¹ As part of the celebration of the ninetieth anniversary of the founding of the Pontifical Biblical Institute (May 6-8, 1999), I was invited to address the assembled scholars and students on the present state of the so-called third quest for the historical Jesus, particularly in the English-speaking world, and most particularly in the United States. Consequently, I have restricted discussion of the literature largely to works written recently by English-speaking scholars. This decision arose from the purely utilitarian goal of giving this essay a necessary focus and delimitation. No slight is intended toward the many important scholars writing in other languages. For recent full-length German contributions that are now happily available in English, see J. GNILKA, Jesus of Nazareth. Message and History (Peabody, MA 1997; German original 1993); J. BECKER, Jesus of Nazareth (New York – Berlin, 1998; German original 1996); G. THEISSEN – A. MERZ, The Historical Jesus (Minneapolis 1998; German original 1996).
        I wish to dedicate this article to all the Jesuit professors, living or deceased, whose lectures, notes, and books at the Gregorian University and the Biblical Institute guided me from my first steps in theological studies up to my doctoral thesis in Matthew’s Gospel. Their devoted lives of scholarship were and are a shining example to their students of how a scholar should live as a believer and a believer should work as a scholar.

² Publications reflecting the work of the Jesus Seminar include R.W. FUNK – B. SCOTT – J.R. BUTTS, The Parables of Jesus. Red Letter Edition (Sonoma CA, 1988); R.W. FUNK – R.W. HOOVER, The Five Gospels (New York 1993); R.W. FUNK and the Jesus Seminar, The Acts of Jesus (San Francisco 1998).

³ Examples of book-length expositions by the prolific Crossan include The Historical Jesus. The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant (San Francisco 1991); Jesus. A Revolutionary Biography (San Francisco 1994); Who Killed Jesus? (San Francisco 1995); The Birth of Christianity (San Francisco 1998). Funk’s work is summarized in Honest to Jesus (San Francisco 1996).

⁴ A major source of such an approach is the work of F.G. DOWNING, Christ and the Cynics (JSOT Manuals 4; Sheffield 1988); id., Cynics and Christian Origins (Edinburgh 1992). For a critique of the approach, see H.D. BETZ, "Jesus and the Cynics: Survey and Analysis of a Hypothesis", JR 74 (1994) 453-475; P.R. EDDY, "Jesus as Diogenes? Reflections on the Cynic Jesus Thesis", JBL 115 (1996) 449-469; for replies, see D. SEELEY, "Jesus and the Cynics Revisited", JBL 116 (1997) 704-712; F.G. DOWNING, "Deeper Reflections on the Jewish Cynic Jesus", JBL 117 (1998) 97-104. Besides Crossan, scholars associated with the "Cynic thesis" include B. Mack and L. Vaage.

⁵ See, e.g., M.J. BORG, Jesus. A New Vision (San Francisco 1987); id., Jesus in Contemporary Scholarship (Valley Forge, PA 1994); id., Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time (San Francisco 1994).

⁶ For a detailed survey of the work of Funk, Crossan, Borg, the Jesus Seminar in general, and other participants in the third quest (including the present writer) that seeks to be eminently fair to all parties, see M.A. POWELL, Jesus as a Figure in History (Louisville 1998).

⁷ L.T. JOHNSON, The Real Jesus (San Francisco 1996); id., Living Jesus (San Francisco 1999); cf. R. BULTMANN, Das Verhältnis der urchristlichen Christusbotschaft zum historischen Jesus (Heidelberg ³1962).

⁸ Interestingly, seeking refuge in Bultmann’s approach has not been the usual solution employed recently by most conservative and middle-of-the-road Protestant scholars; see, e.g., G.R. BEASLEY-MURRAY, Jesus and the Kingdom of God (Grand Rapids 1986); B. WITHERINGTON, III, Jesus the Sage (Minneapolis 1994); C.A. EVANS, Jesus and His Contemporaries (AGJU 25; Leiden 1995); C. L. BLOMBERG, Jesus and the Gospels (Nashville 1997); D.C. ALLISON, Jesus of Nazareth. Millenarian Prophet (Minneapolis 1998).

