The Victory of Moses' God Hypothesis explained? - Rated 
Would CT Wright write a book like this in 2008? I don't think so. His main topics are of a Third Quest, the prophet, the kingdom, the coming great disaster, Messiahship, some reasons for Jesus' crucifixion, and Resurrection, all with some delightful prolix. But why is this about a Victory over polydeism, over anti-Theism, over single pyramid heirocracy (unaccountability/ Janus), over Mammon, over fake Nike (might as right), and over mismartialization (fake Mars) of Theism, all of which use Dionysus/ mental hedonism? The nastiness of polydeism is missing here; the "Victory over What" is missing from this book. All is congenial and politically correct instead. What would Jesus say? "Where have the bad guys gone?" "Where's the Love Story gone?" "Where's the who-dun-it gone?" "Where have our songs gone?" "They killed my cousin and attacked my girlfriend you know" "Where's the Roman revolt against reason gone?" "Where's the revolt against the enslavement of women gone?" "Where are my health cures?" "Where is my birth control scheme?" "Where is my famine prevention?" "Where are my 153 affiliation principles?" "Why aren't the miracle triunes identified as Origins of Christianity?" "Where have the snow and the white horses gone?"
And what is Wright's God? It doesn't seem to be Moses' God of best decision-making, or Jesus' Eulogos, care-charity Eucharitas, anti-mismartialization, anti-Pan-Nero complex. It seems to be "Other", Alia in Latin, as in Jesus' last mortal words. You can't be wrong with that one. In truth and fact, he is completely right: God protects Freer Will and true good (right) over the deluded priority of unanalyzed "good" noutions.
These days, Victory of God authorities might address Moses' and Jesus' God Hypotheses and their proofs, and compare them with the Atheism hypotheses of Plato, Aristotle, Seneca, Rousseau, Hegel, Marx, Nietzsche and Wittgenstein, as implemented by various taboo people wrt evidence. The in-depth congeniality of Wright would be downgraded. And what did the Atheists want to delete? The Ten Commandments, criticism/ innovation, Enlightenment, use of pure logic, Freer Will, Philadelphia, comprehension, ethics, a priori Providential reason, and science, reportedly. They wanted Plato's polydeistic Prisoners of the Cave operating a "charmed" democracy instead, the real power having been usurped by false deities and their values, all from Aristotle's metaphysics.
Just as NT Wright proves, Gospel is an analysis of what caused the Fall of Jerusalem in Apocalypse around 70AD "in the logos-logic". These days it is no secret that Gospel had to be cryptic in order to destroy the blamed Roman polydeism and anti-Theism (of Seneca), so the mismartialization (amartias) of fake Judaism was targeted for excoriating criticism instead. By the date of publishing of Gospel, fake Judaism was defunct, a cockshy. As NT Wright put it, paradoxically: "We are not at liberty to manufacture a different Jesus to that of Gospel" with his aim to prevent Apocalypse, destroy polydeism (shared values) and debunk atheism. Quote Jesus, not Giza Vermes (though we all love Giza). Gospel describes how to prevent anything like that "catacaust" ever happening again. I'm not sure that Jesus' mechanisms to achieve this are identified in this book.
NT Wright's oeuvre will continue to be required reading for all Christian scholars, but treat it as only one perspective out of scores for Christian origins. So, if you quote it, ensure that quotes are balanced by the other score or so origins. The Victory of God is Entity Right, just as the cover states, a Tome of Right.
Superlative book to be read for generations! - Rated 
This is serious, scholarly theology. It is not for the faint-hearted. It is a cutting edge historical interpretation of Jesus in his setting as a Jew in the era of the second temple. It is the second in a projected six volume work that if completed, will be regarded with Schweitzer and Bultmann as the most significant historical works on Jesus ever produced. As such, this is not a book for a beginner.
Don't get me wrong however, it is notable for how easy it is to read. Sure, the concepts are huge and the footnotes massive but that has to be taken as a given for such an ambitious project. Anyone with a sufficient grounding in the New Testament and aware of the context of historical criticism could work though this book to their huge profit. It is one of the most substantial books I have ever read and it has deeply influenced my thinking on Jesus, the Gospels and Christianity.
Wright builds on the earth-shattering argument he made in the first volume, NTPG and here tries to show how Jesus came as a Prophet, a Priest and a King. He discusses how Jesus' self-understanding diverges from church piety but equally radically from the so-called objectivity of modern academia. What he restores to us is threefold:
- confidence in the historical investigation of Jesus to show us Jesus and not just his 21st Century portrait painters
- a serious challenge to the hegemony of "skepticism" which dominated the 3rd historical quest, passing off subjective worldview as objective research
- most importantly, a Jesus as human as he is divine. This is a conservative scholar producing a radical piece of research that needs to be taken on its own merits.
