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Paul Among the People: The Apostle Reinterpreted and Reimagined in His Own Time

Sarah Ruden

Start date: October 21, 2012

Finish date: October 26, 2012

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Jul 25, 2011 Dolly rated it really liked it

Shelves: goodreads-first-reads-giveaways, religion-philosophy, 2012, nonfiction, military, greece-greek, italy-italian-roman, jewish-israel

I received this book for free through Goodreads giveaways program. I fully intended to read it sooner, but it got left in one of my suitcases after a trip and I had forgotten about it for awhile. (OK, it was a whole year.)

In any case, this was a very well-researched book. It's not a fast read, but it was still intriguing and thought-provoking. I liked the historical and religious background, as well as the comparison to literature of the time. While I cannot say that I agree with everything that I received this book for free through Goodreads giveaways program. I fully intended to read it sooner, but it got left in one of my suitcases after a trip and I had forgotten about it for awhile. (OK, it was a whole year.)

In any case, this was a very well-researched book. It's not a fast read, but it was still intriguing and thought-provoking. I liked the historical and religious background, as well as the comparison to literature of the time. While I cannot say that I agree with everything that the author wrote, I did find her arguments to be compelling and I found myself nodding along with her conclusions more often than not. Overall, I thought this was an interesting book and a good book to provide some balanced thought into Christian dogma and the interpretation of the New Testament.

interesting quotes:

"Rather than repressing women, slaves, and homosexuals, he made - for his time - progressive rules for the inclusion of all of them in the Christian community, drawing on (but not limited by) traditional Jewish ethics." (p. xvii)

"The evidence is strong that the full Christian doctrine came not from Jesus' mouth but from Paul's pen." (p. xviii)

"The letter to Philemon may be the most explicit demonstration of how, more than anyone else, Paul created the Western individual human being, unconditionally precious to God and therefore entitled to the consideration of other human beings." (p.xix)

"People at war with their own bodies have little respect for others'." (p. 27)

"The ancients believed that it was female hair's nature to influence men, almost like breasts or genitals: men experienced women's hair as powerfully, inescapably erotic, in a way that makes our hair-care product commercials look like an accounting textbook." (p. 88)

"You must marry a very young, very sheltered girl and make sure that she never took it into her head that she was there for anything besides childbearing. The poet Lucretius (mid-first century B.C.), for example, warns husbands against letting their wives move their hips during sex, which was supposed to send the semen off course." (p. 101)

"But nevertheless his new rules give the proper basis for marriage, the erotic one; and they also address the chief reasons that marriages break down: the failure of partners to act generously toward each other, keeping intimacy after passion is gone; and the loss of trust, typical when men have greater freedom and a smaller stake in the relationship." (pp. 101-102)

"Her parents struggle to be friends. They care for each other, but different things interest them." (p. 118)

"To show sympathy and sincere deference to those with power over me, to trust them with my life as if on a battlefield and forgive the very costly mistakes they make, is harder. It's like managing to love my damn parents." (p. 144)

"A male fantasy common in the modern West is sex without fertility. A common ancient one was apparently fertility without sex." (p. 163)

"Suppose that, though human beings fail most of the time, love never does." (p. 181)

new words: sangomas, pudendum, hoplite, manumission ...more

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