Emphasis Preaching Journal

Hans Kung, the Catholic theologian, suggests that Jesus was a lay person. In his exhaustive study, On Being a Christian, Kung came to the conclusion that there is no evidence that Jesus was trained in a rabbinical school and that he belonged to the ranks of the rabbis. On the other hand, Jaroslav Pelikan in his book Jesus Through the Centuries, observes that the public and the followers of Jesus referred to him as both rabbi and prophet. The more neutral and less controversial of the two was the label of rabbi.