History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)

Book Description

Recorded history is a finely-woven magic fabric of intricate lies about events predating the sixteenth century. There is not a single piece of evidence that can be reliably and independently traced back earlier than the eleventh century. This book details events that are substantiated by hard facts and logic, and validated by new astronomical research and statistical analysis of ancient sources.

Customer Reviews:

Calculations are only as good as your numbers.......2007-08-03

Yes, we can all agree that mainstream history is nearly 100% BS due to politics, economics, ego, problems with dating techniques, and various conspiracies. Agreed. But, I've been researching the distinct possibility that human history (in terms of civilizations) are much more ancient than we've been told, so coming across this book was very interesting to me. I wondered how Fomenko could be wrong (if at all) because he is very persuasive in his presentations. Then it dawned on me. If at previous times in prehistory, due to the various catastrophies that are well documented (comets, asteroids, planetary disruptions, plasma discharge, pole reversals, etc) the Earth was in a different position in relation to the sun, different tilt on its axis, different orbit, different rotation (in terms of velocity and DIRECTION), and the continents were in different positions, then would this not cause the ancients to see the sky (constellations) differently? In other words, is Fomenko making erronious assumptions about the physics of the Earth in pre-history, which then corrupt his data with regards to dating the relevant astrology? The last event to seriously disrupt our planet occured roughly 3500 years ago, according to other good researchers, so is it possible Fomenko has been confused by this? The vastly different physics of our planet in the not so distant past may explain this confusion, which is not to say the "mainstream" version of history is correct; on the contrary. I am not an expert in these fields, but wanted to see if this idea could spark discussion.

Pants on fire?.......2007-07-19

Will people ever read before spamming? Yes, Jesuits could not rewrite world history alone, they had help. Anyway, Dr Prof Acad A.Fomenko does not point to jesuits as the driving force of world wide history manipulation in published volumes 1,2,3;, actually he barely mentions the poor devils. Check it with 'Search inside' feature, please. China is rarely mentioned either, in fact, Dr Fomenko is completely eurocentric. Right, his theory contradicts all mainstream schools of history, because in their actual state they are all built on blatantly erroneus chronology. You don't need a mysterious cabal (conspiracy) to falsify history, the falsification is its modus operandi. It is inherent to history(ians) to falsify (distort) events, as it is inherent to humans to boast as it is inherent to power (authority) to legimize itself by referrring to glorious past made to its own order. Dr Prof Fomenko and team have identified scores of instances of such manipulation in Russian, European, etc.. history, and delivered valid statistical proof thereof. His own 'reconstruction' is completely another story. Forget c14 as a valid method of dating. W.Libby has initially discovered a brilliant method of INDEPENDENT dating. Too bad, c14 method has become a joke after a forced marrige with dendrochronology with consensual chronological scale inbuilt. Radiocarbon method can't stand blind tests, but is so very productive as a rubberstamp.

Accepted History & Chronology Must Be Changed. .......2007-04-09

There is no doubt that history as most know it is a sham, & institution's version of History both University & Church is fradulent & inaccurate. Everything was established with an agenda, The real "Dark Ages" are now when we have access to incredible amounts of information past authorities & more important 'common folk' didn't have but our institutions & educators are slow to evolve because of what has ignorantly & arrogantly been taught for too long. This is on many subjects not just Chronology.

For anyone to question "Why would a Mathematician have anything credible to say of History?" The answer is from Dr. Fomenko's preface in the book: "It would be worthwhile to remind the reader that in the XVI-XVII century Chronology was considered to be a subdivision of Mathematics." These volumes could possibly be some of the most important works to date & should be read by everyone with an interest in History, especially professors & educators who have a duty to the public. I have read both books & must say that 'Chronology 1' has some very eye opening & revolutionary information. Even if these volumes are part true the implications are profound & opens the doors to further investigations & questions which must be done. I speak several different lanquages & must say the logic Dr. Fomenko uses with "inflection" of words & words being read from left to right in one region & right to left in another then written backwards, the removal of vowels & get down to basics of words, or different cities & locations having the same name etc. is correct. Vowel usage has always been optional & varied, actually complicating linquistics & study. The first thing one has to understand is that words never had a fixed spelling in history like we do now, the spelling of words was mutable & regional, as well as names & titles of people were vast, varied & changed, NOTHING WAS FIXED or understood linear. Matters of Life & Death as well as financial profiteering yesterday & today were & are made with ignorant, illogical & conspiratorial views of history & reality, it's time people get closer to the Truth & society collectively grow up.

Very Interesting.......2007-03-07

It is a good proposal and I believe it will mature into something even better in the future. I think it deserves to be read.

History as Science Fiction.......2007-01-10

Anatoly Fomenko has written a very intriguing book, full of pictures, charts, and computer 'proof' of his thesis: backwards of AD900 we don't really know what happened or when. Between AD900 and AD1600 there is more certainty, but there is still a lot of fuzzy ground, and things don't get reliable until we get past the 1600's where the printing press made it very difficult for the perpetrators of this timeline manipulation to change anything that had been committed to print. The Dark Ages did not happen. Books were burned for a reason. One organization has doubled the actual length of its existence by expanding the real chronology. Read why.

I had always wondered why Christ died about AD33 and yet men waited until the 11th century to form the Knights Templar, the Cathars, etc and go after the Holy Land by force. Why the 1000 year gap? Turns out there wasn't more than a 10-12 year gap and he proves it using astronomy. This also implies that the planet is not as old as we have been told, and current Christian and other creationist scientists are already championing that idea without being aware of Fomenko's book. The two groups, creationist scientists and the Russian mathematical analysts corroborate each other. Fascinating.

Of course, all this flies in the face of what we have been told traditionally is the 'proper' chronology of western civilization, and most readers will experience 'cognitive dissonance' in reading this book. It means that our history going backwards from AD1600 becomes progressively more incorrect and unreliable until it cannot be trusted at all... in the space of 700-800 years.

