In Christianity, Christ is synonymous with its Hebrew counterpart, the Messiah, which mean "the anointed one." As mentioned in previous posts, Jesus did not readily accept being identified as the Messiah in the Synoptic Gospels. It was others who proclaimed him to be the Messiah or identified him as such.
Throughout most of the Hebrew Scriptures, the use of the term "messiah" referred to someone anointed to be the king of Israel or as a high priest. The term is peppered throughout the books of First and Second Samuel and First and Second Kings. The concept of an eschatological messiah that arises at the end of time is derived from the the prophecies of Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel. Such a messiah is also referenced in the Book of Daniel. The concept of a messianic age evolved perhaps during the Babylonian captivity and strengthened after the restoration of the Judah as a protectorate of the Persian Empire.
The eschatological Messiah was and is thought to be a descendent, a son, of David. This is where the Christian version of the Messiah comes into play. That Jesus never directly identified himself as the Messiah in the Synoptic Gospels leads one to wonder if in fact Jesus ever thought himself to be the Messiah. The Gospels of Matthew and Luke attempt to assure us he is a "son of David." On the other hand both Gospels bring that into question because Joseph, Mary's betrothed husband is cut out of the picture as having anything directly to do with Jesus' birth. That privilege in the Gospel of Matthew and Luke's Gospel, claim that Jesus' biological father is, in fact, God or that Mary, being the only human involved, resulted in Jesus having a parthenogenetic birth. I think it would have been far easier to explain who Jesus is Matthew and Luke wouldn't have tried so hard to cut Joseph out of the picture.
CHRIST, PAUL, AND THE GOSPEL OF JOHN
While etymologically meaning the anointed, the meanings terms messiah and christ have diverged over time. Very little is mentioned in the writings of Paul and John of Jesus being the son of David. Paul makes an in interesting comment about this Jesus being both the Son of God and the son of David in Epistle to the Romans (1:1-4), "Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God— the gospel he promised beforehand through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures regarding his Son, who as to his earthly life was a descendant of David, and who through the Spirit of holiness was appointed the Son of God in power by his resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord." Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV® Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.®
A close reading of this passage indicates that Paul knew nothing of the birth stories of Jesus as recorded in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke and considered Jesus "appointed or chosen" to be God's Son "by his resurrection from the dead." As such, one can speak of Jesus as the Christ as the anointed son of God due to his being resurrected or, according to the Gospel of John, as the only-begotten Son of God, chosen from eternity, the very Word of God made flesh through whom all things came into being (See John 1). One has to remember that in the Gospel of John, Jesus is Christ from the beginning of creation. As such there is no baptism of Jesus story, no brith story, and no transfiguration story. Jesus is Christ from the moment he is born.
In Paul's mind, Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah who was ushering in a new age and a new heaven and earth that occurred at his resurrection and not his birth or even his baptism as described by the Synoptic Gospels. Paul seems totally unaware of any of the life stories found in the Synoptic Gospels. Instead Paul fully recognized Jesus to be a Jew like him, saying in his Epistle to the Galatians (4:4-5), "But when the set time had fully come, God sent his son, born of a woman, born under the law, [in other words, born a Jew -nw] to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship, which occurred after Jesus' death and resurrection.
For Paul, Jesus only becomes and/or is recognized as the Christ after his resurrection. Paul also retained the notion that Jesus as the Christ would return to earth within Paul's lifetime, which can explain some of Paul's sense of urgency that is found in some of his letters. It is not clear, however, that Paul understood Jesus Christ as God incarnate, that is something that is derived from the Gospel of John. The Jewish concept of the Messiah makes no such claim and it is doubtful that if Jesus thought he was the Messiah that he was God incarnate.
Paul did not know Jesus of Nazareth in the flesh. He only encountered and knew Jesus in a spiritual, visionary sense. As a result, Jesus' resurrection was spiritual, as far a Paul was concerned. For Paul, Jesus' resurrection transfigured Jesus from a physical being into a spiritual being. As a spiritual being, the resurrected Christ had a physical presence in the world through the Church, which Paul called the Body of Christ.
Walter Meeks in his book, "The First Urban Christians, the Social World of the Apostle Paul," states that use of the "human body" was a common metaphor for society (pg. 81). Paul's use of the Body of Christ was as metaphor for the ecclesia, the church, where people played different roles within the body, just as the human body has different parts that have different roles. (See 1 Corinthians 12).
As noted in my previous post on the Resurrection, Paul uses the term the Body of Christ as a metaphor of the risen Christ who bestows his being to those who partake in the sacramental life of the church, the rite of Baptism (Christening) and the sharing of Jesus' sacrificed body and blood distributed in Holy Communion. Through the sacramental life of the church one became one with Christ. Being one with Christ made one a spiritual being who has also died with Christ and is raised with Christ to life everlasting.
