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Title: Who Was Jesus? by N. T. Wright ISBN: 0-8028-0694-5 Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company Pub. Date: 01 March, 1993 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $12.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.71 (7 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Lemonaide from lemons.
Comment: At first glance, this seems a rather odd book. What is a first-class historian like N. T. Wright doing, refuting the likes of Spong and Thiering? Does one need a bulldozer to squash ants? (Wilson, I personally find more intelligent, and thus perhaps rising to the dignity of being run over.) Yet Wright gives their arguments a fair hearing, then a fair and gentle hanging.
But there seems to be method to Wright's mildness. As an alternative to the fumbling and bumbling of his protagonists, he offers a simple and readable description of who he has found the historical Jesus to be. Their errors prove a useful foil for explaining the methods and conclusions of legitimate New Testament scholarship. Wright's critiques of those with whom he disagrees are always a delight -- he shows a sincere appreciation for what is worthwhile, then refutes errors with wit and the gentle precision that comes of great intellectual power matched to thorough knowledge of the subject.
The subject here is Jesus, a fox in pursuit of whom academic hounds have banged their heads on many trees. Wright rightly follows him to the cross. "The Christian doctrine is all about a different kind of God -- a God who was so different to normal expectations that he could, completely appropriately, become human . . . To say that Jesus is in some sense God is of course to make a startling statement about Jesus. It is also to make a stupendous claim about God."
I think Wright over-emphasizes the genius of Biblical scholarship. He tends to give the impression that nobody knew anything worth knowing about Jesus, until the question was brought to the attention of modern academics. Having read many "Jesus Seminar" books, I think credentialed scholars like Crossan, Borg, Mack, and Pagels, are often as foolish as Wilson -- and less truly knowledgeable about the historical Jesus than the average Pentacostal grandmother.
Wright also knocks C. S. Lewis for his "odd" criticism of the "quest for Jesus" as "the work of the devil," in the Screwtape Letters. Aside from the unfairness of ignoring the humor in a satire, I think the substance of Lewis' arguments, made more seriously in Fernseed and Elephants, is entirely sound, and makes an excellent critique of many recent historical Jesus reconstructions. I think Wright's historical reconstruction, and Lewis' literary critique of shoddy skeptical arguments, complement one another nicely.
In sum, I recommend this book both for people who have been bamboozled by the particular works it refutes, and also as an antidote to recent works of a similar nature, like the Da Vinci Code, Jesus Mysteries, The Jesus Puzzle, or perhaps Elaine Pagel's new book, Beyond Belief. I am working on a book that will combine Wright and Lewis' approaches, to answer recent attacks on the Gospels.
author, Jesus and the Religions of Man /
Rating: 5
Summary: debunking the debunkers
Comment: Wright, one of the world's leading biblical scholars, takes a close look at the writings of three popular debunkers of the Gospel image of Christ. The works of Barbara Thiering, A.N. Wilson, and Shelby Spong (Mr. I-am-a-bishop-who-believes-nothing-of-the-Gospel) are reviewed through the lenses of logic and scholarship, with results that should give the Jesus Seminar folks (or at least their readers) pause to think if whether or not the whole enterprise is anything more than a publicity stunt geared at eliminating traditional Christian morality by undercutting its founder, Jesus Christ.
The other reviewers have said what needs to be mentioned, but I will just add that this little book is a fantastic introduction to the both sides of the argument. Anyone familiar with Wright's style will at once agree that he is a very fair author when he deals with those who hold views other than his own. Even so, he is also a rather humorous writer and I have found myself laughing aloud when he exposes the idiocy of someone like Thiering who claims, with absolute seriousness and zero textual support even from other scholars, that Jesus was married and had a few kids. Is that what St Luke meant when he said that the Word grew? Uh, I think not. It was like the man who claimed that had Jesus lived just a bit longer his whole view on the God issue would have matured. Nonsense in the guise of reason.
You may also want to check out Wright's other books. The thiker volumes are detailed and quite thik to read, but still worth the effort. In connection to the question of the reliability of the Gospels, his work on St Paul is valuable and clear. Luke Timothy Johnson's "The real Jesus" is also a very fun read about the farce known as the Jesus Seminar.
Read it all for yourself and you will see that the search for the historical Jesus is little more than a money-making industry set out to come up with new and exciting theories about the REAL and TRUE history of the Church with the ultimate end in mind of changing the ethics of the culture without the guilt (Spong's apparent raison d'etre).
Rating: 5
Summary: State of the Quest
Comment: Each year as we approach Christmas and Easter, we are inevitably greeted at magazine racks by news journals trumpeting the "latest scholarship" on the "historic Jesus". The fact that very little of what appears ever has lasting scholarly value seems to of little concern to the journals in question. The attraction of the sensational and the scandalous governs media coverage in our age and any "scholar" who claims things about Jesus Christ that ordinary Christians would find disturbing is enticing to a cynical media looking for a "story" - even if the views promoted lack any credibility with the vast majority of experts in the field.
