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Title: Lewis Agonistes: How C.S. Lewis Can Train Us to Wrestle With the Modern and Postmodern World by Louis Markos ISBN: 0-8054-2778-3 Publisher: Broadman & Holman Publishers Pub. Date: 01 July, 2003 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $19.99 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.88 (8 reviews)
Rating: 4
Summary: A Thoughtful Summary
Comment: I enjoyed the book. The book referenced a large sample of the Lewis corpus. His approach to the Space Trilogy and how we can use Lewis to make bridges to the New Agers was very interesting. I knocked a star off because of his writing style. It was very uneven. At times it seemed forced and at other times it was inspired. The section on the deconstruction of language lost me, but that may be due to my lack of study in that area. His love of the fiction of Lewis came through very strong. I wanted to drop everything and read the Space Trilogy again.
Rating: 5
Summary: An Exciting Study in How to Develop a Christian Worldview
Comment: This is a splendid, insightful, and beautifully written book--certainly one of the very best treatments of C. S. Lewis now available. Markos makes the intellectual challenge posed by modernity and postmodernity not simply the organizing principle of his study of Lewis but a focus of serious attention in its own right.
Chapter 1 offers an accessible biographical account of Lewis that highlights the key personal and intellectual influences in his life. At less than 30 pages, it is the finest short overview of Lewis's life that I have ever read. Chapter 2 shows how Lewis's thought can assist Christians in critically assessing the worldview of modern philosophy and science, particularly its naturalist assumptions and anti-supernaturalist biases. In the process he gives Darwin, Nietzsche, and Freud a run for their money, effectively unpacking Lewis's conviction that there are at four features of human existence that could not have evolved in a purely naturalist or materialist fashion: "joy," morality, rationality, religion. Chapter 3 does the same thing with respect to new-age paganism, in a bracing analysis of the retrieval of the medieval worldview that Lewis achieved in THE DISCARDED IMAGE. Chapter 4 takes up the problem of evil, in an instructive study of THE PROBLEM OF PAIN that focuses on "God's Free-Will Experiment" and in a sensitive treament of Lewis's deeply personal A GRIEF OBSERVED. Chapter 5 confronts the arts and deconstructionism. In a section titled "The Death of Language" Markos gets around to one of the few truly POSTmodern (as opposed to modern) movements covered in the book: the deconstructionism of Jacques Derrida. He also deals with the metaphysical status of the arts, in a theological meditation titled "The Aesthetics of the Incarnation" and follows it up with a look at Lewis's imaginative fiction as the work of a "sub-creator." Chapter 6 brings the volume to a close, fittingly enough, with a discussion of heaven and hell that explores "the psychology of sin" that Lewis unfolds in THE GREAT DIVORCE.
In every chapter, Markos gives readers incisive summaries, generous quotations, and thoughtful analyses of the full range of works in the Lewis canon--his apologetic nonfiction (MERE CHRISTIANITY, THE PROBLEM OF PAIN, and MIRACLES), his overtly religious fiction (THE SCREWTAPE LETTERS and THE GREAT DIVORCE), and his imaginative fiction (the CHRONICLES OF NARNIA, the PERELANDRA space trilogy, and TILL WE HAVE FACES).
If there is anything that Markos could do to improve this book, it would be to write a sequel that delves deeper into current developments in science (e.g., recent trends in cosmology and quantum physics; the intelligent design movement; and the theistic evolutionism of scientists who accept and even celebrate evolution from a Christian perspective). In a sequel, Markos might also look more intently at recent developments in philosophy (esp. epistemology), linguistics, and other disciplines. My sense is that even though C. S. Lewis was engaging modernism (Darwin, Nietzsche, and Freud), his work has implications for critiquing more recent developments in postmodernism.
What most impresses me about LEWIS AGONISTES is that, although Prof. Markos is obviously a committed evangelical Christian, he writes as a Christian humanist who values science, philosophy, literature, the arts, and other aspects of culture. His ultimate aim is to get believers to engage these disciplines as thinking Christians, on the conviction that all truth is God's truth and that creation (including culture) is fundamentally good but fallen and in need of God's redemption in Jesus Christ. He encourages not a world-denying or other-worldly brand of Christian piety or spirituality but a faith that is committed to God's renewal of THIS world as His creation. Like Lewis, Markos makes Christianity attractive--not only spiritually meaningful but intellectually fulfilling and exciting.
This book would lend itself well to classroom use or small-group study. Its relative brevity (174 pages) and approachable style commend it. In fact, I plan on adopting it as THE collateral text in a course on C. S. Lewis.
Louis has produced a book that is worthy of Lewis, and he deserves the gratitude of thoughtful Christians everywhere.
Rating: 5
Summary: Markos Book a "Must Read" for Lewis Fans
Comment: This Book was very meaningful to me. Dr. Markos, using the the ideas and methods of C.S. Lewis, helps the reader to understand and grapple with the ideas and attitudes of the modern and post-modern society. This book is a must-read for all fans of C.S. Lewis. Those who have not read Lewis can also enjoy this well-written thought provoking book.
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Title: C.S. Lewis's Dangerous Idea: In Defense of the Argument from Reason by Victor Reppert ISBN: 0830827323 Publisher: InterVarsity Press Pub. Date: 01 September, 2003 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
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Title: Tolkien and C.S. Lewis: The Gift of Friendship by Colin Duriez ISBN: 1587680262 Publisher: Paulist Press Pub. Date: 01 October, 2003 List Price(USD): $16.00 |
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Title: C. S. Lewis and the Catholic Church by Joseph Pearce ISBN: 0898709792 Publisher: Ignatius Press Pub. Date: 01 December, 2003 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: Following Gandalf: Epic Battles and Moral Victory in the Lord of the Rings by Matthew T. Dickerson ISBN: 1587430851 Publisher: Brazos Press Pub. Date: 01 October, 2003 List Price(USD): $14.99 |
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Title: The Gospel According to Tolkien: Visions of the Kingdom in Middle-Earth by Ralph C. Wood ISBN: 0664226108 Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press Pub. Date: 01 October, 2003 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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