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How God Became Jesus: The Real Origins of Belief in Jesus' Divine Nature—A Response To Bart Ehrman
In his recent book How Jesus Became God: The Exaltation of a Jewish Preacher From Galilee historian Bart Ehrman explores a claim that resides at the heart of the Christian faith— that Jesus of Nazareth was, and is, God. According to Ehrman, though, this is not what the earliest disciples believed, nor what Jesus claimed about himself.
The first response book to this latest challenge to Christianity from Ehrman, How God Became Jesus features the work of five internationally recognized biblical scholars. While subjecting his claims to critical scrutiny, they offer a better, historically informed account of why the Galilean preacher from Nazareth came to be hailed as 'the Lord Jesus Christ.' Namely, they contend, the exalted place of Jesus in belief and worship is clearly evident in the earliest Christian sources, shortly following his death, and was not simply the invention of the church centuries later.
The first response book to this latest challenge to Christianity from Ehrman, How God Became Jesus features the work of five internationally recognized biblical scholars. While subjecting his claims to critical scrutiny, they offer a better, historically informed account of why the Galilean preacher from Nazareth came to be hailed as 'the Lord Jesus Christ.' Namely, they contend, the exalted place of Jesus in belief and worship is clearly evident in the earliest Christian sources, shortly following his death, and was not simply the invention of the church centuries later.
233 pages, Kindle Edition
First published March 24, 2014
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801 people want to read
About the author
Michael F. Bird
87 books157 followersDr. Michael Bird (Ph.D University of Queensland) is Lecturer in Theology at Ridley Melbourne College of Mission and Ministry. He is the author of several books including Jesus and the Origins of the Gentile Mission (2006), The Saving Righteousness of God (2007), A Bird’s-Eye View of Paul (2008), Colossians and Philemon (2009), Crossing Over Sea and Land: Jewish Missionary Activity in the Second Temple Period (2009), and Are You the One Who is to Come? The Historical Jesus and the Messianic Question (2009).
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September 7, 2014
A much needed and sufficient response to Ehrman's 'How Jesus Became God.' I especially enjoyed Evans' and Hill's contributions.
With that said, Bird single-handedly tainted this compilation. With his amateur comedic stylings, he lowered the intellectual integrity of the book. Bird makes reference to Touched by an Angel, Ned Flanders, and St. Nicholas' purported slapping of Arius. He then advises Ehrman to "lock himself in his panic room lest the jolly fat man decides to give him a yuletide body slam as a punishment for being on his naughty list" (201). The worst part is, when Bird's not hosting open mic night at the Apollo he's a quality NT scholar. But when you describe your interlocutor's Christology as smelling "fishier than shrimp left out for too long in the hot sun," it takes away greatly from the ethos of your previous and following points. There's a time for everything, Bird.
With that said, Bird single-handedly tainted this compilation. With his amateur comedic stylings, he lowered the intellectual integrity of the book. Bird makes reference to Touched by an Angel, Ned Flanders, and St. Nicholas' purported slapping of Arius. He then advises Ehrman to "lock himself in his panic room lest the jolly fat man decides to give him a yuletide body slam as a punishment for being on his naughty list" (201). The worst part is, when Bird's not hosting open mic night at the Apollo he's a quality NT scholar. But when you describe your interlocutor's Christology as smelling "fishier than shrimp left out for too long in the hot sun," it takes away greatly from the ethos of your previous and following points. There's a time for everything, Bird.
September 14, 2020
[From my blog, www.mythologymatters.wordpress.com]
Joint Book Review: How Jesus Became God, by Bart D. Ehrman, and How God Became Jesus, by Michael F. Bird et al.
Did Jesus consider himself divine? When did his disciples and other followers come to believe that he was divine? According to the earliest Christians, at what stage in Jesus’ existence did he become divine? This year two controversial books were published with opposing views on these questions, which I review here.
How Jesus Became God, the latest book by Bart Ehrman, Professor of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina, came out in March 2014. Like most of his other popular books, it was commercially successful and attracted attention. Also like many of his other books, it has triggered vehement opposition in some circles. Ehrman is something of a lightning rod. When in 2012 he published Did Jesus Exist?, stating the case in favor of the existence of Jesus, a number of commentators quickly wrote books endeavoring to rebut him, arguing that Jesus is a purely mythical figure. (E,g., Bart Ehrman and the Quest of the Historical Jesus of Nazareth¸ Frank Zindle and Robert Price, eds.) This time around, several New Testament scholars who think Ehrman did not portray Jesus in sufficiently divine terms have teamed up against him in a single book. Thus one sense it seems that Ehrman “can’t win” no matter what he writes along this spectrum of thought; but then his books are the most popular and selling best, in no small part due to the controversies that they generate.
The rebuttal volume to How Jesus Became God, creatively titled How God Became Jesus, was the brainchild of Michael Bird, Lecturer in Theology at Ridley College in Melbourne, Australia. When he heard that Ehrman’s book was coming out, he quickly gathered a group of like-minded (in relation to opposing Ehrman) scholars to cobble together a book that would come out almost simultaneously with Ehrman’s. Ehrman and his publisher, anticipating and undoubtedly looking forward to upcoming lively public debate, kindly provided advance copies to Bird’s group, so that they could publish their response under this timetable. Both books have indeed generated a public debate that also has attracted interest among biblical scholars, even though the books are popular in nature and contain nothing that is not already in the vast scholarly literature on this subject. As a result, at the recent (November 2014) Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature in San Diego, what was essentially a debate on the subject was held between Ehrman on the one hand and Bird, one of his co-authors (Craig Evans), and others sympathetic to their position on the other. As an attendee and speaker at that Meeting, I had the pleasure of attending that lively showdown session, which filled the hall of nearly 300 seats to standing room only. In my view, Ehrman got somewhat the better of that exchange, but of course none of the principal issues at stake were settled there.
How Jesus Became God first covers how people in the 1st century CE Greco-Roman world viewed divinity and divine figures, whether Jesus thought he was divine, what we can and cannot know about Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection, and then Ehrman presents his view of how the early Christians’ ideas of Jesus’ divinity evolved, up through the gospel of John and onward to the Nicene Creed. How God Became Jesus consists of 10 chapters each authored by one of the contributors, though some of them wrote more than one chapter. The book covers who Jesus thought he was, who the first Christians thought he was, whether Jesus was actually buried in a tomb as reported in the gospels (which Ehrman considers unlikely), and then proceeds to somewhat technical discussions of relevant biblical passages and criticisms of Ehrman’s exegesis. Both books cite to the biblical passages needed to make the technical arguments, and also refer (to an extent appropriate for popular books) to the relevant scholarly works. (For simplicity I avoid doing so in this review post, and also do not get into the technical details of the exegetical issues here. Readers can turn to the books for that.) This makes the points in debate clear, and enables the reader to follow up on points of interest.
Ehrman argues that Jesus himself probably did not consider himself the son of God or as divine, but instead was an apocalyptic preacher who looked forward to God intervening in history through a future “Son of Man” to establish the Kingdom of God on earth. He considers the gospel passages (principally in Mark) where Jesus appears to refer to the Son of Man as someone other than himself to be the most authentic, with the other Son of Man passages (at least in Mark) that appear to be self-referential being later emendations or additions by redactors. The scholarly debate on this point is long-standing, and essentially nothing new has been brought to light either by Ehrman or Bird and his co-authors, either in their books or in their in-person debate.
As to when Jesus became divine, the alternatives run, at one extreme, from Jesus becoming divine only upon his resurrection, to various earlier stages including his baptism by John the Baptist, at his birth, at his conception (as in the Annunciation in Luke), all the way to the other extreme set out in the gospel of John, where Jesus as the Word existed from time immemorial and then took human form in the flesh (known as “incarnation Christology”). As we know, in history essentially the latter position in John eventually won out. The harder question is when this position first arose and which of the other alternatives might have come first and competed with it. This is an extremely difficult determination to make, because there is literally no evidence from what scholars call the “tunnel period” of at least 20 years between Jesus’ life and death on the one hand and the appearance of Paul’s writings and the lost written gospel of Jesus’ sayings known as Q (reflected in Matthew and Luke) which many or most scholars believe predated Mark (the first of the canonical gospels to have been written). Ehrman argues that Jesus was not viewed by himself or any others as divine during his lifetime and that the first idea that he was divine came about in connection with his resurrection. The natural reaction was to consider that he was exalted into divinity then, but over time ideas of Jesus becoming divine at earlier stages took root until the date was pushed back to the incarnation Christology reflected in John. Ehrman pushes his theory of a fairly linear evolution fairly far, probably beyond what the evidence can bear, leaving himself exposed to rather easy attack by Bird et al, who in their turn argue that an incarnation Christology was present and possibly dominant from the very start following Jesus’ resurrection. But they too go beyond the evidence, leaving the reader to suspect that they believe the earliest Christians considered that Jesus was always divine (as in John) simply because this is what they themselves believe. Indeed, one senses from their book a discomfort in principle with any historical approach to such questions that could undermine doctrine and faith.
