Inventing Christic Jesuses, Volume 1

Inventing Christic Jesuses, Volume 1
Author: Charles A. Wilson
Publisher: Wipf and Stock Publishers
Total Pages: 293
Release: 2017-11-09
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1532631448

Inventing Christic Jesuses is the first comprehensive proposal for how revisionist theology can deploy historical Jesus research in a methodologically sophisticated way. Rejecting positions that insulate theology from Jesus research, the proposal sets out warrants and rules for a quested Christology in dialogue with an analysis of the conduct of historians of Jesus from the period of the Third Quest (c. 1980–2010). The volume Method analyzes for theology the methods and values of historical research on Jesus. It argues that the methodic construction of historical images of Jesus in conversation with sources is simultaneously a retrojective activity of value production. First, in defining the terms of the inquiry, Wilson locates a middle ground between hostility to questing and a too-ready application of historical results to Christology. He then identifies rules and warrants for the deployment of Jesus research in theology and reconstructs the notion of the retrojection of value in the production of a historical Jesus. The volume ends with a case study of retrojective Jesus production, an analysis and assessment of the new notion that Jesus is a sage in the tradition of wisdom.

Inventing Christic Jesuses: Rules and Warrants for Theology

Inventing Christic Jesuses: Rules and Warrants for Theology
Author: Charles A. Wilson
Publisher: Wipf and Stock Publishers
Total Pages: 318
Release: 2018-11-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1532643012

In the first comprehensive proposal for revisionist theology’s deployment of historical Jesus research, Inventing Christic Jesuses rejects positions that insulate theology from Jesus research. By setting out theological methods, warrants, and rules, in dialogue with an analysis of the Jesus historians of the Third Quest (c. 1980–2010), the study charts a path toward a quested christology positioned between categorical rejection and uncritical acceptance of historical results on Jesus. Volume 1, Method, analyzes the methods and values of historical research on Jesus and identifies the retrojective activity of value production when historians, in conversation with historical sources, invent images of Jesus. Volume 2, Christological Recommendations, gathers potential contributions of Jesus research for revisionist theology according to the cataphatic, apophatic, and eminent pattern of classical theology. By attending to the limits and opportunities afforded by historical research, both negative and positive, the argument retrieves for theology the complex way that historians shape same and different, association and dissociation in the production of their Jesuses. Then it analyzes how values shape Jesuses in a pervasive Narcissus project to invent a self (and a community) through imaging Jesus. Proposing that the disciplined invention of Jesuses is highly useful for theology, the book ends with recommendations for a quested christology.

Creating Christ

Creating Christ
Author: James S. Valliant
Publisher: Crossroad Press
Total Pages: 450
Release: 2016-09-07
Genre: Religion
ISBN:

Exhaustively annotated and illustrated, this explosive work of history unearths clues that finally demonstrate the truth about one of the world’s great religions: that it was born out of the conflict between the Romans and messianic Jews who fought a bitter war with each other during the 1st Century. The Romans employed a tactic they routinely used to conquer and absorb other nations: they grafted their imperial rule onto the religion of the conquered. After 30 years of research, authors James S. Valliant and C.W. Fahy present irrefutable archeological and textual evidence that proves Christianity was created by Roman Caesars in this book that breaks new ground in Christian scholarship and is destined to change the way the world looks at ancient religions forever. Inherited from a long-past era of tyranny, war and deliberate religious fraud, could Christianity have been created for an entirely different purpose than we have been lead to believe? Praised by scholars like Dead Sea Scrolls translator Robert Eisenman (James the Brother of Jesus), this exhaustive synthesis of historical detective work integrates all of the ancient sources about the earliest Christians and reveals new archeological evidence for the first time. And, despite the fable presented in current bestsellers like Bill O’Reilly’s Killing Jesus, the evidence presented in Creating Christ is irrefutable: Christianity was invented by Roman Emperors. I have rarely encountered a book so original, exciting, accessible and informed on subjects that are of obvious importance to the world and to which I have myself devoted such a large part of my scholarly career studying. In this book they have rendered a startling new understanding of Christianity with a controversial theory of its Roman provenance that is accessible to the layman in a very powerful way. In the process, they present new and comprehensive archeological and iconographic evidence, as well as utilizing the widest and most cutting edge work of other recent scholars, including myself. This is a work of outstanding and original scholarship. Its arguments are a brilliant, profound and thorough integration of the relevant evidence. When they are done, the conclusion is inescapable and obviously profound. Robert Eisenman, Author of James the Brother of Jesus and The New Testament Code "A fascinating and provocative investigative history of ideas, boldly exploring a problem that previous scholarship has not clearly or credibly addressed: how (and why!) the Flavian dynasty wove Christianity into the very fabric of Western civilization." -Mark Riebling, author of Church of Spies: The Pope's Secret War Against Hitler

