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The Genuine Jesus: Fresh Evidence from History and Archaeology Updated Edition
In this richly illustrated volume--formerly titled In the Fullness of Time--Paul Maier visits the origins of Christianity, taking the reader back to the first Christmas, the first Easter, and the first Christians. His impressive research and brilliant insights correlate history, archaeology, and the New Testament to bring alive the true drama of earliest Christianity.
This skillful narrative sheds a brilliant new light on the life of Jesus and the adventures of the courageous men and women who carried His message throughout a hostile empire. A host of magnificent color and black-and-white photographs recreate the world, the mood, the people, and the events with an immediacy that sweeps readers into the exciting first years of Christianity.
This skillful narrative sheds a brilliant new light on the life of Jesus and the adventures of the courageous men and women who carried His message throughout a hostile empire. A host of magnificent color and black-and-white photographs recreate the world, the mood, the people, and the events with an immediacy that sweeps readers into the exciting first years of Christianity.
432 pages, Kindle Edition
Published July 27, 2021
11 people are currently reading
44 people want to read
About the author
Paul L. Maier
61 books135 followersPaul L. Maier was an American historian and novelist. He wrote several works of scholarly and popular non-fiction about Christianity and novels about Christian historians. He was the Russell H. Seibert Professor of Ancient History at Western Michigan University, from which he retired in 2011, retaining the title of professor emeritus in the Department of History. He previously served as Third Vice President of the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
July 12, 2023
It seems that every few years, books are published that make the wild claim of giving you “the real Jesus” while straying far away from the Jesus presented to us in the New Testament. In this book, Maier presents ample historical and archaeological evidence that the Jesus we read about in the New Testament is not just the real but also the genuine Jesus as an actual historical figure, which atheists are still known to challenge but no secular scholar takes seriously Though most secular scholars doubt who Jesus is, they don’t doubt that He existed, for to do so would be to deny history, which is not intellectually honest. Most books about history that are written tend to be dry and pedantic because of the dense material. Not so with this book. Although it is easy to read, it is filled with enriching and edifying information about the historicity of Jesus from His birth, to His resurrection, and to the ministry of His Holy Spirit enacted through the Apostles.
He opens the book with helpful overviews of caricatures of Jesus that have no shred of historical or archaeological evidence, and others that have been written as fiction but for some reason readers—due to poor reading comprehension—have passed off as truth. For example, the book "Holy Blood, Holy Grail" published by three British authors claim that Jesus married Mary Magdalene, whose daughter married into the Merovingian dynasty. If this sounds familiar, it’s because Dan Brown says the same thing in "The Da Vinci Code." The authors of "Holy Blood, Holy Grail" actually sued him for plagiarism, but unfortunately the judge dismissed the case. All the authors claim to have done meticulous research, but no honest scholar has taken their claims seriously because there’s no shred of evidence for their claims.
Another caricature you might be familiar with is the Jesus Seminar where 60-70 radical theologians basically met twice a year and voted on whether Jesus actually said the things He said in the Gospels. Their methodology is incredibly biased, and they have been denounced by the scholarly community. Perhaps my favourite caricature—if we can have a favourite—because of its hilarious absurdity, is British scholar John Allegro’s claim in his book, "The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross," that the stories about Jesus, His disciples, and even David and Moses were invented by a fertility cult who got high on a phallic shaped mushroom called Amanita muscaria that’s red-topped and white-flecked. If you’re laughing with me, then you’re laughing with his scholarly colleagues because they all dismissed his book as a “scholarly hoax” or a “philologist’s erotic nightmare" (p. 24).
There are both coloured and black-and-white photographs to help show you what the world was like that Jesus and His disciples lived in, so if you like picture books, this book is for you! Despite its density, the book is really easy to read. Any layperson can pick up this book and read it and learn a lot. I would recommend that every serious Christian have this book on their shelf as part of their apologetic arsenal. Maier does an expert job at delineating how the Gospels are grounded in human history surrounded by historical figures who actually lived and historical events that actually happened. The book makes quite evident that Christianity truly is the only world religion that has empirical history as its ally.