Naturally, the curious, open-minded reader will want to know WHO did this, WHY, and did any of the events we think of as really ancient ever happen?
Dr. Fomenko is a respected scientist/mathematician at Moscow State University who has already answered these questions to the satisfaction of his initially skeptical colleagues. Most of them are now believers, a few still refuse to believe (the usual diehards), and of course the western press has ignored Fomenko's work -- for obvious reasons when you read the book. The ones who perpetrated this chronology ruse have a lot to answer for. They are still with us. That's why this book is a well-kept secret.

I gave the book a 4-star rating because I was unable to check out some of his claims; those I checked were as he said. But if even 1/3 of his claims are true, this punches a big hole in what we think is our history, the meaning of western civilization, our educational process (for repeating the ruse as gospel), and the trustworthiness of the organization that perpetrated this ruse, well-intentioned or not.

This book relates to current research into a Young Earth paradigm, to John Keel's discoveries about our planet, and Fr Malachi Martin's insights (in his now out-of-print books). We are indeed sheep who are manipulated and kept ignorant -- for a reason. While knowing what these men have to say may be the "booby prize" (as in: 'what can you do with this knowledge?'), it will provide interesting reading. Didn't someone say: "...and the Truth will set you free."?? For you to judge if this book contains the truth.

Poet and Peasant and Through Peasant Eyes: A Literary-Cultural Approach to the Parables in Luke (Combined edition)

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Indispensable source for cultural and historical insights pertaining to many of the parables in Luke
Poet & Peasant and Through Peasant Eyes
A Very Scholarly Treatment of the Lucan Parables
Highest recommendation
Anyone else missing a page?

Poet and Peasant and Through Peasant Eyes: A Literary-Cultural Approach to the Parables in Luke (Combined edition)
Kenneth E. Bailey
Manufacturer: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0802819478

Customer Reviews:

Indispensable source for cultural and historical insights pertaining to many of the parables in Luke.......2007-07-30

Dr. Kenneth Bailey spent most of his life in the Middle East and as result has a great appreciation and understanding for its culture and its spiritual history. This book is actually two previously released books combined that examine in extensive detail the parables of Jesus in the book of Luke in their first century Palestinian context.

The first fifty or so pages in the first book goes into exhaustive analysis of the structure of parables showing that they have four basic types of patterns and there is sometimes a predictable symmetry to them. This segment is highly technical and can be overwhelming for the layman. But once you get through that part of the book and begin the chapters dedicated to each parable, it becomes a literary treasure, revealing the hidden cultural nuances in the setting of first century Palestine and unlocks many spiritual truths for 21st century Westerners.

Overall I strongly recommend this book - especially for someone who gives sermons or leads a Bible study on these parables. I only have a few minor criticisms. One is that I strongly disagree with Bailey's exegesis on the Parable of the Unrighteous Steward in Luke 16 and also but to a much lesser degree, his exegesis on the Parable of the Fig Tree in Luke 13. My other criticism is that Bailey does not cover every parable in the book of Luke. Fortunately he covers most including the Prodigal Son. In spite of these two issues, I still enthusiastically recommend this book.

Poet & Peasant and Through Peasant Eyes.......2007-05-15

An interesting view of the parables found in the Gospel of Luke from a literary and cultural perspective. It helped me understand some of the more obscure parables and gave a fresh perspective on the familiar ones.
Although some of the language studies lost me, the literary form and cultural perspective can be very enlightening.

A Very Scholarly Treatment of the Lucan Parables.......2007-01-10

Having grown up with his missionary parents in the Near East, among the very cultures that spawned the Judaeo-Christian Scriptures, Dr. Kenneth Bailey is uniquely qualified to translate their cultural nuances into such idioms as modern Western minds can grasp. Note that I did not say "readily grasp": as is the case with his other books, 'Poet and Peasant' and 'Through Peasant Eyes' (actually two books in one volume) is a VERY heavy and scholarly treatment of the subject matter. As the titles suggest, the author takes the positions that both Jesus and His first-century audience were peasants and that the Biblical writers were both poets and peasants. Hence, the key to understanding the Christian Parables--a form of poetry themselves--is to be found in the cultures and bodies of literature of the region.

As is the case with 'Jacob and the Prodigal' (which I have also reviewed here), 'Poet and Peasant' and 'Through Peasant Eyes' will be best appreciated by serious Bible scholars interested in exegetical study. If this category excludes you, pass on this one; there are lots of other decent commentaries out there that won't confuse or bore you to death.

Highest recommendation.......2006-10-12

Bailey's unique contribution is that he sat down with a number of trusted Palestinian nomads and listened carefully to their take on the cultural issues behind various parables. He contends, with some justice, that this group of people have something in contact with the original culture that these parables arose in, and thus can help us understand the unstated assumptions and cultural implications of the texts. He invested many years in this and did it with care and precision. On top of that, he has explored the early translations of the New Testament into Syrac and related languages. The result is nothing short of stunning. His analysis of the puzzling parable of the unjust steward (Luke 16:1-13) is worth the price of admission alone, and even on the well-trod parable of the Good Samaritan, he has much valuable insight to share.

Bailey has also written other works including "Finding the Lost: Cultural Keys to Luke 15" that focus on the lost sheep, lost coin, lost son, parables of that chapter. All of his works I especially recommended.

Anyone else missing a page?.......2006-05-11

Just thought I'd write a note because my combined edition book is missing two pages that are supposed to follow p. 105. Though there is a page 106 and 107, I notice the footnotes in my book go from 79 on p. 105 and skip to 87 on p. 107...obviously a misprint. Amazon had never heard of such a problem so I'm getting a new one...just wondered if this had happened to anyone else.

