Ronald A. Wells - History Through the Eyes of Faith: Christian College Coalition Series

W hat does the history of the West look like when seen by a highly competent historian through the eyes of faith? Someone might be inclined to ask in reply, Doesnt it look the same as it does to any other competent historian? Reading this book will show you otherwise. Professor Wells discusses this very issue of the objectivity of history. For as he tells the story of the West, he stops every now and then to reflect on some of the questions that the craft of history as such, and his own telling of the story of the West, might raise in the mind of a reflective Christian.

Most people today would agree that history is not merely a matter of getting the facts right. Always it is a matter of interpreting facts in the face of the data available. Not surprisingly, competent scholars frequently differ in their interpretations. Professor Wellss telling of the story of the West is different from the story that non-Christians would tell. But it is also different from how various competent Christian historians would tell the story. Professor Wells recognizes this, and he takes a stand. But he acknowledges that the positions he takes do not make his telling of the story the Christian interpretation of Western history, only a Christian interpretation. It is one position in the dialogue. And we get an added bonus: Professor Wells not only takes a position in the ongoing debates among historians, both Christian and non-Christian, but often tells us what those debates are all about.

The underlying thesis of the book is that we in the Westlike all humanityhave moved through a succession of crises. A society lives with a certain ideal vision of reality and the good, and it attempts to interpret its experience in the light of that vision and to guide its actions by it. But sometimes the ideal and the real move so far apart that attempts to bring them together are sensed, by society at large, to be failures. The society is then in crisis. Professor Wellss story of Western humanity is the story of the crises through which we have moved.

In this book our present situation is illuminated. But more than that: over and over readers will find themselves challenged to reflect on the light that the Christian gospel throws on history and the light that history throws on the Christian gospel. Christians with settled views on the Middle Ages, say, or on the Reformation, may well find themselves challenged to reconsider those views. And non-Christians with settled views on, say, the glories of the modern world, may well find themselves forced to reconsider those. What is important about the book is its passion for wholeness, for integrity. Professor Wells tries to get beyond the bits and pieces to see Western history whole. He struggles to bring together his Christian faith with the history he knows. In our culture, which, while longing for wholeness, finds almost everything piecemeal, that is remarkable.

Nicholas Wolterstorff

Professor of Philosophy

Calvin College, and the Free University of Amsterdam