Socrates Meets Jesus: History's Greatest Questioner Confronts the Claims of Christ

by Peter Kreeft

What would happen if Socrates--yes, the Socrates of ancient Athens--suddenly showed up on the campus of a major university and enrolled in its divinity school? What would he think of human progress since his day? How would he react to our values? To our culture? And what would he think of Jesus? Peter Kreeft, Christian philosopher and longtime admirer of the historic Socrates, imagines the result. In this drama Socrates meets such fellow students as Bertha Broadmind, Thomas Keptic and Molly Mooney. Throughout, Kreeft weaves an intriguing web as he brings Socrates closer and closer to a meeting with Jesus. Here is a startling and provocative portrayal of reason in search of truth. In a new introduction to this revised edition, Kreeft also highlights the inspiration for this book and the key questions of truth and faith it addresses.

Genres: Philosophy, Christian, Religion, Theology, Catholic, Nonfiction, Christianity

182 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1987

About the author

Peter Kreeft is an American philosopher and prolific author of over eighty books on Christian theology, philosophy, and apologetics. A convert from Protestantism to Catholicism, his journey was shaped by his study of Church history, Gothic architecture, and Thomistic thought. He earned his BA from Calvin College, an MA and PhD from Fordham University, and pursued further studies at Yale. Since 1965, he has taught philosophy at Boston College and also at The King’s College. Kreeft is known for formulating “Twenty Arguments for the Existence of God” with Ronald K. Tacelli, featured in their Handbook of Christian Apologetics. A strong advocate for unity among Christians, he emphasizes shared belief in Christ over denominational differences.

Reviews

[Kyle · Rating 2 out of 5]

Peter Kreeft is perhaps one of the best known presenters of Christian Apologetics in the world today, and one of the few for whom I have any respect.

That being said, Socrates Meets Jesus is a a tremendous disappointment. The rise of fanatical Evangelism has contributed to Christian apologists becoming a dying breed, and this book fails to help preserve their survival.

Socrates represents the ultimate rational skeptic, and his name is among the pillars of Western philosophy. If Peter Kreeft can convince Socrates to believe in God, then his battle is won, right?

Well, perhaps, but regardless, it's a battle he most certainly loses (Which is actually impressive since he's really just arguing with himself).

Kreeft is forced to deal with the clashing intentions of this book. One intention is to convince the rational mind (in this case Socrates) that it is not only perfectly logical and reasonable to believe in God, but a perfectly rational and logical person would believe in God.

Yet Kreeft is faced with same problem Thomas Aquinas faced in the Summa Theologica , that reason and logic alone cannot bring you to a belief in God.

Anselm tried to power his way through the problem with his a priori being of perfection. Augustine and Anselm tried to side-step it. But what does Kreeft do? He tries to write it off as not being important. But the problem is, it IS important. Which is why the issue of its importance takes up the whole first 6/8ths of his book.

I was actually enjoying the book, up until the very end when I almost threw the book across the room. Kreeft paints Socrates well until the end. Socrates remains the consummate logician, following the trail of reasoning like a bloodhound, and latching onto inconsistencies like a rottweiler. Yet ultimately, we are faced with a problem.

With Socrates remaining true to his logical and skeptical nature, we find it's impossible for Socrates to accept the existence of God prima facie . Logic will always end up steering him off the path of belief.

To deal with this Kreeft basically ruins the whole book. He makes Socrates have a "religious experience," a "vision." Socrates then knowingly throws out all logic or reason, and dismisses them as being no longer relevant. He digs in his heels, sets his jaw, and suddenly becomes an ardent believer even though he can't explain why. Essentially, Kreeft makes Socrates become someone other than Socrates. Instead of acknowledging the problem of how Logic can only take you so far, like Thomas Aquinas did. Peter Kreeft tries to solve the problem by changing the game pieces.

Thomas Aquinas tried to use what tools we have within realm of logic, in order to help people make that leap of faith easier and shorter. Peter Kreeft decides that logic is just too damn hard, so the hell with it anyway. But wait! Peter Kreeft is a logician, so... Oh, right. Logic is great and all until it becomes unable to mold to the shape you want to give it.

