|
Jesus for President: Politics for Ordinary Radicals | 
 enlarge | Authors: Shane Claiborne, Chris Haw
Publisher: Zondervan Publishing Company
Category: Book
List Price: $16.99
Buy New: $10.09
You Save: $6.90 (41%)
New (24) Used (9) from $10.09
Avg. Customer Rating:  16 reviews
Sales Rank: 1172
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 348
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 7.9 x 6 x 1.2
ISBN: 0310278422
Dewey Decimal Number: 261.70973
EAN: 9780310278429
ASIN: 0310278422
Publication Date: March 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: Brand New, Perfect Condition, Please allow 4-14 business days for delivery. 100% Money Back Guarantee, Over 1,000,000 customers served.
|
| Similar Items:
|
| Editorial Reviews:
Book Description
Amid all the buzz of politics and elections, Jesus for President is a refreshing reminder that our ultimate hope lies not in partisan political options but in the Jesus who gave his life for us. Politics for ordinary radicals who want to love the world into the kingdom of God.
|
| Customer Reviews: Read 11 more reviews...
 Powerful book May 12, 2008
Let me just say that the book is a powerhouse. The book covers a lot of ground in relatively little text (it seems long but the font is huge and there are illustrations all over the place). Someone made the decision that the book should be wildly decorative, which I actually thought worked well with the content, because it's definitely not meant to be chewed over academically - rather the book itself is a challenge to transform/re-form/envision and act and live in faith, hope, and love. Shane and Chris write in a disarmingly simple and direct fashion, sharing with joy and patience a vision and stories of what the Christian faith could look like in modern times (in this case, we're talking America, militarism, and global capitalism). Many wonder why we, as a body, often look so much like the world around us. The authors challenge us to take up our crosses and follow a King who served with a towel and announced a Kingdom that was not of this world. The power of relentless imagination, transformed thinking, and the living experience of struggling to follow Jesus jump out from the pages.
As I mentioned, Shane and Chris go into a lot of different things - providing snapshots of what transformed life can be. They cover topics ranging from incarnational community to reimagined economics, and amazingly they had a lot meaningful things to say. Contents range from arrest experiences of various Christian peacemakers (like a seventy-something year old nun), to excerpts from early-church writers. I'd say the book is a quick read (really a page-turner, like Irresistible Revolution) but it's also loaded with life-changing possibility. Certainly I'd say it's not easy to read J4P and remain complacent. Perhaps one of the most important ways the book spoke to me was as a reminder that while following Jesus might call for sacrifice, we know that we don't sacrifice for asceticism's sake, but because we seek another Kingdom (and quite a beautiful one at that). There is grace and joy in the journey =).
Anyhow I don't review stuff on amazon much but I thought this one deserved a review.
God is a Theocrat May 5, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
This year (2008) is an election year. And, this means that every politician and political party will play the "Christian" card sooner or later. But, God does not align himself to any political party. The early church did not either. "Jesus is Lord" is a statement that asserts that Caesar is not. It proclaims that modernism, post-modernism, democracy, the president, and America is not Lord. Therefore, we should be shaped by our true Lord rather than the false ones.
Jesus for President May 3, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
This book pealed off a thick layer of...whatever that I've been looking at Jesus through for most of my life. So many misguided ideas my friends and I in the church have had about what it means to follow Christ were exposed. Violence, self-reliance, individualism, financial security, patriotism - what did Jesus really say about them? Be prepared to ask yourself how so many of us could have been so wrong for so long. Jesus said, "My kingdom is not of this world." His kingdom is so different, so completely revolutionary to the way of this world's governments and corporate empires. He did not come to improve our jacked up societies; he came to "make all things new!" So it only makes sense that we would have to become like little children - relearn life - not only to "enter" but even to "see" that kingdom. In fact, his way seems impossible & absurd until we've stripped off what we think we already know (then we wonder how we could have ever been so insane - to think that the way of empire could ever really be the answer). Jesus said, "You don't pour new wine into old wineskins...You pour new wine into new wineskins." Thank you Shane, Chris, Holly, & Ryan for the new wineskins! "Know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain."
 It's Sad: Legitimate theological issues are hampered by awful logic. April 29, 2008
5 out of 9 found this review helpful
I borrowed this book from a friend of mine and because of the subject matter I spent a great deal of time working my way through it in an attempt to evaluate it as honestly as I could. Some of the authors' ideas and positions (a more community based Christian Church and non-violence) have merit and are worth further exploration. If you like these ideas, I recommend you read an essay by Theodore Koontz titled "Christian Nonviolence: An Interpretation." I really do think these are points that are worthy of consideration.
