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63
/100
I Index Overall Rating
Readers
79/100Critics
17/100Scholars
93/100Author:
Francesca Stavrakopoulou
Publisher:
Knopf
Date:
January 25, 2022
A new history that re-presents God as he was originally envisioned by ancient worshippersâwith a distinctly male body, and with superhuman powers, earthly passions, and a penchant for the fantastic and monstrous.
What The Reviewers Say
... brilliant.
... rivetingly fresh and stunning.
Stavrakopoulou has the good grace to quote these distinguished opponents, but she never explains why they are wrong. There is, instead, a lot of dark insinuation that this was the theologians’ 'strategy' to 'veil' the truth, or that they were under the “elitist” influence of Greek philosophers who wrote about the immateriality of God: throughout this book, taking Plato and Aristotle seriously is considered a rather shameful habit.
Some of Stavrakopoulou’s assumptions are—although perfectly respectable—not unassailable, namely that there was nothing particularly distinctive about Israel’s pre-exilic religion and that ancient Israel’s neighbors had a naively literal view of the depictions of their own deities. Regardless, Stavrakopoulou has drawn a masterful line from the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob to that of Augustine, Anselm, and Aquinas.
