A reader recently asked what books I recommended for those who have recently left Christianity. Here are ten books that I think would be most helpful:
- A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson. This is an interesting and funny introduction to science. As a Christian, you’ve probably been taught a lot of nonsense about how old the earth is and how science works. This is a good remedy.
- The Science of Good and Evil by Michael Shermer. You were probably taught that without God there is no morality. That is false, but it’s hard to understand this after years of conditioning. Shermer explains morality from our evolutionary and cultural origins and why it’s important.
- Why People Believe Weird Things by Michael Shermer. Yeah, you got duped. How did it happen? Shermer will try and tell you.
- Evolution by Carl Zimmer. You’re probably also confused about evolution and how it really works. You might think there are no transitional fossils and that there is no evidence for evolution. Zimmer was helpful in setting me straight, and he might help you too.
- Misquoting Jesus by Bart Ehrman. As you’ve already realized, the Bible isn’t the perfect inspired Word of God. Ehrman will help confirm this.
- The End of Faith by Sam Harris. The first of the “new atheism” books and one of the best.
- Letter to a Christian Nation by Sam Harris. This is Harris’s response to Christian criticism of his End of Faith. It’s short and worth the hour or so of time it takes to read it.
- The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins. The most popular of the new atheist books, and I thought it was very well done.
- How We Know What Isn’t So by Thomas Gilovich. This explains “the fallibility of human reason in everyday life.” Our minds can be tricked, and it’s a fascinating explanation of why.
- The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. These novels are hilarious. Losing faith can be very lonely, and you’ll need some laughs. Adams was an atheist and his existential humor is unmatched.
This may seem like a lot of reading, but if you do it an hour a night, you’ll be through this list in a couple months!
Like other times here on this blog I would like to plug Prof. Hector Avalos especially “The End of Biblical studies” and after reading that you really get how humans have evolved their faith in the Bible and faith in general, also he is a former Christian so he does not use the language of Dawkin´s and many other “New Atheists”.
Funnily enough when I read Bryson’s book atop your list I was left with the impression “this is a book about God”. It seemed to me, at the time, that in every area he researched, he was ultimately left with the experts saying something along the lines of “we don’t really know how this works”. And, at the time, I took that as being God. Somehow. (I guess in much the same way as Hawkins actually describes his own Brief History of Time as “a book about God”.)
Perhaps I’ll read it again sometime soon.
And I was a huge Hitchhiker fan for many years without it ever causing me to question my faith. Again, perhaps I should read them again now I’m seeing things a little differently.
Re #6: Meh. One of these days I’ll get off my ass, re-read the book, and put up a review of it (micro-review: while I agree with the main thesis, EoF suffers from strawmen, Islamo-paranoia, and a good dose of special pleading for the author’s own brand of woo). But I should probably read #7 first, to see if successfully rebuts my criticisms of the first book (that, and it gives me an excuse for putting off the Harris-fisking project a bit longer ;-).
Re #8: While not without its own flaws, a much better book than Harris’.
Re #3: A good book on general skepticism.
And of course, I’ll second the recommendation for #10 and its sequels ;-).
@Trevor: I agree it comes off that way with evolution at times. Bryson really helped me with the age of the earth and how we know some of the things we know, but explaining evolution isn’t his strong point, which is why I recommend Zimmer’s Evolution.
I don’t think Hitchhiker caused me to doubt my faith either, but I think it can be a fun enjoyment especially for someone who is going through the experience of losing faith.
@Eamon: Yeah, the last few chapters of EoF bothered me (I began skimming at that point), but I really liked the rest of it.
@Oskar: I still need to read that. If it’s as good as you say, then it probably would have been on this list if I had read it. One of these days I’ll get to it…
I would also strongly recommend Derren Brown’s book, ‘Tricks of the Mind’. Derren is acknowledged around the world as a master of manipulation and psychological illusion. He’s also a former happy clapping evangelical Christian.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Tricks-Mind-Derren-Brown/dp/1905026358/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1221143917&sr=8-1
@Jim: I second your recommendation. That book was awesome! Unfortunately it’s hard to get here in the US, which is why I didn’t put it on the list.
I’m a Christian, and I have thoroughly enjoyed “A Short History…” and “The Hitchhiker’s Guide…” I found Bryson’s book to be very fascinating. It should be required reading for anyone planning to write the next ‘end of the earth’ sci-fi story.
@Eamon: Yeah, the last few chapters of EoF bothered me (I began skimming at that point), but I really liked the rest of it.
My alarm bells started going off around page 40, when he says there is evidence for reincarnation, giving as a reference Rupert Sheldrake. And the last few chapters — page after page of Buddhist metaphysics! Good cure for insomnia; enlightenment, not so much. And this guy is in neuroscience?
@Eamon: I don’t remember him saying that about reincarnation, but the last few chapters I thought surprising (and very Eastern). But I still stand by my recommendation for the rest of it.
