07AR12-09

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Apologia Report 12:9

March 8, 2007

Subject: New Age "Secret," conflict behind its huge success

In this issue:

ATHEISM - Alister McGrath responds forcefully with "The Dawkins Delusion?"

CHRISTOLOGY - Craig Blomberg lauds Craig Evans' Fabricating Jesus

EVANGELICALISM - Don Piper's 90 Minutes in Heaven riding New York Times' top-10 paperback nonfiction list

ISLAM - primary source for moderate Muslim responses to media frenzy over Pope's comments

NEW AGE MOVEMENT - the fastest-selling self-help book in history?

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ATHEISM

The Dawkins Delusion? Atheist Fundamentalism and the Denial of the Divine, by Alister McGrath with Joanna Collicutt McGrath. Publisher SPCK offers the following ad copy: "The God Delusion makes me embarrassed to be an atheist, and the McGraths show why." Michael Ruse, Professor of Philosophy, Florida State University

"World-renowned scientist Richard Dawkins writes in The God Delusion: 'If this book works as I intend, religious readers who open it will be atheists when they put it down.' The volume has received wide coverage, fuelled much passionate debate and caused not a little confusion. Alister McGrath is ideally placed to evaluate Dawkins' ideas. Once an atheist himself, he gained a doctorate in molecular biophysics before going on to become a leading Christian theologian. He wonders how two people, who have reflected at length on substantially the same world, could possibly have come to such different conclusions about God. McGrath subjects Dawkins' critique of faith to rigorous scrutiny. His exhilarating, meticulously argued response deals with questions such as:

Is faith intellectual nonsense?

Are science and religion locked in a battle to the death?

Can the roots of Christianity be explained away scientifically?

Is Christianity simply a force for evil?"

http://www.spck.org.uk/cat/feature_s.php

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CHRISTOLOGY

Fabricating Jesus: How Modern Scholars Distort the Gospels, by Craig A. Evans [1] -- reviewer Craig L. Blomberg refers to his colleague as "one of the foremost evangelical New Testament scholars in our world today" and explains that "Evans' main objective throughout this concise volume is to debunk the claims of radical, unrepresentative scholarship about Jesus and the Gospels."

To begin, Evans "points out how C. S. Lewis' famous 'liar, lunatic or Lord' triad of options excludes at least two main approaches of contemporary skeptics" with "Robert Funk and James Robinson to illustrate the first category of skepticism, and of Robert Price and Bart Ehrman as examples of the second." Evans reviews a number of bogus gospels that sensationalists have been touting over the last few years such as the Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Peter, Papyrus Egerton, the Gospel of Mary and the so-called Secret Gospel of Mark. Evans also touches on the significant contribution of Josephus (curiously ignored by many who strain to emphasize more spurious ancient testimony about Jesus).

A major emphasis of Evans is turning a spotlight on the shoddy work of liberal scholarship. The Jesus Seminar suffers badly under his scrutiny. The next group failing inspection is composed of "popular novelists, who revise history often to create a Jesus or an early Christianity radically unlike anything that can be supported by actual history."

Blomberg concludes: "If all scholars were as sensible and judicious as Evans in his historical judgments, we would not have the confusion and disarray either in the scholarly world of biblical studies or among laypeople unwittingly 'suckered' by the distortions and inventions of the far-left wing." Denver Journal, v9 - 2007, <http://www.denverseminary.edu/dj/articles2007/0200/0202>

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EVANGELICALISM

90 Minutes in Heaven, by Don Piper [2] -- this brief review by Lisa Miller notes that "A few months ago a thin book that has been in print for nearly three years arrived in the top 10 of The New York Times paperback nonfiction list. Last week it rested at No. 6. '90 Minutes in Heaven' is an extraordinary story. Written by a Southern Baptist minister named Don Piper and a coauthor [Cecil Murphey], '90 Minutes' is a firsthand account of Piper's devastating 1989 car wreck (his red Escort was, essentially, run over by an 18-wheeler), his trip to heaven - and his miraculous return to earth and life, thanks to the prayers of a fellow pastor. The trip to heaven - though vivid and full of joyous greetings and singing - is not the heart of the book. Instead, the story's power is in the aftermath: Piper, literally broken in pieces, has to come to grips with the fact that his life and body [34 surgeries later] are forever changed. ...

