Christian Apologetics: An Anthology of Primary Sources [Hardcover]

Khaldoun A. Sweis (Editor), Chad V. Meister (Editor)

Book Description

Release date: July 24, 2012

Christian Apologetics: An Anthology of Primary Sources makes available over fifty primary source selections that address various challenges to Christian faith in the history of Christian apologetics. The compilation represents a broad Christian spectrum, ranging from early writers like Saint Paul and Saint Augustine, to Saint Teresa of Avila and Blaise Pascal, to more recent and present day apologists such as C. S. Lewis, Alvin Plantinga, William Lane Craig, Richard Swinburne and Pope Benedict XVI. Insightful introductions, black-and-white images, concise section headings and discussion questions guide readers toward a clearer understanding of classical defenses of Christianity. Annotated reading lists, a bibliography and author and subject indices contribute to the suitability of this anthology as a textbook or supplemental reader. Christian Apologetics: An Anthology of Primary Sources is an authoritative reference for key persons, concepts, issues and approaches in the history of Christian apologetics. It is especially useful as a supplemental textbook for students, allowing them to read great apologists and thinkers in their own words.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Khaldoun A. Sweis (PhD, University of Hull; MA, Trinity International University) teaches philosophy with the Oxford University Department for Continuing Education in the UK and is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Olive-Harvey College in Chicago, Illinois. His publications include Think : A Journal of the Royal Institute of Philosophy, the Journal of the International Society of Christian Apologetics, and Debating Christian Theism (Oxford University Press), with J. P. Moreland and Chad Meister.

Chad V. Meister (PhD, Marquette University) is professor of philosophy and theology at Bethel College in Mishawaka, Indiana. He is the author and editor of multiple books and articles including: God Is Great, God Is Good (winner of the Christianity Today Book of the Year); Building Belief; Evil: A Guide for the Perplexed; and Debating Christian Theism (with J. P. Moreland and Khaldoun Sweis). Meister is also editor of the Journal of the International Society of Christian Apologetics, book review editor for Philosophia Christi, and General Editor (with Paul Moser) of the series Cambridge Studies in Religion, Philosophy and Society.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 560 pages
• Publisher: Zondervan; annotated edition edition (July 24, 2012)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0310325331
• ISBN-13: 978-0310325338
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 1.7 x 9.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #420,792 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Place to Start to Learn from the Best Christian Apologists August 31, 2012

By Life Long Reader

Format:Hardcover

God wants you to argue for the truth of the Christian faith. To some, the mere idea of God wanting Christians to argue, let alone for His truth, is an oxymoron. This is because many people wrongly associate the idea of arguing with two people yelling at each other while they debate an idea. But this is not the idea of arguing, let alone the picture Peter had in mind when he challenged believers to "Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give a reason for the hope that you have. (1 Peter 3:15)"

No, arguing for the truth of the Christian faith has its roots in Scripture and it is in the life and ministry of Paul in which we see pervasive argumentation for Christianity. A quick read through the book of Acts will bring to light the apologetic nature of Paul's ministry as time and time again Luke tell us he "reasoned", "defended", "contended" and "argued" for the truth of the Christian faith to unbelievers.

With the belief in mind that Christians are commanded to give a defense of the Christian faith, Khaldoun A. Sweis and Chad V. Meister have brought together a selection of some of the best arguments for the truth of Christianity within various fields in the book Christian Apologetics: An Anthology of Primary Sources. It is the editors desire that the book "will be effective in removing obstacles hindering faith in Christ and in bolstering faith in those who already believe. (p. 16)"

As an anthology the book is a compilation of the previously published works of various apologists and theologians who have been recognized over the years as providing some of the best arguments in regards to the subjects they have written on. The book is broken into eleven parts dealing with introductory matters such as the history of various methodologies of apologetics as well as specific disciplines within apologetics like the existence of God, Scripture, miracles, the problem of evil and Christianity within the world.