Will the Boat Sink the Water?: The Life of China's Peasants

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Sad, Heartbreaking Stories.
China's peasants are still suffering.
"The Revolution is a Dinner Party"
A Voice for the Chinese Farmers and Peasants
Startling examination of life in rural China

Will the Boat Sink the Water?: The Life of China's Peasants
Chen Guidi , and Wu Chuntao
Manufacturer: PublicAffairs
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 1586483587

Book Description

A prize-winning investigative expose of the poverty and injustice experienced by China's 900 million peasants, told through a series of dramatic personal narratives

The Chinese economic miracle is happening despite, not because of, China's 900 million peasants. They are missing from the portraits of booming Shanghai, or Beijing. Many of China's underclass live under a feudalistic system unchanged since the fifteenth century. They are truly the voiceless in modern China. They are also, perhaps, the reason that China will not be able to make the great social and economic leap forward, because if it is to leap it must carry the 900 million with it.

Chinese journalists Wu Chuntao and Chen Guidi returned to Wu's home province of Anhui, one of China's poorest, to undertake a three-year survey of what had happened to the peasants there, asking the question: Have the peasants been betrayed by the revolution undertaken in their name by Mao and his successors? The result is a brilliant narrative of life among the 900 million, and a vivid portrait of the petty dictators that run China's villages and counties and the consequences of their bullying despotism on the people they administer.

Told principally through four dramatic narratives of paricular Anhui people, Will the Boat Sink the Water? gives voice to the unheard masses and looks beneath the gloss of the new China to find the truth of daily life for its vast population of rural poor.

Customer Reviews:

Sad, Heartbreaking Stories. .......2007-05-11

This is not a fun book to read, it is bloody, sad, lawless, power vs non power, poor is poor. most of people think China is developing so fast in recent years, but people don't realize that they are still about 800 million people live in rural area in China, they are still struggle with their daily life, and voiceless.

China's peasants are still suffering........2007-04-09

Forget the title, this is an interesting expose on the Chinese peasant. These 900 million people toil in the backwaters of rural China, and were instrumental in getting their country industrialized. They also helped the country sustain itself following the Great Leap Forward (or backward in reality) and the Cultural Revolution. These people spend countless hours in backbreaking labor only to have party cadres unfairly tax them beyond their means. This book by a husband and wife team examines stories about their home province and show the corruption of village and party administration. China may be a coming superpower, but it better solve these problems before the people throw the rascals out.

I found this a very informative read. It starts out slow, but this is an intensely interesting book about the unfair lives led by millions of Chinese peasants and the people that are supposed to protect them-the party and village government hacks.

"The Revolution is a Dinner Party".......2007-04-04

John Pomfret writes in his introduction to this book that when he was in college in the late 1970s, professors taught that the Chinese Communist Party "truly represented the wishes of China's dispossessed" and one quoted Mao's saying that "A revolution is not a dinner party." Chinese reporters Chen Guidi and Wu Chuntao document the plight of the peasants in their country, showing Pomfret and anyone else who dares to read their expose how corruption, excessive taxation, miscarriages of justice, too many layers of bureaucracy, and unchecked industrial pollution oppress and threaten the very existence of China's poorest.

China is no worker's paradise. The rural population is basically an unprivileged underclass -- a class of serfs -- that the government squeezes mercilessly. Despite declarations from the top Chinese Communist rulers that peasants should not be pay more than 5% of their annual income in taxes, 19% is closer to the truth. For a subsistence population, such heavy taxation (often in the form of ill-defined, sometimes illegal, fees and fines) is more than they can bear. Yet, their appeals for relief to various levels of their government generally result only in the status quo retained.

A sizable portion of the book relates journalistic investigations into specific several cases of murder of peasants by village or township officials. The petty officials became enraged to the point of doing or ordering bodily violence against peasants because the fed-up farmers were taking public steps to expose their (the officials') corruption.

Then, the authors cite some of the recent policies of the Chinese central government that have increased the sufferings of the peasants. Examples include increasing the layers of local governance, commanding villages to invest in industrial enterprises that are not sustainable and that force them into mountains of debt, and permitting giant gobs of industrial pollutants to turn black rivers peasants must use for bathing and drinking water.

"Will the Boat Sink the Water? The Life of China's Peasants" does feature portraits of good, conscientious officials who put the welfare of their villages or regions ahead of their own advancement. But the Chinese Communist system does not ordinarily promote such people. The Party is more interested in keeping the peasants in their place, and it promotes those officials who inflate the agricultural yields and other economic "successes" of their locality and who deliver their assessed taxes in full.

This revealing look at China at the grassroots level should be read by everyone who has read glowing reports of the progressive, sweeping economic and social strides allegedly remaking the most populous nation on earth. There *is* a dinner party going on: the Chinese peasants are being feasted upon by their cadres, village heads, and Party watchdogs.

This English translation of the book now banned in China is very highly recommended.

A Voice for the Chinese Farmers and Peasants.......2007-03-08

Chen and Wu are a voice for millions of farmers throughout China. Great insights into what life is like for the peasants and farmers in the countryside of China. It is hard to find many stories and reports about the hardships and persecutions which the farmers in China face and the political and economic system that they have to deal with. These are the people who make up the majority of China's population and yet you normally only hear about the urban areas and economic progress in China. As an American many of these incidents were hard for me to imagine happening within the last ten to fifteen years. I read this book while studying in China and when traveling in the countryside it gave me a better understanding of the places and people I encountered.

Startling examination of life in rural China.......2007-02-08

This short book should be an excellent antidote to the hype about China's economic resurgence and strength. We recommend Chen Guidi and Wu Chuntao's frank, unvarnished account of peasant oppression and misery. Since peasants are the majority of the Chinese population, the system described here is China's true governance. The accounts of peasants suffering under local officials' tyranny are unsparing and quite moving, but the book is particularly valuable for its insights into how weak and ineffective Chinese laws and regulations really are. At the local level, laws clearly mean little against political connections and power. The danger is that this disparity could provoke another revolution in China.

