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- Additional Book Discussions
- Godless in America: Conversations With an Atheist - by George A. Ricker
- Interventions - by Noam Chomsky
- Religious Expression and the American Constitution - by Franklyn S. Haiman
- Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future - by Bill McKibben
- The God Delusion - by Richard Dawkins
- The Third Chimpanzee: The Evolution and Future of the Human Animal - by Jared Diamond
- The Woman in the Dunes - by Abe Kobo
- Evolution vs. Creationism: An Introduction - by Eugenie Scott
- The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals - by Michael Pollan
- I, Claudius: From the Autobiography of Tiberius Claudius, Born 10 B.C., Murdered and Deified A.D. 54 - by Robert Graves
- Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon - by Daniel Dennett
- A Peace to End All Peace: The Fall of the Ottoman Empire and the Creation of the Modern Middle East - by David Fromkin
- The Time Traveler's Wife - by Audrey Niffenegger
- The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason - by Sam Harris
- Ender's Game - by Orson Scott Card
- The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time - by Mark Haddon
- Value & Virtue in a Godless Universe - by Erik J. Wielenberg
- The March: A Novel - by E.L. Doctorow
- The Ethical Brain - by Michael Gazzaniga
- Freethinkers: A History of American Secularism - by Susan Jacoby
- Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed - by Jared Diamond
- The Battle for God - by Karen Armstrong
- The Future of Life - by Edward O. Wilson
- What is Good? The Search for the Best Way to Live - by A.C. Grayling
- Civilization and It's Enemies: The Next Stage of History - by Lee Harris
- Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space - by Carl Sagan
- How We Believe: Science, Skepticism, and the Search for God - by Michael Shermer
- Looking For Spinoza: Joy, Sorrow, and the Feeling Brain - by Antonio Damasio
- Lies (And the Lying Liars Who Tell Them): A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right - by Al Franken
- The Red Queen: Sex and the Evolution of Human Nature - by Matt Ridley
- The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature - by Stephen Pinker
- Unweaving the Rainbow: Science, Delusion and the Appetite for Wonder - by Richard Dawkins
- Atheism: A Reader - edited by S. T. Joshi
- Global Brain: The Evolution of Mass Mind from the Big Bang to the 21st Century - by Howard Bloom
- The Lucifer Principle: A Scientific Expedition into the Forces of History - by Howard Bloom
- Guns, Germs and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies - by Jared Diamond
- Demon-Haunted World: Science As a Candle in the Dark - by Carl Sagan
- Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West - by Dee Alexander Brown
- Future Shock - by Alvin Toffler
Karen Armstrong - Who is she?
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Chris OConnor |
Karen Armstrong - Who is she? |
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Indisputable BookTalk Master
Posts: 9511 12/30/04 12:34:24 BookTalk Owner | ||||
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misterpessimistic |
Karen Armstrong - The Runaway Nun | #1 | ||
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Indisputable BookTalk Master
Posts: 4113 12/31/04 18:41:10 Indisputable BookTalk Master |
Mary Rourke meets the author of "Islam, a short history"
Los Angeles Times, October 9, 2000 For years she was tagged the "runaway nun," the rebellious ex-Catholic with outspoken opinions about religion. Now, with her 12th book, "Islam, a Short History" (Modern Library), Karen Armstrong has changed her image. She can still be sharp-tongued, inclined to draw conclusions that get a rise out of critics. But something closer to reconciliation, rather than anger, is propelling her. Her life in a British convent is 30 years behind her. She spent seven years in the Society of the Holy Child Jesus during the 1960s and later wrote a tell-all book, "Through the Narrow Gate" (St. Martin's Press, 1982) that bemoaned the restrictive life. (The frightened nuns did not know the Cuban missile crisis of 1962 had ended for several weeks; they were not allowed to inquire about the outside world.) Armstrong is still hearing about the book: "Catholics in England hate me. They've sent me excrement in the mail." Readers who have followed her lately are learning her more optimistic ideas about what Islam, Judaism and Christianity have in common. Three of these books--"A History of God" (Ballantine, 1993), "Jerusalem: One City, Three Faiths" (Knopf, 1996) and "The Battle for God" (Knopf, 2000)--show what unites the faiths. Each, Armstrong writes, has developed the image of one Supreme Being who was first revealed to the prophet Abraham. All have historic links to Jerusalem. And more recently, each has built up a rigid conservative strain as a