Scaling the Secular City: A Defense of Christianity

Moreland's work must be considered one of the premier works on apologetics written by an evangelical. Although William Lane Craig is probably now worthy to be called the dean of evangelical apologists, Moreland's volume from the 1980s still stands alone as the best single volume in dealing with challenges to the Christian faith. This is due in large part to two factors: the format of the book and Moreland's concise way in handling the issues under discussion. For the most part, individual chapters are self-contained-they can be read apart from the others. They thus serve as extremely concise summaries of the key arguments. Moreland's strength clearly shows up in the philosophy portions of the work, as he deals with most of the classical theistic proofs. However, he also takes on other issues, such as God as a mental projection, in a concise way that allows the reader to grasp the significant issues quickly.W. L. Craig has a much longer bibliography in this area and must necessarily be consulted on most of the topics that Moreland covers here, but if you need one apologetics volume to keep handy to refresh your memory on the issues, this is the one to have.

Moreland wrote this book 15 years ago at a time when the intellectual veracity of evangelical thought was being attacked from all sides. 15 years later, there is a growing, albeit grudgingly, consensus among secular scholars and philosophers that intellectual evangelicalism is not the intellectual lightweight that many once thought. Moreland has proven himself to be one of an increasing number of evangelical thinkers that have forced such a reappraisal due to his sound argumentation, internally consistent philosophy, and compelling apologetical viewpoints. This book was Moreland's attempt to bring his level of evangelical thought out of the seminary classroom and outside obscure scholarly journals, to everyday readers. I believe he succeeds in this effort.Moreland clearly demonstrates himself to be of a classical apologetic bent, by putting forth and defending many of the traditional arguments for God's existence. His discourse on the cosmological argument is very good, as is his design argument. These philosophical arguments have been sources of severe debate for decades, not only between theists and non-theists, but also among theists of differing apologetic approaches. I happen to agree with Moreland that these arguments remain compelling and have actually been made sharper as a result of the many arguments that have been waged against them.Overall, I felt that Moreland has produced an effective multifaceted presentation for why belief in the Christian God is plausible and reasonable, and that such belief appears to stand on firmer ground than believing in alternative viewpoints. Although I admit that this is not a fair criticism, I will point out something to interested readers. A few years after this book by Moreland, Bill Craig came out with his 'Reasonable Faith'. In my view, Craig's book is stronger on the cosmological argument, the veracity of the Bible and the resurrection of Christ than Moreland is here in this book. I recognize that it's not really fair to demote the review of this book based on a book that came out subsequently, and that's why I'm giving this book 5 stars. At the time, it was probably the best contemporary apologetic in print that was accessible to a wide audience of lay readers. But given a choice between this book and 'Reasonable Faith' by Craig, I believe the latter is a slightly better book for today's reader. I highly recommend both and believe that everyday Christians should pray for God to give them a passion to study these issues and reflect upon them, so that they may be equipped to lovingly contend for the faith in a world that's trying to convince them their beliefs are wrong, as well as to enhance and deepen one's own Christian walk by intellectually meditating upon these issues and how they relate to the God we worship.