Once an incarnation Christology appears, the question becomes what kind of divine being Jesus was. Ehrman argues that many of the earliest Christians including St. Paul viewed Jesus as something like an angel (meaning an intermediary figure never fully human), based mainly on descriptive language by Paul. Bird et al, who do not regard Jesus as a mere angel (which would contravene Christian doctrine), are quick to pounce on this, pointing to contrary evidence and differing in their interpretation of Paul. They score some of their best points against Ehrman here. Indeed, Ehrman, in seeking greater precision, does seem to have dug an unnecessary hole for himself here. While his idea of what early Christians thought is not unreasonable in principle and he may be right, he appears to go beyond what the meager evidence can reliably support. It would have been sufficient to conclude simply that the earliest Christians probably had varying ideas about what divinity meant (including the angel idea) and leave it at that. But pushing the envelope in this manner lies in the dynamic of scholarship.
Significant portions of both books cover what happened surrounding Christ’s burial. Here Ehrman agrees with a number of other scholars in concluding that there is little evidence to suggest that Jesus was buried in the newly hewed private stone tomb of Joseph of Arimathea as reported in the gospels, or even that he received a decent burial. Craig Evans handled the rebuttal on these points, both in the book and in person at the San Diego debate. It is here where Bird et al are at their weakest. While acknowledging that usually the Romans did not bury crucified criminals (so that their remaining on the cross for scavengers would set a public example of their humiliation), Evans argues that the Romans sometimes (as on Roman holidays) allowed the bodies of crucified criminals to be given over to relatives. He neglects to mention, however, that Jesus was not handed over to relatives and, more importantly, that according to the texts that Evans himself relies upon, the Romans did not make such exceptions when the criminal had been convicted of treason/sedition, which was precisely the crime for which Jesus was crucified! Evans also argues that some criminals (though presumably not those crucified for treason) were temporarily put in “criminals’ tombs” for a year before the remains were given to relatives, but this gets us nowhere near to the gospel versions of Christ’s burial. When during the discussion in San Diego I asked him how his above arguments are relevant to and could prove the gospel accounts, Evans relied instead on those accounts themselves, arguing that since similar accounts are given in 3 of the canonical gospels, they should be considered reliable. In other words, to reach his end conclusion he is not relying (and cannot rely) on most of the extended argumentation that he offers.
The live debate in San Diego was civil, gentlemanly, and even humorous at times, and in their book Bird et al were as well for the most part. But at some points in their book I found their rhetoric overly personal and mean-spirited. Most notorious was the beginning of Charles Hill’s chapter in which he compared Ehrman’s writings to political “tell-all” books written by politicians and other public officials soon after leaving office, for personal gain or other personal reasons. He likens Ehrman’s case to theirs because, he says, Ehrman was originally a Christian but (already many years ago) became an agnostic. Debates among scholars of religion ought to and do occur among scholars of various religious and non-religious persuasions. Their personal beliefs should not be injected into it, and in practice they rarely are. Hill’s personalized attack on Ehrman reminds me of the recent Fox News attack on the religious scholar Reza Aslan in connection with his own recent book about Christ (Zealot) arising from the mere fact that he is a Muslim.
Overall, both books are accessible and lively reads that will be understandable to any educated reader with a reasonable background in the Bible and the history of Christianity. The debate is interesting because both sides somewhat overstate their cases, yet neither side goes beyond reasonable mainstream scholarship. Together they offer readers a convenient way to gain some fluency in the important and long-standing debate about the early Christians’ views on Christ’s divinity and how Christian doctrine on the question arose.
Bart D. Ehrman, How Jesus Became God: The Exaltation of a Jewish Preacher from Galilee. New York: HarperOne. 2014. Hardcover, $27.99.
Michael F. Bird, Craig A. Evans, Simon J. Gathercole, Charles E. Hill, and Chris Tilling. How God Became Jesus: The Real Origins of Belief in Jesus’ Divine Nature. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan. 2014. Paperback, $16.99.
© Arthur George 2014
Joint Book Review: How Jesus Became God, by Bart D. Ehrman, and How God Became Jesus, by Michael F. Bird et al.
Did Jesus consider himself divine? When did his disciples and other followers come to believe that he was divine? According to the earliest Christians, at what stage in Jesus’ existence did he become divine? This year two controversial books were published with opposing views on these questions, which I review here.
How Jesus Became God, the latest book by Bart Ehrman, Professor of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina, came out in March 2014. Like most of his other popular books, it was commercially successful and attracted attention. Also like many of his other books, it has triggered vehement opposition in some circles. Ehrman is something of a lightning rod. When in 2012 he published Did Jesus Exist?, stating the case in favor of the existence of Jesus, a number of commentators quickly wrote books endeavoring to rebut him, arguing that Jesus is a purely mythical figure. (E,g., Bart Ehrman and the Quest of the Historical Jesus of Nazareth¸ Frank Zindle and Robert Price, eds.) This time around, several New Testament scholars who think Ehrman did not portray Jesus in sufficiently divine terms have teamed up against him in a single book. Thus one sense it seems that Ehrman “can’t win” no matter what he writes along this spectrum of thought; but then his books are the most popular and selling best, in no small part due to the controversies that they generate.
The rebuttal volume to How Jesus Became God, creatively titled How God Became Jesus, was the brainchild of Michael Bird, Lecturer in Theology at Ridley College in Melbourne, Australia. When he heard that Ehrman’s book was coming out, he quickly gathered a group of like-minded (in relation to opposing Ehrman) scholars to cobble together a book that would come out almost simultaneously with Ehrman’s. Ehrman and his publisher, anticipating and undoubtedly looking forward to upcoming lively public debate, kindly provided advance copies to Bird’s group, so that they could publish their response under this timetable. Both books have indeed generated a public debate that also has attracted interest among biblical scholars, even though the books are popular in nature and contain nothing that is not already in the vast scholarly literature on this subject. As a result, at the recent (November 2014) Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature in San Diego, what was essentially a debate on the subject was held between Ehrman on the one hand and Bird, one of his co-authors (Craig Evans), and others sympathetic to their position on the other. As an attendee and speaker at that Meeting, I had the pleasure of attending that lively showdown session, which filled the hall of nearly 300 seats to standing room only. In my view, Ehrman got somewhat the better of that exchange, but of course none of the principal issues at stake were settled there.
How Jesus Became God first covers how people in the 1st century CE Greco-Roman world viewed divinity and divine figures, whether Jesus thought he was divine, what we can and cannot know about Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection, and then Ehrman presents his view of how the early Christians’ ideas of Jesus’ divinity evolved, up through the gospel of John and onward to the Nicene Creed. How God Became Jesus consists of 10 chapters each authored by one of the contributors, though some of them wrote more than one chapter. The book covers who Jesus thought he was, who the first Christians thought he was, whether Jesus was actually buried in a tomb as reported in the gospels (which Ehrman considers unlikely), and then proceeds to somewhat technical discussions of relevant biblical passages and criticisms of Ehrman’s exegesis. Both books cite to the biblical passages needed to make the technical arguments, and also refer (to an extent appropriate for popular books) to the relevant scholarly works. (For simplicity I avoid doing so in this review post, and also do not get into the technical details of the exegetical issues here. Readers can turn to the books for that.) This makes the points in debate clear, and enables the reader to follow up on points of interest.
Ehrman argues that Jesus himself probably did not consider himself the son of God or as divine, but instead was an apocalyptic preacher who looked forward to God intervening in history through a future “Son of Man” to establish the Kingdom of God on earth. He considers the gospel passages (principally in Mark) where Jesus appears to refer to the Son of Man as someone other than himself to be the most authentic, with the other Son of Man passages (at least in Mark) that appear to be self-referential being later emendations or additions by redactors. The scholarly debate on this point is long-standing, and essentially nothing new has been brought to light either by Ehrman or Bird and his co-authors, either in their books or in their in-person debate.
