How the Life of Jesus Became Embellished Into a New Religion Based on Fables

How the Life of Jesus Became Embellished Into a New Religion Based on Fables February 15, 2014

Reza Aslan is a religious scholar, a professor of creative writing and a journalist. In another age, he would have been called a renaissance man.

In fact Aslan’s range of knowledge and his self-confidence have been used by some of his detractors to challenge his account of the historical Jesus in Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth. However, his critics generally target Aslan’s credentials on the basis of his background (he is an interdisciplinary academic with multiple degrees and a Muslim) rather than taking issue with the contents of Zealot.

Zealot infuses Jerusalem and Palestine at the time of Christ’s life with a vividness and detail that reveals a historical cauldron in which radical Jews challenged both the authority of the Roman Empire and established Jewish leaders who cooperated with Rome. Aslan’s account of the historical Jesus moves back and forth between what was his likely life versus how he is portrayed in the New Testament.

Religion is a question of belief in a divine force, as Aslan affirms, so facts don’t necessarily undercut faith. But they can cause some believers to feel threatened and indignant.

If you’ve seen Aslan on television, he’s not one to back down. Truthout recently interviewed Aslan about his contextual recounting of the man who became the basis of a religion years after his death.

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