Rating: 
Summary: You can't understand European history without it
Review: A riveting and much needed book! Analyzes religious propaganda which was included in the New Testament by the early Christian church in which the Jews are blamed for the execution of Jesus. Crossan shows how that this did not really matter at the time, because Christianity was just a bunch of disconnected movements without much power. But after Christianity became the official religion of the Roman Empire, these passages were used in programs of Jewish extermination. The Nazi Holocaust was built on this Christian foundation.
Rating: 
Summary: Fascinating, but slow-going at times
Review: Although Crossan says he aimed at writing a "popular" book, his task of showing the gospel roots of anti-semitism is too ambitious. While he starts out strongly, his bent for detail and covering all the angles will lose many readers, especially those unfamiliar with modern biblical scholarship. I don't think one can read Crossan carefully and not conclude he is honest and sincere in coming to his views about Jesus. His Christianity will seem heretical to most fundamentalists who refuse to look at the Gospels as anything less than the absolute historical truth. However, for those seeking thoughtful questions and possible answers on an important topic--how the gospels depict Jews in relation to Jesus' death and how much of that treatment is (1) real history or (2)creative application of old testament biblical prophecy presented as history--this book will provide much of substance. It takes some work to get the whole message of this "popular" book, but it is worth the effort.
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating, but slow-going at times
Review: Although Crossan says he aimed at writing a "popular" book, his task of showing the gospel roots of anti-semitism is too ambitious. While he starts out strongly, his bent for detail and covering all the angles will lose many readers, especially those unfamiliar with modern biblical scholarship. I don't think one can read Crossan carefully and not conclude he is honest and sincere in coming to his views about Jesus. His Christianity will seem heretical to most fundamentalists who refuse to look at the Gospels as anything less than the absolute historical truth. However, for those seeking thoughtful questions and possible answers on an important topic--how the gospels depict Jews in relation to Jesus' death and how much of that treatment is (1) real history or (2)creative application of old testament biblical prophecy presented as history--this book will provide much of substance. It takes some work to get the whole message of this "popular" book, but it is worth the effort.
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating!
Review: Crossan (DePaul Univ.), a former Roman Catholic priest and a cofounder of the Jesus Seminar, is the author of many books, including The Historical Jesus (CH, Jun'92), Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography (CH, Oct'94), The Essential Jesus (1994), and The Cross That Spoke (1988). His purpose here is "to ensure that a wider population [than] scholarly experts, knows as clearly as possible that there already existed a radically different interpretation of the passion stories from that given in Raymond Brown's The Death of the Messiah." Crossan's "different interpretation" is based on six fundamental disagreements with Brown. According to Crossan, the Passion stories in the New Testament were preceded by the one in the Gospel of Peter, and they are all prophecy historicized and not history remembered. Beginning with Jesus's crime and ending with the resurrection, Crossan concludes in every case that the texts are prophecy historicized. Of the "events" reported in the Gospels, historicity can be claimed only for the barest minimum: crucifixion "by a conjunction of Jewish and Roman authority under Pontius Pilate in Jerusalem at Passover"; most of these reported events "never happened." The author's view of the gospel accounts as novelistic fiction created from the historicization of prophecy does little to expose the roots of antisemitism in Christianity. There is too much assertion without accompanying evidence. Also, Crossan writes deliberately in a popular style but sometimes seems condescending. Good bibliography; translation of the Gospel of Peter in an appendix.
Rating: 
Summary: Christianity is not to blame for anti-Semitism
Review: Crossan is missing the point. No one killed Jesus. He chose to give His life on the cross. To tie Christianity with anti-Semitism is ludicrous. I can not believe that one man would dedicate so much time to such heresy.
Rating:
Summary: typically Crossan
Review: For a book written for the non-scholarly, it sure seems to be a scholarly book. but I guess Crossan did his best. like all of his books this is jammed full of information and, from a catholic point of view, it should be required reading if only to expose any anti-semitism in the church, it does have some. though I do disagree with his theory of a mass burial, Crossan does put some reasons behind this, like he does for everything else. this is not a book about faith, or your spiritual relationship with God. this ia about an inner jewish religeous struggle in the first century, that when gentiles entered the church, became a racial conflict. Crossan is consistant with his method as well as his desire to overload your brain. This is a scholarly book, but it is also a good one.
