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Socrates in the City: Conversations on "Life, God, and Other Small Topics"

by Eric Metaxas

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2146125,900 (3.75)None
Following the extraordinary success of the New York Times bestseller Bonhoeffer, Eric Metaxas' latest book offers inspirational and intellectually rigorous thoughts about the great questions surrounding us all today. The Greek philosopher Socrates famously said that "the unexamined life is not worth living." Taking this as a starting point, Eric Metaxas founded a speaking series that encouraged busy and successful professionals to attend forums and think actively about the bigger questions in life; thus Socrates in the City: Conversations on "Life, God, and Other Small Topics" was born. This book is for the seeker in all of us, the collector of wisdom, and the person who asks, "What if?" Within this collection of original essays that were first given to standing-room-only crowds in New York City are serious thinkers taking on Life, God, Evil, Redemption, and other small topics. Luminaries such as Dr. Francis Collins, Sir John Polkinghorne, N. T. Wright, Os Guinness, and Peter Kreeft have written about extraordinary topics vital to both secular and Christian thinking, such as "Making Sense out of Suffering," "Can an Atheist Be a Good Citizen?," and "How Good Confronts Evil: Lessons from the Life and Death of Dietrich Bonhoeffer." No question is too big-in fact, the bigger, the harder, the more complex the better. These essays are both thought-provoking and entertaining, because nowhere is it written that finding answers to life's biggest questions shouldn't be exciting and even, perhaps, fun.… (more)
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I wish I could rate this book lecture by lecture, rather than as a whole. While I found some of the lectures to be fantastic (most notably the lecture by Jean Bethke Elshtain), some of the other lectures are a little lackluster at best. This may be due to the fact that spoken lectures transcribed into essay form tend to be a little distorted, but a few of them felt so rambling and unfocused that if it weren't for the essay title, I couldn't have possibly told you what the topic was. A few sloppy mistakes from the lectures also bugged me. For instance, things like, "Four points I would like to make: Firstly, secondly, and lastly..." happened here and there throughout the book. These things happen, I suppose, especially in spoken lectures, but reading them drove me crazy, and left me wondering what the missing point actually was.
Aside from all that, there really were some excellent lectures in this book, and if you can wade through a bit of muddled territory here and there, then you will probably find it worth reading. ( )
  Samantha_Quick | Jul 15, 2021 |
After the success of his "Bonhoeffer" bio, Metaxas gained overnight fame with his February 2012 appearance (catch it on YouTube!) at the National Prayer Breakfast in which he preceded Pres. Obama with a poignant/hysterical speech that suggested an amalgam of Woody Allen and Billy Graham. In this book he collects about a decade's worth of events in N.Y. at which he hosted public intellectuals (most with international reputations) for riveting lectures on topics concerning religion and the publice square. - Adam
  stephencrowe | Nov 11, 2015 |
Very interesting compilation. Contributions are somewhat uneven, but all raise interesting points, and many of the questions are also illuminating. ( )
  nimrodxi | Mar 22, 2014 |
This book was placed in my hands with no prior buildup. Usually, a friend will talk up a book a few times before they hand the volume over to me. This book was literally placed in my hand with no warning and I was told to read it because it did a very good job of presenting many approaches to Apologetics.

My friend was right.

Read the full review on my blog: http://jmnz.us/12jxjyL ( )
  cjmnz8 | Aug 15, 2013 |
This book is for the seeker in all of us, the collector of wisdom, and the person who asks, “What if?”

The Greek philosopher Socrates famously said that “the unexamined life is not worth living.” Using this as a starting point, Eric Metaxas created a forum encouraging successful professionals to actively think about life’s bigger questions. Thus, Socrates in the City was born.

First presented to standing-room-only crowds in New York City and written by luminaries such as Dr. Francis Collins, Sir John Polkinghorne, and Os Guinness, these original essays grapple with extraordinary topics from “Making Sense out of Suffering” to “Belief in God in an Age of Science.” No question is too big—in fact, the bigger, the better—because nowhere is it written that finding the answers to life’s biggest questions shouldn’t be exciting and even, perhaps, fun. ( )
  jerrikobly | Dec 4, 2012 |
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Following the extraordinary success of the New York Times bestseller Bonhoeffer, Eric Metaxas' latest book offers inspirational and intellectually rigorous thoughts about the great questions surrounding us all today. The Greek philosopher Socrates famously said that "the unexamined life is not worth living." Taking this as a starting point, Eric Metaxas founded a speaking series that encouraged busy and successful professionals to attend forums and think actively about the bigger questions in life; thus Socrates in the City: Conversations on "Life, God, and Other Small Topics" was born. This book is for the seeker in all of us, the collector of wisdom, and the person who asks, "What if?" Within this collection of original essays that were first given to standing-room-only crowds in New York City are serious thinkers taking on Life, God, Evil, Redemption, and other small topics. Luminaries such as Dr. Francis Collins, Sir John Polkinghorne, N. T. Wright, Os Guinness, and Peter Kreeft have written about extraordinary topics vital to both secular and Christian thinking, such as "Making Sense out of Suffering," "Can an Atheist Be a Good Citizen?," and "How Good Confronts Evil: Lessons from the Life and Death of Dietrich Bonhoeffer." No question is too big-in fact, the bigger, the harder, the more complex the better. These essays are both thought-provoking and entertaining, because nowhere is it written that finding answers to life's biggest questions shouldn't be exciting and even, perhaps, fun.

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