The Jesus Dynasty, four years after publication in April, 2006, continues to get picked up in the news. Here are the the three latest examples, with on-line links if available:

First, a fascinating article I had previously noted below by Adam Gopnik in the May 24, 2010 issue of The New Yorker titled “What Did Jesus Do? Reading and Unreading the Gospels.” Gopnik draws a number of insights from The Jesus Dynasty in his opening section and specifically mentions the tradition of Pantera as a little-known father of Jesus.

Second, Gopnik’s mention of the Pantera tradition, as if to give any credibility whatsoever to the tradition raised the ire of convervative New York Times columnist Ross Douthat who devoted an entire Op-Ed piece to blasting scholars who would give any view of Jesus’ birth other than the “no human father” option. It seemed to me sort of an odd piece to appear in the New York Times, and as several readers noted in the Comment section following the article. You can find my own comment, 5th from the top:

http://douthat.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/05/27/choose-your-own-jesus/

Finally, on newsstands now, is a special issue of USNews & World Report, titled Mysteries of History, that contains a three page interview with me on “Jesus Last Days Revealed.” I encourage readers to purchase the entire issue but I have attached a PDF version here of my own contribution.

Comments are closed.