Tucker S. Ferda. <i>Jesus and His Promised Second Coming: Jewish Eschatology and Christian Origins</i>

Tucker Ferda has written an enterprising book that is sure to foster discussion and debate for many years to come. His stated aim is to remedy scholarly neglect of and to account for the historical origins of the belief in Jesus’s parousia.Parts 1 and 2 (pp. 1–130) are worth the price of the volume for the way in which Ferda expertly navigates the history of scholarship on Jesus in general and on the parousia hope in particular. The engagement with secondary sources is impressively wide-ranging and sensitive. And especially insightful is Ferda’s treatment of the early history of scholarship before and immediately after Hermann Samuel Reimarus (pp. 7–10).Part 3 (pp. 131–256) carefully works through the Pauline and canonical gospel material, arguing, inter alia, for the early and thoroughly diffuse nature of the parousia hope (within and without canonical material).The most creative and ambitious section comes in Part 4 (pp. 257–430), where Ferda offers his own fresh case for the origins of the parousia hope in the life and ministry of the historical Jesus himself. In this regard, Ferda is surely right about the following: (1) as early as 1 Thessalonians (cf. 3:13), Paul conceives of Jesus’s coming parousia in relation to his christological interpretation of the prophetic promise of Zech 14:5; (2) in 1 Thess 4:13–18 (esp. v. 15), Paul claims that some of the parousia traditions that he is passing on come directly from Jesus tradition itself (i.e., issuing directly from Jerusalem traditions that Paul took to be reliable testimony about Jesus’s own views); (3) Mark 8:38//Matt 25:31 present Jesus alluding to Zech 14:5 in perhaps the same connection; (4) some early traditions expected Jesus’s parousia imminently; and (5) there is a historiographical economy to explaining the early church’s parousia hope on the basis of reports of Jesus’s own claims/views rather than on the basis of post-Easter developments.The book contains literally hundreds of valuable insights, but especially compelling is Ferda’s case that, in light of what we know of other Jewish texts, traditions, and hopes of the period, it is not historically implausible that Jesus anticipated (1) his probable death, (2) some kind of post-mortem vindication, (3) an interim period of however long, and (4) a final consummation (however shortly thereafter) involving (and perhaps directly precipitated by) his own eschatological appearing/presence (i.e., parousia).That this is now the most important volume on the question of the historical origins of the parousia hope is beyond doubt. And though I have seen too much to be too optimistic, the days of doubting the historical possibility that a first-century Jewish apocalyptic prophet might countenance his own impending death, his subsequent vindication, and the relationship of the latter two to ultimate eschatology should, not least in the light of Ferda’s case, be over.I would, nevertheless, like to press on a few specific points. Many have doubted that Jesus spoke of or indeed envisaged anything like his own personal parousia in the future (Ferda highlights in particular, e.g., T. Francis Glasson, J. A. T. Robinson, C. H. Dodd, J. D. G. Dunn, and N. T. Wright). But while some of these (and many other) scholars have doubted that Jesus himself spoke of the parousia, they have readily granted that several synoptic texts have him doing so. This is not, however, the view of, for example, N. T. Wright, who believes that the relevant texts (e.g., Matt 25:31//Mark 8:38; and Matt 24; 26:64; Mark 13; 14:62; and Luke 21; 22:69) do not speak of the parousia but, rather, of the constellation of death, resurrection, ascension, establishment of the early post-Easter community, and the fall of Jerusalem; and Wright further holds that this more or less represents Jesus’s own predictions.While Ferda (pp. 183–90) is right to challenge some of Wright’s formulations in this regard as demythologizing and reductionistic—that is, many of Wright’s formulations imply that all apocalyptic language of cosmic transformation is entirely referentially reducible to sociopolitical realities (Ferda calls these readings “symbolic” or “metaphorical”)—he is too dismissive of this position overall and fails to see that it is possible to hold this position and not to demythologize the language of cosmic catastrophe. It is entirely possible, for instance, to think that when the synoptic Jesus speaks of stars falling from heaven that he is thinking of the literal judgment/demotion of literal false gods/angels in his literal resurrection/exaltation/ascension. Moreover, Jesus’s angelic entourage can be said to be literally if imperceptibly present in their participation in the Roman destruction of Jerusalem.Beyond this, there are a few difficulties that perhaps did not get the attention they deserved. One, as has often been noted, Ferda’s (admittedly majority) view involves all three synoptists basing the trustworthiness of their prophetic protagonist on his prediction of events that, from their perspective, have not yet come to pass. I think it is more likely that, writing after the destruction of Jerusalem, the synoptists, rather, think that the events Jesus predicted precisely have been fulfilled (or at least decisively inaugurated).Furthermore, Ferda (pp. 219–21) downplays the significance of Matt 26:64’s ἀπ᾽ ἄρτι and Luke 22:69’s ἀπὸ τοῦ νῦν, both of which imply that Ps 110 and Dan 7 are already being christologically inaugurated; but that, from Ferda’s perspective, is not Jesus’s position. Aware of the potential problem, Ferda implies that Matt 26:64’s ἀπ᾽ἄρτι does not also apply to Matt 26:64’s immediate allusion to Dan 7 but only to the allusion to Ps110. This is, however, unconvincing. Matthew’s Jesus clearly means to communicate that Dan 7’s fulfillment is already underway.One should also note the following formulations: “The crucial question is not the directionality of movement [in Dan. 7 or in the synoptists’s appropriation of Dan. 7] but whether the coming of the son of man is coordinated with the establishment of the kingdom of God, on the one hand, or with something prior to that, such as the son of man’s vindication or enthronement.” (p. 297). “Put otherwise, What is the risen Christ up to in the in-between of his earthly activity and what he said would happen in the future? Here we are back at our exegesis of 1 Cor 15, where Paul asserted with the aid of Pss 8 and 110 that, before “the end,” Jesus was “reigning”—albeit from heaven—and putting “all his enemies under his feet”—albeit cosmic enemies rather than earthly ones. This, I think, is not exactly the kind of “reign” Jesus expected and told his follower about” (p. 357).In the first formulation above, Ferda dissociates what all four canonical evangelists regard as mutually interpretative: Jesus’s death, resurrection, and ascension, on the one hand, and the establishment of God’s kingdom, on the other.In the second formulation, Ferda explicitly says that the death, resurrection, ascension, and cosmic reign of Christ cannot be made to bear the eschatological weight of the gospels’ apocalyptic traditions.While Ferda’s position—at least with respect to this point—is certainly the majority position, I am not sure that it is right. It at least partly involves rejecting the inaugurated-eschatological hermeneutic of the evangelists in favor of a scenario before and behind our sources that we have deemed to be more historically probable.Whatever the case may be, Jesus and His Promised Second Coming is a major achievement, and Ferda has skilfully intervened in a neglected and difficult area.