Jesus: The Man Who Lives
Greeley, Andrew M. & Roche, Anne
Book Reviews/Andrew M. Greeley and Anne Roche Two Views of Muggeridge's Jesus • I. Review by Andrew Greeley: Malcolm Muggeridge's Jesus is embarrassing. Beautifully printed and illustrated in...
...John Shea (Chicago: Thomas Mo Press...
...At the beginning of my acquaintance with him, 16 years ago, he wrote to me that although he had long considered the Christian explanation of the human condition to be the most satisfying and comforting of all man's attempts in that direction, he could not embrace it, though he envied those who could...
...The light hey mirror is "the true Light, which ighteth every man that cometh into the Vora " Our civilization is, or has been, M extended comment on His Coming, a telebration of "the most stupendous event in human history," the Birth of Christ, His Passion, Death, and Resurrecion...
...They c: make a much better case then he h made...
...In the parable of the "crazy farmer," for example, we see that Jesus is saying that the love of God is so powerful that He behave toward us in a manner which if it were t be observed among humans would b judged a sign of lunacy...
...When n America given to proclaiming "In God qe Trust" now forbids its children to ad[ress Him in its schools, or when Britin's Established Churchmen help vote in bortion on demand, one may be for;iven for concluding that the Christian ges are indeed ended...
...But if you begin your analysis of Jesus with his parables, as do the literary form people, and come into contact with the hard kernel of the world view of Jesus, you are required to believe not the impossible but the highly improbable—which is far more difficult...
...best...
...This book yields nothing to Mu geridge in either orthodoxy or devotic but it does two things which are essent and to which Muggeridge makes no cc 26 The Alternative: An American Spectator June/ July 19 ribution: it stirs Christians out of the elf-satisfied complacencies of their •erbal formulations, and it stirs agnostics gut of the self-satisfied complacencies of heir bland indifference...
...Jesus is a remarkable book—reverent, witty, fresh, moving, prophetic...
...Either Jesus never was or he still is," Muggeridge concludesin a ringing act of faith...
...Those -igh points of our culture that we troop Lbout Europe to admire, the pictures and nanuscripts, the panels, altars, doors, Ind capitals, appear humbly here as ilustrations to a biography, and one sudlenly realizes what they were really neant to be, not decoration, but llumination, in the true sense of the word...
...Th same point is made in the parable of th loving father (incorrectly named th parable of the prodigal son) where all th emphasis is on the father's love and nc the son's prodigality...
...Iussia, Eastern Europe, much of Latin America...
...How quickly, the old journalist remarks, could an editor have tidied them up if a neat plausible story was what was wanted...
...The passion of the convert, the ardor of the new lover, are unforgettably served here by a very great English prose stylist at his brilliant...
...It is not merely that the sophistication of the Scripture scholars enables them to deal more adequately with the problems of the unbelievers, though that is not an unimportant point...
...28 The Alternative: An American Spectator June/July 19...
...He admits to no Damascus Road conversion...
...For this bad time needs not the vapid Superstar Jesus, nor the Che Guevara Jesus, but the Jesus of the Gospels, strong, ironic, passionate and compassionate, scornful of power and riches, suffering unto death, "demand...
...Give it ten years, prophesies -Ienry Kissinger, and it will have pre-'ailed over Europe...
...Paul, he kicked against the goad...
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...And E this is so, even the most optimistic theist should fear for that civilization's prospects, for whatever world view re-daces the Christian one will necessarily produce its own different society...
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...Civilizations do perish...
...The author of Jesus readily admits that f he had been born in Mecca or Bangkokhe might think differently, but as a child of that civilization which still, despite Madalyn Murray O'Hair, counts its age from The Year of Our Lord, he concludes "that whatever is truly admirable in the achievements of the succeeding centuries, in art and literature, in music and architecture, in the quest for knowledge and in the pursuit of justice and brotherliness in human relations, derives from that same event" and that "the revelation Jesus provided...
...Candles held up to the face of ruth...
...Believers meeting Jesus here will love Him more...
...One cannot fault Muggeridge, of course, for his own style of faith...
...F. Review by Anne Roche: It is quite common to hear people peaking, with either satisfaction or de-pair, according to their prejudices, of ow we live in "the post-Christian era...
...Readers of his recent volumes of autobiography will recall his odyssey, from childhood in an ardent Socialist family (as a boy he spoke at political meetings), through a brief love affair with Soviet Communism (he burnt his dinner jacket and his marriage lines and emigrated to Russia), into a lifelong war against Marxist savagery...
...Beautifully printed and illustrated in color prints of marvelous paintings—some of which will be quite new to most readers—the book is a statement of Muggeridge's personal faith in the traditional Jesus...
...for you have to live a same way in the midst of all of life's co, fusions and uncertainties...
...Perhaps ours is bout to...
...The challenge of Jesus is essentially one of accepting what science thinks is impossible...
...And the work of Jesus...
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...it tells us, in effect, that if we merely put aside our modern scientific problems and return to the simple faith of the past, everything else will be taken care of...
...The God of ti parables is "too good to be true," ar...
...His commitment to the "traditional" Jesus is flung in the face of an unbelieving world of scientific enlightenment without the slightest hesitation or propensity to compromise...
...nor can one fault him for expressing that faith in public...
...P.S...
...At the same time, he is scornful of the "quest for the historical Jesus" which inevitably leads away from truth into fatuity, and he will have none of the modern Bultmann-style demythologizing...
...99 The Alternative: An American Spectator June/July 1976 27 ized religion...
