Asimov's Guide to the Bible: Complete Two-Volume Set - Old & New Testaments Explained | Perfect for Bible Study, Historical Research & Christian Education

Isaac Asimov's "Guide to the Bible" is one of the best works to get a grasp of the large and complicated book, the Bible. Asimov is out to put the Bible in concrete historical terms and explain what was happening sans mysticism or superstition. Asimov takes many liberties in trying to explain occurrences giving them rational or scientific validation and these as he usually will admit should be just taken as possibilities. Asimov does put events into an historical context, which he does well. Nothing, as Asimov said, is really new his writing and most of it has been said before but the conciseness of it was worth while. Asimov paints Jesus as a spin master in Mathew rather than take him at his word, which as things went along does have a prophetic quality, although Asimov doesn't pursue this. Also Asimov doesn't discount the reality that a few people were profoundly moved by the reserection, or what they believed to be one. He seems to hold up Mark as the most historically accurate Gospel Luke and Mathew each had a spin to put on and John is totally political with little if any historical accuracy in his, Asimov's, view. Revelations is about things that have happened on the ground recently, with the strong possibility that it is talking about the Christian persecution by Nero and other things in the recent past or predictions about the near future and 666 is Greek alphabetical code meaning Nero.There is probably a better historical interpretation of the Bible, but I don't know what that would be, it would seem there should be. This was pretty good, but again Asimov does do a lot of guessing and scientific explaininations as well as good historical research - the two need to be taken seperately. For instance Asimov speculates that St Paul went blind due to an epileptic siezure and then, at least partially, rejects that idea by saying that a man who did as much traveling as Paul must be in the finest shape - he just grasps at straws. Some of Asimov's ideas were far off track, and yet some obvious points that support Jesus as Messiah were not pursued at all.Asimov refers to the fact that the founders of Christianity really thought of them selves as Jews, Christians are Jews it is a question of semantics (Pagans would see little difference); so the Roman Emperor Constantine converted to Judaism which I think to Paul would be a prophetic if not a miraculous conclusion. He leaves his book saying that some dramatic conclusion was expectant yet didn't happen and seems to mock believers for this, yet 350 years after Caligula tried to build a statue of himself as god in the Temple of Jerusalem a Roman Emporer converts to Judaism.