Richard Bauckham seems to be making a habit out of subverting the commonly held assumptions of modern biblical criticism (see, for example, The Gospels for All Christians, also reviewed on this site). In God Crucified, Bauckham makes the bold assertion that the earliest Christology was a "high", fully divine Christology in which Jesus was included in the "divine identity". "Divine identity" is the term Bauckham has coined to describe how Second Temple Jews would have thought about God. Bauckham suggests that for the Jews monotheism was a question of who God is rather than what God is. Therefore, to project onto the New Testament Greek philosophical ideas about the nature and essence of God is to be untrue to the context in which the texts arose. In the first chapter, Bauckham expounds on the distinction in Second Temple Judaism between God and intermediary figures such as principal angels and exalted patriarchs. He does this with a mind to overturn the attempt made in some scholarly circles to see New Testament Christology as developing from these intermediary figures, suggesting that such a development would lead to an Arian Christology rather than an orthodox, divine Christology. His summary argument is that God was completely distinguished from such intermediary figures by the fact that the Jews considered Him to be (among other things) the sole Creator of and Sovereign over all things. As such, He alone deserved worship, and any attempt to raise the patriarchs or angels to His exalted throne would be seen as a challenge to monotheism. However, there was a second category of intermediary figures in Second Temple Jewish literature, which were seen as hypostatizations or characterizations of God, including the Wisdom, the Word, and the Spirit of God. These intermediary figures were seen as part of YHWH's identity. Bauckham proceeds to argue that it was these intermediaries, particularly Wisdom and Word, that allowed the New Testament authors to see Jesus as integral to the divine identity.

In chapter 2, Bauckham shows how the New Testament writers used "creative exegesis" of the Old Testament to include Jesus in the divine identity. He demonstrates this by highlighting the NT writers' attribution to Jesus of five characteristics or prerogatives normally reserved for God alone: Jesus is given sovereignty over "all things"; He shares God's exaltation over all angelic powers; He is given the divine name; He is accorded worship; and the pre-existent Christ participates in the creation with God. While the inclusion of Jesus, a man, in the divine identity is unprecedented in Jewish literature, Bauckham argues that it is not impossible within Jewish monotheism. Moreover, he shows that the NT writers, who were almost all Jews, did in fact include Jesus in the divine identity. They were able to do this because they were not concerned so much with what God is as with who God is. In including Jesus in the divine identity, the NT writers were making a new statement about who God is without in any way compromising their monotheism.

In the final chapter, Bauckham gets to the heart of his argument: the implications of his thesis for the identity of God. In an age when many if not most biblical scholars shun theological considerations in favor of the historical-critical method, it is refreshing to read a scholar speculate on how Jesus reveals God to us and what we can learn about Who God is through Jesus. Bauckham first explores the Christian exegesis of "Deutero-Isaiah" (Isaiah 40-55) in three NT documents--Philippians 2:5-11, the Book of Revelation, and the Gospel of John--and shows how each author used creative exegesis of this pivotal section of Isaiah to define a "Christological monotheism", as well as to demonstrate how the divine identity is revealed in and through the humiliation and exaltation of Jesus. Particularly insightful and thought provoking is his treatment of John. For example, Bauckham suggests that because of the ambiguity of the "ego eimi" sayings, they could be translated as "I am he" rather than the traditional "I AM". However, this alternative translation would still be a veiled claim to divinity as the phrase occurs seven times in John's Gospel and seven times in the OT, each time in the context of YHWH asserting his singular position as Lord of all. The highlight, though, in my opinion is the discussion about what the inclusion of Jesus in the divine identity reveals to us about the character of God, and here only a quotation will do justice:

The divine identity is known in the radical contrast and conjunction of exaltation and humiliation--as the God who is Creator of all things, and no less truly God in the human life of Jesus; as the God who is Sovereign over all things, and no less truly God in Jesus' human obedience and service; as the God of transcendent majesty who is no less truly God in the abject humiliation of the cross. These are not contradictions because God is self-giving love, as much in his creation and rule of all things as in his human incarnation and death. The radical contrast of humiliation and exaltation is precisely the revelation of who God is in his radically self-giving love.

Bauckham draws other insightful conclusions about the new name of God revealed by Jesus, but the reader will have to consult the work to learn more. Also encouraging are the implications the thesis has for interpreting the development of Christology in the early Church. Instead of the common assumption that the decrees of Nicaea and Constantinople were a capitulation to Greek philosophical ideas, Bauckham suggests that "[i]n the context of the Arian controversies, Nicene theology was essentially an attempt to resist the implications of Greek philosophical understandings of divinity and to re-appropriate in a new conceptual context the New Testament's inclusion of Jesus in the unique divine identity."

Overall, I highly recommend God Crucified. However, the reader should be forewarned--Bauckham states from the outset that this is "not so much a 'popular' as a concise version". Those unfamiliar with current scholarly debate about New Testament Christology may miss the novelty and subversiveness of his argument. In addition, the book being a concise version, the author does not have the space to fully defend his position on the interpretation of the intermediary figures in Second Temple Judaism, among other topics, and he only broadly states his position without a defense. Those wishing a more detailed analysis will have to wait for the fuller study to be published at a later date. Nevertheless, most readers will come away from this work with a new understanding of the New Testament writers' understanding of Jesus and a greater appreciation for the depth of God's love for us. To see such things expounded in a scholarly work gives me great hope for the future of biblical scholarship.