Urban Legends Collection (3 vols.)
Overview
It is easy for any of us to pick up certain ideas over time that we do not realize are rooted in falsehood, exaggeration, or even simple misunderstanding. Untangling these notions and discerning the truth can be difficult. The Urban Legends collection makes this job much easier. These books set the record straight on over 100 such misconceptions that many people today unknowingly believe about the Bible and church history. Each chapter lays out the “urban legend” as it is commonly understood, analyzes how it came about, and then presents the truth of the matter as evidenced by sound scholarship and interpretive principles. With examples from throughout the Old and New Testaments and all of church history, you will learn how to apply those same principles of interpretation to any text.
- Surveys the most commonly misinterpreted passages of the Old and New Testaments
- Addresses key misunderstandings from throughout 2,000 years of church history
- Provides an interpretive model that can be applied to any passage of Scripture
Partially includedReviews
2 ratings
Markus Dasilva
3/22/2022
This collection would be of some value, if only the authors limited themselves to things most Christians know to be legends, but would like to see a more in-depth explanation of why it is so. They indeed cover some unproven well-known claims such as: “The Eye of a Needle Was a Gate in Jerusalem” or “Hell Referred to a First-Century Garbage Dump near Jerusalem”, and a few others. But unfortunately, a big chunk of the work—perhaps because they couldn’t find enough true legend material but needed to finish the books—consists of their liberal personal attacks on some serious Christian beliefs. For some mysterious reason, the authors try to weaken scripture support for the virgin birth, the trinity, the origin of the Devil, etc. About the Devil, amazingly, the authors see no reference to the him in Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28, and reluctantly admit some reference from Jesus in Luke 10:18. For them the OT passages on Satan are just part of a legend. What happened to one of the most basic hermeneutic principals, the double reference? Cleverly placing doctrines that millions of faithful Christians live by in a book titled: “Urban Legends” is highly offensive, to say the least. That’s particularly true by them including obedience to the Law of God in their list of urban legends. Here is a loaded quote from one of the chapters: “Christians are no longer under the Mosaic law”. What law is the Mosaic law? The whole Torah? If the authors want to encourage Christians to not obey some or all of God’s law, fine, the Lord gave us this unbelievable freedom, but there are ways to do it respectfully. Calling the need to obey God part of a legend, is definitely not the proper way to defend their beliefs. Unlike them, there are lots of people out there that take the whole of God’s commandments very seriously: “Here is a call for the perseverance of the saints who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus” (Rev 14:12). And finally, in the volume about church history, the authors’ hyper liberal views go as far as labeling as a legend that the United State founders intended this to be a Christian nation, claiming that all they wanted were for us to be a religious people, as they put it: “But “religious” is not the same as Christian.” Seriously? So, any religion is fine, any god is fine, any belief—in anything—is fine, as long as “we the people” believe in something? For heaven’s sake, what are the authors trying to accomplish with these books?
