What are we really giving when we give Christmas gifts?

[As a brief word of introduction, this paper, which does challenge the logical value of Christmas gifts is NOT a paper that is discussing the cloying Christian trope of society’s commercialization of and war on Christmas; rather, this is a paper that challenges the very practice that devout Christians often hold so dear.]

A traditional practice for the Christmas holiday is the exchanging of gifts. This practice is further practiced on some other special occasions (birthdays, anniversaries, baby showers, weddings, etc.) as well and this paper would additionally apply to them; I focus here on Christmas simply because it is the most common time in which gifts are given. Indeed, the practice of gift giving and the Christmas holiday have become ubiquitous. Even those who do not really celebrate much of a Christmas at all, still give gifts. This paper, though, wonders what is truly being exchanged and whether those can truly be called “gifts” or not. If it is truly a giving of gifts, why is it that such things are frequently paired with emotional regret and frustration? Why is it that these need to be followed with “Thank you” cards or even worse – they have to be opened in the presence of the giver so that the reaction can be observed? It is as if the “gift” is not really “given” at all – instead, it is something that requires some kind of exchange – something that expects something in return. This paper argues that holiday gift giving is illogical and contradictory. Further, it is something that is not very honest – rather than it actually being an exchange of items symbolizing the relationship between two people, it is instead identity discourse which reifies one’s own identity in a public way to satisfy the demands of an oppressive societal nomos (order).

A gift is something that is to be freely proffered to one party to another. This is something that can show appreciation and symbolizes love and care. Further, for something to be a gift, it has to be offered “freely.” This is true in both its senses. On the one hand, it is “free” in the sense that the one offering the gift did not have to offer it. It was offered spontaneously and if it were not offered, there would have been no negative consequences. For a gift to be presented, it cannot be an obligation – otherwise, its nature as a gift is in question. Second, the “free” aspect of a gift is that it expects nothing in return – it is “economically” free. The one receiving the gift has no obligations of any kind (no “strings attached”). The receiver does not have to keep the gift, does not have to provide compensation, nor does the receiver have to even appreciate the gift. The gift is free because it is a complete transfer of ownership. The gift used to belong to giver x and now after a proper gift giving ritual now belongs to owner y. Whatever happens to the gift is completely up to owner y and giver x is no longer involved. If the giver wanted to control the object, it would need to be a contract rather than a gift.

While these things are logically sound, practically, they are rarely followed. Very few people truly “give” anything. They expect some kind of praxis once the gift is given. Usually this includes a variety of responses: 1). An appreciation of the gift – the giver recognizes the gift as valuable, will keep the gift, and use it regularly; 2). An exchange of some kind of thanks; 3). A compensatory gift or action ensuring equality; 4). Some kind of parity in thought and value of the compensatory gift; or 5). An emotional uplifting of the relationship of the two parties by means of this gift giving ritual.  All of these are, at a bare minimum, expectations that accompany a gift and call into question whether a gift is actually free. In fact, the fact that the term “free gift” has been coined is simply to show how rarely it truly is such.

At the end, the gift giving ritual is based upon reciprocity. If one party x gives a gift that is of very much value to party y, and party y gives a gift of little value to party x, the “thought” that is supposed to be behind the gifts are called into question. If this was simply economic value, then there would be no problem. However, what is actually needed reciprocally is the “thought” included in the gift. The “thought that counts” can be better understood as the gift being a symbol of one’s relationship. It is a measure of how important and meaningful the relationship is to the giver to be able to identify a gift. This, is precisely why, it is based upon reciprocity. If one person gives a gift of large value and the other one of little value, then it suggests that one person does not think of the relationship as highly as the other, thereby being a physical object of disparity in the center of the room. For the relationship to be on equal footing, the gift needs to be on equal footing.

