Jesus the Jew (1973 Vermès), book

Jesus the Jew (1973) is a book by Géza Vermès

Abstract

Vermes places Jesus squarely in his first-century Palestinian Jewish environment, reclaiming the Jewishness of Jesus from scholars who prefer to ignore it. The resulting picture of Jesus is thoroughly Jewish; he turns out to be a Galilean hasid, a Jewish holy man similar to Honi the Circle Drawer and Hanina ben Dosa, a figure that Vermes believes is vastly underused as a Jewish model for Jesus. In the first half of the text (“The Setting”) Vermes addresses Jesus’ Galilean context; the second half (“The Titles of Jesus”) interprets Jesus from the context of five well-known Jewish titles that have been applied to Jesus – prophet, Lord, Messiah, son of man, and Son of God. This work is the predecessor of many important Jewish studies of Jesus, and contrasts with the work of Jesus scholars, following the lead of the Jesus Seminar, who marginalize the Jewishness of Jesus. The book is the first of a trilogy on Jesus by Vermes. He published Jesus and the World of Judaism in 1983, and then The Religion of Jesus the Jew in 1993. - Ronald Ruark, University of Michigan.