Jesus Under Fire

Rating:
Summary: Hits the Jesus Seminar Where it Hurts
Review: This book is a composition of short essays written by a number of prominent Christian apologists which focus on specific and fundamental questions about the Christian faith. Each of the chapters offers solid defenses of orthodox Christianity as well as highlighting where folks like the Jesus Seminar are in opposition to Christian orthodoxy and the many philosophical and scholarly flaws that undermine their case.

While each of the chapters offered compelling reasons in support of Christianity while rejecting the 'scholarship' of the Jesus Seminar, I felt that two chapters were quite outstanding. Habermas's chapter on miracles and Craig's chapter on the resurrection both did the best job of deconstructing the Jesus Seminar, in part, by demonstrating the reasonableness of orthodoxy. Habermas did a good job of demonstrating that the Jesus Seminar, far from being a group of people offering fresh scholarship because they are not bound by Christian tradition, are clearly bound tightly to a naturalistic worldview that slants their entire approach to their study of Jesus. These guys are not neutral and impartial scholars. As both Habermas and Evans effectively demonstrate, the Jesus Seminar is often in the intellectually dubious position of trying to meld two worldviews that are hostile to each other - Christianity and naturalism. The result, as the entire book effectively shows, is a highly subjective effort on the part of the Jesus Seminar to naturalize Christianity and to christianize naturalism. Since this can't be done objectively or evidentially, the Jesus Seminar tries to do it subjectively. And while this has certainly resulted in the Seminar getting lots of attention, it also makes books like Jesus Under Fire easy to write, because the Seminar's scholarship methods are frighteningly easy to refute.

William Lane Craig's chapter does a very good job of refuting the Seminar on the question of the resurrection. Craig's main emphasis is on demonstrating the massive falsity of John Dominic Crossan's musings on the resurrection. Craig's chapter in this book, coupled with Craig's formal debate with Crossan some years ago, provides defenders of orthodox Christianity with a multitude of reasons to be confident in the intellectual soundness of Christianity while also being confident that opponents of orthodox Christianity are in a very bad way if Crossan's views represent the best they can do.

In conclusion, this is a book that puts the Seminar squarely in its place as a group of rogue people who's scholarship and improbable theories are better suited for daytime television than in the halls of academia. I was very impressed with the concise nature of each chapter, and how each chapter is heavily referenced. Lastly, I was also very happy to see a somewhat lengthy list of suggested readings on various Christian topics that complement this book.

When it comes to religious books, topics discussed tend to be pretty fluid, and there is no shortage of rebuttals and rebuttals to rebuttals among scholars of differing views. But every once in a while, a book comes along that really cripples the opposition, and this can be seen by the muted response the opposition offers to the book. Mere Christianity by CS Lewis is one of those books, The Gospel and the Greeks by Ron Nash is another. Jesus Under Fire is a book that comes close to falling into this category. This book has been out on the market for nearly 7 years now, and the response to this book from prominent folks on the other side of the equation has been sparse at best. And what little response there has been has often been guilty of the same philosophical and scholarly presuppositions employed by the Jesus Seminar that were so thoroughly refuted in this book. It is therefore with great confidence that I recommend this book as a quality starting point for exploring the rationality of traditional Christianity, and then applying the same tests of logic, philosophy, and intellectually honest scholarship to the views and methods employed by the Jesus Seminar and its sympathizers.

Rating:
Summary: Hits the Jesus Seminar Where it Hurts
Review: This book is a composition of short essays written by a number of prominent Christian apologists which focus on specific and fundamental questions about the Christian faith. Each of the chapters offers solid defenses of orthodox Christianity as well as highlighting where folks like the Jesus Seminar are in opposition to Christian orthodoxy and the many philosophical and scholarly flaws that undermine their case.

