Monsters or Sinners?

Chapter Five is where David Gelernter and I part company most drastically, for reasons easily anticipated. In this chapter, Gelernter tackles the subject of Abraham Lincoln, “America’s last and greatest founding father.” As usual, Gelernter is uncannily accurate in his description, and flies wide of the mark in his evaluation. Lincoln was the great founder …

When Missing by a Hair Means Missing by a Mile

“There is one other general point I would emphasise here before we leave this matter of the content of the sermon; and that is that we are to preach the Gospel, and not to preach about the Gospel. That is a very vital distinction, which one cannot easily put into words, but which is nevertheless …

Heaven Forbid

“However strange it may seem to Westerners, the much-publicized virgins promised to Islamic martyrs in Paradise is no myth or distortion of Islamic theology. Muhammad painted a picture of a frankly material and lushly sensual Paradise for his followers—containing everything a seventh-century Arabian desert-dweller could possibly dream of: gold and fine material things, fruits, wine, …