The Jewish Annotated New Testament: Retrospect and Prospects

Abstract

The Jewish Annotated New Testament, published by Oxford University in 2011, had little precedent: this was the first time that a group of Jewish scholars wrote a commentary (with supplemental essays) on the entire New Testament. As its editors, we were attentive to how the book would be perceived by a readership that, for various reasons, might find the volume at best odd, at worst scandalous. We conceived of and edited the volume with three main audiences in mind: Christians who wanted to know more about the Jewish background of the New Testament; Jews who had little familiarity with the New Testament; and readers from any background who were curious about the New Testament in its original historical matrix. In this essay we discuss our goals in writing the commentary for these audiences, such as overturning Christian stereotypes of Jews and Judaism and Jewish stereotypes of Christians and Christianity, and showing Jewish and Christian readers a part of their intertwined history. We also discuss the book’s reception, which has been largely positive in Jewish and Christian communities and classrooms, despite acerbic and even frightening reviews and blog posts by a handful of readers. As the editors of The Jewish Annotated New Testament (JANT), published by Oxford University Press in 2011, we were attentive to how the book would be perceived by a readership that, for various reasons, might find the volume at best odd, at worst scandalous. Our venture had little precedent: this was the first time that a group of Jewish scholars convened to write a (brief) commentary on the entire New Testament, let alone to offer a collection of supplemental essays that addressed subjects ranging from the intersections of Judaism and the origins of Christianity to how Jews have understood the two main figures of the New Testament, Jesus and Paul, over the centuries. We conceived of and edited the volume with three main audiences in mind: Christians who wanted to know more about the Jewish background of the New Testament; Jews who had little familiarity with the New Testament; and readers from any background who were curious about the New Testament in its original historical matrix. In terms of the first audience, we believe that to misunderstand Jewish practices and beliefs of the first century C.E. will necessarily result in a misunderstanding of Jesus of Nazareth and his followers; to have familiarity with this setting will help any reader better understand the contents of the New Testament. Our goals went beyond providing basic historical information; we also sought to correct the negative stereotypes of Jews and Judaism that often, usually unintentionally, come to permeate Christian sermons and Bible studies. From our experiences in the classroom and * Marc Brettler: Dora Golding Professor of Biblical Studies and former chair of the Department of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies at Brandeis University, USA. Email: brettler@brandeis.edu Amy-Jill Levine: University Professor of New Testament and Jewish Studies and E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Professor of New Testament Studies at Vanderbilt University, USA. Email: amy-jill.levine@vanderbilt.edu MELILAH MANCHESTER JOURNAL OF JEWISH STUDIES 11 (2014) 2 in churches where we have taught scholar-in-residence programs, we are aware that some Christian readers view the Jews of Jesus’ day (if not through the centuries) as hypocritical, greedy, legalistic, spiritually dead, militaristic, interested in retributive violence rather than restorative justice, xenophobic, and misogynist, if not out to undermine Christianity and to rule the world. These views are, not infrequently, inculcated in Sunday school lessons and reinforced in sermons. Were the volume to become mandatory reading for all Christian clergy and religious educators, it would go a long way toward alleviating these problematic teachings. At the same time, well aware of the openness many of our Christian friends and many churches have shown toward Jewish history and Jewish readers, we also wished to demonstrate, reciprocally, our mutual respect. In 2001, the Pontifical Biblical Commission issued a study titled, “The Jewish People and Their Sacred Scriptures in the Christian Bible.” This document affirmed both that “Although the Christian reader is aware that the internal dynamism of the Old Testament finds its goal in Jesus, this is a retrospective perception whose point of departure is not in the text as such, but in the events of the New Testament proclaimed by the apostolic preaching” (II,A,6) and that “Christians can and ought to admit that the Jewish reading of the Bible is a possible one, in continuity with the Jewish Sacred Scriptures from the Second Temple period, a reading analogous to the Christian reading which developed in parallel fashion” (II,A,7). That is, it recognizes and respects Jewish interpretation of our own Scripture (the Tanakh). JANT is