BOY JESUS is a memorably engaging book by Joan Taylor, a Professor Emerita of King’s College, London. She is deeply immersed in early Christian texts and archaeology, and her book draws richly on both as she positions Jesus in the landscape that he knew and the context of extreme violence in which he grew up. She is a natural storyteller, arguing that the childhood of Jesus is not a wholly blank page, and that there is ample evidence to be able to piece together much of what shaped him.

Taylor builds her case from evidence that remains fragmentary, but that, when laid out as clearly as this, gives a definite outline of the first-century world that Jesus was brought up in, and a sense of the historical Jesus. She pieces together from maps, coins, the oral inheritance, the Christian tradition, other early writings, and common logic a fascinating picture of what it might have meant for Jesus, as the book’s subtitle says, to be “growing up Judaean in turbulent times”.

Taylor painstakingly creates a mosaic of what it meant for a child to be born Jewish and Judaean and of the family of David and in Bethlehem, but then to be exiled in Egypt and raised in Galilee. She also commentates thrillingly on the way in which Luke’s birth narrative seems to address many questions raised by Matthew’s version of the birth of Jesus. Interestingly, she writes far more on Joseph than on Mary, suggesting that his ability to interpret dreams and his rootedness in his family line were hugely influential on their son. Being of David’s line meant not only great danger from Herod, but also a sense of destiny and expectation which swirled around Jesus as he grew.

A significant theme of the book is the hatred that Herod had for Bethlehem and for anyone of David’s line, presenting evidence from chroniclers and the buried landscape to his extreme violence and jealousy.

She has complete mastery of her academic subject, the ability to explain things very clearly, and a deep understanding of what it all means for the Christian faith. Her enthusiasm for everything that she is saying makes her a fascinating guide. It draws the reader in, inviting us to ask questions and make connections alongside her.

We can’t hear the voice of the boy Jesus outside his precocious teaching in the Temple, but, by surveying the precise moment and specific world that Jesus was born into, and by exploring his lineage and the expectation that that created, Taylor is able to present the air Jesus breathed and the world he grew up in. She is the most capable and engaging of guides and her book is gripping and a delight.

The Revd Richard Lamey is Director of Mission and Ministry in the diocese of Norwich.

Boy Jesus: Growing Up Judaean in turbulent times
Joan E. Taylor
SPCK £24.99
(978-0-281-08498-2)
Church Times Bookshop £22.49