What is worse, is that “value” is not economic. If it were, then the two parties could generally follow the standard practice of getting for one another things that are of generally equal monetary value. Instead, though, “value” is measured based upon future use. It shouldn’t matter how much it costs, so long as it is something that the receiver will really use. The closer the relationship, the more useful the gift – seemingly. The problem, of course with this, is that a gift that could be very useful is not use at all if the receiver already owns this item. Use is amazingly subjective and creates a wild disparity.

A further consequence of this is the type of comparisons that gifts provide as physical markers of relationships. When parents have multiple children, it is standard that the children will compare their gifts with one another. Children can become distraught if one gift is superior to the others. The children, in this case, are not stupid and understand the societal problem – that the symbol of the relationship with one child is stronger than the same for the others. What has occurred is that the children have been ranked by means of this gift giving system. Further, comparison is done by the giver when gifts are being doled out. It is not uncommon to hear a trope such as “I spent x dollars on recipient a, so I really need to spend a similar amount for recipient b.” The comparison of relationships based upon gifts is tremendously acute.

Another complication with the sentiment “that it is the thought that counts” is that it is not simply a transfer of ownership. A gift is not something that is given from person a to person b. Instead, it is an ongoing symbol of the relationship. Given that, the original source of the gift preceding its being purchased and given is important. It is apparently uncouth to “re-gift” something. If the “thought” that symbolizes the relationship is in the gift, its source should not matter – whether it was re-gifted, stolen, bought, or bartered. However, it matters very much. What this leads toward is the illogical nature of gifts – it is not the gift at all, it is the action of the giver. The commensurate measure of gifts to ensure the relationship is in the amount of work done. It is not actually based upon any type of meaning that the gift might provide.

Finally, the practical challenge of gift giving that makes what is done at Christmas not actually gift giving is what is expected after the gift is given. The gift is a symbol of the relationship, and as such, there are expectations as to what will be done with it. If the gift is expected to be used. If the gift is edible or an article of clothing, the expectation is that the gifts will be eventually used up, but barring those restrictions, gifts are expected to be kept and used. One is not free to simply throw out the gift. To do so is to, apparently, throw out the relationship. The gift needs to remain in the possession of the receiver as a monument to the friendship that has been fostered so long as it continues. The gift can only be discarded when the relationship has soured and therefore the symbolic value of the gift has been lost.

The reason gift giving is illogical is because what is done is not the giving of gifts; rather, what is done is an exchange in Derrida’s terms. An exchange is a relational quid pro quo whereas a gift is something that expects nothing in return.[1] A Christmas gift is coupled with an expectation of thanks. While the practice of the official thank you card wanes, it is very common to expect that the one receiving the gift will state their thanks to the giver. Children are taught to do this at a very young age – even if they aren’t thankful for the gift that well could be slightly manipulative (e.g. an uncle who is a football enthusiast gives a football to a child who has made it very clear he has no interest in sports). This is even more telling by the portion of the ritual where they expect to watch someone open the gifts that they are given. It is a process wherein the giver sits attentively and watches the every move of the receiver to ensure that the receiver really wants it. This is at least slightly creepy and puts the receiver in a very awkward position. The positive goal, of course, is to attempt for the receiver to actually want the gift, provide the giver with the emotional thank you that their relationship is sound, and reify the bond. However, throughout the ritual it is amazingly clear that the “gift” is not given – it is exchanged. It is an action for an action – the giving of a gift for the response of the individual.

The only pure gift, then, is one where there is no exchange. It is the gift that is given with no expectation of anything in return. While most everyone says they do this, they rarely do. If a receiver gets a gift, laughs out loud, tosses the gift in the trash, the giver is usually quite offended. The receiver took the gift wrongly. This receiver is so crass that “no one could give him a gift.” That, logically, should be the only person to whom a gift could be given. It is as Derrida says of Forgiveness – the only things that could actually be “forgiven” are those that are utterly unforgivable.[2] Similarly here, the only people to whom gifts could be “given” are utterly “ungiftable.”

