Jesus Remembered: Christianity in the Making, vol. 1

§14.3 The Character of Disciple ship
that they might be with him' (Mark 3.14). This, of course, is part of Mark's emphasis
on Jesus as 'teacher'. 63 But there can be little doubt that Jesus did give
much teaching. And the fact that so much of it has been retained in the tradition
is evidence enough that his disciples remembered the teaching, treasured it, and
presumably attempted to live it out in their discipleship. To so argue is not to revert
to Gerhardsson's portrayal of discipleship as a kind of proto-rabbinic
school. 64 As has now been illustrated repeatedly, the present form of the Synoptic
tradition is much more fully explained on the pattern of informally controlled
community traditions. But that is wholly consistent with the characteristic portrayal
of Jesus teaching, whether in synagogue and at table, or at lakeside, on
hillside, or as they journeyed. What Jesus taught made a deep and abiding impression,
still clearly evident in the Jesus tradition itself. 65 It requires no stretch
of the imagination to deduce that Jesus himself intended his teaching to provide
the structure of the discipleship to which he made summons. On this specific
point the distance between Jesus and a Pharisaic or Wisdom teacher is not great,
though much more still needs to be said (§14.4 below).
b. Mission
Mark also asserts that Jesus called Peter and Andrew to make them 'fishers of
men' (Mark 1.17) 66 and that he chose twelve in order that he might send them out
to preach and to exercise authority in the casting out of demons (Mark 3.14). He
thus makes explicit what is implicit anyway in the tradition of Jesus sending out
the twelve on mission (Mark 6.6-12 pars.). 67 That is, that Jesus chose an immedi-
(81), but there is a good deal more in the Jesus tradition than falls neatly under that heading.
Crossan also protests that 'disciples' is probably not the best term, since it presumes a relation
of master and students, with overtones of domination and control; he prefers to describe the
kingdom of God as a 'companionship of empowerment' rather than Schüssler Fiorenza's 'discipleship
of equals' (Birth 336-37), but at this point ideology is being allowed to trample over the
language used in the Jesus tradition.
63. See again above, chapter 8 nn. 22-23.
64. See above, §8.3e. Note Hengel's critique of Gerhardsson at this point (Charismatic
Leader 53, 80-81).
65. We need only mention the end of the Sermon on the Mount/Plain (Matt. 7.24-27/
Luke 6.47-49) and the complex of remembered teaching in Mark 8.38/Luke 9.26 (cf. Matt.
10.32-33/Luke 12.8-9); see below, §15.8c(6).
66. See particularly Hengel, who also offers a reconstruction of the Aramaic original
(Charismatic Leader 76-78); Meier, Marginal Jew 3.159-61; see also above, chapter 13 n. 96.
67. See above, chapter 8 n. 282. 'The Twelve were Jesus' shalihim' (Witherington,
Christology 134); Witherington also thinks that they were sent out late in the Galilean ministry,
perhaps just before the feeding of the five thousand (135).
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