"His revelations are hardly unique - God answers prayers, Jesus is the way to heaven - but he has turned himself into a living example of finding meaning through suffering. People, it seems, want to listen." Newsweek, Feb 12 '07, n.p. <http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16950932/site/newsweek/>

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ISLAM

Looking for an English-language magazine produced by moderate Muslims? Try Islamica. When you visit the link <http://www.islamicamagazine.com/issue-18/editorial-2.html>, you'll see firsthand how this group handled the middle-man's position of trying to avoid the radical "death-to-the-Pope" posture of the extremists and yet respond to the media frenzy over Benedict XVI's comments on Islam in September 2006.

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NEW AGE MOVEMENT

Newsweek finds that Rhonda Byrne's new book, The Secret [3], "could be the fastest-selling book of its kind in the history of publishing with 1.75 million copies projected to be in print by March 2, just over three months since it came out, plus 1.5 million DVDs sold."

The lengthy feature continues: "What it doesn't contain, though, is a secret. That should be self-evident to anyone who has ever been in an airport bookstore. The film and book are built around 24 'teachers,' mostly motivational speakers and writers (dressed up by Byrne with titles like 'philosopher' or 'visionary') who have been selling the same message for years. Jack Canfield [of the "Chicken Soup" book series] is probably the best-known of them. ...

"Its explicit claim is that you can manipulate objective physical reality - the numbers in a lottery drawing, the actions of other people who may not even know you exist - through your thoughts and feelings. ... Byrne emphasizes that this is a law inherent in 'the universe,' an inexhaustible storehouse of goodies from which you can command whatever you desire from the comfort of your own living room by following three simple steps: Ask, Believe, Receive. ...

"On an ethical level, 'The Secret' appears deplorable. It concerns itself almost entirely with a narrow range of middle-class concerns - houses, cars and vacations, followed by health and relationships, with the rest of humanity a very distant sixth. Even some of the major figures in the film confess to uneasiness with its relentless materialism. ...

"A woman in the film claims to cure her breast cancer in three months, without chemotherapy or radiation, by visualizing herself well and watching funny movies on television. ...

"'It's pseudoscientific, psychospiritual babble,' says [psychologist John Norcross, a professor at the University of Scranton]. 'We find about 10 percent of self-help books are rated by mental-health professionals as damaging. This is probably one of them.' ...

"'I can show you books written 100 years ago that say the exact same thing,' says Beryl Satter, a professor of history at Rutgers. Long before there was a 'New Age,' Satter says, there was 'New Thought' - a self-help movement that drew on 19th-century Americans' suspicion of elites and on the Protestant tradition of looking for the 'inner light.' You don't need doctors to heal you, priests to save you or professors to instruct you: the secrets to health, success and salvation are within you."

The sidebar, "Secret Wisdom" (p57), offers "specifics on how the law of attraction works," for example: "Make it your intention to look at everything you like and say to yourself, 'I can afford that. I can buy that.' You will shift your thinking and begin to feel better about money." And: "Disease is held in the body by thought, by observation of the illness and by the attention given to the illness. If you are feeling a little unwell, don't talk about it - unless you want more of it." Newsweek, Mar 5 '07, pp52-58. <http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17314883/site/newsweek>

In "Shaking Riches Out of the Cosmos" Allen Salkin "discloses that behind the success of 'The Secret' is a seamier story about the origins of the film. It involves big money and what some participants say are the broken promises of Ms. Byrne. The star of the first version of the movie, released in March last year, demanded to be cut out of the current version, which has been on the market since Oct. 1.