The middle section of the book covers important historical figures and sites that confirm Jesus’ existence, a lot of helpful cultural explanations, and common criticisms made against Jesus’ historicity by atheists. One example is the fallacy that Jesus’ name doesn’t show up in any other sources outside the New Testament in the century after His death. Such a thing is said only due to historical ignorance, and they aren’t very well-read, because the Roman authors Tacitus, Suetonius, and Pliny, as well as the Jewish historian Josephus, all mention Jesus by name that corroborate with the entire New Testament account of Him. Another one atheists say is, “There is no hill in Nazareth from which Jesus could’ve been tossed,” referring to Luke 4:16-30 when the people of Nazareth wanted to throw Jesus down a cliff overlooking the valley of Jezreel. They can only say this due to geographical ignorance. Maier provides a decent photo in the book to show how hilly Nazareth is, and I can personally attest that yes, there is such a hill from which they would’ve tossed Jesus. I personally stood on the Mount of Precipitation—also called Mount Precipice—overlooking the valley of Jezreel that went down at a 45-degree angle with a bunch of sharply eroded rocks that certainly could’ve killed Jesus if they succeeded. I have personal photographs of it, which you can view here: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?s.... So, these atheists, as usual, have no idea what they’re talking about.
Another common objection is Jesus’ miracles, similar to the atheist’s demand that we prove the existence of God. They argue with David Hume that miracles are impossible since natural law cannot be violated, which is an irrational argument because the only way a miracle—a supernatural event (and that word literally means “beyond natural”)—can exist is by breaking natural law. In other words, a miracle by its very nature is not bound to natural law. It’s a similar argument made when atheists demand we somehow prove God’s existence with science. First of all, they don’t understand science at all, because the point of science is not to “prove” anything; the point of science—that is, the scientific method—is to observe natural occurrences through testing and experimentation. Yet God is supernatural, which again, the word literally means “beyond natural.” God, by His very nature, cannot be observed, tested, or experimented with through natural means because He is literally beyond the natural. So, by asking us to prove God’s existence through science, they are asking not only a stupid but also impossible question since science is bound to natural law and is fundamentally limited in its observations since it cannot be utilised to observe what is beyond natural observation, whether that be God, angels, or demons. They know it’s an impossible question, which is why they ask it, because they know we can’t prove God’s existence. But it's not a rational argument they're making; it's an emotional one.
But I digress. What we CAN prove, and has been proven through historical documentation and archaeology—as Maier delineates quite well in this book—is that Jesus, who is God incarnate, is a historical figure and was not only born and crucified but is also risen from the dead. Our proof is that the tomb is empty. Others have their theories, of course, as to how Jesus cannot be risen from the dead, which Maier covers succinctly well in these pages; but just like evolution, they remain unproven theories and conjectures, not fact. Thus, with history and archaeology as empirical witnesses to the historicity of Jesus, who is God in the flesh, it nonetheless proves the existence of God. Of course, this is all believed by faith, not reason, but no more faith than it takes to believe that we evolved from pond scum.
The remainder of the book covers the lives of the early Christians, primarily the Book of Acts. Like the other sections, this part of the book is easy and fun to read because it reads as a story, which makes history much more interesting to read. It's my preferred style of how historians write history because history really is the story of humanity. That's why some people say "History means HIS-story," which is a ridiculous statement because the word "history" derives from Greek word "histor," which means "learned" or "wise." Anyway, Maier continues to provide helpful archaeological photos and extra-biblical documented evidence of early Christianity, and he also includes helpful maps of Paul’s missionary journeys.
My only critique is quite minor. Maier bases his book on Christmas, Lent, Easter, and Pentecost because “they celebrate the most crucial foundations of Christianity in the incarnation and nativity, the passion and resurrection, and the explosive birth and growth of the early church” (p. 20). But he forgets one crucial element of the Church’s growth: the ascension of our Lord. It’s difficult to speak of Pentecost without also celebrating the ascension of our Lord. Indeed, Pentecost is entirely predicated on Jesus’ ascension. It is Christ in His ascension who continues the ministry of Word & Sacrament given first to His Apostles, who then passed this down to the Church and her selected pastors. It is rather unfortunate, then, that the feast day of the Ascension of Our Lord continues to be treated as a footnote in history rather than the climax it is just before the falling action of the Acts of the Apostles, which continues today, until the resolution of Christ's Parousia. Although I do admit that Jesus’ ascension would be rather difficult to prove outside the New Testament, let alone archaeology, which are plausible reasons to leave out of a book with such focuses. Still, though, the statement remains incomplete when leaving His ascension out of “the most crucial foundations of Christianity.”
