Summary:

This is one of the most controversial books about the Christian narrative of Jesus ever published. Is the need for a deathless hero who saves humanity part of the deep structure of our brain? Is religion simply filling a psychological need which is part of being human? This book may be picked apart in its details; however, it was one of the first to explore this 'big' question, an answer to which is as pressing today as it was then. The World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors raised a host of questions, few of which have yet been adequately answered, over a century later. Having said that, there are serious flaws in this book. Graves was apparently not working from original sources, with the exception of the Bible; he also muddles Vaishnava Hinduism and Buddhism, two belief systems with fundamental differences. That said, the traditional narratives of Krishna and Buddha do contain motifs in common with the NT stories of Jesus.