‘But if we are to submit our speculations to the text [the four canonical gospels] and build our theology only with the bricks provided by careful exegesis we cannot say with any confidence that Jesus knew himself to be divine, the pre-existent Son of God.’ 

James D.G, Dunn, Christology in the Making: A New Testament Inquiry into the Origins of the Doctrine of the Incarnation p. 32. (In his book Dunn puts these words in italics for emphasis).

Dunn is a British New Testament scholar who was for many years the Professor of Divinity in the Department of Theology at the University of Durham. Too many people (usually fundamentalist evangelicals) accuse him of being “liberal” and “unorthodox”. Dunn is trying to tell us what he thinks the apostle Paul or the gospel writers believed about Jesus, and not necessarily what he personally thinks of him. Dunn loves Christ dearly, and that has certainly come out in his writings. He is simply trying to avoid putting his personal theology in his books; something that other scholars would do well to imitate.

Categories: Bible, Biblical scholarship, Christianity, God, Recommended Reading