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It is not clear what the earliest followers of Jesus believed about Jesus after his death. Did they actually believe he was physically resurrected. Did the concept of resurrection cross their minds? In what way did they understand Jesus to be the Way? Did they consider him to be the Messiah or did they consider him a prophet? The Book of the Acts of the Apostles, which is the only biblical source describing the earliest days of the early church were written in the last decades of the first century or a late as the early decades of the second century CE.
The problem I have with the New Testament is that it feels like it is one side of story that was heavily shaped by the writings of Paul and John. While the Synoptic Gospels seem to share a common source regarding the teachings and life story of Jesus, they read as though they were edited to favor both the Pauline and Johannine teachings about Jesus. If Paul elevated Jesus to be the Christ, the chosen one of God, the writer or writers of the Gospel of John raised him to be the only-begotten Son of God, the Word made flesh through whom all things came into being.
The Gospel of John, more than other writing in the New Testament, has defined who Jesus as the Christ is, the Word made flesh and the Only-begotten Son of God. I have written extensively about the Gospel of John and the Paul's epistles in various posts, but I feel compelled to stress again how crucial both are to orthodox, mainstream Christian theology, but are they accurate? Do they really capture who Jesus is?
In my opinion, both Paul and the Gospel of John distort a historical understanding of Jesus and, more importantly, they distort the relevance of what Jesus actually taught, very little of which appears in the Epistles of Paul of the Gospel of John. Unfortunately, both the Pauline and Johannine teachings about Jesus is what orthodox and mainline Christianity is based on. This is not to say that what Paul or the authors of John have written is insincere, but rather that much of what they wrote proceeds from theological speculation about Jesus rather than the actual teachings of Jesus. There are a number of places in the New Testament that one can point to as contradicting the teachings of Jesus found in the Synoptic Gospel.
CHRIST AND ESCHATOLOGY
Before moving on to a twenty-first century understanding of Christ, we need to look at both Christ/The Messiah as a metonym for hope. In Abrahamic monotheism, the idea of "the Messiah" and Christ is an eschatological figure who will usher in a new heaven and new earth is rooted in the notion of a hope against all odds. It hearkens back to Abraham and the promise that he would be a father of many nations, although he was, at the time he received that prophetic vision, childless and would father only one legitimate child to carry on his search for the promise land which never occurred in his life time nor the lifetime of his children, their children and his grandchildren. It would not take shape until after the Children of Israel's exodus from Egypt, some four hundred years later. Paul more than any other writer in the New Testament makes frequent references to Abraham's faithful, hopefulness in the promises of God.
The eschatological Messiah of Jesus' day came out of the sense of loss that happened in the destruction of the first temple and the Babylonian captivity in which the the leadership and ruling class of Judah were taken into captivity. As mentioned above, this Messiah was derived from the prophecies of Jeremiah, Isaiah, and Ezekiel; prophecies that offered a hope that some day, the Kingdom of David would be restored, and in fact, that at the end of time there would be established a new heaven and a new earth. This hope became entrenched in Judea when it was under Greek and Roman occupation and deeply entrenched after the destruction of the second Temple and the Roman emperor Hadrian banishing Jews from their homeland, a banishment that for the most part lasted for two thousand years when the state of Israel was established in 1948.
In Christianity, this sense of hope is expressed in the doctrine of the Second Coming of Christ. This doctrine is a bit off in my estimation because if Jesus is/was the Messiah as foretold by the prophets, then why is it necessary for him to come again? The whole theology of the Second Coming seems to say that Jesus wasn't able to accomplish establishing a new heaven and a new earth, or creating a thousand year reign of peace on the earth.
The simple fact is that none of that has happened to date. I can think of theological excuses for it not happening, but they are all speculative. In my opinion, the second coming of Christ can only be properly understood as a metonym for the hope that Jesus' teachings offer and treated as having mythic relevance in how we understand our redemptive roles in the world.
CHRIST AND HOPE FOR THE WORLD
The world is always in need of hope. World peace, an end to war, an end to poverty, an end to hunger, and an end to suffering have always been within our grasp if we would fully vigorously pursue such hope in our lifetimes. To date Christianity has failed to do so; that is not say that there have never been times when some people have tried, but Christian doctrine largely is not aimed at making this world a better place. It has allowed for failure to follow Jesus through doctrines like original sin and the Second Coming; ways to kick the can of our redemptive responsibility and accountability to love God by loving what God loves down the road of this life till it ends in death, at which point the only hope left for any of us is the hope of a better life in a hereafter.
While I personally believe that this life suggests more life, such a belief can't be used as an excuse for me or anyone else from engaging in the redemptive responsibilities Jesus left us with; the responsibility we have in realizing the kingdom of God that Jesus talked about in our lives. If we are to recalibrate Christianity then Jesus as the Christ must be understood as the exemplar of such a redemptive hope that is to be realized by putting into action the teachings he left us with.
Norm
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