How Jesus Became God

While returning to Chicago from Croatia on my 10 hour transatlantic flight, I sat next to an amiable self- described “servant of Christ,” who was engaged in translating the bible into the Kurdish language. Although he had been reading the bible seriously for forty years, he was not bothered by the very different way Jesus is described in the four canonical gospels. To him, they were just different views of the same person, with no more variation than one would expect in four different biographies of Abraham Lincoln.

Not so for Bart Ehrman, the distinguished University of North Carolina professor and agnostic biblical scholar. He looks carefully at the different descriptions of Jesus and then takes into account the timing of when the show more different descriptions were written. In the earliest gospel (Mark), Jesus is neither referred to as God, nor does Jesus claim to be anything other than a human messiah. Yet by the latest gospel (John), which was written some 30 to 40 years after Mark, Jesus has morphed into the “Word,” an eternal being that is the equal of God the creator of the universe, and in some (impossible to define) way, IS God. Ehrman queries, if Jesus claimed to be God, don’t you think that was important enough to mention in any of the first three gospels? Isn’t it more plausible that the belief that Jesus was God developed or evolved after the synoptic gospels (Mark, Matthew, and Luke) were written?

As Ehrman summarizes in a Huffington Post interview about the book:

"Jesus was a lower-class preacher from Galilee, who, in good apocalyptic fashion, proclaimed that the end of history as he knew it was going to come to a crashing end, within his own generation. God was soon to intervene in the course of worldly affairs to overthrow the forces of evil and set up a utopian kingdom on earth. And he would be the king. ... It didn't happen. Instead of being involved with the destruction of God's enemies, Jesus was unceremoniously crushed by them: arrested, tried, humiliated, tortured, and publicly executed. ... 
And yet, remarkably, soon afterwards his followers began to say that -- despite all evidence to the contrary -- Jesus really was the messiah sent from God. More than that, he was actually a divine being, not a mere human. And not just any divine being. He was the Creator of the universe. ... How did that happen? How did we get from a Jewish apocalyptic preacher -- who ended up on the wrong side of the law and was crucified for his efforts -- to the Creator of all things and All-powerful Lord? How did Jesus become God?"

Ehrman attributes the belief of the early disciples in the Resurrection to “visions” several of them had in the first few months after the crucifixion. Those visions are no more nor less historically reliable than the many later appearances of the Virgin Mary to various people. Nonetheless, those who had the visions could conclude that since Jesus appeared to be in some sense alive after being crucified, he was in some sense divine.

Ehrman explains that “there were lots of people like this in the ancient world,” i.e., people who were understood to be in some sense divine. For example, the Roman emperors from Augustus on all claimed to be gods. And there was a man named Apollonius whose popular cult in the first and second centuries contended for believers with Christianity. His followers thought that he too ascended into heaven and lived on after being executed by the Romans. Thus, it would not have been terribly unusual for ancient people to think of Jesus as becoming one of the many “divine” beings rather than an eternal entity, coeval and coequal with the Creator.

It is difficult to pinpoint the cause of Jesus’ promotion from a (lower case) god to God, but the time of the promotion appears to have begun in earnest between the publication of the last of the synoptic gospels and the writing of the gospel of John. Ehrman thinks the change in the perception of Christ was gradual. In fact, he demonstrates that for the first two centuries of Christianity, there were many debates about the nature of Christ. It was not until Emperor Constantine forced the Christians to convene the Council of Nicea in 325 C.E. that the gospel of John’s version of Jesus became orthodox doctrine. And indeed, various “heretical” concepts of Christ’s nature have endured and have been held by many Christians over the centuries.

Ehrman explains various techniques used by historians to vet ancient documents, techniques he described and applied in some of his previous books like Misquoting Jesus. He then applies those techniques to the gospels, and comes to some conclusions that may startle, scandalize, and appall practicing (but not critically thinking) Christians. For example, he contends that it was highly unlikely that Jesus was given a decent burial; more likely, he was not buried at all, being left on the cross like virtually all other victims of Rome’s harsh “justice.” Thus, he finds the stories of the “empty tomb” to be highly incredible.

To some extent, this book repeats theses propounded in Misquoting Jesus. Ehrman states that his basic theses are not revolutionary. In fact, they are taught in most main stream Protestant seminaries. He ascribes the fact that they are not widely known among the laity to reluctance on the part of pastors to share ideas that might weaken the faith of the faithful. These are important ideas, and Ehrman is an excellent explicator of them. Even though this book restates many ideas that Ehrman has expressed before, it is a good read and important in its own right.

