Jesus in the sutras, stele, and suras -- The heavenly elder brother -- A Judean jnana-guru -- The non-existent Jesus -- A Jaffna man's Jesus -- Jesus as a Jain tirthankara -- An Upanishadic mystic -- A minjung messiah -- Jesus in a kimono -- Conclusion: Our Jesus, their Jesus

Although Jesus was born in the western part of Asia, it was not until fifteen hundred years later that Asia experienced the full impact of Jesus' personality and teaching. Western missionaries, the primary transmitters of Christianity, left behind a Western understanding of Jesus. Today, Asians are seeking the face of the original Jesus - his Asian face. For them, all understanding of Jesus arise out of their particular contextual needs. Enriching the Western understanding of Jesus, Asians employ new interpretative resources, cultural symbols, and thought patterns as they make sense of Jesus for their own time and place.

The final book of the Bible, Revelation prophesies the ultimate judgement of mankind in a series of allegorical visions, grisly images and numerological predictions. According to these, empires will fall, the "Beast" will be destroyed and Christ will rule a new Jerusalem. With an introduction by Will Self.

Though the Bible is a product of West Asia, its influence on Europe and the Americas has received far more attention than its complex career in the East. R. S. Sugirtharajah corrects this imbalance with an expansive new study of Asia's subversive and idiosyncratic relationship with the Bible. This is the story of missionaries, imperialists, exegetes, reformers, and nationalists who molded Biblical texts according to their own needs in order to influence religion, politics, and daily life from India to China. When the Bible reached east and south Asia in the third century CE, its Christian scriptures already bore traces of Asian commodities and Indian moral stories. In China, the Bible merged with the teachings of Buddha and Lao Tzu to produce the Jesus Sutras. As he recounts the history of how Christianity was influenced by other Asian religions, Sugirtharajah deftly highlights the controversial issue of Buddhist and Vedic influence on Biblical religion. Once used to justify European rule in Asia, the Bible has also served to promote the spiritual salvation of women, outcasts, and untouchables. The Bible has left a literary mark on Asia in two ways: through its influence on Asian writers and through the reinvigoration of modern Asian vernaculars when proselytizing missionaries introduced Western print culture to the East.

"When it comes to grasping who Jesus was and is, author Michael Amaladoss argues, images can be as important as doctrines. In The Asian Jesus he unfolds nine images from Asian literature, culture, and religion that can lead us to new depths in the person of the Founder of Christianity."--BOOK JACKET.