The Life Of Jesus: Critically Examined (1902)

by David Friedrich Strauss (Author), George Eliot (Translator)

34 ratings

ISBN-13: 978-0548830505

ISBN-10: 0548830509

Why is ISBN important?

Other Sellers

from

Other Sellers

See all 89 versions

Used: Good | Details

Sold by Better World Books

Access codes and supplements are not guaranteed with used items.

FREE delivery: July 19 - 22

Available to ship in 1-2 days.

Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.

Available at a lower price from other sellers that may not offer free Prime shipping.

FREE delivery: July 23 - 27 Details

Fastest delivery: July 21 - 26

Available at a lower price from other sellers that may not offer free Prime shipping.

This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.

Frequently bought together

Customers who viewed this item also viewed

Page 1 of 1 Start overPage 1 of 1

Albert Schweitzer
41
Paperback
3 offers from $10.00
David Friedrich Strauss
2
Paperback
17 offers from $14.09
David Friedrich Strauss
1
Paperback
11 offers from $44.64
Albert Schweitzer
182
Paperback
58 offers from $4.76
Gunther Bornkamm
9
Paperback
34 offers from $3.60
E. P. Sanders
174
Paperback
110 offers from $1.35

Customers who bought this item also bought

Page 1 of 1 Start overPage 1 of 1

Albert Schweitzer
41
Paperback
3 offers from $10.00
Albert Schweitzer
182
Paperback
58 offers from $4.76
Katherine Stewart
559
Hardcover
63 offers from $8.89
Gotthold Ephraim Lessing
1
Paperback
5 offers from $8.90
David Friedrich Strauss
2
Paperback
17 offers from $14.09
Gary Greenberg
196
Paperback
75 offers from $2.40

Special offers and product promotions

Amazon Business: Make the most of your Amazon Business account with exclusive tools and savings. Login now

Start reading The life of Jesus critically examined on your Kindle in under a minute.

Don't have a Kindle? Get your Kindle here, or download a FREE Kindle Reading App.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Kessinger Publishing, LLC (January 10, 2008)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 784 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0548830509
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0548830505
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 2.91 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 7.5 x 1.56 x 9.25 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #17,996,833 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #11,773 in New Testament Criticism & Interpretation
- #25,661 in Christianity (Books)

Customer Reviews:
34 ratings

Customer reviews

5 star		40%
4 star		21%
3 star		16%
2 star		5%
1 star		18%

How are ratings calculated?

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

John B

Maybe try a different edition?

Reviewed in the United States on April 28, 2021

Verified Purchase

02/07/2014 Publication Date Kindle Edition, $0.99 at the time. Intriguing read comparing the four gospel stories to determine which, if any, is historically accurate. This kindle edition appears to be a "photocopy" of the text. Most shows up as legible text, but there are many words that don't "translate" well, particularly what I assume are Latin and Greek quotes, plus some German references, that make it difficult to read. Also, footnotes appear on the page as in a book, so text and footnotes merge. All in all, this was a challenging read, both from an editing point of view and conceptual point of view, but well worth the struggle.

Helpful

Dash Dakota

Pay the ransom; read this book ........

Reviewed in the United States on August 8, 2015

Verified Purchase

This book was the most explosive entry into the 19th Century Historical Jesus Parade. I don't have time to write this right now; but if you're nonbelieving, believing, or, just curious, you will find the scholarship of David Strauss matchless. Matchless. You can not be unacquainted with the documents or you will be lost I assure you. Greek certainly helps; but you can steer through this masterpiece without. I haven't been in seminary for 31 years; but if this copy was in the theological library; out of print; I'd snatch a copy off the shelve and run. Some things are worth a night in jail; this book is one of them. Strauss knocks all the pins down throughout every page. Because of when Strauss wrote this volume, he did not have a big supporting cast; and, what a tribute to one man. He's a scholar along the order of Erasmus in his day.

10 people found this helpful

Helpful

Jack Kilpatrick

Book is Incomplete

Reviewed in the United States on July 22, 2019

Verified Purchase

This is indeed a most interesting book, as a critical method of bible study is employed, but not at the entry or moderate level. The level used is the steroid level. That is all well and good as it forces the reader to open their minds and set aside the Fundamentalist/King James Only approach to understanding scripture. There are many ways to study/understand the bible and I respect them all including the one just mentioned. Nevertheless, I do have one big concern with this book. The table of contents goes to # 152 "Relation of the critical and speculative theology of the church." My book ends with # 90 " The narratives of the women taken in adultery, and of Mary and Martha." Where are # 91 to # 152? This is the reason for three stars instead of four or five.

Helpful

A. Braswell

A Most Interesting Read (if you have the time)

Reviewed in the United States on October 12, 2009

Verified Purchase

I ordered this book because George Eliot translated it and I have been a fan of hers for a long time. The book is shocking in that it is a very long, very involved work - over 700 pages in small print. The author is very detailed in his research and leaves no stone unturned in his desire to ferret out the truth of his subject. As the title suggests, this is a critical work and would not suit traditional thinkers who would be wise never to open it. For those who want to read about someone who tried to find truth in the pages of the gospels - truth as a scientist might seek, this book offers much to ponder. I have not finished it, of course, as it will take many months to read the entire work. I am not daunted by that since I am retired and have plenty of time. I recommend this to any scholar to read though much has been discovered since his writing. It will be a good addition to an abundance of books on the same subject written now. When I did get to the last pages of this book, I found that the summation of it was missing - a great disappointment. Still I would recommend it to those interested in it, just don't expect a conclusion.

