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Mauro Pesce and Adrianna Desto,Encounters with Jesus: The Man in His Place and Time.Fortress Press, 2011.

Chapter Seven

Our authors here attempt to discover and divulge something of the inner life of Jesus. Here, I

have to say quite plainly, I find their work at its least convincing. Discovering the inner life ofa man who lived 2000 years ago is nigh to impossible because its virtually impossible in relation

to our contemporaries. Even when people tell us what theyre feeling we cannot be sure if its

the truth.

For example, how many times have you asked someone how are you today and they reply

fine and then you discover later that day that in fact they are not, and cannot be fine because

theyve lost a job or suffered a family-members death or some such thing. If we have to rely on

our neighbors to tell us the facts of their inner life it seems utterly unreasonable to expect that wecan glean the inner life of Jesus from the writers of the Gospels.

Still, P. and D. do as good a job as can be expected given the impossibility of their self-appointedtask.

They are certainly right, for instance, to attribute to Jesus the emotion ofcompassion.

Jesus compassion is communicated by the words he addressed to the disciples in

a tense situation of human need (p. 158).

And

Here is the point: if behavior is to be changed, there must be a prior change in apersons interior attitude and in his or her way of reacting to situations (p. 158).

Since that is true of people in general it must also be true of Jesus, the man from Nazareth. The

concrete outcome of his emotional standing manifested itself in giving help to others.

Jesus wasnt just compassionate though, he was also silent, angry, and alone. Of that aloneness

P. and D. insightfully opine

It is not impossible that these moments of separation [between Jesus and hisfollowers] are the very first context that generated the hope that Christ would

return (p. 166).

Hows that for a stimulating observation? And theres more of the same when, in connection

with Jesus prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane (which P. and D. invariably call the Garden of

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Olives) as recorded by Luke. To wit

Our hypothesis is that it is possible to identify a number of nuances of the longing

or will of Jesus. [The] expression of his personal will serves only to

emphasize his renunciation. The entire episode is based on the awareness byMark, Luke and Matthew that it is possible for the longing or will of Jesus to

differ from that of God. As you want and what you want constitute the

boundary within which Jesus emotions find expression (p. 166).

They naturally recognize, do our writers, the stark contrast between the Jesus of the Synoptics

and the Jesus of John in this matter.

Obviously P. and D. have to acknowledge that all such probing into the life and mind of Jesus

are tenuous.

His followers found it difficult to penetrate the inner life of Jesus (p. 168).

If thats true of them, it must also be true of us. But I feel fairly sure that Pesce and Destro are

right to say

The principal emotions of Jesus that we see in the Gospels are compassion,

indignation, and a passionate desire (p. 169).

Can that be gainsaid by anyone? This is such a provocative volume and so very worth reading.

The concluding matter next.

Jim WestQuartz Hill School of Theology