Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes: Cultural Studies in the Gospels

by Kenneth E. Bailey

Beginning with Jesus' birth, Ken Bailey leads readers on a kaleidoscopic study of Jesus throughout the four Gospels. Bailey examines the life and ministry of Jesus with attention to the Lord's Prayer, the Beatitudes, Jesus' relationship to women and especially Jesus' parables. Through it all, Bailey employs his trademark expertise as a master of Middle Eastern culture to lead us into a deeper understanding of the person and significance of Jesus within his own cultural context. With a sure but gentle hand, Bailey lifts away the obscuring layers of modern Western interpretation to reveal Jesus in the light of his actual historical and cultural setting.

About the Author:
Kenneth E. Bailey (Th.D., Concordia Seminary, St. Louis) is an author, lecturer and emeritus research professor of Middle Eastern New Testament studies for the Tantur Ecumenical Institute in Jerusalem

Genres: Christian, Theology, Nonfiction, Christianity, Religion, Biblical Studies, History

443 pages, Audible Audio

First published January 11, 2007

About the author

After undergraduate and seminary studies, Dr. Bailey completed degrees in Arabic Language and Literature, Systematic Theology and a doctorate in New Testament. Ordained by the Presbyterian Church (USA), Dr. Bailey spent 40 years (1955-1995) living and teaching in seminaries and institutes in Egypt, Lebanon, Jerusalem and Cyprus.

For 20 of those years Dr. Bailey was Professor of New Testament and Head of the Biblical Department of the Near East School of Theology in Beirut where he also founded and directed the Institute for Middle Eastern New Testament Studies. From September 1985 to June 1995, Dr. Bailey was on the faculty of "The Ecumenical Institute for Theological Research" in Jerusalem, with the title of Research Professor of Middle Eastern New Testament Studies.

In 1990 Dr. Bailey accepted the additional responsibility of Canon Theologian for the Episcopal Diocese of Cyprus and the Gulf, residing in Nicosia, Cyprus and returned a third of each year to Jerusalem to continue teaching at the Ecumenical Institute.

Dr. Bailey's area of specialty is the cultural background and literary forms of the New Testament. In addition to more than 150 articles in English and in Arabic, his writings include:

Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes (Downer’s Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2008)
“Open Hearts in Bethlehem (A Christmas Musical)” (Louisville: W/JK, 2005)
The Cross and the Prodigal [Revised edition] (Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 2005)
Jacob and the Prodigal: How Jesus Retold Israel’s Story (Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 2003 )
Finding the Lost: Cultural Keys to Luke 15 (St. Louis: Concordia, 1992)
Poet and Peasant and Through Peasant Eyes (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, l980)
God Is ... Dialogues on the Nature of God [Revised Edition] (Toronto: FFM, 2005)

Dr. Bailey has authored the scripts for two professionally produced feature length films and has also professionally recorded more than 100 video lectures on a variety of New Testament themes. He has taught at Columbia and Princeton and was for a time an adjunct professor at Dubuque, McCormick and Pittsburgh theological seminaries as well as at Fuller Seminary. Dr. Bailey has lectured in theological colleges and seminaries in England (Oxford, Cambridge, Bristol) Ireland, Canada, Egypt, Finland, Latvia, Denmark, New Zealand, Australia and Jerusalem. He is active as a Bible teacher for conferences and continuing education events in the Middle East, Europe and North America. His writings have been translated and published into more than 20 languages. He is a member of Studiorum Novi Testamenti Societas and is listed in Who's Who in Biblical Studies and Archeology (Washington: Biblical Archeology Society, 1992). In March 1995, at the request of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Bailey was the Bible teacher for the triennial meeting of the Archbishops of the Anglican Communion. In 1999 he received the Pittsburgh Theological Seminary “Distinguished Alumni Award for Excellence in Academics.” In 2003, at the invitation of the Archbishop of Canterbury, he participated in a Muslim-Christian dialogue conference held in Doha, Qatar.

The Baileys now reside in New Wilmington, Pennsylvania. Dr. Bailey continues his ministry of lecturing, writing and recording in the field of New Testament. In June 1997, he was installed as Canon Theologian of the Diocese of Pittsburgh of the Episcopal Church, USA.

Mrs. Ethel Bailey was a research assistant to Dr. Jonas Salk at the time he discovered the polio vaccine. She taught microbiology (in Arabic), raised a family, and typed a number of Dr. Bailey's manuscripts. In Beirut she was the recording secretary for the board of the American Community School. While in Jerusalem she was active in the leadership of daily worship at the Tantur Ecumenical Institute and in various other aspects of the life of the community. The Baileys have two children.

