Re: Reading Recommendation

Michael K. Thompson (thompm@rpi.edu)
Sun, 12 Jan 1997 23:44:09 -0800

Geoffrey Horton wrote:
>
> Although we spend much of our time here discussing the early chapters of
> Genesis, much the same controversy goes on concerning the Gospels. In
> fact, Dan Berger recommended this list to me when I asked him, in another
> forum, how one goes about reconciling a fairly non-literal reading of
> Genesis with a fairly literal reading of the Gospels.
>
> Over the past week or so, I've been reading _The New Testament and the
> People of God_, by N. T. Wright. I found it to be a very interesting book,
> though a little tough sledding in some places. Although the book is
> directed at the New Testament end of the problem, his comments are useful
> in the survey of Genesis as well. I've tried to summarize what he's
> saying, or failing that, to find a quotation that will help, but with no
> success (the book does have over 470 pages of text, after all). But you
> may want to see if your local library has a copy.
>
> Yours in Christ,
> Geoff

I agree that we do need to pay attention to the debate over the
gospels. (If
Christ is not a historical figure then "we are to be pitied") A good
text which
makes sense of the coccophony of New Testament scholarship is -The Third
Quest for
the Historical Jesus_ by Ben Witherington III (IVP). It is shorter and
easier to
understand than most texts and summarizes scholarship from the Jesus
Seminar to
N.T.Wright. One of the striking things I found was all of the parallels
that I
could draw between the positions in NT scholarship and the positions in
the
creation debate.

I probably should introduce myself since this is my first posting. My
name is
Michael Thompson and I am on staff with InterVarsity at RPI and Union
College in
New York. I graduated from Cornell U. with a B.A. in physics/astronomy
(yes I studied under Sagan). I am happily using my degree to teach
students
how to think Christianly in science and technology:)

While I'm here let me say that I appreciate the dialogue I have
witnessed in
the ASA and particularly on this listserv. I was a YEC (till I had
Sagan,
fortunately I found other materials by VanTill et al). I haven't
settled in a
"position" yet but I am at peace to see that this is a debate which
literally
transcends the data.

In Him
Michael