Too few books have been appearing in the field of the Philosophy of Religion, and so it is a pleasure to welcome a good one....

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THE DEATH OF GOD

Too few books have been appearing in the field of the Philosophy of Religion, and so it is a pleasure to welcome a good one. The shock value of the title may lead some non-believers to absorb it, but they would quickly find it no aid and comfort to their disbeliefs. Gabriel Vahanian is saying that if God is dead, then man is dead, too, without spine enough for the suicide logic demands. Carefully he traces the step by step process by which God has been excluded from the normal processes of our secularist society, and how the current religiosity only disguises his enforced absence in any vital, functioning way from the current human scene. Vahanian is far from vanishing in despair, for even as he describes with such telling accuracy the situation of our post-Christian era, he makes obvious some of the immediate avenues where men of faith and hope may look for the appearance of the Lord in power. This is no book for the average layman, but a well trained one would do well by it. Even more it should be read by anyone at the college or professorial level seeking a religious critique of existentialism. Nor is it possible for serious students of either philosophy or theology to ignore the thesis Vahanian so ably presents.

Pub Date: April 29, 1961

ISBN: 1606089846

Page Count: -

Publisher: Braziller

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1961

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