The Cross, the Switchblade, and the Gospels

Bart Ehrman alleges that the Gospels are hopelessly contradictory. Although his examples are unoriginal, he's an influential popularizer. 

In scholarly circles, a common explanation for synoptic variants is theological redaction. Matthew, Luke, and John make changes to Mark because they have their own theological agendas or rhetorical strategies. 

I think there are cases where synoptic variants are due to audience adaptation, but the appeal to redaction criticism is overused. 

A more recent version of redaction criticism is Licona's appeal to compositional devices. This has been painstakingly scrutinized by Lydia McGrew in The Mirror or the Mask, with reference to the Synoptics. She has a sequel volume (The Eye of the Beholder) forthcoming with reference to John's Gospel. 

For purposes of comparison, I'd like to step outside of Gospel criticism and take a different example. Run, Baby, Run and The Cross and the Switchblade are synoptic accounts about a missionary outreach effort to NYC street gangs. These represent independent but often overlapping records of the same events. I'm going to quote from both in reference to a particular episode. These are two firsthand accounts of the same episode by two different eyewitnesses, one told from the experience of Nicky Cruz and the other from the experience of David Wilkerson. It's useful to compare and contrast both sides. What they have in common and how they differ. One natural way they differ is that Nicky doesn't know what Wilkerson was thinking–he can only judge by appearances–while Wilkerson doesn't know what Nicky was thinking–he can only judge by appearances. 

Would it be plausible to apply redaction criticism or compositional devices to explain the differences between the two accounts? I'm going to quote some passages from both books (I've cut the dead wood).

It was almost time for the meeting to begin. The auditorium was filling up on this final night of the rally. Far more young people had already come than had come on any previous evening. I saw some of the Chaplains; I saw the Dragons, and some GGI's. Among then, I was interested to note, was Maria. 

But nowhere could I see a Mau Mau, although I looked everywhere for the bright red jackets with the big double M. 

I hadn't been able to forget the appealing face and open manner of Israel, president of the Mau Maus. I'd been down to invite this gang to the rally as my personal guests, and to tell them about the special bus that we'd hired for them. When I said that I would reserved some seats down front just for them, Israel promised to come and bring the others. 

But it was the last night and they weren't here, and I thought I knew why. Nicky. He had stood seething and silent while Israel and I talked, excluding hatred for me and everything I stood for. 

I wandered to a window overlooking the street. A bus was arriving. I knew it was the Mau Maus even before I saw them. I knew by the way the bus pulled into the curb: it nosed in fast, as if the driver couldn't wait to get rid of his passengers. The doors opened fore and aft and spilled out nearly fifty teenagers, shouting and shoving and out for a ball. One boy tossed away an empty bottle of wine as he stepped down. In the short distance between the bus stop and the arena entrance, they picked up several teenager girls who were standing around outside in very brief shorts and halters. 

"Lord," I said aloud, "what have I gotten into?"

I'd asked the ushers to reserve the first three rows in the arena but had not revealed who the seats were for. Now the head usher came rushing up to me, excited and upset. 

"Reverend, I don't know what to do." He drew me out onto the balcony and pointed down to the arena, where Israel and Nicky were tapping their way down the aisle with their canes, whistling and jeering as they came. "Those are Mau Maus," the head usher said. "I don't think I can keep them out of those reserved seats."

"That's all right," I said. They're who the seats are for. Those are friends of mine."

But I sounded more confident than I felt. I left the usher blinking and staring after me and hurried downstairs to the dressing rooms. There I found an atmosphere of grave foreboding. "I don't like the looks of it," said the manager of the arena. "There are rival gangs out there and we could have a full-scale rumble on our hands."

Do you think we ought to call more police, just in case?" asked one of the ministers who knew the gangs.

I looked out again. One of our own teenage girls, a remarkable young singer, as pretty as a movie star, was walking onto the center of the stage which had been set up at one end of the arena. 

"Let's see how Mary does," I said. "Maybe we don't have to call more police. Maybe we can soothe the savage beast with song."

