This book revolutionaized my perspective of Biblical prophecy. The terrible political position of Christian Zionism has created untold havoc in the Middle East. The violence and hatred is only supported by Christian Zionists who fatally misread Biblical text. Chapman does an excellent analysis of the situation and makes a prophetic call for Christians to change.

Colin Chapman has taken on the unpleasant task of confronting a modern theological innovation that has captured the imagination of the evangelical church - dispensationalism. The concept, born in England in the mid-1800's as the brainchild of John Nelson Darby, has developed into a complex system of biblical interpretation that has become attractive due to its claim to a simple, straightforward, literal interpretation of the Bible. In Whose Promised Land?, Mr. Chapman brings together a myriad of voices on the topic, beginning with the oldest biblical texts, working his way through the historical maze of details and treaties, to the modern day crisis of the Palestinian people and the Jewish State. He does this successfully by letting the voices speak for themselves by way of extended quotes and detailed references for further research. After laying out the historical details, he makes biblical argument for the rejection of the dispensationalist's unqualified support for the State of Israel. For those interested in hermaneutics (biblical interpretation) and the sensitive issues involve, the trek through all the historical data will be worth your while when you arrive at the section entitled "Is there a word from the Lord?" The worst thing about this book is that it is currently out of print. This is unfortunate. For, any serious student of biblical prophecy and theology will want to have this book in their collection.

Inventors are individuals who have an intuitive ability to recognize inherent flaws in the way things are done, or the tools used to do them. They are able to apply their creative skills to visuallising, describing and sometimes, fabricating a working model incorporating their improvements. While often the drawings or models are adequate for evaluation, they require the skills of a trained technician, an Engineer, to bring them to production standard. Then, to convince the public that they must have this newer, better mousetrap, requires the altogether different skills of a promotor/marketer. Anthony Colin Bruce Chapman, the founder of Lotus Engineering, possessed all these attributes. Indeed, his innovative application of these diverse (in ordinary mortals) skills is undoubtedly the key to his recognition as the most influential figure in the development of the modern motorcar. Colin Chapman was undeniably, a genius. To reveal this fact without recourse to cliche requires someone with knowledge of the capabilities and limitations of "ordinary" Engineers, and an understanding that extremes of temperament, or eccentricity are often tools of a superior intellect, used to motivate, to inspire enthusiasm for advanced concepts. Chapman protege and fellow engineer, Hugh Haskell has performed this task admirably. A perceptive writer, and associate and friend to many of the central figures in the phenomenon that was Colin Chapmans' Lotus, he was able to convey the facts behind the myths in engaging, yet authoritative, discourse. He fondly recalls the Chapman-inspired enthusiasm that was part of being a member of the Lotus team. His insightful narrative conveys, in terms familiar to the layman, the brilliant originality of Chapmans' engineering achievements. He takes us from Chapmans' childhood, through the formative years, and the times when "Lotus" was synonymous with leadership in innovation. He also tells how, when forced by circumstance, Chapman was able to find loopholes to achieve an outcome against the efforts of short-sighted officialdom. Almost unbelievablely, there were occasions when the Chapman innovations were so far ahead of the pack that the rule-makers legislated against him to "level the playing field". Haskell hasn't avoided the issues that Chapmans' unconventional approach to matters financial aroused in the minds of many. Indeed, he includes anecdotes that confirm the young Chapmans' admirable negotiating skills. The book also describes Chapmans ventures into other fields,...from bathroom furniture, through luxury cruising yachts to micro-light aircraft, the fertile mind of Colin Chapman left his mark of originality, and his minimalist design philosophy is apparent in many of his creations, light on material substance they may be, but they're full measure for clever engineering. A winning combination. This is a damned good book, a tribute by one engineer to a colleague who happened to be one of the Twentieth Centurys' greatest automotive engineers. Read it,...be inspired.

I first read this book ten years ago. Buying it now I intend to enjoy it all over again. If you are at all interested in cars and have ever lifted a wrench in an attempt to wreak your own improvements, then you will appreciate this life story. The forword by Enzo Ferrari is the only reccomendation that you need.

