Early Attempts
As originally defined by Albert Schweitzer, the quest began in the 18th century with Hermann Samuel Reimarus, up to William Wrede in the 19th century.
Reimarus composed a treatise rejecting miracles and accusing Bible authors of fraud, but he didn't publish his findings. Gotthold Lessing published Reimarus's conclusions in the Wolfenbuettel fragments. Baron d'Holbach (1723-1789) - "Ecce Homo -The History of Jesus of Nazareth, a Critical Inquiry" (1769), the first Life of Jesus described as a mere historical man, published anonymously in Amsterdam. D.F. Strauss's biography of Jesus set Gospel criticism on its modern course. Strauss explained gospel miracles as natural events misunderstood and misrepresented. Ernest Renan was the first of many to portray Jesus simply as a human person. Albrecht Ritschl had reservations about this project, but it became central to liberal Protestantism in Germany and to the Social Gospel movement in America.
Martin Kähler protested, arguing that the true Christ is the one preached by the whole Bible, not a historical hypothesis. William Wrede questioned the historical reliability of Mark. Albert Schweitzer stated that the histories of Jesus had reflected the historians' bias. Karl Barth and Rudolf Bultmann repudiated the quest for historical Jesus, and although the introduction of The Five Gospels asserts this it suppressed any real interest in the topic from c 1920 to c 1970, The Concise Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church says there was a brief New Quest movement in the 50s conducted by Bultmann's students, and the search continued without break outside of the Bultmann school.
Read more about this topic: Quest For The Historical Jesus
Famous quotes containing the words early and/or attempts:
“Humanity has passed through a long history of one-sidedness and of a social condition that has always contained the potential of destruction, despite its creative achievements in technology. The great project of our time must be to open the other eye: to see all-sidedly and wholly, to heal and transcend the cleavage between humanity and nature that came with early wisdom.”
—Murray Bookchin (b. 1941)
“Good resolutions are useless attempts to interfere with scientific laws. Their origin is pure vanity. Their result is absolutely nil. They give us, now and then, some of those luxurious sterile emotions that have a certain charm for the weak.... They are simply cheques that men draw on a bank where they have no account.”
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)