80. Conversation of Jesus With Nicodemus. (Chapter 7. Discourses of Jesus In The Fourth Gospel.) (The Life of Jesus Critically Examined) (Strauss, David Friedrich)

The First Considerable Specimen Which The fourth Gospel gives of the teaching of Jesus, is his conversation with Nicodemus (iii.1-21.). In the previous chapter (23-25.) it is narrated, that during the first Passover attended by Jesus after his entrance on his public ministry, he had won many to faith in him by the miracles which he performed, but that he did not commit himself to them because he saw through them: he was aware, that is, of the uncertainty and impurity of their faith. Then follows in our present chapter, as an example, not only of the adherents whom Jesus had found even thus early, but also of the wariness with which he tested and received them, a more detailed account how Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews and a Pharisee, applied to him, and how he was treated by Jesus.

It is through the Gospel of John alone that we learn anything of this Nicodemus, who in vii. 50 f. appears as the advocate of Jesus, so far as to protest against his being condemned without a hearing, and in xix. 39. as the partaker with Joseph of Arimathea of the care of interring Jesus. Modern criticism, with reason, considers it surprising that Matthew (with the other Synoptics) does not even mention the name of this remarkable adherent of Jesus, and that we have to gather all our knowledge of him from the fourth Gospel; since the peculiar relation in which Nicodemus stood to Jesus, and his participation in the care of his interment, must have been as well known to Matthew as to John. This difficulty has been numbered among the arguments which are thought to prove that the first Gospel was not written by the apostle Matthew, but was the product of a tradition considerably more remote from the time and locality of Jesus. But the fact is that the common fund of tradition on which ^{P.395} all the Synoptics drew had preserved no notice of this Nicodemus.

With touching piety the Christian legend has recorded in the tablets of her memory, the names of all the others who helped to render the last honours to their murdered master: Joseph of Arimathea and the two Marys (Matt. xxvii. 56-61 parall.); why then was Nicodemus the only neglected one, he who was especially distinguished among those who tended the remains of Jesus, by his nocturnal interview with the teacher sent from God, and by his advocacy of him among the chief priests and Pharisees? It is so difficult to conceive that the name of this man, if he had really assumed such a position, would have vanished from the popular Gospel tradition, without leaving a single trace, that one is induced to inquire whether the contrary supposition be not more capable of explanation: namelv, that such a relation between Nicodemus and Jesus might have hcen fabricated by tradition, and adopted by the author of the fourth Gospel without having really subsisted.

John xii. 42, it is expressly said that many among the chief rulers believed in Jesus, but concealed their faith from dread of excommunication by the Pharisees, because they loved the praise, of inen more than the praise of God That towards the end of his career many people of rank believed in Jesus, even in secret only, is not very probable, since no indication of it appears in the Acts of the Apostles; for that the advice of Gamaliel (Acts v.34ff.) did not originate in a positively favourable disposition towards the cause of Jesus, seems to be sufficiently demonstrated by the spirit of his disciple Saul. Moreover the Synoptics make Jesus declare in plain terms that the secret of his Messiahship had been revealed only to babes, and hidden from the wise and prudent (Matt. xi. 25; Luke x. 21), and Joseph of Arimathea is the only individual of the ruling class whom they mention as an adherent of Jesus. How, then, if Jesus did not really attach to himself any from the upper ranks, canic the case to be represented differently at a later period? In John vii. 48 f. we read that the Pharisees sought to disparage Jesus by the remark that none of the rulers or of the Pharisees, but only the ignorant populace, believed in him; and even later adversaries of Christianity, for example, Celsus, laid great stress on the circumstance that Jesus had had as his disciples. This reproach was a thorn in the side of the early Church, and though as long as her members were drawn only from the people, she might reflect with satisfaction on the declarations of Jesus, in which he had pronounced the poor and simple "blessed" (makarioi); yet so soon as she was joined by men of rank and education, these would lean to the idea that con-^{P.396} verts like themselves had not been wanting to Jesus during his life.

But, it would be objected, nothing had been hitherto known of such converts. Naturally enough, it might be answered; since fear of their equals would induce them to conceal their relations with Jesus.

