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The Meaning of History, by Ronald H. Nash
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The Meaning of History is a concise look at the meaning of the history of the world from the viewpoints of major historians and philosophers. By examining the individual approaches of these great thinkers, this book takes on the monumental task of analyzing the history of humanity and its prospects for the future. The book studies not just the facts of history, but the personality and purpose of the vastly influential figures who shaped it. Is history constantly repeating itself, or is civilization evolving toward a predestined utopia? Is history in God's hands, or does it depend on the whims of man? This informative book traces the arc of civilization from the New Testament all the way through to today. It will forever change the way you look at history and your individual place in it.
- Sales Rank: #1103286 in Books
- Color: Purple
- Brand: B&H Academic
- Published on: 1998-08-01
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 8.50" h x .41" w x 5.56" l, .54 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 192 pages
- Great product!
About the Author
Ronald H. Nash (PhD, Syracuse University) was professor of philosophy at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. He is the author of numerous books, including The Concept of God and Faith and Reason.
Most helpful customer reviews
25 of 26 people found the following review helpful.
Good Overview
By Steve Jackson
Professor Ronald Nash has written an enjoyable overview of the philosophy of history. He starts out with a discussion of "world views" from a Christian perspective. He then contrasts the Christian view of history (linear) to the typical non-Christian view, which tends to be cyclical. He then provides concise discussions of some of the principal philosophers of history: Augustine, Vico, Herder, Kant, Hegel, Marx, Spengler and Toynbee. He critiques their thought from a Christian perspective, in his case a Calvinist philosophy drawning on the thought of Gordon Clark (although, curiously, he doesn't refer the reader to Clark's principal work on the subject, Historiography: Secular and Religious).
This is an enjoyable book, meant primarily for those with minimal knowledge of philosophy and the philosophy of history. There's nothing wrong with that, but at times the discussions of various writers can be rather slim. On the other hand, many people well-read in philosophy aren't familiar with Vico and Herder, and they should be.
Readers who are interested in the topic might wish to start with Prof. Nash's work on then read Brander's Staring Into Chaos and Bebbington's Patterns of History. Also relevant is Passmore's The Perfectability of Man, which deals with similar issues from a somewhat different perspective.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful.
great place to start...just don't end here
By Dave Wainscott
I have an aversion to verse-itis.
I hate the seduction of reductionism
I am apologetic about any use of apologetics.
But I unapologetically love the book...even though I didn't want to.
I don't necessarily see Nash selling out to any of those paths.
Mostly, he is limited by the very medium (which becomes, and here becomes {see dictionary definition #2}, the message)
a short introduction (!) to the meaning of history.
Facing an impossible job, he has done wonderfully well.
The basic idea is to introduce us to the speculative history of speculative history, via a comparison of the cyclical view with a linear view (specifically, a Christian view and worldview), and then through a succinct summary of representative figures of the philosophy of history: Augustine, Vico, Kant, Herder, Marx and Spengler/Toynbee..
and all with an apologetic edge; offering the Christian worldview, which Nash defines as linear as opposed to cyclical.
Thoughts:
1)For all the risk of reductionism, it may be the best place for the general (Christian) reader to start on the topic. Nash also offers that it also "a good place...for slightly advanced students of the subject to check their previously acquired opinions" (p. x). I also appreciated his ability to avoid a cheesy "we must train our young people to recapture a Christian worldview" as he discusses how important worldview ("conceptual system") is; and reminds us that everyone inevitably operates from one, and that worldviews are inherently religious. It was somewhat surprising (and refreshing) to read an evangelical saying in print that "Paul Tillich was right." Though Nash is quick to nuance:
"Paul Tillich is right when he defined religion as a matter of 'ultimate concern'...Religion is more than this, but it cannot be less." (27). His chapter on worldview reminded me of VanderLaan's quote that "every story has a pricetag."
2)The chapter on Hegel is hugely helpful. Nash makes the case that Hegel is widely misunderstood
as the thesis>antithesis>synthesis triad. Nash notes that Hegel himself never directly used those three words together, and when he did encounter what would today be popularly considered the basic Hegelian view of the triad, he explicitly rejects it (see Hegel's preface to Phenomenology of Mind)!
