Brant Pitre: are the charges of blasphemy evidence that Jesus claimed to be divine?

I have just started reading Brant Pitre’s Jesus and Divine Christology (2024), in which he sets out to show that the earliest Jewish followers of Jesus believed he was divine because “Jesus himself spoke and acted as if he were divine during his lifetime”—only he did so in a very Jewish way, “using riddles, questions, and allusions to Jewish Scriptures to both reveal and conceal the apocalyptic secret of his divinity” (12, italics removed). So a “divine messianic secret” sort of thing.

In the introductory chapter he presents four “historical warrants” for asking the question about Jesus’ consciousness of divinity when most scholars dismiss the idea (13-24).

First, many scholars now recognise that some second temple texts “describe expected messianic figures as superhuman.”

Secondly, there is quite widespread agreement that the historical Jesus regarded himself as a messianic figure.

Thirdly, commentators are coming round to the idea that “Jesus is depicted as speaking and acting as if he is divine in all four first-century gospels.”

Fourthly, other prominent historical figures from the period “made divine self-claims”—for example, Alexander the Great, Antiochus Epiphanes, Herod Agrippa, and Caligula.

Why was Jesus accused of blasphemy?

Pitre will develop the argument in detail as the book goes on, but under the third point he highlights one particular example of Jesus speaking and acting as if he is divine—the occasions when he is charged with blasphemy.

• See also “Crucified for blasphemy”

In the Synoptic Gospels this happens twice: by the scribes and Pharisees when he forgave the sins of the paralysed man, on the grounds that no one “can forgive sins but God alone” (Matt. 9:3; Mk. 2:7; Lk. 5:21); and by the high priest for saying, when asked if he is “the Christ, the Son of God”: “You spoke. But I say to you (pl.): from now you (pl.) will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Power and coming on the clouds of heaven” (Matt. 26:64-65*).

Pitre notes out that in both these stories ‘Jesus is accused of blasphemy in the context of questions about “who” he claims to be’ (18). “If Jesus never claims to be divine in the Synoptic Gospels, then why is he accused blasphemy in the context of questions about his identify?” (18, italics removed).

There is also one passage in John’s Gospel (10:31-36), but that needs separate treatment.

Some second temple Jewish evidence

Pitre draws attention to three second temple Jewish texts in which, he thinks, the “claim to be divine” specifically is classed as blasphemy.

The first is an account of the death of Antiochus Epiphanes:

Thus he, who only a little while before had thought in his superhuman arrogance that he could command the waves of the sea and had imagined that he could weigh the high mountains in a balance, was brought down to earth and carried in a litter, making the power of God manifest to all… (2 Macc. 9:8)

And when he could not endure his own stench, he uttered these words, “It is right to be subject to God and that a mortal should not think haughtily.” (9:12)

So the murderer and blasphemer, having endured the most intense suffering, such as he had inflicted on others, came to the end of his life by a most pitiable fate among the mountains in a strange land. (9:28)

The blasphemy here lies in Antiochus’ self-promotion to a status equal to or above the God of Israel. This is also clear from the account in Daniel:

And the king shall do as he wills. He shall exalt himself and magnify himself above every god, and shall speak astonishing things against the God of gods. (Dan. 11:36)

Antiochus does not claim to be the God of the Jews, he claims to be equal to or superior to the God of the Jews, and learns too late that it is right for a mortal person to submit to the God of gods. It is not clear even that he claims to be a god. A wider reading of the account in 2 Maccabees suggests that it was his assault on Judaism generally, the attempt to suppress Torah observance, his profanation of the temple, and his programme of hellenisation that was reckoned as blasphemy.

Secondly, Philo describes a high-ranking Egyptian who had sought to impose cultural changes on the Jews, notably with respect to Sabbath observance, whose tirade concludes:

I am a whirlwind, I am war, and deluge, and thunderbolt, and the calamity of famine, and the misery of pestilence, and an earthquake which shakes and overthrows what stood firm before, not being merely the name of a necessity of fate, but actual, visible power, standing close to you. (Dreams 2:129)

Philo comments that in this way the man “has dared to compare himself to the all-blessed God” and, moreover, has uttered “blasphemies against the sun, and the moon, and the rest of the stars, whenever anything which had been looked for according to the seasons of the year, either does not happen at all, or is brought about with difficulty” (Dreams 2:131).

Presumably, Philo understood the rhetorical flourish, but the man only compared himself to God; he has no more claimed to be God than he has claimed to be sun, moon, and stars.

Thirdly, we have this statement from Josephus in his summary of the Law—an apt gloss, incidentally, on the execution of Jesus:

He that blasphemes God, let him be stoned, and let him hang upon a tree all that day, and then let him be buried in an ignominious and obscure manner. (Ant. 4:202)

Josephus does not explain here what he understands by blasphemy, but a few lines later he writes:

Let no one blaspheme those gods which other cities esteem such; nor may anyone steal what belongs to strange temples; nor take away the gifts that are dedicated to any god. (Ant. 4:207; cf. Exod. 22:28)

Here blasphemy clearly consists in reviling (cf. Exod. 22:28) or denigrating or insulting the gods of the pagan cities—not claiming to be one or other of them. It seems very likely, therefore, that blaspheming the one God of Israel consisted similarly in reviling, denigrating, insulting, or otherwise discrediting him.