4 people found this helpful

Helpful

Charles W Koch

Milestone of Biblical criticism.

Reviewed in the United States on May 2, 2013

Verified Purchase

Originally published in German in 1835-36. This edition has a preference in Latin by Strauss dated 1846, and seems to be a translation of the 4th German edition (1840). Exhaustively examines points of coincidence and divergence among the four evangelists, pointing out similarities and differences, and critically evaluating the probable historic or mythic basis of each. Very intelligently done. Highly readable despite having been written 170 years ago. Has a modern feel to it.

This is a facsimile reproduction of a book printed in the 1850s or thereabout. Some handwritten margin notes and underscores marr the text, but only slightly.

3 people found this helpful

Helpful

D. Boerman

Strauss' Life of Jesus Critically Examined

Reviewed in the United States on October 15, 2011

Verified Purchase

This review pertains only to the paperback edition of the book produced as what is labelled a "High Quality Paperback." It has nothing to say about the content of the book. I was very disappointed in the quality of this edition. It looks like a photocopy of a previous edition. The edition copied is not clean, but has a lot of markings and underlining in the text. Plus the text itself is quite small and not always easy to read. It is printed so close to the edge that it is sometimes difficult to see the inside edge of the text.

When one opens the book, one is startled to see that there is no page indicating the publisher, date or who the translator is. There is no ISBN. Then, when I looked at the end of the book, I discovered that the last page of text was not in fact the end of the book! Something was missing. I went to a local college library and found out that there was one whole page of text missing. Plus there are several pages of annotations to the text and a section of bibliographies. All of this is missing, too.

In short, this edition is very cheap and suitable only for the casual reader who cares nothing about the quality of the book. I will think long and hard before I purchase another book from this publisher.

12 people found this helpful

Helpful

D. Baumann

Not Formatted for Kindle

Reviewed in the United States on July 22, 2018

Verified Purchase

The topics are of interest to me but this book is unreadable in Kindle format.

3 people found this helpful

Helpful

Eunsin Lee

No the content

Reviewed in the United States on August 27, 2017

Verified Purchase

Horribly printed. Cannot even review it becaused it's unreadable.

4 people found this helpful

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

S P Mead

a monumental work of critique

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 26, 2016

Verified Purchase

"The Life of Jesus" is a major work on the critique of Christianity - and was highly influential in radical European circles in the mid-19th century. The author, David Strauss, seeks to subject the historical life of Jesus to a sustained critical evaluation - with the purpose of rejecting any possible 'divine' attributes or nature. This book, a comprehensive analysis of the Biblical portrayal of Christ's life, is well-written, clearly argued, and presents a reasoned approach - highly logical in form - to its subject. Fortunately, Strauss' arguments are not affected by his familiarity with (and liking for) the Hegelian dialectic - which, although analytically insightful, tends to result in needless abstraction and unnecessary complexity. Yet the style adopted by Strauss is nonetheless rather dated - when judged by contemporary fashions - and this may deter some readers. However, I encourage anyone genuinely interested in the historical Jesus to read this monumental work.

Strauss does not set out to question whether Jesus existed - but, instead, he embarks upon a critique of the miracles ascribed to Jesus, arguing that these were mythical additions fabricated by the authors of the New Testament, having no basis in actual fact. For Strauss, the miraculous elements of the gospels were mere 'mythical' in character. This conclusion is arrived at by way of a detailed exploration of the Bible - treating it as a single textual source, as a self-coherent body of writing. Looking at the Bible in this manner, it's rather straightforward to identify many contradictions - e.g. the genealogy of Jesus is vastly different in different gospels. By eliminating the contradictions, we start to arrive at a better understanding of reality. Furthermore, by drawing on known historical facts - of events and persons - it's possible to identify erroneous aspects of the Bible (such as the census that is said to have taken place at the time of Jesus' birth). Ultimately, with all the fabricated elements of the Bible removed, what we're left with is a more accurate depiction of historical truth - and the miracle stories form no part of this truth. Instead they were simply 'additions' made by the early church to present Jesus as the Messiah. Thus Strauss rejected both the supernaturalist approach (that Jesus was a miracle worker) and the rationalist approach (that the miracles were primitive misinterpretations of non-supernatural occurrences).

It's a shame that Strauss is today typically relegated to little more than a footnote in Biblical criticism. I tend to think that this has more to do with the way his arguments are so clearly reasoned and straightforward that they are actually conclusive - and negate the need for further inquiry. Academics prefer to ceaselessly debate and discuss topics ... Strauss offers answers - but not everyone desires to hear.

Note - I paid £12 for this book. I recommend looking around for the most reasonably priced seller.

5 people found this helpful

peter w rees

mythology of jesus exposed.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on August 3, 2015

Verified Purchase

every vicar in this country should be compelled to read this book.

2 people found this helpful

See all reviews

What other items do customers buy after viewing this item?

Page 1 of 1 Start overPage 1 of 1

The Life Of Jesus: Critically Examined (1902)

Buy used: $31.90

Buy new: $52.95

Frequently bought together

Customers who viewed this item also viewed

Customers who bought this item also bought

Special offers and product promotions

Product details

Customer reviews

Reviews with images

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Top reviews from other countries

What other items do customers buy after viewing this item?

Buy used:

$31.90

Buy new:

$52.95