Jesus Remembered: Christianity in the Making, vol. 1

§13.5 For Whom Did Jesus Intend His Message?
ing which Levi/Matthew as we might say 'threw a party' to which 'many tollcollectors
and sinners' (Mark/Matthew) came.
Matt. 9.12-13
Those who are in good health
have no need of a doctor, only
those who are ill. Go and learn
what this means: 'I desire
mercy and not sacrifice'. For I
came not to call the
righteous but sinners.
Mark 2.17
Those who are in good health
have no need of a doctor, onlv
those who are ill.
I
came not to call the
righteous but sinners.
Luke 5.31-32
Those who are healthy
have no need of a doctor, onlv
those who are ill.
I
have come not to call the
righteous but sinners to
repentance.
The saying has the variations and elaborations typical of oral performance,
and rounds off effectively Jesus' response to the criticism of consorting with 'sinners'.
179 There is an unwillingness on the part of many to allow that Jesus may
have expressed his sense of mission in such a form. 180 But the saying is echoed
in subsequent Christian literature, which suggests a lengthy history. 181 And we
shall see below that the righteous-sinner antithesis fits closely with the factionalism
of Jesus' time. 182 Moreover, the context indicated is strikingly echoed in the
Q-reported jibe levelled against Jesus, that he was 'a glutton and a drunkard, a
friend of tax-collectors and sinners' (Matt. 11.19/Luke 7.34). 183 It is scarcely
credible that such a critique of Jesus was interjected into the Jesus tradition on
the initiative of later disciples, and the likelihood that Jesus' practice of mission
drew some such dismissive comment is generally acknowledged. 184
In Luke the motif of Jesus' association with sinners is much elaborated: Pe-
179. Was the final clause added as a 'secondary explanation of the saying about the physician'
(Bultmann, History 92)? But it would be equally appropriate to ask whether the whole
passage (2.14/15-17), which makes such a neatly rounded teaching sequence, was ever performed
in a truncated form. Pesch points out how unlikely it would be for the Christian community,
who thought of themselves as accounted righteous (dikaioi), to develop a saying of Jesus
which denied his concern for the dikaioi {Markusevangelium 167-68). For the association
of restoration/healing and forgiveness in the Bible see Ebner, Jesus 152-54, 160.
180. Funk, Five Gospels 46-47 (but the first half of the saying 'sounded like Jesus');
Lüdemann, Jesus 17.
181. Oxy.Pap. 1224 (Elliott, Apocryphal New Testament 35-36) — but the fragment is
broken off before the end of the first clause; 1 Tim. 1.15; Barn. 5.9.
182. See also Davies and Allison, Matthew 2.105-106.
183. Already cited above, §12.5c.
184. The Jesus Seminar's negative vote hung on the thread of disagreement regarding
the use of the phrase 'Son of Man' (Funk, Five Gospels 180, 302-303), but the Seminar had little
doubt that Jesus consorted with 'toll-collectors and sinners' and 'social outcasts' and that he
was criticized for eating with them (Acts of Jesus 66-67); 'the outside testimony about John and
Jesus is authentic' (Lüdemann, Jesus 173). See above, chapter 12 n. 348, and Holmen, Jesus
205-19.
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