Reviews

[Texas Bob · Rating 3 out of 5]

Imagine a book about the American Founding Fathers that starts: "Jefferson wrote the Declaration as a Virginian. I have lived in Richmond since 1970 and so, as someone familiar with Virginians, let me explain what he meant by all men being created equal..." It would strike the reader as absurd.

I wanted to like this book and I had very high expectations based upon the reviews here, but I was generally disappointed. One suspects (hopes?) that much more scholarship lies behind the assertions of Middle Eastern context than Dr. Bailey reveals, but with few footnotes and little explanation, the reader is often left with the impression that he is making the absurd leap that "if you were to read this parable from the perspective of Lebanon in 1984 you would think ______, therefore this is what it must have meant to Luke in the first century."

When the author does reach back into historical Middle Eastern sources, he most often cites (32 times, more than all other such sources combined) Ibn al-Tayyib, an 11th century Persian Christian. al-Tayyib is himself a thousand years removed from the sources and represents a particular strand of Christian tradition. (Imagine citing a modern British exegete to explain what William the Conqueror's motivations, it may or may not be good scholarship, but his British-ness adds little to his credibility).

The book is divided into six sections, each of which are stand-alone and build very little upon one another. If you are going to invest the time in this book I would suggest:
Part 1: Birth of Jesus - very good and worth the time, some genuine insights from a Middle Eastern perspective
Part 2: The Beatitudes - go elsewhere for this, can be skipped in its entirety
Part 3: The Lord's Prayer - worth a quick read, some interesting insights, skim this
Part 4: Dramatic Actions of Jesus - skip this and pick up any N.T. Wright book on the subject. It will be more readable, more in-depth, and offers better Middle Eastern context
Part 5: Jesus and Women - worth a skim if you have not read an explanation of this elsewhere. If you are already familiar with first century attitudes toward women in Jewish and in Hellenistic societies from any of the alternative and excellent sources, this will seem superficial and won't add much.
Part 6: The Parables - Worth the investment of time as there are some real gems here.

The book abruptly stops after the Parable of the Vineyard. No concluding chapter or paragraph to tie it altogether because, sadly, this is less a book than a collection of essays stitched loosely together by a few recurrent themes.

I would very much like to give this a more positive review, especially because the entire book exudes faithfulness and love of the subject. But I just do not think this merits anything close to the high marks given here. You can find much better treatment of nearly all this material elsewhere.

[Paul, · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was quite excited to start reading Bailey's book on 1st century culture and the Bible. This subject was a significant part of my studies in seminary (biblical studies and cultural anthropology), and my years living overseas have only heightened my interest and expertise. I thought the first chapter was quite insightful.

So, why the 1 star rating? A book like this is based on our trust of the author. Bailey makes a lot of assertions, and he is not using many footnotes, so the reader must trust the author. The first chapter augmented and agreed with things that I had already learned. However, as the book progressed, cultural studies gradually disappeared, and it became more about sharing anecdotes from modern Middle Eastern culture, about theology and finding "ring composition". Which is a problem for three reasons. One, cultures change over 2,000 years. Even Middle Eastern ones. Two, Bailey's theology is not really that good. Third, even a novice exegete should know enough to know that you can "find" ring composition (which most scholars refer to as "chiasm" from the Greek chiasmus) in almost any piece of literature if you look long enough and are creative enough. So, why is Bailey calling it "ring composition"? In my opinion, and I could be wrong here, he doesn't use the Greek word for it just to make it sound like an Aramaic/Hebrew literary device. That was troubling to me, but I didn't worry about it too much.

More importantly, Bailey lost his credibility in my eyes as an expert on 1st century culture by making several critical cultural exegetical errors. If he is making fundamental errors, then I cannot even trust those things that sound like they might be true (because there aren't footnotes). Examples of fundamental mistakes (in my eyes and the eyes of modern scholarship):

1. Making arguments based on the grammar of the Aramaic original - What Aramaic original? This is pure speculation. We have no textual evidence from an Aramaic original, not one line, not one sentence. So, in essence, Bailey is making arguments from a possible Aramaic original that he must construct on his own and analyze. That is bad scholarship. Not totally uncommon, but still bad.

2. Making arguments based on very sketchy readings of the Greek - For example, the beggar accepting Jesus as his "Lord". This is such poor exegesis! May I offer an alternative cultural analysis? The beggar is a man of low status. He is addressing a rabbinical healer of high status. He uses Davidic titles out of respect, then addresses him as "sir" or perhaps "my lord" using exactly the appropriate, normal word to address someone of Jesus' status. To take this as a major theological claim of divinity without further evidence ... ? Speculation.