So, even on this limited and very selective evidential basis, it appears that two types of offence would have counted as blasphemy in the eyes of Jews at the time: a king or other high-ranking person might make himself equal to the God of Israel, or a person might flagrantly defame the God of Israel. In fact, this appears to accord with the general usage of the term in the literature, which appears to encompass a quite wide range of spoken offences. For example:

For wisdom is a kindly spirit, but it will not hold blasphemers free of the guilt of their words, because God is a witness of their inner feelings and a true overseer of their hearts and a hearer of their tongues. Because the spirit of the Lord fills the world and that which holds all things together has knowledge of what is said, therefore those who utter unrighteous things will not escape detection, and justice, when it convicts, will not pass them by. For there will be an inquiry into the intrigues of the impious, and a report of their words will come to the Lord to convict them of their lawless deeds, because a zealous ear hears all things and the noise of grumbling is not hidden. Beware then unprofitable grumbling, and keep your tongue from slander, because no word uttered in secret will go without effect, and a mouth uttering falsehood destroys the soul. (Wis. 1:6-11)

Back to the Gospels

Jesus could reasonably be accused of either offence. On the one hand, he claimed an authority to speak and act in the place of YHWH with respect to Israel, as an exceptionally elevated and authorised messiah at his right hand. On the other, he discredited YHWH by his contempt for Jewish institutions, his high-handed attitude towards the Law, and in the end, of course, by his humiliating death.

I have argued before that in the forgiveness of sins incident, the answer given to the scribes and Pharisees, both by Jesus and by the crowds, is that he has been given the authority to forgive sins. The prerogative belongs to YHWH, and no doubt there was something inherently blasphemous, at face value, in the declaration that the man’s sins were forgiven.

Significantly, it is the Son of Man who has received this authority: ‘But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”—he then said to the paralytic—“Rise, pick up your bed and go home”’ (Matt 9:6).

The whole point of Daniel’s vision is that the figure like a son of man, representing the persecuted righteous in Israel, receives an everlasting “royal authority” from the God who judges the current political-religious crisis (Dan. 7:13-14 LXX).

It is also this Son of Man who who is made to sit at the right hand of Power according to the template provided by Psalm 110:1: the Lord who is YHWH addresses the Lord who is Israel’s king at a time of political-religious crisis:

“Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool.” The LORD sends forth from Zion your mighty sceptre. Rule in the midst of your enemies! (Ps. 110:1-2)

This is not abstract “christology.” The narrative-historical context determines the meaning: under these circumstances, at this time, Jesus has been made king of this people for the sake of their long term survival and security.

Riddles and parables

The supposedly blasphemous claim of Jesus is not that he is God but that he has been given authority by God—on the one hand, to pronounce the forgiveness of sins for some in Israel, and on the other, to judge and rule as messiah at the right hand of YHWH.

In other words, because he is the Son of Man persecuted by unrighteous Israel and killed by the Roman oppressor, he has legitimately received what Alexander the Great, Antiochus Epiphanes, Herod Agrippa, and Caligula could only aspire to illegitimately. It is not incidental that these blasphemers are all kings.

That is exactly the message of the encomium in Philippians 2:6-8. See my book on the matter.

Finally, I will make the point here (though I imagine we will come back to it) that Jesus explains why he speaks in a riddling and allusive fashion:

This is why I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. Indeed, in their case the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled that says: “‘“You will indeed hear but never understand, and you will indeed see but never perceive.” For this people’s heart has grown dull, and with their ears they can barely hear, and their eyes they have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and turn, and I would heal them.’” (Matt. 13:13-15; cf. Mk. 4:11-12; Lk. 8:9-10)

It is not to create confusion regarding his divinity but to engage with the logic of Isaiah 6:8-13. Jesus implicitly identifies not with YHWH but with the prophet sent by YHWH to a nation which will hear but not understand the warnings of impending national catastrophe.

Likewise, he speaks in parables ’to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet: “I will open my mouth in parables; I will utter what has been hidden since the foundation of the world”’ (Matt. 13:35). This is Psalm 78:2, which invokes another narrative of national rebellion against YHWH and divine judgment.

Importantly, Jesus differentiates between outsiders and insiders: “To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside everything is in parables” (Mk. 4:11). The “secret of the kingdom of God” is knowledge of the impending divine action—precisely the meaning of his prophetic activity that the leaders of Israel failed to grasp. Its content consists, for example, in his teaching about the Son of Man and the Olivet discourse. He patently does not make known to them the supposed “secret” of his divinity.