"This pen is blue dammit! Even if I have to rearrange the schema of the rainbow to do it!"

"But Peter, weren't you initially trying to convince me that the pen is blue by explaining the blueness of it? You even said that the pen's blueness was self-evident."

"Yeah I was, but I can't do it. So I'm changing the meaning of the word blue. All better now."

"So what was the point of you even trying to convince me?"

"I didn't convince you? But... I waved my hand, used magic, and made it blue. Shouldn't that convince you I was right?"

"Um...Peter?... I think you should go take a nap now."

My advice about what to do with this book? Start reading this book, you'll enjoy it. Then when you get to the last 10-20 pages or so, stop. Because if you continue on it will make you want to urinate on garden gnomes. And nobody likes pee-splattered garden gnomes, do they?

[Walter · Rating 5 out of 5]

Peter Kreeft, one of the foremost Christian philosophers today, wrote this satirical work about the ancient Greek philosopher Socrates, who is mysteriously resurrected on the modern day campus of "Have It" University. In this dialogue, which is reminiscent of Plato's dialogues, Socrates questions graduate theological students at this elite Ivy League university about Jesus Christ and the claims of the Bible. The dialogue is fascinating, at times hilarious, at other times profound. Socrates reads the Bible and comments on its claims from a philosophical point of view. Then he questions his fellow theology students about their culture, their beliefs and the philosophy that they take for granted. It is fascinating how the philosophical assumptions of modern theologians fall so much more quickly at the feet of Socrates' questioning than do the claims and assumptions of scripture. It is also fascinating to read how a transplant from Ancient Greece would interact with modern American society.

One of the great things about Kreeft is how he is able take the thought and assumptions of various philosophers from the many ages of the Western mind and distill them in a way that allows him to see the world as they would see it, if they were still here. In his "Socrates meets..." series, Kreeft inserts Socrates into the thoughts of many different philosophers and examines their thought through the lens of pure reason as Socrates practiced it. In using humor, Kreeft helps the reader to keep interest in complicated subjects that would bore the student in the lecture hall. And he keeps everything relevant for the non-philosopher as well.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in philosophy, Christianity, and the intersection of the two.

[Rod Horncastle · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm gonna have to read this a few more times - This is almost the most enjoyable reading experience I have ever had. So much fun!

Reading a book thats written in the style of a play (all dialogue) is sure a fast moving experience. I would love to see a group perform this...it's very possible, and endlessly entertaining. Socrates has probably never been so humorous.

This book is an interesting challenge: would Socrates end up a Bible believing Christian using his questioning methods to investigate the Truth of Christianity? Maybe? Maybe NOT. The Bible tells us that it isn't pure logic that makes someone a Christian - there's a heart angle as well. And it seems that Peter Kreeft has given Socrates a heart in this story. Not just a heart (everyone has one of those) but a heart that longs for the truth of God. I haven't read enough Socrates to know if this has any truth to it.

The moments of brilliance in this story are observing Socrates challenging liberal Christians (which generally aren't Christians at all) to explore the core of their unbiblical thinking. Liberals generally only follow the Bible as far as it agrees with the God they imagine meets their needs and desires. But Kreeft and Socrates suggest the Biblical God is very specific and must be acknowledged as the deity found in ALL of scripture - not just the lovey parts that agree with liberal theology - Love and Justice in the Old and New Testaments.

I'm now on a quest to find Kreeft other Socrates offerings: Apparently there are discussions with numerous other historical thinkers.

[Brian · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kreeft is not a genius, and he has written some howlers, most recently on ecumenism. That said, I wish I could have given this to my students instead of Christianity and Liberalism by Machen, because many Christian kids just do not understand what liberalism is saying, and this book gives the view almost a full hearing, and Kreeft decisively shows, perhaps overmuch, why it fails.

Now, I recognize that this book needs to be balanced by exhortations to patience, the recognition that people are usually swayed by rhetoric and life-witness as well as by truth, and by a strong, robust theology of charity that does not turn people and their problems or actions into easily diagnosed "propositions" that are either true or false. I think I was sort of like that as a high school/early college student, but I think now I almost tilt the other way. Heh, I probably tilt in the wrong way whenever it is convenient. In other words, we need Richard Hooker as well as J. Gresham Machen or Charles Hodge.

