Westerns Books

For non-history majors, this book is one of the best history texts I've read (or been required to read). Although at a few points it seems to be excessively wordy, it becomes apparent that the authors want the reader to grasp the importance of this element of history. Or put another way, this isn't a Cliff's Notes history book, you're going to get more than just the essential details because the authors want you to understand all facets of how this element caused future events to unfold. If you're not into history, it can take some effort to get through the details.

All political issues seem to be treated with a neutral stance, a temptation many other authors have found it hard to resist. And the book covers important cultural events that shape the century.

This book isn't necessarily an easy read. Be prepared to find your way to a dictionary.

If this book is required as part of your history course, relax. Everything is going to be all right, just be sure to budget plenty of time to read the chapters and it is very helpful to make notes while you read. As stated above, there can be a lot of detail and dates to remember.

This textbook is required for an online class I am taking, but it is so well put together and interesting that I would recommend it to anyone interested in a business law crash course!

The product arrived next day as I had paid for it to do so. The condition was good. I would buy from them again.

This book was one of the best Business Law books I have ever read. The authors write the book that makes Business Law easy to understand. It is very well written and once you start reading it, it is hard to stop. I highly recommend this for any Business Law Course or if you want to skim the surface of the subject, then this book is the proper gradient.

This was an interesting textbook. I almost decided to keep it for future reference. Some of the material did not go into the depth I would have preferred, but it was still a really good read for a textbook.

This text was actually enjoyable to read most of the time. There is a lot of good information, and the presentation makes it easy to digest. It is still a text, and there is a lot of information. Still, when compared to most textbooks, this is among the best for both coverage of the material and ease of reading.

okay book, bought because I had a class on it. could be a little more updated.

The books great and in excellant condition. I got it just in time for class and paid less than everyone else in class. The side definitions are the best as well as the chapter end cases and summaries. The CD is another great bonus!

My oh my, reading some of the extremely negative reviews of this book and seeing the obvious bias of some of the reviewers makes me wish that I could come out swinging in Menocal's defense.

Unfortunately, I cannot. While Menocal clearly has deep affinity and love for the subject matter she fails to support her thesis as she only could have done by reaching farther than culture and poetry for reference. She makes some interesting suggestions through anecdotal evidence, but I found it extremely frustrating that she made no effort to more fully flesh out a claim that would have been very interesting, if true. Furthermore, I do not find that the book was contextualized as simply being a piece of the puzzle of Medieval Spain. I find that it made grander claims for itself. This could well be the fault of the publisher, who recognized a timely topic when he/she saw one (the book was published in 2002). But still, it hurt the overall credibility of the work not to strongly delimit in the beginning both what it is and what it is not.

I have heard much said about Menocal's writing style, both positive and negative. I will grant her a smooth hand with prose. Sadly, she does not exhibit anywhere near the same skill with structure. I found the text did not cohere well and tended to be jumpy and difficult to follow.

She clearly loves her poetry from the time, and I am looking forward to reading some of the writers that I discovered through the book. I found the "Other Readings" chapter particularly valuable. She gets an extra star for all the wonderful poetry that I'm anxious to read.

This is a beautifully written book with some great strengths, but it is almost as frustrating as it is enjoyable. Menocal delineates the big picture well, tracing the evolution of medieval Iberia from Abbasid province to Ummayad caliphate, through political breakdown to a bevy of competing Muslim and Christian taifas(city-states), which then slowly came under the sway of Castile. Ummayad Al-Andalus treated the dhimmi -- "Peoples of the Book" well: the Jewish community, in particular, prospered and played an active role in the economy, state, and Arabic-speaking culture of the peninsula. This intersection of peoples within a "culture of tolerance" was richly fruitful: for example, in Toledo Jews translated Arabic into early Castilian, which Christians then translated into Latin, thus making ancient Greek texts that had been preserved in Arabic available to Christian Europe. Menocal is at her best tracing the manifold influence of Iberian culture on both its component peoples and on northern Europe. Jews such as Samuel the Nagid revitalized Hebrew under the influence of Arabic poetry. Petrus Alfonsi, a Jewish convert to Christianity, brought knowledge of Islam and Judaism, some scientific knowledge, and new literary forms to England. Peter the Venerable of Cluny visited Toledo in search of translators of the Quran. Sparks flew in every direction. Menocal succeeds in re-contextualizing familiar works. Maimonides and Averroes appear as products of Al-Andalus, born into its culture of tolerance, accepting that faith and reason were compatible - but out of tune with the growing power of the repressive Almohad Muslim regime of their day. The elusive line between truth and fiction in Don Quixote echos a post-1492 Spain filled with Moriscos and Marranos who might be Christians or highly practiced pretenders.
Despite the rich, evocative portrayal of Al-Andalus and its influence, Ornament of the World has some frustrating gaps. The boundaries of the "culture of tolerance" are never clearly defined: however willing Muslims and Jews were to borrow one another's poetic forms, did they also live in the same quarters of the city, intermarry, do business together? Admittedly, this may be substituting my own interests for those of the author. But the author also does not explain convincingly why a culture of tolerance arose on the Iberian peninsula in this period, or why it eventually fell. The fall of the culture of tolerance is discussed in the epilogue, but this reader, at least, came away unsatisfied.

