Jump to content
Objectivism Online Forum

Soul of Atlas new book Rand/Christianity

Rate this topic


Recommended Posts

Just saw this in the news:

Do the two most influential books in modern culture, the Bible and Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged, share common ground? In his new book, The Soul of Atlas (Reason Publishing), author Mark David Henderson examines the underlying principles of Christianity and Objectivism, challenging readers to approach the seemingly contradictory world views with a fresh perspective and an open mind.

"Something about these two domains of thought...is deeply compelling to many Americans," Henderson writes in the introduction to The Soul of Atlas. "Given that fact, one would imagine that there are shelves of books comparing and contrasting these ideologies. In fact, there are not. To date, the Conversation between Objectivism and Christianity has not played out. There is common ground to stand on though, and people who adhere to either one of these two world views need to engage with each other and cooperate. It's vital today more than ever.

Read more about it here:

http://books.broadwayworld.com/article/THE-SOUL-OF-ATLAS-Examines-Principles-of-Christianity-and-Ayn-Rand-20130429

Edited by intellectualammo
Link to comment
Share on other sites

From the link:

"The Soul of Atlas leads the reader through a powerful dialogue between two worlds. Both Christianity and Rand's system of thought have played key roles in shaping Western culture, particularly in America, and Henderson challenges readers to uncover the commonalities between them. What they will discover, as Henderson himself discovered, is that reason cannot rule out the need for faith. In fact, the human person needs both."

 

Or is it that faith cannot rule out the need for reason. The human person who embraces faith, finds, in fact, that reason is still required.

 

"The ideologies are miles apart on the surface. Mark's discussion brings out the point that political conclusions can be similar yet come from two differing theological perspectives."

 

The article started,out earlier about weaving two philosophies together. exploring the compatability between faith and reason and transitions into positing as "two differing theological perspectives" Christianity and atheism, or Christianity and Objectivism?

 

The introduction and some selected passages are available on Amazon.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I would read a book on this subject, but only if the author first made it clear that he intends to be fully rational; use nothing but Reason to analyze these systems of thought and establish what these commonalities are. No need to editorialize in favor of one or the other, but never stray from Reason when making a claim.

Instead, this book is asking me to have an open mind, and it's pretty clear what it expects me to have an open mind about. Sorry, my mind is closed to anything but Reason. That's on purpose: my mind started out perfectly open (this is gonna sound crazy, but at one point my mind was even open to the notion that a bearded old guy from the North Pole was flying in just to bring me presents every year), and I gradually closed it off to things that were useless and damaging, like arbitrary assumptions, on purpose.

So please don't ask me to undo all that hard work. Not gonna happen. My days of just accepting that Santa Clause is real on faith are behind me. Same for any other similar claims.

Edited by Nicky
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...