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The Book that Made Your World: How the Bible Created the Soul of Western Civilization, by Vishal Mangalwadi
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Understand where we came from.
Whether you're an avid student of the Bible or a skeptic of its relevance, The Book That Made Your World will transform your perception of its influence on virtually every facet of Western civilization.
Indian philosopher Vishal Mangalwadi reveals the personal motivation that fueled his own study of the Bible and systematically illustrates how its precepts became the framework for societal structure throughout the last millennium. �From politics and science, to academia and technology, the Bible's sacred copy became the key that unlocked the Western mind.
Through Mangalwadi's wide-ranging and fascinating investigation, you'll discover:
- What triggered the West's passion for scientific, medical, and technological advancement
- How the biblical notion of human dignity informs the West's social structure and how it intersects with other worldviews
- How the Bible created a fertile ground for women to find social and economic empowerment
- How the Bible has uniquely equipped the West to cultivate compassion, human rights, prosperity, and strong families
- The role of the Bible in the transformation of education
- How the modern literary notion of a hero has been shaped by the Bible's archetypal protagonist
Journey with Mangalwadi as he examines the origins of a civilization's greatness and the misguided beliefs that threaten to unravel its progress. �Learn how the Bible transformed the social, political, and religious institutions that have sustained Western culture for the past millennium, and discover how secular corruption endangers the stability and longevity of Western civilization.
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Endorsements:
“This is an extremely significant piece of work with huge global implications. Vishal brings a timely message.” (Ravi Zacharias, author, Walking from East to West and Beyond Opinion)
“In polite society, the mere mention of the Bible often introduces a certain measure of anxiety. A serious discussion on the Bible can bring outright contempt. Therefore, it is most refreshing to encounter this engaging and informed assessment of the Bible’s profound impact on the modern world. Where Bloom laments the closing of the American mind, Mangalwadi brings a refreshing optimism.” (Stanley Mattson, founder and president, C. S. Lewis Foundation)
“Vishal Mangalwadi recounts history in very broad strokes, always using his cross-cultural perspectives for highlighting the many benefits of biblical principles in shaping civilization.” (George Marsden, professor, University of Notre Dame; author, Fundamentalism and American Culture)
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- Sales Rank: #62386 in Books
- Published on: 2012-10-24
- Released on: 2012-10-24
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 9.02" h x 1.22" w x 5.98" l, 1.50 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 464 pages
About the Author
Vishal Mangalwadi, LLD, was born and raised in India. He studied eastern religion and philosophy in India, Hindu ashrams, and at L'Abri Fellowship in Switzerland. He is a dynamic and engaging speaker who has lectured in thirty-five countries. He is a social reformer, political columnist, and author of fourteen books. Christianity Today calls him "India's foremost Christian intellectual."
Most helpful customer reviews
82 of 83 people found the following review helpful.
A masterpiece in writing and reasoning.
By Bill Muehlenberg
The broad-brush thesis of this book is this: without the Judeo-Christian worldview, there would be no Western civilisation as we know it. The Hebrew Old Testament and Greek New Testament have contributed more to the development of the West than any other single factor.
In over 400 information-rich pages the Indian-born scholar documents how the Bible directly and profoundly contributed to the rise of the West. And not only has the West benefited immeasurably - so too has the rest of the world. Indeed, he argues that the "Bible was the force that created modern India" as well.
Of course this thesis is not new. One thinks of the recent works by Rodney Stark, Jonathan Hill, or Alvin Schmidt. Also recall the two volumes by D. James Kennedy: What if Jesus Had Never Been Born? (1994) and What if the Bible Had Never Been Written? (1998).
But here we have a masterful presentation of the data in a finely written and cogently argued volume. As Mangalwadi reminds us, the Bible first of all transforms individual human beings, who in turn transform entire nations. In every area of life we see this remarkable record of personal and social transformation.
In whatever area we examine, we see the hand of Scripture all over it. Be it science, or health care, or literature, or learning, or liberty, the biblical worldview touched and transformed entire societies. Mangalwadi very capably discusses the big picture as well as the many individual cases.
Consider the area of technology for example. A quote from Marburg historian Ernst Benz sets the stage: "Christian beliefs provided the rationale, and faith the motive energy for western technology." Says Mangalwadi, "Benz had studied and experienced Buddhism in Japan. The antitechnological impulses in Zen led him to explore whether Europe's technological advances were somehow rooted in Christian beliefs and attitudes. His research led him to the conclusion that the biblical worldview was indeed the key to understanding Western technology."
