Jesus and the God of Israel: God Crucified and Other Studies on the New Testament's Christology of Divine Identity

by Richard Bauckham

This book is a  greatly  revised and expanded edition of Richard Bauckham's acclaimed  God Monotheism and Christology in the New Testament  (1999), which helped redirect scholarly discussion of early Christology.

Genres: Theology, Biblical Studies, Religion, New Testament, Christianity, Christian, Nonfiction

336 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2008

About the author

Richard Bauckham (PhD, University of Cambridge) is senior scholar at Ridley Hall, Cambridge University, in Cambridge, England, where he teaches for the Cambridge Federation of Theological Colleges. He is also a visiting professor at St. Mellitus College, London, and emeritus professor of New Testament at the University of St. Andrews. He is a Fellow of the British Academy and the author of numerous books.

Reviews

[Kendall Davis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bauckham’s category of divine identity is an extremely helpful paradigm for answering the sort of questions he sets out to answer. This provides a rich tool to read NT texts provided one is careful to note the more defined categories of divine identity that Bauckham highlights.

A discussion of the spirit and how divine identity coheres with Trinitarian thought would’ve been helpful. Bauckham is also a bit too dismissive of STJ parallels to early Christology. His point about the strict line between God and all creation in the sources is well taken, but it doesn’t always follow that other parallels, especially messianic ones, are basically irrelevant to understanding early Christology. Bauckham is also a harmonizer to a significant degree. But let he who is without harmonizing impulse throw the first stone.

[Ben Cook · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant, the chapter God Crucified is worth the price of the book alone.

[David Kakish · Rating 4 out of 5]

Do you know what Christians and Non-Christians have in common? They both get a little bored reading Richard Bauckham.

All jokes aside, I'm thankful for RB and the time and effort he puts into pouring over texts. Like an encyclopedia, his books are there when you need them. This was an overwhelmingly informative yet underwhelmingly engaging read.

[Ben Robin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rigorous exegesis in order to demonstrate the full divinity of Christ, but along with a few significant questions on traditional biblical authorship, which makes this 4/5

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

How did Christians come to believe that Jesus was God in the flesh? The usual answer is that this belief developed slowly, from a very human Jesus early on to one who became more and more divine until full Trinitarian theology took hold. A large impetus in this was the penetration of Christianity into the Greek world as Greek categories allowed Christians to better understand or explain how Jesus related to God. Bauckham's argument is that this explanation is all wrong. He argues that the earliest Christology was a high Christology with early Christians incorporating Jesus into God's identity. All the categories for this are present in first century Judaism. Bauckham argues that there was a strong line between God and everything else. Beings such as angels were never accorded any divine status while God's Wisdom and God's Word were within God's identity. In other words, identifying certain things (wisdom, word) with God opened an avenue for early Christians to identify Jesus with God.

Another key in Bauckham's argument is that the God of the early Christian, the Jewish God, was identified in acts rather then in just being. Thus the philosophical arguments influenced by Greek philosophy do come later, but to start the Christians saw Jesus acting as in ways God acted. Again, a high Christology is the earliest Christology.

This book is really a collection of essays and is thus disjointed and repetitive. The first essay gives you the key points while the rest fills it in. I found myself skimming many of the later parts, looking for key points. That said, it is still a helpful offering by a great scholar.

[Justin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Brilliant. A must read for anybody taking religious studies classes at an undergraduate or graduate level. A bit technical.

Best chapters: "God Crucified", "Worship of Jesus in Early Christianity", and "The Throne of God"

[Travis Wise · Rating 5 out of 5]

How did early Jewish Christians reconcile Christ’s divinity with their strict monotheism? Bauckham answers through a collection of essays. The overriding point that he makes, is that in contrast to the Greek philosophical flavor that 2nd-4th century Christianity would take, in the 1st century the question was less a question of “what is God,” and more a question of “who is God?” In other words, 1st century Christian writings—I.e. the Bible—didn’t attempt to approach God from the standpoint of essence as much as it approached God from the standpoint of identity. Through Jewish Scripture, the one and only God was Creator, Supreme Ruler, bore the unique divine name (YHWH), and was the sole object of acceptable worship. New Testament writings, instead of trying to address HOW Jesus was both man and God, undoubtedly demonstrate THAT Jesus the man was God by joining his identity with those qualities that only YHWH has. As a collection of essays, there is some unevenness and noticeable repetition; but the repetition guarantees that the insight sticks; and that insight carries the weight of the book.

