What Scholars Are Really Saying About God and the Bible
April 11, 2016
With a folksy approach to examining the nature of the Bible and God, Smoley (Inner Christianity) treads in pedestrian fashion over ground already well covered by others. Smoley trudges through an overview of biblical history—covering the time of the Judges, the exile and its aftermath, Jesus and his context, and the birth of the church, among other topics—before he finally comes to his own points in the book’s closing pages. Along the way, he commits a few gaffes in the service of his attempt to uncover ideas he believes still have little circulation; for example, Smoley treats the divergence of biblical events and archaeological records as startling news. He concludes that the New Testament Gospels contain “much material about Jesus that is not factually true,” but fails to mention that scholars have long held the Gospels to be proclamations, not biographies. Smoley undertakes this overview in order to back up his theory that Jesus is an incarnation of Yahweh, the Great Angel—a figure who appears in the canonical books of Genesis and Daniel as mediator between God and humankind. Readers seeking a clear understanding of the findings of biblical scholarship will be better rewarded elsewhere, but those looking for esoteric theories about the nature of God and Jesus will benefit from Smoley’s book.
April 15, 2016
Retelling of modern views and scholarship on the Bible.Smoley (Supernatural: Writings on an Unknown History, 2013, etc.) offers a systematic tour of modern secular scholarship regarding the Jewish and Christian concept of God. The ground he covers, however, has been well-worn in recent years, and Smoley offers little new insight. The author too often engages his readers with the condescending view that he knows a secret of which they are not yet aware: that by and large what is written in the Bible isn't true. Nowhere is this clearer than in his chapter on the birth of Jesus, in which he compares his role as spoiler to the boy who told him years before that Santa Claus didn't exist. Smoley follows this odd comparison with the statement, "another little-known fact: scholars believe that none of the Nativity story is true. None--zero." Throughout the book, the author makes blanket statements about how certain unnamed "scholars" believe this or that. Those scholars he does mention by name are often on the outskirts of mainline research--e.g., John Dominic Crossan or the group known as the Jesus Seminar. By sensationalizing modern research and focusing on nontraditional authors, Smoley ostracizes many readers. In particular, he often refers to people who believe in orthodoxy as "fundamentalists," and scholarship by people of faith is mostly absent in his work. Smoley does provide casual readers with ample background for understanding many of the arguments set forth in recent decades (and indeed, recent centuries) concerning the authorship of books of the Bible, the role of ancient Israel in history, the identity of Jesus Christ, and other topics. The author's experience as a student of mysticism is evident throughout his work, and he ends the book with a highly heterodox personal statement about the identity of God and the origins of humanity. A decent resource, but several authors, from Karen Armstrong to Bart Ehrman, have provided better sources for curious readers.
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August 1, 2016
Smoley (The Deal: A Guide to Radical and Complete Forgiveness), whose expertise is in the areas of religion, spirituality, mystical, and esoteric thought, wants to inform religious congregants and other readers about contemporary Bible scholarship. He does so by explaining that most scholars do not view some scriptural narratives as having actually taken place, and that despite these findings, the Bible still has vital relevance when interpreted in a spiritual or esoteric manner. Smoley shows that these scholars don't believe that the flood of Genesis and the mass Exodus of the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt occurred in the ways recorded. The book is full of such examples. Yet, Smoley's discussion of the Bible's continued poignancy and meaningfulness is only considered in one chapter--creating a bit of imbalance. VERDICT While scholars and laypersons with more conservative views on the Bible and biblical interpretation will likely disagree with the author's arguments, those with an interest in biblical scholarship will find this book to be informative and helpful.--John Jaeger, Dallas Baptist Univ. Lib.
Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
Starred review from May 1, 2016
As the title suggests, Smoley's ultimate aim is to confer better understanding of what God is in mainstream and mystical Christianity, as informed by Jewish tradition. The vehicle of his presentationa review of what state-of-the-art scholarship says about the Bible's historicityis what keeps the pages turning early on, but the analysis that follows is even more fascinating. Smoley proceeds through the ostensibly historical sections of the Hebrew Bible (Creation to the end of Babylonian exile) and then the New Testament, disclosing why so much is factually incredible, why the authors say that things that never happened did happen, and where crucial but mysterious players in the text, mostly supernatural (e.g., angels) but also fully physical (e.g., Moses), came from. Throughout the proceedings, he tracks the development of God as the Hebrews shifted from polytheism to monotheism, asserted the supremacy of Yahweh, and saw the Jesus movement blossom in their midst. In the end, Smoley turns to his own primary field of study, esoteric Christianity, and his own psychological philosophy of God to argue how God can be best understood today. Intelligent, informative, and surprisingly accessible.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)