Book excerpt: David Friedrich Strauss's Das Leben Jesu kritisch bearbeitet (1835) brought about a new dawn in Biblical criticism by applying the 'myth theory' to the life of Jesus. Strauss treated the Gospel narrative like any other historical work, and denied all supernatural elements in the Gospels. Das Leben Jesu created an overnight sensation and Strauss became embroiled in fierce controversy. This earliest English version of 1846 was translated by the novelist George Eliot, and was her first published book.