As to when Jesus became divine, the alternatives run, at one extreme, from Jesus becoming divine only upon his resurrection, to various earlier stages including his baptism by John the Baptist, at his birth, at his conception (as in the Annunciation in Luke), all the way to the other extreme set out in the gospel of John, where Jesus as the Word existed from time immemorial and then took human form in the flesh (known as “incarnation Christology”). As we know, in history essentially the latter position in John eventually won out. The harder question is when this position first arose and which of the other alternatives might have come first and competed with it. This is an extremely difficult determination to make, because there is literally no evidence from what scholars call the “tunnel period” of at least 20 years between Jesus’ life and death on the one hand and the appearance of Paul’s writings and the lost written gospel of Jesus’ sayings known as Q (reflected in Matthew and Luke) which many or most scholars believe predated Mark (the first of the canonical gospels to have been written). Ehrman argues that Jesus was not viewed by himself or any others as divine during his lifetime and that the first idea that he was divine came about in connection with his resurrection. The natural reaction was to consider that he was exalted into divinity then, but over time ideas of Jesus becoming divine at earlier stages took root until the date was pushed back to the incarnation Christology reflected in John. Ehrman pushes his theory of a fairly linear evolution fairly far, probably beyond what the evidence can bear, leaving himself exposed to rather easy attack by Bird et al, who in their turn argue that an incarnation Christology was present and possibly dominant from the very start following Jesus’ resurrection. But they too go beyond the evidence, leaving the reader to suspect that they believe the earliest Christians considered that Jesus was always divine (as in John) simply because this is what they themselves believe. Indeed, one senses from their book a discomfort in principle with any historical approach to such questions that could undermine doctrine and faith.
Once an incarnation Christology appears, the question becomes what kind of divine being Jesus was. Ehrman argues that many of the earliest Christians including St. Paul viewed Jesus as something like an angel (meaning an intermediary figure never fully human), based mainly on descriptive language by Paul. Bird et al, who do not regard Jesus as a mere angel (which would contravene Christian doctrine), are quick to pounce on this, pointing to contrary evidence and differing in their interpretation of Paul. They score some of their best points against Ehrman here. Indeed, Ehrman, in seeking greater precision, does seem to have dug an unnecessary hole for himself here. While his idea of what early Christians thought is not unreasonable in principle and he may be right, he appears to go beyond what the meager evidence can reliably support. It would have been sufficient to conclude simply that the earliest Christians probably had varying ideas about what divinity meant (including the angel idea) and leave it at that. But pushing the envelope in this manner lies in the dynamic of scholarship.
Significant portions of both books cover what happened surrounding Christ’s burial. Here Ehrman agrees with a number of other scholars in concluding that there is little evidence to suggest that Jesus was buried in the newly hewed private stone tomb of Joseph of Arimathea as reported in the gospels, or even that he received a decent burial. Craig Evans handled the rebuttal on these points, both in the book and in person at the San Diego debate. It is here where Bird et al are at their weakest. While acknowledging that usually the Romans did not bury crucified criminals (so that their remaining on the cross for scavengers would set a public example of their humiliation), Evans argues that the Romans sometimes (as on Roman holidays) allowed the bodies of crucified criminals to be given over to relatives. He neglects to mention, however, that Jesus was not handed over to relatives and, more importantly, that according to the texts that Evans himself relies upon, the Romans did not make such exceptions when the criminal had been convicted of treason/sedition, which was precisely the crime for which Jesus was crucified! Evans also argues that some criminals (though presumably not those crucified for treason) were temporarily put in “criminals’ tombs” for a year before the remains were given to relatives, but this gets us nowhere near to the gospel versions of Christ’s burial. When during the discussion in San Diego I asked him how his above arguments are relevant to and could prove the gospel accounts, Evans relied instead on those accounts themselves, arguing that since similar accounts are given in 3 of the canonical gospels, they should be considered reliable. In other words, to reach his end conclusion he is not relying (and cannot rely) on most of the extended argumentation that he offers.
The live debate in San Diego was civil, gentlemanly, and even humorous at times, and in their book Bird et al were as well for the most part. But at some points in their book I found their rhetoric overly personal and mean-spirited. Most notorious was the beginning of Charles Hill’s chapter in which he compared Ehrman’s writings to political “tell-all” books written by politicians and other public officials soon after leaving office, for personal gain or other personal reasons. He likens Ehrman’s case to theirs because, he says, Ehrman was originally a Christian but (already many years ago) became an agnostic. Debates among scholars of religion ought to and do occur among scholars of various religious and non-religious persuasions. Their personal beliefs should not be injected into it, and in practice they rarely are. Hill’s personalized attack on Ehrman reminds me of the recent Fox News attack on the religious scholar Reza Aslan in connection with his own recent book about Christ (Zealot) arising from the mere fact that he is a Muslim.
Overall, both books are accessible and lively reads that will be understandable to any educated reader with a reasonable background in the Bible and the history of Christianity. The debate is interesting because both sides somewhat overstate their cases, yet neither side goes beyond reasonable mainstream scholarship. Together they offer readers a convenient way to gain some fluency in the important and long-standing debate about the early Christians’ views on Christ’s divinity and how Christian doctrine on the question arose.
Bart D. Ehrman, How Jesus Became God: The Exaltation of a Jewish Preacher from Galilee. New York: HarperOne. 2014. Hardcover, $27.99.
Michael F. Bird, Craig A. Evans, Simon J. Gathercole, Charles E. Hill, and Chris Tilling. How God Became Jesus: The Real Origins of Belief in Jesus’ Divine Nature. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan. 2014. Paperback, $16.99.
© Arthur George 2014
January 6, 2025
The first man to write his book sounds right... until another book is penned to cross-examine him. (Proverbs 18:17 BJV)
In 2014, Bert Ehrman hit the best seller once again with another book meant to shock the world with the real history of the Bible. This time around, he purported to give us the account of how Jesus evolved from being an itinerant rabbi to being worshipped as God in the first couple centuries of Christian history.
One problem... there are actually a great number of scholars who would read such a book and laugh, if not for the knowledge that so many are being deluded into thinking Ehrman actually knows what he is talking about. A few of those scholars got together and in record breaking time wrote this response to Ehrman. When I say record breaking, I am not joking. This response was put together so quickly that this book, How God Became Jesus actually hit the bookshelves the day before Bert Ehrman's book did.
Despite that speed, this is actually an incredibly good response book. Each author tackled a chapter or two of what BE discussed, showing that the actual facts are not what the sensationalist author claims (or sometimes just hints at because academic integrity is at least the shadow of an idea for him still). Michael Bird shows that Greko Roman intermediary figures (demigods) are completely different not just in kind, but also in scope from how the early church wrote about Jesus. He also demonstrates how Jesus clearly did believe he was God (a topic I have also written and discussed extensively in my ministry to Muslims). Evans then shows that the burial scenario we see in the gospels aligns with ancient Jewish burial traditions and that written and archaeological records show that the burial of crucifixion victims was not nearly as uncommon as Ehrman claimed. Gathercole showed that Mark clearly had a theology of the pre-existence of Christ and none of the gospels even hint at the adoptionist theology Ehrman keeps dancing around. Tilling picks this up showing how both Paul and the early church oral tradition had a very high Christology right from the start and there no evidence of (or time for) a gradual development of this between the time of his death and the beginning of the writing of the NT. Finally, Hill shows that orthodoxy was the overwhelmingly majority view among the church in the first couple centuries and not the by any stretch the result of brutal suppression by any group of heresy hunters.
Jesus knew He was God. The disciples knew He was God. The early Church knew He was God. He is God.
In 2014, Bert Ehrman hit the best seller once again with another book meant to shock the world with the real history of the Bible. This time around, he purported to give us the account of how Jesus evolved from being an itinerant rabbi to being worshipped as God in the first couple centuries of Christian history.
One problem... there are actually a great number of scholars who would read such a book and laugh, if not for the knowledge that so many are being deluded into thinking Ehrman actually knows what he is talking about. A few of those scholars got together and in record breaking time wrote this response to Ehrman. When I say record breaking, I am not joking. This response was put together so quickly that this book, How God Became Jesus actually hit the bookshelves the day before Bert Ehrman's book did.