One Nation Under God

One Nation Under God
Author: Kevin M. Kruse
Publisher: Basic Books
Total Pages: 385
Release: 2015-04-14
Genre: History
ISBN: 0465040640

The provocative and authoritative history of the origins of Christian America in the New Deal era We're often told that the United States is, was, and always has been a Christian nation. But in One Nation Under God, historian Kevin M. Kruse reveals that the belief that America is fundamentally and formally Christian originated in the 1930s. To fight the "slavery" of FDR's New Deal, businessmen enlisted religious activists in a campaign for "freedom under God" that culminated in the election of their ally Dwight Eisenhower in 1952. The new president revolutionized the role of religion in American politics. He inaugurated new traditions like the National Prayer Breakfast, as Congress added the phrase "under God" to the Pledge of Allegiance and made "In God We Trust" the country's first official motto. Church membership soon soared to an all-time high of 69 percent. Americans across the religious and political spectrum agreed that their country was "one nation under God." Provocative and authoritative, One Nation Under God reveals how an unholy alliance of money, religion, and politics created a false origin story that continues to define and divide American politics to this day.

Reinventing Jesus

Reinventing Jesus
Author: J. Ed Komoszewski
Publisher: Kregel Publications
Total Pages: 350
Release:
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0825497566

Reinventing Jesus cuts through the rhetoric of extreme doubt to reveal the profound credibility of historic Christianity. Meticulously researched yet eminently readable, this book invites a wide audience to take a firsthand look at the primary evidence for Christianity's origins.

Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation

Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation
Author: Kristin Kobes Du Mez
Publisher: Liveright Publishing
Total Pages: 384
Release: 2020-06-23
Genre: History
ISBN: 1631495747

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER The “paradigm-influencing” book (Christianity Today) that is fundamentally transforming our understanding of white evangelicalism in America. Jesus and John Wayne is a sweeping, revisionist history of the last seventy-five years of white evangelicalism, revealing how evangelicals have worked to replace the Jesus of the Gospels with an idol of rugged masculinity and Christian nationalism—or in the words of one modern chaplain, with “a spiritual badass.” As acclaimed scholar Kristin Du Mez explains, the key to understanding this transformation is to recognize the centrality of popular culture in contemporary American evangelicalism. Many of today’s evangelicals might not be theologically astute, but they know their VeggieTales, they’ve read John Eldredge’s Wild at Heart, and they learned about purity before they learned about sex—and they have a silver ring to prove it. Evangelical books, films, music, clothing, and merchandise shape the beliefs of millions. And evangelical culture is teeming with muscular heroes—mythical warriors and rugged soldiers, men like Oliver North, Ronald Reagan, Mel Gibson, and the Duck Dynasty clan, who assert white masculine power in defense of “Christian America.” Chief among these evangelical legends is John Wayne, an icon of a lost time when men were uncowed by political correctness, unafraid to tell it like it was, and did what needed to be done. Challenging the commonly held assumption that the “moral majority” backed Donald Trump in 2016 and 2020 for purely pragmatic reasons, Du Mez reveals that Trump in fact represented the fulfillment, rather than the betrayal, of white evangelicals’ most deeply held values: patriarchy, authoritarian rule, aggressive foreign policy, fear of Islam, ambivalence toward #MeToo, and opposition to Black Lives Matter and the LGBTQ community. A much-needed reexamination of perhaps the most influential subculture in this country, Jesus and John Wayne shows that, far from adhering to biblical principles, modern white evangelicals have remade their faith, with enduring consequences for all Americans.

