The Twilight of Atheism: The Rise and Fall of Disbelief in the Modern World

by Alister E. McGrath

Book Overview

In this bold and provocative new book, the author of In the Beginning and The Reenchantment of Nature challenges the widely held assumption that the world is becoming more secular and demonstrates why atheism cannot provide the moral and intellectual guidance essential for coping with the complexities of modern life. Atheism is one of the most important movements in modern Western culture. For the last two hundred years, it seemed to be on the verge...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0385500629
• ISBN13: 9780385500623
• Release Date: February 2006
• Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 0.75 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.6" x 8.2"

Customer Reviews

Great Overview of the history of Atheism

This is a tasty overview of atheism, focusing primarily on the years 1789 (the storming of the Bastille) to modern times. He explains the cultural climates that helped atheism to foster, and explains why it is declining in popularity today. Scintillating historical survey from a Christian perspective. The one weakness of the book was when McGrath uses the miserable life of Madeline Murray O'Hair as a case study of why atheism is a vacuous philosophy. I agree in principle that atheism is vacuous, but illustrating it by focusing on one solitary life seems rather insular to me and reeks of setting up a straw man, which is too bad, because the rest of the book is great.

Taking Atheism Seriously

McGrath's is not a polemic against atheism, but an account of it as a cultural phenomenon that arose and declined in a specific historical period and context. That historically concrete (as Marxists say) perspective naturally irritates atheists who want to treat atheism as the default position independent of time and place. Many atheist writers have assumed that atheism is the truth and have sought to explain Christianity or religion in general, not seeing their own disbelief as a cultural-historical phenomenon in need of explanation. (Feuerbach, Marx, and Freud, for example, do not trouble themselves with the truth claims of Christianity but assume its falsity as their starting point.) Hence the claim that atheism does not need explaining because it is simply an absence of belief (not believing). But it is really a positive "belief that something is not the case." Since 1) this disbelief has a distinct history of rise and decline; and 2) it is, unlike Christianity or theism, a rare and until the 19th century an eccentric belief, it is a perfectly proper subject for the kind of study McGrath conducts. It is true that in the late 20th century, half the world's population lived under officially atheist regimes, but this temporary political success and its consequences in themselves are part of the explanation of atheism's subsequent decline. One reviewer gives the impression that the dictionary definition of atheism is absence of belief in God or gods. I did not do an exhaustive search, but the Merriam-Webster online definition I found corresponds to McGrath's use and everyone else's until very recently: a)a disbelief in the existence of deity; b) the doctrine that there is no deity. McGrath well describes the attempt by some recent atheists to expand the definition to include those who have no particular opinion, those who are searching and questioning but undecided, and those (agnostics) who consider the answer unknowable. It is an indication of atheists' demoralization in face of the failure of the old secularization thesis, the loss of atheism's appeal, and the resurgence of religious (especially Christian) belief throughout the world and the confident militancy of Islam, that they go to such lengths to puff up their numbers. The importance of the book is the way McGrath takes atheism seriously as a social, cultural, and historical phenomenon in its own right. It deserves examination in sociological, historical, and cultural terms no less than the religions to which it responds. It played an important historical role in the critique of established religion and the oppressive role it played, for example, in 18th century France. In this context or that of 19th century Russia, atheism could reasonably be seen as a liberating force and much was made of the blood shed in the name of religion through the centuries. This argument lost much of its force in the 20th century given the record of anti-Christian forces like Nazism (which adopted much o

Ebb and Flow of Atheism in Modernity

What gives with the reviews that criticize this book for what it never said it would be about: it promised the rise and fall of atheism in modern world? It delivers the chronicling of the social and political movements that were a part of atheism's history, rather than the desired by some philosophical, abstract analysis of atheism's thought system. McGrath has a personal stake in this movement, and not just a abstract, academic one, but a personal history involving culture, politics, religion. No sanitized removal of this thought system apart from its weaving into fabric of society and its political and social dimensions could tell this story. McGrath is proficient in analyzing subjects which interest him. His fame as investigator into such as: Luther's Theology of the cross, Intellectual foundations of Pre-Reformation theology, Calvin, King James Bible, Justification of God history, etc. What an amazing list! Check out anyone on these who knows anything, and you'll find McGrath's works on such at the top. This latest contribution achieves that same prominence for those of us who have followed and read his past contributions. It is thorough, well documented, fresh and erudite. His main premise is that atheism is in a twilight zone, where it has faded to shadows of society. It flourishes in times when religion oppresses, but suffer withdrawal when spirituality is an asset to people's lives. Thus, now is downtime for atheism. This as McGrath rightly clarifies does not infer that it will remain down for the count. This quote shows some of that: "The future looks nothing like the godless and religionless world so confidently predicted forty years ago. Political opportunies and cultural sensitivity have led to religious beliefs being treated with new respect. The atheist agenda, once seen as a positive force for progress, is now seen as disrespectful toward cultural diversity." For the discerning reader who will judge the work on the agenda set out by the author (clearly done in this work) will find this a fascinating and well laid out "snapshot" look of the period which McGrath lays out as rising (French Revolution) of golden atheism period to its decline (following of Berlin Wall and Communism).

Atheism as a Cultural/Sociolological Effect

Allister McGrath's The Twilight of Atheism is a thought provoking book no matter what your background. This book is no polemic against atheism. McGrath only mentions arguments for and against God on a few occasions, and then only to set them in their historical context and show the rise and decline of atheist philosophy. And to be clear, by atheism McGrath means what many call "hard atheism." The deliberate, supposedly informed, affirmative belief that there is no God. One of the strengths of the book is that McGrath does not hesitate to examine atheism as a cultural/philosophical development just as any other. That is, he examines the cultural factors influencing its development and growth. Though some atheists naively believe that atheism is simply a matter of applying logic and reason to see the obvious, this is an inadequate basis for explaining its origins and development as a philosophical movement. This does not deny the possible truth of atheism any more than examining the cultural and historical factors that facilitated the rise of Christianity necessarily negates the truth of Christianity. According to McGrath, one catalyst for atheist thought was the ongoing revolutionary attitudes across the board towards authority, including royal and ecclesiastical. Christianity was seen as part of an oppressive establishment and atheism was a "liberating" intellectual force. Religion, especially Christianity, was seen by many as an oppressive force and atheism was the vehicle of its destruction. McGrath's overview of this period, and his closer examination of such atheists as Freud and Marx, is very helpful and makes the above points well. He builds on these points to show that by the middle of the 20th century, atheism seemed on the verge of philosophical dominance in two forms. Externally, by the vehicle of communism atheism had spread over almost a third of the world, apparently vanquishing religion in the previously Christian areas of Russia and Eastern Europe. Internally, atheistic philosophy seemed on the verge of similar successes in the West. Symbolized by Time Magazine's famous cover page asking, "Is God Dead?" The answer seemed to be yes, or almost nearly so. But just when atheism seemed on the verge of victory, it collapsed. Communism failed and was widely discredited by a recognition that it was an oppressive, not liberating force. Though atheism had been brutally imposed on the people of Russia and Eastern Europe, it faded fast once the state vehicle of oppression was lifted. Atheist numbers have dropped dramatically throughout former communist nations, and Christian numbers have surged. In the West, atheism stumbled as well. Christianity adapted, and largely through Pentacostalism/Charismaticism, revised itself into a potent and popular new movement. In the third world nations of Latin America, Africa, and Asia, this movement supplanted Marxism in offering hope to the poor and oppressed. Even in Wester