Fragments from Reimarus: Consisting of Brief Critical Remarks on the Object of Jesus and his Disciples as seen in the New Testament

In this important work, Lessing presents some of the writings of Reimarus, the father of the quest for the historical Jesus. Found in the library of the Duke of Brunswick, these fragments represent the genesis of historical Jesus studies, which would shape centuries of biblical and theological scholarship. In these fragments, Reimarus argued that Jesus was a pious Jew who desired to see the coming of God’s kingdom and eventually reached the point where he felt he could force God’s hand to bring in that kingdom by being killed as a martyr. Then, according to Reimarus, the disciples engineered the resurrection account, which provided the impetus for the rise of Christianity. Reimarus paved the way for this theory to be carried on in biblical and theological scholarship up to Schweitzer and beyond. This volume also includes Lessing’s sketch of Reimarus’ life, which complements the study of his writings on this important subject.