Crucible of Faith: The Ancient Revolution That Made Our Modern Religious World

by Philip Jenkins

Heaven and hell, angels and demons, Satan and the Messiah. All of these seem fundamental to the Judeo-Christian religious tradition. Yet these figures are largely, and conspicuously, absent from the Biblical Old Testament.

Philip Jenkins, one of America's foremost scholars of religion, argues that much of the Judeo-Christian tradition we know today was born between 250-50 BCE, during a turbulent "Crucible Era." It was during these years that Judaism grappled with Hellenizing forces, and produced new religious ideas that reflected and responded to their changing world. By the time of the fall of the Temple in 70 CE, concepts that might once have seemed bizarre became normalized-and thus passed on to Christianity. Drawing widely on contemporary sources from outside the canonical Old and New Testaments, Jenkins reveals an era of political violence and social upheaval that ultimately gave birth to entirely new ideas about religion, the afterlife, Creation, and the nature of God.

Genres: History, Religion, Nonfiction, Ancient History, Christianity, Theology, Judaism

336 pages, Hardcover

First published September 19, 2017

About the author

John Philip Jenkins was born in Wales in 1952. He was educated at Clare College, in the University of Cambridge, where he took a prestigious “Double First” degree—that is, Double First Class Honors. In 1978, he obtained his doctorate in history, also from Cambridge. Since 1980, he has taught at Penn State University, and currently holds the rank of Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of the Humanities. He is also a Distinguished Senior Fellow at Baylor University's Institute for Studies of Religion.

Though his original training was in early modern British history, he has since moved to studying a wide range of contemporary topics and issues, especially in the realm of religion.

Jenkins is a well-known commentator on religion, past and present. He has published 24 books, including The New Faces of Christianity: Believing the Bible in the Global South and God's Continent: Christianity, Islam and Europe's Religious Crisis (Oxford University Press). His latest books, published by HarperOne, are The Lost History of Christianity and Jesus Wars (2010).

His book The Next Christendom in particular won a number of honors. USA Today named it one of the top religion books of 2002; and Christianity Today described The Next Christendom as a “contemporary classic.” An essay based on this book appeared as a cover story in the Atlantic Monthly in October 2002, and this article was much reprinted in North America and around the world, appearing in German, Swiss, and Italian magazines.

His other books have also been consistently well received. Writing in Foreign Affairs in 2003, Sir Lawrence Freedman said Jenkins's Images of Terror was “a brilliant, uncomfortable book, its impact heightened by clear, restrained writing and a stunning range of examples.”

Jenkins has spoken frequently on these diverse themes. Since 2002, he has delivered approximately eighty public lectures just on the theme of global Christianity, and has given numerous presentations on other topics. He has published articles and op-ed pieces in many media outlets, including the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, New Republic, Foreign Policy, First Things, and Christian Century. In the European media, his work has appeared in the Guardian, Rheinischer Merkur, Süddeutsche Zeitung, Welt am Sonntag, and the Kommersant (Moscow). He is often quoted in news stories on religious issues, including global Christianity, as well as on the subject of conflicts within the Roman Catholic Church and the Anglican Communion, and controversies concerning cults and new religious movements. The Economist has called him “one of America's best scholars of religion.”

Over the last decade, Jenkins has participated in several hundred interviews with the mass media, newspapers, radio, and television. He has been interviewed on Fox's The Beltway Boys, and has appeared on a number of CNN documentaries and news specials covering a variety of topics, including the sexual abuse crisis in the Catholic Church, as well as serial murder and aspects of violent crime. The 2003 television documentary Battle for Souls (Discovery Times Channel) was largely inspired by his work on global Christianity. He also appeared on the History Channel special, Time Machine: 70s Fever (2009).

Jenkins is much heard on talk radio, including multiple appearances on NPR's All Things Considered, and on various BBC and RTE programs. In North America, he has been a guest on the widely syndicated radio programs of Diane Rehm, Michael Medved, and James Kennedy; he has appeared on NPR’s Fresh Air, as well as the nationally broadcast Canadian shows Tapestry and Ideas. His media appearances include newspapers and radio stations in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada, Australia, Denmark, Sweden, the Netherlands, and Brazil, as well as in many different regions of the United States.