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As usual, Ehrman skillfully points out all the contradictions in the Bible, in this case, the changing nature of Christians' conception of Jesus after his death. At first, a man who became divine when he (supposedly) ascended into heaven. Later, a man who god adopted as his son at Jesus' baptism. Then divine at his birth to a virgin mother. Eventually, always existing and always divine, but that took almost 400 years. This loses one half star because it is a bit repetitive, but that is Ehrman's habit in his books. In any case, when he is done, you won't have any doubt what he said. As a lecturer, he is a bit too strident. He starts out every lecture in a normal voice, but just gets more and more excited as he goes along. I streamed this show more on the excellent Kanopy service. If you're not familiar with it, see if your library provides access to Kanopy, Hoopla, and Libby. You won't have to pay for audiobooks or streaming video channels again! show less

How Jesus Became God

Whenever I have been in churches that recite the Nicene Creed, I have always been struck by the almost legalistic way that the Creed piles declarations about Christ on top of one another, making finely tuned statements that channel belief about Christ into certain tracks while denying other possible ideas about who he might be in relation to God the Father. Perhaps many Christians who recite the Creed don 19t even know why they are reciting it, but they would have a better idea if they read Bart Ehrman 19s 1CHow Jesus Became God, 1D which more or less follows after his earlier book, 1CDid Jesus Exist? 1D Ehrman 19s answer to that question was a solid 1Cyes, 1D at least in so far as he affirms that Jesus was a real show more historical person. Here he explores how the historical Jesus came to be recognized as God.

As soon as his followers decided that Jesus had been resurrected, they decided that he had been 1Cexalted 1D to heaven to be with God the Father. Clues to how this early conceptualization worked are found tucked into the texts of the New Testament where authors like Paul and Luke sometimes use language that expresses ideas about Jesus that they elsewhere either contradict or do not develop, as if they are quoting older formulas of Christian worship that view Jesus in different ways than Paul and Luke do. In these old formulas, Jesus was seen as the Son of God by virtue of his exaltation from crucified man to Son of God, but the older formulas don 19t seem to acknowledge Christ as a preexisting being.

Even the word 1Cexaltation 1D implies that Jesus was born completely and utterly human and only through obedience to God, even to death, was he raised up to a higher level of spiritual existence. This 1Cexaltation Christology 1D gradually saw Jesus in greater and greater glory, though Ehrman admits that he cannot say how early the higher versions of exaltation Christology emerged, and he cannot be sure when the transition to 1Cincarnation Christology 1D took place, but incarnation was very different from exaltation: Jesus was no longer seen as having been elevated to divine or quasi-divine status at birth, baptism or crucifixion, he came to be seen as divine before his birth. He became the incarnation of divinity. Already by the time of Paul, Christ seems to have been identified with the angel who is described in some Hebrew texts as the voice of God. (Think of Alan Rickman 19s role in the movie 1CDogma. 1D) The voice of God, sometimes personified as the Word or even Wisdom, was an aspect of God, a part of Him and yet a separate person. Even some of the earliest Christians began to think of Jesus in this way, and so, by the time the prologue to the Gospel of John was written, Christ had become 1Cthe Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God 1D (John 1:1).

After Jesus was declared to be God and even after he became identified as the incarnation of God, everything wasn 19t settled; the debate about HOW he could be God continued for centuries. A large part of the problem was that with so many different ideas about the sense in which Jesus was God scattered throughout the books that were eventually gathered together to form the New Testament, theologians had their work cut out for them, feeling as they did that they had to reconcile all contradictions and make them fit together. The question of how God the Father and God the Son could be two separate persons and yet Christianity still could be a monotheistic religion was only chief among many tricky questions about the nature of Christ, and these arcane questions did matter to the average worshipper. For example, whether Christ is subordinate or equal to the Father affects how the Father and Son are to be worshipped in church services.

The controversy over the nature of Christ was the reason for the Council of Nicea in 325. The original version of the Nicene Creed that came out of that council only said a few words about God, spent most of its words on Christ and dealt with the Holy Spirit in one short sentence. Though they have been lengthened since then, the Creed 19s statements about the Father and the Holy Spirit are, to this day, shorter than the ones about Christ. When he quotes the current version of the Creed, Ehrman observes that the only part of the Nicene Creed that he still agrees with is the part that declares that Jesus was crucified under Pontius Pilate. Interestingly, the original Nicene Creed, quoted by Ehrman two dozen pages later, doesn 19t mention Pilate at all and does not mention the crucifixion. Indeed, all of the statements about Christ in the Creed are meant to contradict views that were considered heretical. For example, some Christians thought that Jesus was not fully human and therefore did not suffer on the cross. By merely stating that Jesus 1Csuffered, 1D the bishops at the Council of Nicea signaled that the fact that Jesus suffered was more significant than the manner of his suffering.

