot be attained nor “presented”
by literary methods.
235 Von Soden, for instance, germanises Jesus when he writes, “and this
nature is sound to the core. In spite of its inwardness there is no
trace of an exaggerated sentimentality. In spite of all the
intensity of prayer there is nothing of ecstasy or vision. No
apocalyptic dream‐pictures find a lodging‐place in His soul.”
Is a man who teaches a world‐renouncing ethic which sometimes soars
to the dizzy heights such as that of Matt. xix. 12, according to our
conceptions “sound to the core”? And does not the life of Jesus
present a number of occasions on which He seems to have been in an
ecstasy?
Thus, von Soden has not simply read his Jesus out of the texts, but
has added something of his own, and that something is Germanic in
colouring.
236 _i.e._ the MS. Life of Jesus written by Kai Jans, one of the
characters of the novel. The way in which the whole life‐experience
of this character prepares him for the writing of the Life is
strikingly—if not always acceptably—worked out.—TRANSLATOR.
237 Frenssen’s Kai Jans professes to have used the “results of the whole
range of critical investigation” in writing his work. Among the
books which he enumerates and recommends in the after‐word, we miss
the works of Strauss, Weisse, Keim, Volkmar, and Brandt, and,
generally speaking, the names of those who in the past have done
something really great and original. Of the moderns, Johannes Weiss
is lacking. Wrede is mentioned, but is virtually ignored.
Pfleiderer’s remarkable and profound presentation of Jesus in the
_Urchristentum_ (E. T. “Primitive Christianity,” vol. ii., 1909) is
non‐existent so far as he is concerned.
238 _Heimatkunst_, the ideal that every production of German art should
be racy of the soil. It has its relative justification as a protest
against the long subservience of some departments of German art to
French taste.—TRANSLATOR.
239 The Jesus of H. S. Chamberlain’s _Worte Christi_, 1901, 286 pp., is
also modern. But the modernity is not so obtrusive, because he
describes only the teaching of Jesus, not His life.
240 Born in 1839 at Stettin. Studied at Tübingen, was appointed
Professor in 1870 at Jena and in 1875 at Berlin. (Died 1908.)
241 _Das Urchristentum, seine Schriften und Lehren in geschichtlichem
Zusammenhang beschrieben._ 2nd ed. Berlin, 1902. Vol. i. (696 pp.),
615 ff.: _Die Predigt Jesu und der Glaube der Urgemeinde_ (English
Translation, “Primitive Christianity,” chap. xvi.). Pfleiderer’s
latest views are set forth in his work, based on academic lectures,
_Die Entstehung des Urchristentums_. (How Christianity arose.)
Munich, 1905. 255 pp.
242 Albert Kalthoff, _Das Christusproblem_. _Grundlinien zu einer
Sozialtheologie._ (The Problem of the Christ: Ground‐plan of a
Social Theology.) Leipzig, 1902. 87 pp.
_Die Entstehung des Christentums. Neue Beiträge zum
Christusproblem._ (How Christianity arose.) Leipzig, 1904. 155 pp.
Albert Kalthoff was born in 1850 at Barmen, and is engaged in
pastoral work in Bremen.
243 _Das Leben Jesu._ Lectures delivered before the Protestant Reform
Society at Berlin. Berlin, 1880. 173 pp.
244 If Kalthoff would only have spoken of the conception of the
resurrection instead of the conception of immortality! Then his
subjective knowledge would have been more or less tolerable.
245 Against Kalthoff: Wilhelm Bousset, _Was wissen wir von Jesus?_ (What
do we know about Jesus?) Lectures delivered before the
Protestantenverein at Bremen. Halle, 1904. 73 pp. In reply: Albert
Kalthoff, _Was wissen wir von Jesus?_ A settlement of accounts with
Professor Bousset. Berlin, 1904. 43 pp.