reaction against the modern world. Last year, the Islamic Center of Southern California honored Armstrong as a bridge builder who promotes understanding among the three faiths. On a book tour last week that included Los Angeles, the Londoner met again with members of the center in a Santa Monica home. A small woman in her mid-50s with short blond hair and an eager expression Armstrong signed copies of her books while the 100 or so guests grazed a buffet table. "Across the country," she began her brief talk, "night after night in bookstores, I saw in people's faces that they are interested in Islam. You might feel in despair as you are now a minority, living in the West, but people are very interested in learning more about you." Earlier, she explained in an interview: "It is challenging for Muslims in the U.S. who for the first time are not living in a Muslim-governed state. A basic message of the Koran is to create a united community and share the wealth." When Western capitalism was introduced in the East in the last few decades, Iran and other Muslim countries rebelled. "The challenge for Muslims in the U.S. is to come to terms with the success of the secular West." Part of the problem in integrating, she suggested, is that Muslims don't want to alienate anyone. "Muslims need to reach out to other faiths. They aren't as practiced as the Jews at it, who've lived in sometimes hostile countries for 2,000 years." Other religious cultures have met similar challenges as immigrants in the U.S. "The Catholics did, late in the last century. They came from Ireland, Poland and Europe in huge numbers, and they were hated. Their arrival encouraged the rise of Protestant fundamentalism in the U.S. Now it is the Muslims who want to be good Americans." Reviews of her new book, and of earlier works, tend to challenge Armstrong's sophistication. In the case of her new work, one reviewer argued she gave too little attention to the development of Islamic law, a central feature of a faith that blends religion and politics while Western democracies struggle to keep the two apart. Another reviewer said she overlooked Islam's contribution to science, art and economics. "I never read reviews," Armstrong replied, defending herself in a cadence that an observer once timed at 130 words per minute. "Islam" presented the added challenge of telling it all in 222 pocket-book-size pages. "This impossibly brief history of Islam," was the publisher's idea, she said. "People too daunted by thick books will get a sense of things in this one." Armstrong teaches Christianity at London's Leo Baeck College for the Study of Judaism. It was her first trip to Jerusalem in 1983 that piqued her interest in commonality among faiths. "I got back a sense of what faith is all about." At the time she was an atheist who was "wearied" by religion and "worn out by years of struggle." Born a Roman Catholic in the countryside near Birmingham, England, in 1945, she gave up on religion after her time in the convent. "I was suicidal," she said of life in her late 20s. "I didn't know how to live apart from that regimented way of life." With an undergraduate degree in literature from Oxford University, she began teaching 19th and 20th century literature at the University of London and worked on a PhD. Three years later, her dissertation was rejected. Without it, she did not qualify to teach at the university level and took a job as head of the English department at a girls' school in London. Not long afterward, she was diagnosed with epilepsy. "After six years at the school I was asked to leave, but nicely," she said. "My early life is a complete catastrophe. It all worked out for the best." She left the school in 1982 and began working on television documentaries. The story that took her to Jerusalem set her on a new career path and changed her earlier impressions about God. She went from atheist to "freelance monotheist" but has never returned to the Catholic Church or joined any other. Since her writing career took off, Armstrong's communion with God occurs in the library, where she spends up to three years researching her books, which are as densely packed with detail as her conversations. "I get my spirituality in study," she said. "The Jews say it happens, sometimes, studying the Torah." It seems no one sacred scripture could satisfy her now. "It's inevitable that people turn to more than one religious tradition for inspiration," she said. "It's part of globalization." She recently read from the Buddhist canon of teachings for her next book. "Religion is like a raft," she said, explaining the Buddha's view of it. "Once you get across the river, moor the raft and go on. Don't lug it with you if you don't need it anymore." She knows that mode of travel: Leave one raft behind to pick up the next just ahead. Mr. P. The one thing of which I am positive is that there is much of which to be negative - Mr. P.
