On-Topic Fox News Offensive Interview of Reza Aslan's Book about Jesus

[Rolyo85]

A Christian who wrote a hit piece on Mohammed would be rightly criticized... this is a guy with shifting agendas and who was originally a Muslim convert to Christianity who decided his original mythology was more meaningful to him than his little flirtation with what he considers Christian mythology. His agenda is more important than who he is... he interprets Christianity in a basically negative way, but presents himself as a scholar just engaged in ideas. I don't like him or the tendency on the left to get the vapors on anything that smacks of not being culturally sensitive. I know that the history of Christianity is a lot more contentious and complicated than its critics and its adherents postulate but there is no douybt this book on Christianity was meant more as a hit piece by an apostate with an agenda than an honest look at a very emotional but complex subject.

This is an assumption not based on any evidence - why would a Christian writing about Mohammed be "rightly" criticized? Secular scholarship doesn't and SHOULDN'T care about people's beliefs when analyzing religion. Confused people keep forgetting that for science there is nothing sacred about religion, which is as it should be.

And your entire rant sounds like you just read his wikipedia page and have no clue who the guy is. Just saying.

 

[bankside]

Reza should have asked her; "Why am I being interviewed by a Black person on Fox News?"

THAT is funny.

 

[bankside]

JustBelieve and Rareboy, I hope you've read the book.

 

[AstareGod]

I found some of his appearances on Bill Maher on YouTube. These may not necessarily have anything to do with his book, but it may shine a little more light on him in general as a person. The latest one is the third video all the way at the bottom.

 

[Jack Springer]

What would happen if someone, say a Christian (or anyone else) wrote a book titled .....

Zealot: The Life and Times of Mohammed of Arabia.


What image would they put on the cover?

Where would the writer hide?

Where would the publisher hide?



Keep things in perspective.

 

[Kulindahr]

For starters, I can't give much credibility to a man who can write this:

Jesus of Nazareth squarely within any of the known religiopolitical movements of his time. He was a man of profound contradictions, one day preaching a message of racial exclusion (“I was sent solely to the lost sheep of Israel”; Matthew 15:24), the next, of benevolent universalism (“Go and make disciples of all nations”; Matthew 28:19); sometimes calling for unconditional peace (“Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called the sons of God”; Matthew 5:9), sometimes promoting violence and conflict (“If you do not have a sword, go sell your cloak and buy one”; Luke 22:36).

He's picking and choosing out of context as bad as any fundamentalist self-appointed preacher.

 

[Kulindahr]

A Christian who wrote a hit piece on Mohammed would be rightly criticized... this is a guy with shifting agendas and who was originally a Muslim convert to Christianity who decided his original mythology was more meaningful to him than his little flirtation with what he considers Christian mythology. His agenda is more important than who he is... he interprets Christianity in a basically negative way, but presents himself as a scholar just engaged in ideas. I don't like him or the tendency on the left to get the vapors on anything that smacks of not being culturally sensitive. I know that the history of Christianity is a lot more contentious and complicated than its critics and its adherents postulate but there is no douybt this book on Christianity was meant more as a hit piece by an apostate with an agenda than an honest look at a very emotional but complex subject.

Where?

His book isn't about Christianity -- it actually doesn't talk about Christianity at all.

 

[Kulindahr]

This is an assumption not based on any evidence - why would a Christian writing about Mohammed be "rightly" criticized? Secular scholarship doesn't and SHOULDN'T care about people's beliefs when analyzing religion. Confused people keep forgetting that for science there is nothing sacred about religion, which is as it should be.

And your entire rant sounds like you just read his wikipedia page and have no clue who the guy is. Just saying.

The real error here is the same blindness the interviewer showed: a total failure to realize that there's no such thing as a scholar who doesn't have a personal viewpoint. One could ask why anyone at all should want to write about Jesus -- Buddhist, Mormon, atheist, Hindu, or any other non-Christian could be jumped on for having at "attack" piece.

This situation reminds me of a lecture I attended about the Gospel of/by John, given by a speaker who knew more about it than almost anyone in the world -- an atheist, who laughed at any claim by anyone at all that the writer didn't mean to plainly describe Jesus as being God Himself. He knew the material, he understood it -- he just didn't believe it. That shows what scholarship is supposed to be about: finding out what your source/subject is saying, and setting it out, regardless of your own viewpoint.

 

[JayHawk]

What would happen if someone, say a Christian (or anyone else) wrote a book titled .....

Zealot: The Life and Times of Mohammed of Arabia.


What image would they put on the cover?

Where would the writer hide?

Where would the publisher hide?



Keep things in perspective.

Oh so you want Christians to act like fanatics? I mean they do most days, whats left of them.

 

[Kulindahr]

I have to wonder why no mullah has issued a fatwah against him, given that his book definitely assaults the Muslim faith merely by saying Jesus was in fact crucified.

 

[T-Rexx]

What would happen if someone, say a Christian (or anyone else) wrote a book titled .....

Zealot: The Life and Times of Mohammed of Arabia.


What image would they put on the cover?

Where would the writer hide?

Where would the publisher hide?



Keep things in perspective.

Why do you claim that no Christian has?


The Truth About Muhammad: Founder of the World's Most Intolerant Religion by Robert Spencer.
Muhammad: A Biography of the Prophet by Karen Armstrong.
The Life of the Prophet Muhammad - Volume I by Ibn Kathir and Trevor LeGassick.
The Life of the Prophet Muhammad Volume II by Ibn Kathir & Trevor LeGassick.
The Making of the Last Prophet: A Reconstruction of the Earliest Biography of Muhammad by Gordon Newby.
Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources by Martin Lings.
Muhammad by Maxime Rodinson.
In the Footsteps of Muhammad: Understanding the Islamic Experience by John Renard.
Muhammad: The Messenger of God by Betty Kelen.
In Search of Muhammad by Clinton Bennett.