The Historical Jesus: The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant

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Massive, Important Scholarship
Crossan's Jesus
Kross'n Crossan
Do Not Take Up Your Crossan and Follow Him
Who to follow?

The Historical Jesus: The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant
John Dominic Crossan
Manufacturer: HarperOne
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0060616296

Book Description

"He comes as yet unknown into a hamlet of Lower Galilee. He is watched by the cold, hard eyes of peasants living long enough at a subsistence level to know exactly where the line is drawn between poverty and destitution. He looks like a beggar yet his eyes lack the proper cringe, his voice the proper whine, his walk the proper shuffle. He speaks about the rule of God and they listen as much from curiosity as anything else. They know all about rule and power, about kingdom and empire, but they know it in terms of tax and debt, malnutrition and sickness, agrarian oppression and demonic possession. What, they really want to know, can this kingdom of God do for a lame child, a blind parent, a demented soul screaming its tortured isolation among the graves that mark the edges of the village?"

–– from "The Gospel of Jesus," overture to The Historical Jesus

The Historical Jesus reveals the true Jesus––who he was, what he did, what he said. It opens with "The Gospel of Jesus," Crossan's studied determination of Jesus' actual words and actions stripped of any subsequent additions and placed in a capsule account of his life story. The Jesus who emerges is a savvy and courageous Jewish Mediterranean peasant, a radical social revolutionary, with a rhapsodic vision of economic, political, and religious egalitarianism and a social program for creating it.

The conventional wisdom of critical historical scholarship has long held that too little is known about the historical Jesus to say definitively much more than that he lived and had a tremendous impact on his followers. "There were always historians who said it could not be done because of historical problems," writes Crossan. "There were always theologians who said it should not be done because of theological objections. And there were always scholars who said the former when they meant the latter.'

With this ground–breaking work, John Dominic Crossan emphatically sweeps these notions aside. He demonstrates that Jesus is actually one of the best documented figures in ancient history; the challenge is the complexity of the sources. The vivid portrayal of Jesus that emerges from Crossan's unique methodology combines the complementary disciplines of social anthropology, Greco–Roman history, and the literary analysis of specific pronouncements, anecdotes, confessions and interpretations involving Jesus. All three levels cooperate equally and fully in an effective synthesis that provides the most definitive presentation of the historical Jesus yet attained.

Customer Reviews:

Massive, Important Scholarship.......2007-08-22

For all its flaws, John Dominic Crossan's "The Historical Jesus" is certainly essential reading for anyone interested in, well, the historical Jesus. Crossan is a scholar of the first order, and his massive erudition brings together otherwise disparate pieces of ancient history and literature, biblical and secular, to create an honest and methodologically consistent portrait.

Alas, it is his method in which I think the most flaws are to be found. The two most cited sources for his program of stratifying the "first layer" of the Jesus tradition which then moves on to multiple attestation are the "Sayings Gospel" Q and the extracanonical Gospel of Thomas. While Q is a pretty uncontroversial result of over a century of scholarship, it is uncertain, first, whether such a document exists, and second (and much more controversially) whether different layers of its construction can be identified. As for the Gospel of Thomas, his remarkably early dating in the 50s CE (compare with canonical Mark, which in his view does not come around until the early 70s, although here he is at least more or less backed up by the majority of critical scholars) is certainly open for debate. John Meier, in the first volume of his "A Marginal Jew" series, convincingly summarizes a case for the dependence of Thomas on the synoptic gospels. It is something of a shame that Crossan's portrait of Jesus depends so heavily on questionable dating; the preacher of a sapiental Kingdom of God, at least, would not have anything near the force it currently does were the Gospel of Thomas put in the second century, which is where many scholars place it.

Still, the merits of this work are many and much-needed. Among them are his critical reading of Josephus, the analysis of different protest movements in the Roman Empire (which follows on the work, primarily, of Richard Horsley), and his always insightful reading of Jesus' parables. While Crossan is often credited, and criticized, for classifying Jesus as a sort of Jewish cynic, I don't think the radicalism he sees is necessarily dependent on any philosophical "type." It's a natural enough result of his stratigraphy of the Jesus tradition.

No one can accuse Crossan of being unprovocative, and this work has inspired lively debate within the now puttering historical Jesus enterprise. Even if you disagree with him utterly, he is a force to be reckoned with. I find that my loyalties lie more with scholars like Meier and E.P. Sanders, since their portraits do not rely on terribly specific dating of the gospels, much less different layers within them, which I believe Crossan judges with too much confidence. Meier's volume 1 to "A Marginal Jew," mentioned above, contains the best criticism I have seen of Crossan and others' tendentious dating methods. Donald Harman Akenson, in his "Saint Saul," also has good critiques of such methods, although at times his criticisms amount to little more than personal attack.

As Crossan says in the closing paragraph, "if you cannot believe in something produced by reconstruction, you may have nothing left to believe in." In this I think he is quite correct, and even if his isn't the best, it is certainly one of the most formidable and enduringly interesting.

Crossan's Jesus.......2006-11-22

Crossan writes well, and his "historical Jesus" is a must-read and a fast-read for anyone interested in Jesus or Christianity.
There is a trend for academics teaching the Bible or religion to write popular works that would hopefully capture the imagination of the non-initiated or the curious (e.g. Bart Ehrman's or N.T. Wright's rapidly accumulating volumes). They come from both ends of the political/world-view/ philosophical and what-have-you spectrum and in between. This book was one of the pioneers of this approach.
In any case, works that touch on the figure of Jesus and beliefs about him are bound to elicit controversy and discussion. That is often part of the author's agenda. And they all must be taken with a grain of salt - whether it's Schweitzer's Jesus, Bultmann's Jesus, Ehrmann's Jesus, Fredericksen's Jesus, Sanders' Jesus, Wright's Jesus, Vermes' Jesus, Liberation Theology's Jesus, the Jesus Seminar's Jesus....
What matters is that the author should be responsible enough to take into account conflicting issues, proceed in a reasoned argument, and be intellectually honest.

