The God That Did Not Fail: How Religion Built and Sustains the West [Hardcover]

Robert Royal (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 18, 2006

Secular humanists and other progressives have been predicting the demise of religion for the past 250 years. But they keep running into a problem--those who were supposed to be liberated by secular gospel that God is Dead aren't buying it. Why not? Since the Greeks and Romans, as Robert Royal explains, religion has nurtured the development of the individual and of Western culture itself. Christianity and Judaism collaborated to create a dialogue between faith and reason that determined the history of the Middle Ages, the Renaissance and Reformation, and several Enlightenments, including our current postmodern moment. Royal concludes that modern democratic societies are intimately tied to a Christian view of the dignity of the human person and the health and survival of free institutions.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Robert Royal is president of the Faith & Reason Institute in Washington, D.C. Among his books are 1492 and All That: Political Manipulations of History and The Virgin and the Dynamo: The Use and Abuse of Religion in Environmental Debates.

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 280 pages
• Publisher: Encounter Books; First Edition edition (July 18, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1594031452
• ISBN-13: 978-1594031458
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,002,800 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

44 of 46 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Nothing Quite Like It, November 18, 2006

By 

History Lover (Florida) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The God That Did Not Fail: How Religion Built and Sustains the West (Hardcover)

I have to respectfully disagree with the previous reviewer's comments about this book being a tedious read. Since the reviewer feels the need to stipulate that he has an advanced degree, I will preface my review by stating that I too have an advanced degree--and I think this book is a real tour de force!

TGTDNF lays out the whole panorama of the role of religion in the West clearly, calmly, and forcefully, and without resorting to the usual, sterile polemics. Robert Royal uses the latest secular scholarship to correct mis-impressions about our religious history that have become widespread because of the prejudices students are taught in schools and colleges.

Starting from chapters on ancient Greece and Rome, which offer a particularly fresh re-reading of the classics and their true relationship to the modern West, he carries the story down the centuries to the present day and shows how religious questions have become prominent again precisely because they can never be eliminated from any truly human society. At times, the narrative reminds you of the sweep of someone like the British historian Paul Johnson. But there's nothing quite like it out there in my opinion.

47 of 50 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars What created the west? Royal argues it was Christianity, February 16, 2007

By 

Jeri Nevermind "loves to read" (Idaho) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: The God That Did Not Fail: How Religion Built and Sustains the West (Hardcover)

What an interesting book. Royal sets out to prove that the secularists who argue that religion needs to be erradicated from civilization have it all wrong. He insists that Christianity created the western mind, with its unique blend of individualism, science, and democracy. Those who are secularists today are "currently engaged in a deeply incoherent and, in multiple ways, dangerous experiment" (xiii).

First off, and against much tradition, Royal states that the west did not begin in Greece. The Greeks and Romans, just as all eastern civilizations, believed in anakuklosis, that life followed cycles. In China and India this belief crippled scientific questions and even prevented democracy from forming.

The religions and philosophies that grew up in pagan and eastern societies were deeply pessimistic. "Epicurus understood that many of the vices we see--lust, greed, ambition, snobbery, violence--are ultimately the product of the fear of death...in these dimensions Epicurus somewhat resembles the Buddha. Neither believed in a God or gods who are of much help to the human race" ( p 42). Life was pointless. Death inevitable.

Against these truths, paganism was a pale set of rituals created to appease gods who cared little about human beings.

And then came Abraham. He was a nomad, a person of little note in the world. But this obscure man claims to speak to God, and God "starts him on a fateful journey that has still not come to an end in its effects...'I have made you the ancestor of a multitude of nations. I will make you exceedingly fruitful; and I will make nations of you....I will establish my covenant...'" (p 53). And, surprise, some 4,000 years after Abraham about 55% of the world's population claim to believe in Abraham and his God.

Abraham's God is a God of love, unlike Zeus. With the advent of Christianity, society would be changed forever. Most important was the belief that every person had an immortal soul. Christians argued against abortion and infant exposure. They forbade believers to watch the games or the theaters, where human beings were frequently put to death. Christian beliefs would lead ineluctably to the conclusion that Caesar was no god; and a slave was his equal in the eyes of the true God. Christians were famous for facing death calmly when standing in the arena. Unlike the spectators, they knew that death was not an end, but a beginning.

Ancient society, except for the Jews, had no idea of charity. But soon after the advent of Christianity, "Galen was puzzled by the power of Christianity to create virtuous behavior among the uneducated" (p 86). Galen, the famous physician, fled the city as soon as the plague started. He was never criticized for it. Christians, to the amazement of the pagans, risked their own lives to help others.

By 380 AD Christianity was the majority religion. After the fall of the Roman empire, monasteries kept Latin and learning alive. Theology would also prove to be a huge benefit for Christians. If there was an ultimate truth, and God was rational, then it was incumbent upon man to figure out what was right. Very different from the mindset in the east, where only compromise, not ultimate truth, is sought.

The founder of the Sorbonne university said, "'Nothing is known perfectly which has not been masticated by the teeth of disputation'" (p 132). This was the core of medieval thought. The great universities grew, science developed, and the Renaissance blossomed.

Much recommended.

18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Offers strengthening conclusion to attest to religion's importance past, present and future., October 14, 2006

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The God That Did Not Fail: How Religion Built and Sustains the West (Hardcover)

Secular progressives have been predicting the demise of religion for over two hundred years; but even those who were to be liberated by such aren't agreeing: such is the message of THE GOD THAT DID NOT FAIL: HOW RELIGION BUILT AND SUSTAINS THE WEST explores both biblical faith and the rejection of its foundations, which has encouraged ignorance of its history as a central force in the development of the West. Readings of religion in ancient Greece and Rome, of Christianity and Judaism and through the decades offers strengthening conclusion to attest to religion's importance past, present and future.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch