From the Rev. Ian Crumpton, Presbyterian minister, Christchurch NZ.

Thanks for the very careful review of Lloyd's book. I agree with quite a bit of what you say, but would make a few points:

Geering talks about Jesus' practical concern, and his minimal (if any) doctrinaire teaching. Quite a bit of modern scholarship is focussed on recovering the Wisdom Literature, and Geering is locating Jesus in that practical minded tradition.

You write at the end of the intro: ".. he edits out references to God and spirit."  In his approach, Lloyd is following the methods of the Jesus Seminars (Robert Funk et al), at the Westar Institute. Rather than editing out, it is a positive search for authenticity, beneath the accretions of interpretation. (Is the glass half full, or half empty?)

On page 1 you say "Mysticism and incarnation belong together." I think that's absolutely true. You continue: "The transcendent includes and goes beyond the physical."  For Geering and other non-realists, the transcendent is not denied, but regarded as a way of apprehension, a mode of sentience. It is a human construct, an evolutionary gift to humanity. Music, art, liturgy, mythology, all help us develop that sense of the "beyond".

You commented on Arthur Koestler's "Holarchy." It reminds me of Ken Wilber's "great chain of being" or "nested worlds" which he regards as a common element in religion: i.e. the physical world is nested in the mental world of human consciousness; that in the wider mystical world, etc. Since the Enlightenment, the world of empirical knowledge became so successful that most people today think that that is the only world there is. Karen Armstrong "The Battle for God" describes how Fundamentalists, immersed like us all in this materialist, atomistic world, bring into it the mythological insights of earlier times and treat them all as hard facts. They make all elements in our heritage "literally true". Geering is developing a similar theology, directed to those for whom this is the only world. I like you, believe there are other valid ways of knowing, ways of being, much neglected in our time. But unless we recover them, the planet, along with our spiritual selves, will die.

Then you write " I hope it is clear why I am quoting these verses: I am pointing out that according to Paul, he and the Jerusalem apostles agreed that all were preaching the same gospel. And this gospel was not primarily a gospel of a kind of humanism as Geering maintains."  Yes, Paul and the Jerusalem apostles were preaching the same Gospel. But it is a theistic development since Jesus, and a theological construct of his life: divinisation, beautification, sanctification, etc. which had no reality in the life of Jesus. These were constructs to help people understand who Jesus is. In our time, they have become a stumbling block for many. Hence the theological exercise of "recovering" the simpler sage-like Jesus beneath these early theological accretions.   

From these comments, you'll see that you've given me some real food for thought. Yes, you should put it out there for others to reflect upon too.