The Question of God: C.S. Lewis and Sigmund Freud Debate God, Love, Sex, and the Meaning of Life
by Armand M. Nicholi Jr.
List Price:
Our Price: $7.71
You Save: $8.28 (52%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $2.25 (click here)
Category: Book
See more book details and other editions
Book Summary Information
Author: Armand M. Nicholi Jr.Edition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2003-07-29
ISBN: 074324785X
Number of pages: 304
Publisher: Free Press
Book Reviews of The Question of God: C.S. Lewis and Sigmund Freud Debate God, Love, Sex, and the Meaning of Life
Book Review: Making the big questions come alive
Summary: 5 Stars
One of the most popular courses offered at Harvard University is taught by Armand Nicholi. In it he compares and contrasts the lives and ideas of two significant thinkers: C.S. Lewis and Sigmund Freud. The content of that course comprises the material found in this riveting and incisive book.
Both Lewis and Freud thought deep and wide about many important issues: the meaning and purpose of life, the nature of morality, true happiness, human sexuality, suffering and pain, and the existence of God. On nearly all of these issues the two thinkers came to quite different conclusions. Yet interestingly the two came from somewhat similar backgrounds.
Both men were gifted with formidable intellects and wrote widely. Both suffered significant losses in their early years. Both had conflicts with their fathers. Both had a religious upbringing which they later repudiated. Lewis later abandoned his atheism and converted to Christianity, while Freud remained an atheist.
This book lays out the many profound differences of their two divergent worldviews: the materialistic/naturalistic versus the spiritual/supernatural. One says that this world and all that is in it can be explained solely in terms of the physical, while the other says the physical world is supplemented, explained, and sustained, by the spiritual.
Thus the question of God. Freud was not only a non-believer, but he actively and aggressively attacked theism. Religion, claimed Freud, is for the ignorant and childish. Believers are deluded and primitive, he chided. Following Feuerbach, he argued that the notions of God and the spiritual are simply wish-fulfillments and human projections of inner needs. As such they are illusions and false beliefs. When people become more educated they will abandon such juvenile concepts as the divine and the supernatural.
Lewis sees things quite differently. Many of the demands of the Christian worldview, for example, are not something a person would wish for. The Gospels inform us that followers of Jesus must abandon their own desires and die to self. This is not need-fulfillment but need-rejection.
Indeed, the Christian faith never promises the absence of pain and suffering: quite the opposite. We are told to expect persecution and admonished to take up our cross and follow Jesus. Hardly the stuff of wish-fulfillment.
Moreover, the wish for something may indicate that that thing actually exists. How else do we account for the universal desire for the transcendent? This is more than just projecting childhood images of one's father onto the world at large. This universal hunger indicates a universal reality. As Lewis put it, "If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world."
Of course Freud is most widely known for his views on sex. And as in other areas, his thinking differs markedly from Lewis. The views of Freud on human sexuality are well known. In his defense, he seemed more interested in the freedom to speak about sex than to necessarily act on sex, but his views nonetheless have had a lasting, often harmful, impact.
Lewis challenged the idea of Freud that sexual repression can lead to neuroses. Lewis said repression is not the same as suppression. The latter is the conscious control of one's impulses, and a necessary component of civilization. It is the not control of sexuality that is unhealthy, but the lack of control.
And simply being open about our sexuality, or at least our discussion of it, is not the panacea that Freud seemed to suppose. In recent decades we have been embarrassingly open about sexual discussion, but we do not seem the better for it. Instead, out revolution in sexuality has lead to a whole range of problems, from busted marriages and ruined families to sexually transmitted diseases and teen promiscuity.
Not surprisingly, Freud felt that real happiness was primarily tied up in the satisfaction of our sexual needs. Lewis thought otherwise. He felt that happiness will always be elusive if directly sought after. It can be obtained indirectly, as a by-product, if we live our lives in accordance with our design. And we are designed to have a relationship with our creator.
