B.H. Carroll’s Pastoral Theology
Southwestern Journal of Theology
Volume 58, No. 2 – Spring 2016
Managing Editor: W. Madison Grace II
By Michael F. Bird. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2014. 408 pages. Paperback, $30.00.
Michael F. Bird is a prolific and excellent writer. He is lecturer in theology at Ridley Melbourne Mission and Ministry College in Australia. He has written on Historical Jesus studies, including a recent co-authored response to Bart Ehrman’s claim that Christians made the man Jesus into a deity. In The Gospel of the Lord, Bird continues his outstanding scholarly writing with this excellent introduction to the four canonical Gospels—Bird’s earliest area of scholarly interest and research (viii). He explores three main areas: (1) the formation of the Gospels, (2) Gospel genre, and (3) how the Gospels “relate to the Christian discourse about God (viii).”
The book has six chapters: (1) introduction, (2) Jesus tradition purpose and preservation, (3) Jesus tradition formation, (4) Gospel literary genetics, (5) Gospel genre and goal, and (6) the reason for four Gospels. Chapters two and three as well as an excursus have appeared in theological journals, but Bird says they “have been heavily revised for this book in light of recent research (ix).”
Remaining true to the original meaning of the biblical text is important to Bird and is a strength of this book. For instance, in regard to the preservation of the Jesus tradition, he notes the tradition was “preserved by believing communities and guided by eyewitnesses and teachers within that community. Important didactic figures were vital guarantors of the memory and traditions of Jesus (64).” However, Bird departs from the traditional authorship position in assigning much weight to the role of early Christian communities in shaping Gospel tradition (65–66) as well as questioning the traditional authorship of Matthew (“an open question,” 140) and John, who Bird believes was a Judean disciple of Jesus that led a Christian group at Ephesus, and his disciples later redacted his testimony into the Gospel of John (191).
The Synoptic Problem remains unresolved, and understanding the complicated landscape of possible solutions is critical in Gospel studies. Bird does an admirable job describing and critiquing the primary proposals. He gives diagrams when needed (e.g., 128, 187). Helpful harmony charts list the Gospel texts side by side in both English and Greek, and this practice allows the readers to better understand Bird’s explanations (e.g., 129–31, 135–37). Bird makes the case for the HolztmannGundry hypothesis—a rather complex proposal that is also called the “three source theory” (156). This proposal includes Marcan priority, Q-lite (since Bird says 70% of the claims made for the non-extant Q document are “building castles in the air,” 165), and Luke’s use of Mark. Even though Bird does not ultimately prove his case, he does well illustrate the reality that the Synoptic Problem remains an intriguing and open question.
Bird writes in an engaging style. He is easy to understand, and he uses vivid analogies. Examples include the following: “Just like peeling an onion, watching a form critic cut and tear his way through the alleged layers of tradition in Gospels also makes one want to cry because it is so painful to watch (114).” “The ‘Holy Internet’ of the early Christian movement was composed of a myriad of churches who were in close and constant contact with each other (321).” “The ‘Other’ Gospels (the noncanonical Gospels) are typically anachronistic—like finding a document in which Napoleon discussed nuclear submarines and B52 bombers with his officers (296).” Also, Bird aptly says the “forty or fifty ‘other’ Gospels” were written either to supplement or to supplant the four canonical Gospels (281, 308).
The book ends with an informative excursus that is typical of the often conservative viewpoint of Bird in this book: giving reasonable answers to potentially destructive claims by critics. For instance, many critics claim the scribal copying of NT texts in the second century A.D. was fluid or free—supposedly demonstrating the unreliability of God’s Word. However, in this excursus Bird notes recent finds of second-century A.D. papyrus in Oxyrhynchus containing Gospel material help affirm that in the second-century the texts were copied by “strict” or “normal” standards (334–35).
The Gospel of the Lord is an excellent introduction to the origins, interrelatedness, and purpose of the four Gospels. It is balanced and comprehensive enough to be a student textbook on the undergraduate or masters level. Pastors will find it a helpful update on the state of Gospel origin research today.