A sound historical position is set forth in the clear and trenchant
lecture of W. Kapp, _Das Christus‐ und Christentumsproblem bei
Kalthoff_. (The problem of the Christ and of Christianity as handled
by Kalthoff.) Strassburg, 1905. 23 pp.
246 Eduard von Hartmann, _Das Christentum des Neuen Testaments_. (The
Christianity of the N.T.) 2nd, revised and altered, edition of the
“Letters on the Christian Religion.” Sachsa‐in‐the‐Harz, 1905. 311
pp.
247 Eduard von Hartmann ought, therefore, to have given his assistance
to the others who have made this assertion in proving that there
really existed Messianic claimants before and at the time of Jesus.
248 “Jesus,” by Jülicher, in _Die Kultur der Gegenwart_. (An
encyclopaedic publication which is appearing in parts.) Teubner,
Berlin, 1905, pp. 40‐69.
See also W. Bousset, “Jesus,” _Religionsgeschichtliche Volksbücher_.
(A series of religious‐historical monographs.) Published by Schiele,
Halle, 1904.
Here should be mentioned also the thoughtful book, following very
much the lines of Jülicher, by Eduard Grimm, entitled _Die Ethik
Jesu_, Hamburg, 1903, 288 pp. The author, born in 1848, is the chief
pastor at the Nicolaikirche in Hamburg.
Another work which deserves mention is Arno Neumann, _Jesu wie er
geschichtlich war_ (Jesus as he historically existed), Freiburg,
1904, 198 pp. (New Paths to the Old God), a Life of Jesus
distinguished by a lofty vein of natural poetry and based upon solid
theological knowledge. Arno Neumann is headmaster of a school at
Apolda.
249 _Jeschua. Der klassische jüdische Mann. Zerstörung des kirchlichen,
Enthüllung des jüdischen Jesus‐Bildes._ Berlin, 1904, 112 pp.
Earlier studies of the Life of Jesus from the Jewish point of view
had been less ambitious. Dr. Aug. Wünsche had written in 1872 on
“Jesus in His attitude towards women” from the Talmudic standpoint
(146 pp.), and had described Him from the same standpoint as a Jesus
who rejoiced in life, _Der lebensfreudige Jesus der synoptischen
Evangelien im Gegensatz zum leidenden Messias der Kirche_. Leipzig,
1876, 444 pp. The basis is so far correct, that the eschatological,
world‐renouncing ethic which we find in Jesus was due to temporary
conditions and is therefore transitory, and had nothing whatever to
do with Judaism as such. The spirit of the Law is the opposite of
world‐renouncing. But the Talmud, be its traditions never so
trustworthy, could teach us little about Jesus because it has
preserved scarcely a trace of that eschatological phase of Jewish
religion and ethics.
250 Wolfgang Kirchbach, _Was lehrte Jesus? Zwei Urevangelien_. Berlin,
1897, 248 pp.; second greatly enlarged and improved edition, 1902,
339 pp. By the same author, _Das Buch Jesus_. _Die Urevangelien. Neu
nachgewiesen, neu übersetzt, geordnet und aus der Ursprache
erklärt_. (The Book of Jesus. The Primitive Gospels. Newly traced,
translated, arranged, and explained on the basis of the original.)
Berlin, 1897.
251 Before him, Hugo Delff, in his _History of the Rabbi Jesus of
Nazareth_ (Leipzig, 1889, 428 pp.), had confined himself to the
Fourth Gospel, and even within that Gospel he drew some critical
distinctions. His Jesus at first conceals His Messiahship from the
fear of arousing the political expectations of the people, and
speaks to them of the Son of Man in the third person. At His second
visit to Jerusalem He breaks with the rulers, is subsequently
compelled, in consequence of the conflict over the Sabbath, to leave
Galilee, and then gives up His own people and turns to the heathen.
Delff explains the raising of Lazarus by supposing him to have been
buried in a state of trance.