The crass way of understanding these gifts is that it is between the two people – person a gives person b a gift and person b commensurates person a with a similar gift in this economy of exchange. Aside from this system being impractical – as my favorite comedian David Mitchell hilariously points out (Gifts: David Mitchell's Soapbox who points out that we usually know what we want better than other people in addition to the horrible frustrations of not being allowed to simply purchase things we really need because it happens to be nearing Christmas) – it is also not very honest. We are not actually appeasing our friend or relative with this gift – they are our friends and relatives, they don’t really care if we give gifts or not – particularly those who are fiscally well off. Rather, we are fulfilling our role in society. The exchange is not even between the person giving and the person receiving. Both of those figures are simply enacting their given role in the societal nomos.[3] This is, in Lacanian terms, the “big Other” – the symbolic universe that we all silently buy into in order to preserve meaning and identity.

Society as a whole has set these norms and practices in order that we can find our own identity. The goal of the giving of gifts is not that “society” really needs us to – society could continue to function with or without gifts. The “Big Other” would simply change to be a symbolic world without any place for holiday exchanges. However, when the person enacts these rituals and participates in these exchanges, they do so to tell themselves that they are filling their proper duty and as such, they know they are active participants in society. When they act in the way that society expects, they feel they are part of the society and they are grounded in timeless truths.

Society, generally, while being a living construct, is not illogical. It is known that this exchange is an obligation, and hence it really is not a gift – instead it is simply a personal statement of filling the role expected of the individual in order to remind oneself that he or she is a member of the society. Society, then, emphasizes the chosenness of this gift giving. To give the gift was a choice and therefore is not a simple societal obligation. However, upon closer examination, this is what Zizek calls a “forced choice.” The person has to buy into the system of their own free-will; however, the consequences of not buying into the system are very real and looming. If one did not buy into it, they would be social outcasts, would be ostracized and scorned. While that is true, there still is some vague idea that this is really chosen. It is some kind of logic like “Well, you could choose to turn your back on everyone and everything that matters to you, have no sense of belonging, and be punished – or you could choose to participate.” Anyone who is not an idiot knows that this is not a choice. Zizek calls this choice one that occurred sometime in the past. We act in the present as if we had made the choice to participate in the past.[4] The reality, of course, is that no one truly made the choice. The choice was made long ago that this system was set and there is no choice but to participate in it.

While this essay can be accused of catastrophizing the situation, real question should be asked. While it is easy enough to say that gift giving really does not matter an that this is a superfluous ritual, it is more significant than one expects. Consider how frequently gifts are given. This essay has focused on Christmas simply for ease of reference, but the general gatherings of family systems are nearly always centered around a ritual where gifts are given. It seems superfluous, but it really is not. If one decided to simply recuse himself or herself from the ritual, that person would be recusing himself or herself from nearly all family events, and thereby family relationships.

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[1] Jacques Derrida On Cosmopolotanism and Forgiveness, trans. Mark Dooley and Michael Hughes (London and New York: Routledge, 2001), 28-32.

[2] Derrida, On Forgiveness, 32.

[3]Peter L. Berger The Sacred Canopy: Elements of a Sociological Theory of Religion (New Yorks: Anchor Books, 1967).

[4] Slavoj Zizek The Sublime Object of Ideology (London and New York: Verso, 1989, repr. 2008), 186-187.

Chapter Two: Shadows, Souls and Where They Go: Life Beyond Death in Ancient Paganism

 [This is an ongoing project that is analyzing N.T. Wright’s 5 volume series, Christian Origins and the Question of God. This series is widely read and bridges the gap between the academic and devotional world. It is therefore worthy to be carefully analyzed so that all readers can understand his key points while at the same time gaining a critical eye to some of his rather bold claims. This series of posts are concerning volume 3 – The Resurrection of the Son of God.]

