Join Amazon Prime and get unlimited Free One-Day Delivery. Already a member? Sign in.

 

or
Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.
 
   
More Buying Choices
22 used & new from £3.60
Have one to sell? Sell yours here
 
   
The First Christmas: What the Gospels Really Teach Us About Jesus's Birth
 
 
Share your own customer images
Publisher: learn how customers can search inside this book.

The First Christmas: What the Gospels Really Teach Us About Jesus's Birth (Paperback)

by Marcus J. Borg (Author), John Dominic Crossan (Author)
4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
RRP: £8.99
Price: £6.99 & this item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions
You Save: £2.00 (22%)
o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o
In stock.
Dispatched from and sold by Amazon.co.uk. Gift-wrap available.

Only 2 left in stock--order soon (more on the way).

Want guaranteed delivery by Tuesday, July 14? Choose Express delivery at checkout. See Details
19 new from £3.61 3 used from £3.60

Frequently Bought Together

The First Christmas: What the Gospels Really Teach Us About Jesus's Birth + Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus's Final Days in Jerusalem + The Heart of Christianity: Rediscovering a Life of Faith
Price For All Three: £19.97

Show availability and shipping details

Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought

Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus's Final Days in Jerusalem

Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus's Final Days in Jerusalem

by Marcus J. Borg
4.0 out of 5 stars (1)  £5.99
The First Paul

The First Paul

by Marcus J. Borg and Dominic Crossan
£6.99
Why Go to Church? 2009: The Archbishop of Canterbury's Lent Book

Why Go to Church? 2009: The Archbishop of Canterbury's Lent Book

by Timothy Radcliffe
4.5 out of 5 stars (11)  £6.59
The Heart of Christianity: Rediscovering a Life of Faith

The Heart of Christianity: Rediscovering a Life of Faith

by Marcus J. Borg
2.7 out of 5 stars (3)  £6.99
The Shack

The Shack

by William P. Young
3.8 out of 5 stars (275)  £3.99
› Explore similar items

Product details

  • Paperback: 240 pages
  • Publisher: SPCK Publishing (21 Aug 2008)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0281060045
  • ISBN-13: 978-0281060047
  • Product Dimensions: 20.6 x 13.8 x 1.8 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 114,863 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in this category:

    #87 in  Books > Religion & Spirituality > Christianity > Jesus

    •  Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?

Product Description

Review
"The Last Week: 'One of the most careful and insightful readings of the Bible I've ever come across... [an] important, fascinating and well-written book.' Brian McLaren, author of A New Kind of Christian"

Product Description
In "The First Christmas", two of today's top Jesus scholars, Marcus J. Borg and John Dominic Crossan, show how history has biased our reading of the nativity story as it appears in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. "The First Christmas" explores the beginning of the life of Christ, peeling away the sentimentalism that has build up over two thousand years around this most well known of all stories to reveal the truth of what the Gospels actually say.Borg and Crossan help us to see this familiar narrative afresh by answering the question, 'What do these stories mean?' from the perspective of both the first and the twenty-first centuries. They successfully show that the Christmas story, read in its original context, is far richer and more challenging than people imagine.

See all Product Description

Tags Customers Associate with This Product

 (What's this?)
Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
Check the boxes next to the tags you consider relevant or enter your own tags in the field below
(2)
(2)
(1)

Your tags: Add your first tag
 
See most popular tags

What Do Customers Ultimately Buy After Viewing This Item?

The First Christmas: What the Gospels Really Teach Us About Jesus's Birth
85% buy the item featured on this page:
The First Christmas: What the Gospels Really Teach Us About Jesus's Birth 4.4 out of 5 stars (5)
£6.99
Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus's Final Days in Jerusalem
8% buy
Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus's Final Days in Jerusalem 4.0 out of 5 stars (1)
£5.99
The First Paul
4% buy
The First Paul
£6.99
The Meaning Is in the Waiting: The Spirit of Advent
1% buy
The Meaning Is in the Waiting: The Spirit of Advent
£6.99
Explore similar items
 

Customer Reviews

5 Reviews
5 star:
 (2)
4 star:
 (3)
3 star:    (0)
2 star:    (0)
1 star:    (0)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
4.4 out of 5 stars (5 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
Share your thoughts with other customers:
Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating new look about the birth narratives, 6 Nov 2008
By Helen Hancox "Auntie Helen" (Essex, England) - See all my reviews
(TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   
The birth narratives in Matthew and Luke are so familiar, heard every Christmas in church and on the radio, that I wasn't sure there was much more I could learn about them. How wrong I was! Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan's book started brilliantly; within the first chapter I was hooked on what they unfolded. They approach the birth narratives as parables/metaphors, not particularly addressing modern-day ideas of historicity but instead looking at the narratives and their structure in terms of what the gospel writers might have wanted to say. It becomes clear that Matthew and Luke are very different, with Matthew presenting Jesus as the New Moses, reflecting many images and ideas from Jewish writings, and Luke's emphasis on the stories as an overture to his larger themes of women, the marginalised and the Holy Spirit.

