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The apostolic witness is constituted explicitly as such by the christological assertion classically formulated as "Jesus is the Christ." However, the evidence provided by the New Testament writings requires us to recognize not only that this assertion was made explicit by means of a wide variety of formulations, of which even its classical formulation is only one, but also that, in the earliest stratum of Christian witness, it was apparently merely implied and not explicitly made at all.

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This explains, then, why the question of the credibility of the christological formulation, "Jesus is the Liberator," is the question of the credibility of these other assertions, metaphysical and moral, that it necessarily implies. If it is credible, they, too must be credible; and unless they can be believed on the basis of our common human experience and reason, it cannot be believed on this basis, either.

n.d.