Jesus in Egypt: Discovering the Secrets of Christ's Childhood Years [Hardcover]

Paul Perry (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 4, 2003

Do you know Jesus visited Egypt as a child? The Bible contains but a few verses about the years the Holy Family spent in Egypt their flight from Herod s death sentence, the weary journey, their return to Israel after Herod died. But what exactly happened to Jesus and His parents in this ancient land of magic and myth? How did the sojourn in Egypt change Jesus s life and influence His teachings? In search of answers, bestselling author Paul Perry set out to follow the Holy Family s mysterious journey himself. In this fascinating book, Perry tells the story of his own amazing trek into Egypt and the deeper story of the miracles and marvels he uncovered along the way.

Poring over the narratives of the apocrypha, Perry was able to draw a rough map of the Holy Family s route through Egypt from their entrance across the burning sands of the Sinai Desert to their zigzagging path down to the Nile. With devout guides and temperamental transportation, he ventured to find the places where Jesus had slept, suffered, performed miracles, and engaged in innocent acts of mischief. Near Bubastis, he came upon an enormous field of fallen idols that legend says the infant Jesus had toppled and broken. At Belbeis, Perry almost started a riot when he questioned an Egyptian girl about the site of a tree that Jesus and Mary had rested under. In Abu Hinnis, he found fourth-century paintings of Jesus coming to Egypt on the wall of a hermit cave. Near the spot where an angel was said to have appeared to Joseph, he photographed an apparition of light, a photo that has now been declared a spiritual message from the Lord by an Egyptian bishop.

Part travel adventure, part spiritual journey, part historical detective story, Jesus in Egypt recounts a modern-day pilgrimage into an ancient and often baffling land. In the basements of Coptic churches and the teeming back streets of Cairo, in shrines thronged by worshipers and desert wastes haunted by saints, Perry turned up shards of the past, tales passed down through countless generations, and ghostly emanations of antiquity.

This extraordinary book unfolds a chapter in the life of Jesus that has been shrouded in mystery and misunderstanding for two millennia. Combining ancient texts, interviews with clerics and Christian scholars, and his own startling encounters with contemporary Egypt, Paul Perry has fashioned a book of wonders and revelations.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The Bible indicates that shortly after Jesus' birth, King Herod, threatened by the adulation the baby was receiving, ordered the slaughter of male children under the age of two in and around Bethlehem. Warned of this in advance, Joseph and Mary fled to Egypt with Jesus, returning to Palestine only after Herod's death. That's all most Westerners know about Jesus' early childhood, mainly because many Christians tend to reject extra-biblical stories about Jesus, and Westerners in general often deny stories of ancient events that cannot be verified by archeology or science. Ever conscious of that, Arizona author Perry, a self-described "doubting Thomas" who grew up in a faith-rich environment, set out to discover more about Jesus' childhood by following a loosely structured itinerary based on the route the family is believed to have taken. Perry's experiences along the way would by themselves be entertaining enough, but more importantly, they offer significant insight into non-Western thinking about faith, particularly within the Coptic Church in Egypt, where the faithful have no problem believing, for instance, that a baby's footprint found on a stone slab in a sewer in 1984 is that of Jesus. Perry's portrayals of his traveling companions and others he meets on his journey, his retelling of stories about miracles attributed to the baby and his amusing style combine to make a delightful read, even for skeptical Westerners.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Despite the existence of only a few verses in one gospelclaiming that the Holy Family fled to Egypt, Perry decided to retraceJesus' steps on this alleged sojourn. The paucity of biblicalinformation on the topic led Perry to the Gnostic gospels and the oraltradition of the Coptic Church. At first, as he reconstructs and thenfollows the trail, drinking water from healing wells and casting aneye on the bones of saints, it seems as if he simply believes thejourney to have been a real event, but eventually he begins to wonderwhether he is following "a complete fiction." Finally, though, he seeshimself as a believer who "let his heart be his guide," concludingthat it may not matter if the events are factual. Similarly, the mostcompelling part of his book isn't the quest itself but the stories ofthe people he meets along the way: the woman metal worker in what istruly a man's world, or the Coptic priests and monks who help him seein new ways. Ilene Cooper
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: Ballantine Books; 1st edition (November 4, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0345451457
• ISBN-13: 978-0345451453
• Product Dimensions: 9.6 x 6.1 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #730,187 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

About Paul (Contact: [e-mail])
Paul Perry (www.paulperryproductions.com)is the co-author of several New York Times bestsellers, including Closer to the Light, Transformed by the Light and Saved by the Light, which was made into a popular movie by Fox-TV. His work has appeared in National Geographic Adventure, Outside Magazine, Reader's Digest, and several other popular periodicals. His books have been published in more than 30 languages around the world.

In 1986 Paul's interest in the effects and meaning of near-death experiences led him to a professional involvement with Dr. Raymond Moody, considered to be the founder of near-death studies. The two have written five books together (Paranormal, Glimpses of Eternity, The Light Beyond, Coming Back and Reunions). All tolled he has written or co-written 10 books on the subject of near-death experiences, four of which have become New York Times bestsellers.