That said the logic, scholarship, facts, reasoning, and rhetoric in Jesus for President is awful. If this book were written as a persuasive essay, any good professor would fail the authors. Two logical fallacies that the authors make are circular reasoning and the straw man fallacy. On pages 67-69, the authors argue that because within the gospels Christ uses words that have political connotations within the Roman/Greek world there is an inherently political nature in Christ's teaching. These are terms like "evangelion," "Savior," "Lord," and "Emmanuel." The problem is that Christ would have spoken in Aramaic and Christ himself did not write the gospels. His disciples and followers wrote the gospels down somewhere between 30-80 years after his death and resurrection. When the gospels were written they were intended for a mostly Greek/Roman world audience so the authors translated Christ's words into the language and terms that the Greek/Roman world understood and identified with. This is very similar to modern publishing. There are British and American versions of the Harry Potter books. The reason is that there are terms and idioms within the British version that the American audience will not understand, so the publisher translates the novel from British English to a more American English. The writers of the gospels did the same thing. They used terms and idioms that their target audience would understand. Therefore, this means that the authors' argument that Christ used political language is based on a translation and writing technique that only leads around in circles. It is possible that Christ did use political language, perhaps even some of the terms the authors credit to him, but we cannot determine so from this argument. While they don't always commit this particular fallacy in reference to Biblical passages the authors do often impose a modern understanding of politics and life on Biblical passages rather than evaluating them in the original context.
The straw man logical fallacy is where you misrepresent the other side's position so it will be easier to argue against it. The authors commit this error numerous times. One good example is on page 106. Here they assume what all people mean in a specific statement. "In regard to Christian politics, some might say, "Sure my citizenship is ultimately in heaven, but I have to live in the `real' world now." In other words acting heavenly on earth is too risky; or, Jesus was the Son of God, but he was not realistic; or, following the Sermon on the Mount will not work on earth, so it will have to suffice in heaven. This interpretation basically comes to mean that my citizenship in heaven means nothing in the real world." The reason this is a misrepresentation is that people could and do mean several different things by "live in the `real' world." Couldn't they simply mean the earth is not heaven? Couldn't they mean that what Christ says is an ideal that does not exist on earth? I sometimes use this phrase and I have never meant it this way. I have always understood it to mean something like that in this `real' world (which includes many more places than luxury loaded America) there are people who are in horrific situations where they will have to choose between two evils. This is far from an ideal thing and is certainly not good; but problems and questions like this really do exist and need resolution. I find it irresponsible and arrogant for those of us in peaceful, free countries (America and the western world especially) to assume our definition of the `real' world is something that applies everywhere else.
The authors also commit internal factorial inconstancies on pages 281 and 331. On page 281 the authors cite a specific source and claim that as of 2006 there have been 654,965 civilian deaths in Iraq since the US invasion. While this figure sounded a bit inflated to me, knowing the exact number of war related deaths in Iraq is a near impossibility, so I was willing to accept it may be right. However, on page 331 the authors explicitly state, "And publicly remember the Iraqis (around one million) who have died since the US invasion of 2003." So somehow in fifty pages another 350,000 people died? Which figure is right and why does this discrepancy exist?
An additional example of this book's factorial inconstancies occurs on pages 184 and 256. On page 184 the authors state that 36% of the US government's budget ($0.36 of every dollar of tax paid) goes to the Department of Defense or Military. Then on page 256 they claim that nearly half of every tax dollar goes the Department of Defense. So which percentage is it? Is it 36% or something close to 50%?
Both of these inconstancies could have any number of explanations that are not malicious, and I am not accusing the authors of deliberately misrepresenting the facts. They (the facts) could be a hazard of having dual authorship, a lazy editor, or the use of multiple, conflicting sources for the same information. The reason I am pointing out these inconstancies is that they suggest the authors did not do their homework, take the material seriously, or did not know very much about the subject they were discussing.
In addition, several 'facts' in the book are just wrong. Calling AK-47s US made weapons (they're Russian, you can look it up on Wikipida), claims made about Biblical passages and history that scholars and historians will heavily dispute, and a statement on page 178 that the US has the greatest stockpile of nuclear weapons in the world (once again it's Russia) all weaken the authors' arguments. Anyone of these errors in facts or logic could be forgiven individually, but taken collectively they are quite condemning. Is it really reasonable to take the arguments of anyone seriously if he cannot get simple facts right and disagrees with himself?
These errors do not mean the authors' main points are invalid. But it does seem they did not do the basic research needed for a high school essay, much less a published book. For this reason alone, I will not recommend this book to anyone. Read the essay I mentioned above as it supports many of the same positions and commits none of the fallacies these authors do. I really do wish these authors had written a better book as arguing poorly for these points helps no one and brings us no where.
One of the best of our time... April 21, 2008
3 out of 5 found this review helpful
Claiborne and Haw present one of the most thorough representations of what kind of impact Christianity can have in this world. Time and time again the author finds themselves thinking, "Wow, that's a really tough concept."
Exactly.
Jesus claimed that if we desire to follow him, we must take up our cross and follow after Him. This requires things like forgiving others, turning the other cheek, and actually praying for those that seek to do violence towards us. Claiborne and Haw leave no table unturned as they show the relationship between Church and State (ancient, past, and present) and how we ended up in the mess we're in.
Kudos to these men for playing the role of prophet to a Church that doesn't want to hear it and a world that is dying to.
|
|
|
Powered by Associate-O-Matic
| |