Kreeft makes the basic point that loving the heretic cannot and must not include loving the heresy. That point stands, and I wish that more Evangelicals would read some of this stuff, given how liberal Evangelicalism is coming, in ethos if not in doctrine.

Finally, Kreeft is, I think, the only person I have read who is reproducing C.S. Lewis' apologetic method. Passages in the last chapters are especially reminiscent of Miracles, and it's even combined with some pop "doctrine of God" stuff (i.e. God's transcendence and immanence is briefly discussed). That kind of thing needs to be done more, and I wish Canon Press could publish some of those, since the method seems so useful. Also, ideal for waking up young people to philosophy, and for inspiring older people to go back to it.

[Niall · Rating 1 out of 5]

How can I put it nicely...

While mildly entertaining it isn't long before this book descends into some crazy whacked out bullshit. A somewhat entertaining work of fiction but of very little merit except if you want to find out how the writer consolidates the philosophy of Socrates with his own ideals and beliefs about Christianity

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

I choose this word purposefully: this book is delightful. Mr. Kreeft imagines the ancient Greek philosopher Socrates appearing on the campus of a thinly disguised Harvard University, where he enrolls in the Divinity School's graduate program and begins to make everyone insane. I have been a fan of Socrates for a long time, and I found the author's insights to be both amusing and thought-provoking. Socrates, who lived and died before Jesus, approaches the idea of Christianity with his keen, logical mind, and through many pages of questions and answers, manages to disassemble much of what passes for theological thinking in the modern era. While that sounds heavy, it is not: Mr. Kreeft has a very light touch, and makes reading about deep philosophical questions and conundrums quite enjoyable.

I wish I had majored in philosophy in college. I'm pretty much self-taught, which is difficult since philosophy is very...philosophical.

Wonderful book.

[Steven Robertson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely brilliant. LOVED. IT.

[Tessa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Surprisingly quite funny and very relevant for today. I will make my kids read this.

[David Mamdouh · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting

[GallucciCat05 · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book is the worst professional writing I have ever read. It is beyond embarrassing that a grown man would use Socrates (a child molester) for Christian apologetics. He wrote the book in a dialogue format. Bertha is a completely passive airhead- and on that... 'Bertha Broadmind'?! What a pathetic and pointless name. She can't properly explain the concept of cars or working for necessity to survive. And the amazing philosopher Socrates cannot get a rudimentary understanding of why one ought to stay out of the direct path of a primary yellow, two-ton, quickly moving vehicle.
Now, I am not trying to undermine Socrates' adeptness in field of philosophy. My qualm is with how Peter Kreeft wrote Socrates: Like an out-of-character, Christian, self-insert fanfiction. I think Kreeft's writing is best fit for Wattpad. Socrates assumes an immediate understanding of the modern world, despite openly not grasping cars. Kreeft's hating on Harvard is most plausibly because he is mad that they don't want his ludicrous ideas filling their lecture halls. Also, how does Socrates think that the modern western world is barbaric despite saying that we still need slaves-- while simultaneously saying that everyone today is a slave. My understanding is that this book has good reviews because a niche group of people are seeking to confirm their baseless opinions on history. Also, Socrates would not be a part of a mainstream religion... soooo.......

[Dennis Henn · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love Kreeft's writings. In this book, Kreeft resurrects Socrates and places him on a liberal college campus to attend several religion courses. Through questioning basic, widely held premises, Socrates (Kreeft) examines Jesus' claim to be God incarnate. Is there a sound basis for our belief in Jesus? Kreeft answers with a yes. I particularly enjoyed the final chapter on the resurrection being more than myth or archetype. That Jesus' body was physically and literally raised or our faith falls apart.

[Isaac · Rating 3 out of 5]

As a high school student and beginning Theologian reading Peter Kreeft for one of the first times, I found this book interesting, yet sometimes exhausting book to read. Socrates Meets Jesus made very sound and logical (which I expected from Peter Kreeft after reading one of his books on Logic) points through it's fantastical settings and stereotypical characters, but it took it's sweet time making them. I enjoyed this book overall and found it to be thought provoking and funny. But I would need a good break before I would want to read another "Socrates meets.." book.

