|
Source: (consider it)
|
Thread: Zealot; the Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth, by Reza Aslan
|
Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras
Shipmate
# 11274
|
Posted
So anyone here read it? Thoughts about any of it? I decided to purchase a copy after hearing an interview with Aslan on NPR and facing a long flight which required some adequate reading material.
Some initial thoughts on my part. It's an easy read because it's written for a popular, general audience, which is a considerable part of the problem with the book. The scholarship seems lazy and the author doesn't do enough to defend his contentions. I found the descriptions of 1st Century Palestine very interesting, as well as Aslan's commentary on various Temple intrigues over most of the 1st Century until the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE informative and appalling.
I thought, however, that the author overemphasised the poverty culture from which Jesus was ostensibly coming, at the expense of dealing with Jesus' recorded ability to engage elements of society who were not living in poverty. In other words, his portrait of Jesus, and his arguments in favour of this portrait, struck me as at times contrived and one-sided.
I also thought Aslan conveyed a rather disingenuous way of worming out of putting forth a theory of what was done with Jesus's body following his death on the Cross. The author obliquely expresses doubt about the notion that the body would have been entombed in the planned burial place of a wealthy member of the religious-political elite, and Aslan notes that bodies were normatively left on the cross until they had been devoured by predators and reduced to skeletal remains that were then thrown into a heap. However, Aslan never deals directly with the issue of what happened to the body of Jesus. To me, this omission strikes as a likely commercial decision to avoid making the book patently obnoxious to some of his expected readership.
The post-crucifixion chapters dealing especially with Paul and James are of interest, but didn't strike me as anything really new. He certainly did, however, posit an extreme antipathy between the Jerusalem community and Paul's mission, doctrine, and innovations.
There's a great deal more to be said, but I just wanted to get the ball rolling on this.
Posts: 7328 | From: Delaware | Registered: Apr 2006
| IP: Logged
|
|
anteater
Ship's pest-controller
# 11435
|
Posted
From what I gather, it's not worth the time reading it. I recommend anyone to read the review on the Jewish review of books, by an author who not being christian, is not obviously going to be prejudiced. You can read it here. It is quite polemic, even dismissive, as the following extract shows.
quote:
The persistent problem permeating Aslan’s narrative is that he never provides his readers with so much as a hint of any method for separating fact from fiction in the Gospels, a challenge that has engaged actual scholars of the New Testament for the last two centuries. Nowhere does he explain, given his overall distrust of the Gospels as contrived at best and deliberately fictitious at worst, why he trusts anything at all recorded in the New Testament. But one needn’t struggle too hard to discern Aslan’s selection process: Whichever verses fit the central argument of his book, he accepts as historically valid. Everything else is summarily dismissed as apologetic theological rubbish of absolutely no historical worth.
--------------------
Schnuffle schnuffle.
Posts: 2538 | From: UK | Registered: May 2006
| IP: Logged
|
|
Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras
Shipmate
# 11274
|
Posted
I agree with that assessment. Despite his prolific notes at the end of the book, and his citation of many scholars, his own methodology remains opaque and largely unaddressed, whilst opinions are asserted without justification oftentimes. I actually found it surprising that Aslan appears to uncritically accept so much of the Gospel accounts, including healings and exorcisms.
Nonetheless, I expect the book will get a good deal of popular attention, and thus it seemed timely to pick it up in an airport bookshop. I've not read anything else by the author. I wonder if he demonstrates better scholarship elsewhere.
Posts: 7328 | From: Delaware | Registered: Apr 2006
| IP: Logged
|
|
Bostonman
Shipmate
# 17108
|
Posted
Not having read it: my sense from the news coverage and from second hand accounts is "Oh, it's really wonderful -- he looks at Jesus in his historical context and asks what he was really like!" As if the whole historical Jesus project weren't centuries old at this point. And this from some people (clergy!) who should know better.
Snore.
Posts: 424 | From: USA | Registered: May 2012
| IP: Logged
|
|
Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras
Shipmate
# 11274
|
Posted
Possibly what this book might succeed in doing is reviving somewhat the historical Jesus scholarship. The modern Quest for the Historical Jesus of Nazareth has become tired after 150 years. Perhaps Aslan's book will catalyse some new approach(es) to the subject. Really, by mid-20th Century, the truly scholarly work seems to have pretty much exhausted itself and hit the limits of its methodology. The subsequent attitude, as I understand it, has essentially been that this is a futile pursuit. In the wake of it, Jesus "scholarship" has largely been left to hacks of various sorts, with axes to grind.
