Review of True Paradox: How Christianity Makes Sense of Our Complex World by David Skeel
I bought this book excited to see how the author would compare Christianity to other worldviews (religions and philosophies) across a range of vital topics. I was sorely disappointed and cannot recommend this book.
Among the several problems I had with this book:
Throughout, Skeel misses opportunities to draw substantive distinctions between Christianity and other worldviews; and often he simply omits a worldview completely (or, oddly, keeps hanging on worldviews that no one today subscribes to, such as Gnosticism). For example, Islam is mentioned very few times in the book, as is Judaism, and I only counted one mention of Hinduism and no mentions of Buddhism. Nothing on Chinese worldviews like Confucianism or Taoism. How can this be in a book that has the premise of comparing Christianity to other religions and worldviews? (I thought I may have misunderstood the purpose of the book, so I went to re-read the Introduction, and here it is: "We will find, I think, that Christianity is considerably more plausible (and materialism and other systems of thought somewhat less) than you may think." OK; so we *will* compare and contrast.)
In other places Skeel relies too heavily on C.S. Lewis, for me. But I have to say, I'm not a huge C.S. Lewis fan. He is OK, but when a book like this relies so heavily on one other Christian author, I question how widely read that original author is. In other places Skeel sets up and knocks down a current popular Christian philosopher--William Lane Craig, whom he does not name by name in the book but merely in an endnote--by cherry picking from.the full body of Craig's work. (Odd, I thought, when in other portions of the book he's name dropping current thought leaders left and right. I have read Dr. Craig's book Reasonable Faith. I have watched a large number of his debates and lectures and also listened to several of his podcasts. I think Craig would say--and I am saying--that Skeel misrepresents Craig's work on the Kalam cosmological argument. Do a search with google on "Kalam cosmological argument" to see for yourself.)
And in other places Skeel brings up a topic as if to help it support his thought, but then he simply lets it hang. This happens time and time again. Very frustrating.
Other substantial issues I had with this book:
The chapter Suffering and Sensation has no discussion on Buddhism's approach to suffering. None. Astonishing. Did Skeel think not one of his readers ever heard of the Buddha's teaching on human suffering? How can you hope to claim Christianity has a better explanation for suffering than other worldviews when you don't compare it to those other worldviews that *do* have an explanation for the very thing you're talking about?
I found the section "The Problem of Evil" in this chapter to be criminally inadequate. Skeel writes: "In the end, I do not think Christianity can give a complete explanation of *why* there is suffering and evil in the world." (p. 94). I almost dropped the book right there and stopped reading. Of course Christianity provides a complete explanation of why there is suffering and evil in the world. There is suffering and evil in this world because of Satan and because we are not fighting against flesh and blood "but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms" (Ephesians 6:12). There.
Another mistake I think Skeel makes is that he relies heavily on the Old Testament book Job to try to make sense of suffering in the world. I've known other Christians and non-Christians cite Job, too, to grapple with the concept of human suffering. To me, this is like relying on ground-based telescopes to view the sky when the Hubble Space Telescope is now available. In other words: Why rely on the Old Testament when the New Testament now prevails? At best this is immature, at worst, it is misguided and misleading.
In the chapter The Justice Paradox there is no discussion of Islam. Well, there is one mention if you consider actually naming the religion by name and leaving it there. I'm completely baffled by this, unless Skeel was afraid of addressing the concept of justice in Islam. For anyone who is interested, simply google "Justice in Islam" and you'll find many good source materials for study. It will blow your mind. It's a shame Skeel didn't take the opportunity to address this in his book. He had/has a platform, and he didn't take up the fight.
The author attempts to tackle some enormous topics in five chapters: Ideas and Idea Making, Beauty and the Arts, Suffering and Sensation, The Justice Paradox, and Life and Afterlife.
In the chapter The Justice Paradox he never defines the term "justice" or "just society". I'm widely read so I understand what he is getting at, but I don't think the average reader will. That's a shame. The other shame is that Skeel seems to project his personal beliefs about the law (obviously, he's a lawyer by trade) and its uses onto all of Christendom. If you're not a careful reader with a broad understanding of history and philosophy, you'll be easily misled.
In addition, to state that Jesus' trial was a failure of two legal systems is to be blind to the fact that it was a triumph of Jesus' purpose here on earth.
Skeel rightly mentions a Christian influence on the 1948 UN Declaration of Human Rights (but to what extent is left to your own research and study). But, here again, Skeel makes no mention of Muslim country's objecting to the Judeo-Christian basis of the Declaration and, indeed, the 1990 Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam, which affirmed Islamic sharia law as its sole source. Anyone can look this up using a google search. Why wouldn't Skeel include it in this book? Again, Skeel had a platform but refused to use it to teach about the distinct differences between Christianity and Islam.
I admit that I merely skimmed the final chapter on heaven. Up to this point I found Skeel's work so full of missing information, missed opportunities, and outright errors from scripture that I didn't want to do a word-by-word reading to find even more. I might go back and review; might not.
This is the kind of book that happens when you're not well-versed (or, worse, ill-versed) in your source materials. I won't give this book a 1-star rating because Skeel does pose some fascinating questions, and also there are some truths here, they're just buried and you'll need a very keen and discerning eye and mind and spirit to tease them out. To me, in the end, the ride wasn't worth it.
