The Oral Gospel Tradition

The quest for the historical Jesus goes back more than 150 years and has given rise to a great deal of debate about the differences between the Jesus of history and the Christ of faith. As the title suggests, this book is about the oral gospel tradition, reminding readers of the obvious fact that the vast majority of people living at the time of Jesus were illiterate, and that stories were passed on orally rather than in writing. This quest has been a lifelong one for Professor Dunn as he has sought to question the default assumption that a literary approach is more important. This book provides an overview of his thesis with considerable textual commentary as well as some responses to critics. Early Christians were concerned to remember Jesus and his sayings and to pass this on in an oral tradition. Some writers have argued that the diverging traditions can be explained entirely in literary terms, since the Gospels are in writing, but this fails to account for all the divergences and variations within the synoptic Gospels, which are 'the same but different.' Dunn starts from the point that Jesus made a strong impact on people who met him, which created faith and the wish to share and communicate stories. This in turn creates a living tradition. He is very interesting on the contrast between the synoptic gospels and that of John, which 'provides the basis for full and deeper reflection on what Jesus stood for and achieved.' John 'wove his much more refined fabric from the same stuff as the Synoptics.' This treatment helps bring together the Jesus of history and the Christ of faith by showing a process of gradual evolution.