A Portrait of Jesus
The Post-Easter Jesus
The Post-Easter Jesus is the Jesus of Christian experience and tradition.
-Marcus Borg
Christian Experience
Christian experience is born in the Easter experience.
Easter
does not have to include something happening to Jesus' body.
The foundational meaning of Easter is that Jesus' followers experienced his continuing presence as a living reality.
An empty tomb is one way to talk about that experience.
The community speaks of Jesus as:
- Light of the world
- Bread of life
- Messiah
- The way, the truth, the life
- The only way
These
are images/metaphors people used to describe
their experience of Jesus.
They are profoundly true though not literally true.
Jesus did not speak of himself in these ways.
They are vivid testimony about how the community experienced and thought about Jesus.
The post-Easter Jesus can also be the word, light, and bread, of God for us.
Christian Tradition
The post-Easter Jesus is also the Jesus of the developing Christian tradition.
This involves a process, it emerges over time.
- From a non-exalted historical Jesus
- Through early christological metaphors
- To christological narrative
- To christological doctrine
The Nicene Creed (written 325 C.E.) is the indiginization of early Christian beliefs into the Hellenistic thought of the early 4th century and crystallization of thought of a particular time and place.
Trinitarian language says God is one known to us:
- as God the creator
- in the person of Jesus
- in the presence of the spirit
The emergence of Jesus Christ in Christian tradition amounts to a cumulative claim.
For Marcus Borg, as a scholar and as a Christian, Jesus is an epiphany of God, a manifestation of the sacred, the decisive disclosure of God.
The pre-Easter Jesus is a spirit person, wisdom teacher, social prophet.
The post-Easter Jesus is the light of the world, the bread of life.
In Jesus we see what God is like.
Jesus is the icon of the invisible God, a mediator of the sacred, the face of God.
Questions to ponder...
How do you summarize the post-Easter Jesus?
Who is Jesus for you today, as you experience his presence in your life?
What
Difference Does it Make?
Implications for the Christian life of taking this portrait of Jesus
seriously.
Introduction
A Portrait of Jesus Introduction
Research and Scholarship Perspective
Lenses through which Borg sees Jesus
The Pre- and Post-Easter Jesus
Compare Pre- and Post-Easter Jesus
Summaries of the Pre-Easter Jesus
Spirit Dimension
Context: Spirit Persons in Many Cultures
Wisdom Dimension
Context: Wisdom Teachers in Many Cultures
Political Dimension
Context: Social and Cultural World of Jesus
The Post-Easter Jesus
What Difference Does it Make?
Resources for Further Study
Books and Articles by Marcus Borg
FaithFutures Foundation: integrating faith and scholarship
Living the Questions, a progressive 12-week DVD and web curriculum to help participants discover the relevance of Christianity in the 21st Century and what a meaningful faith can look like in today's world. Features Marcus Borg and 14 other scholars and pastors.
New Testament Gateway, created by Dr. Mark Goodacre, University of Birmingham, UK
The Jesus Seminar, created by Dr. Mahlon Smith, Jesus Seminar Fellow and faculty at Rutgers University
Virtual Religion Index, created by Dr. Mahlon Smith, Rutgers University
Westar Institute, official Jesus Seminar site; includes churches open to the scholarship of the Jesus Seminar