TITLE OF THE ARTICLE: THE MADNESS OF THE KING JESUS: WHY WAS JESUS PUT TO DEATH, BUT HIS FOLLOWERS WERE NOT?
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: JUSTIN J. MEGGITT (THESE ARE ALL THE INFORMATION I GOT ABOUT JUSTIN J. MEGGITT)
University Senior Lecturer in the Study of Religion and the Origins of Christianity, Institute of Continuing Education, University of Cambridge, and Fellow and Director of Studies in Theology and Religious Studies, Hughes Hall.
Justin has been a great and a famous publisher of Christian books. Among these are:
Paul, Poverty and Survival. Edinburgh: T and T Clark, 1998.
The First Christians. Oxford: One world (forthcoming early 2008)
The New Testament and Ancient Popular Culture: Rethinking the Origins of Christianity (late 2008)
Christ and the Universe of Disease (early 2009).
Justin J. Meggitt has diversified talents also in writing splendid correspondence with regards to Journal Articles and chapters in books. Among these are:
“The Psycho-Social Context of Jesus’ Miracles.” Jesus and Healing. Ed. Fraser Watts. (London: Darton, Longman & Todd, forthcoming)
“Psychology and the Historical Jesus.” Jesus and Psychology. Ed. Fraser Watts. (forthcoming)
(with Melanie Wright) “Interdisciplinarity in Learning and Teaching in Religious Studies” in B.Chandramohan and S. Fallows (eds), Interdisciplinary Learning and Teaching: Theory and Practice in Contemporary Higher Education. (London: Routledge Falmer). Forthcoming.
“The Madness of King Jesus: Why was Jesus Put to Death, but his Followers were not?” Journal for the Study of the New Testament. 29.4 (2007) 379-413.
“Magic and Early Christianity: Consumption and Competition.” The Meanings of Magic: From the Bible to Buffalo Bill. Ed. A. Wygrant. New York: Berghahn Books, 2006, pp. 89- 116.
“Sources: Use, Abuse and Neglect” in Christianity at Corinth: The Scholarly Quest for the Corinthian Church . Ed. D. Horrell and E. Adams. London: Westminster John Knox Press, 2004, pp. 241-253
“Jesus and John the Baptist” Jesus in History, Culture and Thought. Ed. L. Houlden. Oxford: ABC Clio, 2003.
“Taking the Emperor’s Clothes Seriously: The New Testament and The Roman Emperor.” The Quest for Wisdom: Essays in Honour of Philip Budd. Ed. C. Joynes. Cambridge: Orchard Academic, 2002, pp. 143-170.
“The First Churches: Social Life.” The Biblical World. Ed. John Barton, London: Routledge, 2002, pp. 137-156
“The First Churches: Religious Practice.” The Biblical World. Ed. John Barton, London: Routledge, 2002, pp. 157-172
“Eigentum: III. NT (Property in the New Testament).” Die Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart. Fourth Edition. Ed. H. D. Betz et al. Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 2002.
“Response to Martin and Theissen” Journal for the Study of the New Testament. 84 (2001) 85-94.
“Armenfürsorge: V. NT (Care of the Poor in the New Testament).” Die Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart. Fourth Edition. Ed. H. D. Betz et al. Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1999.
“Artemidorus and the Johannine Crucifixion.” Journal of Higher Criticism. 5 (1998) 203-208
“The Social Status of Erastus (Ro. 16:23)” Novum Testamentum 38.3 (1996) 1-6.
“Laughing and Dreaming at the Foot of the Cross: Context and Reception of a Religious Symbol.” Journal for the Critical Study of Religion, Ethics and Society. 1 (1996) 9-14. (Reprinted in Modern Spiritualities, ed. L. Brown et al., Amherst: Prometheus Books, 1997, pp. 63-70).
“Meat Consumption and Social Conflict in Corinth.” Journal of Theological Studies 45 (1994) 137-141.
BIBLIOGRAPHIC DATA: JOURNAL FOR THE STUDY OF THE NEW TESTAMENT, VOLUME 29. 4. JUNE 2007
OUTLINE OF THE ARTICLE:
- STATING THE CONUNDRUM
- THE MADNESS OF JESUS
- MAKING SENSE OF MADNESS
- A SLIGHT BUT IMPORTANT DIGRESSION: WAS JESUS ACTUALLY MAD?
- PERCEPTIONS AND RESPONSES TO MADNESS
- TWO CASES OF MADNESS:CARABAS AND JESUS BEN ANANIAS
- JUDGING JESUS MAD: CONCLUDING REMARKS
WHAT THE ARTICLE IS ALL ABOUT:
Jesus being put to death by the Romans on the cross is one of those rare pieces of biographical data that is almost entirely uncontested. Crucifixion was an ignoble and unappealing end, and one that is hard to imagine anyone in the early church would have wanted to fabricate about their founder. The reason why Jesus was put to death is very hard to comprehend and savvy. Nonetheless, most commentators have maintained THAT Jesus was put to death by the Romans for a reason of some kind: He either thought of Himself; or was thought of by others, to be King of the Jews. And there are, on the face of it, good grounds for holding this opinion.
The paradox here is that, if Jesus was put to death by the Romans as a Royal Pretender, why were none of His disciples or followers killed or pursued? From everything we know of the Roman policy concerning the treatment of royal pretenders or leaders of seditious movements, this failure to kill Jesus’ followers, or even pursue them, is perplexing to say the least. As Josephus says, the Romans were engaged in killing those who were considered as threats to the Roman government and having already killed a number of prophet’s supporters in an attack, “many prisoners were taken, `and of whom Pilate put to death the principal leaders and those who were most influential among the fugitives”. The determination of the Romans to destroy followers as well as those who led them is hardly surprising, particularly given the characteristic importance of deterrence in explanations and justifications of punishment in Roman law more generally.
The accusation that Jesus was mad is hardly new. Mark’s gospel provides us with the early tradition that Jesus’ own family thought Him so and even went so far as to try to restrain Him (Mk 3:19b-21). They had good reason to think as much. All the gospels contain the accusation that Jesus was possessed (Mk 3:22; Mt 12:24; Lk 11:14; Jn 8:48), a judgment that could be taken as amounting to more or less the same thing.
It is very important to clarify what this article is not about. It is not about whether the historical Jesus actually suffered from mental illness of some kind in an objective sense. Odd though it might appear to many in the field, New Testament scholars have, from time to time, ventured to make judgments on Jesus’ sanity. Also, saying that this article is not about whether Jesus actually was mad, by any objective criteria (if such things exist). Meggitt here says that it is illegitimate to try to investigate the psychology of the historical Jesus. Josephus wrote that he was not sure if the behavior of the Sicarii under torture, in refusing to admit that Caesar was their Lord, should be called courage or madness. Before we can look more directly at the details of Jesus’ treatment by the Romans, it is necessary to examine the range of understandings and responses to madness within first-century pagan cultures, and more specifically the culture of Pilate, a minor aristocrat of equestrian rank, probably from Italy, and the cultures of those involved directly in the crucifixion of Jesus.
Justin Meggitt had hitherto stressed on the conundrum that lies as the heart of our understanding of the fate of the historical Jesus has to be satisfactorily solved: why was Jesus of Nazareth put to death by the Roman authorities but His followers left untroubled by them? From Pilate’s perspective, Jesus would have demonstrated the symptoms of a madman by his behavior.
To solve the conundrum with which Meggitt started, he needed to discover a historical who was not just ‘crucifiable’, but one who alone was ‘crucifiable’, something that is actually much harder to explain than has hitherto been recognized.
bernard kuffuor