...Their Jesus is also a Jesus: The Man Who Lives by Malcolm Muggeridge Harper & Row $17.95 much more powerful Jesus for believers...
...As a typical product of these confused times, with a sceptical mind and a sensual disposition, diffidently and unworthily, but with the utmost certainty, I assert that he still is...
...perhaps even it deserves to...
...Such scholarship has gone far beyond the debunkers and the demythologizers inpresenting a portrait of Jesus which is deeply challenging and profoundly religious...
...In a very real sense, contemporal Scripture scholarship brings us closer the world view and teaching of Jesus tl-Kanyone (save for the mystics, perhap has been since Jesus' own time...
...I'm sorry, but that is, I think, the work If the church...
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...It has b come a powerful asset to the church, ar does not deserve to be ignored in wh purports to be a major book on Jesi (judged by its size, cost, and productior Muggeridge may have reinforced tl faith—and the prejudice—of tradition Christians, but he has not, I think, dor the churches any great favor...
...It took a long time, and like one of his heroes, St...
...China...
...Indochina...
...hence He is terribly disturbing...
...Unfortunately, the reader will easily get the impression that between the Jesus of Muggeridge and the Jesus of Superstar there is no choice...
...Jesus is an account of the events of Christ's life and teachings, by a man who came late in life to an acceptance of the Christian revelation, having tried and rejected the alternatives...
...But t had its moments of glory, some of vhich are remembered in a beautiful new ^ook about our society's reason for existng, Jesus: The Man Who Lives, by Britsh journalist, author, and television peronality Malcolm Muggeridge...
...It is not merely that these options are fundamental, they are also fundamentalist: the simple Christ of the hippies, the simple Christ of the demythologizers, or the simple Christ of Muggeridge's traditional faith...
...The exquisite Nativities—by 3eertgen tot Sint Jans, by the Master of (onstanz, by Frederico Barocci—in vhich the light pouring from the Person nf the Christ Child illumines the darkness, reflecting from men's faces and the eyes of animals and domestic objects (in me case a laundry basket) are meditaions on the Incarnation of God...
...A mwerful and seductive new revelation aleady prevails in a large part of the world hat was never Christian, and in a large )art that once was...
...please print) ALTERNATIVE: Name Address City State Zip (If this is a gift, please tell us who it's for and we'll send it directly to the re cipient along with a card telling who to thank...
...He has illuminated for us a "Jesus for our times" though he would reject that phrase himself...
...thing...
...By human star dards, the Ground of the Universe madly in love with His creatures...
...The work of such writers as Gunther Bornkaam, Joachim Jeremias, and Reginald Fuller, for example, has as much piety as Muggeridge and a good deal more sophistication...
...and a doting mother to offer her breast...
...Only for such a One could a mar consider trying to live such difficult teachings, only for God Incarnate...
...The in-consistencies and problems of the Gospel accounts merely assure him of their truth...
...As an example of the better case, o might consult The Challenge of Jesus the brilliant young Catholic theologi...
...BARON VON KANNON • P.O...
...I cannot recommend, apar from the Gospels, a better place for the unbeliever to encounter Him...
...He never did join any church—he dislikes institutionalDo You Enjoy 0 Jogging ^ Meditating ^ Tennis ^ Affecting a High Tone ^ Surfing ^ Wearing Tee Shirts ^ Imbibing ^ None of the Above If you checked one or more boxes, you should not go another day without your very own Alternative Turkey Tee Shirt...
...And he chooses the Protestant over the Roman Catholic and Orthodox answers to the questions of Mary's perpetual virginity and Christ's continuing Presence in the Eucharist...
...Hereon Muggeridge stands...
...of the true purpose and destination of our earthly existence [is] of unique and everlasting validity...
...through a considerable measure of worldly success, to the surrender of Jesus Rediscovered...
...The pull of the Light was ultimately irresistible...
...Once you have made the leap the rest is relatively easy...
...At any rate, the Christian revelation eems to have lost its ability to animate nd direct the civilization it created...
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...ing everything and enduring every...
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...The Jesus of the sophisticated Scripture scholars is a more impressive person than the Jesus of the traditional piety...
...Thus he is Catholic in his adoration of the Nativity: "...a real baby, wrinkled and wizened and full of wind...
...The Muggeridge book is reassuring and comforting...
...he can do no other...
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...ertainly there seems to be a lot of evience to support that observation...
...Muggeridge accepts the Gospels as historical, that is, he takes their word that the Virgin Birth, the miracles, the Resurrection, did actually happen...
...But one can fault a writer of Muggeridge's intelligence and sophistication for not recognizing apparently that there is an alternative Jesus to the one presented by his traditional piety, a Jesus who is well within the boundaries of Christian orthodoxy and who is much more attractive to those men and women of good will for whom Muggeridge's traditional pieties are simply not enough...
...After all, who but God would have dared to asl of men what he asked of them...
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...He refuses, too, to become entangled in theological argument, though he sometimes must, as must all post-Reformation Christians who speak about Christ, choose between explanations...
...If you accept th world view of Jesus—a view of a un verse animated by a lunatic love—the nothing is easy...
...Yet now he finds himself able to assert that " Jesus's claim to be the Light of the World, and his related promise that through him we may be reborn into new men, liberated from the ego and our appetites into the glorious liberty of the children of God" seem to him to be "indisputably true...
...The "tremendous certainties" are in the end what matter to the nontheologian, not the minor "dubieties about the precise circumstances...
Vol. 9 • June 1976 • No. 9