I enjoyed this book. From my limited understanding of the time period and my inability to read history (facts after facts never interest me... the human element, devoid of many historical accounts, does...).

I have read the positive reviews and the negatives. I can understand either. I will say this book is a great introduction. It is romantic, an account of a world seen with Rosy-Tinted Scholarly eyes. Perhaps it is not going to be the greatest book for the nitpicking historians - and hey, I can see their point - but it is a good place to start, to know the names, the dates, and some of the scenery.

I wish more history books were like this. What is 'history' - a story... the word is there within the greater word most scholars will defend, arguing our need to be objective and search for the facts ('just the facts, 'mam'). But isn't that life, "stories" interweaving, facts important sidenotes to the human element. I respect this work because it has introduced me to a world I have heard about before. It will be my choice to move on further and read other works.

Those who have written their one-star reviews have their point. There is a lot missing here. I don't doubt it. But if a work of history introduces and inspires curiosity, is that a bad thing? Ideals are ideals and ideally, this isn't meant for the historian but for the layman. I am a layman, I enjoyed it. If you're looking for an introduction to a fascinating time in Spanish/Western history, this is a fine place to start. I don't know enough to squabble over details or put the author down for 'misreading' history. I'll simply say, Menocal has written a story about a time and place. Her writing is infused with melancholy and wonder, looking back to the golden aspects of a time believed to be harmonious.

If history was written from the perspective of the people, not so much the events and politics, I would read more history. But then again, I'm not a historian and this book suits me fine. I'll read further but I am thankful I had this book to open my eyes to an interesting time in human civilization.

The final word: historians, you know enough, so don't read this because you'll probably just write more negative reviews and negativity is really tiring at times. (If you don't have something nice to say, don't say it all all... I've written the odd negative review, so I'm guilty...) Layman and Laywoman, if you have a passion for a literary interpretation of history, enjoy this book. It is like wine for me. I savoured it, I took it in, I will remember and go on to the next. But I value the beginnings of what I have learned. And that's the facts, 'mam.

This book I could recommend to anyone who wants to learn more about the early history of modern Europe. Usely it is said that the classical age ended with the Romans, and then after a thousand turbiulent years suddenly appeared renewed culture in Europe with the renaissance. Like there was a big gap in civilization. But there wasn't. There was the great arabic empire that stretched from Marocco to Pakistan, with it's poetry and philosofy and a culture where religion and science went hand in hand. Furthermore there is this remarkable story about a prince who flees from his mothercountry to build his new kingdom, which soon becomes the heart of culture in Europe, where jews, muslims and christians lived and worked side by side. A culture as big that it easely fills the gap the Romans left. A remarkable story that eventually will trigger the renaissance. The forgotten story of Al-Andalus.
Allthough objective this story is written from the point of view of Al-Andalus itselve, which gives a perfect contrapoint to the somewhat common historyclass seen from the christian (castillian) point of view. This put the "Moors" as they denegratedly are called in a totally new perspective.

The culture of tolerance was created by MUSLIMS who were rulling Spain, the writer failed to point out that it was the muslims who granted and who created this tolerance of others.

I am stunned at some reviews here who talked about the tolerance of Muslims at that time with the terms of the 21th century ! this is absurd, you cant look at that era in the eyes of this 21th century.

The tolerance muslims gave to christians and jews was unmatched anywhere else in the world and the jewish massacre in 1066 has political and religious grounds, it did not happen out of nothing or because the victims just happend to be jews, in fact, at the very same time in 1066, Granada has JEWISH wazir or in modern terms prime minister !

