David Bentley HartAnmeldelser

Though I am not a practising Christian, I remain fascinated by religions and how they came to be. In particular, I'm very interested in the history of that diverse collection of documents we call the Bible: how those documents were selected, who wrote them, when they were written, how it was decided to include or exclude them, and what those varied authors had to say.

This new translation of the New Testament by David Bentley Hart is truly interesting, because he has attempted what he calls a 'pitilessly literal' translation from the original Greek (you know that all of the New Testament was originally written in Greek, don't you?). In doing this, he says that he has attempted to provide as thin a layer of translation as possible between the modern reader and the original authors of these documents. He carefully documents his treatment of certain words and phrases and explains why he has chosen to translate them in a particular way.

Lest I give you the wrong impression, Hart is a committed Christian, who believes the writings of the Bible were divinely inspired, but that this "must involve an acknowledgement that God speaks through human beings, in all their historical, cultural and personal contingency."

In many cases, though, Hart's literal translation, insisting on focusing on what the actual words of the original Greek say, rather than on what the layers of theological teachings over the centuries demand that it *should* say, demonstrates that much of the latter interpretation is misplaced. For example, there is nothing in the original Greek which supports the concept of original sin, or that of eternal torment in Hell for sinners. Nor was the Apostle Paul the stiff mysogynist some have made him out to be (indeed my respect for Paul has been increased greatly by reading Hart's translation of Paul's letters—you actually begin to get a sense of him as an actual person). There's one passage in one of Paul's letters, a couple of paragraphs condemning women, which Hart demonstrates convincingly is a later, clumsy insertion into Paul's writing, interrupting a logical argument he is setting out about an entirely different issue.

Certainly those Christians who insist that every word of the New Testament is the literal voice of God, but then want to lean on unlikely readings of the text to make it agree with a particular theological stance they hold, will not like Hart's translation. I, though, found it extremely interesting and refreshing.

Hart's foreword, his footnotes about his translation decisions, and his long 'Concluding Scientific Postcript' are worth the price of the book alone.

A. Slog. I’m not crazy about an author who is so confident he insults scholars who he disagrees with. Still. His prose is gorgeous and I have many quotes I will return to in contemplation.

An amazing look at the problem of evil within the wider Christian context and the only one I’ve found somewhat satisfying. I liked its focus on Southeast Asia as well as its response to Catholic and Calvinist hyperbole.

Hart's focus on world Christianity makes this casual history read both valuable and very interesting. I loved reading it.

The second edition of David Bentley Hart’s critically acclaimed New Testament translation. David Bentley Hart’s translation of the New Testament, first published in 2017, was hailed as a “remarkable feat” and as a “strange, disconcerting, radical version of a strange, disconcerting manifesto of profoundly radical values.” In this second edition, which includes a powerful new preface and more than a thousand changes to the text, Hart’s purpose remains the same: to render the original Greek texts faithfully, free of doctrine and theology, awakening readers to the uncanniness that often lies hidden beneath doctrinal layers.

Through his startling translation, with its raw, unfinished quality, Hart reveals a world conceptually quite unlike our own. “It was a world,” he writes, “in which the heavens above were occupied by celestial spiritual potentates of questionable character, in which angels ruled the nations of the earth as local gods, in which demons prowled the empty places, . . . and in which the entire cosmos was for many an eternal divine order and for many others a darkened prison house.” He challenges readers to imagine it anew: a God who reigned on high, appearing in the form of a slave and dying as a criminal, only then to be raised up and revealed as the Lord of all things."


“In [David Bentley Hart’s] hands, the words of Jesus and his followers produce not shivers of mere approximation, but rather shivers of awe at the clarity, poignancy, and simplicity of this complex treatise. . . . We are delivered a text pulsing with contemporary urgency.Jen" (nifer Kurdyla, America)

Restorationists are often accused, and often rightly so, of not knowing a whole lot about the Christian tradition in general. Yet such is true of most Christians, and really, society at large.

There are lot of expansive histories of Christianity which are good and profitable yet would probably be too long and arcane for the purposes of a general audience.

