The Shadow of the Galilean

“‘I was in the wilderness to reflect in solitude. Not everyone who puts everyday life behind them for a while is a troublemaker and a terrorist. I’m for peace.’ ‘You kept quiet about your time in the desert. That’s suspicious.’”

The wilderness is a recurring motif in The Shadow of the Galilean that is used to demonstrate the idea of being in between. Andreas sees his time in the desert as a time of self-reflection and growth, but because he lived outside the bounds of society, Pilate sees him as more suspicious than an ordinary subject.

“So our policy will continue to be respect for your religion, your God, your customs, your sensibilities. We respect even what is alien to us. But we expect you to respect what is holy to us, to note the reverence that our soldiers have for the emperor and allow everyone everywhere to worship his gods. Respect must have a reciprocal basis.”

Pilate’s words reflect the typical Roman attitude to the religions of those they conquered: People were typically allowed to maintain their religious beliefs and practices even after being assimilated into the Roman Empire, though they were expected to take part in certain aspects of Roman worship as well. As Jewish people are monotheistic, this was not possible, and the conflict created tensions.

“Bannus’ views were radical. Not only the Jews but the whole world had to begin all over again. This existing world had gone wrong. It was a world of injustice and oppression, exploitation and anxiety. It would perish because of its own transgressions in a great divine judgment. But then a new world would begin.”

Bannus’s ideas about the coming of the Messiah can be found in the Book of Isaiah in the Old Testament. During the Second Temple period, some people believed that God would bring about a new world, while others believed that people had to make changes for themselves. To Christians, Jesus is the Messiah whose death ushered in a new covenant.

“There is no such thing as history per se; only history perceived from a perspective. The historian’s view is one perspective alongside others, in which one side of history, which can be told only in the first person, does not perhaps get its due.”

Gerd Theissen is referring to historiography, which is the study of the development of history. What is important in historiography is not so much the history itself but how historians have written about a certain period or event. Theissen wants to explore historiography through a first-person narrator with his own biases and opinions.

“I also kept quiet about their ardent expectation of an imminent change in affairs, about the coming of a new messianic high priest. Prophecies about changing everything were always regarded as dangerous by politicians. There were emperors who had forbidden all prophecies.”

Messianic ideas were threatening to Rome, as they bolstered rebellious movements. It is no wonder that the Second Temple period saw a host of messianic ideas flourish: At a time of Political and Religious Upheaval, opposition to Roman rule necessitated hope for a better future.

“Do these sources really tell us nothing of significance? They say that in all probability Jesus was not a member of the upper classes and that it was not ‘the Jews’ but a Roman official who was responsible for his execution. The history of Christianity would look different if these two things had always been kept in mind.”

Theissen brings up a common debate in Christianity: the question of Morality and Culpability for Jesus’s execution. Unfortunately, the idea that Jewish people were responsible for bringing about the crucifixion has contributed to antisemitism. Theissen wonders what the history of Christianity would have looked like if Christians had not harbored such hatred for Jewish people over this issue.

“Andreas has to reconstruct a picture of Jesus on the basis of various traditions. He has to combine sayings and evaluate them critically. History writing begins when people no longer just affirm ‘It was like that’, but say, ‘On the basis of this source or that—for want of better insights—I would outline the following picture of events.’”

Andreas is a personification of historiography. He is doing in real time what the historian must do when they study history: reconstruct stories based on differing sources and present their best guess about the truth while leaving room for uncertainty.

“He’s worse than those who say that you must reconcile yourself to everything. He wants change and peace at the same time, and that’s an illusion. A dangerous illusion.”

While Jesus preaches peace and change at the same time, Barabbas and the Zealots believe that the only thing that will bring about change to Roman rule and oppression is violent resistance. The question of what to do about the Romans was one of many differences of opinion among Jewish sects at this time.

“I noted that these poor people pinned all their hopes on such stories. In them I heard their rebellion against suffering and death. I felt that as long as these stories were told, people would not be content for men and women to hunger and thirst, be crippled and paralysed, be sick and helpless. As long as they had these stories they would have hope.”

Through Andreas, Theissen discusses the importance of Jesus’s parables. Christians view Jesus’s message as one of peace, hope, and resistance to oppression. Andreas recognizes the future impact these stories will have on the religion before it even develops.

“I asked myself whether Hannah had heard all the stories about Jesus which she had told to Miriam. Had she perhaps invented some of them to comfort little Miriam? I believe that if she had run out of stories, I myself would have added some and invented some.”

This is another moment of Historiography and the Ethics of Narrative. Theissen demonstrates how stories about Jesus could have developed and changed even in his own lifetime, casting doubt on surviving narratives about his life. Nevertheless, it is the stories and the belief in Jesus that is important from a religious standpoint, not the historical facts.

“Let me stress once again: the views which Jesus puts forward could be put forward by us Pharisees and scribes. We are accustomed to discussing a variety of opinions. But Jesus stands aloof from our usual methods of discussion. He doesn’t express his view as one among others. He doesn’t discuss it with reasons for or against. He acts as though God himself were speaking through him. This contempt for our forms—that’s what causes offence.”

Judaism is a religion that values debate and rhetoric. Jesus was outside of this culture, establishing new norms that were not common in Jewish society before him and taking new rhetorical approaches that few people agreed with.

“No, I think that Jesus is a harmless lunatic. You could forget him if there weren’t so many people who regard him as a prophet or even the Messiah. These people are our problem—not Jesus.”