Hegel is not very Hegelian at some points! (and don't blame Calvin for all things branded Calvinism...ditto for
SK et al). The issues raised in the process of deconstructing and reconstructing Hegel are also key in grasping
a) what Hegel intends to connote by aufhebehn (synthesis) and Geist (Spirit/World Spirit/Mind/God)
b)the centrality of self-consciousness and freedom to Hegelian thought.
2)I certainly was not expecting a proposed solution to the authorship mystery of The Book of Hebrews to show up in the book at all, let alone to be so pivotal to the flow that a whole chapter (4) is dedicated to the suggested writer...Apollos..being "the first Christian philosopher." Nash makes the case that the argument of Hebrews assumes an author familiar with (from experience), and arguing against, a Philo-tainted, and Alexandrian-infected (read circular/cyclical) view of history. Check it out in Chapter 4 (though, maddeningly, a huge teaser for "the first Christian philosopher" in the book's introduction [page 4] mistakenly suggests this unveiling happens in Chapter 5....... the only typo/editing mistake I found in the whole book, pretty rare)
3) A format criticism: The book has no concluding chapter. It ends with a chapter on the New Marxism.
That seems bizarre, even impossible for an apologetics kind of book...until you realize there indeed is a brief concluding section, but it will never be found by the causal reader, as it is part of the final chapter on the New Marxism.
In all, an excellent...maybe the best...place to start. Nash would be the first to be sure you branch out from there.
But what a gift to have this unprecedented starting place.
A more detailed version of this review is on my blog, Holy Heteroclite.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful.
Reformed philosophy of history
By phleg_mel
Within meaning of history, scientific history seeks knowledge for its own sake, without practical value; whereas, speculative history attempts to find inner or ultimate significance of events in human history as a whole. Since the New Testament Scriptures reveal the importance and meaning of the historical process, scientific and speculative history is significant to Christianity.
Conflicting patterns of history indicate many opposing answers about meaning, purpose, and goal of history. Consciously or unconsciously, our worldviews affect the way we interpret and judge reality, influencing what we believe and how we live. As we seek to understand importance of worldviews and their role in systems of speculative history, we must not ignore the intellectual and personal biases often carried into field of history.
Nearly all civilizations existing before the beginning of the Christian era ascribed a cyclical pattern to history, wherein the sequence of historical events would continually repeat into the future. Unlike the Judeo-Christian God, an eternal, almighty, all-knowing, loving spiritual Person, the Stoic God is impersonal and hence incapable of knowledge, love, or providential acts.
The non-Hebraic cultures of the pre-Christian world held a hopeless approach to history. Nevertheless, Philo effectively turned away from the Old Testament and its positive view of history in favor of the cyclical view.
The author of Hebrews assumed his readers are familiar with Alexandrian philosophy and theology. Nash concludes the author of Hebrews must have been Apollos, who became the first Christian philosopher.
History is not a circle; it is a line beginning with creation and ending with the final judgment and eternity.
As the most important Christian thinker between A.D. 100 and Thomas Aquinas in the thirteenth century, Augustine opposed the pagan belief in blind fate with the Christian teaching of divine providence. Augustine attacked the moral implications of the cyclical view.
In his monumental work, The City of God, Augustine stated, "People belong to the City of God by virtue of their love of God; the rest of humanity belongs to the City of Man because of their love of self, even to the contempt of God."
Although the City of Man provides a temporal peace, humans escape the City of Man. Through the redemption made available in Jesus Christ, they become part of the City of God, which aims at an eternal peace of heavenly blessedness.
Italy's great philosopher was Giambattistia Vico, who used scientific history as grounds for constructing a universal history. His New Science consisted of two methods: Philosophy, reasoning from axioms, definitions, and postulates; and philology, an empirical study of the languages, history, and literature of people. Vico's firmly entrenched worldview commitment prevented him from stepping back and rethinking his presuppositions. Consequently, he depreciated God's control over history in order to maximize the role of humans as makers of their own history.