3. The straw that broke the camel's back was interpreting "poor" in Luke 4 (quoted from Isaiah) as "humble". WOW! Major red flag! The other two mistakes were just over-reading the text. Those mistakes are easy to detect and not too serious. But this is a grave error. Even if you weren't an expert in first-century culture, if you were to read Isaiah, it would be absolutely clear that poor means poor, as in lacking possessions, food, etc. It is clear from the first chapter by implication and made explicit in Isaiah 3. Bailey actually reads Enlightenment era, Western pietistic culture back into the text. In Isaiah, the rich haven't oppressed the humble and the orphan and the widow. The wages of the humble aren't crying out. Unbelievable. Social injustice is a sign of a lack of love for God and a failure to obey his laws in Isaiah. That's a major theme of the book. I have never read a scholar that has spiritualized poverty in Isaiah before. That doesn't mean those scholars don't exist. But I've been lucky enough to avoid them until now.

I kept on reading for a hundred pages after I started to have misgivings about Bailey's expertise before I finally quit. I quit because of the Isaiah passage. An error of that magnitude means that even if there are nuggets of truth buried in the book, I can't trust them because I can't trust the author.

[Gregory · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is amazing! Bailey lived for 60 years in the Middle East, and has literally lived through the Bible story. The book begins with a stunning study, which presents a convincing case that Jesus was actually born in a house (since many poor, Middle Eastern homes actually have mangers in the house!). I won't give away the rest of his argument, but I did want to share another tid-bit that lept out at me.

Speaking of the Magi, and who they might have been, he writes: "In the 1920s a British scholar, E.F.F. Bishop, visited a Bedouin tribe in Jordan. This Muslim tribe bore the Arabic name al-Kokabani. The word kokab means "planet" and al-Kaokabani means "Those who study/follow the planets." Bishop asked the elders of the tribe why they called themselves by such a name. They replied that it was because their ancestors followed the planets and traveled west to Palestine to show honor to the great prophet Jesus when he was born. This supports Justin's [Justin Martyr - ca. 165 A.D.:] second-century claim that the wise men were Arabs from Arabia," (Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes, 53).

****

So, I've finally finished this! It took about three years to read, mostly because I had to fit into the cracks of my teaching and graduate school schedule. But, it was well worth it. Bailey's insights probably need to be digested over a long period of time, anyway, since they are so paradigm-changing. Nearly chapter had moments of truly deep insight, combined with pastoral applications throughout. I can't recommend this highly enough! Every pastor needs to read it, to avoid recycling some common misnomers about the Bible.

[Richard · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very illuminating and enjoyable read. Bailey approaches his subject with much knowledge and much humility. Sometimes he repeats himself, for example in his explanations of Biblical rhetoric or his fulsome praises of some of his favorite commentators. However that may have to do with the fact that some of the material was transplanted from his earlier writings.

He uses his knowledge of Middle Eastern culture, languages and Bible commentaries to clarify the meaning of specific selections of the New Testament. He pinpoints and explains details of the Christmas narratives, parables and other passages that had hitherto puzzled me or even escaped my notice. He shows how Jesus drew material for his teachings from the cultural and religious heritage of Israel. However, as Bailey demonstrates, Christ did not hesitate to challenge and overturn some of the prejudices and limitations of his times, particularly in his attitude to women and to people who were generally considered undesirable.

[Christine · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a spectacular book. Well worth the investment of time and energy. It has revolutionized my view of Jesus and the gospel story

[Rachel B · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an insightful read. Bailey explains the composition styles of the Middle East in the Biblical times, and walks through various parables and historical accounts, showing how the original authors and readers of the texts understood them. This information was very helpful, especially when it came to some hard-to-understand stories, like Jesus talking to a woman about feeding scraps to dogs.

I did feel that some of the literary/translation jargon became a bit repetitive, and there were a couple of instances where I felt Bailey was reading too much into certain texts, without anything to back up his thoughts, but these things were relatively minor. Also, the ending was very abrupt, as there was no concluding chapter.

I’d definitely recommend this book to all Western Christians to get a deeper understanding of Scripture passages which are so familiar that we take them for granted, and a better understanding of who Jesus was and is.

[rahela · Rating 4 out of 5]

O carte care m-a obligat să-mi regândesc felul în care citesc Scriptura. M-a făcut să conștientizez faptul că mereu am citit evangheliile prin propria mea lentilă culturală, și nu din perspectiva autorilor sau a martorilor oculari. Precum afirmă și K.B., cu cât un text scriptural ne este mai familiar, „cu atât mai mult tânjește să fie eliberat din cătușele care i-au fost puse vreme de secole”.

[Joshua Lister · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was able to glean some helpful things from this book. The author is clearly competent and an expert in middle eastern/ancient languages. He identifies chiastic structures within the text and rhetorical devices, like ring composition, which are interesting and worthy of note.