Despite that speed, this is actually an incredibly good response book. Each author tackled a chapter or two of what BE discussed, showing that the actual facts are not what the sensationalist author claims (or sometimes just hints at because academic integrity is at least the shadow of an idea for him still). Michael Bird shows that Greko Roman intermediary figures (demigods) are completely different not just in kind, but also in scope from how the early church wrote about Jesus. He also demonstrates how Jesus clearly did believe he was God (a topic I have also written and discussed extensively in my ministry to Muslims). Evans then shows that the burial scenario we see in the gospels aligns with ancient Jewish burial traditions and that written and archaeological records show that the burial of crucifixion victims was not nearly as uncommon as Ehrman claimed. Gathercole showed that Mark clearly had a theology of the pre-existence of Christ and none of the gospels even hint at the adoptionist theology Ehrman keeps dancing around. Tilling picks this up showing how both Paul and the early church oral tradition had a very high Christology right from the start and there no evidence of (or time for) a gradual development of this between the time of his death and the beginning of the writing of the NT. Finally, Hill shows that orthodoxy was the overwhelmingly majority view among the church in the first couple centuries and not the by any stretch the result of brutal suppression by any group of heresy hunters.
Jesus knew He was God. The disciples knew He was God. The early Church knew He was God. He is God.
July 2, 2014
A group of conservative Christian scholars has penned these chapters in response to Ehrman's book, How Jesus Became God. As one might expect, this is a defensive reaction to Ehrman's views on the beginnings and development of Christology, and it's greatest weakness is that it assumes what it's trying to prove, namely that the preexistence of Christ as deity. To put it another way, this book will be a treasure for those who are already persuaded of the divinity of Jesus (especially those who are looking for arguments in opposition to Ehrman). On the other hand, Ehrman can be accused of the same thing; his work will be most meaningful to those who are already persuaded that Jesus was not divine in any sense of the word. So, all things considered, this debate ends in a draw.
November 6, 2019
While I am overjoyed that such a response book exists at all, I am deeply disappointed with the styling and the fact that it never addresses several of the main points that concerned me or confirmed them. If the Reformation Church is a church of Sola Scriptura, then our scriptura had better be perfecta.
I started down this rabbit hole in a search for information on the biblical canon formation (specifically why books Jesus quotes were removed) and instead of any answers to those questions from Christian scholars, I find this book of responses that often veer so far from the question that logical arguments lost.
Great disappointment.
I started down this rabbit hole in a search for information on the biblical canon formation (specifically why books Jesus quotes were removed) and instead of any answers to those questions from Christian scholars, I find this book of responses that often veer so far from the question that logical arguments lost.
Great disappointment.
June 3, 2024
A COLLECTION OF ESSAYS CRITICIZING EHRMAN’S “HOW JESUS BECAME GOD” BOOK
The Editor’s Preface to this 2014 book states, “The purpose of this volume is to offer a critical response to Bart Ehrman’s book ‘How Jesus Became God: The Exaltation of a Jewish Preacher from Galilee.’ Ehrman is something of a celebrity skeptic. The media attraction is easy to understand. Ehrman has a famous deconversion story from being a fundamentalist Christian to becoming a ‘happy agnostic.’ He’s a New York Times bestselling author… He’s a publicist’s dream since in talk shows and in live debates he knows how to stir a crowd… For conservative Christians, Ehrman is a bit of a bogeyman… In his recent book… Ehrman proffers the view that belief in Jesus’ divinity emerged gradually in a messy process… recognition of Jesus as God was not so much a result of divine revelation as it was a human process… While Ehrman offers a creative and accessible account… we think that his overall case is … not convincing at all.” (Pg. 7-8) Michael Bird adds in Chapter 1, “we hope to put up a rival perspective to Ehrman by critiquing his arguments and by offering a better model for understanding the origins of belief in Jesus’ divine nature.” (Pg. 21)
In another chapter, Bird observes, “Ehrman is somehow still able in his voluminous writings to use this corrupted and contaminated textual tradition as his primary source to reconstruct the career of the historical Jesus. In fact, he’s written an entire book about the historical Jesus! Not only that, but Ehrman is also able to uncover the real stories about Peter, Paul, and even Mary Magdalene.” (Pg. 47) But he also acknowledges, “This is not to deny that the Gospels are documents … [that are] theologically loaded, and written to create faith… what the Gospels produce is not the transcript for CNN-style footage of Jesus’ career… The Evangelists intended to narrate a story and evoke the significance of one called ‘Jesus,’ Israel’s Messiah and the world’s rightful Lord.” (Pg. 49)
Of Jesus’ and the paralytic [Mk 2:1-12], he comments, “In this episode, Jesus pronounces the forgiveness of sins on a paralytic man, which leads to a charge of blasphemy by the teachers of the law. Ordinarily there was nothing wrong with someone declaring a person’s sins forgiven, as long as that someone was a priest and everyone was in the temple. But… the complaint is, ‘Who can forgive sins but God alone?’… The offense that Jesus’ words provoke is by his presumption to speak with a divine prerogative. Clearly Jesus’ declaration of forgiveness in such a context was tantamount to assuming the authority to forgive in God’s behalf. When Jesus explains why he is able to do so, declaring that ‘the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins,’ he makes that claim explicit.” (Pg. 58)
Of Jesus’ reply in Mk 14:61-62 at his trial, Bird comments, “Jesus was clearly identifying himself with the enthroned messianic figure of Dan 7:13-14, an astounding claim to say the least, and we have no example of any person from the first century ever staking such a claim… If Jesus thinks that Dan 7:13-14 is about him, then he is placing himself within the divine regency of God Almighty. If he’s wrong… it is blasphemy and an affront to Jewish monotheism.” (Pg. 66)
He acknowledges, however, that “to be honest, the gospel of John does constitute something of a problem… While many similarities exist between John and the Synoptics, John is clearly in a class of his own and is doing his own thing… While it definitely has its own historical tradition and it a genuine source about Jesus, nonetheless this tradition has been well and truly interpreted through a pronounced theological Jesus. Many of its unique sayings about Jesus are probably based on a mixture of memory, metaphor, and midrash, a theological elaboration of words and impressions made by Jesus on his followers… It comprises a MAGNIFICATION rather than a MUTILATION of the claims of Jesus found in the Synoptic Gospels.” (Pg. 67-68)
Craig Evans says of Jesus’ body being released to Joseph of Arimathea, “on some occasions Roman officials… sometimes showed mercy to the condemned. This mercy at times extended to those who had been crucified. Clemency was occasioned by a holiday… or simply out of political expediency, whatever the motivation. We actually have evidence that Roman justice not only allowed for the executed to be buried, but it even encouraged it in some instances…. bodies were sometimes released to family and friends.” (Pg. 75-76) Later, he concludes, “In short, there is nothing irregular about the Gospels’ report that a member of the Sanhedrin requested permission to take down the body of Jesus and give it a proper burial.” (Pg. 89)
Simon Gathercole says of Jesus’ ‘I have come…’ statements, “in the Gospels… he is seen as having come FROM somewhere to carry out his life’s work, namely, from heaven… I think if you read Matthew and Luke carefully in the light of their Jewish background, you can see that they have everything to do with Christ existing before he was conceived, before he ‘came’ to embark on his earthly mission.” (Pg. 98)
Chris Tilling points out, “Ehrman’s questionable exegesis of Phil 2:6-11 is the ONLY extended engagement with Paul’s letters in his entire book! Ehrman has constructed a case about the nature of Paul’s Christology by analyzing in depth only six verses in one passage… Ehrman’s exegesis puts Paul’s overall Christological language ENTIRELY out of shape.” (Pg. 147-148)
Michael Bird concludes in the final chapter, “billions of people around the world spend time every day, thinking about, believing in, and praying to Jesus as God. But is this really such a silly belief? I believe it is not. It seems to me that Jesus spoke and acted in such a way as to be claiming that he spoke and acted with, for, and as Israel’s God. His self-understanding was not delusional, but was vindicated by his resurrection from the dead… Many to this day remain loyal in their worship because of the absolute worshipability of Jesus as the ‘one who loved me and gave himself for me’ [Gal 2:20].” (Pg. 205)
This book will be of great interest to those studying the complex issue of Jesus’ self-understanding and Christology in general.