This is one of the best books I have ever read on the topic of defending Christianity rationally. That said, for a Christian new to this topic, a more entry-level book would be more helpful (e.g. Lee Strobel's two books: The Case for Christ, The Case for Faith).The book is written to an educated audience and parts of it are difficult. The most difficult part was Moreland's discussion of the kalam cosmological argument and the mathematical part evidence therein. Moreland is an excellent scholar; in total, there are 359 footnotes where Moreland documents arguments, refers to other philosophers and so on. There is also an excellent bibliography at the end where Moreland classes the books under three categories: Basic, Intermediate, and Advanced.Moreland covers what one would expect to find in an apologetics book:The Cosmological ArgumentThe Design ArgumentThe Historicity of the New TestamentThe Resurrection of JesusMuch of this material can be found in hundreds of other books. In his chapter on the Cosmological Argument, Moreland focuses on a specific form of it, recently revived by William Lane Craig, namely the kalam Cosmological argument (in brief: If the universe had a beginning, then it was either caused or not-caused, if caused, then the cause is either personal or not-personal). In the Design Argument, Moreland covers different forms of Design, some of which are untouched, even if evolution is true (e.g. Design as Order, Purpose, Simplicity, Complexity, Beauty, Sense and Cognition, Information and Cosmic Constants).Moreland's defense of the Resurrection is similar in many respects to Craig's; see my reviews of, "Jesus' Resurrection: Fact or Fiction," and, "Will the real Jesus please stand up?"However, Moreland has several chapters that make his book stand out from the crowd: God and the Argument from the MindGod and the Meaning of LifeScience and Christianity Four Final IssuesIn the Mind chapter, Moreland argues for and defends the idea of substantial, immaterial human souls or minds to the existence of an original Mind or Soul (i.e. God). In the Meaning chapter, Moreland looks at the ethics dimension of the question, examines the options (e.g. Nihilism, optimistic humanism, immanent purpose and Christianity), and concludes that Christianity is not only the most rational but also provides more meaning than the competing views.In the Science chapter, Moreland discusses philosophy of science and the creation/evolution debate. Often, there is an idea that either science and theology are working in totally different spheres of reality or that science should dictate to theology what it can and cannot do. I think Moreland makes an important advance here; his approach takes both science and the Bible seriously. He concludes the chapter with a discussion of evolution and offers a serious of reasons why creation science IS NOT a religion.In the last chapter, he looks at four final issues; the ?problem? of the visibility of God, the religious experienc

J.P. Moreland has done an excellent job in presenting a cumulative case for the truth of Christianity. Chapter 1--The Cosmological Argument--Moreland surveys the three forms of the argument and defends the kalam version. Much of this chapter tries to establish an ultimate beginning of the universe by appealing to philosophical and scientific reasons. Moreland makes the case that it is rational to believe that the universe has a personal cause (God).Chapter 2--The Design Argument--Moreland considers different kinds of design and different forms of the design argument. The richness and force of the design argument is shown in this chapter and common objections are considered as well.Chapter 3--God and the Argument from the Mind--In this chapter, Moreland presents a case for substance dualism and critiques different forms of physicalism as insufficient in explaining the mind.Chapter 4--God and the Meaning of Life--This section examines nihilism, optimistic humanism, the immanent purpose view, and Christian theism. The first three are shown to be inconsistent and lacking in their explanatory power and scope. Christian theism is defended as providing the necessary preconditions for a meaningful life.Chapter 5--The Historicity of the New Testament--Moreland attempts to show that the New Testament documents pass general tests for historicity and can be trusted as reliable. A defense of the early dating of the Gospels and Acts is given along with helpful cultural considerations which point to the general trustworthiness of the New Testament.Chapter 6--The Resurrection of Jesus--This chapter gives the usual arguments for the resurrection including the empty tomb, appearances, and early features of the church. This section is a good outline which gives a great starting point for further research. Hellenistic influences are also briefly addressed.Chapter 7--Science and Christianity--In perhaps the most original of the eight chapters, Moreland gives an introduction to the philosophy of science and gives possible solutions for the integration of science and theology. Also, creation science (in a broad sense) is shown to have scientific merit, contrary to popular belief. A brief treatment of the creation/evolution debate is offered. However, one may wonder if Moreland may be endorsing a young-earth view, which is obviously untenable. However, Moreland doesn't seem to take a strict position on the age of the earth, rather, he argues that there is a wide variety of interpretation in Genesis.Chapter 8--Four Final Issues--In the last chapter, Moreland address the visibility (or lack thereof) of God, God as a psychological projection, religious experience, and different forms of relativism. The section on religious experience is unique and worth consideratiion, while the other three are also important. Conlusion--Moreland ties all eight chapters together and summarizes each of them._Scaling the Secular City_ is a

This book is fantastic! Moreland tackles certain issues in a thorough way, which is not attained by any other book I know of. He very clearly lays down all the arguments and all the counterarguments and his conclusions seem inescapable. Here are the chapters: 1 The cosmological argument 2 The design argument 3 God and the argument from mind 4 God and the meaning of life 5 The historicity of the New Testament 6 The resurrection of Jesus 7 Science and Christianity 8 Four final issues The excellent treatments of these issues are however not integrated, linked together. One must already have an idea of their relevance (I can recommend here the book of N. L. Geisler, "Christian Apologetics", Baker Book House). I also would like to recommend Moreland's other books ("The Creation Hypothesis", "Jesus under fire", ...). Bruno Granger, The Hague, Hollan