God Is Not One: The Eight Rival Religions That Run the World--and Why Their Differences Matter

If God is not One, the word is meaningless...

I work closely with Huston Smith and created and maintain his official website. Stephen Prothero grossly misrepresents Smith's statements and position on this subject.

Huston, Huxley, or Campbell have never said that "all religions are the same" or anything like that. What they say is that there is one underlying reality (call it God, Creator, Self, Ground of Reality, etc.) that the different religions, in their distinctive ways, refer to.

To suggest otherwise is to ignore the very definition of God, or believe that there is more than one God, or claim that only one religion has it right, and the others have it wrong.

Prothero says that the one God idea was, "a defense mechanism developed by Hindus to reject 19th Century Christian missionaries and fostered by the Parliament of World Religions in Chicago in 1893." The realty is that the idea reaches back to the ancient Vedas which declared, "Truth is one; sages call it by various names." This cannot be translated as "all the religions are the same". The Vedantic version of this idea was expressed by Swami Vivekananda at the 1893 gathering, but it was well established by the Transcendentalist in the US well before then, and is also expressed in the mystical branches of the other religions.

When pinned on these facts, Prothero admits he's talking more about how he, as a college student, and others have mistakenly interpreted the Perennial Philosophy as "all religions are the same".

Prothero attributes Huxley, Smith, and Campbell as saying the differences between the religions are, "accidental." I am not aware of any of these three, or any Perennial Philosopher, saying anything of the sort. In fact, they address the differences as being very real and important to the practice of each faith.

Prothero says, "People don't lump communism and democracy as the same, just slightly different. Why should they do it with religions?"

Again, no one but Prothero is saying the various religions are the same, but in any case, Communism and democracy are the same in that they are different means to govern people - religions are the same in that they are different means to connect one's Self with its Source. It's a matter of defining what the underlying subject matter is.

The ONLY way that Huxley, Smith, and Campbell say that religions are the same, is that they are all religions.

12 out of 19 people found this review helpful.

Skip this one

When I read an article promoting God is Not One by Prothero in the Christian Science Monitor I was excited that finally there was a book that would discuss the differences between religions and why those differences matter. Eager to learn more I downloaded God is Not One onto my Nook. I cheered when I read in the introduction, "No one argues that different economic systems or political regimes are one and the same. . Yet scholars continue to claim that religious rivals such as Hinduism and Islam, Judaism and Christianity are, by some miracle of imagination, essentially the same ." Delighted I continued reading expecting to learn more about those differences and their implications only to be disappointed. While Prothero states that each faith takes a journey up a different mountain he never explains why that difference is more important than the common moral and ethical principles most religions share. As I continued reading I became uneasy. Even though Christians out number Moslems Prothero declares that Islam will be the faith of this century since their numbers are growing rapidly. Really? Perhaps we should wait another 90 years before declaring who the religious winner will be. By the second chapter I realized God is Not One is essentially a liberal treatise on religion written by a man will little or no faith and who has a strong bias against Christianity. Raised an Episcopalian, Prothero declares all non-Christian religions to be superior to his own religious heritage. Enthralled with the order Confucianism promotes, Prothero fails to follow its central tenet to respect and learn from his elders and ancestors. I urge Prothero to consider more carefully why his ancestors followed Christ. The chapter on Christianity calls into question the credibility of the entire book. Since I am Christian I can easily pick out the author's errors and distortions but my knowledge of Buddhism and Hinduism isn't extensive enough to know if he has made similar errors in those chapters. In criticizing Christianity he states Christianity has "texts of terror" and that there are whole books in the Bible devoted to war. The books he is referring to are called the Old Testament by Christians and the Torah by Jews. They contain a theological interpretation of historical events. Oddly in another chapter he proclaims the virtues of the Torah as if they are completely different books. Judaism, Christianity and Islam all draw from the covenant God made with Abraham. If the Christian God is implicated in genocide then so is the God of the Jews and Moslems. Prothero implies that Islam is better than Christianity because they have rules for war such as it is okay to behead any non-believer who refuses to convert while Christians have no such rules. He never mentions that Jesus instructed his disciples to walk away if someone rejects the gospel and to turn the other cheek when attacked. He also never mentions the rich Christian theological tradition that among other things talks about war and when it is or isn't just. Whether the Islamic or Christian approach has led to more or less war is open to debate. Prothero does not achieve what he set out to do. Instead of a thorough, non-bias discussion of the differences between faiths and how those differences impact the world, he essentially has given us another comparative religion book. I will have to search for another source containing the information I desire.

6 out of 17 people found this review helpful.

Other Reviewers Miss The Point

This book is not designed to be a Theological Text Book (i.e. difficult and boring to read) but an introduction to the fact that "All roads do not lead to Heaven." As someone with an MDIV and a DMIN, I have found this book useful as a discussion starter when dealing with world religions. Overall it provides a pretty good introduction to the 8 major religions of the world. Not pushing the superiority of one over the other, he shows how ridiculous it is to think believers in each of these faiths want the same thing. I appreciate the professor writing in a manner that let's those without theological training to learn and hopefully fully investigat other faiths to open a well-needed dialogue.

4 out of 4 people found this review helpful.

God Is Not A Sophomore Joke

Prothero's premise, that individual religious commitments understand god in different ways is an important insight. I especially like the pattern of explaining individual religions on the basis of their primary concern and the resolution to that concern that each religion offers. Unfortunately, all that is covered in the introductory chapter, leaving the remaining chapters to take the form of what appear to be randomized comments gleaned from recordings of joking classroom presentations complete with "over the top" Hinduism and "sensible" Protestantism. Hum . . . biased much? The book turns out to be an excellent example of how to get your credit-hungry Sophomore class chuckling over a collection of witticisms that offer little spiritual growth but fuel the campus politics that keeps Professor Prothero in those all-important contact hours that fuel his teaching contract. I do not recommend the book for tenure.

3 out of 7 people found this review helpful.

An excellent collection

While many reviewers were extremely negative about this book, I found this book extremely helpful and well-organized. It's an excellent resource for anyone who wants to know about some of the world's religions, and particularly useful to students of religion. We're using this book as a resource in my World Religions class and this book clearly and effectively describes all of the concepts my professor doesn't. Prothero's writing style is a very welcome break to an endless line of dry, boring authors of religion. I highly recommend this book.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

A fascinating introduction to nine major religions.

I found this book very informative, straight forward, sometimes humorous, and very fascinating, whereas I had expected something heavy and drab. This made me wish I had taken a religion course in college under his teaching. This is the best introduction of the major faiths I think you'll find anywhere!

highly recommend

This book was very useful for my religious class. I recommendedthis book to anyone thats studying religious.

Great!

Was glad to find a paperback version for my class.

Well thought out

I have read pieces by Stephen Prothero in the NYTimes and like his insights. I am not religious, but am curious. When I purchased my Nook, this was the first book I bought. I was not disappointed. I agree with all of the favorable reviews I've read to date, but I think some of the negative reviews were a bit myopic.

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