Unfortunately the book is far too long and could be condensed. The author often uses modern cultural norms in the Middle East to stretch interpretations of the Bible beyond what would seem warranted. When he uses adverbs like, “clearly” or “certainly” it is almost a sure marker that he knows he’s reaching. In the worst cases his interpretation ignores clear explanations that are available to all readers in the text itself. A primary example of this, is when he argues that Joseph redefines our notions of justice by deciding to stay with Mary, all the while, ignoring that Joseph had a dream from God revealing to him that Mary was not unfaithful.

The author is also uncomfortably liberal with his theology and has an axe to grind regarding women in church leadership. He makes the case for woman leadership over men using multiple women that Jesus interacts with to make his case. He simply ignores the part of the Bible where Paul simply says, “no.” The frustrating part about this book is that portions were enjoyable and the author offered great insights. Although, these portions were too few for a more positive review.

[Marly · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lost this book for a full year (hence why it took so long to read LOL) but I finally found and finished it!!! The historical context and analysis greatly enriched my understanding of the gospel of Luke and I’m excited to refer back to many pieces as I read Luke in the future!!! I especially loved the context added to the parables

[Kristin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This gave me so much new insight into a lot of passages that I hadn't fully understood before. I appreciated how Bailey really delved into the structure of the Biblical passages, the multiple ways it had been translated into different languages, and especially the cultural heritage of the texts and the underlying assumptions that would have been made at the time they were written. I mean, what a delight to have him declare that a parable needs to be liberated from our capitalist lense! Or to highlight the use of both female and male metaphors for God in discussion of the Lord's prayer in tandem with an analysis of the parable of the Prodigal Son? Some of these chapters were absolutely invigorating. Most instances where I felt like certain elements of a story hadn't made sense, it was because my cultural understanding really didn't match up with what would have actually
been happening. It made the stories feel both more alive and more accessible. I'll be happy to check out other works by Bailey.

[Tim Casteel · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is my favorite kind of book- books that pay compounding interest because they help you better read the scriptures.

Bailey takes 32 different passages and seeks to uncover the Middle Eastern cultural realities that really open up the meaning of the gospel accounts. The author spent 60 years of his life in the Middle East and devoted his academic career to trying "understand the stories of the Gospels in the light of Middle Eastern culture."

Bailey leans heavily on Middle Eastern scholars and texts written in Arabic (that have yet to be translated into English):
"My intent is to contribute new perspectives from the Eastern tradition that have rarely, if ever, been considered outside the Arabic-speaking Christian world"
Because of this, his book is unique and full of "I have NEVER heard any of this before" moments.

But Bailey is not just a just telling you nifty insights -"Jesus wasn't born in a stable, but a house"- to impress your friends at parties. Bailey is teaching you how to read the Gospels.

The Gospels are "meaning tied intimately to history and to event. That is the way it is with Jesus - not neutrality, bare record, empty chronology, but living participation and heart involvement.
Christian faith is fact, but not bare fact; it is poetry, but not imagination.
Jesus is the music of the reality of God"

Some of Bailey's best insights are re women:
"In the stories Luke chooses to tell he makes it clear that this Savior came for both women and men. A careful examination of the book of Luke unearths at least twenty-seven sets of stories that focus in one case on a man and in the other on a woman. Among these is the parable of the good shepherd with a lost sheep and the parable of a good woman with a lost coin (Lk 15: 3-10). The first story emerges from the world of men and the second from the life experience of women.”

As this book is not a cohesive whole but 32 separate "studies" it's a bit repetitive.

[Andrew · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rereading Kenneth Bailey’s classic book proved just as rewarding as the first time 12 years ago. Every chapter is packed with insights into the text and the Middle Eastern background of Jesus’ day. It’s like reading these parables and episodes for the first time. A bonus is the understanding Bailey brings from ancient Middle Eastern Christian commentators on the text who were much closer to the culture of the New Testament than we are both chronologically and culturally.

What really happened in the Christmas story, the importance of what the Lord’s Prayer does not say, why (in the parable) the employer’s actions are so astounding in hiring laborers throughout the day and in how he pays them—these and so much more offer rich and moving insights.

Just one key idea among dozens I will carry with me for a long time: Despite the deeply insulting refusal of guests to come to the master’s banquet (Luke 14:15-24), he does not send a force to destroy them. Instead he generously opens the banquet to the outcasts. He reprocesses anger into grace. I will long ponder how I can turn anger about injustice into acts of grace.

This is without a doubt one of those few books meant to be slowly chewed and digested.

[Barry · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bailey uses his extensive knowledge of Semitic sources and his experience of living in the Middle East for 40 years to provide critical context and understanding for the gospel texts. His examination of the multiple uses of “ring composition,” or chiastic structure in the NT yields enormous insight for otherwise familiar gospel passages.

In the West, we have come to expect that the point of a story is revealed, as a climax, at the end. But in “Ring Composition” format, the critical point is given in the middle of the narration.

