Subject: ON THE THIRD DAY by Piers Paul Read

From: [email-masked] (Evelyn C Leeper +1 908 957 2070)
Date: 19 Dec 91 18:53:58 GMT

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                       ON THE THIRD DAY by Piers Paul Read
                        A book review by Evelyn C. Leeper
			 Copyright 1991 Evelyn C. Leeper

        The jacket blurb of this book starts off, "Suppose Christ did *not*
   rise from the dead?  This question is the startling premise of Piers Paul
   Read's new novel."  Yeah, and several billion people's belief systems to
   boot.  What the blurb writer meant (or at any rate, should have said) is
   "Suppose someone found proof that Christ did *not* rise from the dead?"

        The premise of the novel is, in fact, that there is a "Lithuanian
   codex" to Josephus's writings that says that the body of Jesus was taken
   from the tomb and put in a clay jar in the cistern under the Temple Mount,
   and that the Israelis, while secretly excavating under the Mount, find the
   skeleton of a man crucified in the 1st Century with marks that match the
   "crown of thorns" and the wound in the side supposed given by a Roman
   soldier's spear.  Now, clearly, whether this premise is fantasy depends on
   the reader's belief system as much as anything in the book itself.  But the
   subject matter makes it reasonable to review it here, so do not take this
   review as promoting one belief system over another.

        All this said, I now have to tell you that, as fascinating as the
   premise is, Read has managed to make the book extremely dull.  (I found
   myself thinking, "This man could make the Resurrection dull"--a particularly
   apt image!)  His writing style is flat, and his characterization consists of
   telling you about people's feelings in a very analytical fashion rather than
   by showing, through actions or dialogue, what their emotions are.  He is
   also a sloppy writer, since he has religious Jews referring to "Christ"
   rather than "Jesus."  The former is a title and Jews consider its use
   improper because it implies that the speaker believes it to be an accurate
   one.  A parallel example would be that during the Second Great Schism of
   1378, followers of Urban VII did not call Clement VII Pope, and vice versa.
   This is not followed strictly by all Jews, but it would have been by the
   ones Read is writing about.  But worst of all, he relies on stereotypes for
   most of his characters, and even more offensive stereotypes for their
   motivations.  (To tell more would be a spoiler, so I will discuss this
   further at the end, after the "spoiler warning.")

        If you are interested in good writing along similar lines, there are
   better books to read.  I would recommend Irving Wallace's THE WORD, whose
   premise is that a fifth gospel is found which was written contemporaneously
   with Jesus (or, if you prefer, the actual document found dates from a time
   indicating the writer of the document was relating first-hand knowledgee
   actual documents of four gospels extant all date from the 2nd Century or
   later).  There are other, non-fiction works in this area, including THE
   PASSOVER PLOT by Hugh J. Schonfield (the contention is that Jesus and his
   disciples faked his death on the cross), and HOLY BLOOD, HOLY GRAIL by
   Michael Baigent.  The contention in the latter, even more far-fetched, is
   that after the Resurrection Jesus moved to France, got married, and raised a
   family whose descendents still control much of Europe.  Look, I don't make
   them up, I just report them.

        I should note that my first-ever book review was of THE PASSOVER PLOT.
   I wrote it in 1967, when I was seventeen, for the high school paper.  The
   town was over 75% Catholic, the principal always checked over the
   newspaper's content, and my review didn't get printed.

                              ***SPOILER WARNING***

        This paragraph describes the end of the novel--stop now if you don't
   want to know.  Okay?  It seems that Ya'akov (an Israeli and a member of the
   Mossad) was worried about the shifting power in the world.  The Jews in the
   United States would soon lose their power in New York and California to
   other immigrants, mostly Catholic, and the United States wouldn't support
   Israel as much.  And Japan and the other powerful nations would have no
   reason to back it, since Israel has no oil to sell.  But if the Christians
   no longer believed that Jesus had superseded Judaism, they would all become
   Jews--or barring that, at least more supportive of Israel even if Israel
   didn't have oil.  Ya'akov was captured in Lebanon during the Israeli
   invasion and interrogated in Syria by a Russian Jew.  During the
   interrogation, Ya'akov mentioned that he had been thinking of ways to
   undermine Christianity.  It turned out that the Russian also was worried
   about the power of Christianity, especially the Catholic backing of the
   independence movement in the Baltics (this was written in 1990, remember).
   So the Russian arranges for Ya'akov to be released, goes back to the Soviet
   Union, and arranges for the KGB to forge a codex with the burial comments,
   which is then "discovered."  Meanwhile, Ya'akov finds a 1st Century
   skeleton, has it doctored to have the correct wounds, then "plants" it under
   the Temple Mount.  He waits a couple of years, then arranges for the Mossad
   to excavate (secretly, of course) under the Temple Mount, and has a noted
   archaeologist along, "just in case we find anything."  Yes, folks, what we
   have here is that old standby, that hoary stereotype, the International
   Jewish Conspiracy to undermine Christianity!  As if this weren't bad enough,
   he also claims that it's really only the Jews in the United States who
   support Israel, and that they manage to force it on everyone else.

        Ptui!

        I'm glad I checked the book out of the library rather than buying it.
   (But I suppose I shouldn't have expected more for an author who best-known
   work is an account of the Andes plane survivors who resorted to cannibalism
   to survive.)

   %T      On the Third Day
   %A      Piers Paul Read
   %C      New York
   %D      1990
   %I      Random House
   %O      hardback, US$20.00
   %G      ISBN 0-679-40089-3
   %P      259pp

Evelyn C. Leeper   |   +1 908 957 2070   |   att!mtgzy!ecl or [email-masked]