Jesus Before the Gospels

Jesus Before the Gospels
Author: Bart D. Ehrman
Publisher: HarperCollins
Total Pages: 233
Release: 2016-03-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0062285238

The bestselling author of Misquoting Jesus, one of the most renowned and controversial Bible scholars in the world today examines oral tradition and its role in shaping the stories about Jesus we encounter in the New Testament—and ultimately in our understanding of Christianity. Throughout much of human history, our most important stories were passed down orally—including the stories about Jesus before they became written down in the Gospels. In this fascinating and deeply researched work, leading Bible scholar Bart D. Ehrman investigates the role oral history has played in the New Testament—how the telling of these stories not only spread Jesus’ message but helped shape it. A master explainer of Christian history, texts, and traditions, Ehrman draws on a range of disciplines, including psychology and anthropology, to examine the role of memory in the creation of the Gospels. Explaining how oral tradition evolves based on the latest scientific research, he demonstrates how the act of telling and retelling impacts the story, the storyteller, and the listener—crucial insights that challenge our typical historical understanding of the silent period between when Jesus lived and died and when his stories began to be written down. As he did in his previous books on religious scholarship, debates on New Testament authorship, and the existence of Jesus of Nazareth, Ehrman combines his deep knowledge and meticulous scholarship in a compelling and eye-opening narrative that will change the way we read and think about these sacred texts.

Great Christian Classics Volume 1

Great Christian Classics Volume 1
Author: Kevin Swanson
Publisher: New Leaf Publishing Group
Total Pages: 30
Release: 2017-06-05
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1683440706

There is a wealth of great literature to study in the history of man, some written by Christians and some by non-Christians. However, the Christian student should direct special attention to literature produced by Christians. The empires of man will always crumble and fall, but the kingdom of Jesus Christ will continue forever. This collection covers five of the greatest life narratives of all time. A thorough study of these great books will help students understand the life, theology, and worldview of some of the greatest Christian men in church history. Sit at the feet of some of the best teachers God has given to His church. Augustine Confessions: (354-430) Augustine is perhaps the most influential thinker of the first thousand years of Christian history. This fifth-century Christian wrote Confessions as a biography in the form of a prayer to God. Patrick Confessions: (387-493) Amid the chaos following the collapse of the Roman Empire, Patrick, a man of legendary faith, led the way to the evangelization of the wild and pagan tribes of Ireland. John Knox History of the Reformation In Scotland (c.1510-1572) Few men have lived in more dangerous times than John Knox of Scotland. Yet he led a reformation movement in a very dangerous land, leaving a testimony for generations to come. John Bunyan Grace Abounding (1628-1688) Great men tell great stories because they live them. This is the case with John Bunyan, whose personal testimony, Grace Abounding, records one of the most tumultuous and agonizing spiritual journeys. John Paton Autobiography (1824-1907) The kingdom of God is only taken by force by courageous men of faith like John Paton, whose missionary work among the cannibals in the New Hebrides is nothing short of legendary.

Jesus Remembered

Jesus Remembered
Author: James D. G. Dunn
Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing
Total Pages: 1046
Release: 2003-07-29
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9780802839312

In Christianity in the making, James D.G. Dunn examines in depth the major factors that shaped first-generation Christianity and beyond, exploring the parting of the ways between Christianity and Judaism, the Hellenization of Christianity, and responses to Gnosticism. He mines all the first- and second-century sources, including the New Testament Gospels, New Testament apocrypha, and such church fathers as Ignatius, Justin Martyr, and Irenaeus, showing how the Jesus tradition and the figures of James, Paul, Peter, and John were still esteemed influences but were also the subject of intense controversy as the early church wrestled with its evolving identity.

One.Life

One.Life
Author: Scot McKnight
Publisher: Zondervan
Total Pages: 210
Release: 2010-12-21
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0310412129

What is the “Christian life” all about? Studying the Bible, attending church, cultivating a prayer life, witnessing to others—those are all good. But is that really what Jesus has in mind? The answer, says Scot McKnight in One.Life, lies in Jesus’ words, “Follow me.” What does it look like to follow Jesus, and how will doing so change the way we live our life—our love.life, our justice.life, our peace.life, our community.life, our sex.life—everything about our life. One.Life will open your eyes to the full, compelling immensity of what it means to be a Christian. “Jesus offers to us a kingdom dream that transforms us to the very core of our being,” says Scot McKnight. “His vision is so big we are called to give our entire life to it. His vision is so big it swallows up our dreams.” Discover exactly what Jesus meant when he announced the arrival of God’s kingdom. Equipping you with a new understanding of that kingdom’s radical nature, One.Life shares profound, challenging, and practical insights on how to demonstrate its reality in your life. In many ways, what The Cost of Discipleship by Bonhoeffer challenged Christians to do in earlier generations, One.Life will do for a new generation. One.Life will call you beyond the flatlands of religiosity toward a kingdom vision that will shape everything you do.