Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Toto · 03-14-2013, 01:09 AM

A New New Testament: A Bible for the 21st Century Combining Traditional and Newly Discovered Texts (or via: amazon.co.uk)

Quote:

To create this New New Testament, Hal Taussig called together a council of scholars and spiritual leaders to discuss and reconsider which books belong in the New Testament. They talked about these recently found documents, the lessons therein, and how they inform the previously bound books. They voted on which should be added, choosing ten new books to include in A New New Testament. Reading the traditional scriptures alongside these new texts—the Gospel of Luke with the Gospel of Mary, Paul’s letters with The Letter of Peter to Philip, The Revelation to John with The Secret Revelation to John—offers the exciting possibility of understanding both the new and the old better. This new reading, and the accompanying commentary in this volume, promises to reinvigorate a centuries-old conversation and to bring new relevance to a dynamic tradition.

This looked almost interesting until I read the reviews.

From a review:

Quote:

First, the good: It's an excellent idea to present canonical and noncanonical early Christian texts together. Clearly, this is how early communities would have encountered these texts before the canon began to solidify, and it is very instructive to see them alongside one another.

But then there's the not-so-good: The editor is a member of the Jesus Seminar, and readers will not be surprised to find the Seminar's perspective presented throughout the notes, introductions, and other material. The editor is also very presumptuous - to put it mildly - in repeated assertions that this new collection of texts may prove useful to Christian communities as scripture. The references to the "council of New Orleans" (a gathering of the editor's friends and colleagues who selected the texts) are also tiresome in their exaggerated importance. Further, there are omissions (e.g. the Gospel of Phillip and the Dialogue of the Savior) which seem very odd, given the other texts which have been chosen. Lastly, I understand that the translators were striving to render sometimes challenging texts into modern English, but they missed any sense of poetry, and allowed modern concerns over gendered language to lead them to some incredibly clunky readings (e.g. realm of the sky for kingdom of heaven, and Child of Humanity for Son of Man).

Another:

Quote:

Taussig's lengthy, Dan Brown-ish afterword, which explains how he crafted his New New Testament, reads like a parody. He thinks a Methodist pastor from Philly has the right to call an ecumenical council. He makes ahistorical claims about the canon process, omitting that Origen and the Muratorian Fragment suggest the current canon existed as early as the year 200. He privileges flimsy, moddish scholarship over centuries of church history.

Perhaps Taussig isn't kidding. Perhaps he thinks he knows better than 1,700 years of Christians, including Athanasius, Eusebius, and the Councils of Nicaea and Carthage. Perhaps he really believes that Twenty-First Century Americans are more attuned to God's will than the Church Fathers. And that scares me, because that such "I know best" absolutism has fired such religious monomaniacs as Jim Jones and David Koresh.

Or from a longer review

Quote:

This book is not even worth the price of admission to view the curiosities contained in it. Since Taussig refuses to cite his sources even for the most outlandish claims and elsewhere is just baldly wrong (for instance when he asserts some obscure manuscript is innovative in that it uses a feminine metaphor for God, when in fact such metaphors are in, oh, Isaiah for one) he is not a reliable narrator or guide, and I don't trust his novel translations. This book is clearly meant for an echo chamber of greying baby boomer liberal Protestants and lefty Catholics who will, the publisher clearly assumed, ooh and ahh over the daring slaying of frumpy orthodoxies and tipping of freedom-impinging sacred cows. But it fails even to shock, these cows having long since been tipped by Funk, Spong, et al. He even gets in the usual dig at Augustine and Luther being "fixated on sin" and sails along to a groove only his generation has ever cared to dance to at length, about "sin being an illusion." So very, very tired and boring and a dead end.

It strikes me that while Taussig anticipates us swooning over his gnostic finds, he neglects to remove any of the books he regards as problematic. Why not? If you can include something about the "Mother" and "Father" bringing forth other deities, why not take out the Timothy bit you so obviously hate? This speaks, I think to his motivation--to continue using Christian infrastructure to enrich his life and reputation, while also thinking he's some great iconoclast because he points out that the New Testament didn't fall out of the sky but was selected by councils.

