The Courage to be [Hardcover]

Paul Tillich (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover: 197 pages
• Publisher: Yale University Press (1952)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0300009909
• ISBN-13: 978-0300009903
• Product Dimensions: 5.4 x 1 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (32 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,355,199 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

123 of 128 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Rich with good ideas, November 5, 2002

By 

Kenneth E. Wagner Jr. (Highland Springs, VA United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Courage to Be (Paperback)

This book has more good ideas in it than clam chowder has calories. It's packed into every page, every line. Tillich is concerned with how the question of finding the courage to face up to existential doubts about death, meaninglessness, and guilt are tied to the ontological questions of being versus nonbeing. How can we affirm our existence when it seems so temporary, meaningless and full of moral failure? Tillich explores with incredible freshness and insight age old strategies, from Spinoza to the Stoics (his discussion of the Stoics alone is worth the price of the book). He gives a brilliant account of how people find the courage to overcome existential anxiety through particpation in groups and through individual strategies like existentialism. Finally, he explores the theological implications in a way that may challenge anyone who has stereotyped Tillich as a mouthpiece for Christianity. The book is excellently written, never dumbed down but always graspable. He also litters the book with brilliant asides on subjects like the history of existential angst and its relations to social relations and a great exploration of existential art. Don't pass this one up.

65 of 72 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Courage to Despair, November 20, 2001

By 

Gary Sprandel (Frankfort, Kentucky) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Courage to Be (Paperback)

Tillich's ultimate concern is what determines our being or non-being. The "shock of nonbeing" and the ensuing anxiety allows Tillich to categorize three types of anxiety (fate and death, emptiness, and guilt). I thought his history of anxiety, starting with the Stoics ("the only real alternative to Christianity in the Western world") was remarkable (though at times a rough read). Influenced by Heidegger and Kierkegaard("to confront his existence alone") he drives on to the inevitable search for God. For Tillich, the "Courage to Be" is partly the courage to despair, and avoid the "Neurosis is a away of avoiding non-being by avoiding being". He is also influenced by Freud and psychoanalysis (called "depth psychology" in the book), which in our day of Prozac and behavioral psychology is refreshing.

The nature of the discussions, being, nonbeing, subjectivity, objectivity make for difficult reading with double negatives (eg. "Nonbeing is no threat because finite being is, in the last analysis, nonbeing"). If one can wade through the language, there a lot of insight.

59 of 67 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Mandatory reading for deeper spiritual and personal growth., November 24, 1998

By 

Erich E. Geary (Texarkana, Texas United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Courage to Be (The Terry Lectures Series) (Paperback)

I first read this book in high school, then in seminary, in graduate psychology classes, and several times since then. Each time I read it I gain insight and growth. Tillich will challenge your intellect and force you to think. He defines courage in a way that will change you if you take it to heart. This is a book that you will need to read several times to apperciate it's depth, but it is well worth it. I often feel I obtain a higher leval of consciousness and often I feel in an altered state after reading and pondering Tillich's writting. Tillich outlines fundemental concepts for existentialist and modern theology. Starting with Tillich's books of sermon is a good work up to this book.