Ask the Author: Michael Berens
Answered Questions (2)
Michael Berens
I am currently working on a novel involving a mysterious fragment of an ancient scroll and the hunt for missing treasure from the Temple in Jerusalem. It's sort of a hybrid mystery-action thriller. It is not a religious book per se but is grounded in religious practices of the late Second Temple period.
Michael Berens
The genesis for "Becoming Jesus" occurred nearly ten years ago during a holiday dinner discussion about Jose Saramago's novel, "The Gospel According to Jesus Christ." Although I am a big fan of Saramago's books, there was something about the portrait of Jesus in that book that didn't sit well with me. It has more to do with the political and social environment in Portugal and Spain in the 20th century than with Galilee in the early years of the first century CE. That got me thinking what, in fact, caused Jesus to become a religious leader. Historically speaking, he didn't just decide one day it was time for him to reveal his divine nature to everyone. The more I read and researched the topic, the more I discovered that most biographies or histories of Jesus pass over the topic rather quickly, because there is not enough evidence one way or the other to make a case. Eventually, I began to formulate my own ideas, drawing not only the Gospel accounts but on the larger field of religious studies, and eventually came to set them down in the book, in the hope it may stimulate others' thinking as well.
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