In The Story of Christianity: A History of 2,000 Years of the Christian Faith, David Bentley Hart (DBH), a notable theologian, has done well at describing the story of Christendom over the past 2,000 years with clear prose and short chapters.

Yes, I said “Christendom,” not “Christianity.” While certain doctrinal arguments are described, much of the book is about the behaviors of European kings and societies which were nominally “Christian.” DBH has done well to broaden the scope to include the churches of the East, India, and Africa, but by necessity much of the work is about the events and developments of Europe in the medieval and modern eras. DBH is Eastern Orthodox and so the “institutional” and Christendom emphases are not terribly surprising; if you’re expecting a lot of detail about the rise and nature of Evangelicalism, you’ll be disappointed, but a lot more will be brought out regarding the Catholic and Orthodox heritage.

As an overall introduction this works well to explain the influence of Christendom over the past two thousand years. In the end, it is the story of “big men” and the “big ideas,” and not about daily life and practice throughout time. I suppose the latter is yet to be written or might be found elsewhere.

Though there were many points in this book where I had to grit my teeth, this is actually a worthwhile book. I was surprised, to be honest. Hart does wander off the rails a few times, and opens the book with e.g. a kind of "some of my best friends are atheists" comment ("hey, some of my best friends are black/gay/liberal/conservative, but..."), but I found this an easy price to pay to read a very clear, cogent, concise, argument for Christianities fundamental importance in the development of the West as we know it. In face, he makes a very strong case for the argument that without Christianity there would be no liberal, 'advanced', individualistic West at all. In other words, the "New Atheists" have it all wrong, religion -by which Hart means Christianity, and he acknowledges this- isn't anything like "poison."

While I could quibble here or there with his logic, and he does seem to apply a double standard in places, this is worth the read (to repeat myself.) His last chapter, especially, left me thinking hard, especially as it touches on topics I have been thinking and reading about for several years now. E.g. Having developed, or inherited anyway, a society with respect for (and the very concept of, Hart points out!) human rights and individual value, can we "kick the ladder away" and keep the values without keeping the religion?

Hart himself is obviously a "believer", but he most sidesteps -whether you like it or not- issues such as whether the truth of God/Christ/etc. matters... mostly, I think, because he really does believe and so that is not really something he is going to discuss. But there are points where he does seem to brush up against a Pascal-ian, utilitarian argument for believing...

How can Christians affirm anything regarding the nature of the witness of Christian tradition in light of the modernist assault on such a perspective?

DBH, in DBH style, does not really have an answer. But he certainly knows how to critique the attempted answers of others.

DBH begins by assessing Newman and Blondel's apologiae for Christian tradition. He concludes Newman ends up in a tautology which Blondel may have been able to escape but ultimately did not.

DBH then attempts to reframe the conversation about tradition to see it in a more apocalyptic way, as a living thing which has a telos but which is not yet revealed. He's willing to play "devil's advocate" about matters such as, say, Arius and his perspective, to be willing to make the argument how Arius was very much within a set of traditions about the understanding of the nature of God, and was far more "conservative" than one might have imagined, and in many respects the Niceno-Constantinopolitan conclusion was less so. That dispute and its conclusion, therefore, were not entirely foreordained, and who knows what later generations might think of them.

The author is Eastern Orthodox but is quite sanguine about the challenges and limitations regarding the appeal to tradition. He would have very little patience for my posture as a Restorationist, but I think he understands the impulse. The problem he would see is how restoration cannot ever be fully accomplished and would even question if that really should be or could be the goal, for how ideal was the beginning?

Such is the inherent tension and challenge when it comes to the Christian tradition. It is completely incoherent and internally self-contradicting. But it cannot, and should not, be entirely jettisoned. An apocalyptic perspective on the living nature of tradition and humility about how dogmatic we should be regarding our perspectives on such things are appreciated.

If one can tolerate the style of DBH, worthy of consideration.

**--galley received as part of early review program

Here is a book I will need to reread a few times to take in what I've missed or misunderstood the first time around. At barely 100 pages, I looked up more words than I have with any other book. The lexicon at work here is so perfectly specific, but it bogs down what is already a difficult topic - not just in logic but in fundamental beliefs.

