Jesus Remembered: Christianity in the Making, vol. 1

§14.7 The Character of Discipleship
be noted also are the reports that those called by Jesus 'left' their occupations and
father — the fishermen brothers (Mark 1.18, 20 pars.) and Levi/Matthew (Mark
2.14 pars.) — and the equally shocking (?) nature of the call to follow in Luke
9.57-62/Matt. 8.19-22. 219 These can then be juxtaposed with a set of mission instructions
which send out the missionaries with minimal personal supplies and
dependent on hospitality (Mark 6.8-10 pars.). 220 From all these ingredients a potent
brew can be quickly mixed to conjure up a picture of discipleship as renunciation
of normal life (work and relations) for a kind of charismatic or Cynic
vagabondry. 221
But there are too many elements omitted from the recipe for the brew to
be acceptable, at least in such stark terms: (1) We have already noted that Jesus
made his 'home' at Capernaum (§9.9d), 222 which he evidently used as a base for
mission outreach, not least to places like Chorazin and Bethsaida. (2) We have
also observed that in practical terms, mission 'throughout all Galilee' need not
have meant more than a sequence of one or two days travel from a centre like
note also 10.10-13) (GTh 55.2 agrees with Matt. 10.38 at this point, rather than Luke 14.27); he
has also set out 10.38 in parallel clauses in a way which matches 10.39/Luke 17.33. Only Luke
has the saying: 'So, therefore, whoever of you does not renounce all that he has cannot be my
disciple' (14.33), consistent with his emphasis elsewhere (see above, §13.4b).
219. But how shocking were they? See above, §§13.2c-d and 14.4h.
220. It is difficult to tell how much these instructions have been 'worked over' as they
were used and reused in many missionary commissionings in the early churches in different
territories and social settings (see above, chapter 7 n. 96). But they certainly fit the context of
mission in the Galilee, and there need be no doubt that they took their initial shape in that context.
221. 'Total lack of security' (Hengel, Charismatic Leader 5); 'an existence on the
fringes of normal life ... homeless charismatics' (Theissen, 'Wandering Radicals' 40; similarly
'We Have Left Everything' 62, 83-85); 'itinerant radicalism' (Crossan, Historical Jesus 346);
'itinerant, en route, without a home' (Gnilka, Jesus 169). In more modest terms by S. C. Barton,
Discipleship and Family Ties in Mark and Matthew (SNTSMS 80; Cambridge: Cambridge University,
1994) 63-64; C. Osiek and D. L. Balch, Families in the New Testament World: Households
and House Churches (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1997) 126. A. D. Jacobson,
'Jesus against the Family: The Dissolution of Family Ties in the Gospel Tradition', in J. M.
Asgeirsson, et al., eds., From Quest to Q, J. M. Robinson FS (BETL 146; Leuven: Leuven University,
2000) 189-218, protests against the prevailing 'radical therefore authentic' assumption
and argues that the key sayings (Q 14.26; 12.51-53; 16.18 and perhaps 9.57b-60a) are
inauthentic, probably creations of the early Jesus movement (191-99). He further hypothesises
that the wandering preachers 'probably had begun to form fictive families in village settings'
(199), functioning 'in much the same way as other families' (208, referring to Mark 10.29-30);
this is 'mirror-reading' taken to extreme.
222. 'Mark 10.28, "We have left everything" . . . means primarily "we have placed everything
in the service of the Jesus movement", not "we have given everything away"'
(Schräge, Ethics 104-107; here 104-105).
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