Overview

What Noam Chomsky did for political commentary, and Stephen Hawking did for cosmology, Donald Harman Akenson does for the Bible and its interpreters - and the resulting conclusions are just as astounding. ""Surpassing Wonder"" illuminates how the greatest cultural artifacts of our civilization are related to one another and constitute the very core of our consciousness. With biting irreverence for denominational prejudices and the pretensions of academics, Akenson renews our sense of awe before these religious works. He challenges received doctrines, arguing that the ancient Jews were indeed idol worshippers and that Saint Paul did not believe in the bodily resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth or in the virgin birth. With wit, elegance and clarity ""Surpassing Wonder"" makes the ancient Hebrew scriptures, the Christian New Testament, and the Talmuds of the Rabbis accessible to all and shows they can be understood only in relation to each other and against their specific historical settings. Akenson argues that each of the great texts must be considered as the product of a single author and thus as a religious invention - that is, as a self-consciously formed unity rather than an anthology of disparate works. He also argues that the great inventor of the Hebrew scriptures should be credited with constructing the very concept of narrative history and thus the foundations of Western civilization. Using a rich and imagistic language that combines tractor mechanics, Winnie-the-Pooh and architecture with analogies from astronomy, evolutionary biology and economics, Akenson brings about nothing less than a radical reformation of how to think about the sacred texts. He restores their spiritual power through a just appreciation of the achievement of their authors while leaving readers to decide for themselves on the presence of a ""guiding hand"". ""Surpassing Wonder"" is a penetrating study of the historian's craft and a brilliant expose of how theologians and biblical scholars abuse historical reasoning and evidence in their treatment of the sacred texts. Just as a previous reformation cast out the priestly intercessors, so Akenson casts the scholars out of the temple and lets readers in to see the texts anew. In so doing he reinvests religion with meaning for a contemporary world and shows us how Western civilization was created not by the Greeks of Athens or the patricians of Rome but by the desert worshipppers of Yahweh.

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"""Akenson's interpretation of these classics is a promising start for anyone. He encourages serious, holistic reading by word and example. Religious believers may be enriched by the exposition of the ""surpassing wonder"" of these human inventions, even if dissatisfied by the bracketing of some tenets of their respective faiths. Cultural critics may find an entree into a more mature conversation with some texts that live on in our culture. Most important, this book will guide and stimulate ordinary readers to read on."" Anthony J. Saldarini in The New York Times ""Even though something on the order of a million books have already been written about the Bible, Surpassing Wonder is in no way redundant. Its central arguments are powerful and unusual, and its ample endnotes and appendices alone are worth the cover price: They provide a succinct overview of just about everything anyone needs to know to pursue serious self-education in the subjects it treats, including a knockout critique of Northrop Frye's The Great Code."" T.F. Rigelhoff in The Globe and Mail."

Venturing as an amateur into biblical and Judaic studies, historian Akenson (Queen's University, Ontario) constructs a brilliant integrative theory of continuities and parallels between Hebrew scripture, the New Testament, and rabbinic Judaism. Within today's complex world of biblical interpretation, Akenson's book falls under the rubric of canonical criticism: the extrapolation of meanings and intents from the final (canonical) forms sacred scriptures assumed. By his own terms for his project - to uncover the grammar of biblical invention - Akenson means to highlight both his theological neutrality on the issue of divine biblical inspiration and his awe-filled regard for the genius of the Jewish and Christian inventors : the author/editors who shaped the disparate materials they received, both oral and written, into literary masterpieces that met historically conditioned spiritual needs. The central need in question, according to Akenson, was to replace the temple of Jerusalem, destroyed first by the Babylonians in 587 B.C., and then again by the Romans in 70 A.D., with texts whose ideas could substitute for the temple-based ritual sacrifices. Temple-substitution is the common template over which Akenson lays Hebrew scripture, the New Testament, and the rabbinic literature, with startling and provocative results. The Torah, or first five books of Moses, traditionally most revered by Jews, becomes a relatively late, politically motivated extract out of a prior unit of nine books (Genesis through Kings, in the Hebrew Bible); the physically resurrected Christ becomes a biblically ungrammatical aberrancy; and rabbininc Judaism emerges as the younger sibling of Christianity. The intellectual shocks are hugely instructive (St. Paul conceived in relation to the gospels as the Mishnah to the Talmud), entertaining (Ecclesiastes as camped-up staginess ), and conciliatory - for ultimately, Akenson hopes to reinvigorate Jewish-Christian dialogue with shared wonder over the literary ploys of genial scriptural redactors working common themes to opposite effect. Akenson successfully reproduces, in microcosm, an ancient world of scriptural ideas that he rightly calls one of the greatest intellectual air shows ever conducted. (Kirkus Reviews)

Akenson's interpretation of these classics is a promising start for anyone. He encourages serious, holistic reading by word and example. Religious believers may be enriched by the exposition of the 'surpassing wonder' of these human inventions, even if dissatisfied by the bracketing of some tenets of their respective faiths. Cultural critics may find an entree into a more mature conversation with some texts that live on in our culture. Most important, this book will guide and stimulate ordinary readers to read on. Anthony J. Saldarini in The New York Times Even though something on the order of a million books have already been written about the Bible, Surpassing Wonder is in no way redundant. Its central arguments are powerful and unusual, and its ample endnotes and appendices alone are worth the cover price: They provide a succinct overview of just about everything anyone needs to know to pursue serious self-education in the subjects it treats, including a knockout critique of Northrop Frye's The Great Code. T.F. Rigelhoff in The Globe and Mail.

Akenson's interpretation of these classics is a promising start for anyone. He encourages serious, holistic reading by word and example. Religious believers may be enriched by the exposition of the ''surpassing wonder'' of these human inventions, even if dissatisfied by the bracketing of some tenets of their respective faiths. Cultural critics may find an entree into a more mature conversation with some texts that live on in our culture. Most important, this book will guide and stimulate ordinary readers to read on. Anthony J. Saldarini in The New York Times Even though something on the order of a million books have already been written about the Bible, Surpassing Wonder is in no way redundant. Its central arguments are powerful and unusual, and its ample endnotes and appendices alone are worth the cover price: They provide a succinct overview of just about everything anyone needs to know to pursue serious self-education in the subjects it treats, including a knockout critique of Northrop Frye's The Great Code. T.F. Rigelhoff in The Globe and Mail.

Author Information

Donald Harman Akenson is Douglas Professor of Canadian and Colonial History at Queen's University.

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