Entrees to Philosophy of Religion

One of our readers wrote recently enquiring whether I could suggest names of some important books or texts in the field of philosophy of religion. Here is a brief bibliography of books, beginning with texts I have used in some of my classes and others that I consider good entrees into the field, with no pretense of thoroughness. I begin with beginner's books, because I think those are the most difficult to pick, and proceed toward some of the more substantial classics. Feel free to suggest others that come to mind in the comment box.

Books and approaches in philosophy generally, and philosophy of religion as well, are divided along various ideological lines into various camps, one of the largest being (a) logical empiricist, or analytical, or anglo-American, and (b) continental/phenomenological. When it comes to philosophy of religion, the former has a tradition of preoccupation with analytical proofs for God's existence, truth claims, interest in religious languages statements, etc., whereas the latter is concerned less with truth claims than with understanding and describing the experience and meaning of religious experience. Both traditions have merit, as well as defects, and one finds Christians in both camps. The Catholic tradition of philosophy of religion was originally independent of either of these camps, though one now finds Catholics all over the place. Alvin Plantinga (pictured left), a Calvinist philosopher, writing from within the analytical tradition, was one of the first to break open the strangle-hold of positivist assumptions within that tradition. (See my review of The Analytic Theist: An Alvin Plantinga Reader, ed. James F. Sennett.) Some of his books are well worth reading. But here's what I would do. I would start with a few basic anthologies, and I would recommend the following, probably in something like the following order:

• C. Stephen Evans, Philosophy of Religion: Thinking About Faith (1985), a good popular overview of the first tradition of philosophy of religion by a very good evangelical Protestant philosopher
  
  
• Kelly James Clark, Return to Reason: A Critique of Enlightenment Evidentialism and a Defense of Reason and Belief in God (1990), a very good popular introduction to 'Reformed Epistemology' -- the revolution in religious epistemology effected by Alvin Plantinga -- by another good Protestant philosopher
  
  
• Linda Zagzebski, ed., Rational Faith: Catholic Responses to Reformed Epistemology (1994), a great anthology of a broad spectrum of Catholic responses to Plantinga
  
  
• Merold Westphal, God, Guilt, and Death: An Existential Phenomenology of Religion (1987), a book which, besides it's great title, is a great introduction to the continental/phenomenological approach to philosophy of religion by a professor at Fordham University.
  
  
• Michael Peterson, et al., eds., Philosophy of Religion: Selected Readings (2001), offers a much more thorough, excellent anthology dealing primarily with the analytical approach, with some apparent sympathies for Reformed Epistemology.
  
  
• Michael Peterson, et al., eds., Reason and Religious Belief: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion (2002), is yet another good introduction to the philosophy of religion from this perspective.
  
  
• Zofia J. Zdybicka, Person and Religion: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion (Catholic Thought from Lublin, Vol. 3) (1991), an introduction to philosophy of religion from the perspective of Lublin Thomism, a synthesis of classic Thomism with phenomenological personalism
  
  
• Pope John Paul II, Person and Community: Selected Essays (Catholic Thought from Lublin, Vol 4), translated by Theresa Sandok (1994), which offers the late Karol Wojtyla's contribution to the tradition of the synthesis of Thomism and phenomenological personalism known as Lublin Thomism

Beyond that, there are important writers in the Catholic tradition one should be familiar with, of course, such as Etienne Gilson and Josef Pieper, particularly their books on St. Thomas Aquinas, as well as the works of St. Thomas himself. Some dismiss Thomas as irrelevant to issues in contemporary philosophy of religion. This, in my view, is a large mistake. Those unfamiliar with the thought of this master labor at a great disadvantage in this field, even -- perhaps especially -- in those areas where classic Thomistic positions are derisively dismissed (as in current debates about 'absolute divine simplicity'). In order of mounting difficulty, I would recommend the following:

• G.K. Chesterton, Saint Thomas Aquinas: The Dumb Ox (1974), Thomist scholars have sometimes enviously 'eaten their hearts out' over the ability of this popular English author to summarize so well the basic points of St. Thomas' life and thought.
  
  
• Josef Pieper, Guide to Thomas Aquinas (1991), a gem of an introduction by a renown German Catholic well worth knowing.
  
  
• Etienne Gilson, The Christian Philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas (1994), a classic standard by a magisterial interpreter of St. Thomas.
  
  
• St. Thomas Aquinas, A Summa of the Summa, edited and annoted by Peter Kreeft (1990), a good introduction to St. Thomas' Summa Theologia, with very helpful footnotes and guides for the beginner.
  
  
• St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica (translated by Fathers of the English Dominican Province) (5 Volume Set) (Hardcover) 1981), the Doctor of the Church himself.
  
  

Other classics in philosophy of religion include, of course, such works as the following, and many, many others:

• St. Augustine, Confessions: Books I-XIII (1993), immortal classic in Frank Sheed's magisterial translation
  
  
• St. Anselm, Proslogion (1979), classic by the Archbishop of Canterbury, author of the Ontological Argument for God's existence
  
  
• Blaise Pascal, Pensees (1995), by one of the most prescient Christian philosophers of the early modern era.
  
  
• Soren Kierkegaard, Kierkegaard Anthology (1973), one of the most brilliant 'correctives' from the modern existentialist era.
  
  
• Rudolf Otto, The Idea of the Holy (1958)
  
  
• William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience (1999)
  
  
• William James, The Will to Believe, Human Immortality (1956)
  
  
• The Venerable John Henry Cardinal Newman, An Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent (1973), one of the most elegant, eloquent, persuasive, arguments for the existence of God by any Christian philosopher.