The Unmarked Reputation

Not much is given us on the early years of Jesus. All the Bible will divulge is the incident when he was twelve. Yet, there is one verse, Luke 2:40 to be specific, that speaks of his years before age twelve.

Too many race past this verse assuming it only reflects the passage of time. It gives us so much more, in fact, this particular verse attributes to the young Jesus nothing less than a reputation. Let us quickly check a dictionary on the meaning of that word. It is given as “the common opinion that people have about someone or something,” and “the way in which people think of someone or something,” also the “overall quality or character as seen or judged by people in general,” as a “recognition by other people of some characteristic or ability,” and lastly “a place in public esteem or regard.”

There are four points that make up the reputation of Jesus that was held in common by the public in general. Luke 2:40 says, “And the child grew, and waxed strong in spirit, filled with wisdom: and the grace of God was upon him.” It is clear to see that each point is something visible and recognizable. Each point was a consensus.

'The child grew': that was a thing seen with the eye. His parents saw it, his neighbors saw it, the people who followed prophecy and, no doubt, checked in on Jesus saw it. Then, the child 'waxed strong in spirit': simply put, the child had a keen mind. He was clever, a quick study – perhaps a natural at solving problems thought to be beyond the scope of childhood. The normal happy chatter and games of children are usually relegated to a level of importance that is far below the daily concerns of adults. A child with such a mind would have been noticed and news of it voiced abroad.

'Filled with wisdom.' There was no public education then, there was not so much as a rudimentary level of book smarts, and yet, the public opinion of Jesus was that he was wise. I doubt that his wisdom would have merited canonical mention had only his Mom or Dad thought he was wise. There had to be a consensus of public esteem. No trivial matter would it have been to find wisdom in an uneducated child of that day. People would have sought to derive some advantage from it. You can bet Jesus was questioned and engaged on matters of import.

Finally, 'the grace of God was upon him' Jesus carried himself well. His manner was convincing. He sported a certain charm of demeanor. Quite a reputation for a child not yet twelve. For the normal boy of that day, knowledge would have consisted only of those things learned from the mother, the father, or heard in the Sabbath services. Such a reputation did not necessarily mean that he was liked for it by every illiterate, hard-working person of the community: daily concerns and the political clime of the time were just too pressing.

All of this culminated in Jesus' coming of age as seen in this excerpt from a Bible Gateway article on the topic: “Jesus is twelve years old. If the Mishna is relevant to the first-century Jewish practice, which is likely in this case, then religious instruction would have become more intense for Jesus upon his reaching twelve (m. Niddah 5:6; m. Megilla 4:6; m. `Abot 5:12). The custom of bar mitzvah for a thirteen-year-old Jewish boy was not in place at this time (Fitzmyer 1981:440).”

There is more to the reputation of young Jesus as we see in verse 52. After the incident of the temple at age twelve, Jesus returned with his family to Nazareth and was subject to them – but – his reputation continued to grow. He was generally known to have become even wiser. He increased in stature, which may mean, as Merriam-Webster puts it, “the level of respect that people have for a successful person.”

Not only that, but Jesus also was liked and respected in his community. There was the evidence of public consensus that Jesus increased in not only in favor with God, but also in the regard of friends and acquaintances. All of this early reputation may have ultimately been relegated to public life. His public ministry, at the age of thirty or so, might have been somewhat of a head-scratcher for the community he grew up in.

There is nothing in the scriptures of the life of such a one with such a reputation. Had there originally been texts that church authorities later deleted, it begs the question 'just what did they wish to hide?' Despite the lack of specifics in Jesus' early life, I am still encouraged that something, even as generic as this, remains. The few words of this study tell a big truth.