252 Albert Dulk, _Der Irrgang des Lebens Jesu_. _In geschichtlicher
Aufassung dargestellt. Erster Teil: Die historischen Wurzeln und die
galiläische Blüte_, 1884. 395 pp. _Zweiter Teil: Der Messiaseinzug
und die Erhebung ans Kreuz_, 1885, 302 pp. (The Error of the Life of
Jesus. Historically apprehended and set forth. Pt. i., The
Historical Roots and the Galilaean Blossom. Pt. ii., The Messianic
Entry and the Crucifixion.) The course of Dulk’s own life was
somewhat erratic. Born in 1819, he came prominently forward in the
revolution of 1848, as a political pamphleteer and agitator. Later,
though almost without means, he undertook long journeys, even to
Sinai and to Lapland. Finally, he worked as a social democratic
reformer. He died in 1884.
253 A scientific treatment of this subject is supplied by Fr. Nippold,
_Die psychiatrische Seite der Heilstätigkeit Jesu_ (The Psychiatric
Side of Jesus’ Works of Healing), 1889, in which a luminous review
of the medical material is to be found. See also Dr. K. Kunz,
_Christus medicus_, Freiburg in Baden, 1905, 74 pp. The scientific
value of this work is, however, very much reduced by the fact that
the author has no acquaintance with the preliminary questions
belonging to the sphere of history and literature, and regards all
the miracles of healing as actual events, believing himself able to
explain them from the medical point of view. The tendency of the
work is mainly apologetic.
254 _Jesus von Nazareth. Described from the Scientific, Historical, and
Social Point of View._ Translated from the French (into German) by
A. Just. Leipzig, 1894. The author, whose real name is P. A.
Desjardin, is a practising physician. De Régla, too, makes the
Fourth Gospel the basis of his narrative.
255 Pierre Nahor (Emilie Lerou), _Jesus_. Translated from the French by
Walter Bloch. Berlin, 1905. Its motto is: The figure of Jesus
belongs, like all mysterious, heroic, or mythical figures, to legend
and poetry. In the introduction we find the statement, “This book is
a confession of faith.” The narrative is based on the Fourth Gospel.
256 _La Vie inconnue de Jésus‐Christ._ Paris, 1894. 301 pp. German,
under the title _Die Lücke im Leben Jesu_ (The Gap in the Life of
Jesus). Stuttgart, 1894. 186 pp. See Holtzmann in the _Theol.
Jahresbericht_, xiv. p. 140.
In a certain limited sense the work of A. Lillie, _The Influence of
Buddhism on Primitive Christianity_ (London, 1893), is to be
numbered among the fictitious works on the life of Jesus. The
fictitious element consists in Jesus being made an Essene by the
writer, and Essenism equated with Buddhism.
Among “edifying” romances on the life of Jesus intended for family
reading, that of the English writer J. H. Ingraham, _The Prince of
the House of David_, has had a very long lease of life. It appeared
in a German translation as early as 1858, and was reissued in 1906
(Brunswick).
A fictitious life of Jesus of wonderful beauty is Peter Rosegger’s
_I.N.R.I. Frohe Botschaft eines armen Sünders_ (The Glad Tidings of
a poor Sinner). Leipzig, 6th‐10th thousand, 1906. 293 pp.
A feminine point of view reveals itself in C. Rauch’s _Jeschua ben
Joseph_. Deichert, 1899.
257 _La Vie ésotérique de Jésu‐Christ et les origines orientales du
christianisme._ Paris, 1902. 445 pp.
That Jesus was of Aryan race is argued by A. Müller, who assumes a
Gaulish immigration into Galilee. _Jesus ein Arier._ Leipzig, 1904.
74 pp.
258 _Did Jesus live 100 __B.C.__?_ London and Benares. Theosophical
Publishing Society, 1903. 440 pp.
A scientific discussion of the “Toledoth Jeshu,” with citations from
the Talmudic tradition concerning Jesus, is offered by S. Krauss,
_Das Leben Jesu nach jüdischen Quellen_, 1902. 309 pp. According to
him the _Toledoth Jeshu_ was committed to writing in the fifth
century, and he is of opinion that the Jewish legend is only a
modified version of the Christian tradition.