PS: In several points in the book Skeel bemoans the fact that there are no/few Christian artists in various public forums espousing the truths of Christianity from their perspective. I couldn't agree more. I'm a Christian, and a poet and novelist. I'd welcome the opportunity to share with a wider audience my artistic worldview. :)
Did not like
2/5 on Amazon
1/5 Goodreads
Among the several problems I had with this book:
Throughout, Skeel misses opportunities to draw substantive distinctions between Christianity and other worldviews; and often he simply omits a worldview completely (or, oddly, keeps hanging on worldviews that no one today subscribes to, such as Gnosticism). For example, Islam is mentioned very few times in the book, as is Judaism, and I only counted one mention of Hinduism and no mentions of Buddhism. Nothing on Chinese worldviews like Confucianism or Taoism. How can this be in a book that has the premise of comparing Christianity to other religions and worldviews? (I thought I may have misunderstood the purpose of the book, so I went to re-read the Introduction, and here it is: "We will find, I think, that Christianity is considerably more plausible (and materialism and other systems of thought somewhat less) than you may think." OK; so we *will* compare and contrast.)
In other places Skeel relies too heavily on C.S. Lewis, for me. But I have to say, I'm not a huge C.S. Lewis fan. He is OK, but when a book like this relies so heavily on one other Christian author, I question how widely read that original author is. In other places Skeel sets up and knocks down a current popular Christian philosopher--William Lane Craig, whom he does not name by name in the book but merely in an endnote--by cherry picking from.the full body of Craig's work. (Odd, I thought, when in other portions of the book he's name dropping current thought leaders left and right. I have read Dr. Craig's book Reasonable Faith. I have watched a large number of his debates and lectures and also listened to several of his podcasts. I think Craig would say--and I am saying--that Skeel misrepresents Craig's work on the Kalam cosmological argument. Do a search with google on "Kalam cosmological argument" to see for yourself.)
And in other places Skeel brings up a topic as if to help it support his thought, but then he simply lets it hang. This happens time and time again. Very frustrating.
Other substantial issues I had with this book:
The chapter Suffering and Sensation has no discussion on Buddhism's approach to suffering. None. Astonishing. Did Skeel think not one of his readers ever heard of the Buddha's teaching on human suffering? How can you hope to claim Christianity has a better explanation for suffering than other worldviews when you don't compare it to those other worldviews that *do* have an explanation for the very thing you're talking about?
I found the section "The Problem of Evil" in this chapter to be criminally inadequate. Skeel writes: "In the end, I do not think Christianity can give a complete explanation of *why* there is suffering and evil in the world." (p. 94). I almost dropped the book right there and stopped reading. Of course Christianity provides a complete explanation of why there is suffering and evil in the world. There is suffering and evil in this world because of Satan and because we are not fighting against flesh and blood "but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms" (Ephesians 6:12). There.
Another mistake I think Skeel makes is that he relies heavily on the Old Testament book Job to try to make sense of suffering in the world. I've known other Christians and non-Christians cite Job, too, to grapple with the concept of human suffering. To me, this is like relying on ground-based telescopes to view the sky when the Hubble Space Telescope is now available. In other words: Why rely on the Old Testament when the New Testament now prevails? At best this is immature, at worst, it is misguided and misleading.
In the chapter The Justice Paradox there is no discussion of Islam. Well, there is one mention if you consider actually naming the religion by name and leaving it there. I'm completely baffled by this, unless Skeel was afraid of addressing the concept of justice in Islam. For anyone who is interested, simply google "Justice in Islam" and you'll find many good source materials for study. It will blow your mind. It's a shame Skeel didn't take the opportunity to address this in his book. He had/has a platform, and he didn't take up the fight.
The author attempts to tackle some enormous topics in five chapters: Ideas and Idea Making, Beauty and the Arts, Suffering and Sensation, The Justice Paradox, and Life and Afterlife.
In the chapter The Justice Paradox he never defines the term "justice" or "just society". I'm widely read so I understand what he is getting at, but I don't think the average reader will. That's a shame. The other shame is that Skeel seems to project his personal beliefs about the law (obviously, he's a lawyer by trade) and its uses onto all of Christendom. If you're not a careful reader with a broad understanding of history and philosophy, you'll be easily misled.
In addition, to state that Jesus' trial was a failure of two legal systems is to be blind to the fact that it was a triumph of Jesus' purpose here on earth.
Skeel rightly mentions a Christian influence on the 1948 UN Declaration of Human Rights (but to what extent is left to your own research and study). But, here again, Skeel makes no mention of Muslim country's objecting to the Judeo-Christian basis of the Declaration and, indeed, the 1990 Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam, which affirmed Islamic sharia law as its sole source. Anyone can look this up using a google search. Why wouldn't Skeel include it in this book? Again, Skeel had a platform but refused to use it to teach about the distinct differences between Christianity and Islam.
I admit that I merely skimmed the final chapter on heaven. Up to this point I found Skeel's work so full of missing information, missed opportunities, and outright errors from scripture that I didn't want to do a word-by-word reading to find even more. I might go back and review; might not.
This is the kind of book that happens when you're not well-versed (or, worse, ill-versed) in your source materials. I won't give this book a 1-star rating because Skeel does pose some fascinating questions, and also there are some truths here, they're just buried and you'll need a very keen and discerning eye and mind and spirit to tease them out. To me, in the end, the ride wasn't worth it.
PS: In several points in the book Skeel bemoans the fact that there are no/few Christian artists in various public forums espousing the truths of Christianity from their perspective. I couldn't agree more. I'm a Christian, and a poet and novelist. I'd welcome the opportunity to share with a wider audience my artistic worldview. :)
Did not like
2/5 on Amazon
1/5 Goodreads
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