Kross'n Crossan.......2006-11-04

I'm not a card shark, so I'm going to tip my hand. I am both a Christian and a scientist. I want you to know at the outset that as brilliant as this man is, and as logical as his method seems, he nevertheless fails to deliver the Goods.

Make no mistake, J.D. Crossan is a creative genius. His brilliance is seen in the scholarly and systematic manner in which he brings together various threads of anthropological and historical data. His work evinces a comprehensive familiarity with the literature. For those of us not versed in "stratigraphy" and the finer art of reading between the lines of a historical document, he weaves a compelling story.

Crossan describes his method as "scientific history." Using the word `scientific' implies that he is willing to adapt his paradigm if the evidence directs. In the final analysis, Crossan uses his method in the service of his own worldview. Crossan preserves his presuppositions through his analysis of the facts instead of allowing the latter to transform the former. This is not `scientific' in the true sense.

In this review, I will focus on his method, because it is easy to end up at his final destination unless you can see how and where he might have gone wrong.

Crossan's methodology -

Crossan says that his method analyzes the problem on three levels; anthropological, historical and literary. That is true. Further, he insists that these "cooperate fully and equally to achieve an effective synthesis, thus demanding equal sophistication on all three levels at the same time." He says, "the discipline of this book is to work primarily with plurally attested complexes from the primary stratus of the Jesus tradition." The scope of his program clearly has scholarly merit, and sets him apart from his peers in historical Jesus research. But I think there are some areas where his execution of the program falls short of the promise.

(1) He treats all prospective "gospels" on an equal basis, apparently disregarding traditional canonical lines of demarcation. His primary concern is establishing a probable genetic lineage of Jesus' sayings. Crossan appears to believe that God doesn't have an interest or a direct hand in the way we get scripture. This may make sense for naturalists or deists even, but not for theists.

(2) He uses an analytical concept called the "complex" for analyzing and organizing ancient texts into their basic units of meaning. The difficulty is that isolation of these complexes is an intensively hermeneutical process with huge potential for disagreement. Are these complexes based on events, or on themes? And, to what extent do these "complexes" conflate similar but distinct accounts?

(3) Crossan uses the familiar phenomenon of geologic stratification as a metaphor to explain his approach to establishing chronological layers within the literature. He presumes Scripture is naturally generated and so looks to establish pathways to explain how the text came to be transmitted. But if we expand on that metaphor, how does one interpret a petrified tree that passes through all of the strata? It forces one to reassess his assumptions. Specifically, what happens to our stratigraphic continuum when there is clear evidence that early documents depend on supposedly later documents? Such anomalies could leave Crossan standing in mid-air.

(4) Central to Crossan's method is his assessment of attestation. This is his metric for credibility. But Crossan admits that determination of the degree of attestation is in many cases a scholarly best guess. In this, Crossan appears not to allow himself to be guided or influenced by any theological notion that certain New Testament writers are inspired. He employs an editorial process he calls "bracketing singularities." In this, accounts of Jesus' sayings and actions lacking in plural attestation are called `singularities' and they are not considered admissible in reconstructing the historical Jesus. This leaves us without the virgin birth, the sermon on the mount, the Lord's prayer, the last supper or the empty tomb. This is Crossan's razor and it cuts deep, leaving roughly half of the New Testament on the editing room floor. This is a problem.

Assessment -

First, this book is very unbalanced, focusing almost exclusively on the historical and anthropological contexts, as if knowing the background of a subject tells the whole story. To echo the words of a friend, `Reading Crossan's Historical Jesus, I can't help feeling like I'm searching for something that isn't there. It is like looking at a master painter's portrait of Christ in which the image of the Master has been carefully extracted from its artistic context leaving a mere shadow of an outline, until all that remains is context without subject.'

Second, the methodology Crossan describes may be considered adequate as a component of a naturalist or deist epistemology. But it fails in a universe of sparse observers where "singularities" are important. What Crossan's method lacks is a criterion for assessing the credibility of singly attested scripture passages. I'm no historian, but I suspect that the bulk of ancient history would succumb to Crossan's razor.

Finally, the bigger question that these considerations raise for me is this, `Is this truly sophistication, or is it merely sophistry?'

My assessment is that it is truly unfortunate for all of us that Crossan has chosen to employ his considerably noteworthy talents in the service of a lesser god than the Jesus of history.

Do Not Take Up Your Crossan and Follow Him.......2006-08-30

In "The Historical Jesus" John Dominic Crossan attempts to de-mythologize the New Testament in order to recover the Jesus of history (as opposed to the Jesus of faith). Unfortunately, his methodology and presuppositions end up creating a layer of mythology, not dissolving the one he thinks is there. He relies heavily on the Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Peter, and the Epistle of Barnabas as containing the oldest traditions. However, the Gospels of Thomas and Peter are mid-late 2nd century documents, the second of which is an admitted forgery, and Barnabas, though probably from the 1st century, is also widely acknowledged as a forgery. A look at the early church fathers reveal as much. Crossan also relies on a completely fictional document he concocted called the "Cross Gospel," which he says is embedded in the Gospel of Peter. These documents were used by Mark to construct his Gospel, which was then used by the other three Gospel writers.