Because of its relevance to policy issues, Jenkins's work has attracted the attention of gove

Reviews

[Alex · Rating 5 out of 5]

Without a doubt, this is one of the most accessible histories on the Second Temple Judaism. Jenkins threads the needle on numerous pertinent subjects that are crucial for any student of Biblical history to comprehend; to include, Enochic literature, apocalyptic literature, Platonism, the Dead Sea Scrolls, and a thorough history of the Maccabean War and subsequent Hasmonean dynasty. My *only* complaint would be that I wish Jenkins had provided in-text citations whenever he referenced the Dead Sea Scrolls (or any ancient text for that matter), as I enjoy annotating my version of the Scrolls as I read.

[Tim O'Neill · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've long thought there was a need for a popular overview of the so-called "Intertestmental Period" - the three and a half centuries between the composition of the later books of the Old Testament and the earliest Christian texts. Jenkins has done better than this. He's provided a chronology of this period and the important (though now often obscure) religious texts it produced, showing that this "Crucible Period" saw the origin of several key concepts that came to dominate Christianity, Second Temple Judaism and, later, Rabbinical Judaism, Gnosticism, Islam and Manicheanism. The concepts of a heavenly host of angels, an opposing army of demons, the fall of man, Satan, the Messiah and a coming apocalyptic end to the world all arose in this period.

Jenkins takes texts which have long been consigned to the "Apocrypha" section of many Bibles or excised completely and others which are even more obscure and puts them into the historical context of the turbulent centuries between the absorption of the Jewish people into the empire of Alexander the Great and the collapse of the Second Jewish Revolt about 450 years later. He shows how the exposure of Jewish sphere to a far wider world via Alexander's empire, its Ptolemaic and Seleucid successors states and then the domination of the Roman Empire gave rise to religio-political reactions as well as the absorption of Persian and Greek religious ideas and, particularly, Platonic philosophy. His final chapters show how influential these texts and the ideas they represented came to be, dominating the world from Britain to China and beyond via Christianity, Judaism, Islam and the extinct world faith of Manicheanism. An excellent book by a world class scholar.

[John · Rating 3 out of 5]

Philip Jenkins' subject is what he describes as the Crucible years, or what Christians might call the period of time between the Old and New testaments.
It was far from a time of silence, as Jenkins clearly illustrates, and he argues that the thinking of the time -- influenced by the dominant Greek culture -- laid the groundwork for the Christian themes that would follow.
This is not a densely written, scholars-only treatise by any means. In fact, Jenkins writes in a lively manner that is quite accessible. But it's a lot of material to absorb, and I feel like I'd almost have to read it again to really sort things out.
For balance, I'd also like to experience this material presented from a different perspective, perhaps as explained by a scholar from Wheaton or from Dallas Theological Seminary.

[Lynn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Absolutely fascinating. Jenkins explains that (despite the conviction of most Christians), Jesus and Paul of Tarsus are not reflective of the Hebrew religion of what they call the ‘Old Testament’. But, he adds, neither is rabbinic Judaism as known today. In fact, both of these modern religions, as well as Islam and numerous sects that have disappeared over time, grow out of the political and philosophical turmoil of what he calls the ‘Crucible’ years. Many of the Christian doctrines now seen as reasons for that faith’s breakaway from Judaism were doctrines held by most Jews at the start of the Common Era; rabbinic Judaism in the end rejected these doctrines specifically because of their embrace by Christians. Jenkins analyses a variety of both canonical and non-canonical writings to illustrate the preoccupations of people living in Greek and Roman Judaea during the final two and a half centuries BCE, and how these preoccupations produced both rabbinic Judaism and Christianity.

[Alex Strohschein · Rating 4 out of 5]

Philip Jenkins is one of our greatest and most prolific popular historians. His corpus ranges from studies of Native American spirituality and its modern appropriation in Western culture, anti-Catholicism, Islam, ancient and global Christianity, pornography and pedophilia, terrorism, and climate change.