[Harrison Kossover · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read chapter 1 for my seminar. I found Bauckham’s divine identity motif convincing. He argues that one should research Second Temple Judaism and the Hebrew Scriptures (he spends a lot of time in Deutero-Isaiah) to interpret how the New Testament authors saw Jesus as the same God or holding the same “divine identity” as the God of Israel in the OT. I will likely continue to read through this monograph in the future.

[Flynn Evans · Rating 4 out of 5]

Superb accounting of Judaism’s understanding of monotheism apart from its Hellenized manifestations and how a “high Christology” can therefore naturally arise from it. However, virtually all chapters after the first are creative restatements of it.

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reading it for a class on the Doctrine of the Person of Christ.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

How did so many committed Jewish monotheists come to believe so quickly in the divinity of Jesus? That’s the question leading biblical scholar Richard Bauckham tackles in this excellent collection of pieces mostly published from 1998 to 2008.

First, Old Testament precedents exist for personifications of God himself as Spirit, Word, and Wisdom, which are somehow expressions of and incorporated into the divine identity.

Second, Old Testament writers did not think about God primarily in the categories of Greek philosophy (e.g., nature, essence, attributes). Rather they focused on his divine identity as Creator and Ruler of all that exists.

The New Testament authors likewise used this approach when trying to understand Jesus. That’s why we (who typically think in Greek categories) may be frustrated that they don’t seem to come right out and say Jesus is God. But in their Hebrew/Jewish minds, that’s what they were doing when they use the language of “all things” regarding Creation (Is 40:26-28; 42:5; 44:24; Neh 9:6; and Jn 1:3; Rom 11:36; 1 Cor 8:6; Col 1:16-17; etc.) and “throne” regarding Rule (Ps 110:1 in Mt 22:43-45; Mk 14:62; Lk 22:69; Jn 13:3; Acts 2:33-35; 1 Cor 15:25; Heb 1:3; etc.) in relation to Christ.

Eschatological expectation (Is 40—55) is the outworking of the Creator and Ruler (and is also seen in Jesus—Mk 9:12; 13:4; Jn 5:2; 2 Tim 4:8; etc.).

These themes weave in and out of the various essays, with some overlap and unevenness as would be expected from pieces previously published in different places. The nature of monotheism and of monolatry are also considered along with the Shema, the “name” (YHWH), and how these expressions are incorporated into the early church’s understanding of and worship of Jesus. The Christology of Paul and Hebrews round out the book along with a study of Jesus’ cry of forsakenness within the context of Mark’s Gospel.

Bauckham’s careful and insightful scholarship make for another valuable volume from an author always worth reading.

[Ian Hammond · Rating 5 out of 5]

Eye-opening.

Bauckham argues persuasively, that for Second Temple Judaism, "who God is and not what divinity is" is the important question. Thus, he argues that there were certain characteristics which demarcated the "Divine Identity," namely:

He is the creator and the only uncreated One.
He is the Sovereign Ruler over all with no competitors.
He is known through His narrative identity.
He is known through His eschatological rule.
He has a Divine name, "YHWH."
He alone may and must be worshipped.
And he alone is fully eternal (p. 234).

This is the way the One true God was identified to his people, and through these characteristic Jesus is identified to be within the "Divine Identity." This is what Bauckham calls a "Christology of Divine Identity." The implication is this: the highest Christology of the NT was the earliest Christology, and the supposed intermediary figures in Second Temple Judaism did not play a formative role in NT Christology. Unlike intermediary figures, Jesus from the beginning was included in the work of creation and the eschatological rule of God, sitting upon the Divine throne, having the "Name" above every name, and receiving worship as the eternal one.