According to Crossan, Mark invented a number of literary devices to put forward his theological agenda. If we only look at the inventions Crossan finds in Mark pertaining to the Resurrection and the presuppositions he brings to the data we can see the fatal flaw in his entire project. Crossan's first presupposition regarding the Resurrection is that he rejects the supernatural; miracles are out of bounds and the events they describe must have some other explanation, usually a combination of natural/psychological factors and political/social allusions. Crossan claims not to deny the Resurrection, but he redefines it to mean something completely different. He believes the "Saturday" after Jesus' crucifixion lasted at least 5-10 years while the followers of Jesus tried to make sense of his death. Finally, it occurred to them that Jesus is still alive in their hearts and that his message of love and egalitarianism was still relevant and needed to be preached. This realization is symbolized in Easter, and this is what Crossan means by the Resurrection. Thus, he can use the word and sound orthodox but be speaking heresy. It's a shell game.

To support his take on Jesus' resurrection, Crossan claims that Mark has invented a number of fictions to symbolically tell in a narrative way the process of how the Gospel came to be in the form we have it in the New Testament. Crossan accepts the crucifixion of Jesus as indisputable fact, but rejects his burial as told in the New Testament. He believes if Jesus was buried at all it was in a common grave and was likely food for scavenging animals. Thus, Mark had to somehow get the body from Pilate and into the hands of Jesus' followers so that he could be buried and that the tomb could be found empty to symbolize his still being alive. Mark's stroke of genius was to invent Joseph of Arimathea as a go-between, someone who had a foot in both Pilate's and the disciple's worlds. Crossan sees Matthew, Luke, and John as adding their own takes on Joseph and thus exposing the accrual of the myth. Mark says Joseph is a member of the Sanhedrin, Matthew says he's rich, Luke says he is good and righteous, and John says he secretly follows Jesus because he fears the Jews. Crossan looks at these characterizations as each adding to the myth. But clearly the more responsible reading is that they are complementary descriptions. Similarly, Crossan finds myth accruing in the different descriptions in the burial cloth and the tomb itself. This leaves the discovery of the tomb by the women as obviously invented, though it does speak to the egalitarian message of the Gospel as Crossan sees it.

There are a number of problems with this recasting of the Resurrection that go beyond reading complementary accounts as contradictory. In the first century the testimony of women in a court of law was considered unreliable at best. So why have the first witnesses of the empty tomb be women if it was an invention? They could have been accompanied by men, therefore fulfilling the egalitarian agenda. But they alone were the first witnesses of the most important event in the ministry of Jesus. Why, if this was an invention, choose the very people whose testimony would be discarded out of hand? The far better explanation is that they actually were the first witnesses to something that actually occurred.

And what does Crossan do with 1 Corinthians 15:1-19? Here Paul claims that if the Resurrection of Jesus did not happen then our faith is in vain; find another explanation for it and Christianity fails. Not only that but Paul embeds a creed in vv 3-7 that states that Christ died, was buried, was raised on the third day, and appeared to a number of his followers. This creed can be dated to within 1-3 years of the Resurrection. Crossan's ignoring of this seems a clear case of special pleading. He does deal with the passage, however, and dismisses it as a power-play by Paul to get the respect of the other Apostles based on vv 8-11.

In the end Crossan not only fails in recovering the Jesus of history he thinks is hidden, he actually buries Jesus under so much myth that he can no longer be found or even recognized.

Who to follow?.......2006-01-22

Great book. Author is sensitive to likely human need for faith and belonging, while remaining fearless and faithful to the task of asking difficult questions. Breadth and application of sources is exceptional. Not for those seeking easy comfort.

Weapons of the Weak: Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance

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An Anthropology book - not a Sociology book
Good work
Useful Whever You Go...
Indispensible to anyone interested in social change
An Important Work for Understanding Real Rebellion

Weapons of the Weak: Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance
James C. Scott
Manufacturer: Yale University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0300036418

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An Anthropology book - not a Sociology book.......2007-08-24

This book is a specific case study. Its dense. Not a fun read. Not particularly interesting. Written in typical college dense format. Nothing really redeeming about the book that a reader can take away with as a general understanding of "everyday forms of peasant resistance" because again, its a case study.

Good work .......2006-07-28

Through an observation of a peasant community in Malaysia, Scott maintains that traditional and classic theories on forms of resistance and protest are actually wrong. In proving this, he also proves that class-consciousness and labor relations are not universal and are not similar to one another. Scott believes however that these forms of resistance are common in all peasant societies and take the same shaping. Scott supports his main argument by stating that although is widely believed that peasants cannot struggle or resist oppression because of their "false conciseness" the peasants do indeed resist but not through what we have learned to accept and know what traditionally has been defined as resistance.

Peasants, Scott argues, have their own forms of resistance which have not until now been looked into. The resistance or protest of peasants in the Malaysian village of Sedaka may not be collective and organized but they certainly exist. Simply because the Sedaka villagers do not protest in what we have come to know as "protest" that does not prove that there is no resistance or opposition to authority, change in labor relations, or social changes. Instead of revolution, the peasants choose what the author calls "the weapons of the poor:" silent non-compliance, gossip, character murder, petty sabotage, small theft and pilferage. The common characteristics in these acts of resistance are almost invisible and non-coordinated. The reasons behind these acts are not straightforward: do the poor steal in order to feed their families or do they do so in order to hurt the rich in the village?

Scott goes further into predicting that the weapons of the poor may not directly create a new order, they are effective in mitigating the process of marginalisation and therefore have made impact overtime in social changes and history.

Useful Whever You Go..........2003-12-03

I read this book in college and loved it because it was informative and readable, a rare combination. I didn't appreciate the value of its insights until many years later, though, when I became a corporate consultant tasked with driving organizational change. When people talk about getting buy-in, empowerment, and other workplace democracy concepts, they are all about avoiding the negative dynamics that top-down command-and-control micro-management so often elicits. Those dynamics are the same ones documented in this book.

Indispensible to anyone interested in social change.......2003-10-10

I picked this book up in order to write my Master's thesis on dissidence and collective action in rural China. The last thing I expected to be was entertained, but most of this book is actually very good and fun reading. True, the other part is highly academic, but still accessible and absolutely essential to understanding the dynamics of change in authoritarian societies.

