Review by Choice Review
Noll, a prolific historian from Wheaton College (IL), writes: "The scandal of the evangelical mind is that there is not much of an evangelical mind." This book traces that scandal from a time when evangelicals were still intellectually active (with special attention to Jonathan Edwards) through the "filter of fundamentalism" (which gutted the evangelical mind) to Noll's cautious assessment of the present potential for intellectual renewal within the movement. The tone of the book is passionate. Noll writes: "This is an epistle from a wounded lover ... a cri de coeur on behalf of the intellectual life by one who, for very personal reasons, still embraces the Christian faith in an evangelical form." Noll acknowledges evangelicalism's long anti-intellectual history and accuses the Holiness/pentacostal movements and dispensationalism of almost totally undercutting evangelical intellectual activity earlier in this century. Despite this "disaster," evangelicals have made modest intellectual gains in the realms of politics, science, and--more recently--philosophy. Noll is hopeful but not optimistic about the future. He outlines a "remnant strategy" for evangelical intellectuals--a challenge to keep the flame alive despite the strong possibility of being ignored or denounced by other evangelicals. Undergraduate; graduate; faculty; general. D. Jacobsen; Messiah College
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Booklist Review
American Christian evangelicalism has neglected and disdained the life of the mind, Noll says, and that is scandalous. That anti-intellectualism is not inherent in evangelicalism Noll demonstrates by presenting evangelical intellectual history, primarily in the U.S., with scholarly thoroughness and journalistic accessibility. He argues that anti-intellectualism was a by-product of the fundamentalist ideas American evangelicals seized upon because they were so useful in effecting conversions. He considers the influ~ences the fundamentalist doctrines of holiness, pentecostalism, and especially dispensationalism had upon evangelical political and scientific thought in particular; in neither case does he find much to praise, although he sees dispensationalist-inspired creation science as more damaging to science than any fundamentalist idea has been to politics. He concludes by outlining recent signs of evangelical intellectual revival in philosophy as well as politics and science and by locating the potential for the renaissance of the evangelical intellect in the doctrines of the Incarnation and the Atonement. Noll well exemplifies what he prays evangelicals generally will learn to value again: thinking like a Christian. ~--Ray Olson
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Claiming that ``the scandal of the evangelical mind is that there is not much of an evangelical mind,'' historian Noll sets out to trace the reasons for what he sees as the great divorce between intellect and piety in North American Evangelical Christianity. In a breathtaking panorama of evangelical history from the Great Awakenings to the present, Noll shows that early Evangelicals like Jonathan Edwards embraced the use of reason as an expression of faith in the Creator of the natural world. The advent of Fundamentalism and Pentecostalism, Noll contends, with their emphases on dispensationalism and other-worldliness, fostered anti-intellectualism. Since politics and science, in the form of the religious right and creationism, have been the secular arenas in which the Evangelical mind has most publicly expressed itself, Noll focuses on them to explore ways in which the mindlessness ``scandal'' has created a lack of adequate Christian thinking about the world. Finally, Noll is hopeful that the work of contemporary Evangelical scholars will recover a respect for intellect. Required reading for those seeking to understand the often peculiar relationship between Evangelical religion and secular culture, this is a brilliant study by--yes--a first-rate Evangelical mind. (July) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by School Library Journal Review
Noll (history, Wheaton Coll. A History of Christianity in the United States and Canada, LJ 11/1/92) castigates his fellow American conservative evangelicals for losing their intellectual credibility since Darwin. They have followed St. Paul's injunction to be ``fools for Christ'' to the point of being simply fools, instead of heeding Jesus' call to be ``wise as serpents.'' Their scholarly pursuits include such dead-end propositions as ``creation science,'' end-time apocalyptic prophecies, and biblical inerrancy instead of research and writings contributing positively to American intellectual life. What distresses Noll most is that evangelicals seem not to care. He provides extensive historical background showing how this was not always the case and indicates how Christian scholars might recapture lost ground. Passionately and brilliantly argued, this book is recommended for informed lay readers and specialists.-Richard S. Watts, San Bernardino Cty. Lib., Cal. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