I have been hearing sermons and reading books about these passages for decades, but I found his observations to be consistently eye-opening, and for several sections (e.g., the stories of Zacchaeus, the woman at the well, the Syrophoenecian woman) his analyses are truly revelatory.

This is one of my favorite books of the year, and I’m sure I will be returning to this one again and again.

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Again another fabulous book by Ken Bailey. Don't let the length of the book cause you problems. It is 400 pages, but each chapter is pretty much stand alone.

Again, the insights that Dr. Kenneth Bailey gives to the culture during the time of Jesus is amazing. You will understand parables in a better way. You will understand why some sayings of Jesus offended the local Rabbi's in a way that you didn't catch with a casual reading.

This books helps me to dig deeper into the real lessons behind many stories of Jesus's healings, parables and inneractions with the local people.

You will not be disappointed. Enjoy the adventure with Dr. Bailey.

[Tristan Sherwin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bailey’s insights on Middle Eastern Culture are a gift to the church, and should be lapped up by all those who are hungry to grapple with the historical Jesus.

There’s not a dull sentence within the precious tome.

—Tristan Sherwin, author of *Love: Expressed*

[Nick · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rich insights! Bailey gets academic, yet it is highly readable.

[Laney Dugan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a dense book, and it took me a bit to really get into it… but I so appreciated the thoughtfulness and perspective provided throughout! I know there’s so much that gets lost in translation from an near eastern culture to my western culture, and so books like this are deeply valuable for those of us seeking to engage the scriptures. His genuine concern for the interactions of Jesus with women to be read rightly — shockingly egalitarian! — is a beautiful aspect of this book, and his chapters on the parables were probably the best part of his work in my opinion. Who knew I was missing so much without understanding more fully the middle eastern environment of Jesus’s day?! I’ll definitely be referring back to this book as I study the gospels, and would recommend it to others, even if just for his work on the parables!

[Thomas Mulshine · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enjoyed the author’s commentary regarding how Jesus managed to bring women into His stories equally with men, and made sure women were very involved with His ministry, in opposition to the Jewish culture of that time. The author’s commentaries of the parables,through eastern eyes, were interesting but struck me a little odd at times. He seemed to analysis too deeply as if the people involved in Jesus’s parables were real people with real lives and history, instead of focusing on the point of the teaching.

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

The late Kenneth E. Bailey taught New Testament studies in the Middle East for decades. Thus, he brings to "Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes" an understanding of both the original language used in the Gospels and the culture in which Jesus lived.
I learned so much from this book. I learned that the way the Christmas story is presented in every Sunday school pageant is almost certainly wrong (it stems from a misunderstanding of the word translated as "inn"). I learned that the phrase in the "Lord's Prayer" invariably translated in English as "Give us this day our daily bread," could as easily be translated, "Give us the bread that never runs out." Either translation could be correct, but oh, the difference in meaning.
"Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes" is divided into sections, and the most interesting section to me consisted on chapters about Jesus' encounters with women. Even I know enough of the culture of the time to know that the manner in which Jesus treated women as equals was very counter-cultural. This becomes all the more real and astonishing in Bailey's careful analysis of seven texts.
My interest level dropped a little during the final section, on the parables. But I'm very glad not to have missed the chapter on Luke 12:35-38, which Bailey labels "The Parable of the Serving Master." I don't believe I've ever heard a sermon or teaching on this parable, and I think when I've read it I've just breezed through it without really considering it. It's so short -- how important could it be?
Well, Bailey freed me from that sort of thinking. It's an amazing little story, in which the master of the household walks away from a wedding banquet, goes home to see if his servants are on the job -- and then he serves them a meal! I wonder if Jesus' disciples thought of that parable on the night of that last Passover supper, when Jesus served them.
I was a little disappointed that this book had no section on the miracles of Jesus. It also had no section on the resurrection, although that is discussed in the introductory chapter on Jesus and women. I would love to have read a book by Bailey on those two subjects.
Instead, I'm already starting on "Paul Through Mediterranean Eyes," Bailey's study of 1 Corinthians. I'm excited to dig into it.

[Derek · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is not exactly what I was expecting. It was less a study of the way Middle-Eastern perceptions of Jesus differ from Western ones, and more a Biblical commentary on a random collection of stories and parables found in the four Gospels from a Middle Eastern perspective. But it still does the job of giving a different perspective on those stories.

There were a lot of things in this book that I had legitimately never heard before, so it was certainly worth the read. His perspectives on the birth of Jesus with "no room in the inn" and the "wise men" were legitimately fascinating and compelling. His perspective on the Call of Peter was completely new to me, as was his explanation of the Syro-Phoencian woman. And his insights on "The Parable of the Unjust Steward" and "The Parable of the Pounds" were worth the price of the book.

