Bruce Feiler - Where God Was Born, Abraham, Walking The Bible

"The Bloody Mix of Politics, Violence, and Faith"
Tuesday, February 27, 2007

A little update on what's happening around here. As many of you know, I've been inundated with media requests for comment about the new documentary purporting to have found the tomb of Jesus. To follow how the controversy unfolded on Feiler Faster click here, here, and here. I appeared on CNN last night, ABC's "Good Morning America" this morning, and, in what turned out to be a somewhat heated exchange, with the director himself, live, on the CBS "Early Show" this morning. Put it this way: At the end of our conversation, he stormed out of the studio without saying goodbye. Please check back a little later, when I hope to have a video of some of these appearances.

In the meantime, I have to leave for the airport for Louisville, where I'm giving a talk tonight, and to Dallas, where I'm giving a talk tomorrow. For details, click here. The paper in Louisville ran a wonderful piece this weekend.

Growing up in Chicago, my only exposure to farming was the Farm in the Zoo and for many years I thought that every farm in America had one cow that lived in the stall next to the one goat that lived in the stall next to the one pig, and so on. Similarly, my early years in Sunday school gave me the impression that Abraham lived next to Solomon who lived next to Esther who lived, if not next to King David, at least in the next village.

Bruce Feiler's books have, thankfully, driven out all remaining notions I may have had as a child that everything in the history of all religions happened in the same place at the same time by skillfully, artfully and frequently poignantly walking me through what the German philosopher Karl Jaspers termed the Axial Age -- the years between 800 and 200 B.C., when the relationship between God, faith and reason were born.

In his early writing career, Feiler took us into the worlds of circuses, scholars and singers before he began writing about the Bible and the Middle East. His first two books in this series, Walking the Bible and Abraham were written prior to 9/11. This sequel, however, is much more than an engrossing biblical travelogue. In Where God Was Born, Feiler carries us beyond history and into his personal spiritual exploration, confronting the same ambiguities about the role of religion in his life that many of us face today.

As we are drawn into his physical journey of discovery, the larger theme of the book becomes clear. His search for actual biblical locations with a map in one hand and a Bible in the other becomes a metaphor for the truth that the bloody mix of politics, violence and faith that form the core of these biblical stories create an uncanny prism through which we can see what is happening today.

As violence in the name of faith threatens to imperil our world, Where God Was Born is an enlightening way to explore the question of whether religion is just a source of war, or is it also a way to help bring about world peace.

Labels: Bruce in the Media

Posted by B Feiler at 9:10 AM
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