Paul is also a documentary filmmaker whose work has appeared on worldwide television. His best known film, Jesus, the Lost Years was first the subject of a book he wrote for Random House, Jesus in Egypt, which follows the trail believed to be used by the Holy Family as they fled into Egypt to escape the murderous soldiers of King Herod. He returned to Egypt to produce and direct Visions and Miracles: Out of the Land of Egypt, a documentary film that chronicles modern visions that are confirmed by film or video or with scientific evidence, as with miraculous healings (www.visionsandmiracles.com). His most recent documentary, AFTERLIFE, tackles the fascinating subject of near-death experiences and interviews scientists who have researched proof of a life after death. It also features a number of people who have died and returned to tell their astounding stories (www.paulperryproductions.com).

Paul is a graduate of Arizona State University and a former fellow at the prestigious Gannett Center for Media Studies at Columbia University in New York City. He taught magazine writing at the University of Oregon in Eugene, Oregon, and was Executive Editor at American Health magazine, a winner of the National Magazine Awards for General Excellence. Since becoming a full-time writer, Paul has written or co-written more than books on a variety of subjects, from the paranormal to piracy.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars On the trail of the Holy Family in Egypt, February 28, 2004

By 

Joanna Daneman (Middletown, DE USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Jesus in Egypt: Discovering the Secrets of Christ's Childhood Years (Hardcover)

Author Paul Perry went on a sort of pilgrimage and journalistic quest to find the path of the Holy Family (Jesus, Mary and Joseph) through Egypt. When Jesus was a baby, Herod commanded that all male infants under the age of two were to be killed, a Draconian plan to find the prophesied King of Kings. Joseph is directed in a dream to take his family to safety in Egypt, and we learn little else that he went, taking Mary and Jesus, and subsequently returned.

What happened during the time the family dwelt Egypt is not part of the official Gospels. There are the secret "Infancy Gospels"-- and some of the books of Apocrypha that deal with Jesus' childhood--not officially Biblical truth. What Perry finds out is that the process of creating and transmitting oral legends, some of which were written into the Apocrypha, is still a process going on today. Visit any town along the path the Holy Family took through Egypt and those who are Christians are still telling those legends--and creating them.

This process amazes the author. Among the Coptic Christians, truth seems to be a matter of possibilities --and impossibilities. If a bishop has a dream about what happened to Jesus as an infant in Egypt, this becomes a new legend.

Some of the legends told by the locals sound more like Semitic tales of wisdom or riddles such as Solomon would have faced. Other tales are of miracles that remind one of the wedding of Cana or tell of the raising of the dead. The fact that Jesus didn't start his ministry until Cana and until he was well into adulthood is irrelevant to these legends. Which gives insight into how legends are formed and passed on. And also insight into why officially, some books of scriptural writing are included the Gospel and others were rejected.

But Perry isn't really writing about Biblical truth; he is writing about people and their sacred traditions. And at the end, he finds a holy family of his own; he takes care of a pair of widows in a truly Christian manner. This story is about his quest and about the culture of the people in Egypt. It's beautifully written, and of interest to anyone who loves travel, legends, and meeting people in a culture different than ours. Highly recommended.

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A View of the Coptic World in Egypt Today, November 24, 2003

By 

Harry Decker (Phoenix, Arizona) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Jesus in Egypt: Discovering the Secrets of Christ's Childhood Years (Hardcover)

I've just completed reading "Jesus in Egypt" (as of 11/24/2003). I found it to be well written, easy to read, interesting, and informative. I also found it to be objective, because the author presents many points of view and does not attempt to convince his audience that the material he presents is "gospel." Though I believe that Joseph and Mary and Jesus did indeed travel to Egypt to escape the wrath of King Herod, I personally believe that the apocryphal stories of the miracles performed by the infant Jesus in Egypt to be myths. Paul Perry, however, reveals when these stories started and how much they are revered to this day by the Coptic Christians. That was an eye opener. I actually found more value in the book when Perry reveals a social landscape in Egypt that is obscure to most Americans and the world. It was interesting to learn how the Egyptians believe, how they feel about Americans, that there are conflicts in beliefs even among the Copts, and that many Egyptians are struggling to make a living like most people in the world. It was sad to learn that the Egyptians as well as Americans suffered economically after the terrorist attack on September 11, 2001, because American tourism virtually came to a standstill. Perry is to be commended for taking the risks he did to research his book in a precarious part of the world. Once you read his book, you'll see what I mean. Fortunately, Perry also tells us that most Egyptians love Americans. Let's all pray and strive for peace, be it through Jesus or Mohammed or any prophet whom we may revere. No prophet would ever approve of the atrocious acts of terrorism taking place in the world today.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Ancient Holy Places in Modern Times, November 13, 2003

By 

Timothy Mcintire "Tim McIntire 'Arizona Publi... (Gilbert, AZ United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Jesus in Egypt: Discovering the Secrets of Christ's Childhood Years (Hardcover)

This firsthand travel narrative is as fresh as tomorrow's headlines and as timeless as the eternal mysteries of Egypt. Author Paul Perry seeks to understand the meaning of 2,000 years of extra-Biblical oral and written stories of the infant Jesus. In the process, he takes us to holy places venerated by many faiths, yet still untainted by souvenir vendors and commercial hucksters. Would that such sites always remain so.