The Editor’s Preface to this 2014 book states, “The purpose of this volume is to offer a critical response to Bart Ehrman’s book ‘How Jesus Became God: The Exaltation of a Jewish Preacher from Galilee.’ Ehrman is something of a celebrity skeptic. The media attraction is easy to understand. Ehrman has a famous deconversion story from being a fundamentalist Christian to becoming a ‘happy agnostic.’ He’s a New York Times bestselling author… He’s a publicist’s dream since in talk shows and in live debates he knows how to stir a crowd… For conservative Christians, Ehrman is a bit of a bogeyman… In his recent book… Ehrman proffers the view that belief in Jesus’ divinity emerged gradually in a messy process… recognition of Jesus as God was not so much a result of divine revelation as it was a human process… While Ehrman offers a creative and accessible account… we think that his overall case is … not convincing at all.” (Pg. 7-8) Michael Bird adds in Chapter 1, “we hope to put up a rival perspective to Ehrman by critiquing his arguments and by offering a better model for understanding the origins of belief in Jesus’ divine nature.” (Pg. 21)
In another chapter, Bird observes, “Ehrman is somehow still able in his voluminous writings to use this corrupted and contaminated textual tradition as his primary source to reconstruct the career of the historical Jesus. In fact, he’s written an entire book about the historical Jesus! Not only that, but Ehrman is also able to uncover the real stories about Peter, Paul, and even Mary Magdalene.” (Pg. 47) But he also acknowledges, “This is not to deny that the Gospels are documents … [that are] theologically loaded, and written to create faith… what the Gospels produce is not the transcript for CNN-style footage of Jesus’ career… The Evangelists intended to narrate a story and evoke the significance of one called ‘Jesus,’ Israel’s Messiah and the world’s rightful Lord.” (Pg. 49)
Of Jesus’ and the paralytic [Mk 2:1-12], he comments, “In this episode, Jesus pronounces the forgiveness of sins on a paralytic man, which leads to a charge of blasphemy by the teachers of the law. Ordinarily there was nothing wrong with someone declaring a person’s sins forgiven, as long as that someone was a priest and everyone was in the temple. But… the complaint is, ‘Who can forgive sins but God alone?’… The offense that Jesus’ words provoke is by his presumption to speak with a divine prerogative. Clearly Jesus’ declaration of forgiveness in such a context was tantamount to assuming the authority to forgive in God’s behalf. When Jesus explains why he is able to do so, declaring that ‘the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins,’ he makes that claim explicit.” (Pg. 58)
Of Jesus’ reply in Mk 14:61-62 at his trial, Bird comments, “Jesus was clearly identifying himself with the enthroned messianic figure of Dan 7:13-14, an astounding claim to say the least, and we have no example of any person from the first century ever staking such a claim… If Jesus thinks that Dan 7:13-14 is about him, then he is placing himself within the divine regency of God Almighty. If he’s wrong… it is blasphemy and an affront to Jewish monotheism.” (Pg. 66)
He acknowledges, however, that “to be honest, the gospel of John does constitute something of a problem… While many similarities exist between John and the Synoptics, John is clearly in a class of his own and is doing his own thing… While it definitely has its own historical tradition and it a genuine source about Jesus, nonetheless this tradition has been well and truly interpreted through a pronounced theological Jesus. Many of its unique sayings about Jesus are probably based on a mixture of memory, metaphor, and midrash, a theological elaboration of words and impressions made by Jesus on his followers… It comprises a MAGNIFICATION rather than a MUTILATION of the claims of Jesus found in the Synoptic Gospels.” (Pg. 67-68)
Craig Evans says of Jesus’ body being released to Joseph of Arimathea, “on some occasions Roman officials… sometimes showed mercy to the condemned. This mercy at times extended to those who had been crucified. Clemency was occasioned by a holiday… or simply out of political expediency, whatever the motivation. We actually have evidence that Roman justice not only allowed for the executed to be buried, but it even encouraged it in some instances…. bodies were sometimes released to family and friends.” (Pg. 75-76) Later, he concludes, “In short, there is nothing irregular about the Gospels’ report that a member of the Sanhedrin requested permission to take down the body of Jesus and give it a proper burial.” (Pg. 89)
Simon Gathercole says of Jesus’ ‘I have come…’ statements, “in the Gospels… he is seen as having come FROM somewhere to carry out his life’s work, namely, from heaven… I think if you read Matthew and Luke carefully in the light of their Jewish background, you can see that they have everything to do with Christ existing before he was conceived, before he ‘came’ to embark on his earthly mission.” (Pg. 98)
Chris Tilling points out, “Ehrman’s questionable exegesis of Phil 2:6-11 is the ONLY extended engagement with Paul’s letters in his entire book! Ehrman has constructed a case about the nature of Paul’s Christology by analyzing in depth only six verses in one passage… Ehrman’s exegesis puts Paul’s overall Christological language ENTIRELY out of shape.” (Pg. 147-148)
Michael Bird concludes in the final chapter, “billions of people around the world spend time every day, thinking about, believing in, and praying to Jesus as God. But is this really such a silly belief? I believe it is not. It seems to me that Jesus spoke and acted in such a way as to be claiming that he spoke and acted with, for, and as Israel’s God. His self-understanding was not delusional, but was vindicated by his resurrection from the dead… Many to this day remain loyal in their worship because of the absolute worshipability of Jesus as the ‘one who loved me and gave himself for me’ [Gal 2:20].” (Pg. 205)
This book will be of great interest to those studying the complex issue of Jesus’ self-understanding and Christology in general.
January 5, 2022
2.5 stars [Humanism]
(W: 2.32, U: 2.5, T: 2.42)
Exact rating: 2.41
Michael Bird and four other scholars published a quick rebuttal to [the pseudo-scholar] Bart Ehrman's How Jesus Became God. Although their general conclusions were correct, the book's demerits made for an inferior final product.
The register was down-to-earth, but a little too much so: a strain of sarcasm or snarkiness ran throughout the work (especially in Bird's chapters) and it didn't come off well [-1/4 total, from a 2.57].
The book could be read as a response to Ehrman if no other were on hand [2.5]. Its truth ran between common [2.5] to above average [3]. However, one bombshell error contaminated the work for general recommendation: Michael Bird got The Angel of Yahweh entirely wrong in Chapter 2. The Angel of Yahweh in Genesis is incontestably Yahweh Himself (as mine and others' exegetical scholarship has demonstrated), and Bird missed a seminal opportunity to deliver some real, exegetical Trinitology in this work. The positive elements were some logical and historical arguments against Ehrman.
How God Became Jesus, then, is recommended only to non-academics interested in Apologetics dealing with Humanism. Its non-academic register makes it not worth the time for scholars.
(W: 2.32, U: 2.5, T: 2.42)
Exact rating: 2.41
Michael Bird and four other scholars published a quick rebuttal to [the pseudo-scholar] Bart Ehrman's How Jesus Became God. Although their general conclusions were correct, the book's demerits made for an inferior final product.
The register was down-to-earth, but a little too much so: a strain of sarcasm or snarkiness ran throughout the work (especially in Bird's chapters) and it didn't come off well [-1/4 total, from a 2.57].
The book could be read as a response to Ehrman if no other were on hand [2.5]. Its truth ran between common [2.5] to above average [3]. However, one bombshell error contaminated the work for general recommendation: Michael Bird got The Angel of Yahweh entirely wrong in Chapter 2. The Angel of Yahweh in Genesis is incontestably Yahweh Himself (as mine and others' exegetical scholarship has demonstrated), and Bird missed a seminal opportunity to deliver some real, exegetical Trinitology in this work. The positive elements were some logical and historical arguments against Ehrman.
How God Became Jesus, then, is recommended only to non-academics interested in Apologetics dealing with Humanism. Its non-academic register makes it not worth the time for scholars.
January 22, 2022
I really tried to read this… I just don’t think the authors were able to get any substantial criticism of Ehrman’s book off the ground. I understand that it made them angry, and that there are a handful of scholars who would move dates earlier, and some scholars who have different exegesis, but that’s not the same thing as a full-blown rebuttal, which this purports to be.
October 4, 2020
Bird and co. adequately respond to most of Ehrman’s erroneous claims from “How Jesus Became God.” I read Ehrman first, so as to retain as much objectivity as possible. But I believed that Jesus was God pre-Ehrman, I continued to do so post-Ehrman, and this book provides more arguments in favor of that position.
It isn’t without fault, however. Michael Bird is given to comedy (I once heard him in a podcast say that he’s really a comedian disguised as a Bible scholar). And while I appreciate Bird’s quips has much as anyone, it might be said that he goes overboard here. There are a few places throughout the book where the authors undersell the validity of Ehrman’s arguments, though this may be a framing technique for the sake of their own points (and Ehrman does no different in his book).
It isn’t without fault, however. Michael Bird is given to comedy (I once heard him in a podcast say that he’s really a comedian disguised as a Bible scholar). And while I appreciate Bird’s quips has much as anyone, it might be said that he goes overboard here. There are a few places throughout the book where the authors undersell the validity of Ehrman’s arguments, though this may be a framing technique for the sake of their own points (and Ehrman does no different in his book).
April 28, 2023
I need to read Bart Ehrman’s book now.
