My Aunt's Crusade

[Whitney]

I will also be posting my thoughts, questions, and interesting quotes from the books on here for your entertainment.

cool.  If you want, create a thread for each book so that people can easily find your comments when searching.

[Tom62]

A skeptic Christian gave this review about that book at Amazon

As an extremely skeptic Christian, one of my more conservative friends lent me this book for some research. Typically most Christian apologists only cite the Bible for evidence (along with some weak philosophical arguments). The problem is that if one doesn't believe the Bible is infallible or historically accurate (which it is not as proven by historical record), those apologies are useless. This book attracted my attention because it claimed to have historical evidence other than the Bible backing its "thesis".

After my initial read-through, the book's arguments made superficial logical sense, and it seemed quite obvious that Jesus was the only way, etc. However, the skeptic that I was, I did about 2 hours of research in peer-reviewed historical databases at my university's library to check up on McDowell's evidence. While much of the evidence is technically in existence, there is a still huge problem. He does not acknowledge any conflicting historical documents and he does not mention that some of his sources are completely unreliable when it comes to historical accuracy. He ignores an overwhleming amount of counterpoints that disprove his arguments quite effectively.

Unfortunately most young people do not double check everything they read or hear on the news, and they do not look for bias in sources. I can see a great number of ignorant people reading this book and believing in something on false pretenses. Here is a link to a basic outline of the book's numerous faults: http://the-anointed-one.com/bbu85/josh.htm

I know that people will read it and say "Oh but lots of stuff on the internet is incorrect", etc. However, if you take a couple hours to research this book (at your library), using peer reviewed historical documents, you will find that the website makes viable and accurate claims.

Overall, I find this book to be ignorant and misleading. I am not sure if McDowell knows about all of the evidence he ignored. On a closing note, I find the title kind of funny and misleading, considering that Jesus' main profession was being a Rabbi. Seriously people, go take a historical New Testament class at a accredited state university if you want to learn more about biblical history.

[Chimera]

Thanks! That will help a lot when I read through the book.