In 'Crucible of Faith: The Ancient Revolution That Made Our Modern Religions,' he examines the intertestamental period or the "Crucible Era" (roughly 250-50 BC). This period of time is largely overlooked by many Christians; indeed, at a time like Advent, Protestants in particular are told that there was a great silence from God between Malachi to Matthew some four hundred years. Roman Catholics and smaller Christians sects hold a place for deuterocanonical books like Baruch, Judith, and 1-2 Macabees though Jenkins also explores and explicates the beliefs of more controversial or suspect works such as the Book of the Giants, Jubilees, Sibylline Oracles, Testament of Abraham, and 2 Enoch. Jenkins seeks to show that many of the Judeo-Christian beliefs we take for granted based on the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Testament actually have their origins and development in the Crucible Era, such as the emergence of angels, Satan and demons, and apocalyptic literature. He also chronicles how religious beliefs and practices changed; for instance, Judaism became more text-based a la Protestantism vs. relying upon charismatic revelations (p. 20). He presents such a dizzying array of works that it can be hard to clearly recognize and distinguish amongst them all.

Evangelicals will undoubtedly bristle at some of Jenkins' claims; though Jenkins is an Episcopalian, he approaches the biblical canon and the intertestamental period here not as a believer but as a skeptical historian. This is not a theological study that credits the Spirit of God with guiding orthodoxy and Jenkins earnestly suggests that our modern religious beliefs may have been otherwise were this or that sect not marginalized by the majority. Still, this is an invaluable and accessible book that assesses an era of history that remains chronically understudied, especially by Protestants.

[K. · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is almost entirely hampered by the author’s naturalistic method, which affects his dating of many of the important texts and thus his historical conclusions by necessary consequence. So: Israel wasn’t originally monotheistic, all of the prophecies were retroactive, second temple commentary was essentially revisionist, and Greek innfluence on Judaism fundamentally changed the character of the religion. Aside from that huge problem, the book is rather poorly organized; it tries to be a general political and theological history and doesn’t succeed in being much of-either. I don’t know of a work that’s trying to do something identical, but I suspect that Ben Witherington’s new Testament History combined with something by John J. Collins might get the trick done. Pass this one by. Disappointing from an otherwise very useful semi-scholarly author.

[Bea Croteau · Rating 4 out of 5]

I took this book out from the library on a whim because it seemed interesting. And it was quite interesting. I know a lot about what happened from 350 BCE to 200 CE in Jewish and early Christian history (tho I’m a little fishy on specific dates for specific events because I found the author’s chronological history telling choices occasionally hard to follow). While the author did a very good job of explaining the importance of the arguments he made in the book, I likely would have a greater appreciation for their significance if I had actually read any scripture ever in my life. So I guess that’s what’ll be going on the ol’ tbr.

[Lin · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fascinating dive into a time period that is too frequently over looked.

[Trevor Schaefer · Rating 3 out of 5]