Rating: 
Summary: good but flawed
Review: i am not a fundamentalist, nor am i a revisionist. in fact, i am not even a christian. however, after studying many religions at great length i have come to the problem with most of crossan's work. while his scholarship is generally good and his conclusions well worth considering, he fails to recognise the importance of belief in the unproven, unprovable, and unlikely in any religion. how can one truly have a religious experience, how can one truly feel the actuality of the divine, in crossan's christianity? religion without miricle, religion based only on provable fact, is not religion at all- it's philosophy. by discrediting some of the so-called "myths" intrinsic to christianity, he takes the substance out of the faith and makes it into no more than moral code. if one views all the texts of christianity and the miricles described in them as mere metaphor and symbol, with no basis in fact, why believe it? it may be logically easier to reconcile with a modern sensibility, but it is hardly fulfilling in respect to that multitude of dark and complex questions of the human soul that form the basis of any faith. to a certain extent, one must be willing to believe that things actually did happen, such as the ressurection, even if it can be historically or scientifically proven not to have happened- and neither science or history have ever been able to disprove it anyway. certainly some aspects of the gospels were added to serve various agendas- though probably not in a concious way as crossan would have us believe- but one cannot discredit the entire basic tradition based on this reletively unsubstantiateable likelihood. in short, read crossan as good theory and good history, but poor theology. if his work is what revitalises your faith, i pity you- you're an atheist who just can't or won't admit it to yourself. on a side note, how come other major faiths- islam, judaism, hinduism, taoism, etc- do not have these enormous crises over whether their texts are historically possible? why are christians so reluctant to embrace their own revelation, the miricles supposedly given to them?
Rating:
Summary: An Argument of Power and Honesty
Review: I am not a scholar in theological or Christian studies. I am a specialist in Eastern Europe. I came to this book seeking an explanation for the origins of Christian Anti-Semitism. I got far more than I bargained for: a satisfying and profound answer to my questions on Anti-Semitism, and a powerful analysis of the origins and meaning of the central story in the Christian drama. This is simply one of the finest books I have ever read. I recommend it to the general reader as an introduction to the world of historical Jesus research. It has certainly opened up a whole new world for me. I have read two more of Crossan's books, and find myself coming back to this one over and over again. The author's autobiographical epilogue is a work of great rhetorical power and integrity and can stand by itself as a work of genius. Reading it is worth the price of the whole book. I regularly recommend this book to believing and non-believing friends alike. The moral conclusions to be drawn from this book are too important not to share.
Rating:
Summary: Another Angle on the Mel Gibson's Film
Review: I saw Crossan interviewed during a television special prior to the opening of Mel Gibson's The Passion. I knew, based on that interview, that he would dissent from the story conveyed in that film, and therewith from the literal reading of the Gospels as related to the passion of Jesus Christ. The film itself, which I saw last night, is a deeply moving, almost traumatic experience. Crossan's book, Who Killed Jesus? will be rejected by many believers prima facie, simply by virtue of his presumption that one should place the Gospels in their historical context rather than read them at face value. Crossan defines the problem as follows: "Jesus stands before a Roman governor who declares him innocent and wants him released while a Jewish crowd declares him guilty and wants him crucified. The crowd wins. Is that scene Roman history, or Christian propaganda?" Elsewhere, he asks, is it history remembered, or prophecy historicized? As an example, early-on he concludes that the three-hour eclipse, the darkness at high noon, foretold in Amos, was not an historical event, but an emendation to the written record for the purpose of establishing a link with a prophecy, and therewith winning believers. Again, many readers will reject Crossan's methods from the outset: divine revelation does not require interpretative feats. Crossan is not for everybody. But those who have read the Gospel narratives and view the film but remain curious about alternative interpretations, will find it in Crossan.
Rating:
Summary: Another Angle on the Mel Gibson's Film
Review: I saw Crossan interviewed during a television special prior to the opening of Mel Gibson's The Passion. I knew, based on that interview, that he would dissent from the story conveyed in that film, and therewith from the literal reading of the Gospels as related to the passion of Jesus Christ. The film itself, which I saw last night, is a deeply moving, almost traumatic experience. Crossan's book, Who Killed Jesus? will be rejected by many believers prima facie, simply by virtue of his presumption that one should place the Gospels in their historical context rather than read them at face value. Crossan defines the problem as follows: "Jesus stands before a Roman governor who declares him innocent and wants him released while a Jewish crowd declares him guilty and wants him crucified. The crowd wins. Is that scene Roman history, or Christian propaganda?" Elsewhere, he asks, is it history remembered, or prophecy historicized? As an example, early-on he concludes that the three-hour eclipse, the darkness at high noon, foretold in Amos, was not an historical event, but an emendation to the written record for the purpose of establishing a link with a prophecy, and therewith winning believers. Again, many readers will reject Crossan's methods from the outset: divine revelation does not require interpretative feats. Crossan is not for everybody. But those who have read the Gospel narratives and view the film but remain curious about alternative interpretations, will find it in Crossan.
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