His chapters on the Beatitudes and the Lord's Prayer dragged a bit for me. They were not bad, they just didn't have many insights that I wasn't already reasonably familiar with. Additionally, while he is clearly familiar with Middle-Eastern culture, I would have preferred to see more citations. This was particularly problematic in areas where he appeals to ancient Middle-Eastern culture. I don't necessarily think he is wrong, but for a book that resembled a Biblical commentary, he didn't go out of his way to show his work most of the time.

All in all, despite this book being different from what I expected, I really enjoyed it. It has been really beneficial to me to learn about and consider Biblical perspectives that differ from my own. I found this book instructive in that way. It was more interesting than practical, but would likely be a good resource for preachers and teachers who want to explain a passage in a fresh new way.

[Ainsley Steinbrueck · Rating 2 out of 5]

Never thought I would finish this book, but I finally did after many months. This book was full of cultural history and was extremely informative and taught me a lot. I would not say this was an easy read, but I definitely took a lot away from it. My favorite chapters were on the birth story of Jesus and the in-depth studying of the parables. I wouldn't recommend this book for all people... probably just those who are interested in culture history or older people who are looking for deeper knowledge about Jesus. I don't think I would ever take the trek to read this book again, but there are some parts I will read back on.

[Danielle Carlson · Rating 5 out of 5]

I started reading this book in December and I read the first few chapters via audiobook which was lovely but when I picked up my husband’s hard copy of the book I realized the tables that outline the literary analysis are visually extremely helpful so I definitely recommend reading the hard copy!

In this book, Kenneth Bailey draws from his decades of experience living, studying, and teaching in the Middle East as well as a wealth of sources, primarily the writings and commentaries of early Middle-Eastern church fathers, manuscripts, historical sources, and his own literary analysis and translation skills to give the reader a picture of how Jesus’ audience would have received his teachings as well as insight into the cultural and historical context of the narrative of Jesus’ life as recorded in the gospels.

I don’t know where this quote came from—Brooks received it from one of his professors and if I can source it I will—but it’s “The Bible was written for you, but it was not written to you.”

I so enjoyed getting this glimpse into the context of the people Jesus was speaking to and the people the apostles wrote these gospels to. I have come away more in awe of the Scriptures and more profoundly convicted by Jesus’ words.

The one downfall of this book is that it is not a commentary on all the Gospels. But what Bailey has to share here is so valuable. I will be coming back to this book again and again in the years to come.

[Hannah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful! Expanded and deepened my understanding of many of the gospel stories and parables.

[Meagan Papala · Rating 4 out of 5]

I would give it 3.75 stars - I would recommend reading with someone as it’s pretty complex and like a textbook. the literary devices part was a little confusion But I learned so so much from it. I see the parables and some other common stories in their context much clearer now

[Jim B · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rarely does a book surprise me with new insight into the familiar Biblical accounts of Jesus and His teachings as this one has.

Years ago I stumbled across a book by Kenneth Bailey called The Cross and the Prodigal: Luke 15 through the Eyes of Middle Eastern Peasants which introduced me to the riches of this approach to understanding the New Testament. Bringing the culture of the Middle East into the discussion of the story scrapes off centuries of misreading or simply missing significant details - many of them strong Gospel insights.

Culture skews the way we understand so many things. As an example, in Japan there is a culture of worship of the dead. One of the hard things for Japanese followers of Jesus is to move against this culture. Then they observe the gift of flowers at American Christian funerals and their first understanding of this custom is that it is a form of worship of the dead! To an American Christian, that sounds foreign to our perceptions of grieving. Now imagine American Christians steeped in capitalism (as one part of our culture) reading the Parable of the Ten Minas (Luke 19:11-27). It's easy for an American to skip over all the details of the rich man "going off to be appointed king" and "his citizens hated him" and make the story about faithful stewardship of our gifts or our worldly goods. That would sound very foreign to someone in the Middle East who understands what is going on in this parable.

Bailey spent most of his ministry in the Middle East and immersed in the study of the ancient middle eastern Biblical translations such as Syriac and Aramaic. He doesn't just talk about culture - he backs up his observations with references to these texts.

The book is more scholarly than the Prodigal Son book, but even an amateur with no foreign language experience or familiarity with the theological terms Bailey uses will understand his analysis. Although I purchased a paperback copy of the book, I listened to an audiobook version which meant I couldn't look at the diagrams but I still benefited from digging deep into the Biblical text to bring up new insights. I look forward to consulting the book I purchased when I want to look at specifics.

A lengthy section of the book is dedicated to the parables of Jesus. In my training, we were taught to stick to the "point of comparison" of the parable - this was a corrective to allegorizing the details of the parables. The allegorical approach was very subjective to the interpreter and often pretty far-fetched. But limiting the interpretation of parables to the "point of comparison" sometimes strips the story of details significant to understanding the parable.