While each of the chapters offered compelling reasons in support of Christianity while rejecting the 'scholarship' of the Jesus Seminar, I felt that two chapters were quite outstanding. Habermas's chapter on miracles and Craig's chapter on the resurrection both did the best job of deconstructing the Jesus Seminar, in part, by demonstrating the reasonableness of orthodoxy. Habermas did a good job of demonstrating that the Jesus Seminar, far from being a group of people offering fresh scholarship because they are not bound by Christian tradition, are clearly bound tightly to a naturalistic worldview that slants their entire approach to their study of Jesus. These guys are not neutral and impartial scholars. As both Habermas and Evans effectively demonstrate, the Jesus Seminar is often in the intellectually dubious position of trying to meld two worldviews that are hostile to each other - Christianity and naturalism. The result, as the entire book effectively shows, is a highly subjective effort on the part of the Jesus Seminar to naturalize Christianity and to christianize naturalism. Since this can't be done objectively or evidentially, the Jesus Seminar tries to do it subjectively. And while this has certainly resulted in the Seminar getting lots of attention, it also makes books like Jesus Under Fire easy to write, because the Seminar's scholarship methods are frighteningly easy to refute.

William Lane Craig's chapter does a very good job of refuting the Seminar on the question of the resurrection. Craig's main emphasis is on demonstrating the massive falsity of John Dominic Crossan's musings on the resurrection. Craig's chapter in this book, coupled with Craig's formal debate with Crossan some years ago, provides defenders of orthodox Christianity with a multitude of reasons to be confident in the intellectual soundness of Christianity while also being confident that opponents of orthodox Christianity are in a very bad way if Crossan's views represent the best they can do.

In conclusion, this is a book that puts the Seminar squarely in its place as a group of rogue people who's scholarship and improbable theories are better suited for daytime television than in the halls of academia. I was very impressed with the concise nature of each chapter, and how each chapter is heavily referenced. Lastly, I was also very happy to see a somewhat lengthy list of suggested readings on various Christian topics that complement this book.

When it comes to religious books, topics discussed tend to be pretty fluid, and there is no shortage of rebuttals and rebuttals to rebuttals among scholars of differing views. But every once in a while, a book comes along that really cripples the opposition, and this can be seen by the muted response the opposition offers to the book. Mere Christianity by CS Lewis is one of those books, The Gospel and the Greeks by Ron Nash is another. Jesus Under Fire is a book that comes close to falling into this category. This book has been out on the market for nearly 7 years now, and the response to this book from prominent folks on the other side of the equation has been sparse at best. And what little response there has been has often been guilty of the same philosophical and scholarly presuppositions employed by the Jesus Seminar that were so thoroughly refuted in this book. It is therefore with great confidence that I recommend this book as a quality starting point for exploring the rationality of traditional Christianity, and then applying the same tests of logic, philosophy, and intellectually honest scholarship to the views and methods employed by the Jesus Seminar and its sympathizers.

Rating:
Summary: Great book
Review: This book is a series of articles on the issues surrounding Jesus. It rebutes the Jesus Seminar point by point. It goes to issues like the studies of Jesus, the reliablity of the Gospels. Also the Resurrection of Jesus etc. It's great book from some great scholars in this area. My copy of the book is a bad addition, because it's missing some pages and the index. I email zondervan 2x but got no response. So I called and their going to replace ot for free. Thanks!


Rating:
Summary: Excellent Book
Review: This is a great book. It is too bad that it didn't get the press that the Jesus Seminar got. Despite what one reviewer wrote, the authors don't approach the issue just as biased as the Jesus Seminar. The authors of this book approach it from a perspective of supernaturalism. This allows for the examination of a greater number of hypotheses than does naturalism. A supernaturalist does not necessarily attribute supernatural reasons to tough questions. On the other hand, a naturalist necessarily DOES attribute natural explanations to tough questions. I hope that reviewer finishes the book, it may do him well to find that the essays are written partly in order to convince people who tend toward naturalism that naturalism is actually too limited of a world view to account for all of the facts we have.

GET THIS BOOK FOR ALL OF YOUR FRIENDS AND FAMILY!!