I had so many problem with this book! And so many compliments for it, too! First, the good bits: G Willow Wilson’s politics are solid and smart and she clearly knows what she’s talking about regarding the Middle East and class and social distinctions. I also really liked her ventures into metaphysics, theology and, with …
Tag: Religion
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2015/07/27/alif-the-unseen-by-g-willow-wilson/
Jul 24 2015
Beyond Belief: My Secret Life Inside Scientology And My Harrowing Escape by Jenna Miscavige Hill & Lisa Pulitzer
Having just finished a bunch of Orwell, this was both mind-boggling and horribly sympathetic. She describes growing up in a state of repression more suited to communism or a paranoid dictatorship a la North Korea than to any religion that purports to help people self-actualize. I applaud her for having the intelligence to see that …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2015/07/24/beyond-belief/
May 09 2015
History is Weird
The second offspring of [Jewish] messianic hopes [in eighteenth century Poland] was Frankism—from the name of its founder, Jacob Frank (?–1791). Frank’s father had fled Poland to escape persecution as a follower of Sabbatai Zevi, and Jacob Frank himself traveled widely in Romania and Greece, where (in Salonika) he met those believers in Sabbatai who …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2015/05/09/history-is-weird/
Jan 04 2015
The Book of Strange New Things: A Novel by Michel Faber
I admit that I was prepared to not like this book. It concerns a Christian pastor being sent to the first inhabitable planet found by humankind so that he can minister to the alien species already living there, but I quickly discovered that that was an extremely simplistic view of the story. What I had …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2015/01/04/the-book-of-strange-new-things-a-novel-by-michel-faber/
Jan 01 2015
Theogony / Works and Days / Shield by Hesiod
Hesiod’s poems, along with Homer’s epics, can be considered the bible of the ancient Greeks, but Hesiod’s works are far more religious in nature than Homer’s, both in theology and in moral doctrine. Theogony describes the origin of the gods and the world. I am not sure if Hesiod is simply recounting basic accepted beliefs …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2015/01/01/theogony-works-and-days-shield-by-hesiod/
Mar 22 2013
The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Understanding Judaism by Rabbi Benjamin Blech
Like most Christians, I think I understand Judaism; this book showed me how much there remains to learn about this ancient and important religion. Jews believe in the Fall, but they do not believe in original sin. They believe in an afterlife, but they do not believe in a bodily resurrection. They believe in hell, …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2013/03/22/the-complete-idiots-guide-to-understanding-judaism-by-rabbi-benjamin-blech/
Jul 23 2010
Religion and Science by Bertrand Russell
Russell seemed confident, even in 1935 when this book was written, that science had effectively triumphed over religion in the minds of most people. He no doubt would have been appalled to see that in twenty-first century America religious faith is still going strong. But his analysis of the issues that religion and science dispute …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2010/07/23/religion-and-science-by-bertrand-russell/
Oct 20 2009
Disappointment with God by Philip Yancey
I read this a while back, but reading it again was an entirely new experience. The book purports to deal with the issue of why God is often so disappointing to us, but the biblical exposition actually deals more with why we are so disappointing to God. This book actually helped me to see myself …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2009/10/20/disappointment-with-god-by-philip-yancey/
Al Singh
Doug Merrill
Doreen Sheridan
John Pitzel
Lars N. Goldschlager
Laura Eilers
Professor X
Robert Maedgen
Sylvere Ap Leanan
The Shire