From the Preface...

In this book I explain in a very straightforward and unapologetic way why, if I had been in the Land of Israel in the first century, I would not have joined the circle of Jesus' disciples. I would have dissented, I hope courteously, I am sure with solid reason and argument and fact. If I heard what he said in the Sermon on the Mount, for good and substantive reasons I would not have followed him. That is hard for people to imagine, since it is hard to think of words more deeply etched into our civilization and its deepest affirmations than the teachings of the Sermon on the Mount and other teachings of Jesus. But then it also is hard to imagine hearing those words for the first time, as something surprising and demanding, not as mere cliches of culture. That is precisely what I propose to do here: listen and argue.