Paradise Mislaid: How We Lost Heaven and How We Can Regain It

by Jeffrey Burton Russell

Book Overview

The Christian concept of heaven flourished for almost two millennia, but it has lost much of its power in the last hundred years. Indeed today even theologians tend to avoid the topic. But heaven has always been a central tenet of the Christian faith, writes Jeffrey Burton Russell. If there is no heaven, no resurrection of the dead, the entire Christian story makes no sense.

In this stimulating book, Russell sets out to rehabilitate heaven...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0195334582
• ISBN13: 9780195334586
• Release Date: October 2007
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Length: 224 Pages
• Weight: 0.75 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.8" x 8.9"

Customer Reviews

Paradise regained

This is a magnificent work of scholarship and faith by a self-confessed 'lapsed atheist'. In concise, vigorous prose Russell summarizes the evolution of views on heaven and God from the time of the Middle Ages to the present day. Along the way he assesses the various skeptical arguments that undermined faith in heaven and a loving God and judges them at best inconclusive and at worst incoherent. His research in philosophy, history, sociology, science, literature and theology is massive and thoroughly comprehensive, demonstrating that a case for heaven need not be built on a fundamentalist appeal to Scripture or to sentiment alone. Russell gives devastating if sketchy critiques of 'physicalism' (more like scientism in general) on one hand, and Progress (as a metaphysical belief in the gradual perfection of the human race) on the other, leaving the historical Christian tradition, informed by reason, scripture and science, as the most plausible alternative. He relies heavily on the defense of the Christian faith as developed by Alvin Plantinga in "Warranted Christian Belief" as well as Hilary Putnam's critique of physicalism in "Representation and Reality", both of whom are a good step above the usual apologetic sources. Russell does not shy away from real bones of contention and admits where advances in science and philosophy have made certain questions less straightforward as they had been, but his case for heaven emerges unscathed from his immersion in the best anti-theistic polemics this age has to offer. Christians need to read this book. Liberal theology has been too dismissive of one of the great hopes and comforts that our religion has to offer. It's time to reclaim Paradise, and Russell's book is a huge step in the right direction.