Who Was Jesus — And Who Is He In The 21st Century

FAIN: FZ-286767-22

Elaine Pagels
Princeton University (Princeton, NJ 08540-5228)

Research and writing of a book on how different peoples and cultures have envisioned Jesus through history from the earliest sources to the present. 

The primary question I raise is: How, from the first century to the present, have countless people envisioned Jesus in such varied and contradictory ways? I address this question as follows: First, what is the evidence from the earliest sources? Second, what is different about how we evaluate it now? Third, who was Jesus of Nazareth in his own time? Finally, what do the countless versions of Jesus tell us about the people and cultures who produced them in literature, art, music, and films, up to the present? While all scholars start from New Testament texts, here I investigate a far wider range of sources, including many nearly always left out of such discussions: Gospels later denounced as “heresy;” and anti-Christian writings by critics of the early movement. Like The Gnostic Gospels and others I have written, this book is addressed not only to scholars and students, but also to a much wider audience, offering a historical view of how Christianity began, and how it resonates today.