The New York Times best seller The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism by Timothy Keller was given to me as a gift by the leadership of Reality Church in Boston's south end to better understand Christianity. Timothy Keller is a pastor of a large Presbyterian church in New York City, and is well known among urban evangelicals. Despite its success, The Reason for God is full of mostly superficial reasoning, sprinkled with a few good insights.
(Reminder: my methodology for book summaries is that I allow myself no more than 140 words for the summary and may expand on the ideas presented by the author in the critique).
Summary:
Skepticism and faith are ascending; replies to skepticism exist. Why would God allow unnecessary suffering? This question
implies we know suffering is unnecessary. Even injustices perpetrated by
Christians point to a God given sense of justice. God does not send people to
hell, instead everyone’s soul follows the trajectory of their life. Believing
in one true religion is no more exclusive than asserting all religions have
truth. Historically, Christianity has liberated people. Science does not disprove
Christianity; science looks for natural causes and cannot address supernatural
causes. The regularity of scientific laws are one clue to God’s existence. Sin
is absolved through grace, not effort. Jesus had to die because forgiveness is
costly suffering and love is personal exchange. If the resurrection did not
happen, Christianity would not have been popular. God exists eternally in three
persons; God is relational.
Critique:
The problems of this book start with the title 'The Reason for God,' which does not accurately depict its content. Nowhere does Keller even claim to give the reason (singular) for God. In the first half he responds to several objections to Christianity, and the second part is titled "The Reasons for Faith". But, the problem with the title does not end there. Towards the end of the book Keller defends God as a trinity, an exclusively Christian concept of God. Thus, the title should be The Reasons for Christianity.
The structure of the book, particularly the first half should have been better organized. Chapters 1,3, 6, and 7 should be grouped together as well as 2, 4, and 5. Chapters 1, 3, 6, and 7 all concern objections pertaining to the truth of Christianity. In particular, chapters 1 ("There Can't Be Just One True Religion") and 3 ("Christianity Is a Straitjacket") start with quite similar objections. Chapters 2, 4, and 5 all have to do with some version of the problem of suffering or injustice perpetrated by Christians.
There are a few excellent observations throughout the book. Keller starts the book by observing that both skepticism and faith are ascending, and the world is polarizing over religion. This is correct. A recent Pew poll shows this polarization quite nicely. This poll shows that 72% of Americans believe that religion is losing influence in public life, and 56% polled say this loss of influence is a bad thing.
Another worthwhile observation is that doubts arise from a set of alternative beliefs. This does not necessarily entail that all perspectives are equally valid. Keller argues that whenever you have a doubt or critique of Christianity, this doubt is just as bound to a set of beliefs as Christianity itself. In addition, these critiques often come from a culture steeped in Christian values.
While he holds that doubts arise from a set of beliefs, he rants against relativism, especially moral relativism. In general, relativism is the theory that truth is specific to the time and place of the subject. Taken to its extreme relativism is untenable. But Keller is right that, even in its most sophisticated forms, relativism does have a serious problem. If it is a correct theory about truth, then a relativist would have to acknowledge that relativism is not true, or at least just as true, as moral absolutism. This undermines the relativistic theory of truth. However, this extreme relativism is rarely held and Keller does not properly acknowledge the middle ground between this extreme relativism and his preferred theory that there is one Truth.
For Keller, God is the author of moral law. We have a sense of justice and fairness that cannot be explained without recourse to God. Thus, God is the metaphysical justification of morality. For Keller, everyone (at least in this culture) implicitly knows God exists. The problem is that Keller does not spell out exactly what moral codes or rules God wrote. Or how the moral sense functions to produce various moralities in multiple cultures. But speaking for myself, I don't care whether or not there is a metaphysical foundation of morality. I know, at least for myself, that I like it when others are happy and do not like it when they are sad. I do find an evolutionary explanation for morality more plausible, but an evolutionary explanation is compatible with God.
Keller does pose a problem for a theory of truth arising from an evolutionary standpoint. Natural selection only selects the best survivors, not those who can best ascertain truth. Thus, from a purely evolutionary perspective we cannot be sure of our rational faculties, including the faculties that lead us to the theory of evolution. In this argument, he leans heavily on the philosopher/theologian Alvin Plantiga. However, many philosophers have written responses to Plantiga. You can start here for the most basic primer. Suffice it to say that Keller's critique is superficial.
Keller also suggests that the Bible has beat Karl Marx, the founder of communism, to his own criticism. However, Keller misread Marx. He focuses on Marx's idea that religion is oppressive without discussing the details of Marx's theory. Marx's theory about religion is that religion is the opiate of the masses because it tells the masses that the righteous should NOT seek power in this life. However, when discussing Marx, Keller states: "...He (the God of Jesus) can only be reached through repentance, through the giving up of power (emphasis original, pg. 61)." By telling us to give up power, Keller is actually helping Marx's argument in this chapter.