Posts: 7328 | From: Delaware | Registered: Apr 2006
| IP: Logged
|
|
Tea
Shipmate
# 16619
|
Posted
Originally posted by Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras: quote:
Really, by mid-20th Century, the truly scholarly work seems to have pretty much exhausted itself and hit the limits of its methodology. The subsequent attitude, as I understand it, has essentially been that this is a futile pursuit. In the wake of it, Jesus "scholarship" has largely been left to hacks of various sorts, with axes to grind.
This comment puzzles me. What about E P Sanders or Géza Vermes? I don't think they could be fairly described as "hacks...with axes to grind."
Posts: 66 | From: USA | Registered: Aug 2011
| IP: Logged
|
|
Gee D
Shipmate
# 13815
|
Posted
Of course, by his association with tax-gatherers and Roman soldiers, Jesus showed that he was not a Zealot. While Simon the Zealot was an Apostle, so was Matthew the tax-gatherer. I wonder if Aslan understands this.
--------------------
Not every Anglican in Sydney is Sydney Anglican
Posts: 7028 | From: Warrawee NSW Australia | Registered: Jun 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
Fr Weber
Shipmate
# 13472
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Tea:
Originally posted by Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras: quote:
Really, by mid-20th Century, the truly scholarly work seems to have pretty much exhausted itself and hit the limits of its methodology. The subsequent attitude, as I understand it, has essentially been that this is a futile pursuit. In the wake of it, Jesus "scholarship" has largely been left to hacks of various sorts, with axes to grind.
This comment puzzles me. What about E P Sanders or Géza Vermes? I don't think they could be fairly described as "hacks...with axes to grind."
Well "hack" would be far overstating the case with regard to Vermes. But I'm still not clear how exactly he has made some of his decisions (e.g. Jesus didn't reach out to non-Jews and the parable of the Good Samaritan was inserted later by early Christian editors).
--------------------
"The Eucharist is not a play, and you're not Jesus."
--Sr Theresa Koernke, IHM
Posts: 2512 | From: Oakland, CA | Registered: Feb 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
Golden Key
Shipmate
# 1468
|
Posted
I haven't read it yet; but I did hear a couple of interviews with him.
IIRC, he's been through various religious stages. I think he's Muslim, now, And has been both a Christian and also an atheist. So his view is probably shaped by all those stages. Muslims believe Isa/Jesus was crucified, but don't accept the resurrection, IIRC. They do regard him as a high-level prophet, though.
I'm not sure the book was intended as a scholarly work, so scholarly standards may not apply.
I do think it's cool that his last name is Aslan! ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
--------------------
Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")
Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
RuthW
liberal "peace first" hankie squeezer
# 13
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by anteater:
From what I gather, it's not worth the time reading it. I recommend anyone to read the review on the Jewish review of books, by an author who not being christian, is not obviously going to be prejudiced. You can read it here.
Thanks for the reference; it confirms my decision not to spend any time on this book. I can't agree, though, that the reviewer's not being a Christian means he won't be prejudiced -- he's not at all happy with Aslan's portrayal of first-century Judaism. And he takes a bit of a potshot at Mohammed at the end.
Posts: 24453 | From: La La Land | Registered: Apr 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
|
Posted
Look for who benefits? I'm inclined to be sceptical about these reworkings, for the reasons already given; ground much dug over the importance of coherent methodology etc. Problem is, there is quite a lot of money to be made out of iconoclasm and conspiracy theories. "Now at last the truth can be told! Is this what really happened? We all know that establishments conceal embarrassing info".
So it goes. I might read it, for the dubious fun of picking holes in it, but only if someone loaned me a copy ..
[ 19. October 2013, 11:05: Message edited by: Barnabas62 ]
--------------------
Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
| IP: Logged
|
|
TurquoiseTastic
Fish of a different color
# 8978
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Golden Key:
IIRC, he's been through various religious stages. I think he's Muslim, now, And has been both a Christian and also an atheist. So his view is probably shaped by all those stages. Muslims believe Isa/Jesus was crucified, but don't accept the resurrection, IIRC. They do regard him as a high-level prophet, though.
Muslims believe that Jesus was not really crucified, because Allah would never allow such a great prophet to be treated in this way. The thinking seems to be that Allah changed the appearance of Judas so that he was crucified instead of Jesus. See for example this link.
