Can the "Real" Jesus be identified with the historical Jesus? A review of the Pope’s challenge to biblical scholarship and the various reactions it provoked

Abstract

This article discusses reactions from primarily German New Testament scholars to Pope Benedict XVI’s book “Jesus of Nazareth,” focusing less on controversial exegetical details but more so on the ‘great questions’ which too often lurk unaddressed in the background. It defends the Pope’s book as an important, necessary attempt to reconcile faith and history under the proposition of the biblical God actually acting in history. The reality of Jesus of Nazareth as God’s incarnate son is therefore missed and misrepresented not only theologically, but also historically if he is understood solely within the parameters allowed by ‘secular positivism’. Against Benedict’s project, the majority of reviews of “Jesus of Nazareth” by New Testament scholars defend an approach to the historical Jesus based on a secular methodology as the only one that is academically viable. The transempirical realities in the life of the earthly Jesus are therein not denied but relegated to the realm of personal beliefs.