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John McChesney-Young

jmccyoung@bookwyrm.social

Joined 2 years, 7 months ago

Theology, fantasy and science fiction, science, history, classics, general bibliophile

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Talia Lavin: Wild Faith (Hardcover, 2024, Grand Central Publishing)

I've probably read 10 books now over the last 5 of so years about the Christian Right and this was by far the most engaging (her first book was also excellent). I will warn readers that the second part, devoted to education, family dynamics, and childrearing are intense, with the chapter devoted to the last topic quite disturbing.

Good, but the title and subtitle are misleading because although a substantial part of the book is devoted to the nominal subject of the deciphering of Old Persian and Akkadian, a majority is on the archaeological work that made it possible. (Also, the subtitle refers to "the world's oldest writing," but in the body of the book it's made clear that it's only the script itself which is oldest but the language for which it was first used was Sumerian, which receives only paying discussion.)

Lizzie Wade: Apocalypse (Paperback, 2025, HarperCollins) No rating

The history of humanity is one of devastating, once-in-a-thousand-year events: rising seas that make land …

Interesting, but there was a lot of speculation about what people in the past civilizations thought and felt about what was going on. Apart from that I thought it was quite good and very educational.

Luke Timothy Johnson: The Real Jesus  (Paperback, HarperOne) No rating

The first part of the book is composed of pointed and (to me) cogent criticism of the Jesus Seminar and their way of approaching early Christianity. The second part presents Johnson's positive alternative and includes an excellent explanation for why the resurrection is not "historical": it's not at all that it's didn't happen, but that by his definition history is purely naturalistic and the supernatural nature of the resurrection therefore puts it outside the bounds of history. I was very glad to have been pointed toward this book by Fleming Rutledge's Crucifixion, which I also recommend.