Deconstructing Jesus

Deconstructing Jesus
Author: Robert M. Price
Publisher: Prometheus Books
Total Pages: 284
Release: 2009-09-25
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1615921206

After more than a century of New Testament scholarship, it has become clear that the Jesus of the gospels is a fictive amalgam, reflecting the hopes and beliefs of the early Christian community and revealing very little about the historical Jesus. Over the millennia since the beginning of Christianity various congregations, from fundamentalist to liberal, have tended to produce a Jesus figurehead that functions as a symbolic cloak for their specific theological agendas. Through extensive research and fresh textual insights Robert M. Price paves the way for a new reconstruction of Christian origins. Moving beyond the work of Burton L. Mack and John Dominic Crossan on Jesus movements and Christ cults, which shows how the various Jesus figures may have amalgamated into the patchwork savior of Christian faith, Price takes an innovative approach. He links the work of F.C. Baur, Walter Bauer, Helmut Koester, and James M. Robinson with that of early Christ-myth theorists-two camps of biblical analysis that have never communicated. Arguing that perhaps Jesus never existed as a historical figure, Price maintains an agnostic stance, while putting many puzzles and scholarly debates in a new light. He also incorporates neglected parallels from Islam, the Baha'i Faith, and Buddhism. Deconstructing Jesus provides a valuable bridge between New Testament scholarship and early freethinkers in a refreshing cross-fertilization of perspectives.

What Would Jesus Deconstruct? (The Church and Postmodern Culture)

What Would Jesus Deconstruct? (The Church and Postmodern Culture)
Author: John D. Caputo
Publisher: Baker Academic
Total Pages: 160
Release: 2007-11-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1441200363

This provocative addition to The Church and Postmodern Culture series offers a lively rereading of Charles Sheldon's In His Steps as a constructive way forward. John D. Caputo introduces the notion of why the church needs deconstruction, positively defines deconstruction's role in renewal, deconstructs idols of the church, and imagines the future of the church in addressing the practical implications of this for the church's life through liturgy, worship, preaching, and teaching. Students of philosophy, theology, religion, and ministry, as well as others interested in engaging postmodernism and the emerging church phenomenon, will welcome this provocative, non-technical work.

Republican Jesus

Republican Jesus
Author: Tony Keddie
Publisher: Univ of California Press
Total Pages: 376
Release: 2021-09-09
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0520385691

The complete guide to debunking right-wing misinterpretations of the Bible—from economics and immigration to gender and sexuality. Jesus loves borders, guns, unborn babies, and economic prosperity and hates homosexuality, taxes, welfare, and universal healthcare—or so say many Republican politicians, pundits, and preachers. Through outrageous misreadings of the New Testament gospels that started almost a century ago, conservative influencers have conjured a version of Jesus that speaks to their fears, desires, and resentments. In Republican Jesus, Tony Keddie explains not only where this right-wing Christ came from and what he stands for but also why this version of Jesus is a fraud. By restoring Republicans’ cherry-picked gospel texts to their original literary and historical contexts, Keddie dismantles the biblical basis for Republican positions on hot-button issues like Big Government, taxation, abortion, immigration, and climate change. At the same time, he introduces readers to an ancient Jesus whose life experiences and ethics were totally unlike those of modern Americans, conservatives and liberals alike.

Deconstructing Calvinism Revised Edition

Deconstructing Calvinism Revised Edition
Author: Hutson Smelley
Publisher: Xulon Press
Total Pages: 338
Release: 2011-08
Genre:
ISBN: 1613799381

Does God love everyone? When Jesus died on the cross at Calvary, did he die for the sins of the elect only or for the sins of the whole world? Can anyone respond in faith to the gospel message? Or is the act of believing a gift of God only given to a subset of humanity called the elect so that the rest of humanity is unable to believe and destined to spend eternity apart from God? What does the term elect mean in the New Testament? These are fundamental questions about the God of the Bible and the salvation He provides in Jesus Christ. This book invites you to sit as an unbiased juror and consider the traditional principles of TULIP Calvinism as explained by the leading Calvinists in their own words, then to weigh their proffered Scriptural evidence to make your own determination. This book will address exegetically all of the most commonly cited proof texts for Calvinism, with a thorough consideration of the "pillar" passages like John 6:44, Romans 3 and 9, and Ephesians 1:4. This book will defend a middle ground position (called NULIF - "new life") between TULIP Calvinism and Arminianism and demonstrate that you can tell people with confidence that God loves them, Jesus died for their sins, and they can be saved by trusting Christ for the forgiveness of their sins based on his finished work at Calvary. HUTSON SMELLEY is an attorney, Bible teacher and seminary student residing in Houston, Texas with his wife and seven children. He has a degree in Biblical Studies from the College of Biblical Studies, a B.S. in Mathematics from the University of Houston, a M.S. in Mathematics from Texas A&M University, and a J.D. from the University of Houston. His website can be found at www.proclaimtheword.net.