N.T. Weight’s emphasis in this chapter is laudable. He is primarily interested in how the message of the resurrection would have been heard to a Gentile audience (he will discuss how this same message would have sounded to a Jewish audience in the following two chapters). Wright focuses on the worldview of most members of Greco-Roman society. He does a good job presenting the worldview, but less of a good job showing the possibilities within the world by focusing so exclusively on the concept of resurrection and by not discussing minority religion such as Greek magic or the mystery cults.

First, Wright emphasizes that on the level of the worldview, most people could not have imagined a conversation about any type of “resurrection” in any way that would have made sense to them:

This basic tenet of human existence and experience is accepted as axiomatic throughout the ancient world; once people have gone by the road of death, they do not return. When the ancient classical world spoke of (and denied) resurrection, there should be no controversy about what the word and its cognates referred to: it was a coming back again into something like the same sort of life that humans presently experience.[1]

He argues that any idea of “resurrection” would not be expected because such an idea would be a reanimation of one’s bodies – a view held by very few. While Wright is correct that the focus of Greek and Roman religion is on the present world – and frankly very little speculation about any type of “life after death” – his focus being so narrowly on resurrection causes problems.

First, it is necessary to show where it is that Wright succeeded. He correctly points out that the worldview generally had little interest in life after death. He argues any idea of life after dearth would be something that was not particularly hoped for:

We can, then, answer the worldview questions in relation to the dead. Who were the dead thought to be, in the ancient pagan world? They were beings that had once been the embodied human beings, but were now souls, shades or eidola. Where were they? Most likely in Hades; possibly in the Isles of the Blessed, or Tartarus; just conceivably, reincarnated into a different body altogether. They might occasionally appear to living mortals; they might still be located somewhere in the vicinity of their tombs; but they were basically in a different world. What was wrong? Nothing, for a good Platonist, or a Stoic like Epictetus; the soul was well rid of its body – a sentiment echoed by many non-philosophers in a world without modern medicine, and often without much justice. Almost everything, for most people: some kind of life might continue after death, but it was unlikely to be as rich and satisfying as the present could be, at least in theory.[2]

This is certainly accurate. Most people did not focus on the coming life after death, rather, they focused upon life right now. Roman religion had almost no interest in any kind of future life, instead religious devotion was centered upon a do ut des relationship that addressed current needs (as well as having nearly no interest in ethics).

He illustrates this by showing that life after death in Homer is something that is not what a Western reader would expect. Any type of future existence is not “bodily” in the sense that Christians would later make so popular. Instead, the type of existence was shadowy and elusive:

Who then are the dead, for Homer and the subsequent centuries that read him devoutly? They are shades (skiai), ghosts (psychai), phantoms (eidola). They are in no way full human beings, though they may look like them; the appearance is deceptive, since one cannot grasp them physically. The Latin word Manes conjures up the same sort of world, with similar variations. Where are they? They are in Hades, under the eponymous rule of the underworld’s god and his dread wife. What’s wrong? They are sorry both to be where they are and at much that happened in their previous human existence. They are sad at their present subhuman state. In some cases they are tormented, as punishment for particularly heinous crimes (though we are not told, interesting, the crimes of Tantalus and Sisyphus). There may be some who have a shadowy alter ego in a better place; we shall come to Hercules presently. But for most of them, including those who have been great and goo din their former life, Hades holds no comforts, no prospects, but only a profound sense of loss.[3]

Here Wright is correct – at the level of Homer, there really is very little as far as a Christian life after death. There certainly were not otherworldly expectations of wages of life based upon any kind of merit.

