The Case for God

While this is an interesting read, Armstrong misrepresents modern atheism, and that detracts from the book's overall impact.

In this work, Armstrong tries to directly address some of the “New Atheists” by claiming that the God they are attacking is basically a straw man. She argues that, historically, religious texts were not seen as something meant to be taken literally, that they were starting points from which we could contemplate the ineffable. She believes that religions only started insisting on the literal interpretation of their texts when science and rationalism began to be the way most humans engaged with the world. Some people reacted by trying to prove that their religions and religious texts were compatible with science. This, Armstrong believes, is the God that the New Atheists attack, while leaving alone the god/source/path that most religious people have engaged with over the centuries.

She makes a compelling argument, and this book could find readers on both sides of the God debate. If you agree with the New Atheists, you might be infuriated, but it would still be worth your while. If, on the other hand, the New Atheists infuriate you, even though you don't believe in religious texts literally, then this is definitely worth a read.

‘The Case for God' is a case not made, from my Examiner column.

Few religious thinkers have eased the consciences of spiritual liberals, anti-fundamentalist religious moderates, and functional nonbelievers unwilling to stake any affirmatively atheistic ground than Karen Armstrong. For years she has been making the assertion that her scholarship proves that the “great” monotheisms ought not be associated with the fear, xenophobia, irrational faith in the absurd, violence, or misogyny that so they so often encourage, but that they have their “true” foundations in love and tolerance–and anyone who doesn't think so hasn't been doing it right. As much as that assertion causes many skeptics to arch their eyebrows, it at least sounds like a good thing to which the faiths could aspire if they were so inclined. Alas.

Her latest book, The Case for God, is not meant to explain the various faiths' dispositions or ideological foundations, but to convince the reader that the most commonly held notions of God, those of a being that created the universe and “exists,” are false, and that in actuality, God is an unknowable, unfathomable concept for which the very term “existence” is too limited. If you think that sounds like a pretty weak basis for an argument when dealing with such a grand concept's veracity, you're right. And despite Armstrong's impressive breadth of knowledge and her nuanced grasp of various thinkers' positions throughout the generations, her case never adds up.

Part of the trouble, of course, is that her book's premise is challenged by her own explanation of what God is. It is nigh impossible for me to understand how someone can build a case for God if the central thesis is that God is an unknowable pseudo-entity-but-not-really, something that mere humans are wholly incapable of defining. Where does that leave your book?

[For the rest of this review, see my Examiner column here: http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-4275-Secularism-Examiner~y2010m1d3-Book-review-The-Case-for-God-is-a-case-not-made]