Peter Cresswell offers a rare book; an attempt at an objective view of a history more usually approached from the point of view of faith. He opens by contextualising the story, comparing it to current politics and terminology, as well as its own historical context and the politics of the time. He later goes on to examine the various contexts and standpoints of his sources. An intriguing further link the author makes is that with pagan myth.
The author quickly uncovers inconsistencies and uncertainties in the various accounts of the history of the person we now know as Christ, clarifying his role and the role of many of the people associated with him as belonging to groups of resistance fighters, terrorists or freedom fighters according to one's point of view. He is able to theorise lucidly on the rationale of those who may have re-interpreted the stories since, to suit the political and ecumenical purposes of churches established since the events he studies. Examples of this include a convincing case for the `air brushing out' of the real family and for the obscuring of Yeshua's Jewish origins. The comparative abundance of material on Paul is also credibly explained and enlisted to support the author's thesis that much of the story as currently received has been altered to suit the purposes of intermediate writers and of others, including Paul himself, who were alive at the time.
The relevance of this work to our times is clearly shown by the use of some passages, for example libellously suggesting it was Jews rather than Romans who brought about Yeshua's execution, since exploited to justify the persecution of the former.
The author succeeds in producing a book that combines academic rigour with readability, the reader being helped by a flowing style, logical progression as well as clear sub-headings, signposting crucial points in the author's argument. There are some points in the book where more thorough proof reading would have eliminated grammatical errors, but these are infrequent and therefore a minor irritation in an original and important contribution to our understanding of this part of the history of our culture.
This book will be valued equally, both by those who appreciate an evidence-based account, honest in acknowledging the necessary limitations to certainty permitted by the subjective nature of the data available, and by those whose convictions are sufficiently strong to permit them to contemplate a different point of view.
Earlier books by this author include The Censored Messiah