The Wisdom and Wit of Rabbi Jesus

by William E. Phipps

Jesus was more than just a supernatural figure, says William Phipps. He had much in common with teachers and shared many of the interests of rabbis, ethicists, philosophers, and satirists. Phipps provides evidence of this in his thought-provoking book and then gives a boarder perspective of Jesus, showing that he differed from the traditional ancient wisdom with his rejection of the ideas of female inferiority, nationalistic prejudices, and intolerance of the unlearned. Readers are presented with a view of Rabbi Jesus as the consummate master teacher with a keen sense of humor, whose central theme was love.

268 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1993

Reviews

[Edward · Rating 4 out of 5]

The basic question to be answered in this book is one asked by Christ himself, “Who do you say that I am?” (Mark 28:29). Phipps’ answer is that Christ preferred to stimulate reflection rather than to declare any absolute truths, and it’s one that the author says constantly challenges believers and non-believers alike.

Phipps’ book includes a good deal about the “wisdom” of Christ, much less on the specific “wit” which does, though, merit a chapter of its own, emphasizing that Christ’s humor was subltle and wry and can often only be understood in its context. The wisdom of Christ, on the other hand, is much more far-rangng with the remainder of the book’s ten chapters taken up with it. Headings such as the “Prophetic Pharisee,” “Interpreting Scripture,” “Christ as Teacher,” “In Light of Other Philosophers” and “Supernatural and Other Signs” give some idea of the scope of Phipps.

However, to return to the “wit” of Christ, Phipps quotes what was said of the philosopher Alfred North Whitehead, “His writings are characterized by a subtle and somewhat ironic type of with which both enlightens and amuses,” and remarks that Jesus’ “teachings” could be substituted for Whitehead’s “writings” He adds that this is a unifying theme for the book.

In a sense the book is a survey of attitudes toward Christ, obviously not exhaustive, but full of interesting opinions from individuals who have tried to make sense of the meaning of Christ’s existence. One overriding danger of interpreting Christ is to take his life and teachings too literally. Phipps compares literalists to computers, good at retrieving and storing factual information, but poor at responding to figurative nuances. Devils, angels, a sky-dwelling “father”, heaven, hell, and the miracles fall into this category. The Bible, for Phipps must always be read imaginatively.

This speculation raises a related question of the motives of the gospel writers (all we know of Christ is what someone else wrote of him. Like Socrates, he wrote down nothing himself). Why didn’t they stop at showing Christ as an inspiring leader, an enlightening teacher, a compassionate healer and physician? Because there was more; there have been many such figures in world history and as Dostoevsky wrote, “Humans seek not so much God as the miraculous. They cannot bear to be without the miraculous and will create new miracles for themselves and will worship deeds of sorcery and witchcraft.”

Christ’s “miracles”, then, are always meant to point toward and lead to virtuous conduct, but too often they are praised as external acts in themselves with virtuous conduct getting only secondary emphasis. The beatitudes, for example, can be seen as a combined portrait of Christ and one that he hoped his followers would imitate. All of the miracles embed some aspect of the beatitudes.

A particularly interesting comparison is made between Christ and Socrates. Obviously, neither had any awareness of the other, but “as wise men and teachers, they interacted with common elements of the human condition” and in their ideas of virtuous behavior, each emphasized moral decision-making, rather than a passive acceptance of negative injunctions of the “shalt-not” variety.

As I indicated, Phipps has not written any kind of complete commentary on Christ, but has intelligently posed some of the many questions, and answers that any thoughtful person might have in pondering what Christ was all about.

[Rolph Payet · Rating 3 out of 5]

Phipps provides a unique perspective on the Jewishness of Christ by focussing on his human qualities and the context of Jewish thinking, teaching, and traditions at the time. He argues that Jesus’ approach to humour and laughter as an antidote to vanity, greed, and tyranny among humans. He also provides interesting insights into how Jesus used such approaches in his ministry on earth to demonstrate how humans treat foolishness as wisdom and discard God’s word as myths or gibberish. He goes a long way toward correcting prevailing Christian views that Jesus was anti-Pharisee, did not have a sense of humour, and was more of a preacher than a teacher. He devotes a chapter to the teaching methods of Jesus, and how Jesus used plain language drawn from every day life to convey His message. On philosophy, the author compares Jesus' teaching with Socrates and dabbles in some recent writings of Nietzsche and Russel, rather than comparing in some depth with other philosophers of the time. He also devotes most part of a chapter to the fictional novel 'Christ's Last Temptation', instead of exploring the relationships of Jesus with his entourage. including women. Overall a good read, some indepth analysis is lacking in some key areas.