I came to get down, I came to get down. So get out ya seat and jump around - House of Pain HEY! Is that a ball in your court? - Mr. P I came to kick ass and chew Bubble Gum...and I am all out of Bubble Gum - They Live, Roddy Piper |
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misterpessimistic |
Re: Karen Armstrong - The Runaway Nun | #2 | ||
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Indisputable BookTalk Master
Posts: 4113 12/31/04 18:54:12 Indisputable BookTalk Master |
Quote: Excellent quote! I like her from what I have read of her in this article. I respect anyone who gets "excrement in the mail" from Catholics! Seriously...this lady seems to have run the gamut of spiritual exploration. From Catholic to athiest to "freelance monotheist". Seems to me a very experienced and searching life backs up her credentials! Mr. P. The one thing of which I am positive is that there is much of which to be negative - Mr. P.
I came to get down, I came to get down. So get out ya seat and jump around - House of Pain HEY! Is that a ball in your court? - Mr. P I came to kick ass and chew Bubble Gum...and I am all out of Bubble Gum - They Live, Roddy Piper |
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Dissident Heart |
Karen Armstrong, God, and Genesis | #3 | ||
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Posts: 1868 01/02/05 00:15:23 Indisputable BookTalk Master |
Karen Armstrong has been a steady foundation for my personal theological development and a ready source for shaping my knowledge of historical and doctrinal development.
My first introduction to her work was with A History of God: The 4,000-Year Quest of Judaism,Christianity and Islam Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1994. Which served as an excellent supplement for my study of Hans Kung's mammoth texts regarding the Abrahamic Family of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Armstrong's journalistic flow, tempered by serious scholarship, made for a very accesible narrative spanning 4,000 years. In this wonderfully engaging and insightful book she captured much of what I have, with much less elegance and astuteness, been trying to say in my posts here at Booktalk. This is how she conveys the flawed, but essential connection to social justice in the Abrahamic ecumene: Quote: Or, in the way that I have struggled to express a commitment to seeking justice wherein all humans carry a sacred value and ultimate importance; a type of comunique from the God of shalom and agape: Quote: Likewise, in the way that I have tried to explain Faith as a radical trust in the uncertain, incomplete, unfathomable and abysmal awesomeness of existence; she lifts the voices of Luther, Pascal, and Kierkegaard as imperfect minds struggling with their own flawed interpretations: Quote: and, specifically regarding Pascal: Quote: And in her examination of the Enlightenment critique of Religion beginning with Spinoza, Diderot, Feuerbach, Marx, Nietzsche, Darwin, and Freud- she links a key term of the discussion 'Repression' to the fanaticism of Fundamentalism, as well as unhealthy forms of Atheism: Quote: Finally, she and I share a common hope regarding the lasting, integral, and wondrous beauty of Religion: when it finds itself springing from a place of loving compassion, toward justice and peace; as opposed to the resentiful hunger for punishment and chauvenistic exclucivism that so often mobilizes Fundamentalism towards its destructive deeds: Quote: For those interested in listening, or viewing Karen Armstrong, she was an excellent addition to the informative and entertaining PBS Series by Bill Moyers titled, "Genesis: A Living Conversation". Her erudite eloquence was a constant challenge to those Christian, Jewish, and Muslim members of the conversation unwilling to look plainly and ethically at the many troubling portraits of God's brutality and immorality in Genesis. |
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Chris OConnor |
Re: Karen Armstrong, God, and Genesis | #4 | ||
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Indisputable BookTalk Master
Posts: 9511 02/09/05 12:34:06 BookTalk Owner |
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Chris OConnor |
Re: Karen Armstrong, God, and Genesis | #5 | ||
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Indisputable BookTalk Master
Posts: 9511 02/09/05 12:35:55 BookTalk Owner |
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Chris OConnor |
Re: Karen Armstrong, God, and Genesis | #6 | ||
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Indisputable BookTalk Master
Posts: 9511 02/09/05 12:39:00 BookTalk Owner |
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Loricat |
Re: Karen Armstrong - Who is she? | #7 | ||
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Posts: 600 03/03/05 11:11:03 OMG I'm Awesome! |
Hi, I'm new to BookTalk, and this is my first post!
