History & Christianity

by John Warwick Montgomery

Book Overview

A vigorous, convincing presentation of the evidence for a historical Jesus. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0877844372
• Release Date: January 1971
• Publisher: InterVarsity Press
• Length: 110 Pages
• Weight: 0.24 lbs.

Customer Reviews

THE MOST POPULAR APOLOGETICS WORK BY A MAJOR PHILOSOPHICAL APOLOGIST

John Warwick Montgomery (b. 1931) is one of the major philosophical apologists of the 20th century. He is also a trained lawyer, which influenced his "historical/legal" approach to Christian apologetics. He is perhaps best known as a writer for his book History and Christianity, as well as for his debates with the infamous atheist Madalyn Murray O'Hair (1967), with the "Death of God" theologian Thomas Altizer (reprinted in Montgomery's book The Suicide of Christian Theology), as well as with Joseph Fletcher, who wrote the book Situation Ethics, The New Morality. (The Montgomery/Fletcher debate is reprinted in Situation ethics; true or false?: A dialogue between Joseph Fletcher and John Warwick Montgomery (Dimension books).) This brief (110 pages) book began in 1963 as two lectures, which were subsequently expanded into four articles in HIS Magazine in 1964-1965. C.S. Lewis even wrote a letter (one of the very last Lewis wrote) to Montgomery, lauding the book (the letter is printed in the book). Josh McDowell's Evidence That Demands a Verdict gave a lot of attention to Montgomery's book, as well. Here are some representative quotations from the book: "This is not to say that New Testament writers did not ever employ sources. We have seen that Luke expressly asserts that he did so. But with the small time interval between Jesus' life and the Gospel records, the Church did not create a 'Christ of faith' out of a simple, moralistic Jesus." "Would the disciples of Jesus, steeped in the Jewish faith, have deified a mere man, thereby contradicting the central tenet of the Jewish faith, that 'thou shalt have no other gods before me'?" Montgomery's arguments (remember he is also a lawyer) retain their pungency, even nearly fifty years after they were written. This is an essential work of Christian apologetics.

Admissable Evidence

In this short, highly readable book, Dr. Montgomery defends the New Testament against its critics by going directly to the original documents themselves and subjecting them to the tests of reliability used by historians and literary critics. What the reader comes away with is the undeniable conclusion that the Bible is an accurate presentation of what eye witnesses to the life of Jesus Christ documented. Also,compared to other documents universally regarded as accurate and authentic even though they were written more than one thousand years after the original manuscripts were supposedly written, the earliest known manuscripts of the books of the New Testament were written less than 300 years after the events documented and their accuracy would hold up in any court of law. This is an excellent resource for those Christians who are witnessing to skeptics who may be more amenable to the Gospel presentation once certain intellectual, legal, and historical/critical hurdles are overcome.

Outstanding book of real historical christianity

Dr. Montgomery's book is an outstanding treatment of the historicity of the New Testament. It is well written, succint, and it complete guts the arguments of the "scholars" from the ineptly named "Jesus Seminar". What is even better is that it was written many years prior to their "scholarship".

Jesus of the Bible = Jesus of History

In an age of controversy concerning the historicity of Jesus of Nazareth, Dr. Montgomery's book is still a refreshing look at who is Jesus. If you want to read a text devoid of the higher critcism tactics utilized by the "Jesus Seminar" then this is definitely a book that you should buy!

Concise presentation of the historical evidence for Jesus

This text was first published in the 1960s and has proven to be a classic work inspiring other Christian apologists like Josh McDowell. The book arose out of a series of lectures delivered in Canada. Montgomery's style is eminently readable. He sets out three essential tests in historiography and applies each test to the gospel records. His purpose is to demonstrate that the gospel accounts are historically sound and reliable sources of data for the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. From the quantity and quality of extant Greek manuscripts of the gospels, the internal eyewitness value of the documents and the external verification of them, Montgomery shows we can depend on them. He then explores the portrait of Jesus as the incarnation of God and delves into the evidence for his bodily resurrection from the dead. This is a superb, succinct treatment of the subject, and its continuing circulation in print is a testament to its worth. A book that non-Christians can grapple with if they doubt the veracity of the Gospels.