Jesus of the Nazareth

Methodology

             According to the preface to the first part of his work, Joseph Ratzinger began his dream of building the text “Jesus of Nazareth”, a few years before his appointment as the supreme pontiff of the Roman Apostolic Catholic Church, through the cardinal college, in the conclave of the year 2005, after the death of Pope John Paul II.

            The corpus being elaborated in three volumes, it has as its central theme the approach on the person “Jesus of Nazareth”, whose figure is fundamental in the Christian faith, not so much as a theory, but a persona, God himself made flesh, manifested in life concrete - daily life, whose relationship with humanity has revealed and continues to reveal divine filial love for all men.

            Ratzinger makes it clear that despite the publication of this great commentary on Jesus, during his pontificate, he does not present it in a magisterial format, that is, explaining his singular character, that is, the result of his own experience and elaboration of reflection, subject to theological contestation - someone else's literary.

            Already in the intricacies of the first part of “Jesus of Nazareth”, he emphasizes the value of biblical exegesis, mainly using some historical-ecclesiastical data, such as the publication of the encyclical: Divino afflante spiritu in 1943, whose ecclesial opening to hermeneutic-exegetical research, under the historical-critical methodological perspective it worked as an awakening and impulse for Catholic scholars, such as Rudolf Schnackenburg, quoted by Ratzinger in the preface to his first volume.

            Other relevant documents of the magisterium such as the conciliar constitution “Dei Verbum” (from Vatican II) and those of the Pontifical Biblical Commission: “The interpretation of the Bible in the Church” and “The Jewish people and their Holy Scripture in the Christian Bible” were also shown elementary to Ratzinger's theological clarification.

This one will defend the unspeakable and unavoidable importance of historical-critical exegesis, the investigation of the engendering traditions of texts: its historical character of scriptural erection.

However, it will not present it as the only model of interpretive “diving” in the Sacred Scriptures, following the steps of the Magisterium itself, which points, for example, to canonical exegesis, based on the totality already formed and present in the biblical books constituted in the canon. .

            It does not propose a theoretical encounter with an icon of global history, nevertheless, an authentic approach to Jesus, a person, who also being historical, is the “Christ of faith” - thus breaking the dichotomy established in the 1950s, immanent in the spheres academics.

            His theology, in this way, ratifies the unity defended by the Church between the human and divine dimensions of Jesus, and indicates, in the subtleties of his theological work, a path of personalized discipleship and encounter with the Lord.

“Jesus of Nazareth”: volume I

Regarding the structure of “Jesus of Nazareth”, it is not by chance that Ratzinger chooses to introduce the Galilean ministry through the volume first: starting from the baptism in the Jordan River until the event of the Transfiguration, for which in the whole of Jesuit public life, little little by little, the messianic (Christ) character is being unveiled.

With regard to the chapters, they are subdivided, respectively, as follows: the baptism of Jesus; Jesus' temptations; the Gospel of the Kingdom of God; the Sermon on the Mount; the Lord's prayer; the disciples; the message of the parables; the great images of São João; two important beacons on Jesus' path: Peter's confession and the Transfiguration; and Jesus' self-affirmations.

 The Kingdom of God:

 “After John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee. He preached the Gospel of God and said: The time is complete, the Kingdom of God is at hand. Convert and believe in the Gospel ”(Mc 1,14ss) - Ratzinger also presents in this first book, as mentioned above (in the third chapter) the question about the Kingdom of God, a conceptual principle so debated by theologians, although it is unanimously accepted as the center of the evangelical proclamation.

Some tend to generate a certain schizophrenia between the Kingdom, Jesus and the Church, following the denunciation of the Author. Another view agreed by Ratzinger will defend, on the other hand, the semantic complementation between them.

The Theologian quotes three propositions: One is configured from the Kingdom as the immediate identification with Jesus himself, a kind of “autobasileia” (Origen): Jesus is the Kingdom already present among us. The other, from an idealistic perspective: the Kingdom as something that comes from the interior (spiritual) coming from the action of man (from the interior to action), and also as an ecclesiological explanation: not the full equivalence, but the approximation between Kingdom and Church. Certainly, the relation between the points of view listed cannot be denied, however it must be borne in mind that the gospels show a greater reality about the Kingdom: Various realities are embraced, which reveal God's plan to reign in the world, that is, where the Presence, which is Jesus-Kingdom, helped by the Church (promoter of the seeds of the Kingdom), transmits the values ​​of a different world, where solidarity and love must be the guiding flags of praxis.  According to this conjunction of the concepts reiterated above, the Kingdom does not end in a single perspective, but opens itself to the greatest, to the good established among men, as the first fruits of the eschatological sign of full life (cf. Jn 10,10) for all, culminating in eternity.

· Jesus of Nazareth: volume II

Continuing his intellectual production, the pope writes two more volumes, completing the cycle about “Jesus of Nazareth”.

The second volume with the subtitle: “From the entry into Jerusalem until the Resurrection” - it encompasses exactly the critical and, at the same time, grandiose period of the Jesuit ministry, from the moments preceding his passion and death, to the mystery of the resurrection, which is wrapped.

If the son of God is dead, can there be hope?

The glorification of God by the resurrection will allow a new hermeneutics for men, responds the “Ratzingerian” reflection.

Christ (Messiah), savior, resurrected, not as a returned corpse, but as a new, transfigured body, a sign of the new creation inaugurated, will allow men an unbreakable faith, open to the infinite, to the unlimited transcendent, builder of a different world, of the resurrection of all, of the definitive “vitalization” of humanity.

This will be engendered as one of the themes inserted in the second part of Jesus of Nazareth, whose structural subdivision is given by the following chapters, respectively: entry into Jerusalem and purification of the temple; the eschatological discourse of Jesus; the foot wash; the priestly prayer of Jesus; The last supper; Gethsemane; the Jesus process; the crucifixion and the deposition of Jesus in the tomb; and Jesus' resurrection from the dead.

The pope will once again affirm the need to go beyond the methodological principles of historical-critical exegesis, and will not justify the intention of writing a Christology manual, especially its valorization character, through its textual sinuosities, the personal encounter with Christ Jesus:

 I tried to develop a look at the Jesus of the Gospels and a listening to Him that could become an encounter and, however, in listening in communion with Jesus' disciples of all times, also reach the certainty of the truly historical figure of Jesus (BENTO XVI, 2011, p. 14).

Jesus of Nazareth: volume III

As a conclusion to his theological essay, Benedict XVI composes the third and final part, entitled: “The childhood of Jesus”.

Despite its not very extensive writing, this booklet has a reflective depth, presenting some elements connected to the so-called “childhood gospels” in Luke and Matthew.

Ratzinger presents some singularities, even questioned peculiarly by the society, as the question of the crib, much more a symbol, than a historical concreteness, regarding the details of how many and which animals were at that moment.

The chapters will be subdivided as follows, respectively: “where are you from?” (Jo 19,9); the announcement of the birth of John the Baptist and Jesus; the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem; and the wizards of the East and the flight to Egypt.

The text concludes with an epilogue on the adolescence of Jesus, a phase also shrouded in mystery, but which illuminates an important phase in the life of Galileo - his being with his family and the local people, constituents of his subjective identity as a historical being , embodied in a specific reality

·Final considerations:

Among the points highlighted, still in the preface to the third volume, Ratzinger introduces with a beautiful statement, fundamental to the Christological study, which we also place as a prediction at the end of this textual commentary work:

"I am well aware that this dialogue, in the connection between past, present and future, can never happen completely and that any interpretation falls short of the greatness of the biblical text" (Benedict XVI, 2012, p. 10).