Life giving resources. Faithfully delivered.
FREE delivery on orders over £10
Serving over 2 million Christians in the UK
with Bibles, Books and Church Supplies
Our Buy-Now-Pay-Later accounts used
by over 4,000 UK Churches & Schools
Excellent 4.8 out of 5

Trustpilot

You now have 0 of this item in your basket

For The Glory Of God

How Monotheism Led to Reformations, Science, Witch-Hunts, and the End of Slavery [Paperback]

by Rodney Stark

Author
Rodney Stark
Book Format
Paperback
Publisher
Princeton University Press
Published
August 2004

Rodney Stark

Read full description

Click to expand

Today's Price

£23.27

Save 34%

Free UK Delivery

Available - Usually dispatched within 4 days

Buying for a school or church? Upgrade to a FREE Eden Advance Account

Enter the product quantity

For The Glory Of God

Today's Price £23.27

Frequently Bought Together

For The Glory Of God

by Rodney Stark

Paperback

The Rise Of Christianity

by Rodney Stark

Paperback

Add both to basket for £39.00 and save £14.99

Product Description

Rodney Stark's provocative new book argues that, whether we like it or not, people acting for the glory of God have formed our modern culture. Continuing his project of identifying the widespread consequences of monotheism, Stark shows that the Christian conception of God resulted - almost inevitably and for the same reasons - in the Protestant Reformation, the rise of modern science, the European witch-hunts, and the Western abolition of slavery. In the process, he explains why Christian and Islamic images of God yielded such different cultural results, leading Christians but not Muslims to foster science, burn "witches," and denounce slavery. With his usual clarity and skepticism toward the received wisdom, Stark finds the origins of these disparate phenomena within monotheistic religious organizations.Endemic in such organizations are pressures to maintain religious intensity, which lead to intense conflicts and schisms that have far-reaching social results. Along the way, Stark debunks many commonly accepted ideas.He interprets the sixteenth-century flowering of science not as a sudden revolution that burst religious barriers, but as the normal, gradual, and direct outgrowth of medieval theology. He also shows that the very ideas about God that sustained the rise of science led also to intense witch-hunting by otherwise clear-headed Europeans, including some celebrated scientists.This conception of God likewise yielded the Christian denunciation of slavery as an abomination - and some of the fiercest witch-hunters were devoted participants in successful abolitionist movements on both sides of the Atlantic. "For the Glory of God" is an engrossing narrative that accounts for the very different histories of the Christian and Muslim worlds. It fundamentally changes our understanding of religion's role in history and the forces behind much of what we point to as secular progress.