Indeed, argues Lewis, all our attempts to obtain happiness will fail until we realize the primary purpose of our lives: to be in relationship with the Peron who made us. Happiness is only found in God, and God cannot give it apart from himself. So refuse God and you forfeit the path to happiness.
Other areas of difference are explored. Taken together, they provide a very nice contrast between two competing philosophies of life: the materialist vs the spiritual. In short, this book describes the difference of God and the difference he makes. Freud's atheism had a profound effect on all that he thought and wrote about. So too did Lewis's theism. The question is, which worldview best explains the world we find ourselves in, and which one gives us a proper grounding for hope, meaning and a satisfied life?
Nicholi is to be congratulated for taking some of the deep questions about life and living and putting them into this very accessible and readable account. He has made Lewis and Freud come alive, and has presented his readers with a clear contrast in conflicting worldviews.
The question of God is one that all of us must grapple with. And "The Question of God" by Nicholi is a great vehicle for that task.
More The Question of God: C.S. Lewis and Sigmund Freud Debate God, Love, Sex, and the Meaning of Life reviews:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
Summary of The Question of God: C.S. Lewis and Sigmund Freud Debate God, Love, Sex, and the Meaning of Life
Throughout the ages, many of the world's greatest thinkers have wrestled with the concept of -- and belief in -- God. It may seem unlikely that any new arguments or insights could be raised, but the twentieth century managed to produce two brilliant men with two diametrically opposed views about the question of God: Sigmund Freud and C. S. Lewis. They never had an actual meeting, but in The Question of God, their arguments are placed side by side for the very first time.For more than twenty-five years, Armand Nicholi has taught a course at Harvard that compares the philosophical arguments of both men. In The Question of God, Dr. Nicholi presents the writings and letters of Lewis and Freud, allowing them to "speak" for themselves on the subject of belief and disbelief. Both men considered the problem of pain and suffering, the nature of love and sex, and the ultimate meaning of life and death -- and each of them thought carefully about the alternatives to their positions.
The inspiration for the PBS series of the same name, The Question of God does not presuppose which man -- Freud the devout atheist or Lewis the atheist-turned-believer -- is correct in his views. Rather, readers are urged to join Nicholi and his students and decide for themselves which path to follow.
Of course we can never really answer the question of whether God exists. And of course it would have been highly unlikely for Sigmund Freud and C.S. Lewis to discuss this question in person, considering that they were born in different countries and a generation apart. Nonetheless, The Question of God allows readers to listen in on one of the most articulate debates possible by creating a virtual meeting of Freud and Lewis. For the past 25 years, Armand M. Nicholi has taught a similar course at Harvard, where he compares Freud?s atheist-based reasoning against the atheist-turned-believer C.S. Lewis. Both men were considered brilliant, highly educated thinkers who profoundly influenced 20th-century thought. And both men presented compelling arguments for and against the existence of God. At the core is Freud?s assertion that God is a figment of the imagination (more accurately, God is an outcome of our deep-seated need for protection, stemming from the helplessness of early childhood). Lewis, on the other hand, did not see the belief in a higher power as a childish need for comfort. In fact, he wrote, "rendering back one's will which we have so long claimed for our own, is, in itself, extremely painful. To surrender a self-will inflamed and swollen with years of usurpation is a kind of death." Nicholi never take sides. Instead he gives both men a chance to eloquently answer the big questions of humanity: why is there suffering? What should be our guiding belief? How do we form a moral compass? Surprisingly, this debate turns out to be a fascinating page-turner, with most of the credit going to Nicholi. Because he understands these men's arguments so well and respects their beliefs so thoroughly, believers could begin to have doubts and atheists could start to wonder. Regardless of where you ultimately land on the question of God, this stellar book will deeply enrich your understanding of humanity. --Gail Hudson
