The Five Gospels: The Search for the Authentic Words of Jesus Paperback – 1 Jan. 1997

An excellent book... arrived in time and as described. Thank you

Efficient

'The Five Gospels' is one more study dedicated to the quest for the historical Jesus. The scholars of the Jesus Seminar (the body behind the study: numbering around eighty-five persons at publication) provide a lively, new translation in American English of the four canonical gospels and the Gospel of Thomas: newly discovered in the middle of the last century. Some expressions sound strange to English ears. 'Ranking priests' for the usual 'chief priests', 'son of Adam' for 'Son of Man' and 'God's imperial rule' for 'kingdom of God' are minor examples which nevertheless always stand out.The volume concentrates on the sayings attributed to Jesus, which are colour coded. According to the scholars' democratic vote on each saying: words in red were spoken by Jesus, words in pink were probably spoken by him, words in grey contain hints of what he said and words in black were not spoken by him. After each section of the gospel, there is commentary on how the scholars arrived at their verdict on each saying. Inevitably when dealing with five gospels with many similar sayings, there is much repetition and a tendency towards tediousness. However this is offset by a feeling that you are drawing closer to the truth. A picture emerges of a humble, laconic sage: more loving and accepting of others than a straight reading of the gospels would indicate. We also get a strong idea of what the early church made of Jesus as it struggled to establish itself.Anybody interested in the subject and all open-minded Christians will find this study fascinating, but the latter should beware: they are likely to have their cherished views shaken to the core.

Book arrived as described. Very pleased.

The book is unreadable, it's just a very bad quality scan. There is no option to complain to Amazon about kindle books