Excavating Jesus or Inventing a Jesus?
An Examination of Recent Efforts to Support Historical Criticism of the Gospels with
Archaeological and Sociological Data
By Dennis M. Swanson,
Head Librarian and Director of Israel Studies
The Master`s Seminary
Sun Valley, California
Presented at the Annual Meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society
November 21, 2003
Atlanta, Georgia
Introduction
he Quest for the Historical Jesus has entered a new and interesting phase. The co-
lored marbles of the Jesus Seminar, which were used to vote on what Jesus may or
may not have said, are being replaced, or at least supplemented, by the tools and methodolo-
gies of the archaeologist. The joining of literary and archaeological forces to study the His-
torical Jesus will naturally face potential problems, as John R. Bartlett noted, the literary
scholar has not always understood the limitations of the archaeological evidence, and the
archaeologist has not always understood the complexities of the literary evidence.
1
Howev-
er, as Freyne notes, New Testament scholars, for their part, are becoming more conscious of
the need for dialogue with their dirt` colleagues.
2
1
John R. Bartlett, What Has Archaeology to do with the Bible? in Archaeology and Biblical Interpretation.
John R. Bartlett (ed). (New York: Routeledge, 1997): 2.
2
Sean V. Freyne. Archaeology and the Historical Jesus, in Archaeology and Biblical Interpretation. John R.
Bartlett (ed). (New York: Routeledge, 1997): 118.
T