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Is Jesus God?: Finding Our Faith
In the new millennium, the most central question is how to understand God and Jesus. This book is an invitation to Christians—and non-Christians—to challenge their inherited notions of how and why Jesus is to be thought of as divine.
144 pages, Paperback
First published May 1, 2001
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
November 24, 2018
Ultimately, I was disappointed in this book.
Former Catholic priest Michael Morwood does do a great job tackling the outmoded theology that continues to weigh down Christian churches, including the idea that "Jesus HAD to die for our sins to be forgiven," the idea that "heaven" is a place, and that "God" exists somewhere separate from where we are. He correctly (in my opinion) points out that this kind of theology a) was a formulation from a given time and place millennia ago and frame within the cosmology of the time (the earth being the "center" around which the sun revolved, etc.); and b) has been frozen by Church authorities so that, despite all that we have learned about the size and functioning of what we now know to be a vast universe of incomprehensible dimensions, our understanding of the most important elements of the Christian faith remain stuck within a straightjacket of obsolete thoughts.
On this, and on the fundamentals of what a theology for our time might include, he writes well and interestingly.
However, much of his brief book is truly repetitious. There is not much new information contained after the first couple of chapters.
Also, despite the impressions one might initially have from the first chapter or so, this is not rigorous theology. For instance, after properly (I think) questioning whether "The Trinity" is still in our time a meaningful way to conceive of "God," he repeatedly uses the "Spirit" as well as "God" in his book, meaning, I believe, "God's spirit." But such language actually reinforces the concept of "three persons in the Trinity: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit."
More substantively, I was very disappointed in the chapters where he discussed Jesus' resurrection, specifically where he casually dismisses the possibility that some of Jesus' post-resurrection appearances contained some form of physical manifestation (as the Gospels state some of them did), and the chapter on whether or not Jesus was "God" in some way.
That question is a very important one, but his response is unsatisfactory. For one thing, he does not address something that has long puzzled me: the fact that the Synoptic Gospels (of Mark, Matthew and Luke) make it clear that Jesus did believe he had some kind of special relationship to the one he called "Father."
A few years ago, in fact, I read an excellent book by a Jewish scholar who tied Jesus' repeated use of the phrase "Son of Man" as referring to himself to a vision recorded the book of Daniel in which an "ancient of days" appeared with the clear manifestations of the godhead and to whom was presented a unique, mysterious figure called "Son of Man." When, after his arrest, Jesus was questioned by the Jewish elders and was asked whether he was "the Messiah, the Son of God," Jesus responded with "...from this time on you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right side of the Almighty and coming on the clouds of heaven!" To which the high priest responded, "Blasphemy!"
Morwood's ignoring the question of Jesus' apparent self-identification with, at least, a semi-divine character weakens considerably his rather confusing discussion of whether or not Jesus was/is God!
I am going to keep looking around for a book that I think does a better job of critiquing the antique theological framework of the Church hierarchy and also presents a more useful guide to a theology for our time.
Former Catholic priest Michael Morwood does do a great job tackling the outmoded theology that continues to weigh down Christian churches, including the idea that "Jesus HAD to die for our sins to be forgiven," the idea that "heaven" is a place, and that "God" exists somewhere separate from where we are. He correctly (in my opinion) points out that this kind of theology a) was a formulation from a given time and place millennia ago and frame within the cosmology of the time (the earth being the "center" around which the sun revolved, etc.); and b) has been frozen by Church authorities so that, despite all that we have learned about the size and functioning of what we now know to be a vast universe of incomprehensible dimensions, our understanding of the most important elements of the Christian faith remain stuck within a straightjacket of obsolete thoughts.
On this, and on the fundamentals of what a theology for our time might include, he writes well and interestingly.
However, much of his brief book is truly repetitious. There is not much new information contained after the first couple of chapters.
Also, despite the impressions one might initially have from the first chapter or so, this is not rigorous theology. For instance, after properly (I think) questioning whether "The Trinity" is still in our time a meaningful way to conceive of "God," he repeatedly uses the "Spirit" as well as "God" in his book, meaning, I believe, "God's spirit." But such language actually reinforces the concept of "three persons in the Trinity: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit."
More substantively, I was very disappointed in the chapters where he discussed Jesus' resurrection, specifically where he casually dismisses the possibility that some of Jesus' post-resurrection appearances contained some form of physical manifestation (as the Gospels state some of them did), and the chapter on whether or not Jesus was "God" in some way.
That question is a very important one, but his response is unsatisfactory. For one thing, he does not address something that has long puzzled me: the fact that the Synoptic Gospels (of Mark, Matthew and Luke) make it clear that Jesus did believe he had some kind of special relationship to the one he called "Father."
A few years ago, in fact, I read an excellent book by a Jewish scholar who tied Jesus' repeated use of the phrase "Son of Man" as referring to himself to a vision recorded the book of Daniel in which an "ancient of days" appeared with the clear manifestations of the godhead and to whom was presented a unique, mysterious figure called "Son of Man." When, after his arrest, Jesus was questioned by the Jewish elders and was asked whether he was "the Messiah, the Son of God," Jesus responded with "...from this time on you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right side of the Almighty and coming on the clouds of heaven!" To which the high priest responded, "Blasphemy!"
Morwood's ignoring the question of Jesus' apparent self-identification with, at least, a semi-divine character weakens considerably his rather confusing discussion of whether or not Jesus was/is God!
I am going to keep looking around for a book that I think does a better job of critiquing the antique theological framework of the Church hierarchy and also presents a more useful guide to a theology for our time.
June 11, 2022
Simply outstanding, with important insights - and not just for Roman Catholics or other Christians. From purely a communications perspective, what we say matters. We should always strive to mean what we say and say what we mean, and the truth is that as time passes the words we use to accomplish those tasks must change because usage changes. Despite that, we tend to seek to enshrine our religious language in stone. The result is that over time that language becomes so esoteric than the uninitiated who stumble across us can’t help but misunderstand what we are failing to say, if you will. Are we seriously confused about why they leave?
Lots of food for thought here, and well as food for action! Let’s eat!
Lots of food for thought here, and well as food for action! Let’s eat!
March 18, 2019
Some good points. Some stuff was way out there.
November 6, 2016
Excellent, stimulating and provocative reading. Michael Morwood raises pertinent questions that every thinking Christian must face.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews