The Jesus You Really Didn’t Know
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The Feasts of Repentance
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2 Corinthians – a letter of integrity
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The Jesus Story in 4D: Combining the Accounts
The Jesus Story in 4D:
Combining the Accounts
Author Nigel Andrews
Publisher Loxwood Press £14.95
Format pbk
ISBN 9781908113340 2020
What a delicious irony for a retired anaesthetist to review the cutting and stitching of a retired surgeon! Andrews has compiled a chronological account of the life and work of Christ from the Gospels and the first two chapters of Acts, using 76.5% of the verses available. What was his motivation – and is he successful? He feels the gospel may be better understood within the framework of a continuous timeline so that ‘…the closer will be our encounter with Jesus… the good news of God’. Each excerpt is colour-coded for source. After an explanatory introduction, 14 chapters follow, from ‘Preparation for the Messiah’ to ‘The Church is Born’. The text flows easily, even if a single interpolation from another source brings a slightly intrusive colour change. The author’s use of his personal version of the text is sometimes striking: John 8:9, (the accusers) “began to go away one at a time” becomes ‘they begin to slip away, one by one’. Other occasions are less helpful: Mark 5:19, ‘how he has had mercy on you’ becomes ‘how kind he has been to you’. If it does indeed increase accessibility and understanding for a casual gospel reader then it is a benefit worthy of the obvious effort.
ROGER THORNINGTON
New Testament Analysis
The Meeting That Changed the World
The Meeting That Changed the World
Author Michael Knowles
Publisher Sacristy £17.99
Format pbk
ISBN 9781789590265
The argument of this book is that the Council of Jerusalem in AD49 as outlined in Acts has been underestimated. Whatever detailed negotiations led up to its conclusions, it liberated pagan Christian converts from needing to follow the full rigours of the Torah. This traumatic but necessary step changed Christianity from being a local sect into a world-transforming faith. The author, a Roman Catholic, uses this model to challenge his own Church: if it is not prepared to ordain women and accept other similar reforms, its numbers will continue to decline. He is thus revealed as the kind of Vatican II-affirming Catholic who would be sympathetic to the present Pope. He would, of course, be strongly opposed by the neo-traditionalists in his church, some of whom are showing an odd disloyalty to that very Pope whose office they claim to venerate. Although the book is perhaps too long as it trawls through the New Testament, it offers a challenge particularly relevant in this year of Cardinal Newman’s canonisation: in the light of his Essay on the Development of Doctrine, how far can you embrace radical change while staying true to the deposit of faith?
ADRIAN ROBERTS
New Testament Analysis
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