EARLY BOOKING IS ADVISED Revd. Adrian Alker, 4 St. Mark's Crescent, Sheffield S 1 0 2SG Tel. 0114 267 0362 Email conference@stmarkssheffield.co.uk - http//www.stmarkssheffield.co.uk Sof 54 July 2002 18 D r a f t O n l y Daniel Clark, a theology graduate, reviews Conversations in the Garden of Shizen:
Jesus of the Gospels, women, sex and the family by D.W. Phillips (pp.288, 0 Books, 2002 ISBN:1903816106, £9.99 pb) This book has an unusual format, being a transcript of conversations between William Whitland, an amateur but clearly highly knowledgeable student of the New Testament, and two Japanese anthropologists, Shoji Kamada and Masako Hiraoka. The conversations are more wide-ranging than the subtitle of the book would suggest, touching on concepts of the kingdom of God and what the New Testament means by "demonpossessed", as well as women, sex and the family.
This is an ambitious range of material to cover in 288 pages, including footnotes and explanations. However, the book is an easy read and broken down into short chapters to make each topic easily digestible. A key advantage of this broad scope is that nearly everyone with any interest in the New Testament will find something here that is new, interesting and / or provocative. For example, Whitland comments in one chapter on the story of Jesus having his feet washed and being anointed by a "sinner" (Luke 7, 36-50 — but apparently she was almost certainly a prostitute as they were the only class of women who would have worn their hair down). Kamada makes the point that the scene as described by Luke is powerfully erotic. This is despite the fact that Luke uses no descriptive adjectives or adverbs in the entire passage. Obviously, Luke also does not comment on whether Jesus was sexually aroused by the experience, as many men would be. This is one of a number of familiar scenes which this book encourages us to look at with fresh eyes.
Whitland also makes a point relating to the family that is not new, but needs to be made as often as possible. In Western political debate, the linking of "family values" to the terms "Christian", "JudaeoChristian" or "biblical" is so common that we are probably inured to it. Whitland has no difficulty demonstrating that such a link has no basis whatsoever in the gospels. Jesus did not often speak about the family, but when he did, it was invariably in negative terms (e.g. Luke 14, 26, Mark 13, 12). For him, the family is a hindrance to acceptance of the kingdom; it is an institution which will be destroyed by the coming age.
In so far as there is any evidence on the matter, Jesus' relationship with his own family was somewhere between cool and hostile (e.g. Luke 11, 27-28).
Undoubtedly, such views are influenced by Jesus' likely belief that the end of this age was imminent, but they still suggest that the relationship of the founder of Christianity to the nuclear family so beloved of his followers was deeply problematic.
The scope and format of this book do render an obvious disadvantage. Because such a range of themes is explored, none of them is explored in any depth. Time and again, a potentially fascinating topic is introduced, only for us to be hurried along to the next one a few pages later. To his credit, Philips provides extensive footnotes with details of works referred to in the texts, although an organised bibliography would have been more helpful and allow an interested reader to follow up more thorough works on these subjects. Anyone who wishes to explore, for example, the role of women in the gospels, the development of Mary Magdalene in Christian thought or concepts of the kingdom of God in the gospels will be better served by exploring such works direct.
D.W. Phillips, Conversations in the Garden of Shizen: Jesus of the Gospels, women, sex and the family (pp.288, O Books, 2002, ISBN:1903816106, £9.99 pb). Reviewed by Daniel Clark, a theology graduate.