Author | C. S. Lewis |
---|---|
Language | English |
Subject | Christianity |
Publisher | Eerdmans |
Publication date | 1970 |
Publication place | United Kingdom |
Media type | |
Pages | 346 |
ISBN | 0-8028-1456-5 |
OCLC | 32880490 |
God in the Dock is a collection of previously unpublished essays and speeches from C. S. Lewis, collected from many sources after his death. Its title implies "God on Trial" [lower-alpha 1] and the title is based on an analogy [1] made by Lewis suggesting that modern human beings, rather than seeing themselves as standing before God in judgement, prefer to place God on trial while acting as his judge.
This book was originally published in the United Kingdom as Undeceptions: Essays on Theology and Ethics, [2] while a shorter book, published by Fontana in 1979 and entitled God in the Dock: Essays on Theology, does not include many of the essays in this larger collection. [3]
The editor states in the book's preface that the collection is a "very mixed bag". They are divided by the editor into Part I - "clearly theological", Part II - "semi-theological", Part III - "basic theme is 'ethics', and Part IV - "letters arranged in the chronological order in which they were published".
The collection covers a wide range of topics but focuses primarily on Lewis' view of Christianity. The book is split into three sections, the first of which contains essays such as "Myth Became Fact", "The Grand Miracle", and "Is Theism Important?". These articles lay the groundwork for Lewis' apologetics, essentially establishing a starting point at which the true discrepancies between Christians and non-Christians become clear.
The second section of God in the Dock builds on that starting point and presents a persuasive argument for Christianity. In articles including "Revival or Decay?" and "Modern Translations of the Bible", Lewis defends authentic Christianity and draws a distinct line between Truth and Religion.
Lewis had already noted a distinct split between the religious and secular observance of Christmas. In Xmas and Christmas: A Lost Chapter from Herodotus , [4] Lewis relates as satire the observance of two simultaneous holidays in "Niatirb" (Britain backwards) from the supposed view of the Greek historian and traveller. One, "Exmas", is observed by a flurry of compulsory commercial activity and expensive indulgence in alcoholic beverages. The other, "Crissmas," is observed in Niatirb's temples. Lewis's narrator asks a priest "why they kept Crissmas on the same day as Exmas?" He receives the reply:
In the chapter "Evil and God," Lewis refers to "mellontolatry", or the worship of the future. [5] He considers this to be unproductive IF the future is simply where the world is going, that is, a random walk. He believes that the world can hardly congratulate itself for having "arrived" at a future that is simply a place it has got to, if that is all that it is - Lewis in fact argues that there is more purpose than that, but that some choose to worship that alone.
Lewis also address those skeptical of the Resurrection of Jesus. Even if one interprets the crucifixion of Jesus as a strictly historical event, this doesn't preclude its subsequent mythologization. But neither does it negate its historicity. The claim of the Gospel writers is that Jesus' resurrection is a specific historical event.
The final section of the book focuses on specifics. It addresses the logical fallacy Lewis named "Bulverism" as well as issues concerning religious observances such as Christmas. It answers some of the questions non-Christians have about Christianity.
These essays are not actually logically connected; rather, they have been collected together from various sources, by an editor not by the author. Some essays may have fit into other sections, but are organised by the collector of the essays as they are—posthumously.
Christian mythology is the body of myths associated with Christianity. The term encompasses a broad variety of legends and narratives, especially those considered sacred narratives. Mythological themes and elements occur throughout Christian literature, including recurring myths such as ascending a mountain, the axis mundi, myths of combat, descent into the Underworld, accounts of a dying-and-rising god, a flood myth, stories about the founding of a tribe or city, and myths about great heroes of the past, paradises, and self-sacrifice.
Mere Christianity is a Christian apologetical book by the British author C. S. Lewis. It was adapted from a series of BBC radio talks made between 1941 and 1944, originally published as three separate volumes: Broadcast Talks (1942), Christian Behaviour (1943), and Beyond Personality (1944). The book consists of four parts: the first presents Lewis's arguments for the existence of God; the second contains his defence of Christian theology, including his notable "Liar, lunatic, or Lord" trilemma; the third has him exploring Christian ethics, among which are cardinal and theological virtues; in the final, he writes on the Christian conception of God.
Religion and mythology differ in scope but have overlapping aspects. Both are systems of concepts that are of high importance to a certain community, making statements concerning the supernatural or sacred. Generally, mythology is considered one component or aspect of religion. Religion is the broader term: besides mythological aspects, it includes aspects of ritual, morality, theology, and mystical experience. A given mythology is almost always associated with a certain religion such as Greek mythology with Ancient Greek religion. Disconnected from its religious system, a myth may lose its immediate relevance to the community and evolve—away from sacred importance—into a legend or folktale.
A miracle is an event that is inexplicable by natural or scientific laws and accordingly gets attributed to some supernatural or praeternatural cause. Various religions often attribute a phenomenon characterized as miraculous to the actions of a supernatural being, (especially) a deity, a miracle worker, a saint, or a religious leader.
