I'm very happy with my purchase. The product was in perfect condition and I recieved it in a timely manner.

I am very satisfied with the product and service provided.

Besides the fact that Hitchens's premise equates his BELIEF in a non-existent "God" with religion -- which is far from the truth (G*d is not religious, what a radical idea!) -- his writing is far too pseudo-intellectually written in faux Old English, circa 1700. Very, very difficult to read. You'll have to read every sentence 3 or 4 or 5 times. (And yet, I have a post-graduate degree.) His thoughts are all over the place. He refers to things like "it," or "the book," or "that" and we have no idea to what he is referring without careful study and rereading.

He gets his facts wrong as well. For example, jumping to page 113 (just bad luck, I guess), he refers to "Barbelo" in the Nag Hammadi Library as "a heavenly destination, a motherland beyond the stars," whereas it is correctly defined as a non-visible, feminine intermediary ASPECT of the divine, a "REALM" from which "Christ" comes--or IS. (It is actually a very poetic reference to something very real, something you can find out about in detail in an Amazon book that CHANGED MY LIFE forever: "BRAINMAN-HOW ANCIENT MAN USED FORBIDDEN BRAIN SCIENCE TO CONTACT TRUE GOD & INVENT THE HOLY GRAIL.")

Strangely, Hitchens, in "God Is Not Great," refers to "God" and "Jesus" (for example) by name and as "He" as if "they" existed. This would be contradictory to his "principles" which he presents. Perhaps the only thing he is correct about (right from the beginning) is that religion is HARMFUL. Unfortunately, he also equates religion with God, which is NOT correct. Religion is NOT God, God is NOT religion, and God is not religious.

"God Is Not Great?" Which God? See, like most atheists, he actually DOES believe in only one God--the "God" the religious define as "God"--and then proceeds to reject it. This not only doesn't make sense, but precludes pursuing any OTHER "God," as yet unknown by most, like the one from / in "Barbelo" as defined in "gospels" banned as heretical by the Catholic Church because it conflicts with their exclusive trademark on "God."

In the end, Hitchens merely presents more and more individual, unprovable BELIEFS and THEORIES rather than hard fact. What we need now is FACTUAL PROOF and we finally got it. (Click here if you're looking for facts and proof:)
BRAINMAN-HOW ANCIENT MAN USED FORBIDDEN BRAIN SCIENCE TO CONTACT TRUE GOD & INVENT THE HOLY GRAIL (Black & White Edition)

(Or here:)
BRAINMAN-HOW ANCIENT MAN USED FORBIDDEN BRAIN SCIENCE TO CONTACT TRUE GOD & INVENT THE HOLY GRAIL (Full-Color Edition)

And, like most atheists, Hitchens is just as firm in his BELIEFS (NOT FACTS) as religious people and far from open-minded. He places extreme FAITH in [his understanding of] present-day science, implicitly making the assumption that science knows everything. It DOESN'T. (In fact, everyday, scientists -- including medical scientists -- announce that they were wrong about yet another thing, having allegedly discovered something new, which tomorrow they will undoubtedly recant.) For someone to place 100% faith in science is just as irrational as placing faith in the dogma of an organized religion claiming to magically turn wine into blood and unleavened bread into flesh of a 2000-year-old, dead god-man. Apparently, Hitchens is unaware of the fact that, in the middle ages, the Catholic Church banned scientific study of various things and persecuted and executed those who disobeyed. This was an attempt to 1) erase a science that science now knows nothing about, and 2) distance "religion" from science, especially this FORBIDDEN science--which REVEALED the actual "realm of 'Christ'" (very different from Church dogma).

And what of Hitchens's own scientific credentials? He is a liberal arts "professor" at the highly acclaimed New School in Manhattan. Oh... He is also a part-time contributing writer at the highly scientific magazine "Vanity Fair." Please! Amazing how someone so unschooled in science can place so much FAITH in their own extremely limited understanding of the vast field science.

I find that different people will see the same work in different ways because their minds are too busy reading their OWN thoughts. Everything they see or read is "filtered" by their own constant internal debate. Author writes "blue" and person A reads "green" while person B reads "red." Whoever gave this a good review was seeing something different from what was actually on the page.

I will return this trash.

.

YAWN!!! Same old, same old. This is the best of atheism? This guy would probably (or perhaps definitely) beat me in an argument where you need to think fast. But with a little reflection most of his arguments are like shouting into the wind. Anyone can make an argument by using straw men. Maybe I'm naive, but this man reminds me of the bloke who stuck his chair in the surf and tried to tell the tide not to come in! He may in fact be one of the most religious of us all ... but is he right? (PS. When are we going to get an atheist who understands "Biblical Theology" rather than simply a familiarity with "Systematic Theology"?)

Hitchens just doesn't plan on going to heaven. Formerly many people who were religious basically held there was no heaven, either there was no afterlife or it was pretty bleak for all. Hegel, of course, founded a religious cult where this world is holistically negated so as to better serve the Absolute and the few who know and do the bidding of the Absolute. As a Trotskyist Hitchens was under the sway of the Absolute (the communist utopia being the historical goal of the Absolute in Marxism) and Hitchens still is as a neo-con. The neo-cons took Hegel underground. Hitchens has just gone neo-con about Hegel. The neo-elite isn't full of traditionalists. Clearly for neo-cons as evidenced by Leo Strauss the tradition failed. The neo-cons are underground modernists, hold Freud got humanity correct etc and adhere to an estoeric Hegelianism. This book is both an attack on Christianity, Islam etc but also an invitation to join the neo-con elite in service to the Absolute. This book, of course, is a huge assist to fundamentalism painting those who adhere to atheism as like rabid dogs. Hitchens the 'Great Atheist' is trolling those who adhere to atheism.

Hitchens just doesn't plan on going to heaven. Formerly many people who were religious basically held there was no heaven, either there was no afterlife or it was pretty bleak for all. Hegel, of course, founded a religious cult where this world is holistically negated so as to better serve the Absolute and the few who know the Absolute and who do the bidding of the Absolute. The neo-cons took Hegel underground. Hitchens has just gone neo-con about Hegel. The neo-elite isn't full of traditionalists. Clearly for neo-cons as evidenced by Leo Strauss the tradition failed. The neo-cons are underground modernists, hold Freud got humanity correct etc and adhere to an estoeric Hegelianism. This book is both an attack on Christianity, Islam etc but also an invitation to join the neo-con elite in service to the Absolute. This book, of course, is a huge assist to fundamentalism painting those who adhere to atheism as like rabid dogs. Hitchens the 'Great Atheist' is trolling those who adhere to atheism.

Hitchens just doesn't plan on going to heaven. Formerly many people who were religious basically held there was no heaven, either there was no afterlife or it was pretty bleak for all. Hegel, of course, founded a new religious order where this world is holistically negated so as to better serve the Absolute and the few who know the Absolute and who do the bidding of the Absolute. The neo-cons took Hegel underground. Hitchens has just gone neo-con about Hegel. The neo-elite isn't full of traditionalists. Clearly for neo-cons as evidenced by Leo Strauss the tradition failed. The neo-cons are underground modernists, hold Freud got humanity correct etc and adhere to an estoeric Hegelianism. This book is both an attack on Christianity, Islam etc but also an invitation to join the neo-con elite in service to the Absolute. This book, of course, is a huge assist to the fundamentalism painting atheism as like a rabid dog. Hitchens the 'Great Atheist' is trolling those who adhere to atheism.

