Zealot

I’ve seen Reza Aslan on The Daily Show over the years, so I knew that he was an author that I needed to check out. I didn’t find the time, however, until his latest book, Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth, came out earlier this summer. As I’d expected, he’s an author worth reading.

Aslan, who has degrees in creative writing as well as a master's from Harvard Divinity School and a Ph.D. in Sociology of Religions from the University of California at Riverside, begins by emphasizing that his book, the result of twenty years of research and study, is about the historical Jesus, not about the supposed son of God. In other words, Aslan is interested in finding out as much as he can about the physical man who lived some 2,000 years ago and is not interested in debating whether or not that man was a manifestation of a deity.

Judea of 2,000 years ago, Aslan points out, was aflame with Jewish rebellion against the oppressive rule of Rome. Many prophets wandered through the land, declaring themselves God, or the son of God, and trying to lead a revolt to free the Jewish people. The Romans, and the Jewish ruling class that owed its privilege to the Romans, promptly executed—usually through crucifixion—nearly all of those rebels before they could stir up too much trouble. (Crucifixion, in fact, was the punishment specifically reserved for non-citizens who espoused sedition against Rome.) A problem for any scholar of the period, however, is that almost nothing is known about any one of these prophets, including the most famous of all, Jesus of Nazareth, although a lot is known about them collectively because of the meticulous records-keeping of the Romans. Consequently, to learn about Jesus, Aslan must rely on inference based on his study of the political, economic, religious, and social conditions of that period. Aslan’s central question, then, is how did a Jewish radical, one who advocated for kneeling only to the Kingdom of God, become transformed into the son of God? How did Jesus the man become Jesus the Messiah?

Although his book is rigorously documented (his bibliography runs to sixteen pages), Aslan writes in a colloquial style for the general reader. For example, here he describes what a typical Jewish man arriving at the Temple in Jerusalem would see:

The money changers play a vital role in the Temple. For a fee, they will exchange your foul foreign coins for the Hebrew shekel, the only currency permitted by the Temple authorities. The money changers will also collect the half-shekel Temple tax that all adult males must pay to preserve the pomp and spectacle you see around you: the mountains of incense and ceaseless sacrifices, the wine libations and the first-fruits offerings, the Levite choir belting out psalms of praises and the accompanying orchestra thrumming lyres and belting cymbals.

This straightforward, unadorned style allows Aslan to make his points directly and clearly so that his book's emphasis remains on his argument, which is that Jesus was a dangerous radical who posed a threat to Rome's rule of Judea. He adds, perhaps controversially, that Jesus’s mission should be seen as a failure since, according to Jewish tradition, the messiah would be a living man, proclaimed “King of the Jews,” who would expel the Romans and restore the purity of Judea for the Chosen People. Instead, the Romans crucified Jesus and, following a large-scale rebellion forty years later, razed the Temple in Jerusalem and exiled the Jews from Judea.

Zealot is divided into three parts: Part One covers the birth and early years of Jesus and also explains the rise of zealots during these years (the term refers to Jewish nationalists, full of “zeal,” who swore strict allegiance to the Torah and vowed never to kneel before any but the One God); Part Two begins by describing Jesus’s radical acts, such as attacking the money changers at the Temple, before then explaining exactly why the Jewish and Roman authorities saw such acts as heresies against the Jewish religion and sedition against Rome; and Part Three focuses on the years immediately following Jesus’s crucifixion, in which, Aslan writes, “a failed messiah who died a shameful death as a state criminal” became transformed into “God incarnate.”

Regardless of your faith, or lack of faith, Aslan’s book is a fascinating account of life in Judea 2,000 years ago and, as such, is worth reading.

(After I wrote this review in June, Zealot sparked much controversy, especially following an inflammatory Fox News interview with Aslan).