Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Extremely disappointing! As other reviewers have mentioned, the book has many inaccuracies throughout. There is an absolute anti-Christian bias, and oversimplification of events described. On page 11 - "Then suddenly, all this wondering and figuring stopped. Christianity was the new religion, fighting for survival, and in A.D. 391 Christians burned the city of Alexandria and it's famous libraries, which contained, along with many ancient treasures of scholarship, the work of Ptolemy. Christians did not believe in scholarship. They thought it was sacrilegious to be curious." This is a gross over simplification of the burning of the library of Alexandria. It is believed to have been burned by several different groups of people over many decades. And it was not simply "the Christians" who are suspected of the attack of the library in A.D. 391, but rather a Christian man, Coptic Pope Theophilus, who may have ordered a portion known as the Serapeum, burned. As far as "Christianity being a new religion, fighting for survival", the author fails to mention that Christians had been severely persecuted from the time of Christ until A.D. 313 when Emperor Constantine ended Christian persecution. Therefore, it cannot be assumed that "Christians did not like scholarship." The author would have been better to state the facts and not assume a motive which cannot be factually substantiated. On page 17 - "Moreover, people in Spain and the countries along the Atlantic seaboard were feeling hemmed in by the Muslim world which almost surrounded them. They felt threatened by people who had a different religion and customs." This is a gross misrepresentation of events, as the Christians lived in Europe for centuries before the Muslims overtook them by force and the sword, beheading anyone who would not agree to follow their religion. Is this what Jean Fritz refers to as "feeling hemmed in"? Page 20 - "Christians never forgot that they wanted to make the whole world Christian, so of course they considered any war against the Muslims a Holy War and anyone who led it was a hero." The context of this statement was after the Muslim "Holy war" on Christians, and the taking of their land, but yet, this fact is never mentioned in the book. When European slavery is discussed on page 29, the book states, "This was not done peacefully. Force was the only way to do it. But if Prince Henry regretted this, he probably comforted himself that he was "saving souls" by having the natives baptized." Again, the use of the word "probably" here alludes to the author's use of unsubstantiated assumption. Also on page 20, "Europeans took for granted that other people were inferior because they were different, and so Europeans believed (or persuaded themselves) that they could use natives in whatever way that suited them. Once European curiosity was unleashed on the world, so was their cruelty, arrogance and greed." Again, gross assumption of motive and inaccurate and selective use of facts. Cruelty, arrogance, and greed have endured on the earth for all of recorded history, and slavery has existed in nearly every culture and civilization in history as well. I give this book only one star for its gross assumption of motive, inaccurate information, and selective use of facts. Shame on Scholastic for publishing such rubbish! I will not be using this book with my students.