⁹ B. WITHERINGTON, III, The Christology of Jesus (Minneapolis 1990); id., Jesus the Sage (Minneapolis 1994); id., The Jesus Quest (Downers Grove, IL 1995).

¹⁰ E.P. SANDERS, Jesus and Judaism (Philadelphia 1985); The Historical Figure of Jesus (London 1993).

¹¹ N.T. WRIGHT, Jesus and the Victory of God (Minneapolis 1996).

¹² E. SCHÜSSLER FIORENZA, In Memory of Her (New York 1987); id., Jesus. Miriam’s Child and Sophia’s Prophet (New York 1994).

¹³ G. VERMES, Jesus the Jew (Philadelphia 1973); id., Jesus and the World of Judaism (Philadelphia 1983); id., The Religion of Jesus the Jew (Minneapolis 1993); P. FREDRIKSEN, From Jesus to Christ (New Haven – London 1988).

¹⁴ J.P. MEIER, A Marginal Jew. Rethinking the Historical Jesus (Anchor Bible Reference Library; 2 vols.; New York 1991, 1994) I, 1-2.

¹⁵ On this whole question, see MEIER, A Marginal Jew, I, 196-201.

¹⁶ To avoid multiplying notes, I refer the reader to the references listed in my treatment of the source question in A Marginal Jew, I, 41-166.

¹⁷ J.D. CROSSAN, The Cross That Spoke (San Francisco 1988).

¹⁸ R. BAUCKHAM, "The Brothers and Sisters of Jesus: An Epiphanian Response to John P. Meier", CBQ 56 (1994) 686-700. See my response in "On Retrojecting Later Questions from Later Texts: A Reply to Richard Bauckham", CBQ 59 (1997) 511-527.

¹⁹ M. FIEGER, Das Thomasevangelium (NTAbh 22; Münster 1991).

²⁰ See, e.g., WITHERINGTON, The Jesus Quest, 162-163, 276 n. 1; B.D. EHRMAN, The New Testament. A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings (New York – Oxford 1997) 189. While admitting that my approach has simplicity in its favor, THEISSEN – MERZ, The Historical Jesus, 65-74, prefer a hypothetical reconstruction that would have been neutral or even positive toward Jesus; however, they do not offer the precise wording of such a text for consideration.

²¹ See, e.g., R. BULTMANN, Jesus and the Word (London 1934); G. BORNKAMM, Jesus of Nazareth (New York 1960); J. JEREMIAS, New Testament Theology. Volume One: The Proclamation of Jesus (London 1971).

²² For a few examples of the huge literature on the subject, see, e.g., M. SMITH, "Palestinian Judaism in the First Century", Israel: Its Role in Civilization (ed. M. DAVIS) (New York 1956) 67-81; S.J.D. COHEN, "The Significance of Yavneh: Pharisees, Rabbis and the End of Jewish Sectarianism", HUCA 55 (1984) 27-53; id., From the Maccabees to the Mishnah (Philadelphia 1987) 124-164; A.J. SALDARINI, Pharisees, Scribes and Sadducees in Palestinian Society (Wilmington, DE 1988); E.P. SANDERS, Jewish Law from Jesus to the Mishna (London 1990) 97-254; id., Judaism. Practice & Belief 63 BCE–66CE (London 1992) 380-451; J. NEUSNER, The Rabbinic Traditions about the Pharisees before 70 (3 vols.; Leiden 1971); id., "Mr. Sanders’ Pharisees and Mine", SJT 44 (1991) 73-95; id., "The Mishna in Philosophical Context and Out of Canonical Bounds", JBL 112 (1993) 291-304; S. MASON, Flavius Josephus on the Pharisees (SPB 39; Leiden 1991); C.A. EVANS, "Mishna and Messiah ‘In Context’: Some Comments on Jacob Neusner’s Proposals", JBL 112 (1993) 267-289; G. STEMBERGER, Jewish Contemporaries of Jesus. Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes (Minneapolis 1995). For a Forschungsgeschichte on the Pharisees up to the 1950s, see R. DEINES, Die Pharisäer (WUNT 101; Tübingen 1997). A sober counterbalance to Deines’ relative optimism about identifying the Pharisees and Pharisaic teaching is found in J. Sievers’s fine essay, "Who Were the Pharisees?" Hillel and Jesus (ed. J.H. CHARLESWORTH – L.L. JOHNS) (Minneapolis 1997) 137-155. On p. 138 he remarks: "After over two decades of research [from Jacob Neusner to Steve Mason], there is at least one assured result: we know considerably less about the Pharisees than an earlier generation ‘knew’".

