James D. G. Dunn, Neither Jew nor Greek: A Contested Identity (Christianity in the Making, Volume 3) (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2015), xiv + 946 Pps., $60.00.
James D. G. Dunn is Lightfoot Professor Emeritus of Divinity at Durham University. He is one of the foremost New Testament scholars in the world today. He has written numerous books including The Oral Gospel Tradition; Jesus, Paul, and the Gospels; The Theology of Paul the Apostle; and Jesus Remembered and Beginning from Jerusalem, the previous two volumes of Christianity in the Making. This is the third and final installment of his authoritative history of Christian origins through 190 C.E. Neither Jew nor Greek: A Contested Identity covers the period after the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 C.E. through the second century. It was during this that the still-new Jesus movement firmed up its distinctive identity markers and the structures on which it would establish its growing appeal in the following decades and centuries.
In this third volume, Dunn examines the major factors that shaped first-generation Christianity and beyond. In so doing, he explores the parting of the ways between Christianity and Judaism, the Hellenization of Christianity, and Christian responses to Gnosticism. He consults various first- and second-century sources, including the New Testament Gospels, New Testament Apocrypha, and various church fathers like Ignatius, Justin Martyr, and Irenaeus. In the process, he shows how the Jesus tradition and the figures of James, Paul, Peter, and John were still esteemed influences but were also the subject of intense controversy as the early church emerged with it a new identity. The executions of three great leaders in the early church – James, Paul, and Peter – were seen to be almost as destructive as the execution of Jesus himself. This is because the Jesus tradition and the gospel of Jesus’ and resurrection were relatively fresh. Prior to 70 AD, the early Jesus tradition had remained a part of Second Temple Judaism. While the term ‘Christianity’ was first coined by Ignatius in the 110s AD, Christianity’s decisive break did not occur until the second decade of the second century. Over a lengthy period of time, at different places, and as judged by different people differently, Christianity emerged from Judaism only after the Constantinian settlement.
In this text, Dunn stipulates that it is no longer acceptable to assert that the apostolic age was an ideal and pure period, from which the subsequent period fell away. The history of Christianity is much more complex than the history of Christianity has usually allowed for. The historical reality was evidently more of a tension and struggle between competing ideas, faiths, and practices than the emergence of a great church with a a clearly defined rule of faith and clearly defined structures. Dunn’s story in this volume reaches it climax with Irenaeus. With Irenaeus, the four-Gospel canon was effectively established. It was Irenaeus who ensured also that the contributions of Paul and John were not commandeered by gnostic sects, as well. Also with Irenaeus, the internal and external conflicts with gnostic and Judeo-Christian reached its decisive point, and he secured the character of Christianity that endured beyond these conflicts.
Dunn structures this third volume of Christianity in the Making by asking how the major factors which shaped early Christianity were received into the second, third, and fourth generations, and in each case the answer is that their influence was still prized and laid claim to, but also that their heritage was contested and the definition which they gave to Christianity was in effect the subject of intense controversy. The defining factors of first-generation Christianity included the following factors, according to Dunn: the Jesus tradition, as the principal means by which the mission of Jesus continued to exert its impact on subsequent generations was embodied and slowly constricted within the written Gospel, but was at the same time contested in content and character by other claimants to embody and carry forward the impact of Jesus. Moreover, the impact of James in offering a different model of Jewish and Gentile church was largely lost for those who defined Christianity over and against Judaism. Third, the impact of Paul in shaping a Jewish messianic sect which was open to non-Jews and attracting an increasing number of Gentiles was profound. Further, the impact of Peter, who at times was surprisingly hidden from the first generation, was more controversial and controverted than the history of catholic Christianity has generally allowed. Finally, the impact of John, which was hardly evident in the survey of first generation Christianity, turned into a major voice at the turn of first and second centuries, which raises new questions about the way that the Jesus tradition was received, and about the influences shaping Christianity.
In sum, this volume comprehensively covers a complex era in early Christianity, one that is often overlooked. As such, this volume is a landmark contribution to the field of Christian studies. Dunn’s findings within this book call for some reassessment and refinement of the traditional account of the emergence of the early church, the rule of faith, Christology, the New Testament canon, and the rise of the episcopacy. The title should be welcome by all with interests in the forming of early Christian identity.
Bradford McCall
Holy Apostles College and Seminary