When was Jesus considered divine? Was it when he was on earth? Just after? At the Nicene Council 300 years later? Michael Bird, New Testament scholar and prolific author, shows that Jesus was considered fully divine well before the Nicene Council, and, arguably, during the New Testament times. He shows this through numerous quotes from writers of the early church within the first three centuries.
In antiquity, gods were thought of in either absolute (i.e., ontological) or euergetic (i.e., honorific, relative, relational) terms. That means that, in Bird’s words, “gods were either eternal and unbegotten (uncreated) or deified and begotten (created)” (2). There was not a new thing “introduced by a Platonic big bang in the second and third centuries” (2–3, 84). In fact, these categories were used by Greek, Roman, Jewish, and Christian authors over several centuries.
As well, there are both parallels and contrasts with intermediary figures presented in both Jewish and Greco-Roman texts, figures such as demiurges, principal angels, exalted patriarchs, and deified emperors. Bird writes that he “map[s] these similarities and differences at length” (3). This is true, as Chapter 4, “Jesus and the In-Betweeners,” is 266 pages! Added with Chapter 5, “Setting Jesus apart from Demiurges, Deities, Daemons, and Divi,” the page count totals 297 pages.
By making these comparisons, Bird shows that the more we understand ancient categories of divinity, the better we understand Jesus’ own divinity. Understanding Jesus as divine did not happen in the fourth century debates but already within the first century. Early Christologies “made the various literary representations of Jesus that they did” because of the influences of Greco-Roman religions and philosophy on Judaism. That said, Jesus is most similar with the God of Israel, his activity in creation and with his people.
Bird’s book consists of five chapters. The first section (chapters 1–2) covers the nature of divinity and Christology. These chapters cover the “problem” of Jesus’ divinity, the meaning of calling him both “god” and “divine” (ch 1), and the categories of absolute and euergetic and how Jesus is divine (ch 2).
The second section relates Jesus with intermediary figures. Chapter 3 surveys scholarly opinions on Jesus and intermediary figures and shows a spectrum of those who make much of the similarities and those who make a very small deal about them. In Chapter 4, the longest chapter, Bird lays out parallels and differences between Jesus and (1) demiurges, logos, and wisdom; (2) angels; (3) exalted patriarchs; and (4) ancient ruler cults.
Chapter 5 takes the information from chapter 4 and asks, “So what?” These similarities shows that Jesus’ divinity fit with a Greco-Roman understanding of divinity (see my review of Josh Jipp’s Christ is King). According to Bird, “The fact that Jesus was described as an unbegotten and uncreated god is proof that Jesus was considered a divine being in the strongest Greco-Roman sense imaginable” (382). In spite of all the similarities between Jesus and the figures found in chapter 4, it was known that Jesus was different from these intermediary figures. There is “no single intermediary figure [who] can be considered the hermeneutic key explaining the development of early Christology” (383). Hebrews tells us Jesus is eternal, placed above the angels (386). All things were made by him and through him (Col 1:15–18), he was preexistent and eternal (John 1:1–2; 17:5), and was on the side of the “uncreated creating God” in distinction from all of creation. Jesus is the uncreated God who created the world (John 1:3).
Recommended?
Bird represents a strong pushback against scholars such as Ehrman (see both Bird’s How Jesus Became God and When Did Jesus Become God?) that Jesus both understood and claimed himself as divine and that the early church understood him to be fully divine. Bird offers numerous quotes from Greco-Roman and Jewish sources to support how the two categories of divinity were understood in antiquity and how Jesus was understood within those categories. On top of that, he offers many quotes from early church theologians like Justin Martyr, Tertullian, Irenaeus, and Clement of Alexandria, and Christian writings like the Ascension of Isaiah, Shepherd of Hermas, and Epistle of Diognetus (see pgs. 66–67). For a better understanding of early Christology, as well as how it fit into the first century culture of Hellenistic Judaism, Bird’s book is a stand-out volume. He presents how Jesus resembled divine agents in Greco-Roman religions and within Second Temple Judaism, yet was considered ontologically divine in keeping with God the Father.
Lagniappe
- Author: Michael F. Bird
- Paperback: 480 pages
- Publisher: Baylor University Press (October 15, 2022)
Buy it on Amazon or from Baylor University Press
Disclosure: I received this book free from Baylor University Press. The opinions I have expressed are my own, and I was not required to write a positive review. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 http://www.access.gpo.gov/nara/cfr/waisidx_03/16cfr255_03.html.
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