Customer Reviews

The God of Hope and the End of the World

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I had to use my dictionary many times, and found myself rereading whole sections over, sometimes more than once. But I found the scope of Polkinghorne's book wonderful and challenging, from the physics of the Big Bang and the eschatological challenge of infinite expansion (vs. the Big Crunch) to pastoral implications for Anglican priests. This book is a condensation of a series of academic papers, certainly more dense and obscure, but it does a remarkable job of stretching our minds and perspective while still being inspriational. One of the most meaningful books of my spritual journey.

Polkinghorne's book is a summary for the general reader of the discussions on eschatology by several scientists and theologians found in the earlier work, The End of the World and the Ends of God. However, as Polkinghorne alone wrote the latter work, it bears his mark as a well-known former scientist and current Anglican priest and writer on religious topics for the general public. The ideas he expresses would not be well-received either by doctrinaire fundamentalists, or by committed atheists. However, for the reader with an open mind, it presents a thought-provoking inquiry and meditation on the questions dealing with, to put it concisely, the meaning of it all. Does existence have a point, and if so, what is it?
Of course, as mentioned before, the author in an Anglican priest, so he writes from the Christian perspective. But there is no hint of dogmatism in what he has to say; and no apologies or lack of conviction either. Whether one agrees or disagrees with his ideas, they are stimulating. For example, in contast to most earlier theologians who speculated that any future existence must be beyond time, and thus an eternal Now, Polkinghorne points out that human beings are creatures of space and time, that cherished art-forms such as music require time, and proposes that any redeemed universe would contain some type of both space and time. Although he does not, of course, claim to know what a redeemed time would be like, he envisions the new creation as having its own history. Though it would be a history of fulfilment rather than becoming. And it would be based on the template set by the old universe, tho the new would have God as the direct underlying basis of it, rather than the laws of physics as now, based as they are on death and decay, as well as on life and creation.
To the sceptics who bemoan the seemingly inevitable boredom of an eternal existence, Polkinghorne agrees that from our current perspective, even the most fanatical golf enthusiast might begin to tire of it after his millionth game. But the new creation he looks for would be one in which everyone could explore the endless beauties, interests, and possibilities of God's truly infinite, endless nature. In such a state, there would be a tension between continuity and discontinuity: for both the universe as a whole and the resurrected beings within it,the new life would have to be substantially different from the old. At the same time, the redeemed would truly have to be continuations of what they were in this existence, not just copies. Only in this way can redemption really be redemption. All in all, this is a book that should be read by anyone curious about a modern Christian perspective on eschatological questions.

The thesis of this book is that Christian belief provides the essential resource for answering the fundamental question of whether we live in a world that makes sense not just now, but totally and forever. Quoting author John Polkinghorne, "What I am seeking to do is to present the motivations for Christian eschatological hope, and to show that this hope is intelligible and defensible in the twenty-first century."

Polkinghorne then goes on to support his thesis. Although it draws its inspiration from an earlier collection of essays by a number of authors, this book stands on its own quite nicely.

For Polkinghorne, a foundation of the discussion "is the necessity of an interplay between continuity and discontinuity in speaking of God's purposes beyond the end of history." (p. xxiii) "There must be sufficient continuity to ensure that individuals truly share in the life to come as their resurrected selves and not as new beings simply given the old names. There must be sufficient discontinuity to ensure that the life to come is free from the suffering and mortality of the old creation." (p. 149)

"The equally necessary continuity between the old and new creations lies in the fact that the latter is the redeemed transform of the former. The pattern for this is the resurrection of Christ where . . . the Lord's risen body is the eschatological transform of his dead body. This implies that the new creation does not arise from a radically novel creative act ex nihilo, but as a redemptive act ex vetere, out of the old. God's total creative intent is seen to be intrinsically a two-step process: first the old creation, allowed to explore and realize its potentiality at some metaphysical distance from its Creator; then the redeemed new creation which, through the Cosmic Christ, is brought into a freely embraced and intimate relationship with the life of God." (p. 116)

"Therefore, we must expect that there will be a destiny for the whole universe beyond its death, just as there will be a post mortem destiny for humankind. We have seen that two remarkable New Testament passages (Romans 8:18-25; Colossians 1:15-20) do indeed speak of cosmic redemption." (p. 113)

Along the way, Polkinghorne offers his scientist-theologian thoughts on an intermediate state between death and resurrection, universalism, and annihilationism.

The book has footnotes instead of endnotes (as should be the case for all books) and a three-page Index.

I recommend it for any Christian interested in how to think about the end of the world from a scientist-theologian's point of view.

For such a simple book, this is one of the more profound books I have read in recent years (I have an MA in Theology) in any realm of Christian Theology and particularly in the area of Eschatology.

The author is an intellectual thinker and speaks that language well. It's no surprise then that his audience will be other intellectuals. While the author talks over my head, there are many who can appreciate his writing. Afterall, it's not a sin to have an extensive vocabulary or high I.Q.!!! Only God can speak the language of 'all' people.

An author is supposed to communicate with the reading audience. This book greatly misses the mark, unless of course you are a top intellectual professor. And even then you might have difficulty. The author's sentence structure is needlessly complex, and his vocabulary is filled with obscure words, rarely used in normal communication. The words are not there for any purpose other than to impress the reader with the author's intellect. I had to reread passages of the book numerous times in an attempt to comprehend what he was saying. I have two college graduate degrees, so I am no dummy. This book made my head hurt and I eventually stopped reading it.

This book is NOT written for the general reader. The language is too complex for the average reader. Also, you must have a dictionary at hand, unless you are familiar with words like "ineluctably, noetic, reified, solipsistic, etiolated, hihilistic, irrupt, meretricious, soteriology, parousia" etc.

Polkinghorne states on page 128 that "it is surely also true, in the mercy of God, that those who, through circumstances beyond their control, have never truly heard the gospel of Christ, or never had a real opportunity to respond to its call in this life, will not be denied that opportunity in the clearer light of the divine presence in the world of the new creation." This contradicts Romans 1:18-20 which state (NIV) "The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities - his eternal power and divine nature - have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that MEN ARE WITHOUT EXCUSE."