The Everlasting Man

Rating:
Summary: Flies in the face of conventional scientific wisdom
Review: This book opens up with a very strange discussion concerning our conventional assumptions regarding the "cave man", primitive man, and Neanderthals in general. Chesterton seems to believe that these people were much more intelligent and sophisticated than we give them credit for being. I interpreted this to be a sort of refutation or denial of Darwinism, although Darwinism is rarely if ever mentioned specifically. By assuming the cave man to be a more sophisticated spiritual being than previously assumed, Chesterton seems to be implying that these people had a direct relationship with God. From this we must assume that the cave man does not represent the "missing link" or evolutionary transitory species that would be critical to upholding Darwinism. In other words, Chesterton is trying to refute Darwinism by uplifting the cave man closer to our current level of intelligence, rather than degrade him into a neo-primate type creature representing a transitional phase between archaic primates and man. I will leave it to the reader to decide if this denial of Darwinism is convincing. But all the objective scientific purists out there will probably not be convinced by much of what Chesterton has to say, because he does not provide much in the way of scientific proof or examples. For some this might be an unpardonable sin, but in my opinion, this book is enhanced by the fact that it doesn't get bogged down with boring empirical details. Chesterton's non-scientific approach is refreshing in that it it readable, free-flowing, speculative, and somewhat instinctual. Although Chesterton relies heavily on his gut-feelings, and is highly speculative in his conclusions, the witty and down-to-earth writing style more than makes up for any lack of boring, scientific methodology in supporting these conclusions.

This book is ideal for people who want to find the right balance between a book that is informative and thought-provoking on the one hand, but readable and enjoyable on the other. Sometimes it is important to forgoe enjoyment in the name of uncovering unbiased, objective truth, and granted, Chesterton does not establish anything close to such an objective, empirical truth in this book. However, there is a need for a style of free-flowing speculation, uninhibited and unencumbered by scientific rigour. It makes for a more enjoyable philosophy, which can cover more ground by being more generalized and all-encompassing, and less narrowly focused and specialized. In the end, much of what Chesterton has to say is sensible, plausible, and believable. We should take this book seriously; just not TOO seriously. I highly recommend this book to someone who wants a down-to-earth philosophical chat with one of the most skilled English authors of the twentieth century.

Rating:
Summary: One of the best books of the 20th Century.
Review: This is a book that everyone ought to read two or three times at least. It is a crime that such nonsense as Conversations With God, or better but still relatively shallow introductions to comparative religion like Religions of Man, seem to be better known. Here you will find a description of Christianity and its relation to other faiths strong and fine as aged wine. I don't know of anyone who writes with this much class in the modern world. Having ordered the book for our college library, I tried not to mark it too much, but found myself putting ink dots on paragraph after paragraph of material I wanted to quote. He rambles a bit, but I think there is more wisdom, humor, and insight in a single page of this book than in whole volumes that are better known in our days. Imagine if, after reading David Barry and laughing your head off, you wanted to go out and kiss a blade of grass or be amazed by the water running in the river instead of (say) looking up at the sky to make sure there aren't any mackerel about to fall on you. G.K.Chesterton makes his readers laugh themselves sane. And sanity is a rare and wonderful thing in the modern world.

Chesterton's archeology and contemporary references are a bit dated, of course. But even there, what goes around often comes around. Chesterton leads off with a story about Grant Allen, author of a piece of heresy of that time called "Evolution of the Idea of God." More recently Karen Armstrong wrote a book with an almost identical title and thesis, "History of God," and was greeted in the press as a bold thinker. Chesterton kindly and elegantly refuted her error, and those of many other modern skeptics, decades before they were born. Admirers of Bishop Spong in particular should read this book. Chesterton was not a scholar of comparative religions, of course, and he may have oversimplified a few things, but I think got the big things in true proportion better than anyone.

The plan of the book is simple. In the first half, Chesterton describes man, particularly in his religious aspect. In particular, he explains four universal elements of human religion: mythology, philosophy, demonism, and an awareness of God that one finds in almost every culture around the world. The tendency in the modern world is to ignore the last two elements when they occur outside of Western culture. But I have found in my own studies of Asian cultures and religions that Chesterton's description of human religion fit the facts extremely well.

The second half of the book is about Jesus and the movement he founded. I like what he says about Jesus best, and wish he had spent more time on that and proportionally less on European culture. A few of his racial or cultural assumptions do not come across well in our age. It is worth remembering how the face of Christianity has changed over the hundred years since this book was published. Then Christianity was almost exclusively a Western religion, while now two thirds of the believers in the world live in Africa, Latin American and Asia.

If you are interested in a more detailed discussion of some of the points Chesterton brings up, I suggest Don Richardson's Eternity in Their Hearts, another of the most overlooked works of the 20th Century. I have also just written a book called Jesus and the Religions of Man, that covers in more detail (but undoubtedly with less style) much of the same territory.