But as Mary Arguinzoni began to sing, the hollering and whistling doubled.

"Hey, babe! Watch out for the curves!"

"You got time after the show for a poor old sinner?"

"What's your name, honey?"

The boys were standing on their seats doing the Fish, and the girls in their halters and too-brief briefs gyrated to the gospel song that Mary sang. She looked over to where I was standing in the wings and asked with her eyes what she should do. Despite the cheers and the clapping and calls for another song, I signaled to Mary that she should come away.

"Do you want to call the thing off, Dave?"

"No, not yet. Let's wait just a little longer. I'm going to try to talk to them. If you see things aren't going right, then you can do whatever you choose."

I walked out. It was a long walk to the center of the stage. And of course Israel had to let me know he was there.

"Hey, Davie! Here I am. I told you I'd come and bring my boys."

I turned to smile at him, and my eyes met the rock-hard gaze of Nicky. Then I had a sudden inspiration. 

"We're going to do something different tonight," I announced over the loudspeaker system. "We're going to ask the gang members themselves to take up the collection." I looked right at Nicky as I spoke. "May I have six volunteers?"

Nicky was on his feet in a flash, incredulity and secret triumph struggling on his face. He pointed at five Mau Maus and the six of them came foreword and lined up in front of the stage. One good result of my decision was apparent already: that arena had come to attention. Hundreds of teenagers stopped their cavorting and leaned forward in breathless anticipation. 

I stepped to the wings and took the paper milkshake cartons from the hands of the astonished ushers. "Now," I said to the boys as I handed them round, "when you've passed down the aisles, I'd like you to bring the offerings around behind the curtain and up onto the stage." I pointed to the place, watching Nicky's face. Behind the curtain, as well as the stage steps, there was a door to the street. A big arrow announced it: EXIT. Nicky accepted the carton solemnly, but in his eyes I could read mockery and contempt.

And so while the organ played, Nicky and his boys took up the collection. He did well as a fundraiser, too. Nicky had sixteen stabbings to his record and was known as a vicious knife-fighter not only to the Brooklyn kids but to the gangs in Manhattan and the Bronx as well. He was famous for his baseball-bat tactics. Newspapers had pegged him "The Garbage Can Fighter" because in a rumble he would put a can over his head and wade into battle swinging ihs bat blindly in a deadly circle. When Nicky stood at the end of the row shaking his carton, the kids dug deep. 

When he was satisfied that he had enough, he signaled the other boys and together they walked down front and ducked behind the curtain. I waited, standing on the stage.

A wave of giggles swept over the room. A minute passed. Girls clapped their hands to their mouths to keep in the glee. Two minutes. Now the suppressed laughter exploded in guffaws, and my inspiration evaporated into sheerest lunacy before my eyes. The kids were on their feet, stamping and howling in derision. 

Then the room froze. I turned my head. Nicky and the others were crossing the stage toward me, the full cartons in their hands. Nicky looked at me with bewildered, almost frightened eyes, as though he himself could not understanding what he was doing. 

"Here's your money, Preacher," he said–not graciously–angrily, reluctantly, as though the words were dragged out of him.

"Thank you, Nicky," I said, in what I hoped was a casual voice. I walked over to the pulpit as though I had not just lived through the worst two minutes of my life. 

I preached for perhaps fifteen minutes, and all I could sense was the growing restlessness of the crowd. I quoted Jesus's command to love one another.

Suddenly someone jumped up in the second row. He stood on his chair and shouted:

"Hold on, Preacher! Hold on! You say you want me to love them Dagoes? One of them cut me with a razor. I'll love them all right–with a lead pipe."

And another boy , this one from the Hell Burners' section, jumped up and ripped open his shirt.

"I got a bullet hole here, Preacher. One of them Nigger gangs did it. And you say we're supposed to love them? Man, you're not real." 

I bowed by head, as I had done on the street…Three minutes can be an incredibly long period of time. I stood before that crowd with my head bowed for three minutes. I did not say a word. I did not move. I prayed, quietly and yieldingly. It didn't bother me any more that some of the kids were laughing. Nor did it surprise me when slowly the great hall began to quiet down. First it was the front three rows. I recognized Israel's voice: "All right, you guys! Can it."