My title says it all. Chapman reviews all of the major questions of Christian/Western-Islamic relations with knowledge and objectivity. Good sources. Clearly written. I would recommend it highly.

A short review in the magazine _Nature_ (9 Oct 97, p 557) has a cool picture and says "gripping read and lavishly illustrated." END

I'm a management student and I have some matter's that I need to study with this book

In this book, one can learn that: The internet started as a Defense Department project in the 80's p. 120 The proper way to search for pager manufacturing in internet web search engines is just to mention "pager", and not worry at all about other key words or symbols. p. 124 That, according to an intelligence project, pager repair could be a great business. p.139 I was lead to believe by a book review that this book would give me a great deal of information about passive intelligence gathering. It does not live up to its promise, and lacks credibility for so many factual (1,1969 2, +pager +manufacture + industry +trends ) and analytical (3 I threw my cell phone away, and got another for free)errors. What a shame.

I work as a professional performing due diligence for VC firms and client companies in Seattle and Silicon Valley. I have been using many of the techniques for several years that enable me to rapidly assess business opportunities and develop turnaround strategies. I am also a member of the Society of Competitive Intelligence Professionals.

What this book did was enable me to enhance my business process and better articulate this extremely difficult line of work. For example, the business process outlined on page 58 is crucial in that it identifies several "Stop" or check points with clients. Key in this type of consulting, especially where steps you take as a consultant may directly add risk to your client, it is important to know where to draw the line and involve them for a decision. The authors clarify where the key decision points are when it comes to going from passive to semi-active, to active intelligence gathering. Critical, as time is money to you. But! to the client, information - or exposure thereof also means risk that could become your liability.

Consultants in this field are in the knowledge business, and one of the most difficult things to do is get the client to place a value on knowledge or intelligence. The authors, through wit and excellent real-world examples, spell out some of the keys to getting paid!! (pp 67). Naturally, this would go over the head of the casual reader who has never practiced and is looking for a "cook book" approach to due diligence of new business opportunities (i.e. see above commentary from Bogota).

This book is a "how to" book in that the authors have taken the time to clarify and rank several research tools and locations that one might not normally be aware of. This comparison alone is worth the money, as anyone who has used the web for performing research would agree.

The real brilliance in this book is subtle. By connecting the examples, you learn how to ask questions and iden! tify with what is important in doing intelligence research.! Again, for anyone who has gone in circles with clients who "don't know what they don't know", or worse yet, don't know how to value knowledge - this is critical to delivering fast, and minimizing your exposure.

Frankly, the Bogota guy didn't get it and has probably never performed true business intelligence. I agree that the coverage of the Internet web search engines, which used the example of finding information on pagers, is old news. The chapter's purpose was to show how more advanced tools outside of the Internet, such as Nexis, are preferred substitutes. That point was clearly made. However, this example was only used among 10 pages of chapter 5 (which was taken up with images of why the web doesn't work). The other 257 pp of this book are the meat.

My hats off to the authors for delivering a humorous text based on real-world wisdom that cuts through a very gray area that is as difficult to perform, as it is to explain.

As an investment banking anaylst, one of my primary jobs is build financial models of the companies we evaluate. One of the most underrated and (in my view) more important element of my work comes when we perform due diligence and understand the soundness of the assumptions we build into our models. Most analysts (in my experience) are too infatuated with their sophisticated spreadsheets and believe the sheer complexity of their models can compensate for a lack of understanding of the fundamental business they are set to evaluate.

The book does an outstanding job of articulating, at every step, the importance of challenging one's assumptions and systematically gathering, synthesizing, and =analyzing= information that helps to dig through the colored lenses of wishful thinking or purely numerical analysis. The occasional injection of humor is quite welcome - in a world of stuffy self-important books on business, here's a piece of work that was written by people who love what they do, and are adept at making you better at what you do as well.

