God

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by Jack Miles

Miles portrays God in the form of a great literary figure, the Old Testament hero. God is seen from his earliest appearance as Creator to his last appearance as Ancient of Days through a meticulous, thorough, and inspired study of that testament - book after book, verse by verse. Miles reveals to us that the God he exposes is a fighter whose biggest struggle is with himself. We witness God split between opposing desires. He is destructive and constructive, conceited and modest, sophisticated and naïve, cruel and delicate, lawful and lawless, strong but impotent, omniscient and blind, to his own chagrin. We are lured into the epic drama of his desire for self-knowledge, which motivated him to create humans as his mirror, as we witness him alter so dramatically. He attempts to inspect his own reflection in that mirror, but he also discovers a rival. Then we see God's hazardous transition from might to wisdom. Our culture's attitude to the Bible has been more of a respectful act than a quest for understanding about the Bible's protagonist for generations; as a result, the intricacy of God's essence and "life" has been diluted in our consciousness throughout the years. This book depicts the endlessly intricate God who created infinitely complex man in his image in finely sculpted relief. Here, we get a glimpse of the spirit of that literary masterpiece that has influenced both our society and our religious lives. With imagination, insight, intelligence, bravery, and stunning originality, Jack Miles approaches his big topic in God: A Biography, providing us with an illumination of the Old Testament as a work of supreme art and a voyage to God's inner heart.