Kant describes history as the development of humanity from barbarism and superstition to a life of reason. Reason, nature, and progress are three controlling ideas of the Enlightenment. The Enlightenment eventually gave birth to an essentially anti-Christian worldview within Christendom.
Kant presents us with a linear view of history that encourages optimism about the future. Nevertheless, the progress doctrine denies human personality its true significance. Those willing to learn from the record of previous civilizations realize the importance of rejecting the doctrine of inevitable human progress. The Christian worldview's uncompromising message of human weakness and evil is realistic, whereas the now-abandoned theories of progress were not.
Though an ordained Lutheran clergyman, Herder taught that God does not interfere in human history, thus making history a purely natural phenomenon. Each culture grows like a plant - unevenly and spontaneously - depending on the soil where it is planted. Whatever happens to humans is determined by conditions in their environment. Herder and other historicists contend that historical, geographical, and cultural conditions are both necessary and sufficient conditions for the content of human nature.
In his approach to history, Hegel believed "that Reason is the Sovereign of the world; the history of the world therefore presents us with a rational process." Hegel's God fulfills itself through the evolutionary development of human consciousness. Whenever the World Spirit initiates new and difficult turns in human history, it uses "heroes." The particular purposes of these heroes contain substantially the will of the World Spirit. Individual humans are but pawns in the inevitable movement of history toward the Universal. In the depressing record of tragedy, heartbreak, and stupidity is to be found the mechanism of history. Hegel calls this "the cunning of reason." Truth is the synthesis of humanity's subjective will (their own thinking) and the universal Will (which is objectified in the laws and organization of the State).
Marx repeatedly makes moral judgments that have a ring of absoluteness and authoritarianism about them. For Marx, economics is the only factor determining human life. Marx replaced Hegel's idealism with his own materialism, thus creating his now famous "dialectical materialism." Marx argued that ending the evils of the class struggle mandated a change in who controlled the instruments of production.
Near the end of his life, Marx did admit that the full development of capitalism might not be necessary in predominantly peasant countries like Russia. Marx's emphasis upon economic considerations as the primary cause of social and cultural conditions was simplistic. Marx's writings imply that eliminating private property would lead to an abolishment of human evil.
For Spengler, each culture goes through a cycle similar to that of living organisms. Spengler likewise elevated instinct and feeling above reason and principle.
Unlike the pessimistic determinism of Spengler, Toynbee believed humans possess the power to prevent the impending destruction of Western civilization. Toynbee believed a civilization grows through a series of challenges, rising to a universal state consisting of a unity of law, purpose, belief, and government. For Toynbee, religion is grounded upon evolving human experience rather than special revelation. The ultimate goal of history is a new religious society composed of elements of the world's major religions. He mostly discounted the essential elements of historic Christianity, reflecting the religious liberalism of his time.
Leading liberationists have attempted to synthesize Marxism with their definition of Christianity. An attempt in Eastern Europe to find an acceptable basis for humanism within a Marxist context became in the West a new way of glorifying Marx for those seeking his authority for their own causes. For the radical New Left, Marx is the prophet, Mao the sword, and Marcuse the ideological spokesman. Marcuse claimed we need to free ourselves from the artificial needs of false consciousness, recognizing true needs as we gain true consciousness.
Whereas Marx taught social class shapes the consciousness of individuals, Gramsci believed intellectual and moral leadership shapes human consciousness. Radical historians understand that controlling what people remember of the past leads to control of those people. This understanding motivates their rewriting of the past into Marxist categories. Manipulating truth and perceptions lies at the very heart of Gramsci's vision of the new intellectual.
In conclusion, Christianity sought to counter the pessimistic view of history found in pagan philosophy. Without a purpose or goal, neither history nor individual human lives can have significance. The Christian faith deserves credit for the central place it gives to history, certainly more than many of its critics will admit. The Christian worldview grounds our conclusions about the purpose and meaning of history, the eternal significance of individual human persons, and our hope for the future. No viable Christian view of history can make peace with a theory that teaches cultural or historical relativism. We must continue to ask whether the worldviews behind the secular systems of history provide an equally adequate ground for their author's conclusions. In the final analysis, each person must decide if there exists a plausible and coherent alternative to the Christian worldview and its approach to history.
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