Knowing the Historical Jesus

Images of Jesus

Popular images of Jesus are often related to devotions - like the devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the Divine Mercy, the Infant Jesus of Prague, and the Black Nazarene. There are also popular images of Jesus like the image of Jesus the Good Shepherd, the image of Christ the King, the Risen Christ, the crucified Christ, and many more. These popular images of Jesus, and the devotions that were born from them, have a basis from the Bible. It is only when a particular aspect of the person of Jesus is emphasized that the images are given form and a devotion is born from the image.

The Historical Jesus

Realizing that the popular images of Jesus have some basis in Scripture, then it follows that knowing the Scriptural image of Jesus is as close as we can get to the historical Jesus. One biblical scholar stated that there are words in the gospel uttered by Jesus that are Aramaic in origin. One such Aramaic word is "Abba", which means Father. The result of this study suggests that Jesus was of Aramaic descent. Another plain understanding of what racial stock Jesus came from is from the genealogy given in the gospel of Matthew. From this genealogy, Jesus was a descendant from the Jewish family of David. And we can also gather that Jesus was brought up as a Jew by the observance of Joseph and Mary of the Jewish rituals when Jesus was young - like the offering of a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.

Jesus and table fellowship

One other aspect of the historical Jesus that is often overlooked, is that Jesus used the meal and the social gathering around these meals as occasions for his preaching and teaching. Sometimes focus is made on Jesus as the Crucified One that many Catholics forget that the entire ministry of Jesus was one of drinking and eating with both the Scribes and the Pharisees and with the sinners and the tax collectors. Being together in a meal in the time of Jesus meant table fellowship. If two men were not in good terms with one another, they would not eat together. But Jesus exactly used the context of a meal to create Christian relationships that bound people together. This is why the Last Supper was highly emphasized in the Gospel and soon became the source for the institution of the holy Eucharist.

Jesus was not discriminatory

Although men counted more than women in Jewish culture, Jesus had women disciples following Him. He even permitted a woman to wipe her hair on his feet as an expression of her deep sorrow for her sins. And not only was Jesus not discriminatory to women, but He was very accepting of all people - the outcasts, the marginalized, the lepers, the sinners, the tax collectors, the widows, the orphans, the poor, the foreigner [the Samaritan woman], and many more. Even though Jesus was raised in Jewish culture, because of the mission entrusted to Him by the Father, He let love transcend the laws of His culture and created a culture that is specifically Christian.

Jesus was a man of prayer

The gospel of Luke especially heightens the person of Jesus as a man of prayer. There would always be references and allusions to Him as going out to a lonely place to pray. Also, in the gospel of Luke, he says and teaches a lot about the subject of prayer. It is in the gospel of Luke (and also to be found in Matthew) where He teaches the Our Father (Lk 11:2-4). Any serious decision that He had to make, He made it a point to pray. This can be seen also before He chose the twelve apostles. (Lk 6:12-16) This passage says that Jesus went out to the hills to pray; and He spent the whole night in prayer to God. And the next day he summoned His disciples and picked out twelve of them. Also, we have the gospel account of His prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane before His passion.

Jesus was a man of action

Although Jesus spent many times in prayer, He was also a man of action. His ministry is filled with many accounts of preaching, teaching, healing and the working of miracles. In fact, He was so active (as a Gospel passage states) that He leads a crowd to gather in a way that they could not even have a meal! (Mk 3:20-21). He went from town to town preaching about the Kingdom, teaching many things, and healing many people - making the blind see, the deaf hear, the mute speak, the lame walk, the lepers clean and driving evil and unclean spirits from the possessed.

The historical Jesus is the biblical Jesus

Those who study more in-depth the historicity of the bible accounts and also examine the cultural elements embedded in the text, discover more about the person of Jesus as He had lived as a Jew in His time. There are also other sources for knowing who Jesus is aside from the biblical texts. One other source is the Dead Sea Scrolls. Another is the Shroud of Turin. And the most popular ones are the gospels of Thomas and the other writings on Jesus not considered canonical by the Catholic Church. Although these other sources are not counted by the Catholic Church as official sources for knowing the historical and biblical Jesus, they can bring some light upon certain biblical passages that we may not know of without them.

