Fictional Religion
Keeping The New Testament New
By Jamie Spencer
Jamie Spencer challenges readers to take a more rational, more scholarly, and more historical-critical approach to the New Testament. He examines twelve writers who, he posits, allow us to see how thoughtful artists over the last 600 years have taken the Christian doctrine they inherited, and applied both its formal tenets and its spirit to the intellectual needs, social contexts and cultural biases of their age. Playwrights, poets and story writers like Chaucer, Shakespeare and C. S. Lewis have performed the same services for New Testament doctrine that Hebrew Bible storytellers provided for Jewish law as laid down in the Pentateuch. Although our creative artists are not allowed official entry into Holy Writ, they shape Christian doctrine and insights in new ways to meet new human conditions. They keep the New Testament new.
“Spencer’s learned and accessible exploration shows the prose and poetry of these English authors to be a source of insight and inspiration.”
— Cynthia Briggs Kittredge, Seminary of the Southwest
“A marvelous mash up of sacred and secular texts. The conversation ranges from raucous to sublime, from hilarious to heady. After reading this book, you won’t think of God, humans, or books in the same way again.”
— Deborah Krause, Eden Theological Seminary
“A thoughtful, intentionally provocative and helpful work which will challenge experienced theologians and prove equally engaging to a wider audience.”
— The Reverend James H. Purdy, Rector, Saint Peter’s Episcopal Church, Ladue, St. Louis, Missouri
“Surprising and pleasing. Any open-minded reader of this irenic book is likely to find both instruction and delight. As for the closed-minded ones, there’s just the outside chance that it might pry open an eyelid.”
— John V. Fleming, Princeton University, emeritus