Hermann Samuel Reimarus, was a German philosopher and writer of the Enlightenment who is remembered for his Deism, the doctrine that human reason can arrive at a knowledge of God and ethics from a study of nature and our own internal reality, thus eliminating the need for religions based on revelation. He denied the supernatural origin of Christianity, and was the first influential critic to investigate the historical Jesus. According to Reimarus, Jesus was a mortal Jewish prophet, and the apostles founded Christianity as a religion separate from Jesus’ own ministry.
In Christianity, Jesus is the Son of God as chronicled in the Bible's New Testament, and in most Christian denominations Jesus is held to be God the Son, a prosopon (Person) of the Trinity of God.
Karl Rahner was a German Jesuit priest and theologian who, alongside Henri de Lubac, Hans Urs von Balthasar, and Yves Congar, is considered to be one of the most influential Catholic theologians of the 20th century. He was the brother of Hugo Rahner, also a Jesuit scholar.
Pauline Christianity or Pauline theology, otherwise referred to as Gentile Christianity, is the theology and form of Christianity which developed from the beliefs and doctrines espoused by the Hellenistic-Jewish Apostle Paul through his writings and those New Testament writings traditionally attributed to him. Paul's beliefs had some overlap with Jewish Christianity, but they deviated from this Jewish Christianity in their emphasis on inclusion of the Gentiles into God's New Covenant and in his rejection of circumcision as an unnecessary token of upholding the Mosaic Law.
Most scholars who study the historical Jesus and early Christianity believe that the canonical gospels and the life of Jesus must be viewed within their historical and cultural context, rather than purely in terms of Christian orthodoxy. They look at Second Temple Judaism, the tensions, trends, and changes in the region under the influence of Hellenism and the Roman occupation, and the Jewish factions of the time, seeing Jesus as a Jew in this environment; and the written New Testament as arising from a period of oral gospel traditions after his death.
The miracles of Jesus are miraculous deeds attributed to Jesus in Christian and Islamic texts. The majority are faith healings, exorcisms, resurrections, and control over nature.
The Christ myth theory, also known as the Jesus myth theory, Jesus mythicism, or the Jesus ahistoricity theory, is the view that the story of Jesus is a work of mythology with no historical substance. Alternatively, in terms given by Bart Ehrman paraphrasing Earl Doherty, it is the view that "the historical Jesus did not exist. Or if he did, he had virtually nothing to do with the founding of Christianity."
Criticism of Christianity has a long history which stretches back to the initial formation of the religion in the Roman Empire. Critics have challenged Christian beliefs and teachings as well as Christian actions, from the Crusades to modern terrorism. The arguments against Christianity include the suppositions that it is a faith of violence, corruption, superstition, polytheism, homophobia, bigotry, pontification, abuses of women's rights and sectarianism.
The Weight of Glory and Other Addresses is a collection of essays and addresses on Christianity by C.S. Lewis. It was first published as a single transcribed sermon, "The Weight of Glory" in 1941, appearing in the British journal, Theology, then in pamphlet form in 1942 by Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, London. It was published in book form in 1949, as a compilation of five addresses, in London by Geoffrey Bles under the title Transposition and Other Addresses and in the U.S. by The MacMillan Company under the title The Weight of Glory and Other Addresses. A revised and expanded edition featuring four additional essays and an Introduction by Walter Hooper was published by Macmillan Publishers in 1980.
John Dickson is an Australian author, Anglican cleric and historian of the ancient world, largely focusing on early Christianity and Judaism. Since 2022, he has been a professor at the graduate school of Wheaton College in the United States.
Lewis's trilemma is an apologetic argument traditionally used to argue for the divinity of Jesus by postulating that the only alternatives were that he was evil or mad. One version was popularized by University of Oxford literary scholar and writer C. S. Lewis in a BBC radio talk and in his writings. It is sometimes described as the "Lunatic, Liar, or Lord", or "Mad, Bad, or God" argument. It takes the form of a trilemma—a choice among three options, each of which is in some way difficult to accept.
Walter Künneth was a German Protestant theologian. During the Nazi era, he was part of the Confessing Church, and in the 1960s took part in the debate around the demands of Rudolf Bultmann to 'de-mythologize' the New Testament as an advocate of a word-oriented interpretation of the Bible. The Walter Künneth Prize is named after him.
This is a list of writings by C. S. Lewis.
The Chronicles of Narnia is a series of seven fantasy novels for children written by C. S. Lewis. It is considered a classic of children's literature and is the author's best-known work, having sold over 100 million copies in 47 languages. The series borrows characters and ideas from Classical, Norse, Irish, Arthurian, Islamic, Jewish and Christian mythology. Of all the mythologies taken into consideration, the Christian one is the most fundamental for the Narnia series, due to the themes covered.
Pheme Perkins is a Professor of Theology at Boston College, where she has been teaching since 1972.