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| The Words of Jesus: A Gospel of the Sayings of Our Lord with Reflections by Phyllis Tickle | 
 enlarge | Author: Phyllis Tickle
Publisher: Jossey-Bass
Category: Book
List Price: $22.95
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Avg. Customer Rating:  4 reviews
Sales Rank: 44244
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 224
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.6
Dimensions (in): 8.3 x 5.7 x 0.9
ISBN: 0787987425
Dewey Decimal Number: 232.954
EAN: 9780787987428
ASIN: 0787987425
Publication Date: February 4, 2008
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Product Description
What if you could encounter the words of Jesus on their own, lifted up from the surrounding narratives and presented in their full power and mystery? That’s the question Phyllis Tickle—one of America’s most beloved writers on Christian spirituality—asked when she set out to write what she calls a “Sayings gospel.” In The Words of Jesus Tickle has compiled and arranged all the sayings of Jesus from the first four books of the New Testament and the first chapter of the Book of Acts in a way that creates an entirely new kind of encounter with the texts. And she has accompanied those sayings with her own personal reflections and commentaries not just on the words themselves but on the One who spoke them.
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| Customer Reviews:
 An innovative approach August 23, 2008
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
I have become very much an admirer of Phyllis Tickle (with that name she must be a candidate for a good joke), initially by her wonderful books of prayer and then learning of her involvement with the Emerging Church movement. A happening elder statesman!
I have to say I like the idea of this book, featuring just the words of Jesus. A good way of shaking up the familiar, status quo, mind/spirit laziness when reading those oh-so-familiar Gospels. And yes, some of Jesus' words will definitely disturb anyone's comfort zone!
In reflection though, perhaps a balance to this book, the actions/deeds of Jesus without the words, would make for a balanced package at a later date. Certainly, both Jesus' words and deeds need to be contextualized within the backdrop of a specific culture and time. But for many of us, "deeds" do speak louder than words and may be actually a greater entry point into the compassionate Christ.
Focusing exclusively on the words of Jesus confronts us at times with the sternness of ancient near eastern/Semitic idiomatic expression. Think of the black and white contrasts common of that idiom: either one is hot or cold, light or dark, for us or against us etc. etc. Very few doubt Jesus was both compassionate and empathetic for the oppressed, downtrodden and marginalized. But I wonder if the verbal reprovals and rebukes of Jesus really need to be kept wedded with the very compassionate actions of Jesus throughout the Gospels. Perhaps that is the genius of our canonical Gospels, they kept both vital elements together.
But thumbs up for a creative shaking up of traditional convention! This is a great exercise to rethink the status quo notions of who Jesus has become for us in our often comfortable and stale traditions and also a shaking of the tree to encounter the risen Jesus who continues to shatter our impoverished imaginations of what can be.
Encounter the words of Jesus in a new way! July 14, 2008
5 out of 5 found this review helpful
We've heard them from the pulpit, scanned the red-letter words in our Bibles and quoted them in scripture memorization. But when we listen --- really listen --- to the words of Jesus, they may change us irrevocably. So says renowned religion writer Phyllis Tickle in THE WORDS OF JESUS, which offers a new way of looking and listening to familiar passages.
The book began with a simple question from a colleague who asked Tickle, "Did you ever wonder what you would really find if you took out the duplications and triplications and connective tissue of the Gospels and stripped it all down again to just His words?" The question stunned her, and she admits, "I had never wondered such a thing...I was also fascinated by the potency of the Sayings format and drawn to the intellectual game and pleasure of trying to tease out just how and why that format works so well."
The "Sayings" format is indeed unique. All of the words of Jesus from the four gospels and the first chapter of Acts are compiled and arranged into five different "books" and then organized by topic. In each book, Jesus' personality is "shaded and shaped by the particularity of either his audience --- public, private, or intimate --- or an activity --- healing." Rather than relying on a particular translation, Tickle brings her own scholarship and the texts of several translations to bear to recreate Jesus' words.
Tickle suggests that the reader begin with Book Two, Christ's words of private instruction to His followers. Here, He is "most self-revelatory and open to us." Bits and pieces of Jesus' words reach out and pull the reader in. "Be careful that you do not look down on one who seems small or unimportant and trivial...," Jesus says in one passage. In another, "Sit down in the humblest place." And, "Keep awake therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour." Each saying in each "book" is grouped under a topical header.
Tickle divides the other four books of Jesus' Sayings into The Words of Public Teaching, The Words of Healing Dialogue, The Words of Intimate Conversation and The Words of Post-Resurrection Encounters. The 21 Sayings under "healing" are interesting, Tickle points out, as most of them have little or nothing to do with the healing itself: "Rather, they read now as if much of the time the act of healing becomes a platform for teaching health of more than just the body." Good food for thought.
One of Tickle's passages that resonates particularly well is the idea that the brain and the heart are both organs of perceiving and being. "We must assume that there is in the human being a means of knowing other than that of the brain." Her surprise, she said, was that the Sayings of Jesus "entered prayerfully" are first heard somewhere other than the mind. "The heart, it would seem, has its own consciousness and knowledge and ways that can be experienced just as the brain's consciousness and knowledge and ways are experienced. They are just not as scientifically measurable at the moment, and may never be."
Tickle, who has worked with other sacred writings before (The Divine Hours series), has a delightful blend of humbleness and confidence in her reflections on the Sayings. As she began compiling the "words" of Jesus through the past two years, Tickle said she wrestled with new perceptions about what it is to be a Christian, as well as to be herself.
So reader be warned. If, as Tickle says, "It is the correct and proper business of followers to try to discern the meaning of God's words," then THE WORDS OF JESUS is a good place to be about our business. But readers will encounter the sayings of Jesus through this book in new ways --- and may come away changed.
--- Reviewed by Cindy Crosby
We Would Have Crucified Him, Too February 7, 2008
21 out of 24 found this review helpful
Finally ... the true Jesus, in his own words. It's no wonder, after domesticating Jesus like an obedient poodle wearing pink nail polish and a tiara, that this book is so shocking to us. Jesus said a lot of things that even today would get him locked up, blacklisted, wiretapped, put on the no-fly list, and sent to Gitmo with a black bag over his head. Think hard before you read this book. Wouldn't you rather be happy with your illusions than know the truth and be disappointed? It's the real Jesus all right. But it's not the Jesus you and I have been hearing about almost from the moment of birth. This guy had a lot of strange, revolutionary ideas. He was scary then, and still is. So why can't we seem to turn away ...
this is a very dangerous book February 1, 2008
23 out of 25 found this review helpful
This is a dangerous book.
But these are dangerous words. They always have been, but we have forgotten and let them become comfortable through the centuries. Too comfortable.
Like The Sayings of Chairman Mao and the words of Confucius, the concentrated wisdom the Eastern mind works best undiluted and unexplained.
Jesus spoke just words, they didn't come from His mouth wrapped in narrative explanation. The words of Jesus were real conversations with real people. People close and intimate who shared the dusty roads with him, and also people who hung at the edge of curious crowds listening with skeptical ears.
The naked words ripped from the cocoon of expectations hit us the same way they hit the first ears that heard them. Intimate and corporate they work beyond reason to disturb the heart. Familiar words now new, shocking like unexpected words from a long known lover or spouse who changes your world with a word.
This is not a book to enter unwarned and unprepared. Expect to be shocked and angered and touched and changed. That is always what he intended. These are dangerous words.
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