What motivates Reza Aslan to allege the historical Jesus was a Zealot, a violent revolutionary who engaged in treason against Rome? Some history’s in order: Reza is a former Christian, now a Muslim. And what do we know about Mohammed, the founder of Islam? Unfortunately he was (among other things) a conquering war-lord (and I’ll happily note that Mohammed, by the standards of his time and place, was something of a reformer). Jesus seems comparatively tame, the peace-loving sermonizer on the mount. I think the juxtaposition bothers Reza: “Christians look up to their founder and see a benign do-gooder, whereas Muslims look to a man who used violence and terror to get what he wanted.” Maybe Reza wants to take Jesus down from that mount and station him near Mohammed: “You Christians think your founder was a proto-hippie? Think again. The Christ of the Gospels is a rewrite, a retcon, and the real man believed in getting things done with a sword.”
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