Witness to the Truth: Christ and His Interpreters

by Edith Hamilton

This is another attempt to rediscover the Christ by brushing aside the ceremonies, rituals, creeds and dogmas which, in the view of the author, have obscured the figure of the Master. In chapters on the Gospels, on St. Paul, on Faith and on the Church, Miss Hamilton, endeavors to set forth the basic truth which makes Christ an unforgettable figure. She includes a chapter on Socrates because of her belief that in his life and teaching the Greek philosopher was closer to Christ than anyone else that ever lived. Orthodox Christians, whether Protestant or Catholic, will not follow Hamilton in many of her arguments. But it is not for such that she writes. Rather her appeal is to the wistful, seeking souls for whom Christ has become an ecclesiastical personage or a theological dogma.--Kirkus

Genres: Religion

244 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1948

About the author

Edith Hamilton, an educator, writer and a historian, was born August 12, 1867 in Dresden, Germany, of American parents and grew up in Fort Wayne, Indiana, U.S.A. Her father began teaching her Latin when she was seven years old and soon added Greek, French and German to her curriculum. Hamilton's education continued at Miss Porter's School in Farmington, Connecticut and at Bryn Mawr College near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, from which she graduated in 1894 with an M.A. degree. The following year, she and her sister Alice went to Germany and were the first women students at the universities of Munich and Leipzich.
Hamilton returned to the United States in 1896 and accepted a position of the headmistress of the Bryn Mawr Preparatory School in Baltimore, Maryland. For the next twenty-six years, she directed the education of about four hundred girls per year. After her retirement in 1922, she started writing and publishing scholarly articles on Greek drama. In 1930, when she was sixty-three years old, she published The Greek Way, in which she presented parallels between life in ancient Greece and in modern times. The book was a critical and popular success. In 1932, she published The Roman Way, which was also very successful. These were followed by The Prophets of Israel (1936), Witness to the Truth: Christ and His Interpreters (1949), Three Greek Plays, translations of Aeschylus and Euripides (1937), Mythology (1942), The Great Age of Greek Literature (1943), Spokesmen for God (1949) and Echo of Greece (1957). Hamilton traveled to Greece in 1957 to be made an honorary citizen of Athens and to see a performance in front of the Acropolis of one of her translations of Greek plays. She was ninety years old at the time. At home, Hamilton was a recipient of many honorary degrees and awards, including election to the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Edith Hamilton died on May 31, 1963 in Washington, D.C.

Reviews

[Eric · Rating 5 out of 5]

Edith Hamilton has written an excellent, brief, analytical account of Jesus. Perfect for a curious Jew like me. She laments that Christianity chose to follow the Roman rather than the Greek way, which lead to near absolute power and corruption. I agree with Hamilton that we need to return to the ideal of Jesus: accepting all types of people, giving everything to others, and not expecting anything in exchange. He died for that ideal. Today, too many people die because we have lost touch with it.

[Adam · Rating 1 out of 5]

Hamilton comes at the New Testament with a sheaf of modernist presuppositions and grasps at any notion that supports them while rejecting out of hand anything that might rattle them. She wants to preserve Christ and Paul as enriching figures of history while dismissing all things supernatural. She seems to have no background whatsoever in theology, and much of her core argument would be dismantled by simply reading all of the New Testament. Take, for starters: Acts 26 and I Corintians 15.

[Rick Davis · Rating 1 out of 5]

Edith Hamilton wrote this book in 1948, meaning that at the time it was published it was simply warmed over liberalism at least half a century old. And like all theological liberals, she is smug and condescending not only to the culture of the early church, but also to the writers of the New Testament and all orthodox Christians for nearly 2000 years. The most frustrating thing is that her reading of the New Testament is weak at best. She cuts and pastes at her own whim to create characters out of the NT writers to her liking, and then arbitrarily removes all bits that she believes on nothing more than rampant speculation to be added at a later date. Hamilton’s books on the Greeks were weak and lacked any sort of academic rigor, but this book on Christ and Paul is atrocious. I can think of nothing of value you might get from this book unless you’re the type of person who likes to dive in open sewers to find a few shiny pennies. The arguments are puerile, the scholarship is non-existent, and most of her assertions are products of outdated and now discredited textual criticism.

[Stuart Dean · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hamilton examines the writers of the Gospels and Paul of Tarsus. How the story of Jesus was told and why it was told in that specific way. The original story was passed down word of mouth with nothing set to paper for 150 years after the Crucifixion. None of the writers actually met Jesus. Mark wrote what he heard from Peter. Matthew and Luke copied much from him but focused more on the miracles. John was the most original but still borrowed from Mark. Paul hardly mentioned the life of Jesus at all and was totally focused on the message. The setting was shortly after the Romans destroyed the Temple so Jews of the time were looking hard at the End Times and needed a Messiah. All of this is bookended with chapters about Socrates, the most Christ-like of pre-Christian heathens.

A very interesting exploration of the New Testament by someone who is obviously a true believer.

[Ferrell · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a marvelously interesting book. Hamilton was a scholar of Greek mythology and philosophy, and that insight is very helpful in understanding Scripture. She actually has a chapter on Socrates, calling him the first Christian because of the similarities between what he and Jesus taught.

[Erik Graff · Rating 2 out of 5]

I read this for two reasons. First, I'd read several of Hamilton's books as a kid and one, Mythology, for freshman year high school English. They, except for the school book, were relatively happy memories. Second, I'm generally interested in informed takes on the person of Jesus. Hamilton was a classicist and I hoped for a kind of Robert Graves type of perspective.

Well, Graves' King Jesus is much better. The only really impressive thing about Witness to the Truth is the argument for a strong similarity between Jesus and Sokrates. She liked both of them a great deal, but her argument is not very convincing.

[Eileen · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting analysis of the power of Jesus' life. Hamilton compares Christ to Socrates, claiming both men had an extraordinary charisma that came from living the truth they sought. She also compares the gospels. Her view is sometimes idiosyncratic, but is deeply felt and an often compelling argument about the failure of Christians to live as Christ lived.