I was just perusing Amazon.com and I came across the book description for the soon-to-be-released How God Became King by N. T. Wright. Here’s what it said:
Foundational: The four gospels come directly from the ancient church and are among the primary sources for the church’s teachings.
Familiar: Since Christian worship services began, a reading from the gospels has played a central role.
Studied: For over two hundred years scholars have challenged and defended the central claims of the gospels: miracles, historical accuracy, the divinity of Jesus, and more.
But Forgotten: Still, leading Bible scholar N. T. Wright reveals shocking news: We have all forgotten what the four gospels are about.
“Despite centuries of intense and heavy industry expended on the study of all sorts of features of the gospels,” Wright writes, “we have often managed to miss the main thing that they, all four of them, are most eager to tell us. What we need is not just a bit of fine-tuning, an adjustment here and there. We need a fundamental rethink about what the gospels are trying to tell us.”
What Wright offers is an opportunity to confront these powerful texts afresh, as if we are encountering them for the first time. How God Became King reveals the surprising, unexpected, and shocking news of the gospels: this is the story of a new king, a new kind of king, a king who has changed everything, and a king who invites us to be part of his new world.
I can think of a number of p-words that describe the emboldened sentence in the description. Preposterous. Pretentious. Presumptuous. Pedantic. Painful. Pathetic. Paranoid. Pervasive (throughout Wright’s work). Any other p-words you can think of to add to this list?
B”H
It makes me wanna Puke; that’s a p-word.
It is Patently Pietous and Privy to a Prevailing Preference to Promote one’s imagined Precedence. It lacks the Power of historical Proof and is Potentially one of the Poorest Post hoc Positions on the Gospels to Pervade our Christian Populace.
Poop is also a p-word.
But, when I read it, it will be good.
Billy: Well Played!
Geoff: Perhaps.
This is the sort of lagnuage one expects of cults and YouTube nabobs.
Tom, get a new publicist. Because this sort of thing invites people to search the Internet and say, “Dr. X. said this in 1837″, and provide the link.
Pobnoxious?
I’m ashamed of my fellow countryman’s bombast. Aren’t you people the ones supposed to have little reserve? ;-)
‘Hi there. Reading anything at the moment?’
‘Oh, yeah. Just the gospels.’
‘What were they about?’
‘Oh, they were about, uh… this guy who… uh… hm.’
Chuck: Word!
Roy: Perfect!
Benjamin: I’ll accept your shame as an apology for Wright’s bombast. And your dialogue is exactly what one would expect if the book’s description was true.
Policing Wright on publisher’s preposterous publicity publications? Poopy!
The comments I see here are what absolutely infuriate me about Christian circles. There is an internal conversation occurring that is self-absorbed and interested in pointing out picayune points. (There’s your three P’s.) Battling against Christian leaders and thinkers, not over doctrine but over whether you’ve heard this thing before, or challenging whether there really is an original thought, is counter productive. Dare I say, unchristian. No, I won’t proof text it. But it is divisive behavior. It’s much like watching this year’s Republican contest – so much time spent fighting each other while the President is gaining a foothold. Can we just shoot ourselves in the head instead? It would be faster.
You may not like Tom Wright. You may disagree with Tom Wright. But, one thing is certain, the gospel does change everything and it should be proclaimed.
Hope: If only we could blame the publishers. It’s not like Wright hasn’t been claiming this type of thing for years now.
Desmith11: Really? This is the type of thing that infuriates you about Christian circles? I can only imagine how you must feel about serious stuff. For the record, I don’t know Wright to like him or not like him, and I agree with him on a great many things, just not that we’ve all forgotten the message of the Bible and need him to remind us of what it is exactly.
I daresay Christ was being divisive when he pointed out His problems with the Pharisees. I daresay Paul was being divisive when he pointed out his problems with Peter not eating with Gentiles. I daresay Martin Luther was being divisive when he posted those theses on that door. Augustine/Pelagius, Athanasius/almost everyone, etc….
Divisiveness is not the sin against the Holy Ghost.
It’s a press release. But it’s a silly, presumptious press release. It smacks of nonChristian publicity, where every tv show and book is a “new shocking revelation that changes everything we thought we knew”. Judging by the style, Wright will be writing about Mary Magdalene and the Knights Templar in this latest book.
Badly done, Tom, publisher. Badly done.
Chuck: Well said sir, amen!