| Part 1 The Theory of Faith | Hirohumi Hoshika |
Regarding the changes in the apostles' faith, R. Bultmann addresses this as a "discontinuity" between "Jesus' teachings" and "the apostolic ministry (kerygma)". He considered this difference a mystery that needed to be solved.
――Jesus taught about God, saying, "God is the Father," but the apostles proclaimed Jesus, saying, "Jesus is the Savior". At this point, Jesus shifts from being the one who preaches to the one who is preached to. Why was the disciples' teaching not a repetition of the master's teachings, as in other religions? ――
In response to the question of why there are two distinct teachings — Jesus's doctrines and the apostolic kerygma — Bultmann's students embarked on "The Second Quest for the Historical Jesus", aiming to discover the continuity between Jesus and the apostolic ministry. It was an attempt to find within Jesus' teachings a foreshadowing of Christology, the central tenet of the apostolic ministry, that "Jesus is the Christ",
According to E. Käsemann, a central figure in the Bultmann school, this endeavor soon achieved its objective. According to him, the facts demonstrating the continuity between Jesus and the apostles became clear as follows:
"It cakes around Jesus' preaching about a gracious God, around his words and favorable criticism of the Mosaic Law and its commentary based on it, around his thorough demand for obedience and love, and around his death as a consequence of his service."
Bultmann countered this attempt as follows:
"No matter how much we may come to gain about the visual form of Jesus … what, exactly, would have been achieved by them?"
The disciples during the Gospel era did not attain the faith that Jesus demanded, and only came to that faith after Jesus' death. If they did not acquire a firm kerygma while with Jesus, then this means that knowledge of Jesus is of no use in achieving this. Therefore, no matter how much we learn about Jesus through historical study, this is irrelevant to reaching apostolic faith.
Furthermore, if a continuity between the two teachings were to be proven, then one of them would be deemed superfluous. This would not explain why there are two teachings in the New Testament, but rather simply demonstrate a refusal to acknowledge a discontinuity between Jesus' sermons and the teachings of the apostles of Kerygma.
In other words, Bultmann's argument is that "the historical facts of Jesus do not give faith," and his reasoning is that "the first stage that can be grasped is the oldest Palestinian religious order",
Thus, Bultmann defines our faith not as faith in Jesus, but as "faith in the apostles' message".
In fact, not only conservative churches but also many modern mainline churches hold this view,
However, readily accepting the identity of the two teachings could lead to viewing the apostles' faith in the Acts as an extension of the spontaneously arising faith of the Gospel era. As a result, by not viewing the emergence of the Church in the first century as a significant mystery, wouldn't this understanding leave us with a "shallow understanding" of Christian faith?
That superficial understanding is as follows:――The fact that the disciples' faith remained the same before and after the Acts is demonstrated by the continuity between Jesus' teachings, which they modeled upon during the Gospel era, and the Apostles' kerygma. Ultimately, Christian faith, as seen in the Gospels with the disciples and those in need, is no different from other religions in that it is about people who are moved by the work of the founder or who are in dire straits and believe in the power of God.――
Needless to say, if that's the truth, then so be it. However, when people change dramatically, there's always some underlying reason. In many situations, we tend to overlook things and fail to grasp the truth that should be understood. Even in Christianity, there is the experience, which is difficult to readily accept, of how the doctrines concerning salvation that existed in its early stages were quickly lost, and how it took a fourteen or fifteen centuries centuries, until the Reformation, to restore them. It is entirely possible that the shift in the faith of the early church apostles could also be counted among these examples.
Bultmann’s claim that “the historical Jesus does not give faith” is, however, nothing more than a statement of the obvious when viewed from a different perspective. As discussed in the Prologue of this chapter, this was the case for most people who encountered Jesus in first-century Palestine, and the disciples themselves brought the same situation upon themselves. No one gains faith simply by being in the presence of Jesus.
In conservative churches, the understanding that Jesus gave faith to his disciples is taken for granted, so the very concept of a "disconnect between the historical Jesus and the apostle Kerygma" is not understood,
Generally, people who are taught about Jesus, regardless of age, usually feel a natural sense of respect for Him. However, something more is needed to reach faith from there. The same was true for the disciples who were with Jesus; to progress from the faith of the Gospel era to "Apostolic Faith," some kind of catalyst was needed, separate from Jesus' ministry and teachings.
Furthermore, regarding Bultmann's claim that "the historical Jesus does not give rise to faith" — regardless of the impression it may give — the following points are entirely clear, and as long as this claim is linked to them, it must be considered undeniable.
It means that the faith of the apostles and our own faith today includes both what can be known by seeing Jesus and what can never be known even by seeing him.What Jesus taught, whether he performed miracles, and whether he was resurrected are all things that can be seen by observing him. However, no matter how much one observes Jesus, one cannot know for certain whether he is the Christ, whether he is the Son of God, or whether the atonement on the cross is valid.
The disciples, who had lived with Jesus for more than three years, found themselves in precisely this situation; and that is why, even though they were close to him, they remained uncertain about their judgment of Jesus right up to the very end.
Therefore, even if "historical research on Jesus" were to reveal the historical Jesus, and even if it were possible for us to go back in time and verify the facts about Jesus, there would be nothing we could do about "things that we wouldn't understand if we saw them". Even if Jesus had given a self-testimony, or if his self-awareness had been revealed, it would only further confuse us.
The facts that can be inferred from the changes in the Apostles described in the Gospels and the Acts suggest that the faith Jesus required of his disciples was not for specific help, and that, in order for the Apostles to attain "Apostolic Faith," which cannot be acquired simply by looking at Jesus, they needed circumstances different from those that arise spontaneously. The change in faith that occurred there must have been an extremely important event in early Christianity.
For these reasons, I support Bultmann's assertion of a "discontinuity between two teachings". The discontinuity between these two states in the disciples' faith process — before and after the Acts — is a mystery that must be explored.
That said, I cannot help but describe Bultmann’s solution to this problem as thoroughly bizarre. While it cannot be denied that this factor also contributed to the decline of this issue, but for now, let's look at Bultmann's own solution below.