I found many profound and succinct ways of articulating what I believe in this book, while also stumbling through some hand-wavery to explain the crux of the issue - why on God's green earth is evil present.
I submit wholeheartedly to the idea that God is all loving and good and evil cannot come from him or be part of his "plan". To believe in a god like that would be shrugging off accountability, essentially leaving one complicit in the evil. A very Nuremberg defense of bad theology.
I just find myself wanting more explanation of why creation fell in the first place, allowing the mysterious hand of evil to bind us to death. Free and rational beings apparently call for it, but I lost the plot with that explanation. We might be free of a controlling will, but we are certainly not individually free of creation's falling.
I think this is leading me to a more communal understanding of the Church and the body of faith, and away from the personal/individual religion I grew up with. The deconstruction continues.

Astonishingly, given the somewhat deceptive (or perhaps inept) marketing of the book, this was Hart's best book to date, which is saying something monumental. What neither the title, nor the jacket cover, nor even the blurb reviews reveal is that the book is primarily a relentless attack on the superstitions and credulous fideisms of materialism. Over and against this decrepit and impoverished philosophy of reality, and in response to its inept attempts to demystify the world, Hart turns to the common theistic metaphysical deposit of tradition for the soothing and compelling antidote.

In the mystery of being, in the mystery of consciousness, and in the manner that they blissfully coinhere as a surfeit of physical reality, the Supernatural, the Absolute, the Good, Beauty, God is immediately present to us in every moment. Yet we dull and numb ourselves to this in innumerable ways, but especially through the barbarisms of the 'mechanical philosophy' that we have inherited from the 'Enlightenment'.

As for the attempts of naturalism to sweep away such an obvious reality, Hart is insistent all such attempts are pitifully incoherent and suffer massive -- probably insuperable -- explanatory deficiencies. While the traditional metaphysical arguments for God, arguing from contingency, for example, are comparatively sublime with scarcely any of the objections lodged against them being worth serious consideration.

Stay tuned for a more complete review, but I can't recommend this highly enough.

Translation is a challenging exercise, especially translating a work, like the New Testament, which has uncommon vocabulary and stylistic conventions. Translators need to make choices that balance many different concerns: comprehensibility to modern readers, fidelity to the voices of the original authors, overall stylistic constraints, translation choice of tricky words, phrases, and passages, etc.

An additional challenge comes when translating a well analyzed text like the New Testament. Translation choices that may have originally been fairly neutral have gained layers of doctrinal meaning that were not always there in the original text. A similar but not quite identical influence on the translated text is that translators may choose to resolve ambiguity by choosing the option that is most consistent with the doctrinal position they hold. In neither of these cases is the translator intentionally biasing the text. However, the overall effect is that the modern reader comes away with an impression that is notably different than those with the language and context of the original hearers and readers of the text.

No translation can ever reproduce what a New Testament text would mean to the original audience. However, in this translation Hart aims to recapture some of the ambiguity of the original text as well as letting the varying voices of the authors show more clearly. To achieve this, he aimed for a literal translation that does not apply stylistic conventions or attempt to modernize sentence structure or text for easier understanding. When translating difficult terms and phrases, he attempts, as much as possible, to try to capture the meaning (or lack of highly specific meaning) that it would have had for the original reader.

I cannot speak to the linguistic quality of this as a translation since I have no knowledge of ancient languages. However, I can say that the translation meets its overall goal of demonstrating how many of the ideas that seem incontrovertible in common translations have much more nuance or ambiguity when different translation choices are made. Does that mean those translations are wrong and this one is right? Not really (Although it's hard to say this one is or isn't right since it mainly makes interpretation more fuzzy rather than pointing to a different interpretation.) Rather, it points to how important it is to understand how complex the problem of translation is (especially for those who choose to make significant life choices based on a text).

Overall, if you are interested in using multiple translations to try to triangulate the meanings in the New Testament texts, I recommend adding this to your list of tools.

David Bentley Hart is a religious scholar and Eastern Orthodox Church theologian who has published a number of essays on both religious and secular subjects.

