Review by Choice Review
Recent popular books such as Sam Harris's The End of Faith (2004) and Richard Dawkins's The God Delusion (CH, May'07, 44-4994) argue that scientific advances make faith an irrational proposition. Audi (Univ. of Notre Dame), author of Religious Commitment and Secular Reason (2000), makes a detailed philosophical case for faith's rationality in a pluralistic world and the sorts of evidence that support that commitment. Using the care inherent in analytic philosophy, he argues that the evidentiary bar for "rational" religious commitment has been set high. He also shows how religious and secular morality can be compatible in many cases. This book helpfully parses different types of faith, and the sorts of knowledge and reasons that attend them. Some forms of faith are about the truthfulness of cognitive propositions, whereas other religious hopes admittedly are, by their very structure, not based in evidence available in the world as it is. Advanced students in philosophy and philosophical theology, especially those who tend to favor analytic approaches, will find much to learn from and debate in this book. Summing Up: Recommended. Graduate students and researchers/faculty. A. W. Klink Duke University
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Choice Review