Besides the cultural insights, Bailey also points out a structure that is invisible to Western readers, but common in the literature of the Middle East. We are familiar with parallelism of the Psalm, but the New Testament also uses a story telling structure where the point is at the center verse and the verses on both sides are connected - a pattern like 4, 3, 2, 1, 2, 3, 4 - it's amazing how much this pattern is there and yet after 40 years of working professionally with the New Testament text I was never aware of this structure!

There is a danger into reading too much into the text of a parable. We distinguish between applying the commands contained in God's Word and applying descriptive language which is not intended to be a command. For example, the fact that Abraham lied about the identify of Sarah is not intended to teach us to lie. Occasionally Bailey's analysis of the details may find moral teachings where Jesus was only telling the story, but he rarely crossed that line and far more often revealed how a parable had the gospel of the Lord emptying Himself in grace for the sake of sinners. This is clearly a theme in the teachings of Jesus that I hadn't seen in so many of the places He tells a story.

This is a long book! (And for me, a long review!) It is worth the read. As I downsize my library in the years ahead for the sake of my family, this is a book that will make the cut every time!

[Seán Mchugh · Rating 3 out of 5]

To be honest I found this book to be a real slog... but I’m glad I persevered. You will trawl through pages of tedium, but just as you’ve nodded of for the umpteenth time, you’ll stumble upon a revelation that makes it all worth while. One such example for me is how clearly he shows radical aspects of the teaching of Jesus that escaped my western worldview. Here’s an example:

P147
The inauguration of Jesus' ministry
[Jesus' and remixing the Bible]
Luke 4:16–31

Jesus unrolled the scroll to Isaiah 61 and proceeded to read the text, which in Luke's Gospel shows careful editing. ... the text of Isaiah is changed or interrupted. In the first of them the phrase "to bind up the brokenhearted" is left out. The second is after an entire phrase has been brought in from Isaiah 58:6.… The word "to call" has been upgraded into a word that means "to proclaim a message."… a verse has been cut in half with the second half omitted. Both the selection of the text and its editing are important. Why this particular text, and why these editorial changes?

[Isaiah revised? Jesus takes a text which is well understood by the Jewish people to emphasise their superiority over the Gentiles, and intentionally remixes it to take away this emphasis and instead to replace it with an emphasis upon the whole world inclusive of Gentiles, this is why they wanted to kill him when he finished this reading]

It is often assumed that Luke (or his source) did the editing. It is also possible to trace the editing to Jesus.
...
For a long time English language versions have translated Luke 4:22–30 in a manner that presents a pleased audience that quickly turned into a howling murderous mob. Yet it is possible to understand the Greek text describing a congregation which is upset from the beginning.
[Depending on how this is translated the same words can be understood as being framed as people speaking of Jesus with pride, or speaking of him with contempt, what follows is the more likely way of understanding the opening passage]

In this case the question: "is not this Joseph's son?" Means "Didn't this young man grow up here!? Doesn't he know how we feel and how we understand this text?" Jeremias suggests that the congregation was angry because Jesus quotes "to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord" but leaves out the second half of the verse, which reads "and a day of vengeance of our God."

Jeremias writes: "Luke 4:22 exhibits no break in the attitude of his audience towards Jesus. On the contrary it records that from the outset unanimous rage was their response to the message of Jesus. The good news was their stumbling block, principally because Jesus had removed vengeance on the Gentiles from the picture of the future."
...
A careful look at the verses in the first section (stanzas 1-4) clarifies what Jesus read and what he left out. As noted, he omitted the phrase, "he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted." Two lines later he borrowed a sentence from Isaiah 58:6 and added it to the reading. Finally he cut the final verse in half and deleted the phrase "and the day of vengeance of our God." ... His omission of the second half of the verse in 4 no doubt deeply angered the crowd in the synagogue. But his total omission of the second and particularly the third stanza in Isaiah was in all likelihood even more infuriating.
The second section (stanzas 5–6) ensured comfort and gladness for the mourners. Leaving that material out could have disappointed some but would not have given offense.

[Anna Mussmann · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dr. Bailey laments that “Middle Eastern Christians evaporated from Western consciousness after the Council of Chalcedon in A.D. 451.” Because Westerners interpret Scripture through the lens of our own culture, we miss out on the riches of a full cultural understanding of the context of Jesus’ words. In his book Bailey takes his personal experience in the Middle East and combines it with his scholarly studies of Biblical languages and historic Middle Eastern Christian sources. He applies this knowledge to selected topics from the New Testament.