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

A diverting, quick read. I was rather taken with the stage adaptation I'd seen live some years ago but only just now got around to reading the original book. (https://youtu.be/ZWxop3Kz8Fg) This could no doubt be considered a "fictional, abridged" version of some more comprehensive Feser book on "Christology" or what-have-you.

[Jacob Aitken]

Very good at demonstrating cross-examinations, moral weaknesses in opponents, etc. His picture of Socrates is utterly false, however. At best the evidence points to Socrates as a rationalistic pagan. At worst, he is a sodomit. Great content in the book; I would pick a different interlocutor.

[Sonja · Rating 1 out of 5]

Vielversprechender Titel. Kein Inhalt.

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun read, though not as well crafted as "Between Heaven and Hell"

[Steven R. McEvoy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is another in a series by Kreeft that has Socrates reappearing in a modern day setting to challenge people with what they believe or why the live the way they do. So, much like his other books The Best Things In Life and The Unaborted Socrates, the names of people and places in this book are a series of puns and jokes. In this book, Socrates wakes up from what he assumed was his suicide in the 'Broadener Library at Have It University', which is supposed to be a renowned hub of learning in 'Camp Rich, Massachusetts'. Sound familiar?
It appears that he has been registered at the Have It Divinity School. The characters he interacts with are varied and interesting. The first student he meets is Bertha Broadmind, then Thomas Keptic, Professor Flatland who teaches 'Science and Religion'. Then Socrates encounters Professor Shift who teaches 'Comparative Religions'. Next Socrates encounters the claims of Christ in Professor Fesser's 'Christology' seminar. This is the purpose of the book - to have Socrates encounter the claims of Christ. The rest of the book takes place around these seminar classes.

Kreeft has a very interesting book here, in that he tries to answer the question of what would happen if Socrates of Athens were to reappear today and interact with a modern university crowd. Socrates has not changed much from dying and reappearing somewhere and some time else. He is still the ultimate questioner and his questions will challenge what people believe and why they believe.
The first time I read Kreeft's Socratic style, a book written directly as dialogue, I was not all that enthusiastic about it. But now that I have read a few books in this style, I really enjoy it. It makes the reading of philosophy very quick and painless. That, combined with Socrates method of asking questions, lets you read more serious philosophy in an easier-to-approach method.


Kreeft is known as a great scholar who specializes in apologetics (the defense of the faith), also C.S. Lewis and Socrates. This book brings together two of those passions of his academic life and highlights them in a fun, uncomplicated way. Kreeft has a knack for taking very difficult topics and making them far more approachable.

This is a great book to encounter the claims of Christ and the modern academic setting. Though a little kitschy with all the puns, that just makes it more fun and memorable.

So pick up this book and join history's greatest questioner as he confronts and challenges the claims of Christ and the modern academic environment - especially in religious schools, colleges or seminaries. My recommendation would be to give it a try even if you just want to broaden your knowledge of Christianity or to learn how to ask the right questions to get the answers you are looking for. A great scholar, Dr. Peter Frick, once said, 'Life is not about knowing all the answers but about learning to ask the right questions.' This book will help you learn how to do that. Therefore, I can only say this book is definitely a 'Love It'.

(First Published in Imprint as 'Love It' in the 'Love It / Hate It' book review column 2007-05-04.)

[JooHeon Lee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Peter Kreeft's Socrates Meets Jesus is a short and enjoyable read as he satirizes the whole liberal Christian movement and shows that there is simply one logical conclusion from reading Scripture - namely, that the Bible makes certain truth claims that cannot be allegorized into one big symbol or collection of meanings but must be taken as historical reality and truth to be accepted for one's salvation. Although written in a form of a play, the book does require that the reader sit down and actually read through the logic and the apologetics demonstrated by the author. So, even if the book may be short in length, it will nevertheless take some critical thinking on the reader's part, and Kreeft will work your brains through the discourse between Socrates and the students at Have It Divinity School.