November 29, 2023
Bart Erhman's book How Jesus Became God really touched a nerve. He is known as a bit of a gadfly within the Christian scholarly community. His book, in which he attempts to make the case that belief about Jesus as God developed systematically over the course of the first few centuries of Christianity, led to the extraordinary step by these scholars to write an entire book in rebuttal which was published on the same day. The book is by several believing scholars and picks apart Erhman's claims systematically. While the obvious bias toward belief as opposed to Erhman’s atheism leads to some intractable differences, for the most part this is an objective analysis of Erhman’s methods and conclusions.
And he comes off looking pretty bad. They make a strong case that his entire thesis is flawed and based on a systematic distortion and presentation of the historical data, selective readings of scripture, and failure to engage with relevant scholarship. While the question of whether Jesus thought of himself as God and how the early Christian community viewed him and when these views changed is a valid one, this book does a good job of proving that Erhman's attempt to address it should not be taken seriously. The only complaint is that Bird's condescending and unprofessional tone and style in his contributions seriously bring down the overall character and feel of the book. He should have stuck with a rigorous and respectful critique and not devolved into cynicism, jokes, and ad hominem attacks. Overall though, a necessary companion read to Erhman's provocative book.
And he comes off looking pretty bad. They make a strong case that his entire thesis is flawed and based on a systematic distortion and presentation of the historical data, selective readings of scripture, and failure to engage with relevant scholarship. While the question of whether Jesus thought of himself as God and how the early Christian community viewed him and when these views changed is a valid one, this book does a good job of proving that Erhman's attempt to address it should not be taken seriously. The only complaint is that Bird's condescending and unprofessional tone and style in his contributions seriously bring down the overall character and feel of the book. He should have stuck with a rigorous and respectful critique and not devolved into cynicism, jokes, and ad hominem attacks. Overall though, a necessary companion read to Erhman's provocative book.
August 7, 2016
I generally enjoy reading Ehrman and with this book I was able to read the rebuttal along with Ehrman's How Jesus became God. Tiring but worthwhile. After a while though it is hard to go back and forth. I probably did about half of both books.
Ehrman's book How Jesus Became God: The Exaltation of a Jewish Preacher from Galilee
Ehrman's book How Jesus Became God: The Exaltation of a Jewish Preacher from Galilee
December 19, 2014
Fantastic, exclusively Evangelical perspectives - but all scholars.
July 25, 2021
The book How God Became Jesus by Michael F. Bird and four others is a direct response to the book How Jesus Became God by Bart D. Ehrman. The books are two sides of one coin. It is difficult to review How God Became Jesus without discussing How Jesus Became God.
From his high school years to middle age, Ehrman went from being a Christian to being an agnostic.
“I started out thinking of Jesus as God the Son, equal with the Father, a member of the Trinity; but over time, I began to see him in ‘lower and lower’ terms, until finally I came to think of him as a human being who is not different in nature from any other human being.”
Ehrman accepts the idea that Jesus is God “was the view of the very earliest Christians soon after Jesus’ death.” However he claims that the claimed divinity of Jesus then was not as it is today. He says that, in Jesus’ day, “the human and divine were continuums that could, and did, overlap.” In his book, which was researched and written over eight years, he describes how the current view of Jesus as God was developed over several centuries. His book is filled with references to scripture and various historical sources.
Bird acknowledges that believing that Jesus is God is a matter of faith. However, he says that “when, where, and why” people began to believe that Jesus is God is a historical question, and he disagrees with Ehrman on that matter.
“In contrast to the thesis of Ehrman and others that a ‘high Christology,’ which identified Jesus as a fully divine figure, was an evolutionary development, a cohort of scholars has argued for something more akin to a ‘big bang’ approach to the origins of a fully divine Christology.”
Bird and his co-authors dispute Ehrman by contradicting the details of Ehrman’s writing. They claim that he misinterprets scripture and cherry-picks portions of the Bible. For example, they note that he focuses on one small portion of the Letters of Paul and ignores most of them. They claim that he misstates the beliefs of various people in history. Also, they attack Ehrman’s observations and conclusions by attacking his process. I found the book How God Became Jesus to be enlightening.
Ehrman continues to have respect for Jesus even though he does not believe that Jesus is God.
“As an agnostic, I now think of Jesus as a true religious genius with brilliant insights. But he was also very much a man of his time. And his time was an age of full-throated apocalyptic fervor. … I don't believe there is a God in heaven who is soon to send a cosmic judge of the earth to destroy the forces of evil. And yet I think that the ethical principles Jesus enunciated in that apocalyptic context are still applicable to me, living in a different context.”
In their book, Bird and his co-authors have respect for Ehrman.
“Not everything Ehrman says is wrong. Much we accept, and other scholars may side with him on issues here and there. However, our overall verdict is that Ehrman has not extended or enhanced our knowledge of Christian origins. Therefore, we hope to put up a rival perspective to Ehrman by critiquing his arguments and by offering a better model for understanding the origins of belief in Jesus’ divine nature.”
Both books are interesting and worth reading. However How God Became Jesus does not flow as well due to the multiple authors and the objective of attacking portions of Ehrman’s book. It is somewhat piecemeal. Also, the attempts at humor do not make the book better or its message more convincing. I read Ehrman’s book first and found his evolutionary tale to be plausible. I read Bird’s book next and could see how there could be flaws in Ehrman’s story. Although I have enough interest in the subject matter to read both books, I am not interested enough to do my own research to try to determine who is right and who is wrong. At the very least, though, I can now see how the origin of Christianity is not a simple one.
From his high school years to middle age, Ehrman went from being a Christian to being an agnostic.
“I started out thinking of Jesus as God the Son, equal with the Father, a member of the Trinity; but over time, I began to see him in ‘lower and lower’ terms, until finally I came to think of him as a human being who is not different in nature from any other human being.”
Ehrman accepts the idea that Jesus is God “was the view of the very earliest Christians soon after Jesus’ death.” However he claims that the claimed divinity of Jesus then was not as it is today. He says that, in Jesus’ day, “the human and divine were continuums that could, and did, overlap.” In his book, which was researched and written over eight years, he describes how the current view of Jesus as God was developed over several centuries. His book is filled with references to scripture and various historical sources.
Bird acknowledges that believing that Jesus is God is a matter of faith. However, he says that “when, where, and why” people began to believe that Jesus is God is a historical question, and he disagrees with Ehrman on that matter.
“In contrast to the thesis of Ehrman and others that a ‘high Christology,’ which identified Jesus as a fully divine figure, was an evolutionary development, a cohort of scholars has argued for something more akin to a ‘big bang’ approach to the origins of a fully divine Christology.”
Bird and his co-authors dispute Ehrman by contradicting the details of Ehrman’s writing. They claim that he misinterprets scripture and cherry-picks portions of the Bible. For example, they note that he focuses on one small portion of the Letters of Paul and ignores most of them. They claim that he misstates the beliefs of various people in history. Also, they attack Ehrman’s observations and conclusions by attacking his process. I found the book How God Became Jesus to be enlightening.
Ehrman continues to have respect for Jesus even though he does not believe that Jesus is God.
“As an agnostic, I now think of Jesus as a true religious genius with brilliant insights. But he was also very much a man of his time. And his time was an age of full-throated apocalyptic fervor. … I don't believe there is a God in heaven who is soon to send a cosmic judge of the earth to destroy the forces of evil. And yet I think that the ethical principles Jesus enunciated in that apocalyptic context are still applicable to me, living in a different context.”
In their book, Bird and his co-authors have respect for Ehrman.
“Not everything Ehrman says is wrong. Much we accept, and other scholars may side with him on issues here and there. However, our overall verdict is that Ehrman has not extended or enhanced our knowledge of Christian origins. Therefore, we hope to put up a rival perspective to Ehrman by critiquing his arguments and by offering a better model for understanding the origins of belief in Jesus’ divine nature.”
Both books are interesting and worth reading. However How God Became Jesus does not flow as well due to the multiple authors and the objective of attacking portions of Ehrman’s book. It is somewhat piecemeal. Also, the attempts at humor do not make the book better or its message more convincing. I read Ehrman’s book first and found his evolutionary tale to be plausible. I read Bird’s book next and could see how there could be flaws in Ehrman’s story. Although I have enough interest in the subject matter to read both books, I am not interested enough to do my own research to try to determine who is right and who is wrong. At the very least, though, I can now see how the origin of Christianity is not a simple one.
March 30, 2018
This book is a response to Bart Ehrman's How Jesus became God. It was published at the same time due to cooperation between the author's and publishers. A pity such civility and courtesy isn't the standard. This is not to say the 2 books don't take exception with the each other.