[Logan Hurley · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is often at the academic level, but it needs to be in order to make the argument that it's making. What is Bauckham arguing? That we have a tendency to focus a lot on what God is (eternal, infinite, omnipotent, etc) which poorly prepares us to understand the 2nd Temple Judaism that informs and shapes the entire New Testament. What did the Jews that Jesus grew up with want to know about God? What did the apostles need to be convinced of to call Jesus their God? Not the nature of God, but the identity of God. By surveying how Jewish thought at the time of Jesus thought about God, Bauckham shows that the New Testament doesn't occasionally leave us a trail of Trinitarian breadcrumbs to follow, but instead is from its earliest documents arguing forcefully that Jesus and YHWH are one and the same. For any believer who wants to deepen their understanding of Jesus as God, or the importance of the Old Testament for Christian piety, this is an amazing book.

[Roger · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is not a continuous, chapter-by-chapter explication. It is, rather, a collection of essays that deal with the unifying topic of Christology and the divine identity of Jesus that have been edited to be one book. As Bauckham notes in his introduction, you can pick up this book and start reading any chapter and it will make sense.

A lot of this book is scrupulous scholarship, even if it's relayed with brevity. There are many themes that repeat themselves in -- were it a continuous explication -- would be unnecessarily duplicative. It's not light reading, but it is fascinating and informative. It's also a great reference work to have on your shelf if you are a seminarian or student of theology of any kind.

[Ronnie Nichols · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was recommended to me both by a seminary professor and several bibliographies of other books I have read in the past. I set it on the shelf and had almost forgotten it. I am glad I picked it up and invested the time to read it. The deity of Christ is one of the major dividing lines between Christianity and all of the world religions. Mr. Bauckham does a thorough job of providing biblical proof of the validity Christian trinitarian monotheism and shows how it is compatible with both the jewish understanding of Yahweh as expressed in the law and the prophets and 2nd temple Judaism. The world may deny Jesus but they cannot refute the truth He is and proves to be. Jesus is Yahweh and this book provides much in the way of proclaiming this eternal truth.

[Gwilym Davies · Rating 4 out of 5]

There are elements of Bauckham's doctrine of God that I'm not sure I'm fully sold on, and they occasionally surfaced here. And the nature of this volume (a first chapter that republishes an earlier book, followed by a set of follow up essays) that means that some of the later chapters don't add quite as much value as I might like. But the overall thesis is brilliant, and enormously illuminating. So good to locate the New Testament's Christology in a proper appreciation of divine identity in the Old Testament. And especially good on Isaiah 40-55. I could easily give this five stars. I'll settle on four for now.

[Darcy · Rating 5 out of 5]

When scholar after scholar points back to this book, it is well worth taking note. And while there are many reasons for which this book is considered so valuable and groundbreaking, for me one of the chief reasons is how Bauckham allows the voice of Scripture to speak for itself in articulating what Old Testament and Second Temple Jewish monotheism entailed—not a monotheism shaped by Greek philosophy (though able to express itself in such categories)—and how this enabled the followers of Jesus to see, after his resurrection, his clear identity with Yahweh.

[Ben · Rating 4 out of 5]

I teeter somewhere between 3 and 4 stars, but because of this book's effect on scholarship, I leaned toward 4. Some chapters I disliked, others I thought were revelatory. In particular, Chapters 2, 3, and 5 were instructive presentations of Monotheism in Second Temple Judaism, while chapters 4 and 6 were helpful for showing how the earliest Christians could square a high Christology with this strict Monotheism. The infamous "God Crucified" essay/book was less than helpful and left a lot unsaid, but subsequent chapters made Bauckham's points well. Overall, I think that Bauckham made his point well; the earliest Christians were working within the confines of strict Monotheism. I think the verdict is still out--for me--as to whether the earliest Christians worshipped Jesus, but if they did, Bauckham's thesis in this regard is well argued. I believe there is room for refinement, but this is a substantial contribution to an understanding of the earliest theologies of the Christian Church--but everyone reading this review already knows that.

[Hunter Quinn · Rating 5 out of 5]

This may be the most important book I have read in a long time. How did Jewish monotheists come to identify Jesus as God in a way that did justice to the Old Testament depictions of God? Richard Bauckham analyzes the Old Testament, Jewish texts of the Second-Temple period, and the authors of the New Testament to answer this question. His analysis is masterful.

[Jenny Webb · Rating 4 out of 5]

An argument well worth thinking through, supported by a significant amount of research and reading. One of those reads where you take a lot of notes. I was thinking this was a book length expansion of the original piece, but it’s more like an extended reworking of the original piece with additional pieces along similar themes gathered with it.

[Daniel MacDonald · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wonderful book arguing early Christology as the highest, a growing field in today’s academic climate. This is a great mix of history and theology, and I especially appreciated the interpretation of Mark’s “Why have you forsaken me?” which has been the subject of some past criticism. It’s a good book for familiarizing with the basics of history and Christianity.

[David M. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Better for the soul than a rich steak the flesh. Bauckham fed me.

[Nick Bersin · Rating 4 out of 5]

A thorough examination of the early Christian understanding of Jesus' divinity.

[Sean Meade · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another great book from Bauckham

Typically insightful like Jesus and the Eyewitnesses and his book on Revelation. There are also some valuable talks on YouTube.

[Parker McGoldrick · Rating 4 out of 5]

I couldn’t put it down.
In sum, “the earliest Christology...is the highest Christology.”

[Emily Gayle · Rating 3 out of 5]

There is some excellent material in his book I just found it lengthy and hard to get through.

[Nilushan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I need to read this book. But how?

[cindy]

Read section 3 of chapter 1 "God Crucified" for Re-Reading John.

[Rowland Pasaribu]

This text is derived from the 1996 Didsbury Lectures given by Richard J. Bauckham at the British Isles Nazarene College in Didsbury, Manchester, in October 1996. It offers a concise version of a promised later study. Bauckham sets his work in the context of current scholarly discussion about the nature of Jewish monotheism in the Second Temple Period and scholarly attempts to find Jewish precedents for early Christology. He argues clearly for a continuity between what he reads as a strong Jewish monotheism in the Second Temple Period and a high Christology from the beginnings of New Testament thought.

Beginning from an emphasis on the identity (in contrast to the nature) of God, Bauckham argues for the singularity of the Jewish god of this period. On the one hand, intermediary figures such as angels are read as distinct from the divine; on the other hand, personifications or hypostatisations, such as divine wisdom, are interpreted as entirely included within the divine identity. Neither is reckoned to indicate Jewish alternatives to, or variations on, monotheism. By reference to early Christian exegesis of Jewish scriptures such as Psalm 110, Bauckham argues for Jesus’ participation in divine sovereignty and his full inclusion in the divine identity. Exploring interpretations of Isaiah 40–55 in Philippians 2:5–11, Revelation, and the Gospel of John, Bauckham argues for a reading of God-crucified as central to the divine identity.

While the focus on divine identity and the androcentrism of the god-language are problematic, the emphasis on “a process of mutual interpretation” (p. 47), where the writers of the Second Testament brought into relationship Jewish scriptures and the history of Jesus, is worthy of further consideration. So, too, is Bauckham’s claim: “it was actually not Jewish but Greek philosophical categories which made it difficult to attribute true and full divinity to Jesus” (p. 78).

[Matt Friedman · Rating 5 out of 5]

While Bauckham notes in his introduction that this "isn't yet the fully comprehensive study (provisionally titled, 'Jesus and the Identity of God: Early Jewish Monotheism and New Testament Christology')" that had been promised in his earlier, ground breaking _God Crucified_, this is still an important book, which he describes as a collection of "working papers" on the way to the promised fuller study. Especially in view of the controversies surrounding the topic and idea of Jesus' identity being within that of God, this is a timely and very important book, and will serve to whet our appetites for the full treatment to come, hopefully in the not-too-distant future. It is one of those books in which my mind was engaged, and my heart and spirit sang. Highly recommended.