Anyone who rejects the rejuvination of the land of Israel today as a clear sign that God has returned to complete His prophetic revelations to the nation of Israel is ignoring massive chunks of scripture. Leviticus, Deuteronomy, and the prophets are not the least bit vague in this land sign. Vagueness only manifests itself when people like the author here decide to turn the declared promises of God to Israelinside-out to suit their own human goals...whatever those may be.

I can't recommend this book unless you are very familiar with those promises mentioned above. If you are familiar with the promises, then I might consider a recommendation because some history is worthwhile reading.

This is a subject which I have devoted a considerable amount of study to for many years. This book appeared to promise so much in it's title, yet failed to deliver on virtually every level.

The author holds the view that there is no theological significance to the present state of Israel, and that the re-birth of the Jewish state is not the fulfilment, or even a preliminary stage in the fulfilment, of what God promised and predicted in the Old Testament.

The tone of this book feels slanted towards the doctrine of Replacement Theology in my estimation and the references and interpretations of Scriptures are erroneous and flawed, with the writer trying to separate the spiritual dimensions of the Gospel of Christ from the material dimensions of the Gospel which are intrinsically part of the Old Testament. This is unbiblical and inevitably leads to incorrect conclusions.

I find the references and use of prophetic Scriptures in this book to be inconsistent and very selective.

The Old Testament Divine promises in relation to the People (Jews) and Land of Israel by God were explicitly eternal and irrevocable. The Holy Scriptures directly and conclusively declare that the Land being discussed here belonged to the Lord Himself, yet he had promised it to none other, absolutely no other, than the descendants of Abraham, Issac and Jacob (Israel), as an eternal possession.

The Divine prophetic promises relating to the heritage, diaspora, regathering and re-birth of the Jewish state are clear and unquestionable. (Genesis 15; v18, Genesis 17; v7-19, Genesis 35; v9-12, Ezekiel 11;v17, Jeremiah 30;v3, Jeremiah 31;v35, Isaiah 11; v10, Zechariah 14; v2...to mention just a few references, which are also dealt with in the New Testament).

To pick and choose, and selectively interpret which sections of Scripture are relevant to an agenda is dangerous and can only have disastrous results. The Bible is either the whole Word of God and absolute truth or it is not worth the paper it is written on. If God states that His promises and covenants are eternal and everlasting, then that is exactly what they are. If He makes promises in relation to a Land, then to describe the Land as something spiritual or anything else is a distortion and misinterpretation.

The author is rightly concerned about some of Israel's actions in relation to the Palestinians at this time, yet even these have to be taken in their correct, true and entire context in both the political and Scriptural arenas. Matters which are not in any way suitably addressed in this book. The Israeli victims and Palestinian terrorism/violence being sidestepped.

Unfortunately, furthermore due to the interpretations expressed in this book, current events and their significance in relation to the end times are not dealt with in the manner deserving of their critical importance.

The writer does not correctly address the dispersal of the Jewish people in antiquity which was described Scripturally as being due to their sinfulness and rebellion. Neither does the book address the re-gathering and re-birth of Israel as a nation as not being in any way conditional upon repentance, which itself is declared in Scripture to only occur during the prophetic events of the end times and the Tribulation when the Messiah returns again and is recognised. (Zechariah 12; v1-11).

This is an extensive discussion which cannot be satisfied within the confines of a review. This book poorly covers the subject and there is a wealth of excellent material out there which commendably covers this topic.
Might I respectfully suggested some other recommended reading which clarifies many of the issues that have become unfortunatley clouded in this particular work;-
"Our Father Abraham: Jewish Roots of the Christian Faith" by Marvin Wilson.
"Unholy War" and"Jerusalem In Prophecy" both by Randall Price
"Israel at the Crossroads: Fifty Years and Counting" by David Dolan.

An excellant book; theologically sound; rooted in the real history or the region. It will not please those sold on fundamentalist, dispensational theology. It will please those open to Biblical interpretation that makes sense and that is consistent with New Testament teachings on the Kingdom of God and the people of God. It will give the reader a balanced view of the real history of the confict. It will in the words of each side give their story and rationale for the conflict. It is one of the best books I have ever read cataloging each side's perspective of the problems.