After Doubt

After Doubt
Author: A. J. Swoboda
Publisher: Brazos Press
Total Pages: 224
Release: 2021-03-02
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1493429590

Is there a way to walk faithfully through doubt and come out the other side with a deeper love for Jesus, the church, and its tradition? Can we question our faith without losing it? Award-winning author, pastor, and professor A. J. Swoboda has witnessed many young people wrestle with their core Christian beliefs. Too often, what begins as a set of critical and important questions turns to resentment and faith abandonment. Unfortunately, the church has largely ignored its task of serving people along their journey of questioning. The local church must walk alongside those who are deconstructing their faith and show them how to reconstruct it. Drawing on his own experience of deconstruction, Swoboda offers tools to help emerging adults navigate their faith in a hostile landscape. Doubt is a part of our natural spiritual journey, says Swoboda, and deconstruction is a legitimate space to encounter the living God. After Doubt offers a hopeful, practical vision of spiritual formation for those in the process of faith deconstruction and those who serve them. Foreword by pastor and author John Mark Comer.

What Would Jesus Deconstruct?

What Would Jesus Deconstruct?
Author: John D. Caputo
Publisher: Baker Academic
Total Pages: 164
Release: 2007-11
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN:

Uses the postmodern theme of deconstruction to suggest a constructive and provocative way forward for the church.

Regenerate

Regenerate
Author: Tony Scarcello
Publisher: Wipf and Stock Publishers
Total Pages: 166
Release: 2020-09-24
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1532685157

“Loss. Fear. Doubt. What does anything mean when your ground of being is stripped away?” Tony met God when he was four years old through the love of his mother. When he was twelve, he realized he had a crush on one of his male friends and grew convinced God would have nothing to do with him. At sixteen, Tony reencountered God who affirmed that nothing stood between them but love. When he was twenty-three, married to the girl of his dreams, and on staff at a church, Tony’s secret came out, and he came close to losing it all. What followed was arduous years of deconstruction, losing everything he thought he knew about God, only to rediscover God in the mystery. This God was not a new God—it was the same one as before, just seen with regenerated faith. This God was more beautiful and restorative than Tony could have ever imagined. Tony’s story is not uncommon in the modern evangelical landscape. Thousands of people throughout the West are experiencing a crisis of faith that is commonly referred to as “deconstruction.” With raw honesty, Tony uses his own story as a starting point for a dialogue on the deconstruction process. Tony unpacks what the deconstruction process is, why it happens, and how the church can help people experiencing a crisis of faith without worsening it along the way. In this memoir, Tony candidly pleads for the church to make a turn: not to a trendier, “progressive” version of Christianity, nor to a stricter form of fundamentalism, but to the revolutionary, Jesus-centered movement that changed the face of the earth. A movement once better known for its society of healing love than its dogma.

Deconstruct Faith, Discover Jesus

Deconstruct Faith, Discover Jesus
Author: Preston Ulmer
Publisher: NavPress
Total Pages: 177
Release: 2023-06-06
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1641586044

What If Deconstructing Your Faith Isn't a Phase but a Holy Process? There's probably a really good reason you picked up this book. Are you desperate to be in relationship with family or friends who are questioning their faith? Are you experiencing your own deconstruction of faith? Here is your invitation to rethink everything you thought you knew. In this process, you'll . . . learn why it's important to deconstruct (and how we are wired to do it); define deconstruction and deconversion--what they really mean; consider WWJD (What Would Jesus Deconstruct?); and apply the FUSE method to deconstruct for yourself. Deconstruct Faith, Discover Jesus will help you to enter the mindset of a deconstructionist. A worldview with a high capacity for paradoxes. A mental space that outweighs your self-interest in being right. A tendency to see Christian beliefs as inseparable from Christian ethics. In doing so, you will find the original deconstructionist, Jesus, right beside you.

Deconstructing the New Testament

Deconstructing the New Testament
Author: Seeley
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 219
Release: 2021-08-30
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9004497897

To deconstruct a text means to disassemble the various points of view contained within it, and to let them stand fully exposed with all their own presuppositions. When this is done, the contours of these building blocks appear so different from one another that the structural unity of the text is called into question. Biblical scholars will sense how close this process is to familiar methods of form and source criticism. Without jargon, this study sharpens and clarifies the analytical thrust behind such methods. At the same time, it offers a fresh rendering of redaction criticism, inquiring after the often contradictory motives and historical circumstances influencing the evangelists. This book thus provides an intriguing combination of the old and the new.