The “revolution” referred to in the title happened during the period c.250 to 50 BCE when, the author argues, a fundamental shift in assumptions occurred that “transformed Jewish belief and practice at all levels, for ordinary followers as well as elite thinkers” (p.xviii). It is during this period that the universe was first conceived as a battleground between cosmic forces of Good and Evil. For most of these two centuries, the political and cultural fate of the Jewish people hinged on the rivalry between the Greek dynasties based in Syria and Egypt, the Seleucids and the Ptolemies (the kings of the North and the kings of the South in Daniel 11).
Philip Jenkins is a distinguished professor of history at the Institute for Studies of Religion at Baylor University in Waco, Texas. He is the author of many books since his doctoral thesis at Cambridge University in 1983. In this book he is introducing readers to the Apocryphal and Pseudepigraphical literature that was written between the times of the Old and New Testaments. In doing so, he is performing the same function that R.H. Charles did 100 years ago and David Russell did 50 years ago, a function that is still needed.
However, he does not see this as merely a reading of ancient esoteric writings. He argues that these scriptures and other writings are the missing link between the two testaments, which explain the differences in their worldviews, especially in the areas of the afterlife and eschatology. They also fill in much information that is taken for granted in the New Testament on the pre-history of Heaven and the warring forces of the cosmos.
Jenkins asserts that historical fiction was born (p.22) in this period, which was characterised by creative fragmentation of Jewish culture (p.52). The authors engaged in analysis and critique of their contemporary society, but dressed it up as historical narratives (p.119).
I found it useful to read 1 Enoch, a book of 108 short chapters, in conjunction with Jenkins. This book is not part of the canon or apocrypha, and so its unfamiliarity enables the reader to savour the worldview of the time. It is quoted by the Epistle of Jude as scripture, but it fell out of favour afterwards and was forgotten for millennia. However, it remained canonical for the Ethiopian church and it was from there that it was recovered to the west in the eighteenth century (p.69). The patriarch Enoch was taken up to God in Genesis 5:22-29, and so the authors of Enoch used this figure as the mouthpiece for their visions of the heavens and the earth. Its core story is the account of the Watchers, based on a few verses in Genesis 6. This book was of overwhelming importance in what Jenkins calls the “Crucible”era.
Jenkins makes substantial use of the latest scholarship in this field, and his footnotes fill thirty pages at the end of the book. He also cites many ancient texts that can be accessed online. There is an informative table in the introduction listing all the texts and scriptures mentioned in the book, their likely dates of composition and their canonical status. Some of his main sources for the history of the four centuries from Alexander the Great to the fall of Jerusalem are the Jewish Antiquities and Jewish War of Josephus, classic (though verbose) texts that are invaluable as background reading.
He writes about many forgotten movements and lost scriptures as well as the eras that produced them, which are “equally consigned to oblivion” (p.249). In doing so, he is performing a valuable function, as I stated earlier. However, he is rather too fond of ‘explosions’ and ‘revolutions’, which he has occurring all over this period of history.
He begins the book with Jesus’ parable of the wheat and the tares (Matthew 13:37-43). This is to illustrate the dualism and determinism of the worldview of the time. He finishes it with “All scripture is inspired by God” from 2 Timothy 3:16. This is ironic, given that the main burden of his book is to show that there were many scriptures current at the time, many of which are no longer considered “inspired”.
Here is a quote from the book to finish this review:
The date mentioned in 1 Maccabees 1:20 comes from the conquest of Babylon in 312 BCE by the Greek general Seleucus 1. “Even when a society attempted to secede from the Greek political order, as did the Maccabean revolutionaries, the wider cultural hegemony was almost inescapable. Jewish nationalists might retake Jerusalem, but the Greeks still owned time.” (p.28)

[Tony Jones · Rating 5 out of 5]

An absolutely fantastic 'splainer on the intertestamental period.

[Jeremy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This books looks at the "Axial Age " (ca 800-200BCE), a revolutionary period which Jewish thought was shaped by Persian religion and Greek philosophy which set the scene for the birth of Christianity.

Here are some of the ideas from the book that have impacted me.

- "So much of what we think of as the Judeo-Christian spiritual universe was conceived and described only after the closure of the canonical Old Testament." - xiv

- The growth of monotheism "created an intellectual need for intermediary figures who enacted the divine will in his stead, and that necessitated a fast-growing belief in the reality and power of angels. Meanwhile attempts to explain the existence of evil in a divinely ordained system inspired an obsessive interest in dark angels and in Satan himself. The need to see justice in the divine order inspired a vital new belief in concepts of the afterlife and resurrection, in ultimate rewards and punishments." - xvi

- "Other thinkers, though, followed implication of doctrines of God's transcendent authority to preach a bold universalism. That view was symbolised in these years by a new emphasis on Adam, the parent of all humanity, whether Jewish or gentile." (e.g, Paul's creative use of Adam - See The Evolution of Adam by Pete Enns).