The quiet spread backwards through the house, and up to the balconies…And then I heard the sound of someone crying.

I opened my eyes. In the front row Israel was tugging at a handkerchief in his hip pocket. He pulled it out and blew his nose very loudly, then blinked and sniffed….And while I prayed, Nicky got out his handkerchief. I couldn't believe my eyes and took another look. There he was, leaning on his cane, snorting and blinking and angry with himself for crying. 

I knew the time had come to speak out. "All right. You've felt Him; He's here; He's in this room, come especially for you. If you want to have your life changed, now is the time. Stand up and come forward!"

Israel didn't hesitate. He stood up and faced his gang. "Boys," he said, I've been your leader for three years. When I say go, you go! Right?"…They jumped up as a man, and followed Israel forward…I looked to see if Nicky was among them. He was. 

The surge to move forward was contagious. More than thirty boys from other gangs followed the Mau Maus…I wanted to do something to give him [Nicky] confidence, so I asked him and Israel to come with me, and I found them, and each of the Mau Maus who had come forward, copies of the Bible. There were two sizes, little pocket editions and much larger ones. 

"Give us them big books, Davie, so people can see what we're carrying." David Wilkerson, The Cross and the Switchblade (Jove Books 1962; 1977), 75-80.

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During the second week of July, Israel came by and told us about Wilkerson's big meeting over at St. Nicholas Arena. In fact, Wilkerson had been down and talked to Israel, inviting us in front of P.S. 67, and they were going to have special seats reserved for us at the front of the auditorium. 

It was hot that July night when we scrambled on board the bus…More than fifty Mau Maus crowded onto the bus…The gang was pulling at each other, shouting obscenities, opening windows, smoking, drinking wine, pulling the bell cord, and shouting for the bus to get under way. 

When we arrived at the arena, we opened the emergency doors and some even crawled out the windows. There were several teenage girls standing around in front of the arena with tight shorts and brief halters.

Israel and I led the parade into the arena. An usher tried to stop us at the inner door. 

"Hay, Man, let us in," Israel said. "We are the People. The Mau Maus. The priest himself invited me. We got reserved seats."

We paraded down the aisle, tapping loudly with our canes and  shouting and whistling to the crowd.

Several boys and girls stood up near the organ and went into the fish…Suddenly, a girl walked out on the stage.

"Hey, Baby, wiggle it a little bit," someone shouted. "How about a date, Honey?" 

The girl began to sing…As she sang, several boys and girls got up on the seats and began gyrating and dancing…The girl finished her song and glanced nervously toward the wings. We began to cheer and clap and call for another song. However, she walked off the stage and suddenly the skinny preacher stepped forward…Israel was on his feet. "Hey Davie! Here I am. See, I told you I'd come. And look who's here," he said, pointing to me.

Wilkerson began to speak: "This is the last night of our city-wide youth crusade. Tonight we're going to do something different. I'm going to ask my friends, the Mau Maus, to receive the offering."

I was on my feet in a second. I'd been waiting for some opportunity to show off, to draw attention to myself in a big way. This was it. I couldn't believe that the preacher would call on us, but if he wanted us to do it, we'd really do it. 

I pointed to five others, including Israel. "You, you, you…let's go." The six of us walked to the front and lined up in front of the stage. Behind us things got quiet–deathly quiet. 

Wilkerson bent down and handed each of us a big ice cream carton. He said, "I want you to line up here in front of the platform. The organ will play and I'm going to ask the people to come forward and give their offering. When it is finished, I want you to come around behind that curtain and up onto the stage. I'll wait here until you bring me the offering."

It was too good to be true. There was no doubt in anyone's mind what we would do. Anyone who didn't take advantage of a situation like this was a fool. 

The offering was large…I was determined to make it a good one. Some of the gang members…pretended to put in money or tried to take some out of the cartons. When this happened, I'd put my hand in my pocket like I was going for a knife and say, "Hey, wait a minute, Baby, you forgot to put anything in." They would begin to laugh until they saw I was serious. 

