Levi reviewed Orthodoxy by G. K. Chesterton
None
3 stars
A mixed bag of brilliant insights on one hand and absolutely pedantry and jingoism on the other. GKC speaks in metaphor constantly, and some of them are brilliant and others completely break down quickly. Some of his arguments are sublime while others are easily and even obviously refuted, and yet he pretends they are rock solid, which is annoying. Part of that is that this was written a few generations ago so I’m sure some is lost in translation. He refers to contemporary events so sometimes you have to guess a little at exact meaning based on context. And sometimes you get the sense that certain words may have been used differently then. But for the most part it is understandable; I don’t think you need a study guide for this necessarily.
He gives some of his opponents due justice but for most of them he merely argues against a …
A mixed bag of brilliant insights on one hand and absolutely pedantry and jingoism on the other. GKC speaks in metaphor constantly, and some of them are brilliant and others completely break down quickly. Some of his arguments are sublime while others are easily and even obviously refuted, and yet he pretends they are rock solid, which is annoying. Part of that is that this was written a few generations ago so I’m sure some is lost in translation. He refers to contemporary events so sometimes you have to guess a little at exact meaning based on context. And sometimes you get the sense that certain words may have been used differently then. But for the most part it is understandable; I don’t think you need a study guide for this necessarily.
He gives some of his opponents due justice but for most of them he merely argues against a straw man. Most of his treatments of other philosophers or thinkers were totally insufficient. It’s funny that he accuses others of jingoism and yet he is the most jingoistic writer I have possibly ever read.
His language is so dense with metaphor on abstract ideas (religion/philosophy/history/etc) that you have to stop and think about it carefully. This isn’t a quick read, but for those who enjoy having to really think about and engage with what you read. That should be a selling point really but...just putting it out there.
So...should you read this? If you’re a Christian thinker I think the answer is still a resounding YES for multiple reasons. First for the gold in here, even if you have to sift gold out of mud it’s still gold! And the second reason is that he provides a model of how to go about searching for meaning in a totally different way than the typical. That’s interesting enough in its own right. And a third is that this guy probably influenced other writers that you love...CS Lewis, JR Tolkien, Barfield, George MacDonald, the list goes on.
So yes, read this, just be ready to take some things with a grain of salt.
