SOME BOOK NOTES by Susan Campbell in the South Bend Tribune are of interest:

[...]

• Geza Vermes is a respected Biblical scholar, specializing in Judaism during the time of Jesus. In his latest work, "The Nativity: History and Legend" (Doubleday, $17.95, 172 pp.), Vermes turns his trained eye to the story of the birth of Jesus, perhaps the pivotal tale of Christianity.

Stripping away the legends and add-ons of later years, Vermes casts his net far to explain (and, in some cases, debunk) what some believers hold true -- even while he maintains respect for the core story. According to Vermes, Mary, the mother of Jesus, could hardly have been a virgin her entire life, as the Bible specifically talks about her and husband Joseph enjoying marital relations after the arrival of their first-born. And though the world celebrates in December, the actual event most likely occurred in the spring, roughly four years later than we think.

[I think she means "roughly four years earlier than we think."]

[...]

• One of the best writers on religion today, Bruce Chilton, takes us into "Abraham's Curse: The Roots of Violence in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam" (Doubleday, $24.95, 272 pp.). He begins his inquiry with the story of Abraham and Isaac and shows how that close brush with human sacrifice sets precedent for all three religions. He makes a compelling argument that human sacrifice didn't stop with God's encouraging and then thwarting Abraham's sacrifice of his son. It continues today with militancy and fundamentalism that would ignore and even destroy those outside the boundaries of its faith.

[...]

• And, finally, it's time to reconsider Queen Jezebel. In "Jezebel: The Untold Story of the Bible's Harlot Queen," (Doubleday, $24.95, 272 pp.), Lesley Hazleton shows us why so much of what we know of this "harlot" -- so called because of her religion, not her sexual practices -- is wrong. Jezebel was a powerful, pragmatic ruler, deeply loyal to her husband, King Ahab, and able to survive as a leader for 30 years in a ruthless age that devoured the weak. Translating original Hebrew scriptures, Hazleton, a journalist and a former psychologist, traces the queen's life from her early years in the Phoenician city-state of Tyre, to her marriage at age 15 to the king of Israel, to her coming to grips with a culture that worshipped one god and rejected all others. And then there is her final scene, where she is thrown out a window and eaten by dogs. By the time Jezebel's life ends, Hazleton has convinced the reader that this is a truly sad loss, an end to tolerance that also spelled the end of the Israelites' freedom.