Potter argues similarly. He states that he applied the logic which he learned in college to the facts concerning The Secrets of Enoch and decided that there was “no convincing reason against Jesus’ authorship.”27 With this logic he surely should have noticed that his argument was also from silence. An absence of reasons against Jesus’ authorship provides no evidence that he did, in fact, write the book. Potter additionally argues that The Secrets of Enoch was written by one author, from AD 1–50.28 That is also an argument from the absence of evidence. There were surely an enormous number of intelligent people who lived between these years who would, given accurate dates, also be candidates for authorship. But this is not evidence that Jesus was the author. In concession, Potter even admits that his thesis is somewhat “imaginative.”29
2. Major differences with Qumran
The second major reason for rejecting this thesis is that, while there are similarities between Jesus and Qumran,30 there are also many differences that oppose any close connection. As asserted by Brownlee, “The Qumran literature tells us much about the background of primitive Christianity, but it can tell us nothing directly about Jesus.”31 A number of scholars have noted numerous differences between Jesus and Qumran beliefs.32
(1)Jesus opposed legalism, whereas the Essenes held strictly to it.
(2)Jesus also opposed ceremonial purity, while the Essenes, again, adhered meticulously to it.
(3)Jesus associated with common people and “sinners,” whereas such activity was appalling to the Essenes.
(4)The sinlessness of Jesus is in contrast to the Essene teaching that even the Messiah would be purified from sin by suffering.
(5)Jesus combined several messianic aspects, while the Qumran community was looking for two (or even three) different messiahs.
(6)Jesus did not teach a strong hierarchy among his followers, while the Essenes imposed strict social rules.
(7)Jesus’ group was open, but the Essene community was closed.
(8)Jesus’ ministry was public, while the Essenes were very private.
(9)Jesus’ teachings were oral, whereas the Essenes emphasized writing and copying.
(10)Jesus’ manner of teaching was clear, not obtuse as in the Dead Sea Scrolls.
(11)Jesus had no formal training, in contrast to those from the Qumran community.
(12)Healing was a major part of Jesus’ ministry, but this aspect was not emphasized at Qumran.
(13)The teaching of love was Jesus’ major ethical message, but does not appear in Essene teachings.
(14)Jesus’ ethics are closer to Rabbinic literature than to Qumran.
(15)Jesus had a more positive admiration for the Old Testament prophets than did the Essenes.
(16)Jesus did not emphasize angelology as much as did the Qumran community.
(17)Jesus’ central teaching was the Kingdom of God, whereas the Essenes give little or no place to the concept.
(18)For Jesus, salvation was straightforward, while the Essenes had an elaborate initiation system.
(19)Jesus taught that salvation would also be extended to the Gentiles while the Essenes were more exlusivistic.
(20)Jesus was missionary-minded, while the Essenes were not.
(21)According to Josephus, the Essenes taught the immortality of the soul, in contrast to the Christian teaching of the resurrection of the body.
As a result, a close connection between Jesus and Qumran is very improbable.33 Daniélou even states:
Must we then conclude that he was an Essene, at least at some period of his life? Here historians are unanimous in affirming the contrary. There is nothing either in his origins or in the setting in which he habitually lived, to justify such a conclusion.34
3. Major differences with the “Teacher of Righteousness”
Our third critique opposes the minority opinion that Jesus was the Essenes’ “Teacher of Righteousness.” Although very few hold this view, we will still list several problems noted by scholars.35
(1)The Essenes’ Teacher was a priest, as opposed to Jesus’ plural office.
(2)The Teacher considered himself a sinner in need of purification, while Jesus was sinless.
(3)The Teacher perceived that he was separated by an infinite gulf from God, while Christians hold that Jesus is the very Son of God.
(4)There is no evidence of any atoning value being placed on the Teacher’s death, while such is the special significance of Jesus’ shed blood and death.
(5)There is no claim or evidence that the Teacher was raised from the dead, while this is the central event for Christianity.
(6)Jesus is worshiped by Christians as God, while such was not the practice of the Essenes and even opposed their belief.
(7)Additionally, the Essenes’ Teacher lived long before Jesus did.
4. View not necessarily critical of Christ
Our fourth critique of this position is the strongest. While the point is often missed, this view is not necessarily critical of Christ or his teachings even if it was shown that he had affinities to Essene thought or even that he was a member of the group. As Pfeiffer explains:
It should be observed that there is nothing derogatory to the person of Christ in the assumption that He or His followers were of Essene background. The Scriptures make it clear that the mother of our Lord was a Jewess, and that He became incarnate in the midst of a Jewish environment. If it were proved that this environment was also Essene, Christian theology would lose nothing and the uniqueness of Jesus would be no more disproved than it is disproved by the assertion of the Jewish origin after the flesh.36
In other words, Jesus had to be born somewhere and he went to school somewhere. To assert that this background was influenced by the Essenes is not in itself critical of Christianity, as long as his teachings are not adjusted or his uniqueness modified. His person and teachings are still validated by a trustworthy New Testament (see Chapter 2) and, if his resurrection is verified, this could also serve to confirm his message.37
Yet, we must still reject this approach to the life of Jesus. The illogical argumentation, the differences between Christianity and Qumran and the differences between Jesus and the Teacher of Righteousness all invalidate it. However, even if this hypothesis was demonstrated, it would affect nothing of major importance in Christianity since Jesus did have some type of background and his message can be shown to be trustworthy and unique anyway.
Jesus’ Message Is Changed by Others
The charge is often made that Jesus’ message was actually quite different from the one which Christians have traditionally taught concerning him. This sometimes is said to be the case, for instance, because the Gospels represent the teachings of the early church and not those of Jesus himself (compare the discussion about Bultmann above). We saw how this approach is invalidated as an attempt to ascertain Jesus’ teachings.
Hugh Schonfield postulated another reason for this change in Jesus’ message. He holds that Jesus was a teacher who was true to Judaism and who had no desire to start any new religion. That is why, for instance, he never proclaimed his own deity.38 While Paul did present some different teachings,39 he is not the real culprit. Rather, Schonfield asserts that the church at Rome perverted Paul’s teachings about Jesus in order to turn him into a deity who set up a new religion.40 The Roman church did this by consciously writing some of the New Testament books and by influencing others to rewrite the story of Jesus. Books said to be either written or influenced strongly by this effort include the synoptic Gospels, Hebrews and Peter’s epistles.41 The general movement is from Jesus’ original teachings, to Paul’s assessments, to the Roman redirection.42 The result is that Christian theology as it is taught today is not the teachings of Jesus and the apostles.43 By such progress, the teachings of Jesus and Paul have been changed by a plot to make Christianity palatable to Roman Gentiles. In spite of Schonfield’s new “twists,” his thesis is vulnerable to four criticisms.