Confessions of a Born-again Pagan

Front Cover
Yale University Press, Oct 25, 2016 - Religion - 1176 pages

In this passionate and searching book, Anthony Kronman offers a third way--beyond atheism and religion--to the God of the modern world

"An astonishing, . . . epically ambitious book. . . . An intellectual adventure story based on the notion that ideas drive history, and that to dedicate yourself to them is to live a bigger, more intense life."--David Brooks, New York Times

We live in an age of disenchantment. The number of self-professed "atheists" continues to grow. Yet many still feel an intense spiritual longing for a connection to what Aristotle called the "eternal and divine." For those who do, but demand a God that is compatible with their modern ideals, a new theology is required. This is what Anthony Kronman offers here, in a book that leads its readers away from the inscrutable Creator of the Abrahamic religions toward a God whose inexhaustible and everlasting presence is that of the world itself. Kronman defends an ancient conception of God, deepened and transformed by Christian belief--the born-again paganism on which modern science, art, and politics all vitally depend. Brilliantly surveying centuries of Western thought--from Plato to Augustine, Aquinas, and Kant, from Spinoza to Nietzsche, Darwin, and Freud--Kronman recovers and reclaims the God we need today.

 

Contents

Prologue
1
Introduction
19
GRATITUDE
47
PRIDE
113
SALVATION
227
JOY
587
Downward to Darkness on Extended Wings
1067
Notes
1077
Index
1131
Copyright

Other editions - View all

Common terms and phrases

About the author (2016)

Anthony T. Kronman served as dean of the Yale Law School from 1994 to 2004. He currently divides his time between the Law School and the Directed Studies Program in Yale College. He is the author of Education's End: Why Our Colleges and Universities Have Given Up on the Meaning of Life.

Bibliographic information