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Summary: :) GREAT!
Review: This book was not what I expected it to be. I read it again and I just saw every point the authors Bruner and Ware made was logical. If you are a die hard fan of LOTR and have questions of whether or not if your favorite series is worth your time spiritually, then get this book. It was very helpful to me. :)
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Summary: Great read! A really awesome book!
Review: This is an awesome book! I know J. R. R. Tolkein was big on anti-allegory, but the authors specifically state that they are not making his classics into an allegory; they are simply showing how his books can be used to illustrate a point, so to speak. This is a fantastic book to give to non-Christian Tolkein fans.
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Summary: The book is something that was inevitable
Review: This is an incredibly disappointing "work." Any true reader of Tolkien will marvel at the shallowness of this critique of his trilogy. I wonder if the authors did any more than peruse the book or, at best, speed-read through it to write this drivel. God is indeed present in Tolkien's work but this book is no road map to finding Him there. Far superior is "The Gospel Acording to Tolkien" by Ralph C. Wood. I would also suggest that serious readers pick up the Tolkien's "Silmarillion" in which God's act of creation literally leaps off the first page. Bruner and Ware would also do well to read this to deepen their own knowledge.
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Summary: A Mere Scratch on the Surface
Review: This is an incredibly disappointing "work." Any true reader of Tolkien will marvel at the shallowness of this critique of his trilogy. I wonder if the authors did any more than peruse the book or, at best, speed-read through it to write this drivel. God is indeed present in Tolkien's work but this book is no road map to finding Him there. Far superior is "The Gospel Acording to Tolkien" by Ralph C. Wood. I would also suggest that serious readers pick up the Tolkien's "Silmarillion" in which God's act of creation literally leaps off the first page. Bruner and Ware would also do well to read this to deepen their own knowledge.
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Summary: The Lord of the Rings as seen from a Biblical perspective.
Review: This is one of the best books on the fiction of J.R.R. Tolkien ever written. Kurt Bruner and Jim Ware show with great skill and integrity how a Biblical and Christ-centered perspective helps to illuminate literary works such as Tolkien's "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy. This book is a more than adequate demonstration that "God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise...That no flesh should glory in his presence" (1 Corinthians 1:27-29). For all who have read and enjoyed such "foolish things" as Tolkien's fiction and for all who are leery of the fantasy genre I thoroughly recommend this book. May this book be a means of leading one to the recognition that the Bible is the word of God and that it is only through Jesus Christ that we can find true and everlasting happiness.
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Summary: Keep Looking
Review: This short book uses the themes and stories of Tolkien's Trilogy to draw similarities to various themes and stories from the Bible, with each chapter ending with a simple little reflection. It's actually more of a devotional work than scholarly work. People who are looking to learn more about Tolkien and his Christian faith should continue to look elsewhere - such as "J.R.R. Tolkien : Author of the Century" by Tom Shippey.Each chapter starts with a retelling of an event in Tolkien's trilogy, and continues to explore the theme or lesson to be learned from that event as it is also expressed in the scriptures, then ends with simple sentence reflection. The book sheds no real insights for anyone who has read Tolkien's trilogy and the Bible. As far as the Trilogy being secular or sacred, Tolkien was equally clear that while he was not writing an allegory, a myth may have some truth in it.
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Summary: Christian theme? Factual!
Review: To the reader on January 31, 2004 and to all who think like this person: J.R.R. Tolkien himself was a Christian and thus his rendition of the Lord of the Rings was a Christian work. Tolkien may not have written his work as an allegory, but he did write his work with a Christian conscience. I, as well as many others, see in these books many allusions to various themes in the Bible. I have not read this book, but am looking forward to in the future. Tolkien may not have meant his work to bear a Christian theme, but it does.
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Summary: If you really knew Tolkien
Review: Tolkien said himself that his writings about Middle-Earth were not Allegorical, but applicable. That means that he did not write it with any parallels in mind, but that you can apply it's own inherent lessons to your life as you choose. The only way to "find god" in the Lord of the Rings, is if you have already found god and wish to make the application yourself.
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Summary: Ho Hum
Review: Well, I dunno. This is a nicely written but ultimately deeply flawed attempt to find religious meaning in a morally deep but ultimately unreligious book. Brunner and Ware dont get too trapped in dogma but dont dig up any illuminating truths either. Tolkien was a Christian and the trilogy is about responsibility and morality - It doesnt take a rocket scientist to pull out the comparisons to born-again, american-evangelist Christianity.
In the end it all comes down to typical religious circular reasoning. If you belive in an omnipresent God or Gods, youll find him/her/it/them in LOTR and/or reflections on his/her/its/their teachings in the text. Worth reading but not worth believing in
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Summary: JUST WANTED TO POINT THIS OUT
Review: When Tolkien wrote the Lord of the Rings, i gather from all i have read on him that he had no intention of having relate to god. If you read the history set forth in other books he has written on Middle-Earth you will find that while the god in the books is the one and only god they have many god-like beings, unlike the cristain religon. The elves for instance worship countless numbers of these "beings". Tom Bombadil is only one example of this. However for all i know Tolkien may have for some obsure reason written the Lord of the Rings with refrences to the christian religon but as he devoloped it, it is clear to that he evolved it out of that phase. Now, do not think me as a disloyal christain, because i'm not a christain. So, buy this book if you like, but for my sake please stop and laugh at it every ten seconds.
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