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Rating: 
Summary: Author misses the Obvious Conclusion
Review: Do all Christians wonder if they've made a mistake? When they're alone at night and they hear the dead silence that answers their prayers, do they wonder if maybe, just maybe, there isn't a God out there listening? I assume Dr. Habermas would classify this as factual doubt. (He says the other kinds are emotional, when you're angry at God for letting a loved one die, or volitional, which he defines as a weak or immature faith, meaning you are unwilling to submit to biblical principles and let some minister make all the important decisions in your life for you, using a 1,900 year old text.) I got the impression that Habermas has so many doubts about Christianity, he doesn't really believe that Jesus is a divine being any more. In his other books, Habermas claims to be an expert on the resurrection appearances, so he knows how flimsy the evidence is. Anyone who watches a beloved teacher and friend die a horrible death over several hours, nailed to a cross on the side of a busy public road, and then has a dream in which a gardener tending his grave suddenly starts speaking with the voice of the dead man, well, these dreams have to be viewed with skepticism, and not accepted as evidence that the loved one actually came back from the dead to visit. Human beings store memories for years, and memories with a strong emotional content are often replayed during sleep as dreams. This is a normal process, and the first Twelve disciples encouraged new converts to report their dreams as prophecies. In this book, Habermas treats his feelings of doubt that came from categorizing the evidence. Now, his conclusion is that "Doubt doesn't come until I give myself permission to question." And I think that illustrates the Christian position. As a Christian, you don't have to give yourself permission to question the divinity of Jesus. You can go out and buy books that affirm the validity of Christianity, but those books are dishonest unless you allow yourself to evaluate the evidence honestly. A Christian who does not give himself permission to question the evidence, by saying things like "God said it, I believe it, and that settles it" is always going to be troubled by emotional doubts. Every time God betrays this blind faith (the 700 recent deaths in Uganda by a Christian minister who took money in anticipation of the end of the world comes to mind) then all of the hidden doubts rise to the surface. This book presents so much compelling evidence for doubting Christianity, I can only encourage the reader to write his own last chapter. What happens when you give yourself permission to doubt? Personally, I like the advice of John Stuart Mill, "Proportion your faith to the evidence." If the evidence for a "resurrection" 1,900 years ago is based on slight evidence, then don't give 100% belief. Give your belief in proportion to the strength of the evidence. Habermas knows the evidence better than most, and he has written an entire book explaining how he uses his doubts to make his faith stronger. Well, I don't think that's the right conclusion.
Rating:
Summary: Author misses the Obvious Conclusion
Review: Do all Christians wonder if they've made a mistake? When they're alone at night and they hear the dead silence that answers their prayers, do they wonder if maybe, just maybe, there isn't a God out there listening? I assume Dr. Habermas would classify this as factual doubt. (He says the other kinds are emotional, when you're angry at God for letting a loved one die, or volitional, which he defines as a weak or immature faith, meaning you are unwilling to submit to biblical principles and let some minister make all the important decisions in your life for you, using a 1,900 year old text.) I got the impression that Habermas has so many doubts about Christianity, he doesn't really believe that Jesus is a divine being any more. In his other books, Habermas claims to be an expert on the resurrection appearances, so he knows how flimsy the evidence is. Anyone who watches a beloved teacher and friend die a horrible death over several hours, nailed to a cross on the side of a busy public road, and then has a dream in which a gardener tending his grave suddenly starts speaking with the voice of the dead man, well, these dreams have to be viewed with skepticism, and not accepted as evidence that the loved one actually came back from the dead to visit. Human beings store memories for years, and memories with a strong emotional content are often replayed during sleep as dreams. This is a normal process, and the first Twelve disciples encouraged new converts to report their dreams as prophecies. In this book, Habermas treats his feelings of doubt that came from categorizing the evidence. Now, his conclusion is that "Doubt doesn't come until I give myself permission to question." And I think that illustrates the Christian position. As a Christian, you don't have to give yourself permission to question the divinity of Jesus. You can go out and buy books that affirm the validity of Christianity, but those books are dishonest unless you allow yourself to evaluate the evidence honestly. A Christian who does not give himself permission to question the evidence, by saying things like "God said it, I believe it, and that settles it" is always going to be troubled by emotional doubts. Every time God betrays this blind faith (the 700 recent deaths in Uganda by a Christian minister who took money in anticipation of the end of the world comes to mind) then all of the hidden doubts rise to the surface. This book presents so much compelling evidence for doubting Christianity, I can only encourage the reader to write his own last chapter. What happens when you give yourself permission to doubt? Personally, I like the advice of John Stuart Mill, "Proportion your faith to the evidence." If the evidence for a "resurrection" 1,900 years ago is based on slight evidence, then don't give 100% belief. Give your belief in proportion to the strength of the evidence. Habermas knows the evidence better than most, and he has written an entire book explaining how he uses his doubts to make his faith stronger. Well, I don't think that's the right conclusion.
Rating: 
Summary: OK, but not substantial enough.