Love Bart Ehrman!
Dr. Ehrman pretty much answered every major question I had about why I was wrong about the things I suspected I was wrong about.
If the foreword to “Misquoting Jesus” doesn’t light your fire, your wood’s wet!
His latest book, about Theodicy, is called “God’s Problem”, and I sat in Barnes &Noble – while waiting for the IMAX showing of The Dark Knight – and read the (equally good) foreword to that one.
I got so distracted reading, I ended up having to sit at the very end of the front row at the movie, but it was worth it.
hmm…
Me, I’d suggest Terry Pratchett’s books. He fills them with little nuggets of wisdom and lays out a practical ethics, all the while managing to convince people that he’s not doing any more than writing a comedy series…
Adams is great too. I’d recommend the Dirk Gently books, though. He himself was a lot more proud of those than of the later Hitchhiker’s Guide.
Phillip Pullman’s His Dark Materials is an amazing trilogy about religion and what it does to people, written by an atheist. A great fun story with a powerful ending.
I heartily second wazza’s choice of Pratchett. Small Gods actually helped move me closer to atheism from my former “oh-I-was-raised-Catholic-but-now-I-guess-I’d-say-I’m-an-agnostic”-ism.
One of the things Pratchett says in that book is that the thing about talking to God is that the answers you get usually come from inside, not out.
How about adding “The Bible” to the list?
I don’t mean reading it in the “Bible Study” sense where you just try to make things fit with pre-conceived notions, but in a scholarly sense where you ask whether the ideas make any sense without drastic mental gymnastics.
Or maybe I just feel punchy tonight and want to see how people respond (mischievous grin goes here). Although, the suggestion is only mostly-snarky. Reading the Bible is what did it for me – sitting down and for the first time in my life to read it front to back, all along the way thinking “I’m supposed to believe WHAT?” and “You mean that wasn’t a metaphor?”
A more serious (and time-intensive) suggestion for the scholarly is to study Plato and Aristotle, to see where so many of the ideas in Christianity ultimately come from. Also, finding a good collection of Greek, Roman, Egyptian, and Mesopotamian myths can be eye-opening.
SteveWH: Eye-opening and scrotum-clenching. Some of those myths are harsh.*
A lot of people say reading the bible is what made them realise how crazy it all is. No wonder the Scientologists only let the True Believers know the full story of their creation myth.
*A technical religious studies term meaning “this story made my testicles contract into my body”. It’s a hold-out from the old days when only men were allowed to be scholars, but our female colleagues assure us they know the feeling.
Oh, and Metro, I’ve read that Terry gets letters from protestants telling him how much they appreciate a book that’s so supportive of their view. It’s like a mirror for each person’s view of religion, I guess.
Thanks for the list. I intend getting hold of the Shermer books. I cannot endorse Misquoting Jesus by Bart Ehrman enough. It was so important in helping me come to terms with my own move away from faith.
Already done with The God Delusion. I am going to order a few of those. Thanks for the list.
@SteveWH: I thought about adding the Bible, as it is quite different through the eyes of unbelief. I would recommend all apostates to read it again.
Irrationality by Stewart Sutherland is a recommendation in my book (pun intended!)
I would recommend Christopher Hitchens: “God Is Not Great”. This book goes quite deep into the history of the different religions and shows a lot of contradictions and what religion has led to. Quite informative.
Jerry: Hitchens seems a little controversial for the newly-deconverted. I’ve never actually read his book, though, so I can’t comment on this particular part of his oeuvre. But I’d suggest someone a little less strident… Harris and Dawkins seem a little more level-headed than Hitchens.
That said, reading history can really help turn you off religion. I’d recommend PZ’s cracker desecration post, and other such historical overviews.
One more:
“The History of Hell” by Alice K. Turner.
It’s very scholarly look into all of the origins of the Hell mythos. It traces the evolution of the Jews ideas on Hell, and shows how little bits were borrowed from the Babylonians, Egyptians, Romans, etc. It’s fascinating, and when you’re done, it all becomes clear, and your fear of hell vanishes in a puff of logic.
“Origin of Species” by Charles Darwin. Carl Zimmer’s book is good, but it doesn’t prove evolution — what it does is explain certain things about natural selection. That evolution occurs is assumed.
For proof you need Darwin. Maybe after reading Zimmer to set the background.
Being a Filipino, born and raised in a country where religion permeates every level of the society, it was hard to be a voice of unbelief among numerous masses condemning you because you refuse to follow the voice of the irrational. This issue, that there will be no morality in the absence of a godhead, is one of the common points raised whenever the subject of my disbelief comes in (especially by Catholic mother–who in many ways could probably be labeled as heretic in her own right, though she doesn’t know it.) Thankfully, I had a great philosophy teacher during college and in one of his talks on Confucian Philosophy, he basically debunked this whole myth by explaining the essence of Confucian morality: “Even if there is no God, morality would still exist because a man is not alone.”