Before Scott published his book, the dominant model for understanding participation in authoritarian societies did not extend far beyond institutional and client-patron models. Scott breaks away from this mode and demonstrates how ordinary, powerless people in repressive societies can still manage to influence policies, through such actions as sabotage, foot-dragging, and gossip. This model makes it much easier to understand, for example, how China reformed its agricultural system (although this book is about a Malaysian village, it is easily applied to most any country one wishes to study).

Essential reading for political scientists and sociologists alike. After reading this book, you will have a whole different view of how change is affected, and a more sophisticated frame of analysis.

An Important Work for Understanding Real Rebellion.......2000-08-12

In understanding Chinese political violence in my Master's thesis I tried to show political power as it actually exists and functions in real life. To do this I used Scott's work, whose focus on orthopraxy over orthodoxy, miniture rebellion and slander began in this work and was continued in "Domination and the Arts of Resistance". Scott is insightful, clear and important: he shows how the elite try to raise the stakes of rebellion past what is acceptable to the subordinate and how the subordinate use the lowest risk, yet highly effective, tools of rebellion at their disposal. Required reading for those trying to understand politics without becoming mired in gross oversimplification.

State and Peasant in Contemporary China: The Political Economy of Village Government (Center for Chinese Studies, University of Michigan)

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a fine book, intelligent theory backed by strong research

State and Peasant in Contemporary China: The Political Economy of Village Government (Center for Chinese Studies, University of Michigan)
Jean C. Oi
Manufacturer: University of California Press
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Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0520076370

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a fine book, intelligent theory backed by strong research.......1999-08-09

Oi's book, which adopts a clientist model of rural Chinese politics is a well supported, and strongly argued analysis backed by extensive interviews with former participants at all levels of Chinese rural politics. An added pleasure for the student of Chinese is Oi's consistent use of "pinyin" Chinese equivalents of English terms such as "production brigade" which add color to the book's already fine prose.

The Moral Economy of the Peasant: Rebellion and Subsistence in Southeast Asia

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The Problem of Subsistence in a Capitalist Economy
Here's a review that'll never be read....

The Moral Economy of the Peasant: Rebellion and Subsistence in Southeast Asia
James C. Scott
Manufacturer: Yale University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0300021909

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The Problem of Subsistence in a Capitalist Economy.......2007-04-26

Traditionally, Marxist analyses have taken `exploitation' as a uniform relationship, mostly referring to an unjust transfer of `surpluses' from the lower strata to the upper ones, which creates resentments among the former and eventually results in mass rebellions. Contrary to the conventional Marxist thinking, James Scott believes that the "nature of exploitation" is as important as the exploitation itself (p. 4). In his The Moral Economy of the Peasant: Rebellion and Subsistence in Southeast Asia, Scott sets out to solve the puzzle why some types of exploitative relations give way to grassroots revolutions and others not.

Scott complains that approaches to exploitation hitherto have been "too one-sidedly materialistic," (p.165). Accordingly, his goal is to shed light to the moral/psychological aspects of rebellions and thus fill an important gap in the analyses of exploitation and rebellions, for "the problem of rebellion is not just a problem of calories and income but is a question of peasant conceptions of social justice, of rights and obligations, of reciprocity," (p. vii).

The key elements in Scott's analysis are norms of reciprocity in a society and right to subsistence of the members of that society. Scott argues that traditional (pre-capitalist) societies differ substantially from modern (capitalist) societies with respect to these two elements. Traditional societies in general maintain a "subsistence ethic" that prefers safety and reliability to long-run profits (p. 13). This "safety-first" principle leads peasants to favor those institutions that "minimize the risks to subsistence", although they may claim much of the surplus (p. 55). On the other side, informal relations between the members of traditional societies provide means to secure the survival of individuals. Collaborative family and kinship ties as well as tacit tenancy and citizenship rights and obligations set up "safety valves" that rescue individuals at times of adversity: "a family that is hard-pressed will expect help from others who have fared better and will expect to reciprocate when the situation is reversed," (p.168). The relationship between the landlord and his tenant are quite paternalistic in traditional societies. The landlord undertakes the risks of cultivation and gives financial assistance to his tenants. The tenant is considered "an inferior member of the extended family" of landlords in these societies (p.186). Thus, tenants under the traditional system "seem willing to put up with its injustices for the compensating security," (p. 37).

By contrast, Scott argues that commercialization of agriculture and agrarian class relationships in capitalist societies strip the individual from the "security valves" of the traditional ones. In his in-depth analysis of the Burma and Cochinchina cases, Scott demonstrates that the intrusion of capitalist economic system into, and the integration with the world economy of, these regions throughout their colonial administration undermined the subsistence security of the peasantry in five ways: introduction of market-based insecurities which increased the variability of peasants' income, erosion of the village protection, elimination of the traditional safety-valves, imposition of a fixed charge on tenants' income, and stabilization of the taxes at the expense of the cultivating class (p. 57). On the one side, elimination of the norms of reciprocity results in the growth of permanent disparities and increases the polarization within the society; on the others side, disregard to peasants' right to subsistence causes to the marginalization of masses and creates massive penury and hunger. While the new system creates small and privileged labor force, "it eliminates the main source of food for e greater number of landless Javanese. The potential for class polarization and conflict here is ominous," (p. 211). It is these negative changes in peasants' lives that undermine the legitimacy of the system in the eyes of the peasants, for a peasant whose subsistence hangs on a balance faces not a personal but a "social" failure (p. 189).

Scott's analysis of the moral economy of the peasants in Asia portrays that the underdevelopment and poverty of today's less developed countries is not simply a result of their failure to develop; yet it is an active process of impoverishment and social destruction which results from "the way in which they are joined to the international system." In Scott's words, "It is possible to speak of peasants in both Cochinchina and Lower Burma in virtually the same breath, this is precisely because the integration of these two areas into the world market had, even before the 1930s, produced a convergence in their social histories," (p.90).

