Do You like book According To Mary Magdalene (1999)?
Extremely interesting. It occasionally took some effort to figure out "when" we were, and I think some things could have been explained a little better, but overall I think it gave a view that we might not hear everyday - the women's side of Jesus's story. I think it would have meant a little more to me if I was religious, or even well versed in religion, but it was interesting to think about how different Christianity is (or might be) from what Jesus actually taught. I liked the view on God and religion found in this book much more than the religion I actually see around me.
—Fionna
My problem with organised religion is that the "original" message is interpreted and presented to us as incontrovertible truth by men. Very, very, VERY occasionally women, but overwhelmingly men. Fallible people, full of the usual faults present in all human beings.Just as history is always written by the victors, I have always wondered exactly how the cult around a young Jewish man, reputed to be the performer of miracles, spread across the world - after his death - to become a huge religion. Exactly whose words form the basis of Christianity - is it truly Jesus' own words and message that was conveyed by the Apostles and after them, by leaders of the Church in all it's many dominations? But I have always been too lazy to read up on it. I love this book for giving me a very compelling Mary Magdalene to spark my interest in reading about how Christianity started, grew and began to develop. As with other books I've read by Marianne Fredriksson, the characters leap off the page in all their complexity and human fallibility. Of course, her story is a skeleton of fact, fleshed out by the writer's imagination, but it does it's job of provoking us to think just who Religion, like History, is written by and for, and to what end?
—Suzierussell