²³ On the vexed problem of Jewish identity in the first centuries B.C. and A.D., see S.J.D. COHEN, The Beginnings of Jewishness: Boundaries, Varieties, Uncertainties (Hellenistic Culture and Society 31; Berkeley – Los Angeles – London 1999).

²⁴ I use "marginal Jew" not as an answer to the question but a way of posing the question. What I definitely do not intend by the phrase is any attenuation or elimination of the true Jewishness of Jesus. After all, from a sociological point of view, the sectarians at Qumran can be labeled "marginal" Jews, yet no one would question the intensity and commitment of their form of Judaism.

²⁵ See, e.g., J. NEUSNER – W. S. GREEN – E, FRERICHS (eds.), Judaisms and Their Messiahs at the Turn of the Christian Era (Cambridge 1987); Neusner gives a spirited and nuanced defense of the locution "Judaisms" in his preface, pp. ix-xiv.

²⁶ Somewhat similarly, Sanders argues for a "common Judaism" in Judaism. Practice & Belief, 45-303.

²⁷ See, e.g. B.E. THIERING, Jesus and the Riddle of the Dead Sea Scrolls (San Francisco 1992); R.H. EISENMAN, James, the Brother of Jesus (New York 1996).

²⁸ From the vast literature on the subject, see, e.g., J. MURPHY-O’CONNOR, "Qumran and the New Testament", The New Testament and Its Modern Interpreters (ed. E.J. EPP – G.W. MACRAE) (Atlanta 1989) 55-71; J. A. FITZMYER, Responses to 101 Questions on the Dead Sea Scrolls (New York – Mahwah, NJ 1992); J.J. COLLINS, The Scepter and the Star (Anchor Bible Reference Library; New York 1995); id., "Ideas of Messianism in the Dead Sea Scrolls", The Dead Sea Scrolls and Christian Faith (ed. J.H. CHARLESWORTH – W.P. WEAVER) (Harrisburg, PA 1998) 20-41; H. STEGEMANN, The Library of Qumran (Grand Rapids 1998).

²⁹ Amid all the similarities, one must also honestly note the differences. In the Matthean text, proclaiming good news to the poor is the climax and conclusion of the list. 4Q521 breaks off soon after mentioning the proclamation of good news to the poor, but apparently other saving acts of God were listed.

³⁰ On 4Q521, see E. PUECH, "Une apocalypse messianique (4Q521)", RevQ 15, no. 60 (1992) 475-522; J.D. TABOR – M.O. WISE, "4Q521 ‘On Resurrection’ and the Synoptic Gospel Tradition. A Preliminary Study", Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha 10 (1992) 149-162; COLLINS, The Scepter and the Star, 117-122; C.A. EVANS, "Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls from Qumran Cave 4", Eschatology, Messianism, and the Dead Sea Scrolls (ed. C.A. EVANS – P.W. FLINT) (Grand Rapids 1997) 91-100, esp. 95-97.

³¹ On the question of the similarity of the prohibition of divorce by Jesus (Mark 10,2-12; Matt 5,32 || Luke 16,18; cf. 1 Cor 7,10-11) to prohibitions present in some of the documents found at Qumran (11QTemple 57,17-19; CD 4,20–5,10), see J.A. FITZMYER, "The Matthean Divorce Texts and Some New Palestinian Evidence", To Advance the Gospel (Grand Rapids 21998) 79-111. On Sabbath observance in the teaching of Jesus and the Essenes, see MEIER, A Marginal Jew, II, 756-757 n. 146.

³² See J.A. FITZMYER, "The Contribution of Qumran Aramaic to the Study of the New Testament", A Wandering Aramean (SBLMS 25; Missoula 1979) 85-113; id., "The Semitic Background of the New Testament Kyrios-Title", ibid., 115-142. The now outdated claim of Bultmann is found in his Theology of the New Testament (2 vols.; London 1952, 1955) I, 51.