"That star, Esther Hicks, 58, has been promoting her own version of the law of attraction with her husband, Jerry Hicks, in books and seminars for two decades. 'We teach that you keep saying it the way you want it to be, and if you keep saying it the way you want it to be, the universe will line up and give you exactly what you've said you wanted,' Ms. Hicks said.

"Ms. Byrne had promised Ms. Hicks 10 percent of DVD revenues to appear in 'The Secret,' both parties said. But they had a falling out, and Ms. Hicks could not even bring herself to watch Ms. Byrne this month on 'Oprah,' the movement's moment of triumph. ...

"Although 'The Secret' is an overnight phenomenon, its message of think-and-grow-rich is but the latest version of a self-help formula dating back more than a century, with roots both secular and religious, and branches that have included Napoleon Hill's best-selling 'Think and Grow Rich' in 1937 and Norman Vincent Peale's 'Power of Positive Thinking' in 1952.

"J. Gordon Melton, the director of the Institute for the Study of American Religion in Santa Barbara, Calif., traces the origins of 'prosperity consciousness' to 19th-century Christian Science. 'It's always waiting for slightly different forms of expression, the same old message,' he said. ...

"The Hickses spend most of the year traveling the country, leading workshops based on the teachings they say Abraham [the collective name for the spirit-beings they use] has given them. They record the workshops and have 10,000 subscribers, who pay up to $50 a month for CDs and DVDs of Abraham's wisdom.

"The clash between Byrne and the Hickses seems mainly over who deserves credit, and the wave of mainstream publicity, for this latest version of prosperity consciousness. The Hickses have preached the law of attraction while traveling with Abraham for 21 years. Ms. Byrne's exposure to the notion is more recent: she was going through a rough patch in her life in 2004, when her daughter gave her a copy of 'The Science of Getting Rich,' first published in 1910.

"The book discussed how focusing on gratitude can help a person take control of life. Ms. Byrne delved into the works of other self-help gurus, like Charles Haanel's 'Master Key System' from 1912; Prentice Mulford's 19th-century 'Thoughts Are Things'; and Robert Collier's 'Secret of the Ages' from 1926.

"By contrast, Ms. Hicks reads no self-help or spiritual material, she said, wanting to keep her mind clear for Abraham's messages. Without knowing what others have written, friends of the Hickses said, it is easy to understand why they believe they did the most to popularize the law of attraction before 'The Secret.' New York Times, Feb 25 '07, n.p. <http://select.nytimes.com/search/restricted/article?res=F10910F93B5A0C768EDDAB0894DF404482>

According to the February 27 issue of Publishers Weekly, "The Secret now has 1.75 million copies in print," and on March 3 PW reported that "Simon & Schuster has placed the biggest reorder in its history for Rhonda Byrne's runaway hit, The Secret, going back to press for two million more copies." See <www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6420578.html?nid=2286>

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Sources, Monographs:

1 - Fabricating Jesus: How Modern Scholars Distort the Gospels, by Craig A. Evans (IVP, 2006, hardcover, 290 pages)

<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0830833188/apologiareport>

2 - 90 Minutes in Heaven: A True Story of Death & Life, by Don Piper and Cecil Murphey (Revell, 2004, paperback, 208 pages)

<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0800759494/apologiareport>

3 - The Secret, by Rhonda Byrne (Beyond Words, 2006, hardcover, 216 pages)

<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1582701709/apologiareport>

(Note: At the time that this info was retrieved, Secret was the top book in Amazon's sales ranking.)

+ The Secret (Extended Edition DVD) with Rhonda Byrne, Paul Harrington, and Rev. Dr. Michael Beckwith (Rating: None; Director: Drew Heriot; Studio: TS Production; Release Date: October 1, 2006; Run Time: 92 minutes)

<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000K8LV1O/apologiareport>

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