Wright then explains that in philosophy, there was a development of a kind of future life that would be valued. Here, he argues that Plato broke new ground by dividing the soul and the body and having the soul exist in the world of the forms as a kind of happy future:

How will we ever get people to be good citizens, he asks, to serve in the army, to do their duty to their friends, if their view of the future life is conditioned by epic pictures of gibbering ghosts in a gloomy underworld? Instead, the young must be taught the true philosophical view: death is not something to regret, but something to be welcomed. It is the moment when, and means by which, the immortal soul is set free from the prison-house of the physical body…Here is the central difference between Plato and Homer. Instead of the “self” being the physical body, lying dead on the ground, while the “soul” flies away to what is at best a half-life, now the “self,” the true person, is precisely the soul, while it is the corpse that is the ghost.[4]

Wright argues that Plato found a way for some type of afterlife to be of value. In fact, it was of utmost value in the world of the forms when a human could finally stand at rest rather than being tossed to and fro in the vicissitudes of the present world rife with changes.

Wright though, narrowly focusing, argues that Christianity was fundamentally different because this idea of a soul was not “bodily” in the same sense Christians would expect and therefore was not analogous to “resurrection.” He argues that this goal of life is fundamentally different in that it is not bodily in the sense that Christians would expect. However, this is too narrow. There certainly is an expectation of a life after death – just because they did not focus on the issue of resurrection does not make this so foreign that it cannot be fathomed. What seems to be at issue is the nature of the human after death. Rather than being souls (which, in themselves were not acorporeal in the way that Wright seems to imply), they would be truly somatic (bodily). However, that is far less of a change than he wishes it were.

The important emphasis is that a future life that had something to do with a change in philosophy was generally valued. The point, though, is that the worldviews he expresses does not find it important. Take, for example, what he says about Seneca and the general apathy toward future life everlasting:

For Seneca, the immortal human soul has come from beyond this world – from among the stars, in fact – and will make its way back there. Though one might hold that it simply disappeared, it is more likely that it will go to be with the gods. Death is either the end of everything, in which case there is nothing to be alarmed about, or it is a process of change, in which case, since the change is bound to be for the better, one should be glad.[5]

Seneca – like many stoics – was simply indifferent to the issue of death. There might well be something in the future, there might well not; however, that was not the goal of human life.

The worldview of Greco-Roman society was far less one of disdain toward any discussion of resurrection; rather, it was general indifference. The vast majority of people would not have heard the message of a physical resurrection as troubling because they felt any future life should not be physical – they would have been indifferent to the calling of the question in the first place. This is the emphasis that would have been more rich for Wright to explore.

There were minorities, however, who did think of life after death as something to be taken very seriously. These are most easily found in the mystery cults and in Greek magic. These groups did very much focus upon a future life in which ethics often determined one’s future (the latter being more true of mystery cults than magic). Wright does briefly bring up mystery cults arguing that they held the same goal as Platonists with less work:

Already in Socrates’ time the mystery religions had begun to flourish, offering (so it seemed) a comparable benefit to philosophical wisdom but without the hard intellectual work. Beginning with the Orphic cult, but fanning out much more widely, these religions (if that is indeed the right term for them) offered the initiate access to a world of private spiritual experience in the present time which would continue into the world beyond death.[6]

He argues that the eventual goal of the mystery cults was not a bodily resurrection and therefore can simply be folded inside Platonism. The problem, though, is the issue of indifference cited above. Many Platonists would be generally indifferent about a future life – they expected it, but it was not their main concern. By contrast, a reasonable argument can be made that the mystery cults were very much interested in an afterlife and it was their main concern. Therefore, real question arises as to why Wright does not discuss this issue further. He does bring up mystery cults one more time, but the conversation is so clipped that it is hard to follow:

These multifarious and sophisticated cults enacted the god’s death and resurrection as a metaphor, whose concrete referent was the cycle of seed-time and harvest, of human reproduction and fertility. Sometimes as in Egypt, these myths and rituals include funerary practices: the aspiration of the dead was to become united with Osiris. But the new life they might thereby experience was not a return to the life of the present world. Nobody actually expected the mummies to get up, walk about and resume normal living; nobody in that world would have wanted such a thing, either. That which Homer and others meant by resurrection was not affirmed by the devotees of Osiris or their cousins elsewhere.[7]

Why would this be different? Why is this not an important element to delve into very deeply? Wright does not clearly explain.

