Jesus Remembered: Christianity in the Making, vol. 1

THE MISSION OF JESUS §13.5
ter urges him, 'Depart from me, for I am a sinful man' (Luke 5.8); the woman
who is remembered as anointing Jesus' feet while he reclined at table is identified
as a 'sinner' (7.37, 39); Luke introduces the three parables of lost things/people
by reporting that 'toll-collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear
him', prompting the grumbling of some Pharisees and scribes that 'This man receives
sinners and eats with them' (Luke 15.1-2); and Luke drives home the point
by concluding the first two parables with the refrain, 'there is joy in heaven when
one sinner repents' (15.7, 10); Luke also includes a parable contrasting a Pharisee
and a toll-collector, where the latter prays, 'God be merciful to me, a sinner'
(18.13); and it is Luke who notes the grumbles at Jesus going to be guest of
Zacchaeus the rich toll-collector, 'a man who is a sinner' (19.7). We may conclude
that even if Luke has elaborated the motif, there was a motif in the earliest
memories of Jesus' mission to be elaborated.
Three features stand out in this catalogue, shared by Mark and Q, as also
by the fuller material in Luke: (1) the term 'sinner (hamartölos)' is remembered
as regularly used in criticism against Jesus, (2) the term 'sinner' is regularly associated
with 'toll-collector', 185 and (3) the criticism is most often levelled against
Jesus for dining with such people. There is no reason to doubt that all three features
are well rooted in the earliest memories of Jesus' mission, as is generally
agreed. To clarify their significance it is necessary to clarify each feature:
(a) who were the 'sinners'? (b) why the association of toll-collectors and sinners?
(c) why was eating with sinners so offensive to some? The third question is
best left till chapter 14, and the second can be dealt with briefly. But the first requires
some attention.
a. Who Were the 'Sinners'?
One of the more spicey controversies of recent historical Jesus scholarship was
occasioned by the swingeing criticism levelled by Sanders against Jeremias's answer
to the question. Jeremias had confused the issue by defining 'sinners' as 'a
specific term for those engaged in despised trades' and by lumping them together
with 'the amme-ha-aretz (people of the land), the uneducated, the ignorant,
whose religious ignorance and moral behaviour stood in the way of their access
to salvation, according to the convictions of the time'. 186 Sanders responded that
the term 'sinners' means 'the wicked', or as we might say, law-breakers, crimi-
185. Note also Matt. 21.31-32: 'Truly I tell you, toll-collectors and prostitutes are preceding
you into the kingdom of God. ... the toll-collectors and prostitutes believed him (the
Baptist)'; see above, chapter 12 n. 165.
186. Jeremias, Proclamation 109-12.
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