2024.03.02 | Jesse P. Nickel. The Things that Make for Peace: Jesus and Eschatological Violence. BZNW 244. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2021.

Review by Kendall A. Davis, University of Edinburgh.

In this revision of his PhD thesis, Jesse Nickel seeks to answer the following question: “how does understanding eschatology and violence together … enable us to make better sense of the presence and/or absence of violence in Jesus’ life and ministry?” (p. 3). In particular, Nickel seeks to refute what he calls the “seditious Jesus hypothesis” (SJH), the idea that the historical Jesus was really a violent revolutionary and that Jesus’ rejections of violence are later additions to the Jesus tradition. Scholars who hold to the SJH, according to Nickel, include S. G. F. Brandon, Dale Martin, and Fernando Bermejo-Rubio. Nickel argues that such perspectives fail in large part because they misunderstand Jewish eschatology. In particular, they assume that eschatology is “other-worldly” and therefore “irrelevant to ‘this-worldly’ matters” (p. 5). By contrast, Nickel argues that “certain elements of Jewish eschatology … inherently involved violence; and that such expectations played a motivational role in the revolutionary violence that was frequent during the Second Temple period” (p. 7). Nickel calls such violence “eschatological violence” and argues that Jesus’ “nonviolence” should be understood as a rejection of this pervasive concept of eschatological violence. 

In chapter 2, Nickel examines violence and eschatology in three texts of the Second Temple period: Daniel, 1 Enoch, and the War Scroll (1QM). Nickel finds that all these texts share the expectation that those who oppose God’s purposes would ultimately be defeated. However, Nickel argues that these texts do not agree about whether human violence helps bring about this eschatological state of affairs. Nickel finds that 1 Enoch and the War Scroll assume that violence committed by God’s people helps contribute to the fulfillment of eschatological hopes. Daniel, however, rejects such associations: “While eschatological violence is, therefore, present in the book of Daniel, it is not associated with those who inherit the blessings of God’s eternal kingdom” (p. 63). 

Chapter 3 examines similar phenomena in Second Temple Jewish history. Specifically, Nickel argues that the revolutionary violence observed in the Maccabean revolt, the Jewish-Roman war of 66–73 CE, and the Bar Kokhba revolt were all eschatologically motivated. In other words, these events are for Nickel proof that many Jews of the period assumed that the violence they committed against Israel’s political enemies helped to fulfill God’s plans and promises for his people. Nickel argues that such ideas were sufficiently prominent to form the background for much of the material in the Synoptics.

In chapter 4, Nickel addresses the primary passages appealed to by proponents of the SJH. These include Matthew 10:34 (“I did not come to bring peace, but a sword”), the triumphal entry into Jerusalem (Matt. 21:1–11 // Mark 11:1–11 // Luke 19:29–39), the cleansing of the temple (Matt. 21:12–17 // Mark 11:15–19 // Luke 19:45–48), the question about paying taxes to Caesar, the two swords of Luke 22:35–38, Jesus’ arrest in Gethsemane (Matt. 26:47–56 // Mark 14:43–50 // Luke 22:47–53), and Jesus’ trial and crucifixion (Matt. 26:57–27:56 // Mark 14:53–15:41 // Luke 22:66–23:49). Since the arguments of the SJH rely on these texts being incompatible with texts that reject violence, much of Nickel’s arguments rest on showing that these texts can be read coherently with the rest of the Synoptic material. 

Nickel argues in chapter 5 that, contra the SJH, Jesus actually rejects eschatological violence. According to Nickel, Jesus believed that eschatological violence “had no role to play in either inaugurating the kingdom of God, or identifying the people who belonged to it” (p. 161). The key texts Nickel discusses include Matthew 11:12 (“the kingdom of heaven is taken by force”), John the Baptist’s query about whether Jesus is the coming one (Matt. 11:2–19), Jesus’ discussion of Pilate’s violence and the tower of Siloam (Luke 13:1–5), the command to love enemies from the sermon on the mount/plain (Matt. 5:38–48 // Luke 6:27–36), and Jesus’ arrest in Gethsemane (Matt. 26:47–56 // Mark 14:43–50 // Luke 22:50). 