The contributors are varied which adds to the strength of the book. By varied I mean several things. First, the contributors represent various apologetical methodologies. For the broad evidentialist camp there is C.S Lewis (poster boy for Evidentialists), William Lane Craig (Classic Evidentialist), Josh McDowell (Historical Evidentialist) and Richard Swinburne (Cumulative Case Evidentialist). For the Presuppositionalist there is the formidable Greg Bahnsen and the variant of Presuppositionalism, Reformed Epistemology as represented by Alvin Plantinga. Finally, for the Experientialist there is Blaise Pascal. Second, though fundamentally I am a committed presuppositionalist, I realize the apologetic value that other methods have to offer. Thus, having a variety of methods represented allows the best defenders of a certain topic to be added to the book despite their apologetic method. This leads to the third observation in regards to the strength of a varied representation, that is, since each apologetic method tends to focus on a certain area, having them all together speaks to the all-encompassing nature of Christian apologetics: it speaks to all of life and there is no place in reality where God's truth cannot speak too. Fourth, though there is only one women contributor, Teresa of Avila, this speaks to the fact that though men have been the dominate force in apologetics, there are women who given their minds to the task as well. Finally, there is a variety in regards to the era of contributors represented. Contributors are selected from the beginning of Christianity to the present. The first entry is from the Apostle Paul himself in Acts 17, there are the greats that followed like Augustine, Aquinas and Anslem as well as apologists in the present era like William Lane Craig and Alvin Plantinga.

One of the most intriguing chapters of the book was by James K. Beilby, Varieties of Apologetics, who is the author of Thinking About Christian Apologetics. In this chapter (taken from his book), Beilby surveys the variety of apologetical methods and attempts to break them down by comparing and contrasting them. Beilby believes that all apologetics methods are trying to answer five basic questions: (1) What is the relationship between faith and reason, (2) To what extent can humans understand God's nature, (3) What is the role of the Holy Spirit in apologetics, (4) What is the nature of truth and (5) What is the task of apologetics? Beilby then breaks down each apologetical method into its essential core beliefs in order to demonstrate why each one takes the road they do in defending the Christian faith. Beilby concludes the chapter with a look at whether an eclectic apologetic is possible or not. In doing so he notes that there are those within each apologetical school of thought who are either strict adherents or eclectic adherents. Strict adherent believe their method is how it must be (Van Til is a Strict Presuppositionalist) whereas eclectic adherents believe their method is how it might be practiced (Francis Schaeffer is an Eclectic Presuppositionalist) (p. 37) Men like Augustine, Anslem, Pascal, Edward Carnell, C. Stephen Evans and Alvin Plantinga are examples of apologists who have anchored themselves within one method or another but made wide use of the strengths of other apologetical schools of thought.

Some of the other notable chapters are Norman L. Geisler's chapters on The Knowability of History, Alvin Plantinga's Advice to Christian Philosophers, Greg Bahnsen's presentation of the transcendental argument for the existence of God in his debate with Gordon Stein, Athanasius' On the Incarnation, William Lane Craig on The Bodily Resurrection of Jesus, Kurt Wise's chapter on The Origin of Life's Major Groups and last but not least, Francis Schaeffer's classic work A Christian Manifesto. No doubt, many readers will be reading through the list of contributors and their respective topics and think of others who could have been in there as well, but the books is an selection of representatives and not an exhaustive reference book with the best of everyone on each subject. To do so would require a multi-volumous work which I am sure would be heartily received.

Another helpful feature of this book is the list of questions at the end of each section designed to encourage the reader to engage more deeply and intentionally with the contribution of each chapter. Also located at the end of each section is a rich list of resources for further reading on the subject covered. No doubt, the selections in this book are just a sampling of the must-read contributions to each subject.

Christian Apologetics: An Anthology of Primary Sources is a feast for the mind of a Christian apologist who desires to be acquainted with some of the best apologists in their field. This is a must read for serious students of apologetics and should be on the required reading list for any apologetics class. This book will stimulate your mind with a desire to know more about our great God and speaks to the fact that God's truth speaks to all of life. This is an apologetics book in its own right, not from the mind of one man, but from a multitude of capable defenders of the Christian faith.