Staffers for an organization called Campus Crusade for Christ are responsible for allegations that I (Lucifer) and Christopher Hitchens are in cahoots; and that no one -- not even a born-again evangelical Christian -- can read either Hitchens' GOD IS NOT GREAT or Lucifer's TRUE HISTORY OF EVERYTHING without falling into apostasy, atheism, and eternal damnation.

If you should receive that email from Campus Crusade for Christ, please delete it. That's not just Jesus "spam." It is a load of Hersey's chocolate-chip crapola.

Hitchens is a man whose courage and intelligence I greatly admire. But I utterly deny that "Lucifer" is a pseudonym.

For the record: Lucifer's online "True History of Everything" (graciously hosted by BobShakespeare) presents an accurate eyewitness account of human events, from Day One until yesterday. When composing it, I received zero help from Chris HItchens; nor any help from Bill Maher, Richard Dawkins, or the holy Ghost. It's my own goddamned story. And it's totally true.

Second, I deny CCC allegations that my blog is "responsible for church closings all across North America," particularly where members of the congregation were allegedly "infected" by "Lucifer's blasphemies, lies, and left-wing politics" (CCC chain email). Among the flocks that are said to have been "seduced" into apostasy by L's "True History" are congregations of "the Conemaugh Presbyterian Church in Johnstown, PA; the United Methodist Church in Atlanta, GA; the First Baptist Church of Greenfield, MA; St. Patrick's Anglican Church in Lucan, Ontario; and the Trenton Presbyterian Church in Paint Rock Valley, AL; to name just a few."

I grant that all of those churches closed their doors this autumn, after their respective congregations got bored with Jesus and Yahweh. I grant that many parents now stay home on Sunday to play ball with their kids, or to mow the lawn, or to roll on the floor laughing out loud at L's TRUE HISTORY, or at Chris's GOD IS NOT GREAT. But is that my fault?

You can't blame every church closing for the past two years on the serpentine attractions of my true-history blog. You have to blame some of those failed churches on the books of Christopher Hitchens.

And we are NOT the same person, god damn it!

--L

P.S. Hey, Chris, if you should happen to read this: on Saturday I lost a cufflink from that set given to me by Joan Baez. It's not worth much but the thing has sentimental value. Would you mind looking for it under your passenger seat? Thanks, pal.

As a science teacher, I definetely enjoyed Hitchens' debasement of Intelligent Design and agree with him wholeheartedly, but keeping the overaching context of this book in mind, i was left with no choice but to offer one lonely star as a rating.
Hitchens, in typical myopic atheist fashion, throws out the proverbial baby with the bathwater. Being an "atheist" myself (with qualifications not expressible here), I have come to make a distinction between the external (exoteric) forms of religion: idols, statues, rites, laws, etc, and internal (esoteric) experience: the actual "religious" experience itself. The former is for the masses, mistaking the outer forms for the totality of religious experience, while the latter is for very few indeed. Hitchens believes he is critiquing religion, when actually he is judging only those that adhere, to varying degrees, to its outer forms. He makes no distinction between those who remain at the simple level of belief (evangelists as an extreme example), and those who through deeper practice transcend mere belief entirely. There is a saying in Zen for example: a master tells his student, "if you see Buddha in the road, kill him", another way of saying, don't take the forms (signs) to be the experience. Paradoxically, deeper levels of religious (for lack of a better word) experience have little to do with our COMMON notion of religion. So Hitchens only gets it partially right: he critiques those who simply BELIEVE, but evidently has little or no knowledge of those who have "gone the distance" (though he thinks he does). One must also be aware of those who profess to have deeper awareness, when in fact they fool themselves and those who feed at their trough. These are an easy target for Hitchens, and so they should be. Anybody can critique religion from this level, which makes this such a boring read.
His critique of Buddhism is laughable and demonstrates little knowledge on even the most superficial level. He cites those who completely misrepresent the deeper levels of the system, using Buddhism for their own means, Hitchens believes he is actually critiquing Buddhism. In fact, he is critiquing a bastardized appropriation, but he doesn't realize (nor can he) that he's doing so. Unfortunately, this misinformed appropriation is pretty much the history of religion (all of them), so in this respect Hitchens' attacks are right on. But his transgression is that he is not altogether different than those he judges: the latter in ignorance adheres to outer forms alone, sustained by simple belief, while the former disavows the whole shebang, without knowledge of religious depth. Hitchens believes he has come to the table to critique the main course, but in fact, by predictable default, has only examined the digested end products, i.e. the excrement of religious history. As a critic of that excrement, he is nonpareil, a master among Plato's "chained men".
As an analogy, I recall a student of mine saying " Just look what science has done to our environment." She failed to realize that the laws of science are immutable - the facts of physical reality, and as such "do" nothing. It is what WE DO with that knowledge. Similarly, deep religious experience is ahistorical, and operates outside temporal, political trappings. Fundamental truths, realizable only through direct experience, are neither for zealots, nor critics. Yes, "many have died in the name of religion," but via adherence to its lower, outer forms propagated by those in power, and sustained by those who simply follow along. These unfortunately become the poster children of spiritual tradition and easy fodder for folks like Hitchens. These very same, for the most part, are ignorant of higher esoteric forms of spiritual practice, which always arise from a condition of compassion and non-violence.
Authentic spiritual experience (which can also be interpreted neurologically if one wishes), fostered by practice, and transmitted by a TRUE adept, is not for Hitchens, or fundementalists, evangelists, new agers, and 99.9999% of us. It is that .0001% that poke holes in the argument. One need not attain that experience however to understand the narrowness of Hitchens' complaint. For the lesser among us understanding that level, at least, requires keen discernment, a task perhaps too daunting for the run of the mill atheist (or theist for that matter), who invariably mistake the tree for the forest. Atheist-Theist, all the same stuff... a surface play.
It is amusing, after centuries of religious examination, discussion, and critique, by some pretty heavy hitters, that some reviewers above presume that Mr Hitchens has finally figured it all out for us and got it right. Now there's some dogma for you.
"God is not Great" is not the full-bodied examination that the reviewers on the back cover suggest, but is in fact just another White Zinfandel on the shelf.