Thus a door was opened for the admission of any number of secret adherents among the higher class (John xil. 42 f.). But, it would be further urged, how could they have intercourse with Jesus, unobserved? Under the veil of the night, would be the answer; and thus the scene was laid for the interviews of such men with Jesus (xix. 39.). This, however, would not suffice; a representative of this class must actually appear on the scene: Joseph of Arimathea might have been chosen, his name being still extant in the synoptic tradition; but the idea of him was too definite, and it was the interest of the legend to name more than one eminent friend of Jesus. Hence a new personage was devised, whose Greek name Nikodhmoj seems to point him out significantly as the representative of the dominant class. That this development of the legend is confined to the fourth Gospel, is to be explained, partly by the generally admitted lateness of its origin, and partly on the ground that in the evidently more cultivated circle in which it arose, the limitation of the adherents of Jesus to the common people would be more offensive, than in the circle in which the synoptic tradition was formed. Thus the reproach which modern criticism has cast on the first Gospel, on the score of its silence respecting Nicodemus, is turned upon the fourth, on the score of its information on the same subject.

These considerations, however, should not create any prejudice against the ensuing conversation, which is the proper object of our investigations. This may still be in the main genuine; Jesus may have held such a conversation with one of his adherents, and our evangelist may have embellished it no further than by making this interlocutor a man of rank. Neither will we, with the author of the Probabilia, take umbrage at the opening address of Nicodemus, nor complain, with him, that there is a want of connection between that address and the answer of Jesus. The requisition of a new birth (gennhqnai anwqen) as a condition of entrance into the kingdom of heaven, does not differ essentially from the summons with which Jesus opens his ministry in the synoptic Gospels, liepent you, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. New birth, or new creation, was a current image among the Jews, especially as denoting the conversion of an idolater into a worshipper of the Lord. It was ^{P.397} customary to say of Abraham, that when, according to the Jewish supposition, he renounced idolatry for the worship of the true God, he became a new creature. The proselyte, too, in allusion to his relinquishing all his previous associations, was compared to a new-born child, That such phraseology was common among the Jews at that period, is shown by the confidence with which Paul applies, as if it required no explanation, the term new creation, kainh ktisij, to those truly converted to Christ. Now, if Jesus required, even from the Jews, aa a condition of entrance into the Messianic kingdom, the new birth which they ascribed to thenheathen proselytes, Nicodemus might naturally wonder at the requisition, since the Israelite thought himself, as such, unconditionally entitled to that kingdom: and this is the construction which has been put upon his question v. 44 But Nicodemus does not ask, How can you say that a Jew, or a child of Abraham, must be born again? His ground of wonder is that Jesus appears to suppose it possible for a man to be born again, and that when he is old.

It does not, therefore, astonish him that spiritual new birth should be expected in a Jew, but corporeal new birth in a man. How an oriental, to whom figurative speech in general how a Jew, to whom the image of the new birth in particular must have been familiar how especially a master of Israel, in whom the misconstruction of figurative phrases cannot, as in the Apostles (e. g. Matt. xv. 15 f.; xvi. 7), be ascribed to want of education could understand this expression literally, has been matter of extreme surprise to expositors of all parties, as well as to Jesus (v. 10). Hence some have supposed that the Pharisee really understood Jesus, and only intended by his question to test the ability of Jesus to interpret his figurative expression into a simple proposition: but Jesus does not treat him as a hypocrite, as in that case he must have done-he continues to instruct him, as one really ignorant (v. 10). Others give the question the following turn: This cannot be meant in a physical sense, how then otherwise? But the true drift of the question is rather the contrary: By these words I can only understand physical new birth, but how is this possible? Our wonder at the ignorance of the Jewish doctor, therefore, returns upon us; and it is heightened when, after the copious explanation of Jesus (v. 5-8), that the new birth which he required was a spiritual birth, Nicodemus has made no advance in comprehension, but asks with the same obtuseness as before (v. 9), how can these, things be? By this last difficulty L cke is so straitened, that, contrary to his ordinary exegetical tact, he refers the continued amazement of Nicodemus, (as other expositors had referred his original question,) to the circumstance ^{P.398} that Jesus maintained the necessity of new birth even for Israelites.

