The sayings of Jesus

Ross Woods, 2021

The synoptic gospels contain many stories about what Jesus did, but some His sayings are traditionally called the logia (λογια). They have the following characteristics:

  1. They originated from eyewitnesses and then seem to have circulated as independent stories. In all three synoptic Gospels, the writers' purpose seems to be to present the words of Jesus as the original hearers and writers heard them. (Lk 1:1-3)
  2. They tend to be stand-alone, even if they are strung together as lists of sayings, such as the Sermon on the Mount. They often either lack narrative context or with so little context that it is difficult, perhaps impossible, to see why Jesus said them.
  3. The text usually gives no little or no explanation.
  4. They tell of a Man who left strong impressions on people. The logia are memorable; people easily remembered them, even if they did not deliberately commit them to memory, or perhaps even understand them. Parables are stories that make a clear point, so they are particularly easy to remember. Miracles are by nature extraordinary. Claims to be Messiah were revolutionary. They were often counterintuitive or disruptive in their own time. Even now, they don’t always fit with a standard Christian theology, and expositors go to great efforts to rationalize them into "normal" theological thinking. Some logia are quite short. In all cases, the disruptive tone seems to have made them valuable and worthy of inclusion.
  5. Accuracy in the text overshadowed the need to explain them. The writers possibly presumed the logia were self-explanatory, and many are quite easy to interpret. In some cases, it is clear that the original hearers understood them enough to reject Him, while in other cases, it is clear that they did not understand. Of those that are difficult to explain, the sense of mystery adds to their value, not detracts from it. (In contrast, John's Gospel seems to contain personal recollections with reflections and explanations.)

In a few cases, the sayings of Jesus are clearly embedded in a narrative context, and a few are explained, most notably the parables of the sower and of the weeds. It is more likely that these did not circulate independently as discrete oral traditions before the writing of the Gospels.

It is possible to speculate on a few aspects of interpretation.

First, Jesus quite possibly told parables more than once and in slightly different forms. For example, the parable of the sower differs slightly in different gospels, but there is no reason to doubt the authenticity of either version.

Second, it is equally possible that the gospels present a precis. Some of the parables might have been much longer in the original oral form, because oral language is different from spoken language. This is not to say that the written record is inaccurate in any way, simply that it is different from a voice recording. For example, the parable of the mustard seed is very brief, and would probably take more words if being told as a story to an audience. The parable of the prodigal son is actually two parables; it also contains the parable of the two sons.

Third, did they fit the leitmotif of a prophet, and have the effect of identifying Him as a prophet? For example, Jesus sometimes condemned and offended people especially Mt 24.

Some interpretive questions

  1. What did Jesus actually say?
  2. Who did He say it to?
  3. Is there a relationship to the verses before and after? For example, is it part of a story?
  4. What did He mean?
  5. What did the listeners think He meant?
  6. How much did they understand?
  7. Why would the Gospel writer have remembered this even if he didn’t quite understand it at the time?
  8. Why was it put in the gospel record?
  9. To what extent does it reflect a Jewish way of thinking in culture and theology? To what extent is it universal?