Einleitung in das Neue Testament

Harking back to Johann David Michaelis’s seminal work (see the foreword), this study takes up the three classic concerns of NT introduction in its Teutonic conception: (1) the details of each individual writing’s origin, (2) the textual foundation of each NT book (textual criticism), and (3) the history of each writing’s acceptance into the canon. In this book, Armin Baum places emphasis on item 1.Within that emphasis, Baum names six distinctives of his approach and findings. (1) The Gospels and Acts are recognizably histories by ancient standards and exhibit key features of OT historical accounts. (2) Baum stresses the important role and competence of cultural memory in the preservation and transmission of historical knowledge in antiquity. (3) Baum thinks the authorship of Mark, Luke–Acts, and John can be reasonably established as Peter’s student John Mark, Paul’s companion Luke, and John the son of Zebedee (although he holds that John’s followers edited and expanded parts of what we call the Fourth Gospel). The author of Matthew, Baum thinks, is an open question.(4) The ancient conception of historical authenticity must be kept in mind. “The reproduction of an utterance in direct speech was regarded as authentic when its content was felt to have been accurately paraphrased” (p. vi). This observation is foundational for analyzing Jesus’s sayings in the Synoptics and John as well as the speeches in Acts. (5) Sometimes worldview affects critical judgment, as in whether predictive prophecy is possible, which can be a factor in dating NT books containing predictions. In these cases, Baum lays out the issues and full range of possible interpretations. (6) Baum takes up textual criticism only in major celebrated cases like the ending of Mark or John 7:53–8:11. In the latter case, Baum is inclined to hold that the passage is secondary from a literary point of view but still canonical (see very full discussion, pp. 825–64).The subtitle of this book is significant. Despite containing nearly 1,000 pages, only the Gospels and Acts are treated. This points to the comprehensive and detailed scale of a book divided into ten parts, labeled A through J: (A) the language of the NT historical books, (B) the narrative style of the NT historical books, (C) the authorial references in the NT historical books, (D) the literary type (Gattung) of the Gospels, (E) the Gospel according to Mark, (F) the Gospel according to Matthew, (G) the Lukan two-part corpus, (H) the Synoptic question, (J) the Gospel according to John, and (K) the dates of the historical books’ appearance. (The table of contents and chapters go from part H to part J, omitting a part I I am told by the author this is a German convention to avoid confusion between the capital letter I and both the capital letter J and Roman numeral I.)The book focuses most of all on primary sources—classical, Jewish, biblical, and patristic writings. According to the (selective) modern author index, major discussion partners, while relatively few, are telling: R. Bauckham, R. E. Brown, F. F. Bruce, H. J. Cadbury, J. A. Fitzmyer, A. von Harnack, M. Hengel, R. Morganthaler, M. Reiser, R. Schnackenburg, B. F. Westcott, and (by far most frequently) Theodor Zahn. Baum’s choice of major discussion partners signals his command of English language scholarship, not always a feature of German scholarly works (of course even more English language writers ignore German discussion). Nor does Baum overlook French language scholarship. It also signals his commitment to the hard-nosed, primary source–based historiography of doyens like Zahn, Hengel, and Bruce. Westcott, too, deserves inclusion as a master of the patristic and other extrabiblical literature accessible in his day; it is remarkable and gratifying to see how carefully, creatively, and constructively Baum mines Westcott’s insights and proposals, which are often overlooked in the discussion.Still, while Baum cites and interacts with these and hundreds of other contemporary scholars and their publications, this is most of all a historical introduction, designed to give advanced students (and scholars willing to think outside the confines of critical consensus) maximal exposure to the primary evidence and its most cogent interpretations, not to compile lists of favored authorities to arrive at predictable partisan conclusions.An esthetic element bears mention in a brief assessment of this book: Baum does a beautiful job of producing scholarship as it should be done on the subject in question. He arrives at innovative breakdowns of individual issues that do justice to both the evidence and contemporary debates about it. For example, Baum partitions his discussion of the Synoptic question, not just into a few main options, but into 17 different subsections, a virtual book in its own right (covering some 200 pages). Every subsection begins with bibliography (which is actually cited and used), then follows with carefully crafted subsidiary subsections, concluding with a clear and concise summary. Dozens of graphics transpose prose into pictures, a display of pedagogical giftedness. Blessed are the students who learn the subject this way, for they are being equipped to understand the data on the ground and the various best options (and permutations of options) for dealing with those data, rather than being unwittingly steered to the writer’s own conclusion.For example, regarding the hypothesis that the Gospels go back to an oral Urevangelium, Baum first clears away the mistaken view that it traces back to Johann Gottfried Herder. It originates rather with J. C. L. Giesler (pp. 488–89), whose views were then extended and refined by Westcott (pp. 489–91). Baum concludes the section with a look at eight more recent advocates of this (or a closely related) solution: (1) Paul Fiebig and Gerhard Kittel, (2) John Rist, (3) Eta Linnemann, (4) Bo Reicke, (5) James Dunn, (6) Robert McIver and Marie Carroll, (7) Baum himself, and (8) Karl Jaroš and Ulrich Victor. But to balance out all these supporters of this view, the section concludes with a summary of the main objection: “The most important objection to the tradition-hypothesis is that the considerable agreements between the Synoptic Gospels, especially in specific wording, cannot have arisen through the activity of human memory along with oral transmission” (p. 494; Baum’s emphasis). Baum later subjects this objection to extensive scrutiny using studies of both ancient and modern culture and memory. But he lets the full range of pros and cons to Synoptic issues come into view before refereeing the debates toward what he regards as plausible conclusions.According to Baum’s Doktorvater Klaus Berger (see http://www.kath.net/news/41449), it was Baum’s evangelical convictions that eliminated him from consideration for a German university post some years ago. He is perhaps the leading German evangelical NT scholar of his generation. It is a shame that this book is not published by a major German academic publisher. It will be a greater shame if it does not find its way into an English translation since it is the greatest work of its kind since Zahn’s monumental achievement, which it surpasses in various ways

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