- Historical Judaism post the loss of the Temple in 70AD was profoundly suspicious of anything apocalyptic, messianic or millenarian therefore the once popular writings that became known as apocryphyal and pseudepigraphical vanished from the Jewish heritage. - xxviii

- "In terms of the nature of religious authority, the shift from prophetic to apocalyptic signified a restriction of popular acecess to the divine and a new emphasis on formal channels, whether priestly or scriptural." - 12 (In other words, as Hebrew Bible was canonised, ability for an individual to proclaim something on behalf of God decreased as God was 'already spoken for' so to speak.) "A division was bring drawn between what was and was not sacred scripture." -19 "The emphasis on text contributed to the decline from the charismatic guidance claimed in earlier centuries, as the rise of scripture established a body of divine truth that any would-be prophet contradicted st his peril." -20

- "The reform era of the seventh century BCE (Josiah's?) witnessed a steady movement toward concepts of the individual religion and a consequent decline in collective and communal identity." - 18 (The growth of sacred texts and reading individualised faith.)

- There was an alternative Jewish Temple in the Egyptian city of Leontopolis that had all the requirements (priests of proper lineage, scribes and all forms of sacrificial worship) that remained in operation for 240 years! All thanks to Ptolemy VI Philometor. - p39

- How much of our understanding of YHWH was shaped by Zeus-Omlypios or Apollo in Greco-Judaism syncretism? - 45

- Ecclesiastes is richly laden with Greek concepts and philosophical terms, suggesting influence from Stoic, Epicurean and rationalist perspectives. - 55

- It is in 1 Enoch that the concept of hellfire is invented. - 75

[Ben McFarland · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a detailed, interesting history of an overlooked period time: roughly the period between Malachi and Matthew, which I had described to me as the 400 years of silence between the Old and New Testaments. Yet it was a time of political turmoil and theological innovation as ideas were developed that led to Christianity. What's fascinating to me is how many ideas that look like abrupt innovations were more gradual changes in thought in response to external conditions. Just like human evolution, theological evolution gets more and more complicated the closer you look at it. The standout issue to me at the time is the nature of Adam and the Fall, and surprisingly, the original idea placed the Fall with the Watchers -- in Genesis 6 -- rather than with Adam and Eve in Genesis 3. I think this helps, because it shows that the Fall is more than a single event and is at the very least diffused over 9 chapters rather than located in one. How does this change how we talk about it? Of course, Jenkins is a historian and this book has very little interpretation. Also, sometimes he tosses out specific historical references and proper names that get the less historically minded reader lost in the weeds. I want to know what Jenkins thinks, and he seems too careful to say, like a professor wanting his students to develop their own ideas. Another interesting side of this is how the same dualism keeps showing up, first in the Crucible years (as Jenkins calls the few centuries before Christ), then in Gnosticism, and then in the heresy fights for centuries. I want to draw a line between these movements that in my opinion draw too firm a line between matter and spirit. Why do we keep making these mistakes? Lots to think about, and I would like to know where the scholarship is that takes these ideas and thinks about it in a practical Christian context. This book is a great starting point but it leaves me with far more questions than I started with. I certainly appreciate that.

[Alex Joyner · Rating 4 out of 5]

Philip Jenkins, in his new book Crucible of Faith: The Ancient Revolution that Made our Modern  Religious World, makes a sweeping claim in the opening pages:
“During the two tempestuous centuries from 250 through 50 BCE, the Jewish and Jewish-derived world was a fiery crucible of values, faiths, and ideas, from which emerged wholly new religious syntheses. Such a sweeping transformation of religious thought in such a relatively brief period makes this one of the most revolutionary times in human culture. These years in effect created Western consciousness.”

Jenkins, a professor of history at Baylor University, has made a career out of helping us look at Christianity from new perspectives ever since he made a splash with his 2002 book, The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity.  That book forced U.S. Christians who were mired in narratives of decline to grapple with the explosive growth of the faith that was taking place in the Southern hemisphere.  Maybe, Jenkins suggested, Christianity was just making one of its periodic, geographic shifts, this time from the West to the South.

In Crucible of Faith, Jenkins wants to lift up a period often neglected by biblical students—the so-called intertestamental period that is not reflected in most Protestant bibles.  For many Christians, the biblical story skips directly from the return of the exiles to Jerusalem in the 6th-century BCE to Jesus’s appearance in the city at the start of the Common Era.  Jenkins points out, however, that much of what we associate with the new Christian worldview, from angels to the role of Satan to apocalyptic expectations, was forming in this period...