This book made some fascinating points. Reading it was also hard work. There were several reasons. One: It’s a series of essays, and therefore lacks overarching momentum. Two: The author spends a great deal of time discussing things like “modified prophetic rhetorical template” and “ring structure” and deduces all kinds of things from a passage’s formatting. Part of me wants to think he’s making stuff up, and part of me suspects I simply don’t have the background to fully “get” and evaluate what he says. Three: I struggle with whether or not his approach to Scripture borders on the historical-critical method (more on this later).

I especially appreciated Dr. Bailey’s discussion of the cultural context of the Christmas story. He points out that even though certain imagery surrounding Jesus’ birth is deeply ingrained in Western culture, it is not entirely accurate. Some of the details we see in paintings and nativity sets come not from Scripture but from The Protevangelium of James, essentially a Christian novel written 200 years after Jesus’s life. Interesting stuff. Some of the background he brings to the parables of Jesus is also enlightening.

I found myself scratching my layperson’s head over other passages. He discusses Mary’s Magnificat and points out that it includes no reference to God punishing the Gentiles even though such a phrase would balance the poetic format. He says, “In like manner, Jesus exhibits no hostility against the Gentiles, as is demonstrated in Luke 4:16-30. Did Jesus absorb these attitudes from his mother?. . . . Regardless of one’s views on the origins of this hymn of liberation, it links Mary and Jesus. The text of Luke affirms the sentiments in this text to be the views of Mary. Thereby the reader is led to understand that Jesus was raised by an extraordinary mother who must have had enormous influence on his attitudes toward women.”

Does it disrespect the accuracy of Scripture to suggest that even if the Magnificat reflects “the views of Mary,” it was arranged in its present poetical format by someone else? [And does Bailey believe this himself, or is he simply acknowledging the academic scholarship in his field?] Is it overly naturalistic to contribute the Savior's outlook to his human experiences? Where exactly lies the line in the sand between “acceptable speculation” and “not-so-acceptable speculation”? Stuff like this forces me to realize how little I know about the nitty-gritty of hermeneutics. I’ve asked my pastor to recommend some reading on this topic and am looking forward to clarifying things a bit in my own mind.

Overall, I wouldn’t recommend this book to everyone. I’m glad though that I read it--if nothing else, it forced me to ask myself new questions about Scripture and theology and to realize how much more I need to learn.

(That rating: perhaps 3.5? Not sure).

[Robin · Rating 5 out of 5]

It is amazing how much we miss when we read the Gospels through Western eyes. Excited to continue to use this book as a resource to deeper understand what Jesus actually meant when He taught the parables

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

I highly recommend this book, and it's on my list of books to buy for my library. It's highly readable by the layperson and filled with tremendous insight on Jesus and his teachings from a Middle Eastern perspective. It is a commentary, but without being academic and unreadable like many commentaries: each chapter covers the text, some comments and meditations on the text, and then a summary of take away points. I found it very practical to use in my bible study and devotional time. Great for discussions with the spouse as well.

Dr. Bailey is well known for his several books on The Prodigal Son parable. He lived and taught in the Middle East for 40 years, so he has a very good understanding of Middle Eastern culture.

Here's a description of the contents borrowed from Amazon:
Beginning with Jesus' birth, Ken Bailey leads you on a kaleidoscopic study of Jesus throughout the four Gospels. Bailey examines the life and ministry of Jesus with attention to the Lord's Prayer, the Beatitudes, Jesus' relationship to women, and especially Jesus' parables.

Through it all, Bailey employs his trademark expertise as a master of Middle Eastern culture to lead you into a deeper understanding of the person and significance of Jesus within his own cultural context. With a sure but gentle hand, Bailey lifts away the obscuring layers of modern Western interpretation to reveal Jesus in the light of his actual historical and cultural setting.

[Robert Durough, Jr. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kenneth E. Bailey’s Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes: Cultural Studies in the Gospels is a treasure trove of cultural insights on the life and teachings of Jesus the Christ. Bailey pulls together writings, traditions, and perspectives both ancient and contemporary to help us better understand Scripture. Though it is written more for the academic, I would recommend this to anyone wanting a deeper understanding of Scripture. He writes that neither separating “the exact words of Jesus from the careful editing of the Gospel authors” nor authoring a “full-fledged technical commentary” are purposes of this book (20); rather, “My intent is to contribute new perspectives from the Eastern tradition that have rarely, if ever, been considered outside the Arabic-speaking Christian world” (21).

The book is presented in six parts, each worth the reader’s time and energy:
1. The Birth of Jesus
2. The Beatitudes
3. The Lord’s Prayer
4. Dramatic Actions of Jesus
5. Jesus and Women
6. Parables of Jesus

Most people I know read the Bible solely from a Western tradition and perspective heavily influenced by the Enlightenment period, completely unaware of over a millennium’s worth of culture and writings predating those views that have been virtually ignored, often intentionally. Many thanks to Bailey for making some of this more accessible and bringing these things to light.