As a science teacher, I definetely enjoyed Hitchens' debasement of Intelligent Design and agree with him wholeheartedly, but keeping the overaching context of this book in mind, i was left with no choice but to offer one lonely star as a rating.
Hitchens, in typical myopic atheist fashion, throws out the proverbial baby with the bathwater. Being an "atheist" myself (with qualifications not expressible here), I have come to make a distinction between the external (exoteric) forms of religion: idols, statues, rites, laws, etc, and internal (esoteric) experience: the actual "religious" experience itself. The former is for the masses, mistaking the outer forms for the totality of religious experience, while the latter is for very few indeed. Hitchens believes he is critiquing religion, when actually he is judging only those that adhere, to varying degrees, to its outer forms. He makes no distinction between those who remain at the simple level of belief (evangelists as an extreme example), and those who through deeper practice transcend mere belief entirely. There is a saying in Zen for example: a master tells his student, "if you see Buddha in the road, kill him", another way of saying, don't take the forms (signs) to be the experience. Paradoxically, deeper levels of religious (for lack of a better word) experience have little to do with our COMMON notion of religion. So Hitchens only gets it partially right: he critiques those who simply BELIEVE, but evidently has little or no knowledge of those who have "gone the distance" (though he thinks he does). One must also be aware of those who profess to have deeper awareness, when in fact they fool themselves and those who feed at their trough. These are an easy target for Hitchens, and so they should be. Anybody can critique religion from this level, which makes this such a boring read.
His critique of Buddhism is laughable and demonstrates little knowledge on even the most superficial level. He cites those who completely misrepresent the deeper levels of the system, using Buddhism for their own means, and believes he is actually critiquing Buddhism. In fact, he is critiquing a bastardized appropriation, but he doesn't realize (nor can he) that he's doing so. Unfortunately, this misinformed appropriation is pretty much the history of religion (all of them), so in this respect Hitchens' attacks are right on. But his transgression is not at all different than those he judges: the latter in ignorance adheres to outer forms alone, sustained by simple belief, while the former disavows the whole shebang, without knowledge of religious depth. Hitchens believes he has come to the table to critique the main course, but in fact, by predictable default, has only examined the digested end products, i.e. the excrement of religious history. As a critic of that excrement, he is nonpareil, a master among Plato's "chained men".
As an analogy, I recall a student of mine saying " Just look what science has done to our environment." She failed to realize that the laws of science are immutable - the facts of physical reality, and as such "do" nothing. It is what WE DO with that knowledge. Similarly, deep religious experience is ahistorical, and operates outside temporal, political trappings. Fundamental truths, realizable only through direct experience, are neither for for zealots, nor critics. Yes, "many have died in the name of religion," but via adherence to its lower, outer forms propagated by those in power, and sustained by those who simply follow along. These unfortunately become the poster children of spiritual tradition and easy fodder for folks like Hitchens. These very same, for the most part, are ignorant of higher esoteric forms of spiritual practice, which always arise from a condition of compassion and non-violence.
Authentic spiritual experience (which can also be interpreted neurologically if one wishes), fostered by practice, and transmitted by a TRUE adept, is not for Hitchens, or fundementalists, evangelists, new agers, and 99.9999% of us. It is that .0001% that poke holes in the argument. One need not be on that level to understand the narrowness of Hitchens' complaint, but understanding that level, at least, requires keen discernment, a task perhaps too daunting for the run of the mill atheist (or theist for that matter), who invariably mistake the tree for the forest. Atheist-Theist, all the same stuff... a surface play.
It is amusing, after centuries of religious examination, discussion, and critique, by some pretty heavy hitters, that some reviewers above presume that Mr Hitchens has finally figured it all out for us and got it right. Now there's some dogma for you.
"God is not Great" is not the full-bodied examination that the reviewers on the back cover suggest, but is in fact just another White Zinfandel on the shelf.

As a science teacher, I definetely enjoyed Hitchens' debasement of Intelligent Design and agree with him wholeheartedly, but keeping the overaching context of this book in mind, i was left with no choice but to offer one lonely star as a rating.
Hitchens, in typical myopic atheist fashion, throws out the proverbial baby with the bathwater. Being an "atheist" myself (with qualifications not expressible here), I have come to make a distinction between the external (exoteric) forms of religion: idols, statues, rites, laws, etc, and internal (esoteric) experience: the actual "religious" experience itself. The former is for the masses, mistaking the outer forms for the totality of religious experience, while the latter is for very few indeed. Hitchens believes he is critiquing religion, when actually he is judging only those that adhere, to varying degrees, to its outer forms. He makes no distinction between those who remain at the simple level of belief (evangelists as an extreme example), and those who through deeper practice transcend mere belief entirely. There is a saying in Zen for example: a master tells his student, "if you see Buddha in the road, kill him", another way of saying, don't take the forms (signs) to be the experience. Paradoxically, deeper levels of religious (for lack of a better word) experience have little to do with our COMMON notion of religion. So Hitchens only gets it partially right: he critiques those who simply BELIEVE, but evidently has little or no knowledge of those who have "gone the distance" (though he thinks he does). One must also be aware of those who profess to have deeper awareness, when in fact they fool themselves and those who feed at their trough. These are an easy target for Hitchens, and so they should be. Anybody can critique religion from this level, which makes this such a boring read.
His critique of Buddhism is laughable and demonstrates little knowledge on even the most superficial level. He cites those who completely misrepresent the deeper levels of the system, using Buddhism for their own means, and believes he is actually critiquing Buddhism. In fact, he is critiquing a bastardized appropriation, but he doesn't realize (nor can he) that he's doing so. Unfortunately, this misinformed appropriation is pretty much the history of religion (all of them), so in this respect Hitchens' attacks are right on. But his transgression is not at all different than those he judges: the latter in ignorance adheres to outer forms alone, sustained by simple belief, while the former disavows the whole shebang, without knowledge of religious depth.
As an analogy, I recall a student of mine saying " Just look what science has done to our environment." She failed to realize that the laws of science are immutable - the facts of physical reality, and as such "do" nothing. It is what WE DO with that knowledge. Similarly, deep religious experience is ahistorical, and operates outside temporal, political trappings. Fundamental truths, realizable only through direct experience, are neither for for zealots, nor critics. Yes, "many have died in the name of religion," but via adherence to its lower, outer forms propagated by those in power, and sustained by those who simply follow along. These unfortunately become the poster children of spiritual tradition and easy fodder for folks like Hitchens. These very same, for the most part, are ignorant of higher esoteric forms of spiritual practice, which always arise from a condition of compassion and non-violence.
Authentic spiritual experience (which can also be interpreted neurologically if one wishes), fostered by practice, and transmitted by a TRUE adept, is not for Hitchens, or fundementalists, evangelists, new agers, and 99.9999% of us. It is that .0001% that poke holes in the argument. One need not be on that level to understand the narrowness of Hitchens' complaint, but understanding that level, at least, requires keen discernment, a task perhaps too daunting for the run of the mill atheist (or theist for that matter), who invariably mistake the tree for the forest. Atheist-Theist, all the same stuff... a surface play.
It is amusing, after centuries of religious examination, discussion, and critique, by some pretty heavy hitters, that some reviewers above presume that Mr Hitchens has finally figured it all out for us and got it right. Now there's some dogma for you.
"God is not Great" is not the full-bodied examination that the reviewers on the back cover suggest, but is in fact just another White Zinfandel on the shelf.

