The Age of Reason
by
Thomas Paine
I put the following work under your protection. It contains my opinion upon Religion. You will do me the justice to remember, that I have always strenuously supported the Right of every man to his opinion, however different that opinion might be to mine. He who denies to another this right, makes a slave of himself to his present opinion, because he precludes himself the r...more
paper, 220 pages
Published
November 8th 2007
by Book Jungle
(first published 1794)
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"It has happened, that all the answers that I have seen to the former part of 'The Age of Reason' have been written by priests: and these
pious men, like their predecessors, contend and wrangle, and
understand the Bible; each understands it differently, but each
understands it best; and they have agreed in nothing but in telling
their readers that Thomas Paine understands it not."
That, an opening salvo in part II of Paine's "The Age of Reason,"...more
pious men, like their predecessors, contend and wrangle, and
understand the Bible; each understands it differently, but each
understands it best; and they have agreed in nothing but in telling
their readers that Thomas Paine understands it not."
That, an opening salvo in part II of Paine's "The Age of Reason,"...more
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Thomas Paine plays the ace and brings the house of cards down: the wizard behind the curtain is dead, the emperor has no clothes.
Don’t be mistaken, this would be shocking if it were written today. But no, incredibly, this was the eighteenth century, before modern scholarship, in the depths of scientific anthropocentrism and Biblical literalism. “If only,” 200 years later, with what we now know— but here’s America, trying to write Thomas Paine out of history books and cover up the tr...more
Don’t be mistaken, this would be shocking if it were written today. But no, incredibly, this was the eighteenth century, before modern scholarship, in the depths of scientific anthropocentrism and Biblical literalism. “If only,” 200 years later, with what we now know— but here’s America, trying to write Thomas Paine out of history books and cover up the tr...more
This book is a must-read for every American. Thomas Paine was one of the most influential thinkers in the founding of the United States and in the form that it's government took. His thinking had a profound influence on many of the founding fathers, including the author of the constitution - Thomas Jefferson.
This book was Paine's commentary on religion and his defense of deism, as opposed the Christianity. It will help every American who reads it to understand the nature of thinking...more
This book was Paine's commentary on religion and his defense of deism, as opposed the Christianity. It will help every American who reads it to understand the nature of thinking...more
This book consists of two parts. In the first one Thomas Paine is laying ground for deism on the basis of his own opinions and insights. But he is not saying he is the only one who is right, and worshipers of other religions are blind or stupid. No, he respects the fact that other views and believes are no lesser than his own. I admire the way he manage this discussion.
The first part is also the part where he shares a lot of his thoughts about religions, universe and his most fundamental b...more
The first part is also the part where he shares a lot of his thoughts about religions, universe and his most fundamental b...more
Kaput
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review of another edition
Recommends it for:
Fans of Richard Dawkins or Carl Sagan.
This guy is like the godfather of Richard Dawkins or Sam Harris, only this is better than anything either of them have written on religion. It attacks the reasoning behind ideas such as miracles, prophecy and redemption by way of weighty intelligent examination, and there is real insight here that still holds much value.
Using nothing more than the bible's own chronology and history it points out how these books must have been written hundreds of years after it has been suggested. In ...more
Using nothing more than the bible's own chronology and history it points out how these books must have been written hundreds of years after it has been suggested. In ...more
This is a tough book (pamphlet?) to review, for a number of reasons. There is a difference between whether the point Paine is trying to make is well argued and well written (which it is), whether I enjoyed reading it (mostly), and whether I would encourage others to read it (strongly encouraged).
The arguments that Paine mounts against Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) are that:
- Revelation can only be experienced individually, and therefor indicating tha...more
The arguments that Paine mounts against Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) are that:
- Revelation can only be experienced individually, and therefor indicating tha...more
I'm on page 163 of 180 of The Age of Reason: While Paine's writing style tends to run-on sentences, he is, after all, Thomas Paine, a great thinker upon which America's Founding Fathers relied to develop theories and systems of democracy, and I believe he should be studied. I'm finding what he has to say about the historic value of religion useful as I work on my second novel, "Drinking the Knock Water." It's gratifying to know that there were those who came before us who thought as w...more
Thomas Paine, one of our Founding Fathers by virtue of having written "Common Sense," lost many friends and made many enemies with "The Age of Reason."
Paine called himself a Deist, by which he meant that he believed in one God, the Creator of the universe, and in no other, including Son and Holy Ghost.
Paine believed that, in order to know God, a person needed to study creation. Creation was the only true word of God, the Bible and all other sacred tex...more
Paine called himself a Deist, by which he meant that he believed in one God, the Creator of the universe, and in no other, including Son and Holy Ghost.