Read my full review on Heartlands: https://alexjoyner.com/2018/09/09/whe....

[Leslie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Many Jews and Christians assume that many of the things they take for granted, such as angels and demons, an afterlife complete with reward and punishment, and a final resurrection of the dead, were there from the start. Many of these concepts, however, came to life, or at least to full fruition, in an extraordinary time of political violence, intellectual ferment and social disruption between 250 BCE and 50 CE. Philip Jenkins, distinguished professor of history at Baylor University, writes about this period in his new book Crucible of Faith.

We know from the story of Hanukkah how, in the late second century BCE, Jewish ideas came into conflict with Hellenistic thought. Other ideas and concepts came from places from Babylon to Rome, and an age of turmoil that rivals that of modern times also made old certitudes seem increasingly untenable. Forced to engage with these challenges, Jews incorporated some ideas, including apocalyptic visions, into books that entered the canon, such as Daniel, as well as the universalism that characterizes the book of Ruth, and abandoned others. Many of these strains of thought also went on to influence both nascent Christianity and rabbinic Judaism, and in the end Islam as well.

While Jenkins’ book does not make for light reading and is often challenging, it provides a much-needed overview of a sadly neglected period that contributed enormously to the development of the Abrahamic religions and continues to influence us to this day.

[Brian Hanson · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's a fascinating thesis: how Jewish thought during the three centuries before Christ - the "Crucible age - in having to adapt to Hellenistic thought, led to emphasis on subjects absent or secondary in classical Jewish thought, thus paving the way for central Christian themes such as Judgement, Hell and Resurrection. It has long been known how the C3 BC Septuagint (Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures) - the version current in the Apostles' day - embodied this tendency, but Jenkins places this in a much wider context, involving relationships with nations to the east as well as Greece. We are introduced to the so-called Enochian writings from this period - purportedly authored by the figure in Genesis who was taken by God and bypassed death - a figure from before the Abrahamic Covenant. For the thesis fully to work, the "Parables" section of 1 Enoch must be from the Crucible period under review, rather than from, say, the C1 AD, as in that case it would prefigure a good deal of early Christianity. But for now this is only a conjecture. Excellent book, but not recommended, perhaps, for those whose faith rests on a conventional understanding of what "The Bible" is.

[Dale · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is incredibly well-written. Philip Jenkins does heavy lifting by illuminating what was happening in the Jewish world between old and new testaments (and, to be accurate, beyond the new testament time period) and explaining how the writings and events of that period, "lost books" of the Bible like Enoch, influenced Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. It's not an easy read but if you have the interest in history and theology, it is well worth your time. There are several parts of the book that blew my mind. Have you ever tried to read Revelations? Mind blowing in and of itself, right? The apocalyptic writings and themes of the Bible make a lot more sense to me after reading Crucible of Faith. I would really like to read a conservative Christian apologists' reply to this book. That said, I can't recommend this book highly enough.

[Caomhghain · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent combination of history and philology, the books covers the intertestamental period between the Old Testament and the New. The history is complex and bloody - it is good to be reminded how brief and unstable the existence of Israel has been historically and how much of the war and suffering was either civil war or pretty well insane uprisings. That said this period was, as Jenkins makes wonderfully clear, a crucible for many of the basic tenets and ideas of modern Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The messiah, angels, private prayer, synagogues, apocalypse, satan and dualism, the list goes on and it is backed up by a plethora of canonical, semi-canonical and non-canonical texts.

[Tom · Rating 5 out of 5]

A worthy introduction.

Crucible of Faith is a great flyover of the period between the conquests of Alexander and Augustus Caesar in relation to Jewish history. So many of the key concepts that the New Testament take for granted developed in this era, with a legacy extending through the early Christian ferment of ideas into Islam.

I recommend this book as an introduction to the era and an invitation to more specialized treatments of the time period.

[Diane · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a history of Judaism in the centuries before Christianity emerged, and early Christianity. The author looks at the history of the time, and how religious ideas spread across the Near East in this time period. It is a fascinating read, but a little hard to follow at times. This author tends to include as much information as he can, which can make the overall story get lost to some degree.

