Jesus Creed: CT and the Historical Jesus Scot McKnight
Some of you may have seen our piece in Christianity Today called "The Jesus We'll Never Know." The essence of my article is that "historical Jesus" studies, the official Historical Jesus enterprise, has a major goal: finding what the real Jesus was really like. By that I mean the HJ enterprise wants to get behind the Creeds and behind the Gospels to discover what the human Jesus was like — and in doing this the HJ enterprise is about creating a new Jesus, a Jesus who differs from the Gospels and the Creeds because it will shear away any faith accretions and any legendary embellishments and any theological overlays. …
… In the article I contend the HJ enterprise is all but over; at the least, interest has waned to a pittance of what it was. Very few scholars are attending HJ sessions; very few books are now being produced (in contrast to an avalanche of books in the 80s and 90s); one could say the HJ is at a dead-end. I also contend that historical methods, because of what they assume about what can be demonstrated, can't get us to the orthodox faith about Jesus' death or his person or the significance of what he did and who he was.
To this article, CT solicited responses from Tom Wright, Craig Keener and, only in the online edition, Darrell Bock. These three are my friends and I value what they have to say. So, I'll enter into brief conversation here with what each says: …
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