But, in that case, Nicodomus would have inquired concerning the necessity, not the possibility, of that birth; instead of asking, "How can these things be?" he would have asked, "When shall these things happen?" this inconceivable mistake in a Jewish doctor is not thon to be explained away, and our surprise must become strong suspicion so soon as it can be shown, that legend or the evangelist Iiad inducements to represent this individual as more simple than he really was. First, then, it must occur to us, that in all descriptions and recitals, contrasts are eagerly exhibited; hence in the representation of a colloquy in which one party is the teacher, the other the taught, there is a strong temptation to create a contrast to the wisdom of the former, by exaggerating the simplicity of the latter. Further, we must remember the satisfaction it must give to a Christian mind of that age, to place a master of Israel in the position of an unintelligent person, by the side of the Master of the Christians. Lastly it is, as we shall presently see more clearly, the constant method of the fourth evangelist in detailing the conversations of Jesus, to form the knot and the progress of the discussion, by making the interlocutors understand literally what Jesus intended figuratively.

In reply to the second query of Nicodemus, Jesus takes entirely the tone of the fourth evangelist's prologue (v. 11-13). The question hence arises, whether the evangelist Lorrowed from Jesus, or lent to him hid own style. A previous investigation has decided in favour of the latter alternative, But this inquiry referred merely to the form of the discourses; in relation to their matter, its analogy with the ideas of Philo, does not authorize us at once to conclude that the writer here puts his Alexandrian doctrine of the Logos into the mouth of Jesus because the expressions, "speak what we do know," and, No man has ascended up to heaven," have an analogy with Matt. xi. 27; and the idea of the pre-existence of the Messiah which is here propounded, is, as we have seen, not foreign to the apostle Paul.

V. 14 and 15 Jesus proceeds from the more simple things of the earth, (the communications concerning the new birth,) to the more difficult things of heaven, (the announcement of the destination of the Messiah to a vicarious death.) The Son of Man, he says, must be lifted up which, in John's phraseology, signifies crucifixion, with an allusion to a glorifying exaltation,) in the same way, and with the same effect, as the brazen serpent (Numb. xxi. 8, 9.) Here many questions press upon us.

Is it credible, that Jesus already, at the very beginning of his ^{P.399} public ministry, foresaw his death, and in the specific form of crucifixion? and that long before he instructed his disciples on this point, he made a communication on the subject to a Pharisee? Can it be held consistent with the wisdom of Jesus as a teacher, that. he, should impart such knowledge to Nicodemus? Even L cke puts the question why, when Nicodemus Iiad not understood the more obvious doctrine, Jesus tormented him with the more recondite, and especially with the secret of the Messiah's death, which was then so remote? He answers: it accords perfectly with the wisdom of Jesus as a teacher, that he should reveal the sufferings appointed for him by God as early as possible, because no instruction was better adapted to cast down false worldly hopes. But the more remote the idea of the Messiah's death from the conceptions of his contemporaries, owing to the worldliness of their expectations, the more impressively and unequivocally must Jesus express that idea, if he wished to promulgate it; not in an enigmatical form which he could not be sure that Nicodemus would understand. L cke continues: Nicodemus was a man open to instruction; one of whom good might be expected. But in this very conversation, his dulness of comprehension in earthly things had evinced that he must have still less capacity for heavenly things: and, according to v. 12, Jesus himself despaired of enlightening him with respect to them. L cke, however, observes, that it was a practice with Jesus to follow up easy doctrine which had not been comprehended, by difficult doctrine which was of course less comprehensible; thai he purposed thus to give a spur to the minds of his hearers, and by straining their attention, engage them to reflect.

But the examples which L cke adduces of such proceeding on the part of Jesus, are all drawn from the fourth gospel. Now the very point in question is, whether that gospel correctly represents the teaching of Jesus; consequently L cke argues in a circle. We have seen a similar procedure ascribed to Jesus in his conversation with the woman of Samaria, and we have already declared our opinion that such an overburdening of weak faculties with enigma on enigma, does not accord with the wise rule as to the communication of doctrine, which the same gospel puts into the mouth of Jesus, xvi. 12. It would not stimulate, but confuse, the mind of the hearer, who persisted in a misapprehension of the well-known figure of the new birth, to present to him the novel comparison of the Messiah and his death, to the brazen serpent and its effects; a comparison quite incongruous with his Jewish ideas. In the first three Gospels Jesus pursues an entirely different course. In these, where a misconstruction betrays itself on the part, of the disciples, Jesus (except where he breaks off altogether, or where it is evident that the evangelist unhistorically associates a number of metaphorical discourses) applies himself with the assiduity of an earnest teacher to the thorough explanation of the difficulty, and not until ^{P.400} he has effected this does he proceed, step by step, to convey further instruction (e. g. Matt. xiii.10ff.36ff.; xv. 16; xvi.8ff.) This is the method of a wise teacher; on the contrary, to leap from one subject to another, to overburden and strain the mind of the hearer, a mode of instruction which the fourth evangelist attributes to Jesus, is wholly inconsistent with that character. To explain this inconsistency, we must suppose that the writer of the fourth gospel thought to heighten in the most effective manner the contrast which appears from the first, between the wisdom of the one party and the incapacity of the other, by representing the teacher as overwhelming the pupil who put unintelligent questions on the most elementary doctrine, with lofty and difficult themes, beneath which his faculties are laid prostrate.