In the end the high-handedness, the arrogance, and the bald hypocrisy made me angry and sad. Clearly Taussig does not respect his readers, and does not respect the Christian canon, and does not have any sense of humbleness about any of this. He delights in "proving" everything an orthodox Christian believes is somehow outmoded and mistaken, but persists in his pastorate, and again, I just have to ask: why? Is it for the pension, the social cachet, the nifty uniform? It defies all reason.

wordy · 03-14-2013, 03:19 AM

Quote:

choosing ten new books to include in A New New Testament.

Reading the traditional scriptures alongside these new texts—the Gospel of Luke with the Gospel of Mary, Paul’s letters with The Letter of Peter to Philip, The Revelation to John with The Secret Revelation to John—offers the exciting possibility of understanding both the new and the old better. This new reading, and the accompanying commentary in this volume, promises to reinvigorate a centuries-old conversation and to bring new relevance to a dynamic tradition.

Could one maybe get a summary of what these ten books claim about Jesus Christ?
I guess they are more Gnosticistic than the old ones then?

My naive take is that one maybe should start all over or to not refer to Jesus at all?

Could one maybe start with how Dawkins got fooled by a guy he trusted in
and then how he clashed with Rebecca Watson and then how the Atheism Plus
became the new Catholic version of Atheism and that this is what one have to deal with?

PZ Myers should be included and Michael Shermer and maybe Daniel Dennett?

Dawkins is maybe jesus or is he the John the Baptist to make the way for
Sam Harris or what? Sorry could not help myself.

semiopen · 03-14-2013, 07:52 AM

Funny how so many biblical translators are religious.

Kind of like priests (and maybe orthodox Rabbis) and pedophiles.

Chili · 03-15-2013, 10:23 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by semiopen

Funny how so many biblical translators are religious.

Kind of like priests (and maybe orthodox Rabbis) and pedophiles.

. . . and will bomb the wrong country every time. Hooray America with yet another a new scheme on the way, the spiritual fornicators that they are.

Minimalist · 03-15-2013, 11:10 AM

Hasn't the Old New Testament caused enough trouble?

Horatio Parker · 03-15-2013, 03:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

A New New Testament: A Bible for the 21st Century Combining Traditional and Newly Discovered Texts (or via: amazon.co.uk)

This looked almost interesting until I read the reviews.

It might not be the best start, but he's got the right idea (ie expanding or altering the canon).

The Thunder, Perfect Mind is pretty cool, forgive the sophmorism.

andrewcriddle · 03-16-2013, 02:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Horatio Parker

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

A New New Testament: A Bible for the 21st Century Combining Traditional and Newly Discovered Texts (or via: amazon.co.uk)

This looked almost interesting until I read the reviews.

It might not be the best start, but he's got the right idea (ie expanding or altering the canon).

The Thunder, Perfect Mind is pretty cool, forgive the sophmorism.

I like The Thunder, Perfect Mind too, but I suspect it will always be a minority taste. (It appears little know even in ancient "gnostic" circles.)

A canon is, or should be, an attempt to identify works of widespread appeal/relevance. It has to be more than a statement of one's individual tastes and preferences.

Andrew Criddle

Chili · 03-16-2013, 10:21 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Horatio Parker

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

A New New Testament: A Bible for the 21st Century Combining Traditional and Newly Discovered Texts (or via: amazon.co.uk)

This looked almost interesting until I read the reviews.

It might not be the best start, but he's got the right idea (ie expanding or altering the canon).

The Thunder, Perfect Mind is pretty cool, forgive the sophmorism.

Nice lines, and true for sure.

The problem is that we cannot elevate ourself to that end but must die to see the same, and if we can, we will see the same. It is a Form, or Vision that is universal in mankind as the end of our search for destiny wherein truth itself is found inside our very genus of the naked animal wherein we truly are 'the man' we have been looking for.

Northrop Frye writes on this and tells us that we cannot purify our flesh but must go 'down under' to reach that end, for which he used the word 'parody' to enable our descend into our netherworld and there our ancients meet and so organize our own Cana event to celebrate the New (page 321 "Anatomy of Criticism").

He uses third person here as critic, to be sure.

Chili · 03-16-2013, 10:40 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by andrewcriddle

Quote:

Originally Posted by Horatio Parker

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

A New New Testament: A Bible for the 21st Century Combining Traditional and Newly Discovered Texts (or via: amazon.co.uk)

This looked almost interesting until I read the reviews.

It might not be the best start, but he's got the right idea (ie expanding or altering the canon).

