A history of God

Book Description

4 Reviews

• 

  Superb, with crucial omissions

  In a 400-page book covering 4000 years of western religion, you just can't cover everything. Karen Armstrong does a fabulous job of presenting various schools of religious interpretation - God of the Philosophers, God of the Mystics, etc., showing not only how complex religion is, but also how dyna ... (continue)

  In a 400-page book covering 4000 years of western religion, you just can't cover everything. Karen Armstrong does a fabulous job of presenting various schools of religious interpretation - God of the Philosophers, God of the Mystics, etc., showing not only how complex religion is, but also how dynamic, fluid and subjective it is.

  In this narrative, we see how the Big 3 western religions start from what is effectively a very similar, if not common, foundation of Greek tradition, and evolve along distinct, yet similar, paths on different time scales. While different paths are taken, Armstrong concludes the 3 religions have evolved what amounts to remarkably similar conceptions of God. Much of this, I have to confess, was over my head. That said, the key themes come through rather nicely.

  Many reviews lament the lack of information on their favorite topic - Gnosticism, Taoism, etc - or decry Armstrong as a no-nothing. Well, I can't see the finger-pointers' credentials in their profile, so will discount accordingly. The omission I will complain about is the politics. Armstrong takes Christianity from a fledgling faith to a power having the backing of the Roman Empire with only a couple flip sentences about Constantine adopting it, and that its ascension was unclear, but couldn't have been achieved without the Romans.

  I suppose this book focussed on the 'whats,' 'wheres' and 'whens' of religious evolution rather than the 'hows' and 'whys'. Like I said, in 400 pages you can only cover so much...

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  Andyberschauer said on Oct 9, 2009 about the Paperback edition | Add your feedback

• 這並不是本消閒或者通識的書，而是本宗教的專門書籍，對世界不同的宗教都有非常詳盡的介紹，很不容易讀。
  This is a thick book and very difficult to read, if you wish to understand the full history and development of all world' religion. You must have this.

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  Gaimike said on Aug 3, 2008 about the Paperback edition | Add your feedback

• Every now and again I discover a book about a subject I'd never even thought about before. I mean, everybody knows that God is up there in the sky and lets us into heaven if we've been good, and listens to our prayers, again if we are good. Right?

  Well, not so right. As Karen Armstrong points ... (continue)

  Every now and again I discover a book about a subject I'd never even thought about before. I mean, everybody knows that God is up there in the sky and lets us into heaven if we've been good, and listens to our prayers, again if we are good. Right?

  Well, not so right. As Karen Armstrong points out, there's a lot more subtlety to God than that, and so it's actually pretty silly to think that everyone thinks about him in the same way. This book has broadened my perspective no end and made me think about a lot of things I never thought to question before. It's also filled in a lot of fascinating details: I grew up going to a Catholic Church listening to readings from the Acts of the Apostles and the letters of St Paul to the Corinthians, but until now I never knew (or even thought about) who, for example, the Corinthians were, or what St Paul's motives might have been in all those letters.

  Karen Armstrong writes well: I might pick up another by her after this one, though it's going quite slowly.

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  zbrntt said on Feb 10, 2008 about the Paperback edition | Add your feedback

• 

  worth reading but,

  comparing her view on Catholic & Islam, being an ex-Catholic nun herself, she seems to have a soft spot for Islam.

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  綠函數達人 said on Oct 8, 2007 about the Paperback edition | Add your feedback

Book Details

• Rating:
  (23)
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• English Books
• Others 511 Pages
• ISBN-10: 0434024562
• ISBN-13: 9780434024568
• Publisher: Heinemann
• Pub date: Mar 01, 1993
• Dimensions: 240 mm x 160 mm Just how big is that?
• Also available as: Paperback, Hardcover, Audio CD, Audio Cassette, School & Library Binding and eBook
• In other languages: other languages 繁體書, 简体书, Nederlandse Boeken

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• The Collective (146)
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