Years ago, an acquaintance of mine, one Thomas Sheehan, wrote a book entitled The First Coming in which he argued that the life and death of Jesus constituted the first, only, and real coming of the Christ to earth. He argued that there was and will be no second coming because Christ accomplished his task in the first one. The tricky thing here was that Tom was a well-known Catholic scholar at that time teaching at Stanford University. He upset many in the Church.
In essence what Sheehan was claiming is that the entire history of Christianity in the world as we know it was a colossal mistake. I do not know whether he was ever sanctioned by the Catholic Church, of which he was a member, or what became of his academic career after the publication of his book. I do know that his book created quite a storm, both within the Catholic Church and throughout the entire field of Biblical scholarship.
The story began on this wise. Back around 321 CE, when the Christian Church was just getting under way and was being strenuously persecuted by the Roman Empire, the new Emperor Constantine decided that the way he read the situation of the future, at least his future, as well as that of the Roman Empire, lay with these strange people who called themselves “Christians”. So, when he won a battle under their banner, he claimed that he had had a vision in which he was directed to fight under the sign of the Cross, the chief Christian symbol.
Thus it was that Christianity became the official religion of the Roman Empire during Constantine’s reign. Thomas Sheehan’s claim was that this shift from being a strongly persecuted group of refugees on the very edge of the Empire to being the favored group of the Roman Emperor signaled the end of Jesus’ “First Coming” and thus the end authentic Christianity. All that was left for real Christians to do was to wait for the coming of the Kingdom of God.
In other words, according to Sheehan’s reading everything that has transpired in Western and world history since the death of Jesus had nothing to do with Christianity. Rather, it had all been a classic and cosmic confusion. What Christians should have done, and what they should now do, is wait faithfully for the realization of the Kingdom of God on earth. Sheehan’s claim was simply that the whole history of Christianity had been predicated on a huge mistake about just what the Christian faith was and is all about. Needless to say, making these extraordinary claims got Professor Sheehan in a lot of trouble.
In the midst of our own perennial squabbles and accusations over when, or if, Christ will return to reign in his kingdom over the world, this idea about the First Coming being the ONLY official visit of Christ to earth constitutes a genuine bombshell. Catholic believers tend to remain faithful to the original idea of Christ returning to earth in order to set up the Kingdom of God when the right time arrives. This was Sheehan’s point, that so far there has been only one coming of Christ to earth, and that is all that was intended.
Very conservative Protestants, on the other hand, have been arguing and even fighting over the nature and timing of the Second Coming for centuries. As far as I know no one has claimed that Christ has already come, but there are those who, mostly on the basis of certain difficult passages in Paul’s letters to the Thessalonians, argue over whether it will come in two phases separated by seven years of tribulation. There also have been folks who expected to meet Christ in the air aboard his space ship (Heaven’s Gate?).
After two thousand years it seems to me unlikely that any of the Biblical passages were ever meant to be read as a secret coded message. I like Tom Sheehan’s idea. Perhaps there will be no “second coming.” As Jesus put it: “Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof”, and Jesus’ teachings should be sufficient for the present.
7 responses to “The First Coming of Jesus Christ?”
Hi Jerry: Really enjoy your posts–you are as prolific as ever! It appears that Thomas Sheehan survived the backlash from “The First Coming” and was a champion of academic freedom at Loyola and is now Professor Emeritus of Religious Studies at Stanford, and has published extensively on Martin Heidegger. Clearly a maverick, he has strong arguments for his perspectives and, though far from the mainstream, has a very positive message akin to the kingdom of God is manifested by the extent to which we love our neighbor. Thanks, again, for keeping us philosophically connected.
Hi Gary – great to hear from you :O) I only knew Tom briefly – did you actually know him? I think you’ve got him right !!!
I was Tom’s student at that time. We were reading Heidegger’s Being and Time in a seminar at Loyola. At that time the emphasis of complaint was that he was claiming that Christ never intended to establish a church and that Christian faith should operate without any sort of church, a position he apparently later recanted. He did get into trouble with church and university authorities but was smiling and laughing about it. He was quite popular with the students back then, though he never seemed to like me much. The consequence of churchless (not quite the Bonhoefferian position) Christianity was that no second coming was in the offing. He did not seem to care about Paul’s statement. Yes, historically the Romans wanted to co-opt Christianity into their political structure; but that was their idea, not that of Christ or Paul. Seventh Day Adventists assert an “invisible” second coming to HIs heavenly Temple, and Jehovah’s Witnesses claim he has come as well. I think the 1st century affirmations of a second coming need to be respected as an event that has not yet happened. With N.T. Wright I think of it as a process that will reach a kind of “supersaturation” point and sudden “Crystallization”. A Whiteheadian notion, somewhat reflected in A.C. Clarke’s “Childhood’s End”, assert it as a kind of evolutionary event of a divinized natural process. Some think the second coming is the church itself, which Tom wanted to deny. When you think of how many years the first coming was expected, whipping up Messianic fever and intense speculation, I am not surprised that this “return” point has not been reached. One important thing to keep in mind is that the teachings of Jesus are not what distinguishes him as anything special. He sides with certain rabbinical teachers and is bold about forwarding the consequences of their way of reading the law. But what he says about who he is and his eschatological affirmations are what really identify his importance. Without these he is just another rabbi and mendicant wonder worker among others. But if we take seriously who he is rather than focus on just what he taught, his ongoing presence in the church and the special event of his return just makes sense. That is all part of being faithful to the “end”.
Lots of interesting stuff here !! I think you and Ray ( the next responder) should get together :O) I still think Tom was right !!! Paz, jerry
Informative, as usual. A few contrarian comments.
–The earliest Christians may have hoped for a second coming. They, as is not uncommon, wished for a triumphalist occasion, one which would proclaim them victors. What is hard for me to grasp :What keeps this issue alive after over 2000 years and no 2d coming?
–St. Paul, like his successor, St. Augustine, was mostly interested in growing membership. Following the way of Jesus was not his highest priority. His comment on everyone being the same “in Christ” was both a power move (to increase membership) and a power move (to say everyone now is the same ‘in Christ” so everyone, now vitrified into a single, umdifferentiated mass, should listen to Paul, self-appointed spokesman for the fledgling movement).
–my comments, admittedly, work within certain assumptions: –do not assume that Jesus, like Paul, sought to homogenize everyone. Instead, my assumption is that, with differences recognized, everyone was still welcome at the table. This, it seems to me, is consistent with the parables and with the Pentecost story.
– Whereas Paul’s move was to say ‘now we must all speak Esperanto’ the Pentecost message is that the “apostles “ i.e. messengers, will adjust to the world’s multiple, irreducible languages.
–Sheehan identifies one moment that was a “collossal mistake” that moved away from “authentic,” Christianity. Another involves Paul and Augustine. Citing Paul and thinking like Augustine are not the same as living a gospel-centered life. Some self awareness tests: How often do we cite Paul rather than Jesus? How often do we privilege and cite, like Augustine, the second creation story (Adam & Eve one) and ignore the first one?
Hi Ray – you and my friend David Jenkins should have a talk :O) I think I agree more with you than with him. Thanks for the engagement :O) Jerry
Would love to chat with Jenkins. My post is derivative as it draws (1) on Michel Serres’s emphasis on mixing&blending as ideal raqther than the maximization of a single value; (2) Derrida’s notion of “messianism without the messiah”,and (3) Catholicism’s awareness that (a) Revelation involves more than the Bible and (b) St Paul is not Jesus. I add (c) a critique of St. Augustine as more
Gnostic than (incarnation-centered) Christian.