In the second half of the book Keller stops responding to objections and starts arguing for Christianity. In the chapter "The Reality of the Resurrection," Keller argues that culturally no one should have expected anyone to rise from the dead and thus the resurrection could not be hallucinations or fabricated tales. The problem with this argument is that there are several passages in the synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) where Jesus tells his disciples that he will rise again and go with them to Galilee. Even if culturally no one should expect Jesus to rise again, the disciples, if they believed the word of Jesus would have expected the resurrection. It is not a stretch to suspect that the disciples may have told others of this message.
Bottom Line:
Keller chose a task that was virtually impossible; responding to seven objections and then making a case for Christianity. Each of the seven objections in the first half of the book and many chapters in the second half of the book deserved a book length treatment. Trying to cover all this material in such a short space led to superficial coverage of complex theological and philosophical topics. However, despite some further problems in organization as well as misreading Marx and other errors, the book's content is better than expected. Given the impossibility of the task Keller chose, it is impressive that the content of The Reason for God rose to the level of mediocrity.
The structure of the book, particularly the first half should have been better organized. Chapters 1,3, 6, and 7 should be grouped together as well as 2, 4, and 5. Chapters 1, 3, 6, and 7 all concern objections pertaining to the truth of Christianity. In particular, chapters 1 ("There Can't Be Just One True Religion") and 3 ("Christianity Is a Straitjacket") start with quite similar objections. Chapters 2, 4, and 5 all have to do with some version of the problem of suffering or injustice perpetrated by Christians.
There are a few excellent observations throughout the book. Keller starts the book by observing that both skepticism and faith are ascending, and the world is polarizing over religion. This is correct. A recent Pew poll shows this polarization quite nicely. This poll shows that 72% of Americans believe that religion is losing influence in public life, and 56% polled say this loss of influence is a bad thing.
Another worthwhile observation is that doubts arise from a set of alternative beliefs. This does not necessarily entail that all perspectives are equally valid. Keller argues that whenever you have a doubt or critique of Christianity, this doubt is just as bound to a set of beliefs as Christianity itself. In addition, these critiques often come from a culture steeped in Christian values.
While he holds that doubts arise from a set of beliefs, he rants against relativism, especially moral relativism. In general, relativism is the theory that truth is specific to the time and place of the subject. Taken to its extreme relativism is untenable. But Keller is right that, even in its most sophisticated forms, relativism does have a serious problem. If it is a correct theory about truth, then a relativist would have to acknowledge that relativism is not true, or at least just as true, as moral absolutism. This undermines the relativistic theory of truth. However, this extreme relativism is rarely held and Keller does not properly acknowledge the middle ground between this extreme relativism and his preferred theory that there is one Truth.
For Keller, God is the author of moral law. We have a sense of justice and fairness that cannot be explained without recourse to God. Thus, God is the metaphysical justification of morality. For Keller, everyone (at least in this culture) implicitly knows God exists. The problem is that Keller does not spell out exactly what moral codes or rules God wrote. Or how the moral sense functions to produce various moralities in multiple cultures. But speaking for myself, I don't care whether or not there is a metaphysical foundation of morality. I know, at least for myself, that I like it when others are happy and do not like it when they are sad. I do find an evolutionary explanation for morality more plausible, but an evolutionary explanation is compatible with God.
Keller does pose a problem for a theory of truth arising from an evolutionary standpoint. Natural selection only selects the best survivors, not those who can best ascertain truth. Thus, from a purely evolutionary perspective we cannot be sure of our rational faculties, including the faculties that lead us to the theory of evolution. In this argument, he leans heavily on the philosopher/theologian Alvin Plantiga. However, many philosophers have written responses to Plantiga. You can start here for the most basic primer. Suffice it to say that Keller's critique is superficial.
Keller also suggests that the Bible has beat Karl Marx, the founder of communism, to his own criticism. However, Keller misread Marx. He focuses on Marx's idea that religion is oppressive without discussing the details of Marx's theory. Marx's theory about religion is that religion is the opiate of the masses because it tells the masses that the righteous should NOT seek power in this life. However, when discussing Marx, Keller states: "...He (the God of Jesus) can only be reached through repentance, through the giving up of power (emphasis original, pg. 61)." By telling us to give up power, Keller is actually helping Marx's argument in this chapter.
In the second half of the book Keller stops responding to objections and starts arguing for Christianity. In the chapter "The Reality of the Resurrection," Keller argues that culturally no one should have expected anyone to rise from the dead and thus the resurrection could not be hallucinations or fabricated tales. The problem with this argument is that there are several passages in the synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) where Jesus tells his disciples that he will rise again and go with them to Galilee. Even if culturally no one should expect Jesus to rise again, the disciples, if they believed the word of Jesus would have expected the resurrection. It is not a stretch to suspect that the disciples may have told others of this message.
Bottom Line:
Keller chose a task that was virtually impossible; responding to seven objections and then making a case for Christianity. Each of the seven objections in the first half of the book and many chapters in the second half of the book deserved a book length treatment. Trying to cover all this material in such a short space led to superficial coverage of complex theological and philosophical topics. However, despite some further problems in organization as well as misreading Marx and other errors, the book's content is better than expected. Given the impossibility of the task Keller chose, it is impressive that the content of The Reason for God rose to the level of mediocrity.
No comments:
Post a Comment