But as usual, I’m just being nit-picky. There is no better way to conclude this review than with the closing thoughts from Maier himself, “Though at the time the Christian cause seemed persecuted—burned, crucified, beheaded, and even beaten out of existence by the greatest power in the world—a greater power was at work that would see Christianity conquer Rome in little more than two centuries, and ‘the ends of the earth’ after that, in Jesus’s own prediction. It was Christ, not Caesar, who conquered the future” (p. 417). It is the same tale that the new Rome, America, will tell, as this empire increasingly opposes Christ and His Church. Despite all that we are facing today, and may face in the future, the Church will emerge victorious from the annals of human history because of Christ’s own victory over death and the grave, upon which His Church is built.
He opens the book with helpful overviews of caricatures of Jesus that have no shred of historical or archaeological evidence, and others that have been written as fiction but for some reason readers—due to poor reading comprehension—have passed off as truth. For example, the book "Holy Blood, Holy Grail" published by three British authors claim that Jesus married Mary Magdalene, whose daughter married into the Merovingian dynasty. If this sounds familiar, it’s because Dan Brown says the same thing in "The Da Vinci Code." The authors of "Holy Blood, Holy Grail" actually sued him for plagiarism, but unfortunately the judge dismissed the case. All the authors claim to have done meticulous research, but no honest scholar has taken their claims seriously because there’s no shred of evidence for their claims.
Another caricature you might be familiar with is the Jesus Seminar where 60-70 radical theologians basically met twice a year and voted on whether Jesus actually said the things He said in the Gospels. Their methodology is incredibly biased, and they have been denounced by the scholarly community. Perhaps my favourite caricature—if we can have a favourite—because of its hilarious absurdity, is British scholar John Allegro’s claim in his book, "The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross," that the stories about Jesus, His disciples, and even David and Moses were invented by a fertility cult who got high on a phallic shaped mushroom called Amanita muscaria that’s red-topped and white-flecked. If you’re laughing with me, then you’re laughing with his scholarly colleagues because they all dismissed his book as a “scholarly hoax” or a “philologist’s erotic nightmare" (p. 24).
There are both coloured and black-and-white photographs to help show you what the world was like that Jesus and His disciples lived in, so if you like picture books, this book is for you! Despite its density, the book is really easy to read. Any layperson can pick up this book and read it and learn a lot. I would recommend that every serious Christian have this book on their shelf as part of their apologetic arsenal. Maier does an expert job at delineating how the Gospels are grounded in human history surrounded by historical figures who actually lived and historical events that actually happened. The book makes quite evident that Christianity truly is the only world religion that has empirical history as its ally.
The middle section of the book covers important historical figures and sites that confirm Jesus’ existence, a lot of helpful cultural explanations, and common criticisms made against Jesus’ historicity by atheists. One example is the fallacy that Jesus’ name doesn’t show up in any other sources outside the New Testament in the century after His death. Such a thing is said only due to historical ignorance, and they aren’t very well-read, because the Roman authors Tacitus, Suetonius, and Pliny, as well as the Jewish historian Josephus, all mention Jesus by name that corroborate with the entire New Testament account of Him. Another one atheists say is, “There is no hill in Nazareth from which Jesus could’ve been tossed,” referring to Luke 4:16-30 when the people of Nazareth wanted to throw Jesus down a cliff overlooking the valley of Jezreel. They can only say this due to geographical ignorance. Maier provides a decent photo in the book to show how hilly Nazareth is, and I can personally attest that yes, there is such a hill from which they would’ve tossed Jesus. I personally stood on the Mount of Precipitation—also called Mount Precipice—overlooking the valley of Jezreel that went down at a 45-degree angle with a bunch of sharply eroded rocks that certainly could’ve killed Jesus if they succeeded. I have personal photographs of it, which you can view here: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?s.... So, these atheists, as usual, have no idea what they’re talking about.