Hitchens, in typical myopic atheist fashion, throws out the proverbial baby with the bathwater. Being an "atheist" myself (with qualifications not expressible here), I have come to make a distinction between the external (exoteric) forms of religion: idols, statues, rites, laws, etc, and internal (esoteric) experience: the actual "religious" experience itself. The former is for the masses, mistaking the outer forms for the totality of religious experience, while the latter is for very few indeed. Hitchens' believes he is critiquing religion, when actually he is judging only those that adhere, to varying degrees, to outer forms. He makes no distinction between those who remain at the simple level of belief (evangelists as an extreme example), and those who through deeper practice transcend belief entirely. There is a saying in Zen for example: a master tells his student, "if you see Buddha in the road, kill him", another way of saying, don't take the forms (signs) to be the experience.. Paradoxically, deeper levels of religious (for lack of a better word) experience have little to do with our common notion of religion. So Hitchens only gets it half right: he critiques those who simply BELIEVE, but evidently has little or no knowledge of those who have "gone the distance". As a practitioner, one must also be aware of those who profess to have deeper awareness, when in fact they fool themselves and those who feed at their trough. These are an easy target for Hitchens, and so they should be.
His critique of Buddhism is laughable and demonstrates little knowledge on even the most superficial level. He cites those who completely misrepresent the deeper levels of the system, using Buddhism for their own end, but believes he is actually critiquing Buddhism. Unfortunately, this is pretty much the history of religion (all of them) , so in this respect Higgins gets it right. But Higgins' transgression is not at all different than those he judges: the latter adheres to outer forms alone, while the former disavows them, without knowledge of depth.
As an analogy, I recall a student of mine saying " Look what science has done to our environment. " The laws of science are immutable - they are the facts of physical reality - and as such "do" nothing. It is what WE DO with that knowledge. It is the same thing as saying "many have died in the name of religion," True, adherence to its lower (outer) forms; the religion of the masses, aka idolatry. Deep spiritual experience (which can also be interpreted neurologically if one wishes), fostered by practice, and transmitted by a TRUE adept, is not for Hitchens, as it is not for fundementalists, evangelists, new agers, and 99.9999% of us. It is that .0001% that pokes holes in the argument. One need not be on that level to understand the narrowness of Hitchens' argument, but understanding that level, at least, requires keen discrimination, a task perhaps too daunting for the run of the mill atheist (or theist for that matter), who invariably mistake the tree for the forest. Atheist-Theist, all the same stuff... a surface play.
"God is not Great" is not the full-bodied examination that the reviewers on the back cover believe it to be, but is in fact just another White Zinfandel on the shelf.

I read "God is not great" relatively quickly, despite many thoughts rushing throung my head while I was reading. I am happy I read this book, which is one of many recently published in the never-ending polemics between believers and atheists. I feel that it is hard to review a book so popular, and I am aware that my review will probably drown in the sea of others, but I could not resist the temptation to share a few thoughts.

Christopher Hitchens tries to take an angle different from Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris, and reviews the whole spectrum of atheist arguments, with a personal flavor, perhaps attempting to win a broader, more general audience. He did not need to win me, because I am a skeptical scientist, but I was curious what his arguments would be.

The book consists of 19 chapters with provocative titles like "Religion kills" or "Religion as an original sin". These are misleading, as is the title of the whole book. Hitchens makes an argument, that much is true, but it is not an argument against God or faith per se - it is an argument against organized, institutionalized religion. If we do not remember it, the meaning of the whole book can be lost. Hitchens himself admits it, somewhat nonchalantly, here and there, for example at the end of chapter six, "Arguments from Design" (which, in itself, is not the best, and serves only and a reference for those interested in biology and evolution): "...we no longer have any need of a god to explain what is no longer mysterious. What believers will do, now that their faith is optional and private and irrelevant, is a matter for them. We should not care, as long as they make no further attempt to inculcate religion by any for of coercion." The people in the hierarchies of various religious organizations, not faith, turn out to be the whole problem, and here Hitchens makes his case very well.

I was a little disappointed by the initial chapter, which I found very superficial and not very original - up to (and including) chapter six (although there was some anecdotal info, which was interesting or new to me - like the answer to the question "if you were in a strange city at night, and you saw a group of men approaching you, would you feel safer knowing that they had just come out of a place of religious worship". The middle chapters I found best, and towards the end I was a bit bored - I am not sure if this was the intention of the author...

I appreciated very much many references to specific works of philosophers, as well as the literary associations and the reference list at the end of the book. For those wishing to explore the subject it is an excellent source. Hitchens relies very much on his area of expertise, having done a lot of work and written books on Thomas Paine and Mother Theresa, and these fragments of the book felt for me the best and the strongest. The biological arguments were not the most impressive part (better left to Dawkins). Some of the language can be perceived as offensive by the religious people, too. I liked the logic and the comparisons of religious organizations to the infamy of Nazism and Communism (sad but true).

All in all, I think it is a book, which can be a useful voice in a discussion for beginners making first steps in the world of the battles between the religious and the non-believers, and trying to figure out what is good for them.

Just another book by an angry Atheist that needs to beat up those (verbally) who belive in God or have religion. I would say the same for a Believer who would write a book railing Atheists. People's religious believes are none of Hitchen's business and instead of writing books, should just read them. Everyone takes cheap shots at those, especially Christianity. I would like to see Hitchens have a conference on his book in Saudi Arabia, perhaps he would appreciate the free press (in Christian nations) that give him rights to spread his gospel of hate.

The first thing to remember about Christopher Hitchens is that he is a journalist by trade, versus a scholar capable of writing a well researched paper that could withstand extensive critical peer review. Just a quick flip to the back of "God is Not Great" proves my point: there is no bibliography, and the "reference" section, all six pages of it, consists mostly of sloppy and essentially lame notes citing sources that, quite frankly, are almost counterproductive to his arguments.

So what you have here is more of an extended essay: Hitchens' view of the world vis-a-vis religion, which he apparently just had to get off his chest.

There is no doubt that Hitchens IS one heck of a writer, and he has a devastating pen. I would not want to be the target of one of his polemics. Which is what this is. Even though I agree with most of what he says, I can see that ultimately, this is just Christopher Hitchens venting a lifetime's worth of bile toward injustices he sees in the world that he is certain have been caused by religion. I don't disagree with him that in many cases, religion seems, in fact, to be guilty as charged.

What Hitchens fails to address at all however is the debate over whether it is religion that is causing all this evil, or whether bad things happen simply because Man is quite simply a very nasty creature. Believers who like to rebut the former argument by arguing "more people have died under atheist regimes like Stalin or Mao than because of religion" are actually and inadvertently supporting the latter argument. I would suggest that all this mayhem occurs simply because some people are simply no good, and when they get into positions of power they are prone to killing people by the dozens, or perhaps millions. Whether they use their religion, or their fanatic belief in Marxism, or something else as justification doesn't change the fact that their primary rationale has something to do with either greed, lust for power, or just plain nastiness.

Conversely, Hitchens does not account for any of the good that religion accomplishes in the world. And it does, in fact, accomplish much good. I cite as Exhibit A my grand-uncle, who died while I was still very young, and so I do not remember the one time I met him. But I know all about him. He was the village priest in a small farming community in Nova Scotia, and he gave of himself ceaselessly for over 50 years caring for and overseeing the needs of all the people in that community. If someone was sick, he got medical help or tended to the person himself, and used church funds to pay the medical bills if the person had nothing. If someone was hungry, he made sure they were fed. When anyone needed a hand, or support, or a friend, he was there. Would he have still been a decent, caring, charitable person if he had not become a priest? Probably. But would he have accomplished all the good that he did had he not become a man of the cloth? Probably not. So I cannot accept Hitchens argument that "religion poisons everything." It may poison a lot. But everything? No.