NOTE: I received this book for free from Zondervan and was under no obligation to provide a favorable review. The views and opinions expressed in this view are my own.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars A strong collection of primary sources October 23, 2012

By Abram Kielsmeier-Jones

Format:Hardcover

Zondervan has just put out a primary source compendium called Christian Apologetics: An Anthology of Primary Sources, edited by Khaldoun A. Sweis and Chad V. Meister.

There are 54 selections divided into 11 parts. Christian Apologetics begins with some methodological considerations in part 1, then moves right into various arguments for the existence of God-cosmological, teleological, ontological, moral, the argument from religious experience, and so on. From there the book narrows to more specific topics like the Trinity, the incarnation, miracles, the resurrection, the problem of evil, and more.

Christian Apologetics claims to be "a sampling of some of the best works written by Christian apologists throughout the centuries," offering "a snapshot of Christian apologetics at its best across the spectrum of time and culture."

The essays in this volume certainly are some of the best in apologetics. There is Paul at the Areopagus in Acts 17, Aquinas on the cosmological argument for God's existence, Anselm and Plantinga with the ontological argument for God, Pascal's wager, Teresa of Avila on experiencing God, Anselm on the incarnation, Swinburne on miracles, John Hick's "Soul Making Theodicy," Augustine on free will, and Marilyn McCord Adams on horrendous evil and the goodness of God. Each of these essays is a classic and makes a valuable contribution to the area of apologetics.

The book spans "the spectrum of time" fairly well, with a higher concentration of 20th century writers. Just a couple of the contributors are women, and the overwhelming majority hail from Western contexts-this latter an admission of the book, but a weakness all the same.

A particularly pleasant surprise to me was the inclusion of an an article by R.T. France, in which he makes the case for the historical reliability of the Gospels, which must, he argues, be understood in their proper literary context as "highly selective" records of Jesus' life with "only a loose chronological framework." This is not due to deficiency of the Gospels; rather, it is how the Gospel writers intended to write:

"The four canonical gospels will not answer all the questions we would like to ask about the founder of Christianity; but, sensitively interpreted, they do give us a rounded portrait of a Jesus who is sufficiently integrated into what we know of first-century Jewish culture to carry historical conviction, but at the same time sufficiently remarkable and distinctive to account for the growth of a new and potentially world-wide religious movement out of his life and teaching."

As I read I appreciated a statement in the book's general introduction:

"But arguments and evidences do not of themselves bring someone into new life in Christ. Here the work of the Holy Spirit is central, and we must be willing to surrender to his leading and his truth and his goodness if we are to truly dwell with the Lord."

I had hoped to hear more in this book about the role of the Holy Spirit in apologetics. There is a short (one paragraph) treatment by James K. Beilby in chapter 3 that asks, "What is the role of the Holy Spirit in apologetics?" He rightly (in my view) sees it as "not a zero-sum game." The apologist should be "significantly involved" yet "still hold that the Holy Spirit will determine the effectiveness of our efforts."

Though the Holy Spirit receives treatment in the section on the Trinity (by Origen, Aquinas, the Creeds, and Thomas V. Morris) and on the Bible (Calvin and canonization), there is never more than Beilby's paragraph treatment about the role of the Holy Spirit in the project of apologetics. Cogent though Beilby is, I would think "a snapshot of Christian apologetics at its best" should make more mention of something like the Wesleyan view of prevenient grace or even the notion that the Holy Spirit witnesses to a person's heart before an apologist does. Only the former can enable the latter. Christian Apologetics is not without the exploration of other methodological considerations; I just would have liked to have seen more of this one.

Several other possible areas for improvement in a future edition could be more on faith and reason and how the two interrelate, as well as arguments for the existence of God that take into account and respond to the varous assertions made by the "new atheism" (anemic though it is).

All in all, though, this is a strong work, and I'm happy for it to sit alongside my old college text, Readings in the Philosophy of Religion. Zondervan's Christian Apologetics is a worthy, if basic, reference guide. I expect it will serve apologists well.