Some of the best apologetics in the book comes when Socrates "deconstructs" the whole set of beliefs held dearly by those promoting the postmodern and progressive approach to Christianity. I personally loved Socrates's exchange with Bertha when he talks about progress and how it is impossible to have progress without an unchanging standard of perfection, which Socrates namely calls God. Another good apologetics was when he discusses the possibility of miracles because God is indeed God. I think that the best of Kreeft's work comes to light when he shows Socrates working through Scripture in order to arrive at the truth about the Christian God and Jesus Christ. Although there are certain knowledge that Socrates can have through pure logic, it does come to a roadblock without the special revelation of the Word, and I am glad that Kreeft implicitly shows this in the character of Socrates. As I read through this book, it made me think about how God is revealed to all people and how all people are left without excuse as the Apostle Paul reasons in the Book of Romans. Socrates, using his pure logic, was able to come to some sense of God, albeit incomplete and not salvific. Also, another interesting thing to consider is how much influence Greek philosophy has had in the development of Christian theology; Kreeft does use Socrates, a Greek philosopher, to criticize liberal Christianity and skepticism after all.

This book may not be for everyone because the logical work can prove to be mind-boggling at times, but I still think that, if you press through with the book, you will find yourself thinking through some of the hardest thoughts about God and theology and thus come out a more critical thinker from it. It is written in a play format, so it doesn't read like a dense philosophical or theological treatise. It may also be fun if you like reading satirical work, where the author mocks the flaws in a specific strand of thinking. I personally enjoyed it, and I would recommend to readers, who are interested in Christian apologetics and logic.

[Payne Walton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Awesome premise. Socrates is enrolled in a divinity school in 1987. The book follows him through different classes and conversations as he asks questions to try and figure out who this Jesus guy was all about.

Kreeft uses a really pleasant mix of apologetics, logic, and humor to lead the fictitious Socrates to the inevitable truth of Jesus. This was a super refreshing perspective on apologetics and the reason that supports Christian faith. Also, the book makes it cool to imagine what the man who invented philosophy could’ve done for the Kingdom.

Highly recommend. Hmu if you want to borrow

[Tom Willis · Rating 3 out of 5]

I did not feel compelled to finish this book. I love Peter Kreeft, but this, for some reason, just doesn't hold up to his other works. I recently read his Socratic dialogue on Marxism, which was fantastic. This is just not that great.

Watch the stage adaptation of it, however. That's worth seeing. (I was actually at this production.)

[Kendall Davis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Creative and well done. This book is more about exposing the logical inconsistencies of various forms of modern theological liberalism than one might expect, but Kreeft does this with ample wit and humor.

[Bennett Rogers · Rating 5 out of 5]

Delightful and illuminating thought experiment. Readers will enjoy it more if they have read Kreeft's Philosophy 101 by Socrates and/or Plato's Apology (his account of Socrates trial). But even so, it stands on its own and is true to the spirit of Socrates.

[Jonathan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Socrates Meets Jesus: History's Greatest Questioner Confronts the Claims of Christ. Downers Grove: IVP Books, 2002

Socrates Meets Jesus is book with a creative story-line and a miraculous ending. The thesis of this book is that the claims of Christ are not false and absurd. They are so robust and true that even history's greatest questioner, Socrates, would have great reason to reject deism, open theism, and other worldviews through the reading, testing, and examination of the trustworthy Word of God. This philosophical work is a collection of interactions between Socrates and students at Have it Divinity School ending with Socrates' acceptance of the gospel through philosophical and logical reasoning and God's Word.
Kreeft's story line is simple, Socrates comes back to life in this age to discover the modern day beliefs of many professing Christians and then evaluate The Scriptures in order to come to a final, rounded understanding of Jesus. Through the book, Socrates seems to slowly realize that the miracle of his return to earth years after his death was an act of a higher being and he even eludes to the fact that this higher being may be more than the god's that were worshiped in his day, but rather a single God who is Sovereign. He comes to this realization through a presentational idea that he has a porpoise in being back on earth, most likely the discovery of a new idea or a more rounded understanding of the “Unknown God”.

