“Paul's portrayal of Jesus as Christ may sound familiar to contemporary Christians—it has since become the standard doctrine of the church—but it would have been downright bizarre to Jesus's Jewish followers. The transformation of the Nazarean into a divine, preexistent, literal son of God whose death and resurrection launch a new genus of eternal beings responsible for judging the world… — Reza Aslan Copy Share
“It was not unusual to be called Son of God in ancient Judaism. God calls David his son: “today I have begotten you” (Psalms 2:7). He even calls Israel his “first-born son” (Exodus 4:22). But in every case, Son of God is meant as a title, not a description. Paul’s view of Jesus as the literal son of God is… — Reza Aslan Copy Share
“The Son of God Among Greeks and Romans,” Harvard Theological Review 93.2 (2000): 85–100. Two zealous rabbis, Judas son of Sepphoraeus and… — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
“Despite two millennia of Christian apologetics, the fact is that belief in a dying and rising messiah simply did not exist in Judaism. In… — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
Religion doesn't make people bigots. People are bigots and they use religion to justify their ideology. — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
“Scattered across the Roman Empire, it was only natural for the gospel writers to distance themselves from the Jewish independence movement by erasing, as… — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
“There is a term for this phenomenon—politicomorphism, or “the divinization of earthly politics”—and it is, to this day, one of the central features of… — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
Obama has been the single worst president in modern American history in dealing with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. — Reza Aslan Copy Share
There's no question that homophobia is rampant among the world's 1.5 billion Muslims - but that doesn't negate the fact that there are huge… — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
Well, to be clear, I am a scholar of religions with four degrees, including one in the New Testament and fluency in Biblical Greek… — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
“There would be no more record of who was rich and who was poor. Everyone in this new and divinely inspired world order would… — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
My biography of Jesus is probably the first popular biography that does not use the New Testament as its primary source material. — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
“Pilate, as the histories reveal, was not one for trials. In his ten years as governor of Jerusalem, he had sent thousands upon thousands to the cross with a simple scratch of his reed pen on a slip of papyrus. The notion that he would even be in the same room as Jesus, let alone deign to grant him a… — Reza Aslan Copy Share