Here is an NPR Fresh Air interview with Karen Armstrong. It aired last year when her autobiography (about her years as a nun, her epilepsy, and how she became a religious scholar) was published. Lori |
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Swamy Maximus |
Re: Karen Armstrong - Who is she? | #8 | ||
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Posts: 49 10/06/05 15:02:13 Lost in Space |
A friend of mine claims she's basically an apologist for Islam. Not that she defends the faith or truth of the religion, but that she has a distorted view of its threat to civilization vis-a-vis Christianity. That is to say, she's not fair in her analysis when comparing the two religions. I will wait to read her myself before deciding if this is accurate.
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- Member Introductions & Journals
- BookTalk News & Development
- Religion, Philosophy & the Arts
- Politics, Current Events & History
- Science, Nature & Technology
- General Discussion & Miscellaneous Topics
- Book Suggestions, Polls, & Reviews
- Additional Book Discussions
- Godless in America: Conversations With an Atheist - by George A. Ricker
- Interventions - by Noam Chomsky
- Religious Expression and the American Constitution - by Franklyn S. Haiman
- Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future - by Bill McKibben
- The God Delusion - by Richard Dawkins
- The Third Chimpanzee: The Evolution and Future of the Human Animal - by Jared Diamond
- The Woman in the Dunes - by Abe Kobo
- Evolution vs. Creationism: An Introduction - by Eugenie Scott
- The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals - by Michael Pollan
- I, Claudius: From the Autobiography of Tiberius Claudius, Born 10 B.C., Murdered and Deified A.D. 54 - by Robert Graves
- Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon - by Daniel Dennett
- A Peace to End All Peace: The Fall of the Ottoman Empire and the Creation of the Modern Middle East - by David Fromkin
- The Time Traveler's Wife - by Audrey Niffenegger
- The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason - by Sam Harris
- Ender's Game - by Orson Scott Card
- The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time - by Mark Haddon
- Value & Virtue in a Godless Universe - by Erik J. Wielenberg
- The March: A Novel - by E.L. Doctorow
- The Ethical Brain - by Michael Gazzaniga
- Freethinkers: A History of American Secularism - by Susan Jacoby
- Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed - by Jared Diamond
- The Battle for God - by Karen Armstrong
- The Future of Life - by Edward O. Wilson
- What is Good? The Search for the Best Way to Live - by A.C. Grayling
- Civilization and It's Enemies: The Next Stage of History - by Lee Harris
- Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space - by Carl Sagan
- How We Believe: Science, Skepticism, and the Search for God - by Michael Shermer
- Looking For Spinoza: Joy, Sorrow, and the Feeling Brain - by Antonio Damasio
- Lies (And the Lying Liars Who Tell Them): A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right - by Al Franken
- The Red Queen: Sex and the Evolution of Human Nature - by Matt Ridley
- The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature - by Stephen Pinker
- Unweaving the Rainbow: Science, Delusion and the Appetite for Wonder - by Richard Dawkins
- Atheism: A Reader - edited by S. T. Joshi
- Global Brain: The Evolution of Mass Mind from the Big Bang to the 21st Century - by Howard Bloom
- The Lucifer Principle: A Scientific Expedition into the Forces of History - by Howard Bloom
- Guns, Germs and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies - by Jared Diamond
- Demon-Haunted World: Science As a Candle in the Dark - by Carl Sagan
- Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West - by Dee Alexander Brown
- Future Shock - by Alvin Toffler