Peter Kreeft did an amazing job at portraying the historical Socrates living in a modern context in a way that pouts his historical method of learning on display and applies it to the claims of Christ as well as The Scriptures. The Socrates displayed in this book used the Socratic method of asking questions in a way that makes this imaginary Socrates come alive in a philosophically accurate portrayal of what would actually happen. It's hard to open to a page of this book without reading some kind of clever and eyeopening question that displays the effectiveness of the Socratic method in a theological and christian context. An example of this is when he is talking to Bertha about how love and justice correlate. “Why could God not be both a loving God and a just God?... Does not love make its own judgments? Has love no eyes? And is love not like an earthquake as well as like a still small voice? In fact, is not love the greatest earthquake?” (56).

Socrates Meets Jesus is filled with eyeopening truths and ideas that challenge the liberal perspective of religion. Socrates uses his method of asking questions in order to challenge the liberal idea of miracles (59-76), ethics (91), essence of religion (88-98), and being open minded (79-83). In Kreeft's section What is the point of being open minded?, Kreeft helps the reader realized how irrational it is to be open minded without a desire and goal of coming to understand a truthful idea or logical, truthful conclusion. Kreeft uses Socrates to help drive the point home that being open minded is similar to the point of opening ones mouth; to bite down on something, in this situation, a dependable truth. The book can also help readers understand the problem with the Open-Theist idea of love. Socrates shows that if the Scriptures are true, the loving thing to do is not shut up and let the ones being lied to parish, but rather speak up about what is true and help others see it. The largest strength of this book is the effect it can have on world view. Everyone has a world view but not everyone has a correct one and Kreeft helps challenge so many ideas and bring false ideas to their logical conclusions by bringing out contradictions that are sometimes overlooked.

Socrates uses a presupposition approach to thinking about the ideas on love, truth, joy, and many other topics showing the contradictions that appear all over different worldviews and Ultimately, ending in the acceptance of Jesus and God's Word in The Bible as the only reasonable explanation of everything. The thesis of this book that the claims of Christ are not false and absurd but are so robust and true that even history's greatest questioner, Socrates, would have great reason to reject deism, open theism, and other worldviews through the reading, testing, and examination of the trustworthy Word of God.

[Adam Graham · Rating 5 out of 5]

Peter Kreeft is the master of the rare art of fictional philosophical dialogs. While Between Heaven & Hell is perhaps the best known of these, Socrates Meets Jesus is a worthy entry.

Socrates doesn't meet and dialog with Jesus, rather he dialogs about Jesus with modern 20th Century students on the fictional Have It University Divinity Schoo, a thinly veiled version of Harvard Divinity School where he encounters students like Bertha Broadmind and Thomas Keptic. While their names indicate roles they play, Kreeft does a surprisingly good job making them real and sympathetic characters.

Kreeft doesn't begin with the big issues of the resurrection but starts smaller with discussions of ideas such as whether we are really progressing as humans and the idea of how we interpret a book, whether we interpret it by what is meant or by what the author meant. The answer may seem obvious but many do quite the opposite. Then he discusses whether Miracles happen with a teacher of Science and Religion. And then discusses concepts of openmindedness.

The book then wraps up with a 3-chapter series in a Christology class.

This is an enjoyable book. Kreeft's Socrates is indeed, a great questioner, challenging constantly the orthodoxy of an age that has abandoned clear-thinking for pseudo-religiosity with ideas that stating the definitive truth of the resurrection is to be avoided at all costs to interpreting scripture to teach what we'd like it to rather than what it actually does.

As another reviewer pointed out, Socrates does have an experience of meeting Christ through his study of the New Testament, a religious experience. While it does have Socrates broach his general character, I think it was a theologically honest stroke by Kreeft. Reason can answer many questions about Christianity, it cannot bring us to faith in Christ, that is the work of the Holy Spirit. Thus to have Socrates defend the resurrection and other Christian doctrines in the final chapter, Socrates must first come to Christ.

Overall, this was a great work that was as fun as it was intellectually stimulating.

[Emily Cook · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the first books assigned to my daughter for her high school class at Wittenberg Academy. Excellent read!