³³ COLLINS, The Scepter and the Star; id., "Ideas of Messianism in the Dead Sea Scrolls", 20-41; see also NEUSNER et al. (eds.), Judaisms and Their Messiahs; J.H. CHARLESWORTH (ed.), The Messiah (Minneapolis 1992).

³⁴ Not surprisingly, the sociology of the New Testament has been used more successfully in treating Paul in particular and early Christianity in general (including the final form of individual gospels), where basic data are more abundant and less contested; see, e.g., A.J. MALHERBE, Social Aspects of Early Christianity (Baton Rouge, LA – London 1977); G. THEISSEN, Sociology of Early Palestinian Christianity (Philadelphia 1978); id., The Gospels in Context (Minneapolis 1991); B. HOLMBERG, Paul and Power (Philadelphia 1978); id., Sociology and the New Testament (Minneapolis 1990); H.C. KEE, Christian Origins in Sociological Perspective (Philadelphia 1980); B.J. MALINA, The New Testament World. Insights from Cultural Anthropology (Atlanta 1981); id., Christian Origins and Cultural Anthropology (Atlanta 1986); W.A. MEEKS, The First Urban Christians (New Haven – London 1983); C. OSIEK, What Are They Saying about the Social Setting of the New Testament? (New York – Ramsey, NJ 1984); R.A. HORSLEY – J.S. HANSON, Bandits, Prophets, and Messiahs (Minneapolis 1985); J.H. ELLIOTT (ed.), Social-Scientific Criticism of the New Testament and Its Social World (Semeia 35; Decatur, GA 1986); B.J. MALINA – J.H. NEYREY, Calling Jesus Names (Sonoma, CA 1988); J.H. NEYREY, An Ideology of Revolt (Philadelphia 1988); id., Honor and Shame in the Gospel of Matthew (Louisville 1998); R.A. HORSLEY, The Liberation of Christmas (New York 1989); id., Sociology and the Jesus Movement (New York 1989); J. PILCH – B. MALINA (eds.), Handbook of Biblical Social Values (updated edition; Peabody, MA 1998). Reliable application to the historical Jesus is more difficult to come by, though scholars like Theissen and Crossan attempt it in their reconstructions.

³⁵ Only a few examples of treatments of women in the Gospels (some translated from German or Italian) can be mentioned here: E.M. TETLOW, Women and Ministry in the New Testament (New York – Ramsey, NJ 1980); E. MOLTMANN-WENDEL, The Women Around Jesus (New York 1982); B. WITHERINGTON, III, Women in the Ministry of Jesus (SNTSMS 51; Cambridge 1984); M.R. D’ANGELO, "Abba and ‘Father’: Imperial Theology and the Jesus Traditions", JBL 111 (1992) 611-630; K.E. CORLEY, Private Women, Public Meals. Social Conflict in the Synoptic Tradition (Peabody, MA 1993); C. RICCI, Mary Magdalene and Many Others. Women Who Followed Jesus (Minneapolis 1994); SCHÜSSLER FIORENZA, Jesus. Miriam’s Child, Sophia’s Prophet; I.R. KITZBERGER, "Mary of Bethany and Mary of Magdala – Two Female Characters in the Johannine Passion Narrative: A Feminist, Narrative-Critical Reader-Response", NTS 41 (1995) 564-586; W. CARTER, "Getting Martha out of the Kitchen: Luke 10:38-42 Again", CBQ 58 (1996) 264-280; B.E. REID, Choosing the Better Part? Women in the Gospel of Luke (Collegeville, MN 1996); E.G. WATSON, Wisdom’s Daughters: Stories of Women around Jesus (Cleveland 1997).

³⁶ R. BULTMANN, Die Geschichte der synoptischen Tradition (FRLANT 29; Göttingen 81970) 174.

³⁷ For a discussion of the criteria, see MEIER, A Marginal Jew, I, 167-195; an introductory bibliography on the question can be found in the notes on pp. 185-187.

³⁸ On the historicity of Jesus’ baptism by John, see Meier, A Marginal Jew, II, 100-105. On Jesus’ practice of baptizing during his public ministry, see ibid., 120-130.