Bart Ehrman is a favorite of those who claim Christianity is fabrication made up by manipulators and fools. As a former fundamentalist who had a crisis of faith from which he did not recover he had added flavor for use against the "fundies". However, unlike many former fundamentalist he does not seem to start from a place of anger and hate. I read some of his books many years ago and was not impressed with some of the assumptions and logic chains so I read other authors. I say this to show I'm familiar with him but did not read his book to which this one is a reply which could be considered a deficiency in reviewing this one.
For those that like Ehrman, his views and his methods this book will not convince them of his errors. It might give pause on an uncritical acceptance of all he says. For those who disagree this will help with a better understanding of why based on standard tools and methods of the academic world. For those unsure it will give a greater understanding of the issues.
Although the authors disagree with Ehrman's conclusions they do point out:
"That he no longer professes faith does not mean that he has nothing to teach Christians. Indeed, I have often found that I learn the most from reading those with whom I most vigorously disagree, as they approach the material with a different pair of interpretive eyes. In this vein, I must commend Ehrman for at least the following:"
Because this book had less lead time it had more authors, each dealing with a portion of the original book. They do not disagree with everything in it and point out the helpfulness of better understanding something through the agency of opposition. All in all it is clear and concise and charitable. It is not afraid to point out what it considers errors but there is no sense of vindictiveness, superiority or victory.
As the book nears conclusion they end with another commendation of Ehrman:
"out of all the questions someone could conceivably ask about Jesus, a sensible one and an important one is definitely this: “How Did Jesus Become God?” I commend Ehrman for raising it in the public forum and offering a fresh and vigorous engagement with the topic."
If only all such discussions could be so civil.
Bart Ehrman is a favorite of those who claim Christianity is fabrication made up by manipulators and fools. As a former fundamentalist who had a crisis of faith from which he did not recover he had added flavor for use against the "fundies". However, unlike many former fundamentalist he does not seem to start from a place of anger and hate. I read some of his books many years ago and was not impressed with some of the assumptions and logic chains so I read other authors. I say this to show I'm familiar with him but did not read his book to which this one is a reply which could be considered a deficiency in reviewing this one.
For those that like Ehrman, his views and his methods this book will not convince them of his errors. It might give pause on an uncritical acceptance of all he says. For those who disagree this will help with a better understanding of why based on standard tools and methods of the academic world. For those unsure it will give a greater understanding of the issues.
Although the authors disagree with Ehrman's conclusions they do point out:
"That he no longer professes faith does not mean that he has nothing to teach Christians. Indeed, I have often found that I learn the most from reading those with whom I most vigorously disagree, as they approach the material with a different pair of interpretive eyes. In this vein, I must commend Ehrman for at least the following:"
Because this book had less lead time it had more authors, each dealing with a portion of the original book. They do not disagree with everything in it and point out the helpfulness of better understanding something through the agency of opposition. All in all it is clear and concise and charitable. It is not afraid to point out what it considers errors but there is no sense of vindictiveness, superiority or victory.
As the book nears conclusion they end with another commendation of Ehrman:
"out of all the questions someone could conceivably ask about Jesus, a sensible one and an important one is definitely this: “How Did Jesus Become God?” I commend Ehrman for raising it in the public forum and offering a fresh and vigorous engagement with the topic."
If only all such discussions could be so civil.
November 21, 2020
The approach of the various authors was straight forward in the "push back" against Bart Ehrman, giving an unavoidable redundancy effect. As with Revisiting the Corruption of the New Testament: Manuscript, Patristic, and Apocryphal Evidence, Ehrman is exposed mainly for inadequate scholarship, which then leads to unsound positions on the person and status of Jesus.
An unintended side effect of this book is similar to what I experienced in reading Corruption of the New Testament, and now Which Bible Translation Should I Use?: A Comparison of 4 Major Recent Versions, being how complex and deep this area of Biblical knowledge is and how little I know. I have just started reading New Testament Exegesis: A Handbook for Students and Pastors, as well as How to Choose a Translation for All Its Worth: A Guide to Understanding and Using Bible Versions, both by Gordon D. Fee, which are reinforcing my concerns about what appears to be a rather daunting task of being able to engage the issues of text, translation, exegesis responsibly. Fee is charitable in his advice for non-scholars, but yet his advice does not obviate the need for a serious full on study of these issues.
All orthodox Bible study teachers (including pastor-teachers) should read this book, not so much to be able to replicate the arguments against Ehrman, but to have some confidence that there are good answers to Ehrman, which vindicate Jesus as God, and the integrity of the NT text making that claim.
An unintended side effect of this book is similar to what I experienced in reading Corruption of the New Testament, and now Which Bible Translation Should I Use?: A Comparison of 4 Major Recent Versions, being how complex and deep this area of Biblical knowledge is and how little I know. I have just started reading New Testament Exegesis: A Handbook for Students and Pastors, as well as How to Choose a Translation for All Its Worth: A Guide to Understanding and Using Bible Versions, both by Gordon D. Fee, which are reinforcing my concerns about what appears to be a rather daunting task of being able to engage the issues of text, translation, exegesis responsibly. Fee is charitable in his advice for non-scholars, but yet his advice does not obviate the need for a serious full on study of these issues.
All orthodox Bible study teachers (including pastor-teachers) should read this book, not so much to be able to replicate the arguments against Ehrman, but to have some confidence that there are good answers to Ehrman, which vindicate Jesus as God, and the integrity of the NT text making that claim.
Read
May 14, 2021Wilken’s "Christians as the Romans Saw Them" an overview of noteworthy critics of
Christianity in the Roman Empire showed the influence these enemies of the faith had on many Romans, which propelled the early church fathers to write vigorous defenses. Last issue ended with a mention of Bart Ehrman of the University of North Carolina, who is today’s model of
the learned opponent. This pop historian and “textural critic” is an effective communicator whose personal story perfectly fits today’s desired narrative: Raised in an Evangelical Household, Ehrman’s research leads him to discover what appears to him to be intentional changes in early manuscripts. He becomes an agnostic and a brave truth-teller, exposing how a Jewish rabbi was turned into God. Ehrman has made quite a career from this line, with several bestselling books, lecture tours, and frequent television appearances.
But, just as there were early Christian intellects who answered the Roman critics, there are many scholars and historians able to counter Ehrman. In How God Became Jesus, five evangelical scholars examine one of Ehrman’s recent books and offer a broad response. As you might imagine,
most of them are not on the network talk-show circuit. They explain, among other things, how Ehrman conflates his own conclusions into the last word on the subject:
Gathercole notes: “The key point is that one might well make the occasional speculation…but to grant one’s speculations the force of probability such that one can then proceed to use them as foundations for other arguments [author’s emphasis] is – not to put too fine a point on it – indefensibly bad method” (p. 106).
Tilling notes: “In sum, this means that he has to ignore a huge amount of important New Testament data, and then force the rest into his artificial grid” (p. 121)
Christianity in the Roman Empire showed the influence these enemies of the faith had on many Romans, which propelled the early church fathers to write vigorous defenses. Last issue ended with a mention of Bart Ehrman of the University of North Carolina, who is today’s model of
the learned opponent. This pop historian and “textural critic” is an effective communicator whose personal story perfectly fits today’s desired narrative: Raised in an Evangelical Household, Ehrman’s research leads him to discover what appears to him to be intentional changes in early manuscripts. He becomes an agnostic and a brave truth-teller, exposing how a Jewish rabbi was turned into God. Ehrman has made quite a career from this line, with several bestselling books, lecture tours, and frequent television appearances.
But, just as there were early Christian intellects who answered the Roman critics, there are many scholars and historians able to counter Ehrman. In How God Became Jesus, five evangelical scholars examine one of Ehrman’s recent books and offer a broad response. As you might imagine,
most of them are not on the network talk-show circuit. They explain, among other things, how Ehrman conflates his own conclusions into the last word on the subject:
Gathercole notes: “The key point is that one might well make the occasional speculation…but to grant one’s speculations the force of probability such that one can then proceed to use them as foundations for other arguments [author’s emphasis] is – not to put too fine a point on it – indefensibly bad method” (p. 106).
