Unity and Diversity in the New Testament: An Inquiry into the Character of Earliest Christianity

by James D.G. Dunn

Unity and Diversity in the New Testament is a thorough investigation into the canon of the New Testament, and Christianity's origins. It assumes the reader is familiar with the basic question of who wrote the books, when, why etc and it moves on to look in detail at what were the various emphases in the gospel proclaimed by Jesus, Luke, Paul and John. It also examines primitive Christianity's preaching and teaching, confessional formulae, oral traditions, organisation and worship, concepts of ministry and community, and ritual acts. In the second half of the book, the author maps out the scope of the diversity he found in the fist half's investigation. Here he identifies and traces the major currents within the stream of first and second generation Christianity which includes a study of Jewish Christianity, Hellenistic Christianity, Apocalyptic Christianity and Early Catholicism. The book concludes with a consideration of the repercussions of such findings, for how Christians understand the New Testament, and what it means to be Christian, today. This third edition is further enhanced with the author's consideration of these same themes, 25 years after he first wrote about them. The final chapter is the authors "critical refinement" of the ideas and issues that remain relevant and important for any realistic theology of canon to be considered today.

Genres: Christianity, Theology, Religion, Nonfiction, History, Church History, New Testament

Paperback

First published January 1, 1977

About the author

James D. G. ("Jimmy") Dunn (born 1939) was for many years the Lightfoot Professor of Divinity in the Department of Theology at the University of Durham. Since his retirement he has been made Emeritus Lightfoot Professor. He is a leading British New Testament scholar, broadly in the Protestant tradition. Dunn is especially associated with the New Perspective on Paul, along with N. T. (Tom) Wright and E. P. Sanders. He is credited with coining this phrase during his 1982 Manson Memorial Lecture.

Dunn has an MA and BD from the University of Glasgow and a PhD and DD from the University of Cambridge. For 2002, Dunn was the President of the Studiorum Novi Testamenti Societas, the leading international body for New Testament study. Only three other British scholars had been made President in the preceding 25 years.

In 2005 a festschrift was published dedicated to Dunn, comprising articles by 27 New Testament scholars, examining early Christian communities and their beliefs about the Holy Spirit. (edited by Graham N. Stanton, Bruce W. Longenecker & Stephen Barton (2004). The Holy Spirit and Christian origins: essays in honor of James D. G. Dunn. Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans Pub. Co. ISBN 0-8028-2822-1.)

Dunn has taken up E. P. Sanders' project of redefining Palestinian Judaism in order to correct the Christian view of Judaism as a religion of works-righteousness. One of the most important differences to Sanders is that Dunn perceives a fundamental coherence and consistency to Paul's thought. He furthermore criticizes Sanders' understanding of the term "justification", arguing that Sanders' understanding suffers from an "individualizing exegesis".

Reviews

[Sanjuro · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dunn's big book on unity and diversity within the New Testament was, at least for conservative scholars and Christians, controversial upon its release. Until its publication in 1977, Dunn had been received as a moderately evangelical thinker, and this book changed that, leaving many conservatives searching its pages for some semblance of focus on gospel proclamation. However, as Dunn states near the end of the book, there are, at times, reasons why scholars need to be alleviated from catechesis, to be able to stand outside of such demands, in order to simply evaluate the biblical material as honestly as possible; to provide exegesis regardless of the costs or ramifications, regardless of what exegesis means for dogmatic theology. Outside of conservative circles, the controversy is trivial - Dunn's conclusions seem relatively self-evident. In this book, Dunn brings a significant knowledge of the biblical texts, early primary literature, and a wealth of secondary literature, and evaluates his topic to the tune of more than 500 thorough and erudite pages. Much can be said about this book, both good and bad, but no one can deny that Dunn accomplished his task of evaluating the topic with honesty and methodological care and insight.

Dunn's basic premise is that there are a few core threads of unity running throughout the NT texts, particularly the meaning and significance of Christ, but there even more marks of diversity. In other words, the NT is a collection of texts that bring together various strands of a common faith in its earliest development, and as such, these strands show a considerable amount of diversity. I agree completely with Dunn's basic premise - there is no question that conservative thinkers have missed, or understated, or ignored the significant diversity in and among the NT texts. The various NT authors clearly wrote to communities of varying flavors and perspectives and experiences, and the NT texts need to first be interpreted independently before they can be interpreted in light of one another. However, I disagree with much that Dunn writes in this book. I think that, as he expounds on the diversity within the NT, he often draws extreme and unnecessary conclusions. Still, I give the book a full score because in the midst of some unnecessary extremity, it never really seems (but for one instance when he admits it) that he is trying to be provocative; his work is remarkably insightful from start to finish, unfolding layer upon layer of valuable exegesis of various texts, and displays an effective command the full scope of the NT texts, and the unfolding of early Christianity in its first few centuries. If one is prone to disagree, they better be well equipped, because Dunn does not seem to come to any of his more controversial conclusions without a very strong handle on the issues.