It is stil great book to read.

I bought this book for a class, and although we were only required to read sections of the book I ended up reading the entire thing, including the extra two essays (Immortality of the Soul & Suicide). The entire thing was extremely well-written and thought-provoking, even to a novice philosopher such as myself.

This isn't a book you can fly through. Hume requires the reader to slow down and really think about what is being said. The main section of the book (Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion) involves four characters, three discussing theories, and one student (technically the narrator) listening and occasionally commenting. By using this dialogue technique, Hume is able to present several sides of each argument in a unique way, and not simply expound his own theories. The method is most effective.

I won't go into depth of what this book discusses, the theory of design, arguments about God's nature and being, the argument from the existence of evil, and whether a posteriori or a priori arguments are best suited for proving God's existence. Overall this book is interesting and exciting, even for a 200 year old publication. Even if you're interested in modern philosophy, this book still offers some interesting theories. And obviously if you're interested in philosophy at all, it's a good book to check out for some history on the subject.

The introduction offers a good deal of information about the essays included in the book as well as Hume himself.

While being a theist I do not accept Hume's conclusions, he is no doubt the finest philosophical skeptic in the West since the time of Sextus Empiricus.

Hume, the philosopher who woke Kant from his 'dogmatic slumbers', takes a very empirical approach to reality and philosophy. In Hume's mind, the pretensions of the human mind to certain truth and knowledge do not accord with the way things are. Many things are believed on insufficient evidence or sloppy thinking or for reasons of emotional need rather than on evidence and reason. The task he set himself was in many ways like that of Descartes, except unlike Descartes Hume did not believe that either the methods of science or God (Hume was an atheist) could give us grounds for certain knowledge.

The dialogues on Natural Religion are one of his supreme masterpieces. Published after his death, this dialogue features a conversation between two philosophers about the nature and existence of God and the proofs for his existence. One philosopher is a skeptic, Philo, and the other is a theist, Carneades. Demea the Deist provides a third interlocutor in the dialogue. Carneades states several popular arguments for God's existence in Hume's time, including the teleological argument, moral argument, and argument from design. Philo responds to this arguments, mostly using the argument from evil as well as appeals to the rule of regular law in nature, to refute ideas about miracles, providence, and evidential design from a supreme 'architect.' Hume states the counter-arguments in extremely powerful terms, essentially completely demolishing the position of Carnedes and concluding that at best, only a very weak inference can be made for God's existence from the structure of the world.

Hume's arguments have been recently re-stated by several atheist philosophers, including J.L. Mackie and Daniel Dennett. For Mackie, Hume was right in arguing theism is philosophical nonsense, and for Dennett, God is a redundant hypothesis when the order and beauty of the universe is readily and clearly explained by science, and at best a kind of Spinoza-style pantheism is where the sacred can enter into the cosmos. While I disagree, the adoption of Hume's arguments by many leading philosophers shows both the power, beauty and logical coherence of Hume's position, which should be read carefully by any philosopher who wants to offer a rational proof that God exists.

For me it is not the order but the beauty of the universe which suggests God exists, but perhaps for others this beauty is marred too much by suffering and evil to come to such a conclusion, and Hume would surely agree.

David Hume, a philosopher of the period often classified as British Empiricism, is the intellectual associate of philosophers John Locke and George Berkeley. Born in Edinburgh in 1711, he attended the University of Edinburgh but did not graduate. He went to France during his 20s, and spent time there working on what would become his most famous work, 'An Enquiry into Human Understanding', first published under the title 'Treatise of Human Nature'. However, Hume was a prolific writer, and dealt with many areas of philosophy, including politics and ethics, epistemology, and metaphysics. He wrote in the area of history as well, and had a politic career as British ambassador to France and a post as a minister in the government for a few years. His final work, 'Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion', was published posthumously in 1779, although work had begun on it as early as the 1750s.

Hume was very concerned about rationality. Hume was never publicly and explicitly an atheist, but his rational mind, concerned about sensory and intelligible evidence, led him to question and doubt most major systems of religion, including the more general philosophical sense of religion and proofs of the existence of God. The primary arguments in his 'Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion' deal with the Argument from Design, and the Cosmological Argument. There is an assumed distinction here between natural religion and revealed religion, an especially important distinction in the Enlightenment and post-Enlightenment philosophical structure.


