A Third Testament? Malcolm Muggeridge on Youtube

A Third Testament? Malcolm Muggeridge on Youtube

Who was Malcolm Muggeridge? He was a secular journalist, editor of the British satire magazine “Punch,” who became a devout Catholic Christian and prophet to “modern Western man.” One thing that made him famous was the television series “A Third Testament” in which he featured Augustine, Pascal, Kierkegaard, Bonhoeffer, Blake, and others of his heroes. I used to show some of these episodes on VHS tapes to students—especially Augustine, Kierkegaard and Bonhoeffer. I recently watched his episode on William Blake for the first time.

Now, finally, all these episodes are on Youtube! Great stuff. If you are interested in Christian intellectual history made understandable with a good dose of interpretation and application to the “modern, Western world”of culture, you should watch these. Just “Youtube” “A Third Testament” and screen out all the garbage, looking for the videos in this series.

Many years ago, in about 1979, I met Muggeridge in person. He was visiting Rice University, my alma mater, and, after the lecture, I was invited to talk with him in a college master’s living room. The undergraduates badgered him about his belief that sex is solely for the purpose of procreation and he defended his position strongly. I don’t remember if I asked him anything. I hadn’t then seen “A Third Testament” or read the book based on the series.

Muggeridge was a celebrity in England and well-known in American Christian circles for his conversion and cultural critiques of modern, Western culture. This was at a time when there were many such Christians doing the same—Francis Schaeffer, Os Guinness, Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Jacques Ellul, et al. Muggeridge, though had his own independent “style” of Christian prophetic criticism of culture. Watch at least one of these episodes and you’ll see what I mean.

Crusty, critical, sarcastic, brooding, brilliant, articulate, incisive, and many other adjectives describe Muggeridge. Check him out.

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