If we ran a balance sheet on whether religion does more harm than good, I'm not sure what the answer to that question would be. It might come out pretty even. Or not. I don't disagree that religion causes a lot of harm in the world. We might be better off without it, though eradicating it, when it seems that the need for it is literally hard-wired into most of us genetically, is almost certainly a fool's errand. Still, the kind of black and white thinking that Hitchens exhibits here is ultimately not useful. I would like to see a more balanced analysis of the pros and cons of religion. This book is not it.

In summary, if you are an unbeliever, you may find yourself agreeing with most of Hitchens' criticisms, and you may find yourself laughing out loud. But in the end, this book is too shrill, too negative, too unbalanced, and too unsympathetic to ever do anything more than preach unto the choir of agnostics and atheists, a relatively small percentage of the population. These are not the people who need to be reminded that religion run amok can become a thing of evil. This book will turn off the folks who actually need to hear the message that this book purports to bring long before it ever has a chance to penetrate their thought processes.

So where do we go from here, now that the great English/American intellectual,talk show guest Christopher Hitchens has informed all of mankind that there is no God, that this internal instinct we all have may just be wish-thinking and our need to worship is probably just fear of the dark. And of dying.
Hitchens does do an impressive job of discrediting the holy men and holy books that somehow came to pass before the invention of the video camera and the printing press. The heretofor sacred scriptures are probably just cobbled together collections of folklore, myths, early philosophy and incredible superstition that seemed believable to illiterate peasants in anchient times. But modern man has easy access to all the information ever recorded in the world thru his laptop computer. Are we still to be devoted to such nonsense that was churned up when civilization was in its infancy?
Where I tend to disagree with Hitchens is that even without religion, man will still behave ethically. No he won't. If there is no God, no heaven or hell fire, no certain punishment or eternal reward to choose from, then the riff raft of this world runs amok and society is ungovernable.
The problem is not religion. The problem is the sinister manipulators who inevitably come along to mobilize the gullible, the uneducated, the poor and to use them for political and military gain.
Also, much of this book is wordy and scholarly and whoever did his fact-checking, God bless him.

I found "God Is Not Great" to be scholarly and informative about the way religions have been constructed, and in general I had to push myself through the first three or four chapters to capture the meat of Hitchens' message.

Why? Because one can only hear the obvious that "religions poison" so many times before the message is over-sold. The descriptions about C.S. Lewis' writings, the formation of religions that I call "tribes" in my book, are interesting.

There is something impressively missing in Hitchens' book and in Dawkins as well: Why do people cling to tribes?; Are there ethical tribes that return real value to the individual?; By what measures or metrics can these be evaluated?; and, What if "the metaphysical" is really a seamless extension of "the physical", wherein "the metaphysical" is only the branch of science not explored?

Atheists who are committed to a "belief" that all of the self ends at death, and believers in deities or saviors, have something in common: Their "beliefs" limit their freedom of mind to explore with reason and experience with epistemology.

Locking out any possibility but "termination-of-being" at death is a blind belief - essentially a "religious-like" limitation.

Humanists, for example, who embrace the philosophy of open minds, the freedom to consider all possibilities guided through reason, to explore and make actionable and ethical decisions in one's volitional self-interest, will find support in a new book: Atheists Can Get To "Heaven": Perspectives From The Journey Beyond The Tunnel of Light.

The book may be the first to describe the continuum between the physical and the post-physical, perhaps the first major new concept about the meaning of human life and evolution since Darwin. "A second Copernican Revolution", said one Editor.

The book describes an extraordinary journey that reveals revolutionary discoveries transcending across the physical into the metaphysical. By replacing mythology and faith with reason, the book deeply opens the meaning and vision of enlightened spirituality for humanity based in reason, as a sequence of evolution. This compelling story connects you to a timeless philosophy, revealing a thought-provoking and perhaps controversial new version of humanity's evolving future. The book vividly transports you beyond "the tunnel of light" during a clinical death experience to explore the vastness of our evolutionary future, describing the true nature of "heaven."

Featuring astute perspectives gained from this journey, readers are encouraged to open their mind to possibilities that may transcend current beliefs by gathering answers and meaning supported with observations that can be applied to every day life. This book is a powerful source of hope and inspiration to evolve personal growth with reason and volition, to impressive awareness and attainment.

For a comprehensive description please visit:

www.atheistscangettoheaven.com

then click on the link to Amazon and read the posted "reviews".

..how about actually reading the book BEFORE writing the review. It's just like religious "science": belivers don't need to research before writing. Please spare us this crap. You only make bigger fools out of yourselfs, how that is even possible.

I wanted to like this book, but it's boring, boring, boring. Mr. Hitchens' arguments about God are not persuasive, although they do make him come across as a major jerk. If anything could make me return to religion, it would be this book.

I read a lot of athiest non-fiction. From Dawkins to Harris, at the least, I have skimmed through the book or in the case of Dawkins and Hitchens read it from front to back, enjoying every page. There's some overlap of course, it's not hard to make a case that 1)there is no god, 2) therefore the bible is a fairytale, 3)all religion is myth, etc.

But this book has something new to say and from the viewpoint of a concerned observer, read it for the information on Mother Teresa alone. Wowza, I really had no idea about her!

I am an Atheist in the very simple formulation that I have no belief. I simply do not believe, in anything. I was looking forward to reading Hitchens new book with some anticipation. A man of no small debator and written skills, he has a wonderfully devious mind especially in regards to literature and its various criticisms and defenses. However, I found that "god is not GREAT" to simply be a rehash of ideas with absolutely nothing new put forth on in the debate. As a wordsmith Hitchins excells, but when nothing new is offered I yawn. Better to read Eller's "Natural Atheism" which at least puts forth a handful of unique ideas that cage belief and religion in terms of pure logic and reason into ever diminishingly small irrational actions and ideas (at least once you get past the first few chapters). I cannot give this a single star because there are passages, paragraphs, and sentences of incredible intelligence and humor, but they do not negate the tedium of simply another 'atheistic rant' that does nothing to further the argument.

Assume that the worst book does not exist. Now imagine in your mind what the worst book would be if it existed. Clearly if that book exists in reality, it is worse than the worst book in your mind. But you were imagining the worst book, and we just found a book that is worse than the worst book. This is a contradiction, so the worst book exists, and it is christopher hitchens "god is not great." This was like reading someone's Live Journal. hitchens goes on and on, telling all these anecdotal stories about Thomas Paine and all areas of irrelevant material. Not once did this book require thought to counter any of the tired objections to religion. Page after page, hitchens builds up straw men, bringing out the worst characters in religion and basing entire faiths on these few lousy individuals. hitchens even fails to get basic facts about different faiths correct. It really was pathetic. I began to feel very sorry for him. He is so far out there and understands very little. Finally, hitchens references hardly any of his claims. A few sporadic ones here and there, but the reader cannot verify the bulk of his claims. This is so far removed from being a scholarly work. I am sure I could write a better book on atheism than this.

I read this book hoping for some new evidence, reason, logic and science. But instead I quickly found two mistakes: one is Abraham (of the Bible fame, not our president) is alleged to threaten suicide (it was murder, actually, of his son), and the comment 'rebuilding of the 2nd Temple' Actually it is the rebuilding of the 1st temple (the 2nd temple was considered a disappointment compared to King Solomon's original temple). According to the author Jesus was a false Messiah and possibly wasn't born. Hmmm. A little common sense here; if you feel Jesus was never born, why make the case that he was a false Messiah?