When all had come forward, I motioned with my head and we all marched out the right side of the auditorium through the drapes that hung along the wall. Right above our heads was a huge red-lettered sign that said "EXIT." 

It was noticeable to everyone and as we disappeared behind the curtain, the laughter began. It was low at first, just a few snickers. Then, we could hear it rising to a crescendo until the whole auditorium was engulfed in gales of laughter at the poor preacher who had been duped by the Mau Maus. 

We gathered behind the curtain. The boys looked at me expectantly, waiting for me to tell them what to do. I could talk to them with my eyes. They were looking for a sign, for a flick of my eyes toward the exit that would say, "Let's run Let's take this money and bug out of here."

But something inside me was tugging in the other direction. The preacher had singled me out and had shown confidence in me. I could do what was expected of me by the crowd, or I could do what he trusted me to do…Instead of flicking my eyes toward the exit door, I shook my head "no." "Come one," I said, "let's take the loot to the skinny priest."

We walked single-file out onto the stage. Many kids began to boo. They thought we had made a fool out of the preacher and were sorry we hadn't ducked out of the door as they would have done.

"Hey, Priest!" I said. "This is yours." Wilkerson took the cartons from us and looked me straight in the eye. "Thank you, Nicky, I knew I could count on you."

We turned and filed back to our seats. Wilkerson began to preach. He spoke for about fifteen minutes…Wilkerson had reached a point in his sermon telling us we ought to love the Italians and the Italians ought to love the blacks and the blacks ought to love the whites and we all ought to love one another. 

Augie stood up behind me. "Hey, Preach. You some kind of nut or something. You want me to love them Dagos? You're crazy! Looky here." and he pulled up his shirt and pointed to huge crimson scar on his side. "Two months ago one of them filthy guineas put a bullet in me. You think I can for get that? I'll kill him if I see him again."

"Yeah," said a boy from the Italian section as he jumped to his feet and ripped open his shirt. "See this?" He pointed to a jagged scar around his shoulder and down onto his chest." One of them black gangs cut me with a razor. I'll love them all right-with a lead pipe." 

Suddenly I had a compelling urge to look at Wilkerson. He was standing calmly on the stage. His head was bowed. His hands were clasped tightly in front of his chest. His knuckles showed white against the skin. I could see his lips moving. I knew he was praying…Where did he get his power? Why wasn't he afraid like the rest of us?

Israel was standing up looking backward. He was shouting. "Hey! Cool it! Let's hear what the preacher has to say". The Mau Maus sat down. Israel continued to shout for quiet. The noise died down. 

Wilkerson was speaking again. He said something about repenting of your sin…Beside me I heard Israel blow his nose. Behind me I heard people crying. 

Wilkerson began speaking again: "He's here! He's in this room. He's come especially for you. If you want your life changed, now is the time." Then he shouted with authority: "Stand up! Those who will receive Jesus Christ and be changed–stand up! Come forward!"

I felt Israel stand to his feet. "Boys, I'm going up. Who's with me?"

I was on my feet. I turned to the gang and waved them on with me hand. "Let's go." There was a spontaneous movement out of the chairs and toward the front. More than twenty-five of the Mau Maus responded. Behind us about thirty kids from other gangs followed our example. 

We stood around the bottom of the stage looking up at Wilkerson. He dismissed the service and told us to follow him to the back rooms for counseling. 

"Nicky, Israel," he said, "I want to give you a Bible. I have other Bibles for the Mau Maus, too…We followed him to another room. There in boxes on the floor were copies of the black book. He bent over and picked up a pocket-sized edition of the NT and started to pass it to us . "Hey, Davie," I asked, "what about these big books? Could we have the big ones? We want everyone to know we're Christians now."

Wilkerson looked surprised. The "big ones" were just that. They were giant-sized editions of the Bible. The kids all wanted them and he was willing to give them to us. Nicky Cruz, Run , Baby, Run (New Leaf ed. 1968; 1992), 130-142.