Joe Amaral's "Understanding Jesus" is part of the flood of new material resurrecting the importance of the Jewishness of Jesus, which, I will admit, is a VERY important project for our full understanding of the nature of the New Testament and the claims of the Christian Gospel. I feel it is important that I go "on the record" that I am in full agreement with Amaral's overall objective and I think that he does a fair-to-middling job of bringing out important insights into Jesus' life and actions.

However. I wouldn't really recommend this book. Granted, there are a couple of unique insights, but much of the material here could be gleaned from any number of respected Gospel commentaries (even including Amaral's scattered references to rabbinic traditions). So, one critique is that there was not much new here. Another key critique is that the book feels REALLY disjointed, almost as if Amaral was attempting to WRITE using rabbinic methods. This was really surprising, especially since you would think that a book about the life of Christ would already have a kind of "automatic" coherence; yet, somehow, by his random references to secondary research (I couldn't discern any consistent pattern), by his mish-mashed quotations from multiple Gospels and other biblical books, and a very odd use of heading structure, he made a naturally-cohesive book appear incoherent, uneven, and almost difficult. To be honest, it read more like a collection of blog posts than a coherent book (and perhaps it was meant to be read in smaller pieces).

But most troubling of all was Amaral's other agenda. Unfortunately, this book was NOT simply an exploration of Jesus' "Jewish roots"; it has a far more troubling aim of reintroducing the celebration of Jewish feasts as part of Christian worship and practice. As he says in his introduction: "The feasts were God's way of teaching His people about Himself. If they are God's teaching methods for us, then why are we not using them? How can we understand God and His plans by using our natural minds and by using our own plans? In order to better comprehend the things of God, the Western church needs to go through a radical transformation in these last days" (pp. 12-13).

To be fair, later in the same section, Amaral admits: "It is certainly true that we should never celebrate the feasts in order to achieve or augment our salvation. That was never God's intent for the feasts...We don't celebrate the feasts to impress God or to try to win His favor. We celebrate them because it reminds us of what He has done for us and what He is going to do" (p. 14). Note the assumptive tone.

Being part of a religious tradition that has seen some of its members depart into what has been colloquially dubbed a "Hebrew Roots" movement, Amaral's suggestions here are disturbing. First and foremost, this suggestion does not seem to settle well with the New Testament rejection of the idea that to be Christian requires one to become a Jewish proselyte who abides by the dictates of OT law (including festal observance, kosher food laws, etc). In reality, many of these ideas are simply the (barely) repackaged teachings of the Judaizers whom Paul so vehemently attacked in Galatians.

Secondly, and in a way perhaps more understandable to contemporary secular culture, I fear that Amaral's urging of Gentile adoption of Jewish practices is nothing more than a thinly-veiled transgressive act of cultural appropriation. We do no honor to the "Jewishness" of Jesus by simply pretending to be Jewish ourselves. I do think it's imperative for the broader Christian church to revisit its historic relationship to the Jews and to make proper restitution for wrongs that have been done to Jews in the name of Christ for centuries. I think Amaral's suggested approach merely "whitewashes" those issues in ways that are unhelpful and perhaps even more harmful.

Amaral's work does receive endorsement from noted NT scholar Craig Evans, so I've no real reason to doubt the accuracy of his claims about Second Temple and Rabbinic Judaism (my expertise lying in other areas of biblical scholarship). So, in that sense, I believe this book is exegetically solid; however, I think in some places, Amaral "oversells" the depth of his insight and treats the common-place as "ground-breaking."

I find myself in the odd place where (pardon the double negative) I wouldn't NOT recommend it, but neither would I actually recommend it. If I meet a person who absolutely gushes over the wonderful insights of Joe Amaral, I think I'll simply say: "That's awesome! Say, have you ever heard of Craig Keener?" ( )

how would we understand the words of Yeshua Jesus if we understood His culture? and the impact of that culture on the meaning of what He said?
as fascinating and insightful a read from Canadian Joe Amaral as he is to hear in person.
i gained much by reading of what would have been commonly known phrases and idioms of speech from the time of Christ's teachings. excellent information on distinct cultural traditions and how they play into the meaning of scripture's metaphors. easy to read and enjoyable all in one!
highly recommended! ( )