Short of wondering if the author was pummeled in his youth by some wayward nuns, I am bewildered by the level of anger here toward God. Whoops - forgot, God doesn't exist, does he. Why then is the author shaking his fist at - well - nothing? You can almost imagine those pesky wayward nuns somewhere - shaking their collective heads and murmuring, 'Hey, isn't that the kid we pummeled years ago..." Stay tuned - there may be a new movie coming for the Christmas season: Nuns Gone Wild.

Simply put, Hitchens manages to write about 300 pages without actually making an argument.

As a religious person who has actually talked to atheists, I know that atheist "arguments" regarding religion tend to fall into two categories: actual logical arguments and whining about the evils of religion. Hitchens's book falls firmly in the second camp. None of what he presents is truly "new" to me, and as a result I found the book to be far from stimulating. It didn't make me think through the issues at all. The problem, of course, is that every religion I am aware of has a rather simple explanation for why even religious people commit evil acts. So, not only is the list of religious atrocities dull (because it is far from new), it doesn't do anything to challenge my religious beliefs.

If you want a book that will actually make you think about the issues involved with theistic belief, don't read this one. If you're atheist already, all this book will do is give you a bunch of information that is totally useless, as no religious person will find it either new or convincing. If you're religious, all this book will do is bore you with examples which, though not familiar in the particulars, are certainly just like the typical atheist whining you're used to hearing.

One side point: Hitchens insists on referring to humans as "mammals". While this may technically be true, the effect that it creates is one of anti-humanism. That is, he pushes humans down in terms of their moral value. This is opposed to Richard Dawkins who, while making a similar point, pulls the rest of life UP. Not a big point, just something that I found to be annoying... And not particularly useful if you want to show that atheists can value humanity. From the way Hitchens talks, it sounds like he has little to no respect for his species.

If you want to read a good defense of atheism, don't read this book. Read Dawkins's "The God Delusion". Though I didn't find it to be convincing, it at least gave me arguments that I had to think about.

just plain bad...I;ve heard two year olds have better arguments aginst God than this guy...

Hitchen's book God is not Great is a thought provoking book that shows much of the violence that has been caused by people of faith. Hitchen's give historical, as well as personal examples of how religion has caused chaos, and even great ignorance around the world. personally, I am a believer in God, but I found myself agree with many of the things Hitchen's was writing about in his book. For instance, the claim that many people make on knowing God's intention, but not understanding the origin of the universe. However, I do disagree with what he writes on Gandhi, and his argument of religion being a form of child abuse. I believe that this is a book everyone should read weather someone believes in God or not.

This book offers a detailed account of the how key aspects of various religious beliefs came to be and the numerous flaws they have. The gospels of the New Testiment, for example, contradict each other on key facts.

Hitchens is thorough in his use of facts to expose the true inconsistencies and failures of the various monotheist sects. He also exposes why many of the beleifs came about - a means to control the masses, to empower key people or institions.

My only criticism with Hitchens is he is overly verbose at times. He could make and support his point with a bit less text.

I recommend this book to anyone looking for a better understanding of how various religious beliefs came about and why they are obviously flawed.

Hitchens does an excellent job of laying out, in very simple terms and concepts, the real role of religion in our society.

From his analisys of the origins of religion to his very interesting examples of failed religions or some amazing facts about religious celebrities like Mother Theresa, Hitchens presents a face of religion that many people may never have seen.

It is not a frontal attack on Christianity; it has a very good chapter on Islam that christians will love.

Now, to all those who have rated this book without reading it. Stop making fools of yourselves. If you had actually read the book you would at least give it three stars. It's that good.

The following is a review of the Christopher Hitchens book "God is not Great." The setting for the writing of the review is beautiful Door County. The weather turned out to be in the 70's and 80's all week. Each morning I would rise and write a little bit while listening to my Mp3 player and drinking caramel flavored coffee. The first morning I rose at about 7am, stepped out onto the porch and spotted a doe. She was feeding on a plant near the path at the foot of the large deck. A pristine morning was made better by glancing at this miracle of nature and symbol of peace. I stared at her and she at me for at least three or four minutes. After a while she capriciously sauntered on into the woods. I felt that the deer was a symbol for my careful but natural movement through life, being cautious not to hurt any living thing. As I write this review, I hope I am going to be as careful and sensitive as possible to different points of view. As my sister said at age 6, "Everybody is different. I know it and you should know it too." Well said Sarah. I will never forget your pearls of wisdom. :)

Well, on to the subject at hand. The book I have chosen to read while on vacation at Door County is "God is not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything." Author Christopher Hitchens seems to revel on controversy and argument. Like a good lawyer he is constantly he is building a better argument for his case.
At the book's beginning, he talks about a teacher he had when he was nine years old who made a poignant impression on him. At that impressionable age, he was imbued with a sense of the sacredness of nature thanks to someone named Mrs. Jean Watts. Hitchens eloquently talks about his disturbing "ah-hah" experience when he realizes Mrs. Watts is teaching about the details of nature but is simultaneously delivering a message of magical thinking---that God created the mountains, the streams the lakes and all of the wonderful creatures. She asks Hitchens about such things as the infinite color variation of the wild flowers and asks how there could not be a God making all of this just for us. Hitchens says he was tempted by ignorance and didn't take the bait. "If Satan chose her to tempt me into error he was much more inventive than the subtle serpent in the Garden of Eden. She never raised her voice or offered violence---which couldn't be said for all of my teachers. " Wow.

In somewhat a related fashion, Hitchens takes some pride in unveiling the late Mother Theresa's humanness. He has written a book about Theresa, who had a private side that was much more flawed and less confident than her public persona. As he saw this poignant cognitive dissonance in his earlier teacher he noticed imperfections after studying the late religious figure. He exposes how Mother Theresa struggled with her faith until her last days. Hitchens with his rapid-fire, William F. Buckley type intellectualism is able to put things in perspective, accepting the vast imperfections even of one who is thought to be God like by some many millions of followers worldwide. This experience of psychologically ingesting Mrs. Watts' ideas on faith led to an epiphany of sorts---confirming to his young strong intellect that he would see many more apparent contradictions that he (and only he) would be able to sort out. Having a strong intellect also carries with it the strong responsibility. With his great propensity towards and aptitude towards logic and learning I believe he knew had the power to sway opinion at an early age.
At this tender age of nine he would continue to critique the Bible. "Why did I have to continue to say in public that I was a miserable sinner?" At 13, he would read Sigmund Freud's "Future of an Illusion," which would give him another totally new intellectual paradigm for assimilating postulates of human good and evil. The Id made more logical sense than some outdated black magic being imposed by non-logical thinkers.

Here are Hitchens' objections to faith in a nutshell:

1. It wholly misrepresents the origins of man and of the cosmos.
2. It combines the maximum of servility with the maximum of solipsism.
3. It is the result and cause of dangerous sexual repression.
4. It is grounded on wish-thinking.

These are hard to argue with.