Chuza believes that Jesus is not the problem; his followers are. In a time of great Political and Religious Upheaval, there are certainly many whose ideas foment rebellion only when they gain a notable following. Jesus’s movement could easily have fizzled and died, as so many others did, if it had not been for his followers.

“He gives them the feeling that their life has meaning. And you’re all worried about that. All of you and Herod Antipas, you’re worried that the little people might come to feel that they’re not little people.”

Johanna gets at the heart of why Jesus’s message was so effective at this time of Political and Religious Upheaval: He appealed to those who had a desire for change. Johanna believes that Jesus is helping to show the poor and the downtrodden that they are more powerful than they have been led to believe, and that they can challenge existing oppressive power structures.

“Moreover the criterion of difference neglects all that Jesus has in common with Judaism, as though—in contrast to other men—he could not be understood from his historical environment. The ‘criterion of originality’ (another name used for the criterion of difference) is dogma in disguise; Jesus seems to drop directly from heaven. And this dogma has an anti-Jewish slant: what puts Jesus in opposition to Judaism cannot be derived.”

Theissen objects to the criterion of difference, which states that if an idea attributed to Jesus has nothing in common with Jewish thought, then it is likely to come from the historical Jesus. This idea is objectionable because it implies an anti-Jewish bias. Jesus was a Jewish man who was raised in a Jewish milieu; many of his ideas would have had much in common with Jewish politics and philosophy at the time.

“In short, I believe that basically Jesus wants to do away with what the temple stands for at present. Anyone who thinks that forgiveness of sins can be achieved independently of the temple has undermined its position.’”

Readers can see one of the perspectives that fed into early Christianity. Whereas Jewish people went to the temple (synagogue) to make offerings to God and receive absolution, John the Baptist, and later Jesus, purported to be able to wash away sin through baptism and personal prayer. This was a threat to the temple, which functioned as the center of Jewish life.

“‘The problem is,’ I began hesitantly, ‘that Jewish faith is not a philosophy. It’s not something of which you’re convinced only in your heart, but something which you’re seen to practise. It’s a life-style.’”

Andreas and Metilius’s debate about religion reveals the fundamental misunderstandings between Romans and Jewish people. Metilius does not understand that faith, practice, tradition, and the commandments form the fundamental arrangement of Jewish society. Religion and lifestyle are inextricable, which differs from Roman culture.

“This unfortunate beginning to my rule caused me many problems. I’ve always had to be careful to maintain my authority. Believe me, a state can be more helpless in the face of people who show that they are defenceless than in the face of legions of soldiers.”

Pilate has to balance the climate of Political and Religious Upheaval very carefully lest he make the wrong move. He knows that he can succeed against a display of force because of the powerful army at his back, but a display of vulnerability is more complicated and requires a nuanced understanding of the cultural climate.

“As far as I’m concerned any lunatic can be regarded as a king. I’ve nothing against that. He only becomes dangerous when others believe in him.”

Pilate echoes Chuza’s words when he states that Jesus is only as dangerous as his followers. The movement is, from a political standpoint, potentially much more dangerous than its leader.

“But the sun did not go dark, and the earth remained at rest. It was a normal day and the darkness was only in me. Only in me did the foundations of life shake; only in me did the voices whisper: ‘You’re guilty. You’re guilty.’ The voices got louder and louder, more and more urgent. I couldn’t keep them back. They drowned any reply. Things grew blurred, then I lost consciousness.”

Andreas is deeply conflicted about Morality and Culpability. He feels responsible for the death of someone he never met, which raises interesting questions about whether anyone can be blamed for Jesus’s death. The circumstances that led to Jesus’s execution were complicated, and nobody can be certain of all the details.

“And you also witness that every moment. The future moment is not yet. We ourselves are not yet what we shall be. A transition from nothingness to being takes place every moment. That’s what we mean when we say that God creates every moment from nothing. And he preserves it until it sinks back into nothingness.”

Andreas talks to Metilius about the act of creation, reflecting themes of Historiography and the Ethics of Narrative. In historiography, the future and the past do not exist but are constantly being created by the historian in the act of research. This is the same as religious creation as Andreas describes it.

“That’s why you’re so rebellious. That God who creates everything from nothing can also turn losers into winners, and outcasts into conquerors.”

Both Christianity and Judaism hold the idea that God created the universe (order) out of nothing (chaos). When something can be created out of nothing, anything is possible. In a time of Political and Religious Upheaval, this means that change is always possible, and that the oppressed always have hope.

“The Jewish council had taken this view: it is better for a man to die than for the whole people to lose its independence. They sacrifice the one man in the interest of the whole.”

The Jewish council weighed the Political and Religious Upheaval that Jesus was creating against the safety of all Jewish people in Judaea. Rather than risk retribution from Rome for allowing Jesus to incite a rebellion, they opted to sacrifice Jesus to the Romans to preserve peace. They were not the only ones who made a meaningful decision in this case.

“Disgust overwhelmed me that I was involved in this game, abhorrence that I would go on being involved in it. I saw no way out unless it were possible to change the basic ordering of the world!”

When Andreas continues to struggle with his feelings of guilt and culpability over Jesus’s death, he wishes for a reordering of the world. Because only God can reorder the world, he sees no way out of his predicament. On a metatextual level, he is yearning for the new world that Christianity will usher in; reordering of the world happens when new religious ideas develop and spread.