Tilling notes: “In sum, this means that he has to ignore a huge amount of important New Testament data, and then force the rest into his artificial grid” (p. 121)
January 22, 2019
I would give this book 1-2 stars. If I don't finish a book then I give it one star. I was able to finish it but only because I forced myself. I was very disappointed with the book overall. It's too bad Michael Bird wrote the first chapters. His style of writing was difficult for me to follow. It felt like I was reading a paper written by a student just before it was due to the teacher. I also disliked his jokes in general, and especially about Bart Ehrman. For example, "... the next time Santa comes to town, Ehrman may want to lock himself in his panic room lest the jolly fat man decides to give him a yuletide body slam as a punishment for being on his naughty list. " Is this funny? "To Jewish audiences, worshiping a crucified man was blasphemy; it was about as kosher as pork sausages wrapped in bacon served to Jews for a jihad fundraiser." "I have to confess that whenever I read Bart Ehrman saying anything about the historical Jesus, I always feel like tweeting '@BartEhrman#epicfacepalm.'" There's many other jokes he inserts here or there, and l suppose l just don't enjoy his humor.
For the rest of the book there are some interesting tid bits. However, I don't recommend reading the book for so little useful information.
For the rest of the book there are some interesting tid bits. However, I don't recommend reading the book for so little useful information.
September 21, 2019
This is a pretty amazing book just in terms of the logistics of its production and publication. First, Mike Bird had to get HarperOne to give him a prepublication copy of the manuscript of Bart Ehrman’s book How Jesus Became God. Next Ehrman’s arguments had to be analyzed. Then Bird had to throw together a crack team of New Testament scholars, get them to write individual essays replying to parts of Ehrman’s argument, and edit the essays into a coherent package so that the book could be published at the same time as Ehrman’s book. I would say Bird and his team did a pretty good job given the short time constraints (“over the Christmas break of 2013,” according to the Editor’s Preface). All of the authors are influenced by and relied heavily on the Early High Christology (EHC) arguments of Hurtado and Bauckham, and adding some of their own particular spin to the EHC mix – particularly Simon Gathercole and Chris Tilling. The chapter by Craig Evans is an excellent response, on purely historical grounds, to one of the claims of Ehrman, namely, that Jesus was not buried as the Gospels say he was and that therefore the discovery of the empty tomb was not a factor in causing the disciples to believe that Jesus had been raised from the dead.
July 20, 2018
Whilst having read Ehrman's book "How Jesus Became God" or at least being familiar with the arguments that Ehrman advances are a big plus when reading this response, I don't think it is a requirement. Many of the ancient apologetic works (a number of which are referenced within) are one side of the argument. There is still great value.
This is a collection of essays arguing against the thesis that Ehrman proposes in his book in regard that over time Christians changed from seeing Jesus as someone who was exalted as God at his resurrection to exalted at Baptism, to exalted at his conception, to being God prior to his incarnation - with the latter taking hold in the Nicaean period. The authors take various strands of the argument and examine Scripture, Early Church Fathers, Historical Evidence and Archaeology to propose flaws (if not complete error).
I found this to be quite an easy read, and does stand well as good book on the apologetics for Jesus as fully God and fully man of the Christian creeds.
This is a collection of essays arguing against the thesis that Ehrman proposes in his book in regard that over time Christians changed from seeing Jesus as someone who was exalted as God at his resurrection to exalted at Baptism, to exalted at his conception, to being God prior to his incarnation - with the latter taking hold in the Nicaean period. The authors take various strands of the argument and examine Scripture, Early Church Fathers, Historical Evidence and Archaeology to propose flaws (if not complete error).
I found this to be quite an easy read, and does stand well as good book on the apologetics for Jesus as fully God and fully man of the Christian creeds.
January 4, 2018
The refutations of Ehrman are solid. The problem with this book is that the authors do not seem to have a clear sense of their audience. They go from very lame jokes (appeal to masses?) to technical historical and exegetical arguments--some of these latter are given without much background. People who can follow these arguments might find the bad jokes distasteful, whereas the types who might appreciate such humor would likely be thrown by the tougher passages. This strange tone throughout tends to make the book a strange mix of popular and scholarly that doesn't quite work. That being said, someone looking to see Ehrman's historical obfuscation and exegetical legerdemain put in place won't be disappointed.
August 12, 2019
the authors do a great job of addressing Erhman’s “How Jesus Became God”: introducing information that challenges Erhman’s early Christian history and his accounts of various church fathers, in addition to deeply undermining his Scriptural hermeneutic and interpretive keys for various proof-texts. perhaps the most helpful thread running through all the different challenging scholars’ articles was the way they made Erhman’s assumptions/presuppositions that shape both his questions and answers explicit, separating out Erhman’s measured academic discussion from his often reductive rhetoric—rhetoric that risks deceiving the reader into believing that the answer is so easy, it’s a wonder that all the famous Christian exegetes and historians haven’t yet waved the white flag!
January 25, 2025
Here are the downsides: as a response-book, you're never going to be as interesting as the initiating-book; as an orthodoxy-book, the side you are going to argue for is always going to be obvious from the get-go; as a popular-level book, you're not going to be able to argue high level gloves-off the way you might in an academic setting (and when you move in that direction the prose gets glacially slow); and finally as a collaboration the arguments are going to seem a little uneven and redundant at points.
All that said, this is a punchy collection of essays that show there's good scholarly and exegetical reason for all us regular old Christians to worship our regular old ecumenical-creed attested incarnate God Jesus Christ.
All that said, this is a punchy collection of essays that show there's good scholarly and exegetical reason for all us regular old Christians to worship our regular old ecumenical-creed attested incarnate God Jesus Christ.
July 3, 2021
I just finished "How God became Jesus," by Michael Bird and company.
This was a rebuttal that was released at the same time as Bart Ehrman's "How Jesus became God." Since I haven't made a habit of reading Ehrman (though I do have his "New Testament and other Christian writings") I have only heard one side of the debate. I will have to pick up Ehrman's book.
This was, for me, an intro into Christology; and it seemed to be a good one. Covered therein was everything from scripture of high and low Christologies, to history, archeology, the Patristic Fathers, ancient heresies and a whole host of other topics. I am glad I read it.
This was a rebuttal that was released at the same time as Bart Ehrman's "How Jesus became God." Since I haven't made a habit of reading Ehrman (though I do have his "New Testament and other Christian writings") I have only heard one side of the debate. I will have to pick up Ehrman's book.
This was, for me, an intro into Christology; and it seemed to be a good one. Covered therein was everything from scripture of high and low Christologies, to history, archeology, the Patristic Fathers, ancient heresies and a whole host of other topics. I am glad I read it.
January 29, 2022
Interesting perspective on Ehrman's work that gave me insight to the range of discussions on biblical history. Ehramn sometimes writes with such confidence a novice like me can forget that there are others who just as confidently hold exactly opposing opinions that they can support with as many references as he does.
It is clear that this was written very quickly to respond to Ehrman's book, and these essays could have been tightened with more edits. Interesting though if you want to learn more about this history.
It is clear that this was written very quickly to respond to Ehrman's book, and these essays could have been tightened with more edits. Interesting though if you want to learn more about this history.
March 10, 2020
God became Incarnate in Jesus - Undoubtedly!
The authors clearly and logically show the fallacies in Bart Ehrman's argument that Jesus only "became" God as Christian doctrine evolved in the first few centuries of the Christian era, and that Jesus himself and the early believers had no such concept of him.
The opposite is shown to be true. Not a light read. but easy enough to follow, and well worth the effort.
The authors clearly and logically show the fallacies in Bart Ehrman's argument that Jesus only "became" God as Christian doctrine evolved in the first few centuries of the Christian era, and that Jesus himself and the early believers had no such concept of him.
The opposite is shown to be true. Not a light read. but easy enough to follow, and well worth the effort.
June 19, 2019
This book was so well-written. Each of the contributing scholars put forward a thoughtful, careful, and accessible challenge to each of the points made by Bart D. Ehrman in his book, “How Jesus Became God”.
I would highly recommend this book to anyone struggling to make sense of Christianity in light of Ehrman’s declarations.
I would highly recommend this book to anyone struggling to make sense of Christianity in light of Ehrman’s declarations.
November 30, 2019
This book pokes so many holes in Ehrman’s book that if it were a boat it would sink
Through rigorous biblical, archaeological, historical, textual, and theological scholarships, the authors clearly refute Ehrman’s fallacious argument for e origins of Jesus’ deification. Ehrman got schooled.
Through rigorous biblical, archaeological, historical, textual, and theological scholarships, the authors clearly refute Ehrman’s fallacious argument for e origins of Jesus’ deification. Ehrman got schooled.
September 27, 2020
This book is a response to Bart Ehrman's book, How Jesus Became God. Ehrman's thesis was that neither Jesus nor his earliest followers thought that he was God; that was a later church development. Bird and 4 other authors respond chapter by chapter, point by point, to Ehrman's book and show that his arguments and conclusions are erroneous. A good book for one's apologetics library.
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