While Indian sages presented God as a dancer or dreamer, the biblical God was a Creator God, the architect of the cosmos. And the incarnation of Jesus reminded Christian philosophers that matter had a spiritual purpose in its creation. Thus Biblical cosmology had a direct bearing on the rise of Western science and technology.
But as Mangalwadi notes, Christian compassion was an equally important factor: "Christian spirituality has emphasized compassion, service, and liberation far more than the need to establish human dominion over creation." That is indeed a vital element here.
He reminds us that India and Africa did not lack in ingenious minds; but how they were deployed matters greatly. "The Egyptians living along the Nile built the pyramids while barbarians inhabited Western Europe. The problem was that the engineers who made pyramids to honor the bones of kings and queens did not bother making wheelbarrows for their slaves."
Speaking of slavery, he reminds us of how early on anti-slavery sentiment arose in Christian communities. Christians were the main ones responsible for ending slavery in the West. He cites Professor Stark: "A virtual Who's Who of `Enlightenment' figures fully accepted slavery. . . . It was not philosophers or secular intellectuals who assembled the moral indictment of slavery, but the very people they held in such contempt: men and women having intense Christian faith, who opposed slavery because it was sin."
Or consider the rise of the modern university and education. Mangalwadi asks why his university in Allahabad had a church, but no Hindu temple or Muslim mosque: "Because the university was invented and established by Christians." We are reminded that while there were brilliant Greeks and Romans, they "established no permanent institutions, no libraries, and no scholarly guilds."
All that basically came from Christians. The medieval monasteries were the seed bed of the European universities. Indeed, many of these monasteries and cathedral schools developed into these great universities. And almost all education back then was in fact Church education, something which atheist H.G. Wells even had to admit.
And again, it was not just the West which has benefitted from all this. In South Korea the education of women was mocked and discouraged, until Western Christian missionaries came there and brought about radical change. As a result, today the largest women's university in the world is located in Seoul.
Even the education of the blind and deaf was a Christian initiative. Says Mangalwadi. "The Greeks often used blind boys as galley slaves and blind girls as prostitutes. Jesus, however, restored their sight." Christian missionaries the world over followed in the positive example of Christ.
He continues, "Darwin's secular `survival of the fittest' philosophy would never pay for developing an education to humanize the handicapped. Every traditional culture left them to their fate or karma. Some deliberately exposed handicapped infants to death. The Bible alone presents a compassionate God who has come to this earth to save us from our sin and its consequences - including sickness and death."
Or look at the issue of literature. The truth is, much of the world's greatest literature is traceable to the Judeo-Christian worldview. Whether we are talking about the Book of Job or the sonnets of Shakespeare, the world is immensely richer because of the Bible. Of course the Greco-Roman era produced great literature, but in terms of the lasting transformative impact on the world, and the impact on English writers, the Bible is without peer
The greatness of this literature is due to the greatness of the Judeo-Christian worldview: "Indian myths, like Greco-Roman myths, are about aristocrats - the ruling elite and sages. The heroes of Genesis, by contrast, are ordinary people with feet of clay."
Indeed, nation-building literature is based on and all about ordinary individuals who found greatness, not in themselves, but by being made in God's image, and being the special objects of his compassion. Transformation of character is a defining feature of Scripture, and that in turn leads to the transformation of nations.
Simply consider as but one example how the Bible so soundly impacted Harriet Beecher Stowe, and how her Uncle Tom's Cabin so powerfully impacted Lincoln and the abolitionists in their fight against slavery in America. The examples are endless.
Indeed, the examples of so many other areas turned upside down by the Bible and those who have been transformed by it would fill hundreds, nay thousands, of volumes. But Mangalwadi here does a superb job of demonstrating how in one area after another, the impact of Scripture has been overwhelming, and overwhelmingly a force for good.
It is commonplace today to trash both Western culture and the biblical worldview which so powerfully and comprehensively led to it. This remarkable book reminds us of the overwhelming good of both. We are not spared the many faults of the West, nor how Christians have at times been a negative influence, however.
But on the whole, the very real benefits we enjoy today in the West, and in so many other parts of the world, are directly the result of the Bible, and the millions of individuals who have been radically transformed by it. Such transformed individuals have gone on to transform their world.
We so very much need to be reminded of all this, and this book performs this task exceptionally well. Every one of us needs to get this book, master its contents, and share it with others. We are all in your debt Vishal Mangalwadi.
34 of 35 people found the following review helpful.
Required reading to understand history
By Peter Ingemi
THE BOOK THAT MADE YOUR WORLD is an intellectual Tour De Force arguing and illustrating the influence of the Bible on Western Civilization and its positive role in creating much of the good that many in the west take for granted, from the freedoms of women to simple respect for life.