Another common objection is Jesus’ miracles, similar to the atheist’s demand that we prove the existence of God. They argue with David Hume that miracles are impossible since natural law cannot be violated, which is an irrational argument because the only way a miracle—a supernatural event (and that word literally means “beyond natural”)—can exist is by breaking natural law. In other words, a miracle by its very nature is not bound to natural law. It’s a similar argument made when atheists demand we somehow prove God’s existence with science. First of all, they don’t understand science at all, because the point of science is not to “prove” anything; the point of science—that is, the scientific method—is to observe natural occurrences through testing and experimentation. Yet God is supernatural, which again, the word literally means “beyond natural.” God, by His very nature, cannot be observed, tested, or experimented with through natural means because He is literally beyond the natural. So, by asking us to prove God’s existence through science, they are asking not only a stupid but also impossible question since science is bound to natural law and is fundamentally limited in its observations since it cannot be utilised to observe what is beyond natural observation, whether that be God, angels, or demons. They know it’s an impossible question, which is why they ask it, because they know we can’t prove God’s existence. But it's not a rational argument they're making; it's an emotional one.
But I digress. What we CAN prove, and has been proven through historical documentation and archaeology—as Maier delineates quite well in this book—is that Jesus, who is God incarnate, is a historical figure and was not only born and crucified but is also risen from the dead. Our proof is that the tomb is empty. Others have their theories, of course, as to how Jesus cannot be risen from the dead, which Maier covers succinctly well in these pages; but just like evolution, they remain unproven theories and conjectures, not fact. Thus, with history and archaeology as empirical witnesses to the historicity of Jesus, who is God in the flesh, it nonetheless proves the existence of God. Of course, this is all believed by faith, not reason, but no more faith than it takes to believe that we evolved from pond scum.
The remainder of the book covers the lives of the early Christians, primarily the Book of Acts. Like the other sections, this part of the book is easy and fun to read because it reads as a story, which makes history much more interesting to read. It's my preferred style of how historians write history because history really is the story of humanity. That's why some people say "History means HIS-story," which is a ridiculous statement because the word "history" derives from Greek word "histor," which means "learned" or "wise." Anyway, Maier continues to provide helpful archaeological photos and extra-biblical documented evidence of early Christianity, and he also includes helpful maps of Paul’s missionary journeys.
My only critique is quite minor. Maier bases his book on Christmas, Lent, Easter, and Pentecost because “they celebrate the most crucial foundations of Christianity in the incarnation and nativity, the passion and resurrection, and the explosive birth and growth of the early church” (p. 20). But he forgets one crucial element of the Church’s growth: the ascension of our Lord. It’s difficult to speak of Pentecost without also celebrating the ascension of our Lord. Indeed, Pentecost is entirely predicated on Jesus’ ascension. It is Christ in His ascension who continues the ministry of Word & Sacrament given first to His Apostles, who then passed this down to the Church and her selected pastors. It is rather unfortunate, then, that the feast day of the Ascension of Our Lord continues to be treated as a footnote in history rather than the climax it is just before the falling action of the Acts of the Apostles, which continues today, until the resolution of Christ's Parousia. Although I do admit that Jesus’ ascension would be rather difficult to prove outside the New Testament, let alone archaeology, which are plausible reasons to leave out of a book with such focuses. Still, though, the statement remains incomplete when leaving His ascension out of “the most crucial foundations of Christianity.”
But as usual, I’m just being nit-picky. There is no better way to conclude this review than with the closing thoughts from Maier himself, “Though at the time the Christian cause seemed persecuted—burned, crucified, beheaded, and even beaten out of existence by the greatest power in the world—a greater power was at work that would see Christianity conquer Rome in little more than two centuries, and ‘the ends of the earth’ after that, in Jesus’s own prediction. It was Christ, not Caesar, who conquered the future” (p. 417). It is the same tale that the new Rome, America, will tell, as this empire increasingly opposes Christ and His Church. Despite all that we are facing today, and may face in the future, the Church will emerge victorious from the annals of human history because of Christ’s own victory over death and the grave, upon which His Church is built.
February 23, 2023
Excellent survey of the life of Jesus and the immediate years following his death on the cross. Many sources of information are cited and explained. A balanced, studious approach.
July 2, 2022
A fascinating book that follows the gospels chronologically. Maier shows the evidence known to us at the moment to support the gospels historicity. But I will caution that this may not be the book for you if you are against the gospels being historical. I say this because he writes with a strong positive bias that might push readers away. A great read for those trying to strengthen their belief or are curious what evidence Christians possess.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews