The Fall of the Prison: Biblical Perspectives on Prison Abolition [Paperback]

Lee Griffith (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 11, 1999

Examining prisons from the perspectives of sociology, theology, history, and biblical exegesis, Griffith argues that the church has taken a woefully wrong turn by aligning itself with the traditional justice system. He shows how prisons are clearly ineffective at deterring crime and rehabilitating offenders and maintains that Christians should be even more concerned with how the prison fails in principle than how it fails in practice.

--This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 268 pages
• Publisher: Wipf & Stock Publishers (January 11, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1579102085
• ISBN-13: 978-1579102081
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.2 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.7 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,872,277 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good News: The Fall of the Prison, December 21, 1999

By 

Charles Chaplain (Lexington, Kentucky) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Fall of the Prison: Biblical Perspectives on Prison Abolition (Paperback)

This book caused this reader to examine his own convictions about pastoral work with "convicts" and understand the historical relationship of the "Christian" church and prisons. Griffith reveals repeated institutional failures to reform criminals by punitive and rehabilitative means throughout history.

Griffith challenges the reader to walk the more excellent way of love that leads to the fall of the prison. He calls the reader back to the early history of the Church when disciples followed Christ into prisons in Christian solidarity with the prisoners - a less traveled narrow way of peace that leads the wolves of the world to dwell with the lambs of God.

As a conclusion to his book Griffith brings the reader to a fork in the correctional road: does the reader choose to enter through the wide prison gate to follow the easy way of crime and punishment or does the reader choose to go through the narrow heavenly gate to follow the hard way of loving one's enemies?

This book begs an answer to the prison's questionable past, present, and future. Read the book and answer the call to Christian discipleship. The walls are tumbling down!