Both erudite and intimate, Metaxas invites even the scoffer to wonder.
Biographer and cultural commentator Metaxas (Seven Men: And the Secret of Their Greatness, 2013, etc.) addresses the concept of the miraculous in a work both intellectual and personal in approach.
Early on, the author notes that miracles “point to something beyond themselves,” (namely, God) and that “a miracle is something that really only happens in context.” Furthermore, “When God pokes into our world through the miraculous, he is communicating with us.” With these parameters in mind, Metaxas sets about the task of strengthening believers’ understanding of miracles and, if not convincing nonbelievers, at least causing such readers to seriously consider his points. He begins with an exploration of life itself, concluding that humanity’s very existence is miraculous and beyond statistical probability. Metaxas gives science its due, respecting its methods and accepting such assumptions as the Big Bang. However, he notes that the existence of life on Earth is dependent upon a complex set of variables which, seen objectively, cannot be scientifically and mathematically explained away. Metaxas goes on to discuss miracles from a Christian, biblical perspective, concluding the first half of his work with the fundamental Christian miracle, the resurrection of Jesus Christ. What Metaxas does next is intriguing. He presents a number of miracle stories, but instead of drawing upon historical or famous sources, he includes only stories from individuals he knows personally. The effect is to demonstrate that a wide range of miracles—or at least unexplainable happenings—can occur even among one person’s own circle of acquaintances. These stories, ranging from healings to visions, make the concept of the miraculous more real and personal. Metaxas cannot be said to have written a definitive work, nor did he set out to do so. However, he has taken a difficult and often controversial topic and presented it with clarity.
Both erudite and intimate, Metaxas invites even the scoffer to wonder.Pub Date: Oct. 28, 2014
ISBN: 978-0525954422
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: Sept. 8, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2014
This a book of earlier, philosophical essays concerned with the essential "absurdity" of life and the concept that- to overcome the strong tendency to suicide in every thoughtful man-one must accept life on its own terms with its values of revolt, liberty and passion. A dreary thesis- derived from and distorting the beliefs of the founders of existentialism, Jaspers, Heldegger and Kierkegaard, etc., the point of view seems peculiarly outmoded. It is based on the experience of war and the resistance, liberally laced with Andre Gide's excessive intellectualism. The younger existentialists such as Sartre and Camus, with their gift for the terse novel or intense drama, seem to have omitted from their philosophy all the deep religiosity which permeates the work of the great existentialist thinkers. This contributes to a basic lack of vitality in themselves, in these essays, and ten years after the war Camus seems unaware that the life force has healed old wounds... Largely for avant garde aesthetes and his special coterie.
Pub Date: Sept. 26, 1955
ISBN: 0679733736
Page Count: 228
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1955
A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.
A teacher and scholar of Buddhism offers a formally varied account of the available rewards of solitude.
“As Mother Ayahuasca takes me in her arms, I realize that last night I vomited up my attachment to Buddhism. In passing out, I died. In coming to, I was, so to speak, reborn. I no longer have to fight these battles, I repeat to myself. I am no longer a combatant in the dharma wars. It feels as if the course of my life has shifted onto another vector, like a train shunted off its familiar track onto a new trajectory.” Readers of Batchelor’s previous books (Secular Buddhism: Imagining the Dharma in an Uncertain World, 2017, etc.) will recognize in this passage the culmination of his decadeslong shift away from the religious commitments of Buddhism toward an ecumenical and homegrown philosophy of life. Writing in a variety of modes—memoir, history, collage, essay, biography, and meditation instruction—the author doesn’t argue for his approach to solitude as much as offer it for contemplation. Essentially, Batchelor implies that if you read what Buddha said here and what Montaigne said there, and if you consider something the author has noticed, and if you reflect on your own experience, you have the possibility to improve the quality of your life. For introspective readers, it’s easy to hear in this approach a direct response to Pascal’s claim that “all of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” Batchelor wants to relieve us of this inability by offering his example of how to do just that. “Solitude is an art. Mental training is needed to refine and stabilize it,” he writes. “When you practice solitude, you dedicate yourself to the care of the soul.” Whatever a soul is, the author goes a long way toward soothing it.
A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.Pub Date: Feb. 18, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-300-25093-0
Page Count: 200
Publisher: Yale Univ.
Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