In my opinion, the greatest contribution that Dunn's book makes is one that must be considered by all people of faith. As Dunn demonstrates that the NT texts show considerable diversity, he also extends this to show how the earliest Christians maintained that diversity for some time, before "orthodoxy" was honed in and established. The application? We need to learn to be far more patient with one another. Diversity is unavoidable, but need not create the false divisions and tribalism that faith communities have long been guilty of.

The book has its detractors, but here it stands, 40 years later, as relevant as ever.

[Benjamin Falcon · Rating 5 out of 5]

This work is quite a tome! In it, Dunn sets out his thesis that Christianity has had a wide ranging diversity from the very beginning held together in unity around a common core. What was that common core?
"...the unity between the historical Jesus and the exalted Christ, that is to say, the conviction that the wandering charismatic preacher from Nazareth had ministered, died and been raised from the dead to bring God and man finally together, the recognition that the divine power through which they now worshipped and were encountered and accepted by God was one and the same person, Jesus, the man, the Christ, the Son of God, the Lord, the life-giving Spirit." (p403)
Dunn traces this unity in the first half of the book, "Unity in Diversity", through the earliest expressions of Christian preaching (he uses the terms 'kerygma' and 'kerygmata'), and through the earliest confessional formulae. He then investigates the role tradition plays, finding that the common traditions of the earliest Christian communities centre around the earthly ministry and teaching of Jesus. He then explores the diversity approaches towards the Old Testament, the diverse understandings of ministry, diversity of patterns of worship and liturgy. The sacraments are discussed as a development that illustrates the common focus on Jesus and a faith finding appropriate expression in him. The role of holy spirit gifts is discussed next (Dunn uses the term 'enthusiasm') and several lines of divergence are explored. Dunn concludes the first half of the book with a statement that there was a diversity of Christologies, with unique and individual emphases that related to the context of the communities in which those Christologies were developed.
Dunn goes on in the second half of the book, "Diversity in Unity", to discuss the trajectories that developed into later Christian communities, which he classifies under the broad categories of Jewish Christianity, Hellenistic Christianity, Apocalyptic Christianity, and Early Catholicism. I found the first two chapters persuasive but felt the chapter on Apocalyptic was not as well argued - I felt that Dunn took conclusions beyond the evidence in places. The chapter on Early Catholicism saw a return to previous form with Dunn's characteristically meticulous argumentation.
The whole work is concluded by a chapter on the enduring authority of the New Testament. Whilst it was a good summary of the overall work, it felt dissatisfying that certain lines of thinking remained unexplored and given the work overall was not explicitly about the canon or authority of scripture these ideas felt out of place surfacing in this final chapter.

[Ted · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'll admit that I did not read every word of this massive tome (520 pages). Dunn takes on a lot of issues in looking for the unity and diversity of Christianity in the NT and the very earliest expressions of Christianity. His lens is mostly issues raised by mode3rn biblical scholarship and some issues debated between Catholics and Protestants. His assumption is these are the only questions that really matter. I hoped he might give some recognition that these contemporary issues of Western Christian scholarship are not the only issues to think about or the only lens through which to read the scriptures. His scholarship is otherwise thorough but I did get to the point that it was just too much and beyond my interest. Still his conclusions were interesting because there he seemed to touch upon some issues I found more interesting - he was far more sympathetic to an ancient church understanding of the scriptures than he had let on in most of the book.

[Gilbert]

So very readable and yet filled with dynamic insight about the interpretation of "the" gospel...is there one Gospel or have we actually created Another Gospel to fit our current context? This book gives you the tools needed to critically examine our own interpretations and how might the early church had viewed the Gospel.

[Charlie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dunn examines to what extent the New Testament documents testify to theological unity and diversity. Dunn does not use an overarching theological framework (such as inerrancy) to predetermine his conclusion, but proceeds by rigorous close reading. His interpretations and conclusions are debatable, but this impressive work is certainly the starting point from which the conversation should proceed.

[Alexander Kennedy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I absolutely loved this book. Dunn is a fantastic scholar. The book is written with technical language, so it takes some work at first to read the book, but it is more than worth it. Dunn explores what is the central core of the New Testament and the wealth of diversity it has to offer. No one can read this book without becoming more tolerant of other religions and interpretations.

[Marius Croeser · Rating 4 out of 5]

I completed my thesis on his work and this is a classic that deserves a place in any respectable library.

[Aura]

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