Even those commentators who pretend to some ability in this department, lose all hope of showing that the remainder of the discourse may have been spoken by Jesus. Not only does Paulus make this confession, but even Olshausen, with a concise statement of his reasons. At the above verse, any special reference to Nicodemus vanishes, and there is commenced an entirely general discourse on the destination of the Son of God, to confer a blessing on the world, and on the manner in which unbelief forfeits this blessing. Moreover, these ideas are. expressed in a form, which at one moment appears to be a reminiscence of the evangelist's introduction, and at another has a striking similarity with passages in the first epistle of John. In particular, the expression the "only begotten Son," which is repeatedly (v. 16 and 18.) attributed to Jesus as a designation of his own person, is nowhere else found in his mouth, even in the fourth gospel; this circumstance, however, marks it still more positively as a favourite phrase of the evangelist (i. 14-18), and of the writer of the Epistles (1 John iv. 9). Further, many things are spoken of as past, which at the supposed period of this conversation with Nicodemus were yet future.

For even if the words, "he gave," ' refer not to the giving over ^{P.401} to death, but to the sending of the Messiah into the world; the expressions, men loved darkness, and their deeds were evil, (v. 19), as L cke also remarks, could only be used after the triumph of darkness had been achieved in the rejection and execution of Jesus: they belong then to the evangelist's point of view at the time when he wrote, not to that of Jesus when on the threshold of his public ministry. In general the whole of this discourse attributed to Jesus, with its constant use of the third person to designate the supposed speaker; with its dogmatical terms only begotten, light, and the like, applied to Jesus; with its comprehensive view of the crisis and its results, which the appearance of Jesus produced, is far too objective for us to believe that it came from the lips of Jesus. Jesus could not speak thus of himself, but the evangelist might speak thus of Jesus. Hence the same expedient has been adopted, as in the case of the Baptist's discourse already considered, and it has been supposed that Jesus is the speaker down to v. 16, but that from that point the evangelist appends his own dogmatic reflections. But there is again here no intimation of such a transition in the text; rather, the connecting word for, yap (v. 16), seems to indicate a continuation of the same discourse. No writer, and least of all the fourth evangelist (comp. vii. 39; xi. 51 f.; xii. 16: xxxiii.37ff.), would scatter his own observations thus undistinguishingly, unless he wished to create a misapprehension, f

If then it be established that the evangelist, from v. 16. to the end of the discourse, means to represent Jesus as the speaker, while Jesus can never have so spoken; we cannot rest satisfied with the half measure adopted by Luke, when he maintains that it is really Jesus who continues to speak from the above passage, but that the evangelist has interwoven his own explanations and amplifications more liberally than before. For this admission undermines all certainty as to how far the discourse belongs to Jesus, and how far to the evangelist; besides, as the discourse is distinguished by the closest uniformity of thought and style, it must be ascribed either wholly to Jesus or wholly to the evangelist. Qf these two alternatives the former is, according to the above considerations, impossible; we are ^{P.402} therefore restricted to the latter, which we Iiave observed to be entirely consistent with the manner of the fourth evangelist.

But not only on the passage v. 16-21 must we pass this judgment: v. 14 has appeared to us out of keeping with the position of Jesus; and the behaviour of Nicodemus, v. 4 and 9, altogether inconceivable. Thus in the very rirst sample, when compared with the observations which we have already made on John iii.22ff.; iv.1ff., the fourth gospel presents to us all the peculiarities which characterize its mode of reporting the discourses of Jesus. They are usually commenced in the form of dialogue, and so far as this extends, the lever that propels the conversation is the striking contrast between the spiritual sense and the carnal interpretation of the language of Jesus: generally, however, the dialogue is merged into an uninterrupted discourse, in which the writer blends the person o'f Jesus with his own, and makes the former use concerning himself, language which could only be used by John concerning Jesus.