a response, in part, to the graciousness of this document: as the Pontifical Biblical Commission expresses a positive view of Jewish biblical interpretation, so we Jews reciprocate with a positive reading of the New Testament. Jewish interpretations of the Tanakh are not a recognized part of Catholic teaching, and the New Testament is not canonical for Jews. Mutual respect and a sense of shared history, however, make the study of each other’s tradition a worthwhile, indeed essential, endeavor. Many Jews have avoided reading the New Testament for various reasons: a concern that it would disparage Jews and Judaism; the presupposition that its texts would not only be strange but also alienating; perhaps even a fear of being seduced by the gospels. JANT, written entirely by Jews, might allow Jewish readers to find the text initially less alien, or alienating. We also wanted to show Jewish readers parts of our own history, since much of the New Testament is Jewish history: its principal figures are Jews; its imagery draws from the Scriptures of Israel; its legacy has impacted relations between Synagogue and Church for the past two millennia. We wanted as well to alert our Jewish readers to the problematic passages in the New Testament, both to provide some explanation as to what purpose they served in their original contexts and to show that most Christian readers do not move directly from a negative comment about Jewish people or practice to a negative view of Jews and Judaism. Just as reading about slavery in Egypt does not prompt Jews to hate Egyptians, and just as reading Deuteronomy does not make Jews desire to commit genocide against non-Jews in Israel, so we sought to show how Christian readers generally have their own filters that function to prevent anti-Semitism. We also sought to correct the negative and false stereotypes that some Jewish readers have of Christians and Christianity, for we have also heard these stereotypes expressed in the classroom and in synagogue programs: that Christianity is a religion that cares only about belief and not about practice; that the ideas of a miraculous conception, resurrection from the dead, a divine manifest in different forms, an incarnate “Word,” etc., make no THE JEWISH ANNOTATED NEW TESTAMENT (BRETTLER AND LEVINE) 3 sense in a first-century Jewish context; that those who believe in Jesus, then or now, are either ignorant or superstitious. And if studying the New Testament prompts Jews to learn, or relearn, the material that it cites from the Tanakh or that finds connections in rabbinic literature, so much the better. Usually with negative and sometimes tragic effects, the New Testament and its interpretations across the past two millennia have been instrumental in how Jews have been viewed and even in how they viewed themselves. Recognition of this influence is one factor in the increasing interest Jewish scholars have shown in the New Testament. (The Talmud offers several negative references to Jesus and to his followers – references that were often removed by Christian censors – but such negative views did not prevail over the centuries, and most Jews are unaware that they ever existed.) We are not the first within the Jewish community to advocate for reading the New Testament and understanding it positively rather than polemically. Writers such as Moses Mendelssohn (1729-1786), Abraham Geiger (1810-1874), Claude Montefiore (1858-1938), Stephen Wise (1874-1949), Martin Buber (1878-1965), and Joseph Klausner (1874-1958) sought to reclaim Jesus for the Jewish tradition. Samuel Sandmel published several books on the New Testament, including the still-influential We Jews and Jesus (1965), and Hugh J. Schonfield’s The Passover Plot (1965) was about as popular then, and as controversial, as Dan Brown’s recent The Da Vinci Code. Today, well more than a minyan of Jews – many of them contributors to JANT – have published academic books and articles on Jesus and his followers. JANT’s annotations and essays demonstrate how rabbinic, medieval, and modern Jewish interpreters have understood Jesus; the volume also annotates the New Testament in light of early Jewish sources so that readers can see both connections and novel contributions. Even Paul has been a prominent topic among Jewish thinkers, as Daniel Langton has recently demonstrated. Baruch Spinoza (1632-1677) and R. Jacob Emden (1697-1776) commented positively on Paul, while later writers such as Heinrich Graetz (1817-1891), Kaufman Kohler (1843-1926), and Buber attributed to Paul a deformation of the more “Jewish” Jesus. This volume provides the historical context by which Paul can best be understood and so allows readers to judge him for themselves. In relation to both Jewish and Christian readers, we were also cognizant of the need for resources for inter-religious families. For example, Christian parents concerned about their children’s Jewish spouses or their Jewish grandchildren have sought a resource that would help them understand both how Judaism and Christiani