The results are phenomenal. His conclusion is as beautifully written as his argument was built. Be warned. If you read the book, chew through its depth you may well will be left facing a very real claim that the Jesus we read in the four Gospels may well be making a claim on you.
Jesus is King - of Israel and of the world of the gentiles - Rated
In this book Wright tells us that Jesus is presenting himself as leader of the people of Israel, the real king David. This kingdom of Israel has been set up by its God to show all nations how to live, and to do so in relationship with their Creator. Israel has to demonstrate the rule of God as the standard against which all human life can be compared, to make sure that no one is getting less than they should. The kings and gods of other nations do not look after their people and no longer under proper control. Only the God of Israel can bring these gods and rulers back under control, and either make them good rulers, or remove them from office. The gospel is the announcement of the arrival of this king who challenges and deposes all other pagan kings and gods. So the proclamation that Jesus is messiah, Christ, is the announcement that God has sent his man to be leader and ruler of the world. Pagan idolatry has been publicly defeated, in the cross of Jesus, and all peoples are summoned to give allegiance to the king of Israel, the umpire and arbiter of all other political authorities.
Wright's work relies on a good fifty years of NT research that has slowly been reuniting Jesus with the people of Israel. Wright's particular contribution is to reunite Jesus and the Old Testament, the agenda of the people of Israel. He shows that Jesus sets in motion what the patriarchs and prophets have been looking forward to. The revolution here is that this account of the Christian people does not cut out the people of Israel, but says their loyalty to God is a function of God's loyalty to them, and the only way to get to God for us is through these people, the people named in the Scriptures, the people of Israel.
For a long while the Church tried to have Jesus without Israel, to have the king without his kingdom and all its subjects. But it also knew that this was to try to separate the New Testament from the Old Testament, and so to divide what God holds together. The agenda driving part of the critical scholarship of the last 200 years has been to show that the Church were wrong about Jesus. It wanted to show that he was either himself mistaken, or misrepresented by the Church, being a moral champion who achieved a merely moral victory against institutional religion. All this was a way to protest at the Church, particularly in its cosy alliance with the state, and a way to say that the state does not have the authority it assumes, and is wrong to deny us our part in the political process.
Wright has put Jesus back with his people, as the one who establishes their identity as the people of God. Now to push this little further than Wright himself does, we can say that their king establishes their diversity and their unity. The Western philosophical tradition is always trying to simplify things by filtering out all the complexity, the crowds, the people. But you can't have Jesus except with Mary, and Martha, and James and John, and equally with Abraham and Moses and David. Christ is their man, and remains their man. Only because this communion and plurality is permanently established can we know that there is a life for the whole people of God into which the Gentiles - that is the Christians - are now included.
Deeply scholarly, shockingly readable!! - Rated
Like the other books in this series, this book combines an astonishing amount of scholarly research and reflection with a style that's not only readable but - dare one say it? - at times, wickedly impish. Casual asides, sometimes buried in the footnotes, point out some of the illogical conclusions or lazy thinking of other scholars, and do so in a wry style that's apt to make you laugh out loud. Not the norm, when reading a theological book! But more seriously, there's real depth here. Wright paints a picture of Jesus which is solidly rooted in history, and after reading this book, a lot of the odd little stories and sayings in the gospels suddenly make sense. I'm talking about those difficult to understand bits, which generations of preachers and lecturers have 'explained', but whose explanations have left us feeling dissatisfied and unconvinced. By placing Jesus solidly in his political/religious setting, and by seeing him as being in line with the Old Testament prophets, suddenly a lot of things begin to make sense. In some sections, the book *is* hard going, because Wright is such a careful and meticulous scholar. But there are real nuggets of knowledge to be mined here. An enlightening and important book. Highly recommended.
JVG - Rated
As mentioned in my review of NTPG, reading this book is like joining a train that has by now built up a considerable head of steam, and travelled some distance. Building on the work of NTPG Wright now turns his gaze to questions specifically about Jesus. And in doing so starts to paint a picture of who is was and what he was wanting to achieve.
Again for me this was another time of personal epiphany for me as I discovered for the first time a Jesus who seemed real and understandable. Meeting a desire that had stirred in me since more ephemeral encounters with God and, I presumed, Jesus had in church.
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