LITERATURE + LECTURES

Blue Willow Bookshop presents  Bill Linden.   We welcome local author and theologian Bill Linden. He will visit the shop to discuss and sign his book, The Historical Jesus for Beginners.

The last few decades have seen a resurgence of the scholarly quest for the historical Jesus -- for the words and deeds that probably can be attributed to the human Jesus who walked the hills of Galilee some two thousand years ago. You might not be aware of the recent scholarship, and the reason is simple. For the most part, many scholars write for and talk to other scholars, using their own technical language. This leaves huge numbers of Christians unaware of their discoveries. So even though you may have studied the Bible for years, you still may be a historical Jesus beginner.

After the life of Jesus, his followers began to develop their memory of his sayings and actions. Then, year after year, and century after century, the tradition grew until it became Christianity as it is known in the twenty-first century. What if we could go back in time and delve beneath all the layers to find what Christianity would be if it were based upon the historical Jesus? If you are a person who would like to begin to be informed, this book is for you.

"This comprehensive and compelling book is a masterful primer of the historical Jesus for beginners. But is also a valuable resource for those who have been on the journey for some years." -- G. Richard Wheatcroft

William M. Linden holds a Postgraduate Diploma in Theology from Oxford University in England and is the Chair of the Board of Directors of the Foundation for Contemporary Theology in Houston. Mr. Linden has concentrated his efforts in theology in the scholarly quest for the historical Jesus -- the human being who walked about Galilee in the first century, a person who showed us what God is like and what a human life full of God is like. For the past three years, Mr. Linden has been teaching a course on the historical Jesus in the Rice University School of Continuing Studies and in various Christian churches in the Houston area. He is an Associate Member of the Westar Institute in California, which sponsors the Jesus Seminar, the leaders in academic historical Jesus research. Prior to concentrating his work on the historical Jesus, Mr. Linden was a Houston lawyer. He is a retired partner of Vinson & Elkins law firm, where he specialized in federal income tax law.