This article seeks to explore the twofold agenda of Schweitzer 's The Quest for the Historical Jesus. The first element is well-known and obvious: Schweitzer 's intention to put to death the 'liberal German ' Jesus and to reinstate the true historical Jesus whose preaching and actions were wholly eschatological in orientation. The second element lies below the surface, and this article argues that Schweitzer structured the book around Reimarus, Strauss, Weiss and himself, as they aim to show

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... impossibility of maintaining Jesus' own dogmatic construction of eschatology in the modern era. It is also demonstrated (against some current understandings) that Schweitzer 's reconstruction of Jesus' eschatology does not simply involve Jesus' belief in the end of the space-time universe.