Jesus Remembered: Christianity in the Making, vol. 1

FROM THE GOSPELS TO JESUS §8.1
below, we have to assume a wider knowledge of the Jesus story among the recipients
of Paul's letters, which his auditors would be able to draw upon to bridge the
'gaps of indeterminacy' in his letters. 55
In short, the fact that almost all the references to Jesus tradition in the writings
of earliest Christianity are in the form of allusion and echo should be taken
to confirm (1) that such letters were not regarded as the medium of initial instruction
on Jesus tradition to new churches, and (2) that churches could be assumed
to have a relatively extensive knowledge of Jesus tradition, presumably passed
on to them when they were first established. 56
f. The Gospels as Biographies
Bultmann led questers up another false trail by his strong assertion that 'There is
no historical-biographical interest in the Gospels'. 57 The influence of this view,
that the Gospels are not biographies of Jesus, persists to the present day. 58 However,
it is too little recalled that on this point Bultmann was reacting against the
Liberal questers' confidence that they could penetrate back into Jesus' selfconsciousness
and could trace the development of his self-understanding as Messiah
(messianic self-consciousness). 59 Kähler had already responded to the Liberal
questers by observing that the real sources for such attempts were the
questers' own imaginations, an unfortunate extension of the historical principle
that teaching in some way; ironically he has to cite Jesus explicitly precisely because he is
qualifying what Jesus was known to have said. In contrast, the allusive reminder of Jesus'
teaching elsewhere effectively indicates that the authority of that teaching required neither justification
nor qualification.
55. See below, §8.3g. The growing recognition that Paul's letters depend in at least some
measure for their coherence on underlying 'stories' which he assumed is indicated by B. W.
Longenecker, ed., Narrative Dynamics in Paul: A Critical Assessment (Louisville: Westminster
John Knox, 2002).
56. See further C. F. D. Moule, 'Jesus in New Testament Kerygma' (1970), Essays in
New Testament Interpretation (Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1982) 37-49, who quotes
J. Munck with effect: 'It is important at the outset to realize that though we have none of Paul's
sermons, they must have differed in form at least from his letters' (41 n. 12).
57. Bultmann, History 372.
58. Albrecht Dihle begins his article on 'The Gospels and Greek Biography' in
Stuhlmacher, ed., The Gospel and the Gospels 361-86, by recalling that 'every theological student
is warned in his first semester against reading the four canonical Gospels as biographies of
Jesus' (361).
59. Hence Bultmann's much quoted view 'that we can know almost nothing concerning
the life and personality of Jesus, since the early Christian sources show no interest in either'
(cited above §5.3 at n. 36; see also chapter 4 n. 49).
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