The book goes step-by-step through some parts of the nativity stories, explaining the historical context for many of the events, showing the parallels and the differences between the gospels, relating parts to historical or metaphorical events. I found the book began slightly to drag by the end but I was really taken by much of what they said, particularly the links Matthew makes between Jesus, Moses and Caesar. Some more conservative Christians will probably find the liberal tone of the book too much to stomach which is a real shame as there are some real gems in here, but for those with an open mind and an interest in understanding more about the world of the time of Jesus this is an unmissable book.
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)



 
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars The nativity stories, or a tale of two empires, 20 Dec 2008
By Jeremy Bevan (West Midlands, UK) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
Following on from their highly successful collaboration `Last Week: What the Gospels Teach About Jesus's Final Days in Jerusalem', Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan examine here the two accounts at the other end of Jesus' life - the nativity stories in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. Steering adroitly away from discussion about the historical veracity or otherwise of the events Matthew and Luke portray, the authors concentrate instead on analysing what meaning the Gospel writers were trying to convey to their hearers and readers through the conscious, careful construction of what they wrote. By close textual (and contextual) analysis, they seek to demonstrate that Matthew was trying to portray Jesus as a new Moses, while Luke aimed to show that a new ruler was here, challenging the emperor Augustus' claim to be `Lord' and `Saviour' of the known (Roman) world.

What's fresh and exciting about this is the way Borg and Crossan then bring their conclusions right up to date by juxtaposing Matthew and Luke' challenge to the Roman empire with the challenge of Jesus now to contemporary Western (and particularly American) ideologies of empire, even reclaiming George Bush's language of `manifest destiny' for Jesus: this is a startling, if understated, critique of American pretensions to impose its superpower views on the rest of the world. For those in thrall to the American vision, Jesus' alternative way is clearly signposted here. A possibly epoch-making book: it only misses five stars because its American focus will not necessarily be to UK tastes, and because there's a certain amount of repetition and redundancy in the argument.
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)



 
4.0 out of 5 stars Transform your Christmas Hymns and Services, 19 Jun 2009
By A. Gilmore (Lancing, West Sussex) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
An attempt by two distinguished American scholars to get at the heart of what the birth stories mean without getting embroiled in their historical accuracy or the biblical and theological arguments arising within them, beginning with the gospel stories which they see as overtures, parables or stories with meanings rather than history, setting the tone and themes for what is to come.
The context is then explored `within Christianity, within Judaism, within the Roman empire', and against the background of the immediate past and explore with no shortage of detailed information on the ancient world's view of virgin birth and divine conception.
Light (as opposed to darkness) is regarded as an archetypal symbol whose imagery pervades the Old and New Testaments and probably explains why the birth of Jesus taking place on a winter evening in the middle of a dark night. This is not so much historic time as parabolic time, metaphorical time, sacred time and symbolic time.
Predictions (`that it may be fulfilled . . .' ) are not predictions of something to happen in the distant future and certainly not predictions of Jesus. Matthew, for example, is not trying to prove that Jesus was the Messiah nor was he trying to impress or convince `outsiders' but to reflect the convictions of `insiders'.
The value of these stories lies in what mean for us today rather than what meant in origin. We are to understand and relate them to our situation, with an emphasis on joy but joy with conflict, and see advent as a time of anticipation, expectation and repentant preparation but a repentance that has more to do with change than with confessing our sins.
Commended especially to preachers and leaders of worship. It could transform our Christmas services, create new life in the midst of traditional ritual and present the gospel in a way which has meaning for everybody.
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)


Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
 
 
 
Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars A laywoman's view
I had known for many years that some of the titles used by early Christians to refer to Jesus upset the Romans ( to put it mildly! Read more
Published 4 months ago by E. A. M. Clark

4.0 out of 5 stars Unanswered questions
A well researched and interesting book which casts new light on the biblical stories of Jesus' birth and makes one think again. Read more
Published 5 months ago by M. Findley

Only search this product's reviews


Customer Discussions

 Beta (What's this?)
This product's forum (0 discussions)
  Discussion Replies Latest Post
  No discussions yet

Ask questions, Share opinions, Gain insight
Start a new discussion
Topic:
First post:
Prompts for sign-in
  [Cancel]


Active discussions in related forums
   
Related forums

Listmania!

Create a Listmania! list

Look for similar items by category

Feedback

Fun for Everyone

Christmas Gifts
Achieve over 15,000 RPM with our great range of Powerballs.

›Shop the Powerball store

  

Up to 75% off Shoes

Shoe Clearance - 75% off Shoes
Save up to 75% on shoes for the whole family.

›Shop clearance shoes

  

Train Hard...Play Hard

Nike, Gola, Converse, and more
Gear up with up to 60% off athletic and outdoor shoes.

›Shop now

  

Treat Someone

Amazon.co.uk Gift Certificates--available in any amount from £5 to £500 With an Amazon.co.uk Gift Certificate, you can get them what they want (even if you don't know what that is).

›Learn more about Gift Certificates

  
Ad

Where's My Stuff?

Delivery and Returns

Need Help?

Your Recent History

  (What's this?)
You have no recently viewed items or searches.

After viewing product detail pages or search results, look here to find an easy way to navigate back to pages you are interested in.

Look to the right column to find helpful suggestions for your shopping session.
Continue Shopping: Top Sellers
The Girl Who Played with Fire
The Girl Who Played with Fire by Stieg Larsson
4.5 out of 5 stars (75)£3.86
 Breaking Dawn (Twilight Saga)
Breaking Dawn (Twilight Saga) by Stephenie Meyer
4.1 out of 5 stars (464)£6.49
 The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson
4.1 out of 5 stars (165)£3.99
 The Host
The Host by Stephenie Meyer
4.2 out of 5 stars (84)£3.86

amazon.co.uk Amazon Home
International Sites:  United States  |  Germany  |  France  |  Japan  |  Canada  |  China
Business Programs: Sell on Amazon  |  Fulfilment by Amazon  |  Join Associates  |  Join Advantage
Customer Service  |  Help  |  View Basket  |  Your Account
About Amazon.co.uk  |  Careers at Amazon
Conditions of Use & Sale |  Privacy Notice  © 1996-2009, Amazon.com, Inc. and its affiliates