Review: I ordered this book while going through a bout of doubt both about my current girlfriend and my faith (strange how some things are linked at times). Of course, since I live in Switzerland, the book took its time to arrive, and by the time I read it, my doubts had been blown away like the clouds on a windy day - by a four-hour phone call with my girlfriend. Previously, they had been exacerbated by reading the book "What is Atheism" by Douglas Krueger, to the point where I was wondering what would happen if I renounced my faith. When the sharpest doubt subsided (the "O boy, he is intelligent and logical and convincing and here I thought it was all true, what do I do now) I realized that while I still wanted to reread Krueger's book and check his arguments against those of apologists (dealing with factual doubt), any decision as to my beliefs should be made with a level head and not while in a panicked frenzy (i.e. while suffering from emotional doubt). The mere fact of doubting something does not mean it's necessarily wrong, and it would be foolish to change convictions every time someone rattles you with his or her arguments. (As reviews demonstrate, neither Atheists nor Christians seem to do that.) This is the main point Dr. Habermas is making, and his goal is clearly to lead any doubting Christian to the point where he or she can take a step back, take a look at the whole picture, and decide rationally and calmly on the course to be taken. It therefore seems to me that Bill Hays mistook Dr. Habermas' main thrust for a recommendation to exercise blind faith. Not so! Dr. Habermas encourages Christians to read apologetic books to counter factual doubts instead of simply using psychological tricks to push them aside; where he urges Christians not to question is in the area of emotional doubt, where questions frequently are "what ifs" of the destructive kind. To give an example: the question "What if I had married a more beautiful woman?" is not only destructive to your marriage, it tends to preoccupy your mind and preclude a levelheaded assessment of your wife's true qualities. The same is true for questions of the type "What if God does not exist despite what I factually know?" Rarely does anything positive come of them. (If the question is reduced to "What if God does not exist?" or "What facts are there about God's existence?", I believe it can lead to a very positive outcome.) In fine, Dr. Habermas has written a clear, logical assessment of doubt (it clicks very nicely with what I've experienced), throwing aside many popular misconceptions in the process. The reason I do not give it five stars is that I have not yet been in the position to apply his principles (I'm on a surprisingly long doubt-free period) and therefore cannot evaluate them. (Another reason is that I dislike the free-flowing margin - looks sloppy - but that's not his fault.) All in all I'd recommend this book to people who are worrying about their faith; to others who have factual questions, it will be of little help (one short chapter and a reference section).
Rating: 
Summary: Aimed at Christians
Review: I ordered this book while going through a bout of doubt both about my current girlfriend and my faith (strange how some things are linked at times). Of course, since I live in Switzerland, the book took its time to arrive, and by the time I read it, my doubts had been blown away like the clouds on a windy day - by a four-hour phone call with my girlfriend. Previously, they had been exacerbated by reading the book "What is Atheism" by Douglas Krueger, to the point where I was wondering what would happen if I renounced my faith. When the sharpest doubt subsided (the "O boy, he is intelligent and logical and convincing and here I thought it was all true, what do I do now) I realized that while I still wanted to reread Krueger's book and check his arguments against those of apologists (dealing with factual doubt), any decision as to my beliefs should be made with a level head and not while in a panicked frenzy (i.e. while suffering from emotional doubt). The mere fact of doubting something does not mean it's necessarily wrong, and it would be foolish to change convictions every time someone rattles you with his or her arguments. (As reviews demonstrate, neither Atheists nor Christians seem to do that.) This is the main point Dr. Habermas is making, and his goal is clearly to lead any doubting Christian to the point where he or she can take a step back, take a look at the whole picture, and decide rationally and calmly on the course to be taken. It therefore seems to me that Bill Hays mistook Dr. Habermas' main thrust for a recommendation to exercise blind faith. Not so! Dr. Habermas encourages Christians to read apologetic books to counter factual doubts instead of simply using psychological tricks to push them aside; where he urges Christians not to question is in the area of emotional doubt, where questions frequently are "what ifs" of the destructive kind. To give an example: the question "What if I had married a more beautiful woman?" is not only destructive to your marriage, it tends to preoccupy your mind and preclude a levelheaded assessment of your wife's true qualities. The same is true for questions of the type "What if God does not exist despite what I factually know?" Rarely does anything positive come of them. (If the question is reduced to "What if God does not exist?" or "What facts are there about God's existence?", I believe it can lead to a very positive outcome.) In fine, Dr. Habermas has written a clear, logical assessment of doubt (it clicks very nicely with what I've experienced), throwing aside many popular misconceptions in the process. The reason I do not give it five stars is that I have not yet been in the position to apply his principles (I'm on a surprisingly long doubt-free period) and therefore cannot evaluate them. (Another reason is that I dislike the free-flowing margin - looks sloppy - but that's not his fault.) All in all I'd recommend this book to people who are worrying about their faith; to others who have factual questions, it will be of little help (one short chapter and a reference section).
Rating:
Summary: OK, but not substantial enough.
Review: While most of his premises seem quite reasonable, a lot of them don't seem to be developed enough to be thouroughly convincing. As someone who counsels people I find his case histories much too brief to be of great use. Perhaps my perception suffers because I recently read the Handbook of Christian Apologetics by Peter Kreeft (5 Stars in my book). I feel like I've gone from Shakespeare to Reader's Digest.
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