 

[Sausy]

Oh so you want Christians to act like fanatics? I mean they do most days, whats left of them.

What the fuck is that coming from? Feckless ignorance on your part. Aslan may be a scholar, but he better get a tougher skin than to play the anti- Islamic card, knowing that the shoe was the other foot the response would be even more heated, and personally threatening. Nice though he thinks Jesus was indeed crucified, but then he does go on with how unremarkable Jesus really was in that respect since in his view the Romans were putting to death a number of would be revolutionary" messiahs". I saw the interview clips with Maher and came out with an even more negative opinion of this lefty "martyr" of the moment. And I'm fully aware agnostics and atheists have a better handle of the Bible than many" Christians" do. But they at least are far more credible than a former Christian who went back to his old religion without putting that faith through the wringer as equally as he did in finding Christianity wanting.

 

[Rolyo85]

How do you know he didn't? You familiar with all of his work? Or are you just pissed because he's from "another team" and is attacking (supposedly) "your team"? This American team mentality is demented...

 

[rareboy]

JustBelieve and Rareboy, I hope you've read the book.

It is on my bedside table and I'm well along. I like Aslan's writing.

Sausy and his alter ego Benvolio are full of nonsense. They are absolutely no different than the fundamentalist Wahabists who want to stone anyone that discusses Mohammed and the Koran in any intellectually meaningful way as a product of their time and societal influences instead of just mindlessly prattling about faith and holiness.

 

[rareboy]

Why do you claim that no Christian has?


The Truth About Muhammad: Founder of the World's Most Intolerant Religion by Robert Spencer.
Muhammad: A Biography of the Prophet by Karen Armstrong.
The Life of the Prophet Muhammad - Volume I by Ibn Kathir and Trevor LeGassick.
The Life of the Prophet Muhammad Volume II by Ibn Kathir & Trevor LeGassick.
The Making of the Last Prophet: A Reconstruction of the Earliest Biography of Muhammad by Gordon Newby.
Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources by Martin Lings.
Muhammad by Maxime Rodinson.
In the Footsteps of Muhammad: Understanding the Islamic Experience by John Renard.
Muhammad: The Messenger of God by Betty Kelen.
In Search of Muhammad by Clinton Bennett.

Oh thank you for this. If anything exposes the complete and laughable ignorance of the defenders of the faith here and over at FOX...it is their idiotic notion that Mohammed and his life and times have not been the grist for many western 'christian' writers and academics.

 

[Benvolio]

It is on my bedside table and I'm well along. I like Aslan's writing.

Sausy and his alter ego Benvolio are full of nonsense. They are absolutely no different than the fundamentalist Wahabists who want to stone anyone that discusses Mohammed and the Koran in any intellectually meaningful way as a product of their time and societal influences instead of just mindlessly prattling about faith and holiness.

You are totally mistaken. I am not a believing Christian, and I have been reading books about the Jesus of history for many years. As I said, there is nothing in his introduction which has not been written before.
My point has always been that a Muslim should not be attacking Christianity and trying to destroy the faith of others (which his introduction admits) at a time when other Muslim immigrants are bombing Americans, while Christians are being killed and churches burned in places like Egypt and Somalia. It is not a time to be preaching intolerance and insults.

 

[rareboy]

It is not an attack on Christianity. Only the wilfully ignorant and reactionary fools reading at a grade three level would see the book as an attack. How frail their own faith must be.

The more you write on this topic, the more foolish and shuttered you appear.

Furthermore, how hypocritical you are as well. I know and you know that you would have no issue with a Christian challenging the beliefs of a muslim while tens of thousands of collateral muslims have been bombed and killed by good white 'christian' forces in Iraq and Afghanistan over the last 15 years.

Face it. You've got nothing here.

 

[Benvolio]

I know and you know that you would have no issue with a Christian challenging the beliefs of a muslim while tens of thousands of collateral muslims have been bombed and killed by good white 'christian' forces in Iraq and Afghanistan over the last 15 years.

Face it. You've got nothing here.

Exactly. It is a salvo in the ongoing was between Muslims and the West. Of course it is an attack, intended to destroy the beliefs of Christians. His introduction says that.

 

[rareboy]

Exactly. It is a salvo in the ongoing was between Muslims and the West. Of course it is an attack, intended to destroy the beliefs of Christians. His introduction says that.

Like your decontextualization of the foreword from the content of the book...you're using the standard reactionary conservative christian trolling technique of isolating my comment from the first statement in my post. This shows how intellectually dishonest and/or desperate you are here.

It is not an attack on Christianity. Only the wilfully ignorant and reactionary fools reading at a grade three level would see the book as an attack.

I can smell the flop sweat from here.

 

[Benvolio]

A purpose of an Introduction is to state the author's purposes in publishing the book. In this case to change " basic assumptions", " expose the claims of the gospels", and "he certainly will not be the Jesus that most modern Christians would recognize". So, yes, his purpose is to discredit Christianity, and he says so.
We must assume that a secondary purpose it to facilitate the conversion of others to Islam. But remember, Muslims are even more hostile to gays than fundamentalist Christians.
The liberals here are themselves anti-Christian and therefore ignore or agree with the author's stated purposes.