This collection of essays, drawn from live addresses delivered in various settings, is divided into five sections. He focuses on how theology intersects with other fields, including science, culture, literature, and philosophy. Most of the essays take the form of critiques of other influential works.

One of the most interesting essays takes on the problem of evil. Did God create evil or just allow it?

Hart’s writing style can be pretentious and tendentious, and he seems loathe to express himself tersely when a plethora of words could serve his cause, thus, unfortunately, obfuscating his points. He also is wont to pontificate on just about every aspect of Protestant and Hindu religions, whether or not he has a good knowledge or understanding of them.

Nevertheless, the book serves up plenty of food for thought, and makes an excellent choice for book clubs amenable to discussing deep, complicated works.

(JAB)

Brilliant and challenging. I can't claim to have fully understood every arguement he makes here -- that's going to require a lot more thought and another reading -- but I find what I do get extremely compelling.

My one criticism of this work is that perhaps it is too densely packed. In fact, it may take multiple readings to understand, yet I believe it is worth the effort.

A fairly interesting discussion about Christian history accompanied by an unconvincing and rather incomplete rebuttal of «New Atheism». He snarks well, I suppose, though that undermines a lot of his criticism.

It must be nice to be so well known and such a good writer that you just can piss on everyone and they'll cheer you on. This is a fabulous piece of clear thinking about the worst aspects of the Christian tradition. In short, if you want to say:

i) God created everything, He is our Father;
ii) God is love; and
iii) God will send most people to hell for eternal punishment

you should probably take a good long hard look at the definitions of 'father' and 'created' and 'love' and 'eternal' and 'people' and 'punishment.' Because there is no way you can use those words, in the normal ways, and hold all three of those things to be true.

Hart would be a better atheist than the New Atheists, because he actually knows what he's talking about, and can use things like 'logic'. When confronted with three statements that can't all be consistent, you only have to choose one to drop. He chooses to drop by far the least plausible of them, (iii), (the New Atheists would of course drop all three) and to accept the plain and clear sense of most new testament passages about damnation, which is that if there is a hell, it will be purgatorial and not eternal. At one point, he just quotes the bible for seven pages to make that point. It's all very enjoyable and convincing. If Christianity is to mean anything, it must mean that all will be saved, together. Hart doesn't spell it out too much, but that clearly means that the whole mythology of individuals dying and 'going to' heaven can get thrown out. Despite their disagreements on bible translation, Hart's work here seems to fit very nicely with Wright's attempt to convince people that just maybe the bible means what it says.

Holy hell is this well written.

I was excited about this book, but I was a bit disappointed by the argumentative / fight approach of the writing style. I understand this is typical in Philosophy writing, but I don't care much for arguing. After all, Heaven doesn't really argue or fight with Hell (those are Hell's methods ;). I was hoping/expecting this book to be more from the heart, speaking to those that believe in or open to the belief that Heaven is our home, everyone's home. Whether you take the short path home, or the long one, with a detour to Hell, that's where we're all going. Though I did laugh at his cleverly calling people that believe in the eternal aspect of hell "infernalists." I should have expected a Philosophical argument, as it's published by Oxford, and such an academic press. Still, I think there is still a hole left to be filled with a book on this topic, but not from an argumentative / fighting stance, and more from the heart.

Trust me, this is not my inability to keep up with advanced topics in philosophy and theology, or finding this book to be too intellectually challenging. I have read many many dense, cerebral texts on philosophy and theology. This is the pacifist in me not caring for such fighting words. I was not expecting Chicken Noodle Soup for the Universalist's Soul.

These truths should lift the heart and fill it with joy. It did not. It brought me down with its sheer brutalism. A beautiful truth expressed with such mean-spiritedness attempts to mar the very beautiful truth expressed.

Rather than fight with the "infernalists," I'm craving a book that speaks to the heart of *why* Hell is not permanent. That God craves our unification with Him, that there's only One in the entire universe, and in the end Hell will be abolished/sublimated/transmuted. What does this idea say about our inherent worth, our inherent and unbreakable divinity? And what does the counter viewpoint (the infernalist one) demean about our inherent worth? What does the counter viewpoint mis-communciate about God and God's nature, and our relationship?

