This book by Kahlil Gibran was an absolute treat. Having re-read his most famous work last night, I became curious about his other stuff and found this for 73p on Kindle, so immediately bumped it to the top of my to-read list - and I have not been disappointed.
It's difficult to decide whether to classify this as poetry or short stories given the style & nature of the content. Basically what the book is constituted of is several dozen vignettes of various people's reactions to, recollections of, and reflections on Jesus of Nazareth; these range from his disciples (eg. James & John, Matthew, Peter, Thomas, Mary Magdalene gets three separate chapters alone) to his erstwhile foes (most notably the high priests Annas & Caiaphas, and Pontius Pilate) to random strangers (eg. a Persian philosopher, a Babylonian astronomer, a Greek poet, and my personal favourite "Ahaz the portly").* The attitudes presented range from worshipful awe to confusion to hostility - there is even one interestingly neutral perspective. Gibran seeks to tread the known and possible ground of the biblically-orthodox Jesus faithfully, making no theological points but as a work of socio-historical imagination driving home the pressing question - "how would you have related to him?"**
A very readable, vibrant & faithful book. Highly recommended for those curious about what we can say or imagine about Jesus without resorting to outright fancy, be they Christian like Kahlil Gibran was or not.
* A couple of lacunae I would have liked to have seen filled would be Pharisees and the beneficiaries of his miracles, lepers & cripples & demoniacs etc, but I suppose you can't have everything, and admittedly Gibran is already doing a great deal here.
** Indeed, the final chapter, "a man from Lebanon [nineteen centuries later]" is Gibran's own reflections on meeting Jesus himself through the life of faith.
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