How Much History is in the Passion Narratives?: Violence, Ideology, Historicity, and the Seditious Jesus Hypothesis

This article reviews Fernando Bermejo-Rubio’s monograph, They Suffered under Pontius Pilate: Jewish Anti-Roman Resistance and the Crosses at Golgotha (2023). This book is the latest publication arguing for the ‘seditious Jesus’ hypothesis, the idea that Jesus was an armed revolutionary. It is argued...

Full description

Saved in:  
Bibliographic Details
Subtitles:Special Issue: They Suffered Under Pontius Pilate: Jewish Anti-Roman Resistance and the Crosses at Golgotha
Main Author: Middleton, Paul 1970- (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
Check availability: HBZ Gateway
Interlibrary Loan:Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany)
Published: 2025
In: Journal for the study of the historical Jesus
Year: 2025, Volume: 23, Issue: 2/3, Pages: 134-152
Further subjects:B Historicity
B Violence
B Historical Jesus
B seditious Jesus
B New Testament
Online Access: Volltext (lizenzpflichtig)
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig)
Description
Summary:This article reviews Fernando Bermejo-Rubio’s monograph, They Suffered under Pontius Pilate: Jewish Anti-Roman Resistance and the Crosses at Golgotha (2023). This book is the latest publication arguing for the ‘seditious Jesus’ hypothesis, the idea that Jesus was an armed revolutionary. It is argued that the volume rightly critiques some theological tendency in New Testament scholarship to downplay or ignore violence inherent in the Jesus tradition, but the argument that the men crucified with Jesus were either some of his disciples or sympathetic to his violent cause fails to convince. Despite arguing for historical minimalism in relation to the Gospel material, Bermejo-Rubio builds his case on the material he judges to be historical, but that is better explained by the imagination of the evangelists.
ISSN:1745-5197
Contains:Enthalten in: Journal for the study of the historical Jesus
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1163/17455197-bja10054