The Thunder, Perfect Mind is pretty cool, forgive the sophmorism.

I like The Thunder, Perfect Mind too, but I suspect it will always be a minority taste. (It appears little know even in ancient "gnostic" circles.)

A canon is, or should be, an attempt to identify works of widespread appeal/relevance. It has to be more than a statement of one's individual tastes and preferences.

Andrew Criddle

Yes, much to foreign to the human mind.

I think a canon should lead the damned towards the point in life where they will feel isolated as the individual in need and there the true shepherd meet first person now to them.

Of course they must sing hosanna's on the way out so they will go out further, still, and eventually reach the end of their own world where so Frye's parody will be their "down in search for truth and up [again] in search for beauty, discovering finally that truth and beauty are the same" (Keats Endymion here).

Again it is Universal in mankind simple because truth is and was prior to us, and so now is wherein we must find our self inside the self we are, for which we must be pretender until we reach that end.

Botton line? It is a dumb thing to call your self right as Christian and lie about it without end.

Steve Weiss · 03-17-2013, 12:40 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

A New New Testament: A Bible for the 21st Century Combining Traditional and Newly Discovered Texts (or via: amazon.co.uk)

Quote:

To create this New New Testament, Hal Taussig called together a council of scholars and spiritual leaders to discuss and reconsider which books belong in the New Testament. They talked about these recently found documents, the lessons therein, and how they inform the previously bound books. They voted on which should be added, choosing ten new books to include in A New New Testament. Reading the traditional scriptures alongside these new texts—the Gospel of Luke with the Gospel of Mary, Paul’s letters with The Letter of Peter to Philip, The Revelation to John with The Secret Revelation to John—offers the exciting possibility of understanding both the new and the old better. This new reading, and the accompanying commentary in this volume, promises to reinvigorate a centuries-old conversation and to bring new relevance to a dynamic tradition.

This looked almost interesting until I read the reviews.

From a review:

Another:

Or from a longer review

Quote:

This book is not even worth the price of admission to view the curiosities contained in it. Since Taussig refuses to cite his sources even for the most outlandish claims and elsewhere is just baldly wrong (for instance when he asserts some obscure manuscript is innovative in that it uses a feminine metaphor for God, when in fact such metaphors are in, oh, Isaiah for one) he is not a reliable narrator or guide, and I don't trust his novel translations. This book is clearly meant for an echo chamber of greying baby boomer liberal Protestants and lefty Catholics who will, the publisher clearly assumed, ooh and ahh over the daring slaying of frumpy orthodoxies and tipping of freedom-impinging sacred cows. But it fails even to shock, these cows having long since been tipped by Funk, Spong, et al. He even gets in the usual dig at Augustine and Luther being "fixated on sin" and sails along to a groove only his generation has ever cared to dance to at length, about "sin being an illusion." So very, very tired and boring and a dead end.

It strikes me that while Taussig anticipates us swooning over his gnostic finds, he neglects to remove any of the books he regards as problematic. Why not? If you can include something about the "Mother" and "Father" bringing forth other deities, why not take out the Timothy bit you so obviously hate? This speaks, I think to his motivation--to continue using Christian infrastructure to enrich his life and reputation, while also thinking he's some great iconoclast because he points out that the New Testament didn't fall out of the sky but was selected by councils.

In the end the high-handedness, the arrogance, and the bald hypocrisy made me angry and sad. Clearly Taussig does not respect his readers, and does not respect the Christian canon, and does not have any sense of humbleness about any of this. He delights in "proving" everything an orthodox Christian believes is somehow outmoded and mistaken, but persists in his pastorate, and again, I just have to ask: why? Is it for the pension, the social cachet, the nifty uniform? It defies all reason.

Makes no difference which additional fictions are added to officially recognized fictions; it's all fiction posing as "truth." The bible and all sacred texts are a sin for the trees that were felled to be used as the paper to pass off fantasic lies as truth.

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03-14-2013, 07:52 AM	#3
semiopen Veteran Member Join Date: Dec 2008 Location: Hillsborough, NJ Posts: 3,551	Funny how so many biblical translators are religious. Kind of like priests (and maybe orthodox Rabbis) and pedophiles.

03-15-2013, 11:10 AM	#5
Minimalist Veteran Member Join Date: May 2007 Location: Arizona Posts: 1,808	Hasn't the Old New Testament caused enough trouble?

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