This, of course, raises the question of how Jesus envisioned the enemies of God being defeated. Thus, in chapter 6 Nickel argues that Jesus made a conscious choice to reject revolutionary violence because he perceived that Israel’s true enemies were not human beings but evil spirits. Thus, “Jesus began to achieve through exorcism what many of his contemporaries expected to come about through revolutionary violence” (p. 192). Nickel examines several key texts to make his argument including the Beelzebul controversy, the temptation of Jesus, and several exorcism stories. 

In the conclusion Nickel summarizes the study and highlights three key areas for further research: the significance of the cross for Jesus’ rejection of eschatological violence, the place of eschatological violence in the Gospel of John, which notably does not contain exorcisms, and finally the effect of Jesus’ rejection of eschatological violence on early Christian texts and communities. 

Nickel accomplishes the task he sets out for himself. This study offers a successful rejoinder to the so-called SJH. Of course, the SJH, as Nickel articulates it, is somewhat of an extreme position. Nickel, however, does more than refute the SJH. He also offers an account of the relationship between violence, eschatology, and exorcism in the Synoptic Gospels, read in the context of Second Temple revolutionary violence. This study will surely be essential reading for future engagement with the question of Jesus’ relationship with violence.

Nevertheless, I have a few questions about Nickel’s arguments. First of all, while he addresses the issue in his introduction (pp. 8–18), it was unclear to me whether the real object of his study is the historical Jesus or the Synoptic Gospels. I take Nickel’s point that the Synoptic Gospels “must be central to any attempt to understand the Jesus of history” (p. 15). However, it strikes me that by focusing on Jesus as he is remembered in the Synoptic Gospels, Nickel is doing something fundamentally different than those who are interested in reconstructing a Jesus that lies behind the Synoptics (such as the proponents of the SJH). I think Nickel’s approach is certainly fruitful and historically valid. I am, however, unsure of how well it works as rebuttal of the SJH, which has very different assumptions about how to talk about the historical Jesus in the first place.

Secondly, Nickel’s conclusions are sometimes overbroad and oversimplified. For example, in his discussion of Jesus’ arrest in Gethsemane, he states that Jesus’ response to the violence committed by one of his disciples shows “that violence—whether human or cosmic—would have no part in the fulfillment of his eschatological ministry” or “his eschatological vision” (p. 188). This is wrong as stated. Violence clearly has a role in Jesus’ eschatological vision as demonstrated by numerous texts (e.g., Matt. 21:44 // Mark 12:9 // Luke 20:18; Matt. 22:7; Luke 19:27). Of course, Nickel recognizes the problem that these “apocalyptic judgment” texts pose for his thesis and carefully defines the focus of his project to exclude them (pp. 47–49). Nickel makes a fair case for excluding these texts from his study. However, some of his more general statements about Jesus’ relationship to violence fail to persuade when they are contradicted by texts he has chosen not to examine. 

Finally, while I generally agree with Nickel’s analysis of the place of exorcism in Jesus’ ministry, it was not clear to me why this does not count as violence. The demons frequently perceive Jesus as a threat who has come to destroy them (Mark 1:24) or to torment them (Luke 8:28). Furthermore, the fate of the legion of demons in the story of the demoniac(s) living among the tombs seems to suggest that these demonic assessments are not entirely off base (Matt. 8:32 // Mark 5:13 // Luke 8:33). Why is this not violence? Nickel does not provide a clear answer. 

Despite these issues, Nickel’s study offers a valuable contribution to Gospels studies and the question of violence. I look forward to seeing future work from Nickel, and I hope he takes up some of the avenues for future research that he identifies.

Kendall A. Davis
University of Edinburgh
K.A.Davis-3 [at] sms.ed.ac.uk