Posts: 1092 | From: Hants., UK | Registered: Jan 2005
| IP: Logged
|
|
Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras
Shipmate
# 11274
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Golden Key:
I haven't read it yet; but I did hear a couple of interviews with him.
IIRC, he's been through various religious stages. I think he's Muslim, now, And has been both a Christian and also an atheist. So his view is probably shaped by all those stages. Muslims believe Isa/Jesus was crucified, but don't accept the resurrection, IIRC. They do regard him as a high-level prophet, though.
I'm not sure the book was intended as a scholarly work, so scholarly standards may not apply.
I do think it's cool that his last name is Aslan!
Well, the book is patently written for a popular, non-academic audience, but the author nevertheless makes reference to his own ostensible scholarly credentials, frequently cites other Historical Jesus scholars and authors, and has a long section of notes at the end of the book (those these aren't footnotes or citations in the normal sense). Thus, I think he implicitly presents his work as scholarship for the general audience.
Aslan's early background was that of a modern, secularised Muslim child growing up in pre-Revolutionary Iran. The family ultimately settled in the USA after the Iranian Revolution, where Aslan says their chief motivation was to fit in, and hence all members of his family abandoned their Muslim faith in practice, due both to the trauma of how they had been impacted by an Islamic theocratic revolution in their country of origin, and out of the perception that to be a Muslim in America would be marginalising. It wasn't so much active atheism as a de facto abandonment of a religion that had become ego-alien.
Aslan relates that he became an evangelical Christian in high school, but this seems to have been a very adolescent "Jesus is my best friend" kind of faith. This immature faith then seems to have easily been displaced when he was exposed to works of higher criticism. Despite Aslan's purported religious studies, he over-simplifies the doctrine of the Incarnation and seems not to have a nuanced view at all of the divinity of Christ: he seems to take a black and white view that doesn't integrate either the Chalcedonian Definition or alternative ways of understanding Jesus as a true reflection of the nature of God.
The key, it would seem, is that a disillusioned Aslan returned to the straightforward and uncomplicated monotheism of Islam, and in so doing was at the same time able to reconnect with aspects of his cultural heritage that he had previously psychologically repudiated in the effort to completely assimilate into a particular popular version of American culture. Indeed, he observes that as an immigrant kid in America it seemed to him that nothing could be more American than Christianity (by which I think he means a particular evangelical protestant iteration of Christianity).
So there does seem to be a certain element of reactionism in his writing. His extremely negative portrayal of the Jewish nation of antiquity is another matter that one might suspect is over-determined, simplistic, monochromatic, and at some level perhaps propagandising.
Posts: 7328 | From: Delaware | Registered: Apr 2006
| IP: Logged
|
|
Beeswax Altar
Shipmate
# 11644
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Tea:
Originally posted by Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras: quote:
Really, by mid-20th Century, the truly scholarly work seems to have pretty much exhausted itself and hit the limits of its methodology. The subsequent attitude, as I understand it, has essentially been that this is a futile pursuit. In the wake of it, Jesus "scholarship" has largely been left to hacks of various sorts, with axes to grind.
This comment puzzles me. What about E P Sanders or Géza Vermes? I don't think they could be fairly described as "hacks...with axes to grind."
Geza Vermes was a Jew who converted to Roman Catholicism and then back to Judaism. He then decided Jesus correctly understood would be appealing to Jews but not Christians. Vermes looked into the well of history in search of the historical Jesus and saw his on reflection in the water below.
Posts: 8411 | From: By a large lake | Registered: Jul 2006
| IP: Logged
|
|
Anglican_Brat
Shipmate
# 12349
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras:
Possibly what this book might succeed in doing is reviving somewhat the historical Jesus scholarship. The modern Quest for the Historical Jesus of Nazareth has become tired after 150 years. Perhaps Aslan's book will catalyse some new approach(es) to the subject. Really, by mid-20th Century, the truly scholarly work seems to have pretty much exhausted itself and hit the limits of its methodology. The subsequent attitude, as I understand it, has essentially been that this is a futile pursuit. In the wake of it, Jesus "scholarship" has largely been left to hacks of various sorts, with axes to grind.
Oh, joy, another Jesus Seminar and its resultant controversy.
--------------------
It's Reformation Day! Do your part to promote Christian unity and brotherly love and hug a schismatic.
Posts: 4332 | From: Vancouver | Registered: Feb 2007
| IP: Logged
|
|
|
Printer-friendly view