Conclusion:

The more one prays and study the gospels, the more one becomes familiar with the biblical and the historical Jesus. The image of Jesus provided by the passages of the Gospel will help purify images of Him that have been popularized by the many devotions that have been handed down from folk religiosity. Also, one would benefit a lot from the meditation made on passages of the Gospels. Such prayer and meditations strengthen one's relationship with God.

St. Madeleine Sophie Barat, Foundress of the RSCJ

St. Madeleine Sophie Barat (1779-1865 A.D.)

St. Madeleine Sophie Barat was called by God to found a religious order of women whose work is to educate young women for leadership roles and positions in society.

Praying to the Sacred Heart of Jesus

St. Madeleine Sophie Barat (1779-1865 A.D.) is the foundress of the Religious of the Sacred Heart. When she was just 10 years old in Joigny, Burgundy in France, she first knew of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and of the Immaculate Heart of Mary through images in their own home. Her brother, Louis Barat, who was 21 years old at the time, was imprisoned during the Reign of Terror. This situation made their parents and Madeleine prayed fervent before those images - entrusting Louis Barat to God. This spiritual experience made such a deep impression on Madeleine Sophie. The Sacred Heart of Jesus then came to be the focus of her devotion.

Education in Paris

After the Reign of Terror, Louis Barat returned home as a priest. That was in 1795 A.D. When Louis noticed his sister to have grown and with much intelligence, he persuaded their parents to allow him to take Madeleine for a good education in Paris. Louis believed that she was destined for an outstanding service in the Church. Under the direction then of her brother in Paris, Madeleine Sophie devoted hours every day in studying the writings of the fathers of the Church, the classics of western spirituality, and the Scriptures.

Origins of the Religious of the Sacred Heart

As she studied in Paris, St. Madeleine Sophie felt attracted to the contemplative life and so planned to become a Carmelite. But Joseph Varin, a priest in Paris who got to know Madeleine Sophie, also believed as her brother Louis did, that her intelligence indicate that she is called to more active service in the apostolate. And since convent schools in France at the time had been destroyed, these priests urged St. Madeleine to establish an order that would work for the education of girls. At the time also, St. Madeleine Sophie was directed to lead the family of a French branch of the just started religious congregation of Dilette Gesú. Eventually, without intending it, she was already laying the foundation for a separate congregation - the Religious of the Sacred Heart.

The Spirituality and Thought of St. Madeleine Sophie

In the mind of St. Madeleine, devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus was closely linked to devotion to the Blessed Sacrament. She followed the tradition of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque and also emphasized reparation, the practice of the Holy Hour for the first Friday of the month, and the use of devotions and prayers intended to draw people to the worship of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. With her influence in these spiritual practices, the custom of making a half-hour of mental prayer daily before the Blessed Sacrament grew up in her congregation.

The Interior Life

Though St. Madeleine Sophie emphasized formal prayer, she also said that interior life is even more than prayer. And she points out the constant recollection of God's presence throughout the activities of the day as a good exercise to develop this interior life. She continues to add that this renewed recollection of God's presence is equivalent to the entire sacrifice of oneself. Such an action also makes a person truly given over to the action of God. St. Madeleine Sophie describes this reality to one of her sisters in her writing:

"Few give themselves over to the Holy Spirit, and what a mistake we make in not being among the privileged few! Believe me, it costs much more to stay in a miserable mediocrity in which one belongs neither to God nor to oneself. It is like swimming between two currents; it is difficult and dangerous. Hurry up and plunge into mid-stream. The Holy Spirit will then carry you and you will get to port much more quickly" (Letters 5 vols., II, 339)

Much of St. Madeleine Sophie's interior life was lived under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit drew her to an immersion and inner penetration of the gospels. She was much absorbed in the mysteries of Christ in the course of the liturgical year of the Church. This inner life that revolved around the mysteries of Jesus made St. Madeleine Sophie more aware of God's love and His guidance.