Hitchens says atheism is less a doctrine and more of a distrust of anything that contradicts science or enrages reason. Wow. The atheist intellectual continues with his insights:

"We are not immune to the love of wonder and mystery and awe; we have music and art and literature, and find serious ethical dilemmas are better handled by Shakespeare and Tolstoy and Schiller and Dostoyevsky and Elliot than in mythical morality tales of the holy books."

As I was reading the book I started thinking about Carl Rogers' term called congruence. It seems to me that the religious crowd may have more problems overcoming contradictions in expression and being honest and direct. Inherent in the scientific method(as Sam Harris aptly puts it) is honest reflection of hypotheses and must have the ability to humbly admit right and wrong. Such humility is scarcely seen in religious circles where minds are already made up. All the answers are known. I saw some of this in Promisekeepers and it made me feel uncomfortable. There is a certain non-intellectual drama inherent in religious ritual it seems that is empty of any objectively meaningful content.

Mighty religious scholars like Aquinas and Augustine "may have written about many evil things and many foolish things, and may have been laughably ignorant of the germ theory of disease or the place of the globe in the solar system, let alone the universe."

So what Hitchens seems to be saying(in his William F. Buckley manner) is that we have been fast asleep like a little children at Christmastime, imbued with magical thinking. As Daniel Dennett aptly puts it, we must courageously break the spell.(Have you seen Dennett's brilliant interview with Bill Moyers. Please google it on Youtube!)

Mr. Hitchens says that people who proclaim answers from belief and tradition alone and not on reason and personal experience should not have the audacity to pretend to know all, arrogantly standing over all non-believers. He says I quote, "Such stupidity, combined with such pride, should be enough on its own to exclude belief from the debate. The person who is certain, and who claims divine warrant for his certainty, belongs now to the infancy of our species. (As Daniel Dennett says, "Playing the faith card is a disqualifying move.")

Hitchens adds that such a farwell should not be protracted. Let's say our goodbyes with a courteous smile and get on with more interesting people. Life is too short to debate with unreasoning individuals.

I cannot help but to think that I may be misrepresenting myself as a "seeker" to my Christian friends, (who by the way are patient with my apparent potential for growth as they see it.)

When Christopher's father died, he read perhaps the most awe inspiring passage from the Bible at this funeral:

"Finally brethen, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report, if there be any virtue, if there be any praise, think on these things."

Richard Dawkins has proclaimed that religion holds many things we hold near and dear hostage. By this he means it's all knowing presence at weddings, funerals, baptisms, Easter, Christmas, etc. Religion is infused with all of these events with a pious intensity, like they own them and the human feelings and compassion that go with those happenings. The events have a religious context and no other, which leads to a sort of cognitive narrowing. It is simply the one-dimensional paradigm that we are all the most familiar with. To abandon religious tyranny of this kind too quickly, I fear, would be too traumatic of a change on people who are firmly rooted in tradition. How about a marriage without God in it? How about instead of "Amazing Grace" we sing "Amazing Energy of a Higher Power That Has Yet to be Scientifically Proven?" It wouldn't fly. We cling to tradition like a security blanket like to Mommy and Daddy when we were four years of age.

Perhaps my greatest fear is that even though Dawkins, Harris, Hitchens and Dennett are well meaning and make very convincing points, their paradigms require a deep intellectual committment not just taking in information on faith.

My Christian friend Craig seems says he is afraid of the bottom dropping out if we learned that God isn't real. It could be mass kaos in the streets. The foundation would drop out and there would be no reason to be good. This life would be a meaningless contest devoid of any reason to do good---hence the only answer is to follow as many selfish desires as is possible during our finitely but sometimes infinitely troubled lives. Serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer believed the same after he converted to Christianity. (I'm in no way comparing my friend Craig with Dahmer, but trying to point out a faulty piece of thinking.) In an interview with Stone Phillips, he said that evil would flourish without this structure and goodness provided by Jesus Christ, the savior of mankind.

This may be most subtly evil idea in the world, that people would be incapable of morality if the paradigm shifts(or as Daniel Dennett calls it 'the Cosmic Shift') The reality is that we live in a world which is changing quickly and if we fail to adapt---we will not survive. This is perhaps Sam Harris's greatest trepidation as well, that he has professed on many occasions. What responsiblity do athiests have once they reasoned believers half way out so they cannot find themselves back in? They are left in the void to search for a messiah they will never be able to reach??



As I read on, I noticing a confrontational mode that Hitchen's ego seems to thrive on---a politically confident tone that could border on unnecessary arrogance. My brother Will saw CH speak in Madison and said he lost respect for him when he got entangled in an argument with anti-war protesters. Will said he felt sorry for the audience because they got shortchanged out of what they came to see, a debate on religion. One of my reasons for reading the book is the investigate this apparent arrogance and to see how it may get in the way of the truth Hitchens wants us to know. How much of his ego is just plain getting in the way??

Hitchens is empathetic to author Salmon Rushdie when he asks why such a "lonely and peaceful individual" would be hunted down by extremist groups. He blames the fanatical mindset for this. True genius is attacked by those who do not understand. That is too bad. There is a quote by Martin Sheen that my mother loved and I believe applies directly to me an my life and Rushie's life,


I do it because I can't seem to live with myself if I do not. I don't know any other way to be. It isn't something you can explain; it is just something that you do; it is something that you are.



I believe that we need to gain the courage to live our own lives as bravely as possible, not afraid of giving our true loving selves to others.

It is up to those with free thinking propensities to shed light on black and white thinking, for example the different between the all or nothing mindsets of pro lifers versus the pro choice thinkers who are able to see the subtle grays. BIG DIFFERENCE!! The black and white thinking of religion says "You believe or else you will experience hell fires for eternity." That is a fairly arrogant claim, don't you think??

Hitchens also offers his thoughts on 9-11. He talks about the rediculous claims of Robertson and Falwell that infer that the terrorist attacks were the result of our moral weaknesses of permitting too much homosexuality and abortion---ant that as then AG John Ashcroft said that America had "no king but Jesus." That is scary. George Bush consults religious leaders before making decisions that could alter the future of the free world. Faith thinking is not the same as thinking based on reason.

CH's book is full of shocking facts about how supposedly learned men are still hanging on to superstition because it gives them more spiritual comfort than science. Timothy Dwight president of Yale University(one of the most respected adults in the country) was opposed forto the smallpox vaccination because he regarded it as an interference with God's design. What about a former first lady who believes in astrology??

Hitchens hits hard again....

"In the city of Jerusalem, there is a special word in the mental hospital for those who represent a special danger to themselves and others. These deluded patients are often sufferers from the "Jerusalem Syndrome." Police and security officers are trained to recognize them through their mania. Their mania is sometimes concealed behind a mask of deceptively beautific calm. They have came to the holy city in order to convince themselves as Messiah and to proclaim the end of days."

Religion is not rational.


"The holy book is the largest continuous use, the Talmud, commands the observant one to thank his maker every day that he is not woman." Hitchens goes on to say, "Throughout all religious texts there is a primitive fear that half the human race is simultaneously defiled and unclean, and yet is a a temptation to sin that is impossible to resist."