Theology Books
Book Subjects
- Arts & Photography
- Biographies & Memoirs
- Business & Investing
- Children's Books
- Comics & Graphic Novels
- Computers & Internet
- Cooking, Food & Wine
- Entertainment
- Gay & Lesbian
- Health, Mind & Body
- History
- Home & Garden
- Horror
- Law
- Literature & Fiction
- Mystery & Thrillers
- Nonfiction
- Outdoors & Nature
- Parenting & Families
- Professional & Technical
- Reference
- Religion & Spirituality
- Romance
- Science
- Science Fiction & Fantasy
- Sports
- Teens
- Travel
Most talked about in Theology Books
Praying the Names of Jesus: A Daily Guideby Ann Spangler
Zondervan; Published: 2006-09-12; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $6.99
Price in other shops:
Case for Christ, Theby Lee Strobel
Zondervan; Published: 2002-10-01; Audio CD; Book
Best price: $18.31
Price in other shops:
What's So Amazing About Grace?by Philip Yancey
Zondervan; Published: 2002-02-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $6.97
Price in other shops:
The Jesus I Never Knewby Philip Yancey
Zondervan; Published: 2002-02-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $8.00
Price in other shops:
Who's Afraid of the Old Testament God?by Alden Thompson
Zondervan; Published: 1989-09; Paperback; Book
Best price: $108.31
Upanisads (Oxford World's Classics)Oxford University Press, USA; Published: 1998-11-19; Paperback; Book
Best price: $8.93
Price in other shops:
St. Augustine Confessions (Oxford World's Classics)by Saint Augustine
Oxford University Press, USA; Published: 1998-06-25; Paperback; Book
Best price: $5.00
Price in other shops:
Christ the Lord: A Crisis in the Life of Godby Miles Jack
Arrow/Children S (a Division of Random House; Published: 2003-03; Paperback; Book
Price in other shops:
The Mind of the Makerby Dorothy L. Sayers
HarperOne; Published: 1987-09-23; Paperback; Book
Best price: $7.40
Price in other shops:
Living Jesus: Learning the Heart of the Gospelby Luke Timothy Johnson
HarperOne; Published: 2000-01-05; Paperback; Book
Best price: $8.77
Price in other shops:
Similar Books and other products
Assessing Organizational Communication: Strategic Communication Audits (The Guilford Communication Series)by Cal W. Downs Phd, Allyson D. Adrian PhD
The Guilford Press; Published: 2004-05-26; Paperback; Book
Best price: $35.10
Price in other shops:
When Science and Christianity MeetUniversity Of Chicago Press; Published: 2008-09-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $14.65
Price in other shops:
Scientific Revolution: A Very Short Introduction (Very Short Introductions)by Lawrence M. Principe
Oxford University Press, USA; Published: 2011-05-19; Paperback; Book
Best price: $6.26
Price in other shops:
Thanks!: How Practicing Gratitude Can Make You Happierby Robert Emmons
Mariner Books; Published: 2008-11-06; Paperback; Book
Best price: $7.44
Price in other shops:
Why Would Anyone Believe in God? (Cognitive Science of Religion)by Justin L. Barrett
Altamira Press; Published: 2004-04-21; Paperback; Book
Best price: $19.62
Price in other shops:
Credibility: How Leaders Gain and Lose It, Why People Demand It (J-B Leadership Challenge: Kouzes/ Posner)by James M. Kouzes, Barry Z. Posner
Jossey-Bass; Published: 2011-08-02; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $17.24
Price in other shops:
Finding Your Religion: When the Faith You Grew Up With Has Lost Its Meaningby Scotty McLennan
HarperOne; Published: 2000-12-26; Paperback; Book
Best price: $4.59
Price in other shops:
Credibility: How Leaders Gain and Lose It, Why People Demand It, Revised Editionby James M. Kouzes, Barry Z. Posner
Jossey-Bass; Published: 2003-01-21; Paperback; Book
Best price: $8.00
Price in other shops:
Freud's Last Session - Acting Editionby Mark St. Germain
Dramatists Play Service, Inc.; Published: 2011-02-24; Paperback; Book
Best price: $6.13
Price in other shops:
The Question of God: Sigmund Freud & C.S. LewisParamount; Release date: 2005-03-08; DVD
Best price: $12.32
Price in other shops: