Customer Reviews

The Search for the Twelve Apostles

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The Protestant theologian who wrote this 312-page book in 1973 provides a highly readable summary of known information about the life and fate of Christ's original twelve apostles plus a number of other important New Testament characters such as Paul, Barnabas and John the Baptist. The is little or no discussion of theological aspects of each character but rather an effort to gather known facts and references from disparate sources about each man (no female characters are covered) in an effort to provide an account of their probable life story, particularly after Christ's crucifixion. It is particularly interesting to learn about the evidence of travel and missions for the lesser known apostles and explanations and theories about Apostolic journeys to India. McBirnie tries to stay with verifiable facts and sources that are considered historically reliable rather than speculate too much about unknown or unknowable matters.

Following 44 pages of general background on the early Christian era and available historic sources McBirnie provides a chapter each for 19 men in 250 pages. That is followed by an appendix listing New Testament references for each character, five-page bibliography and a seven-page index.

I did not find the author is be as negative regarding relics, etc., as some other reviewer do.

I enjoyed this book and recommend it an entertaining read as well as Christian study reference.

I have bought a LOT of copies of this book and handed them out to friends. This is a must for you library. Dr. McBirnie does an excellent job of tracking down not only the twelve apostles, but Luke, Mark, Paul, Lazarus, etc. He makes a clear distinction of Church history, legend and myth. Very useful to anyone teaching from the New Testament. The author does an excellent job listing his resources at the end of the book (in case you are hungry for more) and includes a comprehensive index. Highly recommended.

All other books on the apostles will be judged against this one. This is the definitive account on what happened to the Apostles. Granted, a lot of the material is heresay and legend. But these men lived so long ago that reliable facts about them are few and far between. Sketchy ideas are better than no ideas, and the McBirnie makes it very clear how accurate the theories are. The author delves deep into history to discover the fate of the twelve closest disciples of the lord, and does an incredible job, considering what a daunting task it was.

I have read this book many times. It is extremely well written and inspiration to all Christians. As much as possible this book is historically accurate. The author provides information about where the early church leaders went and many of the traditions associated with such people as Mary, Lazarus, and the 12 apostles. He also talks about where they travelled, how they died, and where they are buried.

A truly outstanding book, easy to read, and when you are going thru difficult times...a book which will uplift your spirit.

I truly wanted to like this book, but I just couldn't. It does have one major strength -- it gathers together a good-sized portion of all the legendary evidence about where the twelve apostles went after Jesus' death. In the process, it clarifies just how much the Church (in both its Protestant and Roman Catholic forms) have trusted "Luke's" Acts as the definitive history of Christianity -- a history which does little more than symbolically transfer God's power from Jerusalem to Rome. McBirnie's investigation delineates what happened in the eastern and in the northern areas around Israel, how the other disciples carried the gospel to Russia, Iraq, Iran, and India. This gives us Westerners a clearer sense of all Christian traditions and their implications for the meaning of right worship.

In the end, the book's many flaws just dragged down the whole reading experience for me. Two of the most obvious problems are: (1) Even though McBirnie claims to have visited Europe thirty-nine times, the Middle East twenty-seven times (xxvii), and to have been allowed to photograph many sacred sites, precious little fruit of these experiences appears in the text (at least nothing informational that one could not glean from a tourist brochure), and the book does not contain a single photo. Apparently, these claims are included for little more than to substantiate his bona fides. (2) A substantial portion of the book -- from one third to one half of the text -- is composed of long quotes. And when I say long, I mean generally one to two and a half pages. Were we given the publication data for these excerpts, we could go look these up for ourselves. The result of this over-quoting is that McBirnie does not provide us with what we came to his book for, his understanding of what these legends should mean to us.

Many other less troublesome problems involve his reliance on the scholarly questionable Scofield Reference Bible, an insensitivity to Catholic readers, and some stretching of the boundaries of logical analysis.

I bought this book because of the reviews and cheap price.

Two things about this book stand out.1)It's well written.2)There is no bias whatsoever in this book.A prior reviewer complained of Catholic "bashing".I read nothing of the sort.The Catholic church itself was a valuable source of information regarding the location and movements of relics throughout history.

The author has done an excellent job covering many of the legends of the Apostles' deaths and burials.He covers the movement of related relics(bodies and parts).Mr. McBirnie travelled to many of the sites that were rumored to be burial sites.He saw first-hand some of the final resting places.Some of the legends will probably never be proven,others such as Thomas' mission to India are well-known.Whether he agrees with some of the stories or not,he covers them.The subjects are more than the Apostles.Included are; Paul,Lazarus,John Mark and James the Lord's brother to name a few.I appreciate that the author devoted a chapter to a particular individual.

This is a worthy addition to any library.It's available and cheap.The standard other books on the subject will be judged by.

I gave it 4 stars instead of 5 because of it's age.There have been more archaelogical discoveries since this edition was printed.

William Steuart McBirnie (1920-1995) was a professor of Middle Eastern Studies at the California Graduate School of Theology, Senior Minister of the United Community Church in Glendale, California, as well as a onetime conservative commentator on his "Voice of Americanism" radio show.

He has written several works of popular Christian history/archaeology, such as The Search For The Tomb Of Jesus Revised Edition and The The search for the early church: New Testament principles for today's church, as well as the present volume, which was written in 1973 (it has been revised since then).

McBirnie begins by stating in his Introduction, "What follows in this book is that which can be known from an exhaustive and critical study of the Biblical, historical and traditional records of the Apostles. The author has tried to reduce the legendary to the probable or likely, justifying it with the known historical facts concerning the state of the world in the first century and the documents of subsequent church history, local history, and relevant secular writings.... Here for the first time in any one volume the preponderance of information concerning the histories of the Apostles is now assembled."

One of the first things that startles the reader is that there is some uncertainty about a few of the apostles' names and even identities. About "Jude Thaddaeus," McBirnie writes, "The correct identification of this Judas is extremely complicated, not only because of the three names which are used for him in the Scriptural record but also because of the enigmatic reference to him as the 'son of James.' We could tell considerably more about him if we were certain exactly who this James was."

In addition to covering the biblical material about all of the apostles in turn, he examines the apocryphal writings, the writings of the Church Fathers, and various legends about the apostles (Protestant readers may be disaffected by the degree to which McBirnie, a very Conservative Protestant, seems to credit some of these legends; such as that Thomas traveled to India).

This book remains a very interesting and thorough treatment of its subject.

The sheer amount of information provides on the apostles in the Bible is amazing. There are many pointers to other places to look for information. I found this to be a good source for a small research paper as well as leading me to other sources.

I started reading this book and unfortunately it was too irritating when the author "bashes" Catholic traditions and beliefs. At the same time he imposes his religious beliefs concerning relics, saints and the Apostles, which is not what the reader pays to buy this book. This book is written in a very biased point of view and not from a serious and unbiased researcher's point of view. I wanted facts and research , not a lesson in religion. I closed the book empty handed. The book may have an interesting title, but it was too much filled with the author's religious beliefs in a way that a reader that does not share his beliefs might find it a very unpleasent experience.

For a more balanced book I strongly recommend "The Twelve: The Lives of the Apostles After Calvary" by Bernard Ruffin, C. Bernard Ruffin

My son needed to do a report on the twelve apostles so we purchased this book. Each chapter reveals a different apostle. It first goes through the twelve apostles and then it goes over other notable apostles. The book is very informitive and helped a great deal with his report.