Why does religion carry with it the fatalistic belief in armagedeon? In this age of nuclear weapons why resign oneself to destruction just because the Bible says it's so? There will fire on the planet, then Jesus will come? Don't bet on it. I think we are responsible for our own survival. Hitchens talks about the death wish which "may be secretly present in all of us." He continues...."When the earthquake hits, or the tsunami inundates or the twin towers ignite, you can see and hear the secret satisfaction of the faithful. Gleefully they strike up, " You see---this is what happens when you don't listen to us. With an unctious smile they offer redemption that is not theirs to bestow and when questioned, put on the menacing scowl that says, 'Oh, so you reject our offer of paradise? Well, in that case, we have quite another fate in store for you.' Such love, such care."

I've absolutely loved everything Christopher Hitchens has said about religion in this book and everything else he's had to say about religion before and after. He's a brilliant man who's done his homework. But I think the title is misleading because I don't think god(as in the concept or possibility) is inseperable from religion. In other words I don't think its unreasonable for an anti or exreligious person or even a scientist to believe in god. As long that god isn't being worshiped and does not stand in the way of education, than it is reasonable.

As long as the concept and possibility of god is used responsibly and not selfishly, it shouldn't stand in the way of truth. Religion is the problem because it is education's worst nightmare, it is absolute. As long as people interpret god as being a cross between Kim Jong Il and some self-centered teenaged girl from Beverly Hills as religion has done beautifully for thousands of years, than its going to become more and more difficult for rational people to be taken seriously by atheists when they say they believe in god too.

But that's enough of my rambling, buy this book, I don't care who you are because Hitchens has said what needs to be said relentlessly about the evils of religion. Don't be ashamed or afraid of being an atheist because books like this one demonstrate that its a good thing.

Hitchens is an extremely sharp, erudite, and well-qualified author on the subject of religion. Having had several encounters with different faiths in his life, he is a journalist who has witnessed first-hand the effects of religious belief around the world. He also has intimate knowledge of religious traditions through history, as well as of important thinkers. In this book he chronicles how throughout human history, religion has been the bringer of more suffering, fear, and misery than any other force. What's sad is that most of what he says is obvious, yet most everyone is afraid to admit it. At one point Hitchens gets a bit carried away, arguing that Stalin's regime showed many characteristics of a monotheistic religion. That may be true, but there's a logical fallacy at work: just because religious institutions tend to be totalitarian in nature, and Stalinism was totalitarian, doesn't make Stalinism a religion. It's important to realize that it's religious institutions that are responsible for the considerable damage catalogued in the book. The faithful don't tend to be any more or less moral than the nonfaithful, but the power of religion as a means of dominance and control gives them a whole lot of leverage.

it comes to no surprise that these anti-religious loons are trying to convert as many people to atheism and humanism when events like 9/11 were sparked by religious fundamentalism. It is fundamentalism that is the problem, not religion itself. However, these people who have limited understanding of God seek to do damage which is not supposed to be the role of individuals but rather a collective of people who seek to prove that they are right and everyone else who is not like them is wrong. These secular fundamentalists are no different nor any better than their religious counterpart, I find it interesting how much they have in common yet they hate each other.

This war on religion should be more so focused upon the war against fundamentalism, not religion, nor God. These inspired texts have caused much conflict, no one can deny it, but they have also cause people to reach potentials never before reached. Could it be that fundamentalism is the problem being that fundamentalism is what has caused religion to be used for war and personal gain? These critics of religion should be willing to help their religious heretical counterparts in breaking down dogmatic fundamentalism. Instead they dont, they attack all of religiosity as if it was the full problem. These books and others like them are based on ignorance.

Whatever this book is about, it's not about God. It's about the author, first and foremost, which is perhaps a very exciting subject for the author himself, but not necessarily for his intended audience. It is also about the religion, primarily about the organized religion. I would suggest that an appropriate title for this book should be either 'Christopher Hitchens Is Great' or 'Organized Religion Is Not Great'.
Boring, inconsequential and meaningless is all I can say about this book.

This review addresses the quality of the audiobook and does not address the content itself.

The engineer on this album failed or simply forgot to compress and/or normalize the audio. The narrator has a habit of "punching" the first words of the sentence and then trailing off to almost a whisper.

If you drive a very quiet car or have a killer sound system, this may not be an issue. For the Toyota drivers of the world, it's a nightmare. If you crank up the volume you get an ear-splitting start of a sentence and then a "what did he just say?" end to the sentence.

In short, do not buy the audiobook version unless you're listening in a sound-proof studio in a hollowed-out volcano using professional earphones. It's maddening.

Author shows his dislike for religion in an intelligent and informative manner. I would recommend people involved in religions to read and assess their views afterwards.

Religion, that which is man made, and God, that which is divine, or natural, have nothing in common. I think Hitchens is confused.

The good about this book is that it is written by Hitchens, and is a very witty, entertaining look at religion. The bad is that it really does not present any new or more convincing arguments on religion than previous good books from atheists or atheist philosophers. So, it stands to be taken wrong by some people.

First, religion doesn't poison Everything, but I would agree it poisons a tremendous number of things. Dawkins did not like the title of his BBC series, "The Root of All Evil," because religion is not the root of All Evil, and he didn't think anything could be given that distinction. It may be the root of much evil, though. For some people, religion helps. I'm just not one of them. For others, religion does hurt and poison. To not admit this is sheer stupidity.

As far as anti-religious arguments, one gets the impression that ad hominem attacks are fine in Hitchens opinion, though they certainly do not disprove the claims of any religion. If one takes this in stride, though, and is contented to read for the sheer enjoyment of the book, this book is one of the more readable of the recent atheist books.

Here I am just going to review the audio book. As for the book I will do that when I finish it. I did not finish it yet because of the poor quality of the audio book! The author is a terrible reader. I would much rather they had hired someone to read it instead of him. When he isn't mumbling he is reading at 50 miles an hour and this isn't some fiction book where if you miss the colour of the protagonists pants it isn't the end of the world. Half the time you cannot tell what the author is reading! I am extremely disappointed!

Welcome to the animal farm. The barnyard animals have finally taken over the farmhouse from those awful farmers, but now the pigs are dressing up like people and acting just as bad! Its humorous to see the "new atheists" embrace the same rigidity, anger, and strident dismissal of any disagreement that they find (rightly so) disturbing in religion. The icing on the cake is that such educated and "intellectual" thinkers could be so obtuse to the irony therein. If I had to be trapped in an elevator with either Jerry Fallwell or Richard Dawkins.....flip a coin.

Hitchens doesnt know that atheist religion is responsable for more deaths in 80 years that all wars combined in human history? (175 - 200M, they lost count after 150M). Lenin, Stalin, Hitler , Mao, Pol Pot. the evil crusades, killed about 100,000. Stalin killed more Russians than Hitler did ( atheists always kill each other, Stalin killed trotsky and Sergie Kurov). hitle rclosed the boy scouts, all religous schools, and youth movements, and taught the waffen SS that jesus was the bastard son of a Jew and embraced evolution. Early evolutionists were hugely racist, believing africans weren't fully evolved . Hitchen really isnt very bright.

Christopher Hitchens is elevating the level of skepticism within the ranks of the mass uniformed public.

This book makes it increasingly difficult to defend religion and adherence to belief in god on the ground with the common person.

We are another day closer to tossing religion and ideas about god onto the ash heap of human immaturities.

Many people