Jesus and the Victory of God (Christian Origins and the Question of God: Volume 2)
Pages
741 pages
Publisher
Augsburg Fortress Press
Published
8/1/1997
ISBN-13
9780800626822
In this highly anticipated volume, N. T. Wright focuses directly on the historical Jesus: Who was he? What did he say? And what did he mean by it?
Wright begins by showing how the questions posed by Albert Schweitzer a century ago remain central today. Then he sketches a profile of Jesus in terms of his prophetic praxis, his subversive stories, the symbols by which he reordered his world, and the answers he gave to the key questions that any world view must address. The examination of Jesus' aims and beliefs, argued on the basis of Jesus' actions and their accompanying riddles, is sure to stimulate heated response. Wright offers a provocative portrait of Jesus as Israel's Messiah who would share and bear the fate of the nation and would embody the long-promised return of Israel's God to Zion.
Wright begins by showing how the questions posed by Albert Schweitzer a century ago remain central today. Then he sketches a profile of Jesus in terms of his prophetic praxis, his subversive stories, the symbols by which he reordered his world, and the answers he gave to the key questions that any world view must address. The examination of Jesus' aims and beliefs, argued on the basis of Jesus' actions and their accompanying riddles, is sure to stimulate heated response. Wright offers a provocative portrait of Jesus as Israel's Messiah who would share and bear the fate of the nation and would embody the long-promised return of Israel's God to Zion.
Reviews
Philibuster
July 15, 2011
July 15, 2011
As someone following the New Perspective, one of N.T. Wright's major strengths is placing texts in their cultural context. JVG is a superb example of this strength. The initial premise of deducing Jesus' aims, intentions, beliefs and such sounds like it's just asking to get mired down in 2000-years-later speculation, but Wright does an admirable job working within a culturally-sensitive approach to access the history behind the texts. Highlights include his extended discussion of Mark 13, Wright's re-understanding of basic Christian buzz-words such as 'faith' and 'repentance' and Jesus' understanding of his work in terms of OT eschatological understanding.