An implication of Scott's arguments is that "stabilization of real income for those close to subsistence may be a more powerful goal than achieving a higher average income," (p.34). Yet the current global economy completely disregards this point. While financial liberalization increases the insecurity of the masses in less developed countries, the general `laisses-faire' economics widens the income distribution gap both within and between countries, thereby marginalizing the majority of the world population. The `survival of individual' is not a concern of a capitalist economy, and this is what makes it "the most efficient expression of organized crime" for some.

Here's a review that'll never be read...........2000-08-11

Honestly, I am enthralled by the work of this man. Writing against the premise that profit maximization is (or should be) the goal of individuals in developing countries, Scott's thesis is that peasant social order is predicated on the fact that the worst-case scenario is starvation. Peasants seek to minimize the risk of this, and as such, to not maximize profits.... which is what the 'West' has tried to force them to do.... (and failed...)

I do not know who you are who is reading this review. I am a student of political economy specializing in South Asia.... for my studies into the rise of Sinhalese nationalism in Ceylon, this book was invaluable. I'd read this book just for fun, too....

Book Description

Uses diaries, memoirs, fiction, trial testimony, personal recollections, and eyewitness accounts to weave a fascinating tale of what ordinary Japanese endured throughout their country's booming economic growth.

The Cross & the Prodigal: Luke 15 Through the Eyes of Middle Eastern Peasants

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Beautiful, Cross-Cultural, Eye-opening
meticulous and eye opening

The Cross & the Prodigal: Luke 15 Through the Eyes of Middle Eastern Peasants
Kenneth E. Bailey
Manufacturer: InterVarsity Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0830832815

Book Description

Honored in 2006 as a "Year's Best Book for Preachers" by Preaching magazine.Where is the cross in the parable of the prodigal son?For centuries, Muslims have called attention to the father's forgiveness in this parable in order to question the need for a Mediator between humanity and God. In The Cross and the Prodigal, Kenneth E. Bailey--New Testament scholar and long-time missionary to the Middle East--undertakes to answer this question.Drawing on his extensive knowledge of both the New Testament and Middle Eastern culture, Bailey presents an interpretation of this parable from a Middle Eastern perspective and, in doing so, powerfully demonstrates its essentially Christian message. Here Bailey highlights the underlying tensions between law and love, servanthood and sonship, honor and forgiveness that grant this story such timeless spiritual and theological power.

Customer Reviews:

Beautiful, Cross-Cultural, Eye-opening.......2006-09-28

One of Jesus' most astonishing stories, a story that has resonated down through the ages, is commonly known in English as The Prodigal Son. In this book, Kenneth Bailey retells this familiar story through the eyes of Middle Eastern peasants.

Bailey is a longtime missionary, a man who has spent his life among the peasants of the Middle East. Bailey really knows village life. And that makes all the difference in understanding Jesus' story.

But this book is much more than another commentary. Bailey (along with IVP) has made a beautiful book. There are several plates decorated with Arab calligraphy, and half the book is a four-scene drama - a retelling of the story in a small village, complete with the score to one of the characters' songs. This is an exemplary work, engaging heart and mind at once.

meticulous and eye opening.......2006-07-08

Ken Bailey is the best New Testament scholar around today because he brings deep insight and experience from the Middle Eastern culture combined with attention to form criticism. The result is an eye opening and inspiring work on the Prodigal. You will not be disappointed in this book or any of his work.

The Ties that Bound: Peasant Families in Medieval England

Average customer rating:

Best book on medieval peasants
destroys stereotypes of medieval peasants
Pretty decent for what it is.

The Ties that Bound: Peasant Families in Medieval England
Barbara A. Hanawalt
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Medieval | World | History | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0195045645

Book Description

Barbara A. Hanawalt's richly detailed account offers an intimate view of everyday life in Medieval England that seems at once surprisingly familiar and yet at odds with what many experts have told us. She argues that the biological needs served by the family do not change and that the ways fourteenth- and fifteenth-century peasants coped with such problems as providing for the newborn and the aged, controlling premarital sex, and alleviating the harshness of their material environment in many ways correspond with our twentieth-century solutions. Using a remarkable array of sources, including over 3,000 coroners' inquests into accidental deaths, Hanawalt emphasizes the continuity of the nuclear family from the middle ages into the modern period by exploring the reasons that families served as the basic unit of society and the economy. Providing such fascinating details as a citation of an incantation against rats, evidence of the hierarchy of bread consumption, and descriptions of the games people played, her study illustrates the flexibility of the family and its capacity to adapt to radical changes in society. She notes that even the terrible population reduction that resulted from the Black Death did not substantially alter the basic nature of the family.

Customer Reviews:

Best book on medieval peasants.......2005-02-19

This is the kind of academic text that can be read for pleasure. Incredibly learned, with a wonderful bibliography, Hanawalt manages to make coroner's reports (the basis of her text) engaging, funny, and illuminating. Never again can you take the image of peasants mucking around in filth as an accurate view of medieval peasant life. Instead, you will find them to be hardworking, ingenious, complex people. Hanawalt explores the material life (houses, lands, etc) as well as the social and economic lives peasants had, all with a great style. Not exactly a light read, but a fun one if medieval studies is your forte. Could use a few more maps, however, so brush up on your medieval English geography. Overall the best book on peasants I've encountered. Highly recommended.

destroys stereotypes of medieval peasants.......2000-01-13

This book does a great job of getting straight to the peasants themselves and depicting their lives as much as possible instead of lumping them together as all equally miserable, brutish, callous, etc.

Pretty decent for what it is........1998-10-27

While, admitedly, I don't think I'd read this book without prompting, (I'm having to read it for a class), it is actually rather fascinating. The way in which the author uses coroner's reports to support her claims is particularly interesting, in a morbid sort of way.

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