Scripture and God in Christianity

of McGiffert who observes "The problem is metaphysical and purely speculative. Except by
those interested to trace the formation of the particular dogmas involved, the whole Trinitarian
and Christological development might be dismissed as unworthy of notice were it not for the profound
religious difference that underlay it...." 736
Contemporary Christian Standpoint:
Throughout the history of Christian dogma, wrestling between various concepts and pictures of
Jesus has never ceased to exist. The origin of these differences, as we have seen, can easily be
traced back to the differing and mostly contradicting pictures of Christ presented by the authors
of New Testament books especially the four Gospels. Crossan rightly observes that if one reads
"those four texts vertically, as it were, from start to finish and one after another, you get generally
persuasive impression of unity, harmony, and agreement. But if you read them horizontally, focusing
on this or that unit and comparing it across two, three, or four versions, it is disagreement
rather than agreement that strikes one most forcibly. By even the middle of the second century,
pagan opponents, like Celsus, and Christian apologists, like Justin, Tatian and Marcion were well
aware of those discrepancies, even if only between, say, Matthew and Luke." 737 The Church has
been using "the documents it has selected in order to prove its own credentials. The documents
are chosen so as to prove what the Church wants proved." 738 Even in these carefully selected
documents there is not one single uniform picture of the person around whom the entire material
revolves. Following the New Testament, Christianity has always been grappling with the question
of understanding who he really is? D. Cupitt rightly observes that "More than any other religion
Christianity has revolved obsessively around one particular man: it has loved him, worshipped
him, mediated upon him, portrayed him, and sought to imitate him-but he slips away." 739
There is no single preached Christ, "An immense variety of ideals of character have been based
upon the example of Jesus: an historical man who lived only one life has been made the exemplar
of a great range of different forms of life. Jesus has been declared to be a model for hermits,
peasants, gentlemen, revolutionaries, pacifists, feudal lords, soldiers and others. If we restrict attention
to the religious life of men in the Latin West alone, the diversity is great among the ideals
of Benedict, Francis, Bruno, and Ignatius Loyola." 740
Even contemporary scholarship is polarized over which picture or image of Jesus is to be accepted
as authentic. Daniel J. Harrington in his presidential address to the Catholic Biblical Association
at Georgetown University on August 6, 1986 gave a "short description of seven
different images of Jesus that have been proposed by scholars in recent years, the differences
relating to the different Jewish backgrounds against which they have chosen to locate their image
of the historical Jesus." 741 There is Jesus as a political revolutionary by S. G. F. Brandon, 742 as a
magician by Morton Smith, 743 as a Galilean charismatic by Geza Vermes, 744 as a Galilean rabbi
by Bruce Chilton, 745 as a Hillelite or proto-Pharisee or an essene by Harvey Falk, 746 and as an
eschatological prophet by E. P. Sanders. 747 To Crossan this "stunning diversity is an academic
embarrassment." 748
This fact of notorious diversity of pictures, ideals, concepts and interpretations of Jesus Christ
has led some to conclude that "every one who writes a life of Jesus sees his own face at the bottom
of a deep well." 749 Moreover, we have very limited reliable narrations about Jesus which
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