Archive for the ‘Religious Studies’ Category

	Paperback: 190 pages Publisher: Fontana Books (January 1, 1960) Language: English ISBN-10: 0020868103 ISBN-13: 978-0020868101	Order from here:

This novel, written by C. S. Lewis is a good primer for introducing Christianity.  He covers the meaning of the Universe, Moral Laws, Marriage, etc.  He then goes into what Christians believe, how Christians should behave.   I liked this book.  I”m not sure however, if I would have gotten more out of it than I did, if I were a non-believer.  I liked many of the concepts, and believe in many of the ideas he presented.  However, I’m a different mindset possibly than the person the book was geared toward.  While I can see it’s value as  primer, it seemed a bit outdated to me.  Some of the concepts, while sticking true to biblical principles, would seem a bit naive in todays society.   If your someone on the edge, pick this up.  It might help you a bit.  Even if your just starting in your spiritual journey, you might find something useful in it.  Pick it up and see what you think. 

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	Paperback: 304 pages Publisher: Schocken (April 2, 1996) Language: English ISBN-10: 0805210636 ISBN-13: 978-09805210637	Order from here:

Like his previous work, Mr. Sarna combines Biblical passages with history and culture of the time period.  This time around, it looks at the book of Exodus.  I was able to learn many interesting things through reading this.  

One example he covers is that of the Staff turning into snakes.  There is a snake known as <em>naja hage</em>.  This is a certain type of snake where, when a nerve is pressed on the back of the neck, becomes stiff like a rod.  When thrown to the ground, the shock snaps it out of it’s paralysis and it crawls off.   In the biblical story however, they didn’t count on Moses snake swallowing the other snakes.

Mr. Sarna also goes into detail on a therory of the 10 plagues, and how each plague, and the resulting environmental problems, led to the next plague.  Lke his book on Genesis, this brings a lot of the history of the time period alive.  I learned a lot about the behind the scenes stuff, especially on aspects like the parting of the Sea of Reeds that I didn’t know before.

I’d recommend this book to any person interested in understanding the bible better, or wanting to learn about the events in their historical context.  It certainly answers a lot of the questions I have, and I think you’d find it helpful as well.

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	Paperback: 320 pages Publisher: Schocken (January 13, 1970) Language: English ISBN-10: 0805202536 ISBN-13: 978-0805202533	Order from here:

This book came in pretty helpful in helping to understand Genesis in the Historical context.    First written in 1966, Mr. Sarna covers the whole creation story, filling in all the cracks that sometimes raises questions with people.   He begins with describing how the biblical stories differ from mytholies.  One reason is that in myths, there’s always a biography for the god, and a birth of the god.  This is contrasted with the Abrahamic God, where there is nothing regarding his birth or coming into being, he just is. 

He points out in the beginning that attempting to explain the bible with science, and science with the bible is a futile effort.   Biblical man did not use all the scientific methods we use, nor record things as we do.  Morals, history, etc. was passed down as stories, poetry, songs, etc.  Hebrew history was always a word of mouth tradition, passed on from person to person.  A lot of groups within our culture are the same.  If you remember Roots, Alex Haley met a man from his tribe who’s job it was to remember the entire history of the tribe from the beginning and recite it.  My own personal thought on that is that while civilizations can destroy the written history, as long as people survive from a culture and can pass those stories on to others verbally, the history will survive.

He covers every major occurrence in the book of Genesis from Creation, to the flood.   Everything though is shown in both a spiritual and historical sense.  For example, the tower of Babel was not necessarily a history of how language came about.  It was a story about man not obeying God.   The people of Israel after the flood had been told to go forth among the world, but in Babel they all began to congregate in one area, thereby disobeying God.  So they were punished and forced to go into separate areas of the world. 

I really liked this book.  For me it made the whole book of Genesis much more believable than it had been in the past.  I’d always struggled with the difference between the biblical stories, and with ancient mythologies.  This helped me settle a lot of those questions by putting things in a historical perspective.   Seeing how the Hebrews thought and about their culture during this time period, and then reading Genesis, it really seemed more alive to me.

I’d definitely recommend this book for anyone struggling to understand the older books of the Bible.  I think you need to keep an open mind while reading it, but if you do, that things will make much more sense.  Pick it up if you get the chance, and let me know what you think.

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	Paperback: 112 pages Publisher: HarperOne (February 6, 2001) Language: English ISBN-10: 0060652381 ISBN-13: 978-0060652388	Order from here:

This was written after the death of C.S. Lewis’ wife from cancer.   As the book progresses, he covers the different stages of Grief.  He also covers how his relationship with God changes during the course of his grief.   I think this book would be helpful to anyone experience grief, especially on helping to get through it.  Having lost people, I could relate to his feelings, and to the different stages he was going through.  The one problem that I did have, was the language was a little beyond that of the casual reader.   The book is also not pleasant, due to the subject matter. 

One area for example, he talks about the danger of falling into the trap of what the loved one would do.  He stated he found that he’d often find himself saying “H. Wouldn’t like that”, or “That’s what H. Would do”.  His caution is that you can fall into using it as domestic tyranny.  For example, a single parent raising a child would fall into a pattern of “Your mother wouldn’t like that”.  I could see his point, because it almost seems abusive. 

If your going through grief, or know someone who is, pick this up.  I think it might help.  If your looking for a feel good book that, I’d suggest something along a different line.  The book was very well written, even though the language at times gave me problems.  I would however recommend it.

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