The Jesus Seminar Finds a New 'Credible' Jesus

A report and comment on religious trends and events being covered by the media.  This week’s item is from Religion News Service, March 23^rd, 2002 with a headline, “Robert Funk, Founder of Jesus Seminar, finds a credible Jesus in his new book on Jesus’ vision for today,” dateline: Santa Rosa, California.In A Credible Jesus, Fragments of a Vision published this month by Pollbridge Press, Robert W. Funk, founder and director of the Jesus Seminar works out the positive implications of his studies of Jesus.Dr. Funk presents a rich conceptual framework for the fragments of aphorism, parable, and dialog that represent the historical Jesus.The reader can take seriously the historic Jesus as a reemerging spiritual leader for today without his having to be a cosmic agent of redemption.“Bob Funk has spent his life amidst the language of Jesus,” John Dominic Krausen comments.“That language has come down to us as ‘fragments of a vision,’ but that is more appropriate than unfortunate.For as this book argues, they envision God’s domain as another world that overturns the normalcy of our everyday one and that we can catch only in glimpses and live only in moments.”The narrative gospels and Paul obscure Jesus the spiritual teacher by turning a Jewish iconoclast into a divine icon.The credible Jesus taught and lived an alternative vision for community in a world where God is present in the everyday.Dr. Funk explains in simple language the voice print that we can attribute to Jesus.He draws the reader into God’s invisible realm based on an ethic of trust to be celebrated communally.Outsiders and outcasts are included.Tribalism is transcended.New family ties and new relationships even with flora and fauna are forged and social and economic systems are subverted.In God’s domain there is no room for demons.Rewards are intrinsic and humor and humility mitigate morality.This Jesus announced the end of brokered religion and trust in a God who was not an oriental despot.The cross becomes a symbol of absolute integrity of the refusal to compromise.Robert W. Funk is founder of the Jesus Seminar and director of West Star Institute, a non-profit advocate for religious literacy.A Guggenheim Fellow and Senior Fulbright Scholar, he’s the author of Honest to Jesus, 1996, and co-author of the best selling The Five Gospels: The Search for the Authentic Words of Jesus, 1993.

Tom:

Dave, I just returned from 3½ days with academics.Now, I’ve spent a little time in college.My dad said too much time, but I’m familiar with academic jargon and an academic approach to it and so on.And again these 3½ days—you can only come away confused.What are these guys talking about?

Dave:

Tom, you know I had a debate with Robert Funk on secular radio.One of the first things, at least as I remember, I said to him was, “Bob, you were born 1900 years too late.You guys sit around with your colored beads voting on whether Jesus said this or didn’t say that.You weren’t even there.We have an eyewitness account and I can prove it.”He got so mad, angry, he hung up.

Tom:

Okay.

Dave:

Yes, we’re both coming in by phone.He got so angry he hung up and I said to the talk show host, “Well, I didn’t hang up, let me carry on.”Well they invited me on thinking he was going to rip me apart.When that didn’t happen, oh no, no, that was the end of it.They didn’t want to hear from me.Look, the guy wasn’t there.Here’s the title of his—he coauthored a best selling, The Five Gospels: The Search for the Authentic Words of Jesus.Now where are you going to search for them?Are you going to find them out in the astroplane somewhere?Are they floating around out there as sound fragments?That’s what it sounds like.We have the authentic words of Jesus.We have them recorded by disciples who tell us they are saying the truth.Tom, we don’t have time in this small segment.I can prove that these are eyewitnesses.Now why would I want to abandon the testimony of eyewitnesses who—they’ve recorded it?Furthermore, they are inspired of the Holy Spirit, which Christ said and I’m going to go off?Where am I going to search for the authentic words of Jesus?

Tom:

But Dave, if you don’t like what Jesus said, you have to go somewhere.You’ve got to find it.For example, I’m quoting from—this is a press release from his book by the way.“The narrative gospels obscured Jesus, the spiritual teacher, by turning a Jewish iconoclast into a divine icon.”

Dave:

Yes, this is what he says.

Tom:

Right.

Dave:

But on what authority does he say that?

Tom:

Well he’s saying Jesus isn’t God, and come on, he had better things to do.

Dave:

Tom again, this is an old illustration.We use it again and again, but I use it all the time. I’m sitting next to a young man on an airplane, he says, (here are his exact words,) “When I was in high school I believed in Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior.”I said, “Well what do you about him…”—oh and then he said, “But I don’t believe anymore.”Well I said, “What do you think of Jesus?”He said, “Well I think he was a good man.”Look Tom, it’s just simple logic.I said you can’t say Jesus was a good man.If he was a man, he’s not a good man, because he claimed to be God.He said he was the only way to the Father.He said he would rise from the dead.He said he would judge the world.On and on it goes.Now you cannot escape the words of Jesus.We have them recorded by eyewitnesses and I can prove it.We have all the evidence which we don’t have time to go into.Now you are going to have to conclude Jesus was either a liar or a lunatic or he was who he claimed to be.”Now this man is making Jesus into being both a liar and a lunatic.The words that Jesus spoke, he does not accept them, he doesn’t like it and now he’s going to dream up—Tom, I’m sorry I guess I’ve said it before, I get angry.But this man is going to dream up what he says.He creates a Jesus out of his own imagination and then he’s going to tell us what this Jesus said.

Tom:

Dave, the sad thing, the grievous thing is that this guy gets the press.People are listening to him and the language that he uses, the way that he presents these things—if you don’t know any better, if you don’t have some understanding about who Christ is and what he has done, you’re game, you are fair game.And a lot of people are drawn to credentials.Look at the guy’s credentials:a Guggenheim Fellow, a Senior Fulbright Scholar.In the world’s terms this is not a stupid guy.But foolish beyond words.

Dave:

Yes, if we do not have an accurate record of who Jesus is, what he taught, what he did, then forget it.I don’t want somebody’s imagination.We learn about Jesus from the Bible.We also learn about him from history and Josephus has a much better testimony about Jesus than Bob Funk and he lived a whole lot closer to him.