In a way, the title of the Nicene Creed is misleading. As Ehrman points out, its declaration that Christ 19s kingdom 1Cwill never end 1D was added because of a view that arose after the Council of Nicea; so, when the Council of Constantinople met in 381, a new declaration was added to the Creed. Another, even later council added the first declaration about the Virgin Mary, 1Cthe mother of God. 1D

Reading Bart Ehrman 19s books over the past decade has been like following a friend 19s personal journey as he combines his background as a young born-again Christian with his later rigorous training as a New Testament scholar and a historian of the period during which Christianity developed into a world religion. show less

An outstanding, objective and well researched analysis of how the understanding of Jesus evolved from earliest Christianity to the Counsel of Nicea (and actually a bit beyond). Mr. Ehrman is an excellent speaker and writer, and sets forth in clear terms the fascinating account of how views of Jesus changed from a poor, fully human apocalyptic preacher to God.

Not a book I can imagine having broad appeal. I'm an Ehrman fan, I think he does an amazing job of explaining the science of the history of the bible. And I also enjoy reading about ecclesiastical history. This book follows the progression of the idea of Jesus over time, from the earliest believers who called him teacher and knew him as a fairly normal apocalyptic preacher through the early years of Christianity and into orthodoxies and heresies, ending with the creed that Jesus is both fully human (and thus, mortal) and also fully God (and thus, immortal) at the SAME TIME. If you aren't especially interested in the minutia of religious debate and/or the politics involved in choosing which beliefs to incorporate and which to denounce, show more then this isn't for you. All of Ehrman's books are excellent, mind, I'm just saying some have greater mass appeal (heh).

This is another one of the spring break books that Veronica and I ended up sharing, because not enough strength to carry all the books one wants to read over a few days.

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Ehrman excavates the old and new testament to offer reasoning to doubt the divinity of Jesus. He openly owns he is an agnostic, having arrived at such an outlook via Evangelical and Episcoplian backgrounds. He explains in detail the methods historians of antiquity use to determine events that are no longer accesible from eyewitnesses, physical evidence, and a restricted reliance on extant docuements. While he criticizes baseless assertions, he at times engages in the same assertions. One of my criticisms is Ehrman's total failure to cite physical evidence. Little exists, but what does exist he should have cites. Ehrman books is highly readable, a testament to his skill as a writer. As the book progresses, I began to notice that the show more structure of Ehrman's positions begins to bucke under the very arguments he presents. He discounts Joseph of Armamthea's burial of Jesus as fabricated by later narrators. Much has been written about Joseph with some physical evidence to support their positon. Ehrman should have addressed this. His absolue embrace of his methods does not allow for evidence cited via other methods. His valid criticsm of those historians who fail to leave their "presuppositions" outside the door of historical research boomerang to count coup against him when his own presuppositions begin to reveal themselves. Ehrman does not does not allow for the possibility that over time inconsistencies in documents are inevitable and are not proof of falsehood. The worst criticsm comes from sentences such as this -- "... one can imagine strictly literary reasons for inventing the women at the empty tomb." Imagine? After offering us strict methods for determining, if not historical truth, at least historical probability? Imagination is neither a valid or reliable method for examining history. Exceptions occur when no documents exist, and the historian admitedly is filling in a significant vacuum with her own imagination and says so.
Ehrman's book asks necessary questions. It challenges dogma. While respecting faith, it correctly asks us not to substitute faith for history. Nor to allow faith to refute reasonable skepticism. show less

I have read and enjoyed several of Professor Ehrman’s books and for his latest book had the chance to hear him give a book talk in Raleigh. A professor of religious studies at UNC Chapel Hill, Ehrman is an historian and a scholar of the New Testament who brings his scholarship and research to bear on the evolution of Christian teachings over the centuries. Ehrman describes himself as agnostic, having lapsed from a quite fundamentalist Christian upbringing and early study at a noted fundamentalist bible institute. From a deeply researched and analytic basis, Ehrman’s works critique – even debunk -- the assumptions and holdings of established religion.

Although I consider myself a church-affiliated Christian, I hold that skepticism show more about “beliefs” passed down through the ages and thoughtful, rational reconsideration of theological constructions is a perfectly valid frame of reference that does not conflict with an honest place in established religion. In my personal religious pondering I am far, far distant from acceptance of the bible as literal truth and from unquestioning adherence to the “teachings” that mortal men have derived from religious tradition. For me anyway, I find that the more one delves into history and socio-political influences on the development of religious tenants the more comfortable and satisfying a “fit” there is in one’s spiritual domain. (Reading the bible as a work of literature is also a valuable way to approach its meanings.)

