The Prophet Jesus and the Renewal of Israel: Moving Beyond a Diversionary Debate, Richard Horsley, Grand Rapids:

Eerdmans, 2012 (ISBN 9780802868077), vi + 161 pp., Pb $20.00. Richard Horsleys latest volume, The Prophet Jesus and the Renewal of Israel: Moving Beyond a Diversionary Debate, responds to what the author understands to be two major problems in the field of historical Jesus research. According to Horsley, the first problem is the debate about whether or not (and to what degree) the historical Jesus derived his perspective and message from the so-called apocalypticism of the Second Temple period. Horsley diagnoses the second pressing problem in the methodologywidespread in historical Jesus researchof focusing on individual sayings of Jesus in isolation from their literary context(s). Thus, in the opening paragraphs of The Prophet Jesus, Horsley identifies the diversionary debate of the books subtitle and hints at what his corrective will be in later chapters. The Prophet Jesus and the Renewal of Israel is laid out in two broad movements. Part one, The Apocalyptic Jesus: A Diversionary Debate, supplies readers with Horsleys diagnosis and critique of the two aforementioned problems in historical Jesus research. In part two, The Prophet of Renewal: Jesus in Historical Context, Horsley offers his own methodology for constructing a more holistic picture of the historical Jesus. In chapters one through three, Horsley reviews some of the major paradigm shifts in historical Jesus studies: the apocalyptic Jesus of the early twentieth century, the non-apocalyptic Jewish sage which followed, and the modern reassertion of the apocalyptic Jesus in the latter twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. Here readers who are unfamiliar with the broad contours of historical Jesus research are met with a helpful review of the dominant reconstructions of Jesus over the last hundred years. In three chapters, Horsley reviews and criticizes three influential perspectives about the historical Jesus, deftly navigating the diverse projects of Schweitzer, Bultmann, Borg, Crossan, Ehrman, and Allison. Schweitzer and Bultmann, scholars whose names are unfamiliar to no one in historical Jesus studies, are both criticized for relying too heavily on form criticism and a belief that Jesus derived his eschatological perspective from an apocalyptic scenario which was supposedly shared by many in Jesus cultural milieu. Although the apocalyptic Jesus of Schweitzer and Bultmann was influential, Horsley notes in chapter two that the tides utterly turned with later investigation that suggested a sapiential, decidedly non-apocalyptic Jesus. Here Horsley brings scholars such as Borg and Crossan and their reconstruction of Jesus as a Jewish sage into the conversation. Horsley roundly criticizes the methodology of divorcing individual sayings of Jesus from their literary contexts as highly individualized and a-historical, and ultimately casts a suspicious eye on Crossans reconstruction of Jesus as a Jewish sage. Horsley completes his review of historical Jesus research in chapter four, in which he reviews and critiques the contributions of Allison and Ehrman, who have reasserted the apocalyptic Jesus in their recent reconstructions of the man from Galilee. Horsleys own contribution to historical Jesus research begins in the latter chapters of part one and is realized fully in part two. Horsley begins by calling for a recontextualization of apocalypticism as a form of scribal resistance to imperial hegemony in the Second Temple period in Judea. According to Horsley, Judean apocalyptic literature is not simply about the end of the world as such, but rather, is a genre of literature in the prophetic tradition that forecasts Gods coming to defeat oppressive rulers or the foreign kings who have conquered his people

(41). As such, Jesus, inasmuch as he is apocalyptic, is not simply an eschatological visionary, but a prophet who foresees the impending doom not of the world, but of those whose rule over Gods people is unjust. In part two, The Prophet of Renewal: Jesus in Historical Context, Horsley lays out his methodology for reconstructing the historical Jesus as a prophet leading a renewal movement against the rulers of Israel. Horsley begins by overturning the table of those whose primary modus operandi has been isolating individual sayings of Jesus from their literary context: [t]he most obvious problem is the historical impossibility of anyone communicating intelligibly with other people only or mainly in isolated individual sayings (69). The meaning of any individual saying of Jesus can only be known by its relation to its meaning-context (70); therefore, the Gospels, which are the literary contexts for the isolated sayings of Jesus, must be taken whole as whole stories about Jesus and the movement(s) he catalyzed (71). The Gospel narratives reveal what Horsley repeatedly calls a Jesus-in-movement: a man who engaged in interaction and conflict with other people in the concrete circumstances and particular (political-economicreligious) forms of first-century Roman Palestine (74). Thus, by taking the Gospels of Mark and Q whole, Horsley constructs a prophetic Jesus of Nazareth who led a renewal movement and challenged (and was subsequently killed by) the rulers of Israel for his prophetic action. Readers who are familiar with Horsleys project will find much here that is reminiscent of his earlier works. This appears to be intentional, as Horsley directs readers to his own work throughout the footnotes for fuller treatments of issues that can only be touched on in this short book. As such, The Prophet Jesus appears to be, at least in part, a popularization of important contributions Horsley has made throughout his careerthough the volume is certainly not without its new contributions to the field. In all, The Prophet Jesus and the Renewal of Israel stands as an important challenge to dominant trends in historical Jesus research and would serve as a fine book for graduate and advanced undergraduate courses on the historical Jesus. Daniel M. Yencich University of Denver/Iliff School of Theology