I don't really need to be convinced, and I'm not keen on arguing. I already believe in the only temporary nature of hell, and our collective destination is ultimately Heaven. I want to read insight into that belief, it's power, and it's, nuances, its implications, and feed my heart with that.

I've heard that The Inescapable Love of God by Thomas Talbott to be much more in that desired vein.

Readable survey with excellent illustrations.

A powerful defence of Christianity and its contribution to civilisation in the face of aggressive atheism which denigrates the religious life in principle.

Orthodox theologian and philosopher David Bentley Hart describes the rational for theistic belief. This a romp through metaphysics and ontology, the philosophy and science of consciousness and the human pursuit of happiness (bliss). While this isn't purely 'apologetic' work, it is written against the dominant narrative of scientific materialism (or 'physicalism'). Bentley also eschews the reductionist tendencies of some in the inteligent design camp. This is written broadly theistic, so to include other faith traditions, and Hart borrows terms and ideas from Hinduism, Buddhism and Islam.

Hart argues well and I think he disposes some of the shallow arguments from the so-called New Athiests as overly simplistic. He also demonstrates there is good thinking done by theists, and there are resources at our disposal. However, there does seem to be a bit of an uppity tone to the book. Hart is used to being the smartest guy in the room, so perhaps it can't be helped, but I understand why some may be put off by it.

The depth and erudition to be found in Hart's essays on Christianity and modern culture revitalizes every topic that falls under his scrutiny. Hart is quite simply one of the most articulate and thoughtful voices in contemporary Christendom - an Orthodox author not to be missed! - Adam

Excellent. Detailed. Makes the case that Terry Eagleton, John Haught, and others have made, that scientistic atheism takes for granted the Christian ethical moral and social heritage. Bracing. A great revision of Charles Cochrane Norris's classic on Christianity versus classical ancient philosophy. Readable polemic persuasive to me.

Insufferable-- mostly due to the author's smug stiltedness.

Hart is an Eastern Orthodox Christian and writes from a perspective that is a little different than what we usually hear. The book is rich is philosophy, theology, and literary references, and will sometimes take a second or third reading of a passage to understand. Hart interacts extensively with the writings of Voltaire and Dostoyevsky in building his theodicy.

Although Hart states that he is not trying to make Reformed theology "the bad guy", he freely admits that certain elements of Reformed theology are simply not compatible with Eastern Orthodox theology. As an Arminian, I found it refreshing to find a work that is so rich and deep.

Since it seems that tragedies come at a fairly regular pace, this is a highly recommended work in understanding God and suffering. As noted, some passages take effort - but you will be rewarded richly for the effort.

David Bentley Hart's book, 'Atheist Delusions', should be read by everyone one each side of the current God debate in our time. Hart's work, which bares a polemical title that he himself did not want, is not an apologetic of the validity of Christian belief, but rather a systemic debunking of the many myths of modernity, specifically those leveraged at Christian belief. The commonly touted (but hardly sustainable) critiques such as Christianity being an impediment to the development of science (including that oft highly misrepresented account of Galileo and the Roman Catholic Church), that it has been the source for countless wars (it has not), etc.

However, the more powerful parts of Hart's work are in his third and fourth sections where he first details the world of pagan antiquity (filled with its vapid and nihilistic religions with a correspondingly inane culture), and how Christianity completely revolutionized how people saw themselves; personal individuality for all peoples, human rights, the beginning of the end for slavery, and more. The fourth section details the retreat of this paradigm and the uncertain future that society now goes to. Though Hart may seem like a bit of an alarmist in this section (something he is aware of consciously), his critiques and shuddering at some of the moral ideas put forward (systemic infanticide of all children with retardation, selective breeding for the benefit of the human gene pool, etc) are all supported by the works of major philosophers and other intellectual giants of the modern era.

This book, by no means, is likely going to convince someone of Christian truth, but that was never it's goal. Rather, it is a powerful refutation of ignorance, a destroyer of historical myths that have become all to common, regardless if they are used with an anti-religious polemic driving them or not. That alone makes this book worth reading.