This omission is further exacerbated for Wright’s eventual goal – to see how the message of Jesus and his resurrection would have sounded to a gentile audience. The one thing Christianity might have sounded like would be a mystery cult. Therefore, to simply ignore major elements of them and instead to focus on Homer does not make a tremendous amount of sense – except in the most vague terms as a general “worldview” – magic and mystery cults were minority religions – but they did exist. It seems that his narrow discussion of resurrection from the dead has eliminated conversation that well should have occurred.

In all, his conversation of the general worldview is strong; however, his details could have been far more carefully managed to create a more robust picture.

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[1] RSG, 33.

[2] RSG, 82.

[3] RSG, 43-44.

[4] RSG, 48.

[5] RSG, 54.

[6] RSG, 51.

[7] RSG, 80-81.

Chapter One: The Target and the Arrows

 [This is an ongoing project that is analyzing N.T. Wright’s 5 volume series, Christian Origins and the Question of God. This series is widely read and bridges the gap between the academic and devotional world. It is therefore worthy to be carefully analyzed so that all readers can understand his key points while at the same time gaining a critical eye to some of his rather bold claims. This series of posts are concerning volume 3 – The Resurrection of the Son of God.]

This first chapter of N.T. Wright’s third volume of his series “Christian Origins and the Question of God” sets up well what Wright is doing in this book. Therefore, some general comments will be made about the book’s scheme and the suspicions that we will need to levy against Wright throughout this book. It is important to take the time to lay out these views now, so that in further analysis of subsequent chapters, the same points do not need to be constantly rehashed. The major critique I have is Wright’s general view of historiographic epistemology and the limits he sets for himself in his study.

First, this volume is amazingly important to study because, first, it is by far the most popular of the 5 volumes so far published of the series and therefore has the most interest for an audience to take the time to study it. Further, this book is particularly helpful because it is less out of date than his previous volumes. The New Testament and the People of God was written in 1992, and throughout the critical reading of the book, I felt I was continually framing in a historical lapse in scholarship. This volume – the Resurrection of the Son of God was published in 2003 and is in dialogue with the major scholarship that is still current. While a decade is no small amount of time in the modern scholarly world, it is still generally true that larger questions and frameworks remain the same. Further, many of the authors have not changed. Therefore, far less accommodation for later developments need to be made.

As to the content of the chapter – and thus the book – the first point is laudable. Wright argues that this book will merge theology and history. This is a helpful plan when one is considering the resurrection. It is very difficult to discuss this “historically” without discussing theological implications. Wright demonstrates this well throughout:

As the overall title of the project indicates, and as Part I of the first volume explained, my intention is to write both about the historical beginnings of Christianity and about the question of god. I am, of course, aware that for over two hundred years scholars have labored to keep history and theology, or history and faith, at arm’s length from one another. There is good intention behind this move: each of these disciplines has its own proper shape and logic, and cannot simply be turned into a branch of the other. Yet here of all place – which Christian origins in general, and the resurrection in particular – they are inevitably intertwined.[1]

These, of course, do not have to be necessarily intertwined, but Wright is not foolish and is very much in tune with his audience. Most of the readers of these books are interested in not only what happened, but also in its significance.

Wright, then, asks a fundamental question as the topic of the book – what really happened on Easter morning? He argues that whatever happened on that morning should explain the movement that followed:

So what did happen on Easter morning? This historical question, which is the central theme of the present book, is closely related to the question of why Christianity began, and why it took the shape it did.[2]

Here, Wright’s analysis sets it tone – to understand the event, it must explain the consequence. At some level this is accurate. Something occurred at some point (given that we do not know precisely the date of the resurrection as we are unsure exactly of the year in which this occurred) that led a group to believe that Jesus was raised and built a movement around him.

Wright, though admits that he is also interested in challenging what he sees as the common scholarly and ecclesiastical view of the resurrection. He argues that there are six key points that generally held – all of which he disputes:

Though my approach throughout the book will be positive and expository, it is worth nothing from the outset that I intend to challenge this dominate paradigm in each of its main constituent parts. In general terms, this view holds the following: (1) that the Jewish context provides only a fuzzy setting, in which ‘resurrection’ could mean a variety of different things; (2) that the earliest Christian writer, Paul, did not believe in bodily resurrection, but held a “more spiritual” view; (3) that the earliest Christians believed, not in Jesus’ bodily resurrection, but in his exaltation/ascension/glorification, in his “going to heaven” in some kind of special capacity, and that they came to use “resurrection” language initially to denote that belief and only subsequently to speak of an empty tomb or of “seeing’ the risen Jesus; (4) that he resurrection stories in the gospels are late inventions designed to bolster up this second-stage belief; (5) that such “seeings’ of Jesus as may have taken place are best understood in terms of Paul’s conversion experience, which itself is to be explained as a “religious” experience, internal to the subject rather than involving the seeing of any external reality, and that the early Christians underwent some kind of fantasy or hallucination; (6) that whatever happened to Jesus’ body (opinions differ as to whether it was even buried in the first place), it was not “resuscitated”, and was certainly not “raised from the dead” in the sense that the gospels stories, read at face value, seem to require.[3]

Here, Wright has painted a picture that is quite striking. This view might be held by some – such as Marcus Borg – but serious questions would remain as to the number of scholars who would hold all of these views. Further, these would not be the only views that they held – they also would hold far more that would make such a picture make some kind of sense. Unfortunately, this is a straw man that needs to be taken very critically. Wright has framed the objections in ways to avoid what are the bigger problems. For instance, many skeptics of the sources would not necessarily argue that the problem is whether it was a bodily resurrection or not. Rather, the argument would be whether there was any resurrection of any kind. Some hold that Jesus was in no sense raised and that the story that it occurred was simply a fabrication of Jesus’ early followers which then spread like wild fire.

Wright’s response to these seven points betrays his bias – that whatever happens must explain what followed as an eventual world religion:

The positive thrust, naturally, is to establish (1) a different view of the Jewish context and materials, (2) a fresh understanding of Paul and (3) all the other early Christians, and (4) a new reading of the gospel stories; and to argue (5) that the only possible reason why early Christianity began and took shape it did is that the tomb really was empty and that people really did meet Jesus, alive again, and (6) that, though admitting it involves accepting a challenge at the level of worldview itself, the best historical explanation for all these phenomena is that Jesus was indeed bodily raised from the dead.[4]

His 5^th point is actually the turning point. He will dispute the other points piece by piece, but the piece of evidence he demands to understand that many other scholars of the historical Jesus would not necessarily require – is that whatever occurred must explain what followed.

To understand how Wright has presented this it is helpful to consider what he is seeking when he discusses the historical event. He argues that there are 5 levels of historical inquiry. For our purposes we will focus on two. He rightly divides historical questions. The “first” question, he rightly points, is that there are some things that we believe and are convinced happened, but we have absolutely no way of knowing how or why they occurred – here he uses the example of the extinction of the pterodactyl.[5]  Anything that “happened” is therefore “historical” – even if we can’t explain it. This portion is not very helpful for analysis, because it’s whole point is that we cannot know whether it occurred. Far more helpful is his third category – that which can be verified/proved: 

Third, there is history as provable event. To say that something is historical in this sense is to say not only that it happened but that we can demonstrate that it happened, on the analogy of mathematics or the so-called hard sciences.[6]

The historian can admit that many things could have occurred – and indeed have occurred – but only a portion of these things can be verified. Wright paints this as logical positivism – and there are indeed historiographers who start here, but in reality few stay here – most go beyond this and posit what probably happened given the very small number of set things that can be proved.