³⁹ See, e.g., N. PERRIN, Rediscovering the Teaching of Jesus (London 1967) 39-43.

⁴⁰ W. BOUSSET, Kyrios Christos (Nashville 1970; German original 1913) 98.

⁴¹ T. JEFFERSON, The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth (Washington, DC 1904, originally 1819-1820); cf. D.W. ADAMS (ed.), Jefferson’s Extracts from the Gospels (Princeton 1983).

⁴² In Jesus and the Word, some five pages (123-128) out of 154 pages (in the English translation) deal with belief in miracles in general, and little more than a page is devoted to Jesus’ performance of miracles. In Bultmann’s introductory sketch of the historical Jesus in his Theology of the New Testament (1. 3-32), there is not even a separate section on the question of Jesus’ miracles.

⁴³ In J. Reumann’s English translation (96 pages) of Conzelmann’s RGG3 article (Jesus [Philadelphia 1973]), the single paragraph on miracles is found on p. 55. Bornkamm’s Jesus of Nazareth has no separate section on miracles; out of a text of 231 pages (in the English translation), only some three pages (130-133) treat directly of Jesus’ miracles.

⁴⁴ M. DIBELIUS, Jesus (Sammlung Göschen 1130; ed. W.G. Kümmel; Berlin ⁴1966, originally 1939).

⁴⁵ Jesus the Magician (San Francisco 1978).

⁴⁶ CROSSAN, The Historical Jesus, 303-353.

⁴⁷ SANDERS, Jesus and Judaism, 157-173; D.E. AUNE, "Magic in Early Christianity", ANRW II/23.2, 1507-1557.

⁴⁸ G.H. TWELFTREE, Jesus the Exorcist (WUNT 2/54; Tübingen 1993); S.L. DAVIES, Jesus the Healer (New York 1995). On the wider question, see G. THEISSEN, The Miracle Stories of the Early Christian Tradition (Philadelphia 1983; German original 1974); H.C. KEE, Miracle in the Early Christian World (New Haven – London 1983); W. KAHL, New Testament Miracle Stories in their Religious-Historical Setting (FRLANT 163; Göttingen 1994).

⁴⁹ MEIER, A Marginal Jew, II, 509-1038. In these pages I attempt to treat the question in its many dimensions: modern philosophical problems, ancient conceptions and parallels, the ways of categorizing the Gospel miracles, as well as the individual narratives and sayings of Jesus on the subject. To avoid multiplying notes, I simply refer the interested reader to the relevant sections and subsections of vol. 2 that treat the issues that will be mentioned briefly in what follows.

⁵⁰ See, e.g., B. CHILTON, God in Strength. Jesus’ Announcement of the Kingdom (Sheffield 1987).

⁵¹ See, e.g., E.M. MEYERS et al., Sepphoris (Winona Lake, IN 1992); R. M. NAGY et al. (eds.), Sepphoris in Galilee. Crosscurrents of Culture (Raleigh, NC 1996).

⁵² The precise nature of Judaism in Galilee at the turn of the era remains a subject of lively debate; see, e.g., S. FREYNE, Galilee from Alexander the Great to Hadrian – 323 B.C.E. to 135 C.E. (Wilmington, DE 1980); id., Galilee, Jesus and the Gospels (Philadelphia 1988); L.L. LEVINE (ed.), The Galilee in Late Antiquity (New York – Jerusalem 1992); R.A. HORSELY, Archaeology, History, and Society in Galilee (Valley Forge, PA 1996).

⁵³ On this, see POWELL, Jesus as a Figure in History, 16.

⁵⁴ The classic work here, of course, is M. HENGEL, Judaism and Hellenism (Minneapolis 1981; German original 21973). It should be noted, however, that the precise degree of Hellenization in Palestine remains debated; see, e.g., L.H. FELDMAN, Jew and Gentile in the Ancient World (Princeton 1993).

⁵⁵ The need to distinguish degrees of Hellenization in Palestine according to region and time period was stressed in a lecture delivered by Dr. S. Freyne at the University of Notre Dame, IN, on April 20, 1999, as part of an international conference on "Hellenism in the Land of Israel".