John Shelby Spong’s latest work Re-Claiming The Bible For A Non-Religious World, (HarperOne 2011) is an
important book. It began as a series of lectures at a summer institute in South
Carolina in 2006, developed into an online series of newsletters, and has now
reached its published form. His intent is to give those interested in the Christian
scriptures - and those dismissing it as nonsense – a clear sense of nature of
the Bible as it is known to scholars who have spent their lives studying it in
minute detail. In the preface, he writes, “… it will give those who engage it
the sense of having completed a major university course on the Bible.”
A fellow of the Jesus Seminar, Spong
adopts what can be defined as a consensus of current progressive biblical
scholarship. Little of what he writes will be new to those who have maintained
an active reading of current literature about how the Bible came into
existence. Little will please those who cling desperately to the conservative,
literal approach to scripture. He discounts the religious value of some of the
less often read books of the Bible, both in the Old Testament and the New
Testament. Some of never appear in
lectionaries designed for reading and preaching in worship of congregations.
Spong holds to what is now the
traditional view, already some one hundred and fifty years old, of the
so-called “five books of Moses” (the Hebrew Torah). On the other hand, he breaks with the
well-known theory of a document called Q, thought by many scholars to have been
the common source shared by the gospels of Matthew and Luke. The Apostle Paul,
he believes, gave not only one of the first but also the most influential
interpretation of the meaning of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection. At the
same time, he does not regard the stories of Jesus’ birth or resurrection as
believable in this day and age. His alternate
views on these narratives is worthy of serious consideration.
A particularly significant part of the
book presents the first three gospels as set in the context of synagogue
worship for a full year. Mark’s presentation of the Jesus story runs from from Rosh
Hashanah to Yom Kippur, a period of about six and a half months. Matthew and
Luke carry the cycle forward for the remaining five and a half months to the next
Rosh Hashanah.
Possibly the most valuable part of
this 400-plus page work of fifty-nine chapters in twelve parts is the religious
and cultural background Spong cites for each book in the Bible. He does not
believe that the Bible is in any sense the “Word of God.” He frankly states
that “it is a tribal story, as this book will reveal – a pre-modern story, an
ever changing and ever-growing story. It came into existence, as every other
book does, out of the experience of human beings seeking to make sense out of
the life they are living and the things they are experiencing.”
Without falling into the trap of supercessionism,
Spong’s approach to the New Testament locates many of the stories and interpretations
therein as the fulfillment of the Hebrew scriptures. He ends his final chapter reassuring his
readers that, despite what some will see as his extreme views, he still
believes that God was in Jesus and therefore remains for him, Christ.
The publisher, HarperCollins
(HarperOne, in Canada) anticipates a wide readership, particularly in small
study groups found in many progressive churches. It is priced accordingly. Anyone
looking for a suitable Christmas or Hanukkah gift for a spiritually searching
friend or family member could find nothing better than this.
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