Professor James D.G. Dunn is a New Testament theologian who employs the exegetical methods of “historical context of meaning” and “conceptuality in transition,” to illuminate the first-century meaning of key New Testament texts that bear directly on the development of the Christian understanding of Jesus. He describes his method in these terms: “But genuinely to locate oneself within the process, and genuinely to take seriously the fact of conceptuality in transition, is to limit oneself to the possibilities available at the time of writing, to take a stand within the inevitably limited horizon of writer and readers, who did not and could not know how the words written were going to be taken and understood in subsequent years and decades.” (Dunn 1989, xvi)
His book, Christology in the Making is a New Testament Inquiry into the Origins of the Doctrine of the Incarnation. He has been criticised on Trinitarian apologetic websites for his “Christadelphian-like logos theology”,[1] particularly for his rejection of a full-blown notion of pre-existence; that Christ somehow had a personal history with God prior to his birth. According to Dunn pre-existence is notably absent from the three Synoptic Gospels, the chief resource for the human history of Jesus. Dunn observes, “There is no real indication that Matthew had attained a concept of incarnation, had come to think of Christ as a pre-existent being who became incarnate in Mary’s womb or in Christ’s ministry (as incarnate Wisdom).” (Dunn 1989, 257) [2] Similarly, he observes that the letters of Paul, if they contain the notion at all, feature it simply in the attenuated, figurative sense of Christ’s pre-temporal presence in the mind and purpose of God, without any implication of personal pre-existence; “Did he (Paul) then think of Christ as a man, a created being, chosen by God for this purpose, perhaps even appointed to this cosmic role as from his resurrection? Or alternatively, as a heavenly being who had pre-existed with God from the beginning? Texts in Paul could be readily interpreted either way. The more plausible interpretation however is that such alternatives had not yet occurred to him: his overwhelming conviction was that God had himself acted in and through Christ, that what had happened in the whole Christ-event was God himself opening the way for man for righteousness and redemption, and that this had been the same power and purpose through which and for which God had created the world. In expressing this conviction in Wisdom language, as when he used the Adam language of the Philippians’ hymn, he introduced into Christology phrases and terminology which when read apart from the original context of Wisdom and Adam Christology would be understood as ascribing to Christ himself pre-existence and a role in creation” (Dunn 1989, 255).
It is of course an oversimplification to ascribe anti-Trinitarian views to Dunn, as his main concern is to trace the development of Christology from pre-Christian Judaism and Hellenistic Judaism, particularly from the Wisdom/Logos categories. Although he finds no pre-existence/incarnational theology in the Synoptic Gospels or in the Pauline corpus, he concludes, “that only in the Fourth Gospel can we speak of a doctrine of the incarnation.” [3]
In his foreword, Dunn comments; “Does it matter whether Paul, and other NT writers, mark an earlier stage in the development towards the full-blown Christian doctrine, or even stages in diverse developments and trajectories? Others might argue in the negative: it does not matter. For myself it does. It matters what Jesus thought about himself. For if we can uncover something at least of that self-understanding, and if it differs markedly from subsequent Christian doctrine of Christ, then we have discovered a serious self-contradiction at the heart of the Christian doctrine of incarnation itself. For we then have to admit that the doctrine of God submitting himself to the full rigours of historical existence is not after all accessible to historical inquiry. This has been a fundamental issue at the heart of Christology in fact from the beginning but most pressingly over the past two hundred years. It will not go away. It matters too whether Paul had a doctrine of incarnation. For the Pauline letters are the only NT writings which belong indubitably to the first generation of Christianity. And the later we have to presuppose the emergence of the Christian doctrine of incarnation the more real becomes the possibility that the doctrine is the product not of organic growth (‘development’ as from seed to plant), but grafting a different growth on to the earlier (non-incarnation) stock, or of transmutation into a different species (by ‘hellenization’, philosophization, or whatever).” (Dunn 1989, xiv )
While we agree with his conclusions concerning the Synoptic tradition and Pauline epistemology, we disagree with his conclusions on the Johannine christology,[4] but his overall balanced approach coupled with his breadth of scholarship and refreshing insights, ensure that this classic should be a fixture on the bookshelf of every Christadelphian.
[1] Steve Rudd, “Dunn, James D. G.: Christology in the Making, 2nd edition, 1989.” Online: http://www.bible.ca/trinity/trinity-Dunn.htm [cited 11 March 2007].
[2] Note that Dunn balances his observations by adding a qualifying statement – “Nor is there any indication of course that he ignored or rejected such an understanding of Christ”, nevertheless, it is clear that the Synoptic Gospels are distinctly lacking any kind of pre-existence or incarnation theology.
[3] “The doctrine of the incarnation began to emerge when the exalted Christ was spoken of in terms drawn from the Wisdom imagery of pre-Christian Judaism.” (Dunn 1989, 259)
[4] “On almost any reckoning, John 1.14 ranks as a classic formulation of the Christian belief in Jesus as incarnate God. Assuming then, as most do, that John’s Gospel is one of the latest documents in the NT, the question was whether John 1.14 is best understood simply as a variation on an already well formed conception of incarnation or as itself a decisive step forward in the organic growth or evolution of Christian doctrine.” (Dunn 1989, xiii)
Review of “The Early Earth” by John Whitcomb (1972)