N. T. Wright, one of the world's leading biblical scholars, has provided in Who Was Jesus? a potent antidote to the faddish output of several popular characterizations of Jesus making the rounds in press reports at the time it was written. With clarity and power, he destroys the arguments of popular revisionist arguments with comparative ease. By placing Jesus in the proper historical and cultural setting, the pet theories of various contributors to the radical fringe in studies of the historical Jesus are found to owe more to the temperaments and cultural presuppositions of the writers than anything likely to relate to the true life and times of Jesus. As a leading figure in the study into the historical and cultural settings of the New Testament, Wright could never be accused of putting his head in the sand. However, Wright insists an understanding of the complex interplay of cultures in fist century Judea is essential to grasping the true meaning of the New Testament writings,
Wright begins with an overview of the quest among scholars for the historic Jesus. While sympathetic to the goals of many of these investigations, he points out they are often as guided by their own prejudices as many forms of traditional Christian belief. The beliefs of many Christians about Jesus may be distorted at points but they are not without historical basis. Indeed, the beliefs of the Church certainly have a greater correspondence with the historical realities of the time than the pet theories of many revisionists. Wright assures traditional believers that any honest investigation into the Jesus of history should leave them with a more robust faith - not a weaker one.
Wright then turns to the particular projects of three major revisionists: Barbara Thiering, A.N. Wilson, and John Shelby Spong. Rather than dismissing them outright, Wright takes the path of considering their ideas seriously and applying the same critical analysis to them given to any serious scholarly hypothesis. In many ways this proves to be even more devastating, as rather than attempting a knockout blow, Wright counters their arguments with surgical precision and leaves their novelties to die of a thousand cuts. Thiering is particularly skewered as both a proper historical understanding of Judaism at the time and archeological discoveries of the period refute her concept of a coded pesher language in the New Testament. Once Wright is finished, her theories are exposed as little more than figments of a fertile imagination. Of the three, Wright shows the most empathy for Wilson for at least attempting to place Jesus within Judaism, but the rather bland figure from Wilson's account could hardly have been expected to found a movement to concern both Jewish and Roman authorities. Wilson's peculiar explanation of the Easter event (the Apostles mistook James for Jesus) comes in for severe criticism as an ad hoc conjecture giving no likely explanation for subsequent events. Spong is calmly refuted as simply taking part in a discussion over his head. Spong tries to paint the Gospels as an exercise in midrash , but as in Thiering's use of pesher, the description does not meet the reality. Spong simply has no idea what midrash is and misapplies it in an attempt to make the Gospels say something they do not. The critique by Wright in all three cases leaves the respective theories lying in ashes.
Wright finishes with an outline of the major points in an honest evaluation of the historical evidence about Jesus. First, the events chronicled in the Gospels must be understood in the context of a Judaism that had endured the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem and their being taken into captivity, the rebuilding of the Temple and Jerusalem under Persian rule, the attempts to Hellenize the Jews under Greek dominance, and the current humiliations of pagan Roman occupation. It was these Jews, looking for the fulfillment of the Messianic prophecies, to which Jesus came. The Gospels themselves must be understood within the literary forms of first century Judea. The language of the New Testament must not be read within a flat literalism but examined within the particular form in question. By moving forwards from first century Judaism and backwards from the Gospel, we are most likely to grasp the true Jesus. Most importantly, Wright sees nothing in such an endeavor to threaten the Jesus of faith. Wright even suggests the New Testament accounts of the resurrection make little sense as a developed tradition - unless it actually happened.
N. T. Wright has issued a challenge to both believers and skeptics alike for a greater appreciation of historical and cultural settings when interpreting the Gospel. Who Was Jesus? is a wonderful introduction to such a study and ideal for anyone looking to grasp the strengths and weaknesses of various theories commonly promoted in the national media. It also may serve as a primer for Wright's own more scholarly work. As a summary of the state (at the time of its writing) of modern scholarship into the historic Jesus, it is highly recommended.
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Title: The Challenge of Jesus: Rediscovering Who Jesus Was and Is by N. T. Wright ISBN: 0830822003 Publisher: InterVarsity Press Pub. Date: 01 October, 1999 List Price(USD): $16.00 |
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Title: Following Jesus: Biblical Reflections on Discipleship by N.T. Wright, N. T. Wright ISBN: 0802841325 Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company Pub. Date: 01 October, 1997 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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Title: What Saint Paul Really Said: Was Paul of Tarsus the Real Founder of Christianity? by N.T. Wright, N. T. Wright ISBN: 0802844456 Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company Pub. Date: June, 1997 List Price(USD): $16.00 |
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Title: The New Testament and the People of God (CHRISTIAN ORIGINS AND THE QUESTION OF GOD) by N.T. Wright ISBN: 0800626818 Publisher: Fortress Press Pub. Date: 01 September, 1996 List Price(USD): $35.00 |
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Title: Jesus and the Victory of God (Christian Origins and the Question of God, Volume 2) by N.T. Wright, N. T. Wright ISBN: 0800626826 Publisher: Augsburg Fortress Publishers Pub. Date: 01 August, 1997 List Price(USD): $41.00 |
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