The Fifth Gospel

Very good plot and very researched references. Gives us an interesting view of the insides of the Vatican A must read

Is it naïve, arrogant or just temerarious to dare to voice an opinion about a NY Times bestseller that begins with three pages of praise in quotations from professional reviewers, top literary journals and leading writers ? Is it possible to say anything new about this "gripping thriller", this "literary but compulsively readable" "erudite page-turner", this "groundbreaking", "captivating" "Rubik's cube of a novel", "with credible characters, twists and turns of plot and a fascinating theological rationale" ? I will have to content myself with telling you why I could not put it down. I learned a lot from Ian Caldwell's ingenious story about two brothers who are priests at the Vatican, one Roman Catholic and celibate, and the other Greek Catholic, married and the father of a five-year-old. I was myself a Roman Catholic priest for seven years, who after my papal dispensation became a lay theologian, Religious Education director and a professor of Theology. Later I became an atheist and author of a blog (blindfaithblindfolly.wordpress.com) in which I try to get "Believers on the Brink" to recognize the credulity and wishful thinking that are the foundations of their faith. One of the examples of this credulity is the credence given to the Shroud of Turin. This book's central character, apart from the priest-brothers, is in fact the Church's most famous relic, said to be the burial cloth of the crucified Christ. I have never read such a riveting account of the Shroud's documented and hypothetical history, the mystery of its supposed miraculous origin and the controversy surrounding its authenticity. I cannot reveal here the novel's plot and the author's thesis, but even I did not expect such a development nor such a denouement. I recommend the book as a superbly written and constructed work of fiction about a real world most of us know only from the outside and from far less credible novels like Dan Brown's "Angels and Demons". One does not have to be familiar with the Bible to appreciate the scholarship behind the novel, nor a bred and buttered Catholic to be intrigued by the inner workings of the world's smallest country and the world's largest Christian denomination, in its relationship with the schismatic Orthodox churches. Centered on the final years of the pontificate of Pope John Paul 2, the novel succeeds - almost - in making us forget that it is fiction. It is one helluva good yarn.

It’s original price is 350 n I got it for less than 200. Satisfied with the product

A bit difficult to follow the plot. Needs to be read slowly and methodically! Good description of the Vatican and interesting insight into the various gospels.

I found this a thoroughly satisfying novel. Ian Caldwell has done his work well. The novel has an intriguing theme and it is thoroughly researched, as well as skillfully plotted and populated with deep and credible characters. The Shroud of Turin is the iconic motif in a plot that really turns on the schism between Eastern Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism. Debatable claims for and against the authenticity of the Shroud give way to much more interesting reflections on the apparent blasphemy of such imagery, while parochial reflections on eastern versus western faith from the perspective of Vatican politics turn into a deeper analysis of the numerous little contradictions between the four canonical gospels. Here the fifth gospel of the title plays a didactic role in dramatizing what might otherwise have been a rather tedious exercise in comparative hermeneutics. The outcome is that the Gospel of John has something to say on the mystery of the Shroud, although to say more here might spoil the plot for some readers. The priestly characters, including Pope John Paul II in all his terminal frailty, add real depth to the philosophizing and illustrate better than any moralizing would do how Christian faith, for all its intellectual vulnerability, can give shape and meaning to mortal human lives. Altogether this is a novel for discerning readers. With a body count of one and no graphic sex it is not an airport novel.