Paine believed that, in order to know God, a person needed to study creation. Creation was the only true word of God, the Bible and all other sacred tex...more
Thomas Paine gives two analyses of the Old and New Testement. THe first one writen hastily being that he was afraid to be imprisoned and thought he might not have another chance. It was writen without a Bible in hand, but still very accurate, just more general and with no referances. This makes the first have more to the point. In the second part Painegoes back with Biblein hand and points out every example sometimes verse by verse. This kind of care is needed to truely disproof the Bible validi...more
Excellent reasoning against revealed/miraculous religion. I have also read many of the responses to this work and they are mostly ad-hominem attacks. Bishop Llandaff managed to agree with Paine that the Bible contained pronblems and suffered as a result:
http://www.infidels.org/library/historic...
"Concerning the Bishop's "Apology" it may be remarked that those who circulated it so industriously could have hardly been aware, generally, of its heretical content...more
http://www.infidels.org/library/historic...
"Concerning the Bishop's "Apology" it may be remarked that those who circulated it so industriously could have hardly been aware, generally, of its heretical content...more
Cynner
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review of another edition
Recommends it for:
Everyone who refuses to question
Shelves:
classics
With Common Sense I new I shared a heart, with the Age of Reason, I knew I shared a mind. Uses the good books own words and 'logic' against itself. Pointing out inconsistencies within the work that show it to be just the work of man, and the fabricated work at that.
5 stars for impact.
5 stars for impact.
It's always interesting when the opponents of organized religion would have the rest of mankind believe them upon their word when it is precisely that phenomenon -- faith -- which they profess to abhor. Could it be they do not understand faith because they do not have it?
In this case, Thomas Paine maintains that men are free to believe what they choose, but at the same moment undertakes to castigate the religions of the world as nothing more than smoke and mirrors, therefore renderi...more
In this case, Thomas Paine maintains that men are free to believe what they choose, but at the same moment undertakes to castigate the religions of the world as nothing more than smoke and mirrors, therefore renderi...more
This book made me angry. Thomas Paine does make some good points and brings up some relevent issues regarding the bible. But his arguements aren't with the bible itself but with religious tradition.
This is a wonderfully fresh perspective on religion. Oh my goodness, he sounds like the ultimate Unitarian. I believe his background was Quaker. There is an innocence about his rationalism and/or reasoning that is delightful. I laugh out loud at some parts, but he was dead serious about it and the painful part of it is that he wrote this while imprisoned for his beliefs/non-beliefs. He is over-the-top, but there are some great truths and it makes one feel, well, patriotic, even though the su...more
This is another book that I found so riveting that I simply could not put it down and read the entire Part I in a single sitting. (Part II isn't really necessary in my opinion. Kind of like running up the score after the outcome of the game is no longer in doubt. Sure the fans might love it but sometimes you've got to know when to call off the dogs.) Considering that this book was mostly written in the 1790's, it is mind-boggling how fresh and relevant most of it still is. Maybe it was a cla...more
Paine, a secular deist, deconstructs the bible book by book and proves that the Christian bible is inconsistent. He further argues that religion is an institution created by men in the name of a false deity to carry out acts of greed and corruption. Paine also deals with faith, and what we call today "intelligent design" proving both to be false and a disruption of rationale thought. Paine is also one of the founding fathers with a capital F, his ideas being literally fundamental to th...more
Paine utilizes what he considers pure reason to tear apart the Bible, and therefore Christianity, while arguing for the precepts of Deism. I found it interesting that through the past two hundred years, biblical scholars have similarly struggled with the Bible's inconsistencies and unknown authorship, however, they have not thrown out the baby with the bath-water, as Paine does. His arguments for Deism are strong and appealing, although I'm not convinced that the witnessing of the world/univer...more
Thomas Paine was a self proclaimed Deist and wrote The Age of Reason as his argument against revealed religion of any type, but more specifically against Christianity. Being a Christian myself, this is not a book that I would have normally read, but a close family member has recently professed to be a Deist and recommended that I read the book and that I keep an open mind. Although I tried to keep an open mind while reading, I found Paine's arguments to be lacking. I remain utterly convinced ...more
Interesting read, when it wasn't slightly boring. I read Paine in high school and was already familiar with this, I think I would have preferred a paine Biography. It is fully a polemic against the bible and the Christian Religion. I don't think most people are aware that one of our most important forefathers was so outspoken against Christianity and organized religion.
