值得深思的兩個「耶穌印象」
第一世紀猶太歷史家約瑟夫(Josephus)眼中的耶穌:(註一)
Now there arose about this time a source of further trouble in one Jesus, a wise man who performed surprising works, a teacher of men who gladly welcome strange things. He led away many Jews, and also many of the Gentiles. He was the so-called Christ. When Pilate, acting on information supplied by the chief men among us, condemned him to the cross, those who had attached themselves to him at first did not cease to cause trouble, and the tribe of Christians, which has taken this name from him, is not extinct even today.
在這時候造成進一步不安的是一個耶穌,他是個智者施行奇蹟,是眾人的教師欣然接受奇特的事。他誤導許多猶太人並許多外邦人。他是那稱為所謂基督的,當彼拉多因我們的領袖所提供的資料判他釘十字架的罪刑,那些從起初便跟隨他的人並未停止引起麻煩,而因他得名的基督徒族群還繼續存留到今天。
當代靈修神學大師彼得遜(Eugene Peterson)筆下的耶穌:(註二)
It is difficult to recapture by an act of imagination the incongruity of a person self-designated as the Son of Man, hanging pierced and bleeding on a cross. The incongruity is less dramatic but even more offensive when the Son of Man has dinner with a prostitute, stops off for lunch with a tax-collector, wastes time blessing children when there were Roman legions to be chased from the land, heals unimportant losers and ignores high-achieving Pharisees and influential Sadducees. Jesus juxtaposed the most glorious title available to him with the most menial of life-styles in the culture. He talked like a king and acted like a slave. He preached with high authority and lived like a vagabond.
我們很難想像那位自稱為「從上帝而來的人子」的是如何自相矛盾,他被刺、流血且掛在十字架上。這看起來只是戲劇性的矛盾其實更令人感到被冒犯:這人子與妓女一同吃飯,與稅吏共進午餐,當他應該將羅馬軍隊從境內逐出的時候竟然浪費時間為小孩子祝福,醫治毫無價值的失敗者,但卻忽略了滿有成就的法利賽人和有影響力的撒都該人。耶穌把他最榮耀的頭銜與社會文化中最卑微的生活方式連在一塊:他說話像君王,但行事像奴僕;他以威嚴的權柄教導人,卻生活像個流浪漢!