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Rating:
Summary: Everlasting Greatness on my Bookshelf
Review: This is the first Chesterton book that I have read. I have placed it in a special place on my bookshelf, along with the books that I like the most.

Chesterton's sweeping glance at human history is amazing. His careful logic, side-splitting wit, and common sense make this an interesting read. He paints such great pictures with his words. Some of his words are really breathtaking.

Rating:
Summary: Brilliantly Stoking the Halo of Hatred
Review: Very few books are worth reading with a pencil in hand. Most fit Stephen Donaldson's description of a novel as "throwing words at a short story."

The Everlasting Man demands to be annotated. Chesterton's prose is masterful, his wit and sarcasm are triumphant, but most fundamentally, his arguments are pointed and illuminating.

Chesterton provides a method and a practical goal. His method is to examine preconceptions by going out of context; to picture our reality as if we were strangers. The goal is to compare the secularist, religious, and dogmatic views of man with this external picture.

His conclusion is in the recognition of Christ as The Distinguishing Event which bears no contrast or comparison with history before or since. Along the way, he dices up comparitive religion, takes a poke or two at Spencer & Darwin, relegates Islam to a heresy (albeit a "respectable heresy") and thoroughly demolishes the concept of secularist rationality.

Among the more profound of Chesterton's recognitions is in the strange continuity of the Church. A little apologetics is involved, but I get the impression that his discussions are intended more for comfort to the faithful than butressing his already-established arguments.

Overall, a thoroughly engaging read. My only negative criticism of the book is the dexterity of Chesterton's references and citations. I probably missed more of his allusions than I caught. In some ways, it reminds me of Swift's Gulliver's Travels - we all get the "Big end/Little end" allusion to Protestant/Catholicism conflict, and the ancillary references to France/England, etc. But only by reading thorough criticism do we find that Swift was referring not only to massive social events, but also to specific individuals and practices. Without a key from contemporary society, there is no way for us to "get" Gulliver's Travels. And I fear that this is true of "The Everlasting Man" as well. Which only goes to prove some of the points of the book itself.

I wonder if Chesterton planned it that way?

Finally, I cannot help but cite the end of Part I as an example of the brilliance of the writing and the theme. Referring to the first Christians in Rome, and the Roman persecution, Chesterton writes: "And there shone on them in that dark hour a light that has never been darkened,; a white fire clinging to that group like an unearthly phosporescence, blazing its track through the twilights of history and confounding every effort to confound it with the mists of mythology and theory; that shaft of light or lightning by which the world itself has struck and isolated and crowned it; by which its own enemies have made it more illustrious and its own critics have made it more inexplicable: the halo of hatred around the Church of God."

Grand!

Rating:
Summary: Brilliantly Stoking the Halo of Hatred
Review: Very few books are worth reading with a pencil in hand. Most fit Stephen Donaldson's description of a novel as "throwing words at a short story."

The Everlasting Man demands to be annotated. Chesterton's prose is masterful, his wit and sarcasm are triumphant, but most fundamentally, his arguments are pointed and illuminating.

Chesterton provides a method and a practical goal. His method is to examine preconceptions by going out of context; to picture our reality as if we were strangers. The goal is to compare the secularist, religious, and dogmatic views of man with this external picture.

His conclusion is in the recognition of Christ as The Distinguishing Event which bears no contrast or comparison with history before or since. Along the way, he dices up comparitive religion, takes a poke or two at Spencer & Darwin, relegates Islam to a heresy (albeit a "respectable heresy") and thoroughly demolishes the concept of secularist rationality.

Among the more profound of Chesterton's recognitions is in the strange continuity of the Church. A little apologetics is involved, but I get the impression that his discussions are intended more for comfort to the faithful than butressing his already-established arguments.

Overall, a thoroughly engaging read. My only negative criticism of the book is the dexterity of Chesterton's references and citations. I probably missed more of his allusions than I caught. In some ways, it reminds me of Swift's Gulliver's Travels - we all get the "Big end/Little end" allusion to Protestant/Catholicism conflict, and the ancillary references to France/England, etc. But only by reading thorough criticism do we find that Swift was referring not only to massive social events, but also to specific individuals and practices. Without a key from contemporary society, there is no way for us to "get" Gulliver's Travels. And I fear that this is true of "The Everlasting Man" as well. Which only goes to prove some of the points of the book itself.

I wonder if Chesterton planned it that way?

Finally, I cannot help but cite the end of Part I as an example of the brilliance of the writing and the theme. Referring to the first Christians in Rome, and the Roman persecution, Chesterton writes: "And there shone on them in that dark hour a light that has never been darkened,; a white fire clinging to that group like an unearthly phosporescence, blazing its track through the twilights of history and confounding every effort to confound it with the mists of mythology and theory; that shaft of light or lightning by which the world itself has struck and isolated and crowned it; by which its own enemies have made it more illustrious and its own critics have made it more inexplicable: the halo of hatred around the Church of God."

Grand!