7/11/2009

Who Is Jesus? - review


Who Is Jesus? by N.T. Wright evaluates three contemporary (1994) claims of who Jesus really is. The unfortunate (but deserving) victims of Wright's penetrating analysis are Barbara Thiering, A.N. Wilson, and John Sprong.

Barbara Thiering claims that Jesus was a figure in the community that wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls. The Gospels are code (she claims pesher) for the happenings within that community. According to Thiering, Jesus is drugged on the cross in a trial and awakens in a cave. He eventually marries Mary Magdalene, has a daughter and two sons, divorces her, and marries again. Easy breezy for Wright to dismantle this mess.

A.N. Wilson claims that Jesus, as we know him, is mythical story. According to Wilson, Jesus actually died, but the people thought that James (Jesus' brother) was actually Jesus resurrected. Wilson's problems in his assessment center around two issues: (1) even though he is a good writer, he isn't that great with facts and using scholarship and (2) he has admittedly given up his Christian faith and (surprise, surprise) Jesus wouldn't have approved of the Christian faith either, all the while calling the NT writers biased. Wright shows his ability as a historian and Wilson readily goes down as well.

John Sprong attacks the birth of Jesus and calls the Gospels fanciful stories which aren't meant to be taken literally (calling them Midrash). Wright deals with Sprong skillfully, but this is a more intricate argument.


Wright is very easy to read; for a book reassessing the historical Jesus, it was a page-turner. There are a couple of comments Wright makes that get under my skin. While N.T. Wright takes positions that I do not hold, they are outside of this volume; this book is a keeper.

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