Cheap Unauthorized Version, The : Truth and Fiction in the Bible (Book) (ROBIN LANE FOX) Price

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Customer Reviews of Unauthorized Version, The : Truth and Fiction in the Bible

Entertaining Historiography
Fox is a brilliant writer and gifted scholar whose PAGANS AND CHRISTIANS may become a classic. THE UNAUTHORIZED VERSION, entertainingly written for the educated general reader, presents his professional's view of the Bible's value as history. Discussions about source issues and dates are too often written by Thomas Carlyle's old nemesis Herr Doktor-Professor Dryasdust. Lane Fox, to the contrary, argues with genuine verve and wit. His explanation of the reason why the Gospels' Infancy Narratives cannot be historically accurate is in itself a brief miracle of clarity. After reading it you would have to be singularly obtuse not to understand why you can have either a Roman tax census or Herod the King, but not both. He can be laugh-out-loud funny about the plight of the poor prophet, doomed to have his predictions fail if he succeeds in convincing people to repent. And when Biblical botanical issues crop up, and they do, he may be the only scholar alive really qualified to deal with them. He's written two books on gardening in his spare time. Personally an atheist, he takes care to be fair. Christian scholars who step outside methodological boundaries or who seem disingenuous are skewered mercilessly. Those who seem honest and conscientious to him are treated simply as scholars. You would never guess from reading this book alone that R.E. Brown is a priest. You would only know that he is a great scholar whose work Fox greatly esteems, even while disagreeing. Similarly, you would not know that the late W.F. Albright was an evangelical Christian. Fox's conclusions, of course, put limits on the ways we can trust the Bible as an historical source (primary for some limited purposes, clearly secondary for others, when not outright fiction). There is nothing earthshaking here, nothing new. Nothing even very controversial except in the eyes of "fundamentalist" readers. What he has to say is perfectly acceptable to most "mainstream" believers and their churches. In a nutshell, THE UNAUTHORIZED VERSION is the Gospel according to modern Biblical criticism. His thesis may be stated thus: If the Bible is claimed to be historically accurate in the way that we mean "historically accurate" today, then that claim can only be evaluated using the same historical standards and methods used to evaluate nonbiblical sources and nonbiblical questions today. Stated baldly like this, its truth is almost selfevident. He is preaching of course to the choir. The people who should read this book won't. But if you are curious about the issues involved, or wind up in controversies, you could not do better for an introduction than this genial book. For emerald_skye.

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Great history from an admittedly partisan author
Robin Lane Fox's book, The Un authorized Version" is often thrilling history , as it takes an often sharp and incisive look at Bible stories as history and reveals the inadequacies and sometimes truths buried beneath the famous words. My main objection to the book is Fox's sometimes subtle sometimes overt prejudice to the Bible's Jewish origins. There is little in Fox's work of any Jewish scholarly thought on the Bible stories- I didn't expect the traditionalists like the medieval Ibn Ezra or Rashi- but I did expect at least a mention of the Enlightenment favorite Spinoza. In fact, I noticed a decisively anti- Jewish cast to a lot of the discussions, especially in the Jesus chapters which portray Jesus as a Christian scholar who happened to be born Jewish, instead of as a Jewish Thinker who interpreted and re iterated much of Gods laws as a Torah Reformer. I also would have enjoyed a deeper analysis of archeological evidence. I was taken with Fox's explanation for Joshua's Mound of Foreskins(early flint left over by prehistoric peoples.) But where is his detailed analysis and comparisons of the newly translated Dead Sea Scrolls? All we get is a cursory description- I would love to have read Fox's comparisons of the Dead Sea Scrolls with the Masoretic text and the Septugaint. Fox's book is an incisively written, often sharp witted work.It also admits to being opinionated and biased(on the atheist bent). It is fast reading and often fascinating. M. Lamb

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The UN-researched Version
I have never written a review of a book that I did not read, but I must admit that I started this book but gave up on page 198. Therefore, my review is of only the first half of the book.

First and foremost Robin Lane Fox is a excellent writer. The books pace and prose was very readable and quite enjoyable. I gave up because Mr. Fox's said purpose was to produce a historical look at the bible. This intrigued me greatly, but as I started to devour the book I found so many historical and exegetical anomalies that I simply lost respect for the contents and found myself relegating this book to a dusty shelf to lie dormant.

While I could nitpick I will simply state 3 obvious errors that can easily be dismissed as the ramblings of an ideological prisoner to a false belief system.

ONE

Mr. Fox suggests that there are two different and irreconcilable accounts of the creation story presented in Genesis. While this novel postulate is not new it has been thoroughly debunked, both logically and hermeneutically. The first Genesis account is from Genesis 1:1 - 2:3 while the second supposedly contradictory one is from Genesis 2:4 - 2:25.
The major mistake that is made, is the belief that it is all one timeline from 1:1 - 2:25. However, it is abundantly clear that starting at 2:4 there is a break and the story is retold but this time focusing on man - the subject of the creation. (This by the way is very common in Hebrew literature to show a panoply of the story first and then focus on the main character involved.) But don't take my word on the subject read the first two chapters yourself, you will see!

TWO

For some reason unbeknownst to me a certain segment of the population love to pull out the Quirinius census debate found in Luke 2:2. Mr. Fox alleges that Quirinius was not governor of Syria until about 6 AD. While it is true that Quirinius did not take over the full governorship of Syria until 6 AD, there is plenty of historical evidence to show that he was governor of Syria from 12 - 2 BC during the military action against the Homonadensians. There is also evidence that Quirinius was given the chore of the census when Augustus ordered it in 8 - 7 BC to help quell the violence in this volatile area of Palestine. Anyway you look at it the honest historian sees no problem with Quirinius being assigned as either governor-pro-tem or as the actual governor during this period

THREE

This was the final straw that made me close the book. Against all known historical records and evidence Mr. Fox gives the date of authorship for Daniel at 'slightly later than 164' BC. This flies in the face of the facts. First, over half of the book is written in Imperial Aramaic. It is with a high degree of accuracy that SECULAR historians can date this Aramaic to the 6th or 5th century BC. The second is that the Septuagint (Greek translation of known Old Testament books) contained Daniel. The Septuagint was completed in the third century BC in Alexandria and it is undisputed that the whole book of Daniel was in the Septuagint. My question is how does anybody who must be aware of the above historical facts date this book at 164BC????

This book would be great if it was a work of Fiction, but unfortunately it is being passed off as a historical documentary. If you are unfamiliar with Hebrew and Greek history I suggest you give this book a pass and then to acquire your knowledge from better sources. If you are familiar with history this book could be viewed as an amusing form of fiction or a rather obnoxious attempt at revisionism. I chose the latter and the book is gathering dust.