<DIV><p>Who was the historical Jesus? Here veteran movie director Paul Verhoeven&rsquo;s lifelong fascination with the facts and fictions surrounding the life of Jesus of Nazareth culminates in a work of brazen scholarship. Combining his passion for the subject with an in-depth knowledge of the history gained through rigorous study, Verhoeven paints a portrait of Jesus the man and Jesus the radical prophet. Verhoeven constructs a new vision of Jesus as a child born from the rape of Mary by a Roman soldier, as a spiritualist who performed exorcisms by screaming and spitting in the mouths of the possessed to drive out demons, and as a militant revolutionary who urged his followers to arm themselves.</p><p>After moving from his native Holland to Los Angeles in 1985, <B>Paul Verhoeven</B> became the only non-theologian admitted into the Jesus Seminar, a group of seventy-seven eminent scholars in theology, philosophy, linguistics, and biblical history. Their discussions are devoted to determining what Jesus actually said and did. <I>Jesus of Nazareth</I> was developed in extensive consultation with Rob van Scheers, Verhoeven&rsquo;s biographer. Verhoeven is the director of successful films such as <I>Turkish Delight</I> (1973), <I>Soldier of Orange</I> (1977), <I>The Fourth Man</I> (1983), <I>RoboCop</I> (1987), <I>Basic Instinct</I> (1992), <I>Starship Troopers</I> (1997), and <I>Black Book</I> (2006).</p><p><B>Susan Massotty</B> is an award-winning translator who has also translated <I>The Diary of Anne Frank</I>, <I>My Father&rsquo;s Notebook</I> by Kader Abdolah, <I>All Souls Day</I> by Cees Nooteboom, <I>Wedding by the Sea</I> by Abdelkader Benali, and <I>The Kreutzer Sonata</I> by Margriet de Moor. She lives and works in the Netherlands.</p></DIV>