Zealot

When you are told that the focus of a book is the "historical Jesus", it's easy to assume that the author is interested in substantiating Jesus as a historical personage so as to bolster the claims of religious Christianity.

Reza Aslan did a masterful job of presenting the historical context for the rise of Islam, (No god but God is a widely translated bestseller and an acknowledged contribution to historiography.) He is a scholar of religions and an excellent writer who can take a sprawling topic and render it sensibly and persuasively.

His argument boils down to this: The Jews of the first century had been consumed by the passion of holy war, of jihad, against Roman occupation, and Jesus was only amongst the last in a long line of messiahs, healers, rebel leaders, and self-proclaimed "King[s] of the Jews" who were executed. (He never uses the phrase "holy war" or jihad, of course, but the parallels are astonishing and unmistakable.) Jesus as a figure doesn't even appear much in the first third of the book, because Aslan is busy constructing a truly impressive context for Jewish rebellion under the harsh rule of Rome, and for Jewish aristocratic and theological co-option by the Romans to the point of collaboration.

Sifting through centuries of mythmaking, Reza Aslan sheds new light on one of history's most influential and enigmatic figures by examining Jesus within the context of the times in which he lived: the age of zealotry, an era awash in apocalyptic fervour, when scores of Jewish prophets and would-be messiahs wandered the Holy Land bearing messages from God. They also espoused a fervent nationalism that made resistance to Roman occupation a sacred duty. Balancing the Jesus of the Gospels against historical sources, Aslan describes a complex figure: a man of peace who exhorted his followers to arm themselves; an exorcist and faith healer who urged his disciples to keep his identity secret; and the seditious "King of the Jews", whose promise of liberation from Rome went unfulfilled in his lifetime. Aslan explores why the early Church preferred to promulgate an image of
Jesus as a peaceful spiritual teacher rather than a politically conscious revolutionary, and grapples with the riddle of how Jesus understood himself. Zealot provides a fresh perspective on one of the greatest stories ever told. The result is a thought-provoking, elegantly written biography with the pulse of a fast-paced novel, and a singularly brilliant portrait of a man, a time and the birth of a religion.

Contents: Map: First-Century Palestine xiii The Temple in Jerusalem xv Author's Note xvii Introduction xxiii Chronology xxxiii
Part I Prologue: A Different Sort of Sacrifice 3 Chapter One: A Hole in the Corner 10 Chapter Two: King of the Jews 17 Chapter Three: You Know Where I Am From 25 Chapter Four: The Fourth Philosophy 34 Chapter Five: Where Is Your Fleet to Sweep the Roman Seas? 46 Chapter Six: Year One 57
Part II Prologue: Zeal for Your House 73 Chapter Seven: The Voice Crying Out in the Wilderness 80 Chapter Eight: Follow Me 90 Chapter Nine: By the Finger of God 103 Chapter Ten: May Your Kingdom Come 115 Chapter Eleven: Who Do You Say I Am? 127 Chapter Twelve: No King but Caesar 146
Part III Prologue: God Made Flesh 163 Chapter Thirteen: If Christ Has Not Been Risen 172 Chapter Fourteen: Am I Not an Apostle? 183 Chapter Fifteen: The Just One 197 Epilogue: True God from True God 213 Acknowledgments 217 Notes 219 Bibliography 273 Index 283