The theme of Ehrman’s book is how was it that an illiterate preacher from an obscure region of Palestine become to be considered as not only divine, but to be God himself? Ehrman starts his analysis by pointing out that in ancient religions and beliefs the distinction between humans and the gods was not as clearly bounded as we hold today. It was common to believe that the gods sometimes take human form, for the gods to intermingle personally directly with humans (often via sexual liaisons) and for humans to achieve divine status. The Roman emperors were considered to possess divinity. Ehrman describes life of the legendary Apollonius whose reputed holy characteristics and works were strikingly similar to those of Jesus. Ehrman says that humans became godly in several ways: through physical intercourse between gods and women whose offspring were semi-divine, through “incarnation” – gods who came to earth assuming human form, and through “exaltation” – humans who were elevated to a divine at some point in their lives or at their deaths.

The book examines what the gospels and writings of Paul say about Jesus’ divinity. Ehrman traces the evolving conceptions of Jesus through the synoptic gospels (Mark, Matthew, Luke and their “sources” – Q, M and L –) and the quite different treatment of Jesus’ divine identity in the gospel of John. He says that the synoptics do not overtly support the belief that Jesus was God, but they begin to hint at it through intimations of how he became divine. Mark holds that Jesus became divine at his baptism by John the Baptist. Luke concludes that at his conception Jesus came into divine status. Matthew, in contrast, describes the nature of Jesus’ birth to a virgin as in accord with prophesy found in scripture. Matthew shows us that a major intent of the gospel writers was to make a link between Jesus and the prophecies and lineages found in the Old Testament – that his existence and purposes fulfilled Hebrew scripture, particularly the prophesized coming of a messiah who would establish a godly kingdom on earth. But, despite their varying perspectives and motives, these claims, which on one level were made (or made up) to establish Jesus’ legitimacy among the Jews, open the way to the much more radical notion that Jesus was not only divine but that his divinity was pre-existent and that he was, in fact, God himself.

What did Jesus say about his divine nature, that he is one with God? It turns out he said nothing of the sort. The gospel of John, however, takes a major leap in this direction. It is the latest of the four gospels and the only one in which Jesus describes himself as God incarnate. Ehrman holds that the words of Jesus about his sameness with God were in reality John’s words, never uttered by Jesus. Except for John’s bald assertions, you cannot find anywhere in the other gospels any self-reference by Jesus that he is really God.

Paul is a bit equivocal on the matter, but intriguingly in Paul’s letters you find passages which are by context and language clearly from pre-Pauline sources. These very early words suggest the beginnings of ideas that Jesus may have been divine.

Ehrman contends that the hinge to these beliefs was Jesus’ resurrection: it was because of his resurrection that Jesus was divine; perhaps even a manifestation of God himself. Ehrman holds that while the fact of the resurrection cannot be historically proven, it can be rationally concluded that the disciples had visions of Christ as a resurrected body (not in a spiritual sense, but an actual corporeal body). He delves into the psychology of individual and mass visions, which are entirely common throughout human experiences. The resurrection put Christian thinkers on the path that Jesus must have been divine not only through his death, but divine in a pre-existence eternal sense. In other words, he was not “created” by God at a certain time to perform his mission of salvation, but always existed and was sent to earth to save mankind. The meaning of his sacrifice for the sins of others becomes exponentially magnified when holding that he possesses infinite existence and is, in fact, God. Ehrman tackles the evolution of the concept of the trinity which is a theological means to hold onto a monotheistic view of God while incorporating Jesus and the Holy Spirit as one in God – not separate gods or separate parts of God.

The question of the nature of Jesus’ divinity and his status as God, while beginning to emerge very early in post-Jesus times and evolving over a few centuries, was not without controversy and alternative views. Ehrman outlines the various views that led to struggles between “orthodox” and “heretical” thinking, resulting finally in the dominance of the triune viewpoint at the Council of Nicaea in the 4th century.

At the book talk given by Ehrman one would have expected that his views (which cut against the most fundamental beliefs of believers) would have been challenged by some from the audience, especially since this region is known to be quite religious. Ehrman bluntly stated that it is not possible from an historian’s perspective to reach a conclusion that Jesus’ life and nature points to his divinity, or that he is a manifestation of God. He says that such spiritual beliefs are matters of faith and cannot form the basis of counter arguments to the historian’s perspective. His questioners were actually quite polite and aimed at eliciting additional explanatory commentary by Ehrman on the points raised in his book. In all, a very interesting evening and a very interesting book. show less