Thomas Cahill: Desire of the everlasting hills

By PHILIP CULBERTSON

Thomas Cahill, former director of religious publishing for Doubleday, is in the process of producing a seven-volume series described as "The Hinges of History", focusing on "the great gift-givers" who arrived at critical moments in Western history.

The first volume, How the Irish Saved Civilization, was an enormous critical success, and the second, The Gifts of the Jews, received equal acclaim. This is volume three.

The book's title, taken from Genesis 49:26, suggests that that which is everlasting in creation yearns for "something new to happen" to break the everlasting cycle of human cruelty. Could that "something new" have been the life and teachings of Jesus?

Cahill begins by setting Jesus within the broadest sweep of human history, with a particular focus on the effect of Alexander the Great upon the Ancient Near East.

Beginning in 333 BC, Alexander imposed Greek culture upon the entire Fertile Crescent, including the indigenous people of Judea and Samaria.

In a striking parallel to the cry of modern Maori, Cahill writes: "What does it take for a whole people to give up their language, their mother tongue, the original nourishment received along with breast milk, the medium of their hopes and dreams? Does it not mean that they have seen their inheritance so devalued that it no longer counts for much of anything?"

Into this volatile mix of occupation and frustration came the peasant revolutionary, Jesus, to preach the dis-entitlement of the powerful and the enfranchisement of the powerless.

In telling this story, Cahill displays a solid grasp of contemporary New Testamentw scholarship, including some of the most heated arguments over the "miracles" of Jesus and the meaning of his teachings.

But with his death, the effectiveness of Jesus' life and works was not clear until Paul had preached and the Gospels, with their contradictory narratives, had been written and distributed. Cahill devotes a chapter each to Paul, Mark, Matthew, Luke and John.

In the final chapter, Cahill remains realistic about both the promise of Christianity and its failures. "Any Christian who imagines himself morally superior to those who turned away has only to glance at the subsequent history of Christian persecution of Jews to realise that Christians have been far more successful at rejecting Jesus than any Jew has ever been."

Yet, when all is said and done, "the figure of Jesus - as final Jewish prophet, as innocent and redeeming victim, as ideal human being - is threaded through our society and folded into our imagination in such a way that it cannot be excised."

Cahill's writing style is accessible, and he is gifted at summarising controversy and complex texts without losing perspective. This is one of the best introductions to the New Testament I have read in a long time.

It should appeal equally to those who are already Christian, as well as those who simply wish to understand better the historical impact of Christian origins.

* Philip Culbertson is the Director of Pastoral Studies at St John's Theological College, Auckland.

Oxford, $29.95