259 William Wrede, born in 1859 at Bücken in Hanover, was Professor at
Breslau. (He died in 1907.)
Wrede names as his real predecessors on the same lines Bruno Bauer,
Volkmar, and the Dutch writer Hoekstra (“De Christologie van het
canonieke Marcus‐Evangelie, vergeleken met die van de beide andere
synoptische Evangelien,” _Theol. Tijdschrift_, v., 1871).
In a certain limited degree the work of Ernest Havet (_Le
Christianisme et ses origines_) has a claim to be classed in the
same category. His scepticism refers principally to the entry into
Jerusalem and the story of the passion.
260 These and the following questions are raised more especially in the
_Sketch of the Life of Jesus_.
261 It would perhaps be more historical to say “as a prophet.”
262 The difficulties which the incident at Caesarea Philippi places in
the way of Wrede’s construction may be realised by placing two of
his statements side by side. P. 101: “From this it is evident that
this incident contains no element which cannot be easily understood
on the basis of Mark’s ideas.” P. 238: “But in another aspect this
incident stands in direct contradiction to the Marcan view of the
disciples. It is inconsistent with their general ‘want of
understanding,’ and can therefore hardly have been created by Mark
himself.”
263 The question of the attitude of pre‐Origenic theology towards the
historical Jesus, and of the influence exercised by dogma upon the
evangelical tradition regarding Jesus in the course of the first two
centuries, is certainly deserving of a detailed examination.
264 Certain of the conceptions with which Wrede operates are simply not
in accordance with the text, because he gives them a different
significance from that which they have in the narrative. Thus, for
example, he always takes the “resurrection,” when it occurs in the
mouth of Jesus, as a reference to that resurrection which as an
historical fact became a matter of apprehended experience to the
apostles. But Jesus speaks without any distinction of His
resurrection and of His Parousia. The conception of the
resurrection, therefore, if one is to arrive at it inductively from
the Marcan text, is most closely bound up with the Parousia. The
Evangelist would thus seem to have made Jesus predict a different
kind of resurrection from that which actually happened. The
resurrection, according to the Marcan text, is an eschatological
event, and has no reference whatever to Wrede’s “historical
resurrection.” Further, if their resurrection experience was the
first and fundamental point in the Messianic enlightenment of the
disciples, why did they only begin to proclaim it some weeks later?
This is a problem which was long ago recognised by Reimarus, and
which is not solved by merely assuming that the disciples were
afraid.
265 P. 33 ff. The prohibitions in Mark i. 43 and 44, v. 43, vii. 36, and
viii. 26 are put on the same footing with the really Messianic
prohibitions in viii. 30 and ix. 9, with which may be associated
also the imposition of silence upon the demoniacs who recognise his
Messiahship in Mark i. 34 and iii. 12.
266 The narrative in Matt. xiv. 22‐33, according to which the disciples,
after seeing Jesus walk upon the sea, hail Him on His coming into
the boat as the Son of God, and the description of the deeds of
Jesus as “deeds of Christ,” in the introduction to the Baptist’s
question in Matt. xi. 2, do not cancel the old theory even in
Matthew, because the Synoptists, differing therein from the fourth
Evangelist, do not represent the demand for a sign as a demand for a
Messianic sign, nor the cures wrought by Jesus as Messianic proofs
of power. The action of the demons in crying out upon Jesus as the
Son of God betokens their recognition of Him; it has nothing to do
with the miracles of healing as such.
267 For further examples of the pressing of the theory to its utmost
limits, see Wrede, p. 134 ff.
268 It is always assumed as self‐evident that Jesus is speaking of the
sufferings and persecutions which would take place after His death,
or that the Evangelist, in making Him speak in this way, is thinking
of these later persecutions. There is no hint of that in the text.