Messiah in Weakness: A Portrait of Jesus from the Perspective of the Dispossessed

by YungSuk Kim

Yung Suk Kim raises a perennial question about How can we approach the historical Jesus? Kim proposes to interpret him from the perspective of the dispossessed--through the eyes of weakness. Exploring Jesus's experience, interpretation, and enactment of weakness, understanding weakness as both human condition and virtue, Kim offers a new portrait of Jesus who is weak and strong, and empowered to bring God's rule, replete with mercy, in the here and now. Arguing against the grain of tradition that the strong Jesus identifies with the weak, Kim demonstrates that it is the weak Jesus who identifies with the weak. The paradoxical truth with Jesus "Because he is weak, he is strong." In the end, Jesus dies a death of paradox that reveals both his ultimate weakness that demands divine justice, and his unyielding spirit of love for the world and truth of God. "A timely intervention of public biblical interpretation. Yung Suk Kim's interpretation of Jesus provides a much-needed intervention in our current cultural moment. A society determined to assert its power naturally seeks a Jesus who affirms its striving; Kim names such theologies idolatrous and demonstrates how Jesus brought transformation out of his own weakness. Acknowledging that we are all weak, he reasons, we can live in solidarity with the rest of humanity." --Greg Carey, Professor of New Testament, Lancaster Theological Seminary "In Messiah in Weakness, Dr. Kim presents the intriguing and engaging contextualized proposition that Jesus of Nazareth embodied both weakness and strength. Expanding the conceptualization of weakness, Kim convincingly demonstrates how Jesus, through his ministry of teaching and healing and his suffering/crucifixion, enacted weakness, advocating for the weak. Reading through the decolonizing lens of weakness, Kim guides readers along a path paved with history of interpretation, adept literary analysis, contextual theology, and cultural and contemporary relevance." --Mitzi J. Smith, Associate Professor of New Testament and Early Christian Studies, Ashland Theological Seminary/Detroit Center Yung Suk Kim is Associate Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity at the Samuel DeWitt Proctor School of Theology of Virginia Union University. He is the author of seven books, including Christ's Body in Corinth (2008) and Resurrecting Jesus (Cascade, 2015). He has edited two 1-2 Corinthians (2013) and Reading Minjung Theology in the Twenty-First Century (Pickwick, 2013). He is the editor of the Journal of Bible and Human Transformation and the Journal of Race, Ethnicity, and Religion.

145 pages, Kindle Edition

Published June 9, 2016

About the author

Yung Suk Kim, M.Div. (McCormick), Ph.D. (Vanderbilt), is Full Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity at Virginia Union University. He has authored nearly twenty books, including How to Read the Gospels (Rowman & Littlefield, 2024), Monotheism, Biblical Traditions, and Race Relations (Cambridge University Press, 2022), How to Read Paul (Fortress, 2021), Toward Decentering the New Testament (Cascade, 2018, co-authored with Mitzi J. Smith), and Christ’s Body in Corinth (Fortress, 2008). He has also edited four volumes, including At the Intersection of Hermeneutics and Homiletics and Paul's Gospel, Empire, Race, and Ethnicity. The forthcoming book's title is Justice and Parables (T&T Clark, 2026, forthcoming). Kim's research interests encompass Paul's letters and his theology, parables, political philosophy, and comparative wisdom literature.

Reviews

[Darcy · Rating 1 out of 5]

Rarely have I been more disappointed in a book. When I saw Yung Suk Kim’s title, Messiah in Weakness: A Portrait of Jesus from the Perspective of the Dispossessed, I quickly put it in my cart, anticipated a scholar’s reflections on the incredible irony of the cross, someone who could further advance the intersection of the life and death of Jesus with the suffering of the marginalized, oppressed and dispossessed of society. I anticipated a strong challenge to those who, though seeking to follow Jesus, have no idea what it means to be weak. Unfortunately, though, what we get in Kim is a thoroughgoing critical scholar who not only denies the deity of Jesus but also any salvific or intentional purpose in the cross. Additionally, he clearly denies the bodily resurrection of Jesus. At best, Jesus is a tragic hero demonstrating a profound commitment to live faithfully before God.

Kim argues that Jesus never intended to die and that his horrific death was not what God had planned. His critique of atonement theories (see pp 110-111) fall flat as his arguments are only feasible if one removes huge portions of Scripture and if one inappropriately pits Paul against Jesus (as enlightenment-driven theologians proposed over 200 yeas ago). This captivity of the Scriptures to the supremacy of human rationality betrays the very challenge of Paul in 1 Corinthians 1: the cross IS foolishness. It IS a stumbling block. In the end Kim is devoted not to the God of the Bible but the god of Greek philosophy (be it Epicureanism or Deism—see NT Wright’s work on Eschatology) for it is the rationality of humanity and spurious critical approaches that have diminished the value and integrity of the Scriptures.

Kim’s treatment of the gospels are muddled with arguments that allege the presentations of one gospel or another is not authentic to Jesus and has been distorted by some later version of the church. It took significant willpower to read this book to the end in hopes of finding a few tidbits of insight that could further my reflections spurred by authors like Jurgen Moltmann (The Crucified God) and Greg Boyd (The Crucifixion of the Warrior God). When the cross is a mistake or an unintended byproduct of opposing the powers, when one believes that “Roman power was too strong to be defeated by Jesus’ teaching or deeds” (108), one is left with little more than a tragedy that offers little in the way of hope and leaves the reader wanting. If all we have in the crucifixion of Jesus is ‘a legacy of faithful obedience to God” (109)—the tragic result of following God as opposed to even being an example of self-giving—we have emptied the cross (Paul’s primary concern in 1 Corinthians 1).

I contend with Paul: had the rulers of the age known who Jesus really was they would not have killed him (1 Cor. 2:8). So yes, Jesus died because of weakness—human weakness as a full man and human weakness expressed in the overwhelming power of despotic oppressors (Rome). Part of the ironic power of the cross is that it serves as a window into the depth of corruption in humanity—a corruption that the God of this universe graciously and mysteriously allowed to fall upon himself—and ultimately upend. Kim argues that “At the cross God did not or could not do anything” (116). Such a claim represents a profound diminishment of the NT witness and a reforming of God to fit his sense of is rational. Ironically Kim is unable to embrace the mystery of weakness found in the cross itself!

In the end, I should have done my homework on Kim and avoided this work. While we do need to explore more deeply what it means for Jesus to be weak and how this reflects both a revelation of God and how it engages with what humanity understands as power, Kim’s approach is bankrupt. I cannot recommend this book to anyone, which is a shame given the topic demands careful attention and reflection by a church struggling with becoming what it was in the beginning: marginal to a society that does not want to follow a crucified saviour.

[YungSuk Kim · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my own book. I believe that this book will be useful to study of the following areas: the historical Jesus, anthropology and Jesus, biblical theology about weakness, and feminsit/womanist theology about the cross.