Wright argues that the study of the historical Jesus is its own type of epistemology that fluctuates between what is “provable” and what can be discussed. He argues that the worldview that must be satisfied is post-enlightenment and this is the failure of the system:

Fifth, and finally, a combination of (3) and (4) is often found precisely in discussions of Jesus: history as what modern historians can say about a topic. By “modern” I mean “post-Enlightenment,” the period in which people have imagined some kind of analogy, even correlation, between history and the hard sciences. In this sense, “historical” means not only hat which can be demonstrated and written, but that which can be demonstrated and written within the post-Enlightenment worldview.[7]

The problem with Wright’s presentation here is what is implied rather than what is said. He seems to use the phrase “Post-Enlightenment” as a kind of attack. Wright tries to suggest that this is a scandal because these historians are using modern models to understand ancient sources. The problem is history is not an ancient source. Historical analysis is done in the present. One is confident in history – if it fits one’s own epistemology. We can only posit what we believe is valid. Just because someone in the first century was satisfied with an answer does not mean that we should be in the 21^st. I am not saying that modern historiography is without error or does not need to be improved, but Wright’s trump card here really makes very little by way of strong, provable, points.

The key to understanding Wright’s framework, though, is not his critique of historiographers – as Wright says, his goal is a positive one. The key to understanding Wright is his view of the connection between the Easter event and the later Jesus movement. As stated above, in some sense, this is and must be accurate. Wright, though, frames this movement in a way that would not be satisfactory to many readers – though it is amazingly common.

Wright argues that the movement that followed Jesus was unique. He uses this fact to retroject backward that the event they held must have been sound. He argues against Troeltsch in this manner:

It is important to note what would follow if we took Troeltsch’s point seriously: we would be able to say nothing about the rise of the early church as a whole. Never before had there been a movement which began as a quasi-messianic group within Judaism and was transformed into the sort of movement which Christianity quickly became. Nor has any similar phenomenon ever occurred again.[8]

This view is amazingly common among Christian apologeticists and it is important to realize its weaknesses. Wright will go through this view in depth later in the book that will display a far smarter presentation of this point, but as to framework, this is not very strong.

First, Wright’s argument that there has never been a movement like the Jesus movement is simultaneously true and ridiculous for what he means by it. It is true only in the sense that there has never been any other movement that is precisely the same – if it were, it would just be called Christianity – as it would be the same. However, Wright means more than just this – he argues that the uniqueness of the movement is how a religious group could develop from a figure such as this. He argues no movement since has done that. Unfortunately, it is hard to argue this. For example, Manichaeism certainly did develop from a leader who proclaimed himself to be divine and flourished for a lengthy time period (until the 16^th century).

Second, and probably more to the point, Wright treats the earliest followers as monolithic. He argues that all of Jesus’ followers had a general view of Jesus that was consistent. If there is one thing we have learned about the earliest Jesus movement groups is that aside from a general basis in Jesus in one way or another, very little else was common. This is why some scholars refer to early “Christianities” rather than early Christianity. I find this cloying as it makes it sound as if there were several religious groups. I find the best way to describe the earliest groups were members of Jesus movements – meaning that these people were varied and members of various communities with some connection to Jesus.

All of this is not to say that I do not think Jesus was resurrected nor do I think that the historical study of the event is fundamentally flawed. I do, however, think we need to be honest about the challenge of sources. I do not think – as so many people hold, Wright simply being among them – that the only way for a movement to develop around Jesus was for him to actually rise from the dead. That certainly is one real possibility, but it needs to be seen as that – one possibility among many.

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[1] RSG, 5.

[2] RSG, 4.

[3] RSG, 7.

[4] RSG, 8.

[5] RSG, 12.

[6] RSG, 13.

[7] Ibid.

[8] RSG, 17.