This was the first book I read entirely on my iphone so it took me forever and was pretty straining, and will be the last boo...more
This was the first book I read entirely on my iphone so it took me forever and was pretty straining, and will be the last boo...more
What a forward thinker Thomas Paine was for the late 1700s! HE challenged the U.S. colonies and the state in general with his "Common Sense" tract and followed it up with "The Age of Reason", touting the intellectual standards upon which to base a society and the separation of church and state, a concept integral to the formation of our country. Easy to read and well thought out, I learned to respect Mr. Paine even more after reading about the reaction to these tracts. Ex: ef...more
Before reading this i liked Thomas Paine and took him to be an intellectual person, but this book was terrible in all regards. the books tone was of a person angerly slandering something that he clearly dosent agree with. Paine even admits in the first half of the book that he had never read the Bible yet he proceeds to tear it apart in any way he can think of, then in the second half he claims he had read through it once but by this point we was biasly reading it searching for things he could...more
Enjoyed Thomas Paine's examination of "revealed religion", as he calls anything other than Deism. And it was interesting to read the take of someone who firmly believes in a Creator when most books on my shelf are by non-believers. A lot of people perpetuate the myth that America was founded as a Christian nation, and while there's no mention of God or Jesus in the Constitution, they point to the Declaration of Independence and the use of the word "Creator" to back up their a...more
Paine catalogues the most important moral atrocities, supernaturalist fantasies and logical fallacies in the Old and New Testaments - with plenty of barbs against Christian sects of his time - in this short, yet somewhat tedious diatribe. Unfortunately, some of his passages smell anti-Semitic, and his case for Deism amounts to 'intelligent design'. Neither that case, nor his derivation of human morality from the obvious 'munificence' of nature (both so popular among the American Founders) would...more
Against four thousand years of combined Jewish and Christian tradition, Thomas Paine answers with the eighteenth century equivalent of: "Bitch, please." This isn't your NOMA (Non-overlapping magisterium) kind of argument; this is Total War. With a disciplined rationalism and an acidic wit, Paine produces an assault so complete on organized religion that it makes the so-called new atheist movement a bit of a misnomer. Paine was not an atheist in any sense of the word, but one does wonde...more
The Age of Reason is definitely quite the controversial piece of writing! I certainly think that the fact the pamphlet was written in 1793-94 needs to be considered when reviewing particular aspects of the work, but it still has thoroughly detailed information supporting the stated arguments. In general, my concerns were all logistical versus content-based. I found the first section of the work lacking a fluid progression between ideas, it was rather hectic and all over the place. The beginn...more
Paine is not an atheist, far from it. He believes in the God who created the universe, not in the men who wrote a book. So, first he shows that the Bible was not written by God - showing the near endless contradictions contained in that book, showing where much of the old testament in particular is a hsndbook of genocide. As he says at one point Moses asks his followers to kill the mothers, fathers and brothers and then to debauch the daughters of those they conquer. For people to say they base...more
Written at the time of the Enlightenment, Thomas Paine virtually instigated the American Revolution and the break from the shackles of religious slavery. Ben Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, and many others were Deists who believed the human mind needn't suffer from the dogma of the day nor unscientific, supernatural beliefs. Paine breaks down the Bible bit by bit to allow you to see the absurdity of it all: the archaic violence, sexism, racism, and scientific stupidity. He lets you see...more
This is a devastating look at religion, a monster and a slap in the face of most theologians at the time, and even today.
"It is a contradiction in terms and ideas to call anything a revelation that comes to us at second hand, either verbally or in writing. Revelation is necessarily limited to the first communication. After this, it is only an account of something which that person says was a revelation made to him; and though he may find himself obliged to believe it, it cannot ...more
"It is a contradiction in terms and ideas to call anything a revelation that comes to us at second hand, either verbally or in writing. Revelation is necessarily limited to the first communication. After this, it is only an account of something which that person says was a revelation made to him; and though he may find himself obliged to believe it, it cannot ...more
Seth
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review of another edition
Recommends it for:
any Christian who wants to practice facing challenges to their religious beliefs
A fascinating criticism of mysticism. However, he seems to imply that any religious belief, especially Christianity, is mysticism, and therefore foolish and detracts from what he views as a true belief in God.
While there is much that is thought-provoking, far too much of it, for my taste, reverts to simply a bitter diatribe against the Bible and the Catholic Church.
Overall, very disappointing after reading some of his earlier works.
While there is much that is thought-provoking, far too much of it, for my taste, reverts to simply a bitter diatribe against the Bible and the Catholic Church.
Overall, very disappointing after reading some of his earlier works.
Knew about his "Common Sense" from school history books, didn't know about this one. As a "deist" (new term to me), openly critical of organized religion but not of religious people, nor critical of belief in a god. He and Jefferson seemed to think a lot alike. Both very popular and very controversial at the time, was actually banned in England. A good piece of education on the foundation of "separation of church and state".
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Thomas Paine was an author, pamphleteer, revolutionary, radical, inventor, intellectual and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. He was born in England and lived and worked there until age 37, when he emigrated to the British American colonies, in time to participate in the American Revolution. His principal contributions were the powerful, widely-read pamphlet Common Sense (1776), ad...more
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“Give to every other human being every right that you claim for yourself - that is my doctrine.”
—
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“Of all the systems of religion that ever were invented, there is no more derogatory to the Almighty, more unedifying to man, more repugnant to reason, and more contradictory to itself than this thing called Christianity. Too absurd for belief, too impossible to convince, and too inconsistent for practice, it renders the heart torpid or produces only atheists or fanatics. As an engine of power, it serves the purpose of despotism, and as a means of wealth, the avarice of priests, but so far as respects the good of man in general it leads to nothing here or hereafter.”
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