Thanks to Zondervan for the review copy, which I was given for the purposes of review, though without any expectations as to the nature of my review.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Solid, but some substantial omissions March 28, 2013

By Douglas Groothuis VINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover

This extensive work is needful and helpful to the mission of extending the knowledge of the one true God to this fallen world; but it is also seriously lacking in several key areas--an odd combination, it seems. No book is perfect, spare Scripture, but a book that attempts to be a major anthology of the history of Western apologetics should have been more carefully thought out. Of course, there were also tough space limits to consider, but, to my mind, these could have been handled more wisely.

Of course, every anthology, encyclopedia, handbook, and dictionary suffers from the constraints of abridgement. Only God, the Omniscient One, knows all things from every angle and from every context. We mortals, especially east of Eden, labor under the limits of partial knowing, ignorance, trivia, and outright errors. For us, everything is an abridgement of sorts. Abridgement, while necessary, is difficult, and often vexing. Thus, one should be chartable in reviewing such works, but the reviewer cannot help but consider the ideal in this daunting task of synopsis.

The church and the world needs to know that apologetics is not an esoteric discipline for eggheads, but vital to the witness of all Christians. This work makes that known through its anthologized materials, general introduction, and its introduction to the eleven individual sections. The authors include both Roman Catholic and Protestant apologists (but leave out contemporary Easter Orthodox apologists such as Father Seraphim Rose). The Apostle Paul's apologetic in Acts 17 wisely leads off the book. But the apologetics of Jesus himself finds no place. Dallas Willard, James Sire, and J.P. Moreland all make compelling cases that Jesus was a philosopher, thinker, and apologist. John Piper also defends Jesus against the charge of anti-intellectualism in his largely exegetical book, Think (Crossway, 2011). Selections from Matthew 22 would have strengthened the book considerably. Here Jesus engages in three theological-apologetic arguments. Moreover, the Hebrew Bible is not lacking in apologetic material, even at the very beginning of Genesis, which presents a polemic against neighboring pagan cosmologies as Gerhard Hasel and others have noted.

Christian Apologetics is also helpful in that it covers all the main topics in apologetics, including two areas often sadly ignored. The first is interreligious apologetics, which is represented in a fine essay by one of its greatest contemporary proponents and philosophers, Harold Netland. Second is the last section, "Christianity and the World," which addressed the Christian's response to culture as part of apologetic engagement. I was particularly happy to see a section from Francis Schaeffer's prophetic work, A Christian Manifesto (Crossway, 1981) included in the entries. James Beilby writes a competent (if brief) overview of apologetics systems, but neglects to treat the cumulative case method--which commands a pretty broad following today--as an apologetics system in its own right. The book should be praised for providing footnotes (which are far more convenient than endnotes), bibliographies, an extensive index, and questions for further study at the end of each section. Thus, it is strong textbook material. But now to some rather significant errors and omissions.

The introduction nicely explains the nature of apologetics, its importance, and sets up the rest of the book. But I discern an epistemic-theological error that is distressingly pandemic in apologetics books. The claim is made that apologetics (no matter how rationally powerful) can only take the unbeliever "so far." It can remove obstacles and commend the Christian worldview as rational, but it is the Holy Spirit who must bring people to the point of conversion. This view, while common, presents a false dichotomy that is, ironically, based on anti-intellectualism and poor pneumatology. The Holy Spirit, according to Jesus, is "the Spirit of truth" (John 14:16-17, 15:26, 16:13). Jesus himself, filled perfectly with the Holy Spirit, came to "make the Father known" through his deeds, character, and words, including arguments (as mentioned above). Therefore, there is no reason to exclude the Holy Spirit from working in and through good apologetic arguments. The Apostle Paul, while discussing church discipline and errant theology, said this about the nature and power of arguments:

For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ (2 Corinthians 10:3-5).