The Work of Education

The work by which St. Madeleine Sophie and her congregation was best known for in her lifetime and also years thereafter, was that of boarding schools for girls of affluent families. St. Madeleine Sophie saw the pressing need of good Christian education for young women who can become leaders in society. She wanted them to exercise a good influence by following ideals of service, self-sacrifice, and strong faith. Even with all the work that soon consumed the activities of all in the congregation, St. Madeleine Sophie never ceased to teach her spiritual daughters that prayer must not be of less importance than activities. She stresses that prayer must dominate and sustain all activities.

Old Age and Death

St. Madeleine thought that in old age the religious should give their major attention and energies to prayer, as she also wished for herself. However, despite her desire to do so, the Congregation she founded refused to release her from her duties as superior general at the age of 84. St. Madeleine Sophie accepted this as God's will for her. She therefore continued to the end until she totally gave herself to God upon her death in 1865 A.D.

Related resources:

• Spiritualities of the Heart

What Happened to the Apostles After Pentecost (Part four)

St. Simon

St. Simon the Zealot was one of the original followers of Jesus. Story-traditions from the West say that he preached in Egypt, and then went on to Persia with St. Jude Thaddeus. Both of them suffered martyrdom in Persia. Another tradition, this time from the East, tells a different story. It reports that St. Simon died peacefully at Edessa. Other story-traditions say that St. Simon also went in his missionary journeys to Libya and into present-day Tunisia. And there is also evidence that this apostle took the gospel with him to Britain, where Christianity took root because of him, before Britain became a colony of Rome in 42 A.D. The most popular tradition commonly believed by many, is that Simon died a martyr together with St. Jude Thaddeus. The two were stoned to death by a mob led by pagan leaders.

St. Jude Thaddeus

St. Jude was a relative of Jesus. He preached the gospel in Judea, Samaria, Idumaea, Syria, Mesopotamia, Armenia, and Libya. He is the author of a New Testament epistle bearing his name. As he preached in many places, he strongly attacked the heresies of the Simonians, Nicolaites, and Gnostics. It was in Armenia (which was under Persian rule) where he suffered martyrdom. His death as a martyr however bore much fruit, because Armenia was finally converted to Christianity in the third century A.D. St. Jude is known to have performed many miracles. These were due to his powerful intercession. He has been made the patron saint of lost causes and hopeless cases.

St. Matthias

We all know what happened to Judas Iscariot, the one who betrayed Jesus to the chief priests. After the Ascension of Jesus, St. Peter addressed the assembly of Christ's followers and said that someone must take the place of Judas Iscariot to fulfill the Scripture. At first, the choice was narrowed down to two: Joseph Barsabbas and Matthias. After the whole assembly prayed for guidance before drawing lots, Matthias was selected. A story-tradition handed down by historians Clement of Alexandria, Eusebius, and St. Jerome, report that St. Matthias first preached in Judaea, then to Cappadocia, and to the shores of the Caspian Sea. In his preaching, he was remarkably insistent upon the necessity of mortifying the flesh to subdue temptations - an important lesson he learned from Jesus and which he himself practiced faithfully. Because of this, he suffered great persecutions and ill-treatment and was eventually martyred in Colchis.

Summary and conclusion

Writers have repeated many times in their works that Jesus is not a myth nor a legend but walked with the people of His time and became part of human history. One truth that attests strongly to what these writers report, is the zeal by which the apostles preached the Gospel, and their readiness to suffer even death for their love of Christ. After this era of the apostles, the early Christians who knew the apostles likewise did what the apostles have taught them by both word and deed. The first centuries of early Christianity were marked by strong martyrs who sacrificed their lives, in the same spirit as Jesus, so that the Good News of salvation may be brought to as many people as possible. This tradition of martyrdom that began with the apostles, continues to this day. Those who are called by God to witness to the saving power of Jesus, through death as martyrs, are all great gifts to the Church - influencing the Church to become stronger in their faith in God.

Resources of these blog posts

• Dictionary of Saints, by John J. Delaney
• A Year with the Saints, by Don Bosco Press, Inc.
• Saints for Our Times, by Ed Ransom