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Mere Christianity
After hearing great reviews on this book from many of my friends, I decided to give it a try. I was quite disappointed with the "wordiness" of the text. The author will make a loose and far from concise statement and then follow it up with an example that is completely disconnected from the scattered statement at the beginning. And to make matters worse the author will use another example to describe the first example and the secondary example will be even more disconnected and irrelevant than that of the first. This sequence is very repetitive on almost every page. It may have been one of the most frustrating readings I have ever encountered. I believe if I ran into a man on the street with schizophrenia and decided to jot down some notes on what he had to say about religion it may be a similar read.I do understand that this was originally a radio address and then was converted into a book, but the author should have shaved off some of the original text and changed the format for presenting his information. I am not discouraging anyone not to read this book; it has impacted thousands of people positively. But if you are looking for an on point, concise, descriptive book about Christianity you may want to look elsewhere.
Mere Christianity
Assertions followed by analogies and metaphors does not even begin to make something true. Neither does it make for good or entertaining reading. Lewis is an acrobat like any other apologist - he uses flips and contortions in his presentation, but unlike a real acrobat, only the feeble-minded will be impressed. What's that? My analogy is dumb and does little to advance what I'm actually trying to say? Good, then I'm glad you get my point.As a brief example, he tries to equate a sexual appetite with an appetite for food. "..when people say, `Sex is nothing to be ashamed of,' they may mean `the state into which the sexual instinct has now got is nothing to be ashamed of'. If they mean that, I think they are wrong. I think it is everything to be ashamed of. There is nothing to be ashamed of in enjoying your food: there would be everything to be ashamed of if half the world made food the main interest of their lives and spent their time looking at pictures of food and dribbling and smacking their lips." Comparing the two is only a tactic that does much less to make a credible point than it does to focus our attention elsewhere, to a place where it is much easier to make a statement that will garner universal agreement. After this it is much easier for him to mold the minds of those among us who let ourselves be fooled. He does this on nearly every page with every assertion and it gets extremely old and painfully annoying.At one point early in the book, Lewis says "the only packet I am allowed to open is Man," referring to the only nature we can know is our own. Yet he spends the rest of the book asserting with such misplaced certainty the nature of God.The book gets a second star because it's easy to read and he writes with a gifted fluidity. On top of that, much of the time he anticipated my own counter-arguments that I was forming in my head, and even though his responses were frustratingly not actually addressing my questions, I give him a bit of credit for noticing possible flaws in what he was saying.
Mere Christianity
I loved this book. C.S. Lewis made several good points, but it's far from perfect. The one thing I strongly disagree with is his views on "truth" or "the right thing to do" I guess you could say. He gives an analogy of playing a piano; saying that all the keys are correct at one time or another and to say that one is incorrect is terrible. Great anaology, but the principle is unBiblical. Through this he's given us the message that the truth or what we do is relative and that there are no absolutes. If it all depends on our situation how will we know what the truth of that situation is? Or how will we know what is the correct thing to do? Does it become ok to lie if it will keep someone out of trouble? Of course not. God has given us a set of rules to live by and it is not ok to disobey those rules ever. What we(Christians)are to do is not relative. No matter what the situation it's not ok to murder, worship false gods, and it never becomes not sin. Instead of supporting his views with scripture, he use's analogies instead. I think that they were very good analogies, and I agree with a lot of his views; but the only thing he uses to support them most of the time are analogies. Analogies are great, but analogies can be used to support even the most irrational of ideas. Look at this book critically, it's not perfect no matter how much sense it seems to make. Francis Schaeffer's "The God Who is There" would be a better choice. This book is well worth your time though, so read it and see what you think.
Mere Christianity
Amended review: I originally rated this at 1 star because of the quality of the materials and binding. My initial reaction when I took it out of the box was "Yuck. This feels and looks awful." I have changed the rating on this to 4 stars based on the fact that, although I feel the overall look and feel of this edition is rough (The publisher's attempt to mimic a high-quality hardcover edition? If so, they needn't have bothered.), it has held up well over several months of almost daily reading and studying. The cover is still in good shape and the pages firmly intact, so it has proven to be good-quality binding. I prefer smoother pages, but pages that stay in the book are even more important! I still think the overall look is a little off-putting, but it hasn't impacted the book's utility or my study of its content. Thanks to those who commented and impelled me to take another look at my review and initial reaction.
Mere Christianity
I agree with the 1 star reviewers. This was no scholarly work. It wasn't nearly enough pages long. He didn't even use long words. If he was really an intellectual don't you think he would have used longer words?
Mere Christianity
Lewis is the premiere theologian of the twentieth century. He provides us with a lucid and concise commentary on Christianity that could only be conceived after experiencing the horrors of WWI. Anyone who wishes to understand Christianity, the twentieth century, or Narnia, must read this book.