While Paul does not explicitly mention the Holy Spirit in this passage, his statement makes no sense without the assumption that one must fight these spiritual-intellectual battles in the power of the Holy Spirit, the "Spirit of Truth," in Jesus' words. Therefore, one should not exclude the Holy Spirit from the work of apologetics itself. The Spirit woos souls (through argument and other means) and the Spirit brings people to conversion; it is a both/and, not an either/or. The one who reaches the point of trust in the truth of the gospel need not then take an irrational or even non-rational leap beyond the evidence or arguments.

There is also a documentation problem. It is not obvious in all cases which essays are unique to this work and which are taken from previous publications. One has to infer this. For example, John Warwick Montgomery's fine essay on the history of apologetics is not listed in a footnote as having appeared first anywhere else. Other essays obviously are (such as the work of Aquinas and Anselm), and some essays mention in a footnote that they are taken from or adapted from other work. However, it would have been more professional (and convenient) to state which essays premier in this book. That is the scholarly convention and there was no reason to avoid it, to my knowledge.

While most sections are representatively adequate, at least two sections are lacking. The section on science and Christianity is not sufficiently represented. The simple reason is that no spokesperson for the Intelligent Design movement is included. Intelligent Design proponent Michael Behe's argument for irreducibly complex systems in the cell is a part of the section on the argument for design, but this does not emphasize the conceptual relationship of Christianity and science proper. An essay by William Dembski (one of the most well-credentialed and brilliant Christian philosophers of our day) would have been apropos, given his deep theoretical understanding of design detection, the nature of science, and the importance of high-level apologetics. Of course, he may have been approached to do just that, and had to decline. (I have had to do this myself a few times.) Nevertheless, another stellar philosopher such as Stephen Myers could have written that kind of essay. Or, the editors could have included a piece by the father and long-time leader of the Intelligent Design movement, Phillip Johnson, whose effect on contemporary apologetics is incalculable. But he appears nowhere in the volume. Second, the section on the argument from design, omits the information argument argued magisterially in Dr. Meyer's work, The Signature in the Cell (2009) as well as in the work of Werner Gitt (In the Beginning was Information.) The information argument is perhaps the strongest and most scientifically-credentialed argument from design in the history of Christian apologetics. Yet it receives no treatment at all. This is deeply lamentable.

Another infelicitous omission is the exclusion of Pascal's anthropological argument, which is both historically rooted in the famous Pensées and which has been revived by contemporary thinkers such as Thomas Morris, Kenneth Samples, and Robert Velarde. Of course, Pascal's wager is included (as it always is in these kinds of collections), but it not put in any kind of apologetic context. This is sadly typical of anthologies that present it. Worse yet, it is placed in the section called, "The Existence of God." But it is not such an argument; rather it claims that belief in God is prudentially rational, given the stakes at hand. The editor's introduction to this section calls it a "pragmatic argument for belief," which is not far from the mark, yet the wager does not belong in the section to which it was extradited.

Two chief epistemological arguments are silenced as well: Alvin Plantingas' "evolutionary argument against naturalism" (summarized in Warranted Christian Belief [Oxford, 2000]) and the argument from rational inference, offered most famously by C.S. Lewis in Miracles, and which has been more recently refined and brought up to date by the yeoman work of Victor Reppert in C.S. Lewis's Dangerous Idea (InterVarsity Press, 2002). The anthology does include a conceptual cousin of these arguments called "the transcendental argument" (made famous by Cornelius Van Til) by way of a debate between the brilliant presuppositionalist Greg Bahnsen and the rather clueless, but militant atheist, Gordon Stein. This is instructive, but it is not apologetic engagement at the highest level. If the editors wanted to present an apologetic debate, they should have chosen a transcript from one of William Lane Craig's many debates with atheists.

Since this book purports to "an anthology of primary sources" that covers the history of apologetics (and without a methodological agenda), it is exceedingly strange that four of the most significant apologists of the twentieth century are missing: Cornelius Van Til, Gordon H. Clark, Carl F. H. Henry, and Edward John Carnell. Read more ›