[Tom Talamantez · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am adding Socrates meets Jesus to my required reading shelf. This book is brilliant in it's simplicity. Using Socratic diologue, Kreeft creates conversations with students who are the products of 20th century progressive education. Through simple Q&A, Socrates challenges faulty premises and leads students to think about the presuppositions regarding Jesus that they have blindly accepted. I think this book is important because as Christians, we are often anxious to just give someone the right answer, but as Kreeft shows, it is often more important to ask the right question than to give the right answer. Helping folks examine their beliefs and arrive at the right answer themselves is of paramount importance in helping people meet the real Jesus. From an evangelism standpoint, I think it also helps believers determine if the person we are engaging is interested in finding the truth. The biblical criteria for finding God requires a complete commitment to finding truth. God says that "you will find Me if you seek for me with all of your heart", a promise made to every person. C.S. Lewis followed the same logical process to determine that Jesus could only be Lord, a liar or a lunatic, all other personas applied to Jesus are just not supported by His claims or the eyewitness accounts of His contemporaries. Okay, this review is starting to feel preachy, so let me just say that I highly recommend this book and many others by Peter Kreeft.

[Andriel Costiuc · Rating 5 out of 5]

Although slightly corny in its approach to naming, the book is a solid read, in depth and superbly critical of the thought processes that pervade in our society. Much of what people believe is not based on research and deep thinking, but in gut-feeling and 'I-wish-it-was' mentality.

And this does not necessarily pertain to nonbelievers, but to the Christian population as well. So much of modern Christians and Evangelicals are engaging in a dangerous game of syncretism. The book provides a clear-eyed analysis of how one should think and apply knowledge.

Another reviewer stated that you should skip the last 20 pages of the book because Socrates essentially has a religious experience and drops logic in favor of revelation. I do not agree. All arguments against the faith or twisting the faith are essentially barriers that one must overcome through careful thought, but just because you tear down walls around a castle doesn't automatically mean you are inside the castle. No, you actually have to walk inside. Just so with Christianity; you can tear down the faulty logic around your heart, but the next step, the actual acceptance of the Gospel, is by necessity by faith.

[Tim · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book - maybe I'm really congratulating myself for having read a "logic" book and not only finished it, but enjoyed it. That's what it takes to get me to enjoy one of these ...

The scenario is that Socrates, having lived and died before Jesus, would never have known His claims or life. Somehow he finds himself at Harvard Divinity School, participating in lectures and small groups where he comes face to face with "progress" since his time, and then comparative religion, christology, the power of myth, etc. Ultimately he reads the Old and then New Testament and Jesus's teachings.

All this is done through imaginary conversations, in the Socratic method, between him and his students and professors. Slightly corny, but an eye opener as to all the side roads of philosophy there are, with the author choosing a few to go down, just mentioning others.

I'm going to have to find another by Peter Kreeft...

[Lee Harmon · Rating 4 out of 5]

If we were to revive Socrates, what would he think of today’s world?

This is a light-hearted—dare I say “cute” without offending Kreeft—conversation with the most famous of all philosophers. Socrates, who lived long before Jesus came on the scene, awakens in the 21st century and enrolls in a divinity school. In typical Socratic pursuit, he aims at uncovering the truth about the Bible and this man, Jesus, who made such a profound impact on the world. Jesus, he learns, was God in the flesh. Not a God, but the God. Remarkable! Who could ever believe in a “one and only” God?

Socrates discusses Jesus with fellow students Bertha Broadmind, Tomas Keptic, and Molly Mooney, and soon takes on the professors themselves, leaving them in a bewildered state of confusion about everything they thought they understood. By the book’s end, Socrates takes on the big question—the resurrection—and comes to a startling conclusion.

An enjoyable read!

[Naomi Ruth · Rating 3 out of 5]

There were aspects of this book I liked. I liked the dialogue format, the punny names, and the clear understanding of many, many different philosophical, theological, political standpoints. I was quite impressed with how Kreeft wove in so much philosophy from so many different philosophers. I will say, sometimes I felt like his bias got in the way - I'm not convinced Socrates would have responded quite the way Kreeft has him respond, and sometimes I think there was confusion on how ancient pagans believed/behaved but... That's to be expected. I think sometimes he was unfair to liberals and those people he obviously does not agree with. It is in keeping with how Socrates treated people of his day, but it felt like poor philosophy to me. But definitely worth the read, I think. Good information in an easy-to-read format. I used it with my 8th graders and they were able to follow quite a bit of the dialogue.