He takes an interesting path to his thesis; starting with Kurt Cobain vs Bach and going on from there. His individual chapters take specific aspects of Western Culture from Humanity, Heroism, Science, Morality, Self and Technology and reflect how the biblical view not only shaped these and other aspects in a positive direction in the western world, but how the lack of the Bible and the biblical worldview caused other cultures to fall behind both in terms of technology and in what the west would consider respect for basic humanity.
Those who read the volume will be surprised at how little the Bible itself is quoted, instead it tells of cultures, nations and individuals driven by its message and how that makes all the difference.
Some of his arguments are stronger to advance, the points concerning corruption in office, the university system and technology are pretty easy gimmes. Most interesting is the semi random inclusion of individual stories from his own life and observations from India, including the violence he and his families and friends suffered due to his faith and actions.
He is unwilling to sugar coat the difference between the liberal laws of India on the books, a gift provided and influenced by British Common Law shaped by the Bible vs the practice (or rather non-practice ) of those same laws by those officials of different cultural background non longer overseen by a colonial power. Yet he managed to convey this wile condemning colonialism as an evil. He takes full advantage of his non-western background to make points that in this politically correct world a western intellectual would find himself cashiered for making.
His weakest bits are his near obsessive worship of Martin Luther and his jabs at the Catholic Church (while extolling particular Catholic Saints like Augustine and Aquinas) Catholic readers will particularly note his minimizing of Protestant violence vs Catholics during the Reformation and after while maximizing the reverse. While annoying even that can not take away from the distinct service that he performs with his general argument.
A few of his chapters tend to twist (his chapter on Medicine in my opinion is his weakest) but his details and his history is generally sound and the credit he gives, particularity of missionaries is significant. Over and over he notes how it is people of faith who have historically made the biggest difference to those in need and that it was the drive of that Christian witness that compelled them to act for the betterment of others.
Much of what he says would be basic knowledge a mere century ago, but in this politically correct and secular age we have forgotten either by choice or accident the basic facts that he reiterates. No defender of Western Civilization will every be unarmed in a debate if fortified by this volume's facts.
No Library should be without it.
25 of 26 people found the following review helpful.
Hopeful, Skeptical, and Yearning to Learn More
By D. Renken
I have questions about the thesis of Vishal Mangalwadi's The Book That Made Your World, but this book prompts me to first ask a few questions of myself.
Am I able to approach this book without bias? As a Christian, it is of course very pleasing to hear positive statements about the influence of the Bible. I would expect God's holy word to have a great and lasting influence on individuals, as well as on communities and cultures. I believe, after all, that the God of the Bible is the creator of the universe. His word is true.
However, I found within myself an oddly opposing bias, as well. As a westerner, I am regularly exposed to multi-culturalism, anti-western thought, and outright Christianity- bashing. The mere suggestion (among even Christians sometimes) that Christianity might be superior to other religions or philosophies is met with accusations of ignorance and ethnocentrism, along with accusations that I must think "America equals Christianity".
I actually hadn't realized how much this exposure had affected my worldview until I was reading Mangawaldi's book. While my faith was making me hopeful, the influence of my unbelieving culture was making me very skeptical. As I read, I found my biases tugging against one another, leaving me unable to either accept or reject the thesis of the book.
Am I learned enough to make a fair judgment? Some of the book's critics do claim to have some expertise in Buddhism, Hinduism, or Eastern culture. But I have to wonder if those same people are as well versed in what the Bible says. To do a little American-bashing myself, I find that many well-educated Americans are abysmally ignorant of the teachings of Judaism and Christianity. I am often left wondering if these people have actually ever read the Bible. Mangawaldi seems to have a fairly rare advantage of having been immersed in several different religions or philosophies.
But, back to my own ignorance... I was impressed with the breadth of Mangalwadi's source material and found myself wanting to learn more. I wish he had included in the book a plan for the systematic study of the Bible's influence on cultures. I will have to rely on the notes and bibliography.
Given his own education, was Mangawaldi expecting a better-educated reader? One, perhaps, who had already dealt with minor issues and could focus then on the major thesis? It is a very readable book, so it is accessible by the broader public, even if not intended for that audience. If the book was not written for scholars, then it makes too many assertions to be dealt with in so short a space. The topic is massive, and the influences on culture myriad. To isolate the Bible as the primary positive influence would require a much more thorough and systematic approach. Each section of the book would merit its own volume.
All my questions aside, I am happy to find a book that challenges my thinking and spurs me on to further study. By that measure, The Book That Made Your World is a success.
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