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jenkins is gold. This examination of what we used to call the Inter-testamentary era is a fascinating look at the movements, scriptures, and people who made both modern Judaism and Christianity (in all their current and past variants) what they are today. A bit dense at the beginning as he lays out his argument and main players, it gets more and more interesting as the book winds to its end. I wish I had something like this to read while I was in seminary!

[Barbara · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very Informative

As stated by the author, this is indeed a time period I have given little time to studying and understanding. I have read about some of these religious ideas, but the author does a excellent job of creating a comprehensive picture of several cultures beyond the Roman Empire. (Which takes all the lesson times in history classes.)

[Laurie · Rating 5 out of 5]

A brilliant study of a time that defined mankind's history. That the literature of this time created such deeply-held concepts as angels, redemption, hell, satan - and that religion has canonized only the literary tip of the iceberg of this incredible time, a veritable renaissance created by the post-Alexandrian introduction of Greek philosophy and thought into a newly connected world.

[Ridge Multop · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent exposition of the influence of cultural and political events and trends on the development of post-exilic Judaism, and, consequentlt, early Christianity. The author also shows how the "Crucible " period has been missed in so much historical and theological writing.

[Tom · Rating 4 out of 5]

Challenging for the non-specialist, nevertheless Jenkins does a great job of explaining the Crucible age and its importance in the rise of Christianity and future developments in Judaism. I’d certainly read more by Jenkins.

[Terence · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good, readable introduction to the topic.

[Geoff Walling · Rating 1 out of 5]

Only religious scholars will find this interesting.

[DAJ · Rating 5 out of 5]

In a typical Protestant Bible there's a 400-year gap in the narrative between the Old and New Testaments, and the books like 1 and 2 Maccabees that are found in most non-Protestant Bibles only do a little to fill that gap. Not only was Judea kicked around by foreign powers, as it had been at many times in the past; now it collided with the Greek culture that was sweeping and reshaping the Near East like no other culture had ever done. Judaism changed drastically under these pressures. It's amazing to realize that many of the beliefs that Christians think of as core to the Abrahamic tradition—the afterlife as we know it, an elaborate hierarchy of angels, Satan as the epitome of evil, and most apocalyptic ideas—only emerged in this period. The gap means the Bible doesn't even indirectly tell us how those beliefs came to be. Jenkins fills in the missing parts of the story, in what may be the first history of this period that is not aimed at an academic audience. As he says, "Without this spiritual revolution, neither Christianity nor Islam would exist, and Judaism would have been unimaginably different."

I appreciate that Jenkins doesn't simply state his own views. Instead he does what a popular introduction to a subject should do: describe the scholarly consensus but point out areas where there's significant disagreement, and where there's simple uncertainty. Zoroastrianism, for example, is often assumed to have inspired many of the novel beliefs that emerged in this period, but Jenkins cautions that we know so little about Zoroastrianism before the early centuries AD that some of those beliefs could have entered Zoroastrianism through Christianity and Judaism rather than the reverse.

Although the blurb description for the book implies that it ends around 50 BC, Jenkins actually carries his narrative down to the second century AD, when Christianity was evolving away from Judaism and Judaism was responding to the destruction of its homeland by evolving into the diaspora religion we know today. Given the widespread ignorance of the ancient world these days, and the context-free way in which biblical passages are generally used, I have a jaded view of most Christians' understanding of their own religion's origins. (For various reasons, I suspect Jews are a very different story.) Even those Christians who have read up on the context of the New Testament are likely to focus on the first century AD in isolation, not the massive innovations that immediately preceded it. Therefore, I think this book satisfies an urgent need.

[Philip Garside · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has helped me to see the gospels and other New Testament books in a new context as a continuation and evolution of Jewish thinking and theology in the previous 250 years. A solid read with ideas well worth mulling over.

[John Lawson · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a wonderful introduction to an under appreciated historical period. He very successfully introduces us to the complexity of these times, especially its violence and dislocation. It makes me want to read more.

[Sara · Rating 5 out of 5]

Interesting but it requires some previous knowledge