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When Jesus was crucified, his followers were devastated for some time and returned to Galilee. The faith of the new movement was severely tested with the two Messiahs now dead. Again, Tabor assumes Jesus could not have been resurrected. He was simply reburied by some unknown figure. The idea that Jesus resurrected inexplicably emerged later. Under the leadership of James and to a lesser degree Peter and John, this movement regained its faith as its followers believed that Jesus, though dead, had been victorious in his cause and would in the end be vindicated. James, also of Davidic ancestry, was Jesus' regal successor, ruling over the nascent messianic government Jesus established. They preached for a reformed nation of Israel, into which non- Jews were also invited.

When Paul showed up and began to preach in the 40s and 50s, Tabor claims he denied any explicit connection to James and other pillars of the faith. He contradicted their message with his rejection of the Torah and his lack of emphasis on works. He went his own way with a more mystical, visionary faith. This eventually won out and became known as orthodox Christianity. James' teaching was in touch with Jesus, while Paul's reflected his own independent development. So it is James who provides us with the best link to Jesus, along with the early Q material (a presumed manuscript that some scholars say must have informed the writing of Matthew and Luke) and works like the early second century Didache. The Pauline works, Luke, and Acts reflect the group that eventually won with only traces of the James wing surviving. Its original messianic message did manage to survive enough so we can piece our way back to the original teaching and the original dynastic arrangement.

Tabor believes this view of Jesus and early Christianity opens up the door for a better ecumenical discussion between Jews, Christians, and Muslims. Jews, Tabor claims, did not reject Jesus but the "systems of Christian theology that equated Jesus with God, that nullified the Torah, and that displaced the Jewish people and their covenant." In this new understanding, Jesus could be a Messiah for Jews if not the Messiah. He could call them back to faithfulness and hope of messianic redemption without invoking his own work to do it. For Christians, the recovery of the Jesus dynasty means the recovery of Jesus as a Jew of his own time. This figure can override the distortion Paul brought into Christianity, opening doors between Jews and Christians. For Islam, Jesus is seen as the messianic prophet they have claimed him to be. Islamic portraits of Jesus are said to parallel Q, James, and the Didache. So we have a Jesus dynasty offered to a world in need of a less contentious religious history and engagement.

But does this reconfiguration work historically? What is to be made of it? Before we try to redefine modern dialogue, it is important to see if the reconfiguration is credible. Here are four key observations.

(1) First of all, Tabor is correct to emphasize the Jewish roots of Jesus and the likelihood that he knew and interacted with John the Baptist. However, by appealing to the two-Messiah portrait of the Dead Sea Scrolls, Tabor says something about John that none of the materials we possess say about him. It is never really explained how John functions as a priest when he frequents no temple. The Bible passages that describe what he is doing, like Isaiah 40:3-5, do not point to him as a priest, but simply as a prophetic forerunner. Even Josephus's description of John treats him as a prophetic exhorter.

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May (Web-only) 2006, Vol. 50