Chapter Four: “History and the First Century”
N.T. Wright’s chapter on his theory of history is dependent
upon his theory of “knowledge” but unfortunately has even poorer execution than
his theory of knowledge. His historiographic methodology is rife with very
vague points and counterpoints that end giving Wright a license to dismiss any
scholar with relatively little evidence. Further, Wright does not seem to take
seriously the challenges that face the ancient historian.
Wright first makes his claim that those who question how
well one can know history. He writes, “We simply can write history. We can know things about what has happened in
the past.”[1]
He has as his thesis for the chapter that history can be accomplished. He
argues this against his straw man “relativists” who deny that we can know
anything outside ourselves. This reading, of course, depends upon the idea that
“knowledge” according to “relativists” is static. One assumes he is now
referencing the post-structuralists he discusses in his chapter on knowledge.
However, post-structuralist thinking does not consider “knowledge” all one
thing – it is surely the case that Peter Ochs considers true knowledge something that can be known only in the present time
for the present person about oneself – it cannot be something that transcends.
However, one would not find that so minimalistically – just because we cannot
know that water is blue the same way
we can know “who I am” does not mean that we cannot know anything about water
at all.
Wright uses this straw man of “relativism” to vaguely
challenge those he is not interested in struggling with. He minimizes this
challenge to the concept that the New Testament is a biased document. He writes
the following:
The fear that ‘actual events’ will
disappear beneath a welter of particular people’s perceptions is a fear of this
sort, and is to be rejected as groundless. As a particular example, it must be
asserted most strongly that to discover that a particular writer has a ‘bias’
tells us nothing whatever about the value of the information he or she
presents. It merely bids us be aware of the bias (and of our own, for that
matter), and to assess the material according to as many sources as we can.[2]
Wright is certainly correct – that a bias is not the same as
knowing nothing. However, that is not the challenge that Wright himself
develops as coming from the post-structuralists.
Wright seems to make a straw man argument in which he seems
to assume that the primary argument against making positive statements about
history is that history is interpretation rather than “bare facts:
Our apparently bare historical
remark is the product of multi-faceted interpretative decision. Nor is this
unusual. It is typical of all history. All history involves selection, and it
is always human beings who do the selecting.[3]
Here Wright has simply made a null statement. He argues
essentially that history is history. Of
course it is something that humans construct – who else would be doing the
construction? He makes his obvious point again: “History, I shall argue, is
neither ‘bare facts’ nor ‘subjective interpretations,’ but is rather the meaningful narrative of events and
intentions.”[4] Once again
this is obvious – history is always a narrative that explains why it is certain
events occurred.
The problem with Wright playing these games is that he gives
himself allowance to do whatever he wants. He seems to suggest that because
logical positivism has failed – and as much as we all love A.J. Ayer, it has
failed – that then apparently there is simultaneously no objectivity and
objectivity at the same time. He knows this would not stand up to any real
scrutiny in the historical world and is so bold as to suggest that “new”
principles be established for the New Testament.
What we require, I believe, is a
set of tools designed for the task at hand, rather than a set borrowed from
someone who might be working on something else. Just as the gospels and
epistles embody genres somewhat apart form their closest non-Christian
analogues, so the study of them, and of their central figures, are stakes
which, though they possess of course several analogies with other closely
related disciplines, require specialized tools, that is, a theory of knowledge
appropriate to the specific tasks.[5]
Wright has essentially argued that the study of the New
Testament should not fit within the normal category of the study of history. He
wants a special status. That status, of course, can be like other histories, but when push comes to shove, he wants the
ability to say that he can finally make the call because he essentially likes
it.
To be fair to Wright, he does not suggest it is dependent
upon whether he “likes” it or not, rather, he guises this in his theory about
“story.” He argues that one considers something and decides whether it “fits”
into the general framework of one’s story (which of course is developed from
communal worldviews). Wright argues the following:
The task of the historian is not
simply to assemble little clumps of ‘facts’ and hope that somebody else will
integrate them. The historian’s job is to show their interconnectedness, that
is, how one thing follows from another, precisely by examining the ‘inside’ of
the events…To display this, the historian needs (it will come as no surprise)
to tell a story.[6]
The “story” or “narrative” is a preconditioned idea that is
presented and then it is simply a matter of “fitting” data into that story.
I appreciate Wright’s honesty in his approach – many
historians do not come out and admit that they do this type of thing. Further,
everyone uses a theoretical framework from which they judge their analyses.
However, I do not appreciate his conclusion. Take, for instance, something that
does not fit his general “story.” Here, he discusses many scholars who emphasize
a disconnect between some of the data in the New Testament with the life of
Jesus:
It has been assumed that we know, more or less, what Jesus’ life, ministry
and self-understanding were like, and they were unlike the picture we find in the gospels. But hypotheses of this
sort are always short on simplicity, since they demand an explanation not only
of what happened in the ministry of Jesus, but also of why the early church
said something different, and actually wrote up stories as founding ‘myths’ which
bore little relation to the historical events.[7]
Wright has not completely explained why it is that such a
hypothesis is so wrong – he simply says it is not “simple” enough.
The problem with Wright’s analysis is that he does not
explain why it is that scholars have discussed disconnect between the Gospels
and the figure of Jesus. I agree that not all of this speculation is
particularly helpful; however, it is important to recognize that it is not some
conspiracy to destroy faith. Scholars have suggested such a thing for a variety
of factors. First, ancient history on the whole is very difficult to
reconstruct. To simply suggest that a “simpler” explanation should be proffered
is not very helpful – there are no simple explanations. We simply do not have enough
data for the simplest explanation. All explanation requires a development of
stories – one way or the other. Second, he does not tell the reader why it is
that scholars came to such a conclusion – a large part of the reason is that
the gospels are not consistent with one another. Someone along the line did
shift form the historical event so that a theological point could be made. If
this is the case, then it led some scholars to question how historical any of
the gospels were. I, myself, do not necessarily agree with all of those
scholars, but Wright simply dismissing them because he feels that it is a
hypothesis that is not “simple” is not a very convincing argument.
Finally, Wright is not a theorist and it becomes blatantly
obvious in this book. The remainder of the book is far superior – in that he
applies his theory to actual texts. However, his theory is important to
consider because of how common it is. I am thankful for Wright for taking the
time to spell it out for us, but hopefully most readers will see many of its
challenges.
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