- Natural Religion and Revealed Religion -

Natural religion is the idea that we come to know and understand God (and, consequently, what God wants or expects of us, if anything) simply from nature and our sensory perceptions, as well as our interpretations (emotion and rational) of this kind of understanding. From very early in his writing career, Hume attacked the idea of natural religion and most of its conclusions, drawing a sharp line between what we can actually know and what ends up being fanciful extrapolations based on other-than-rational ideas and evidence. Revealed religion is primary what most religions base themselves upon - the burning bush to Moses, the resurrection and post-resurrection appearances to the Apostles, the Buddha's enlightenment under the tree - these are examples of revelation. While Hume does take on the idea of revealed religion in his other works, this particular text does not concern itself with that topic, and stays in the domain of addressing natural religion.


- The Argument from Design -

Arguments from Design have always had a strong appeal to believers within religious frameworks; they have often been used as tools of evangelism, as attempts to show that beyond the revealed doctrines, the very nature of things points to a creator. In very short order, the Argument from Design in Hume's newly-industrial time might have read like this:

- Machines are designed by beings with intelligence.
- The world and the universe it is in resembles a machine.
- Therefore, the world must have been created by means of intelligent design.

This is an argument by analogy, and is convincing to some, but often more convincing to those already inclined to believe in the existence of God.


- The Cosmological Argument -

The Cosmological Argument is at once both more subtle and more simple. The most simple way of stating it would be that God is the 'first cause' of everything. If everything has to have a cause (even the whole universe), then that first cause must be God. In the twentieth century era of thinking of a universe that began with a Big Bang, it seemed to some that the Cosmological Argument was confirmed.

Hume would have been familiar with Leibniz's more subtle form of the Cosmological Argument, which argues for a world of infinite contingent causes. However, there has to be something outside of this system of infinite causes that produced the series - thus, even in a universe with no set beginning or ending, there would still need to be an overarching cause.


- Hume's Arguments -

Hume argues on many levels. His first criticism of the Argument from Design is that this analogy (as are most arguments from analogy) is faulty and not exact; we have no idea if the universe is like a machine. Even if it was, machines are often designed and built by several designers - why argue for one God rather than several? How do we know that matter and the universe don't have their own, internal self-organising principles?

With regard to the Cosmological Argument, the argument is a little more strained. Hume argues that, in any series of causality, once one knows about each cause, it makes no sense to inquire beyond the sequence of causes to some other effect. This is a very Empirical argument, to be sure, and while perhaps not entirely satisfying, it still has merit in philosophy to this day.


- Hume's Structure -

This is a dialogue, set up in the classical way of people talking with each other about the subjects. Hume draws primarily from Cicero, whose work 'On the Nature of the Gods' uses characters of the same names. However, whereas Cicero was concerned about the nature of the Gods (their attributes, powers, etc.) and not their existence, it is the very existence of God that occupies Hume's thoughts.

Hume, despite many years of work on this text, probably never quite thought it was finished. He left the work to Adam Smith (the noted economist, and friend of Hume in Edinburgh), who also thought the arguments against the existence of God were too strong, and likely too damaging to Hume's overall reputation. The tug-of-war over the publication makes for interesting reading in and of itself.

These are important arguments, worthy of discussion and dialogue in philosophy classes, theology classes, and among others who ponder the existence of God.

This nearly pamphlet sized book is pretty dense with things to ponder. Hume speaks mostly about how a deity would function as the head of the world. The reviewer is not intent on being cute here. Hume addresses many notions about "God" through a series of dialogues amongst three intellectuals. They are intent on convincing each other of their individual views. Essentially those three have to come to terms with the anthropomorphism associated with the God of Christian belief system. It really is more complicated than that but this is a short review.

In addition to the Dialogues are a short essays on the Immortality of the Soul and the rationality of Suicide. Finally there is a discussion of Miracles. The latter three are well placed with the Dialogues as they address the philosophy of religion in much the same manner but come from Hume rather than the fictional characters of the Dialogue.

This book as short as it is, requires a considerable amount of time to consume. Not only are the concepts that Hume presents detailed and valuable, but the language is particularly arcane and often requires re-reading in order to understand where Hume is going.

The two excellent reviews of this book , one by Kurt Messick and the other by CT Dreyer outline the background to, and the principal content of the work. Hume takes apart the argument from Design as proof of God's Existence, raising objections to the analogy between Machine- design and world- design. I do not believe however that Hume in the work really considers two other major arguments for belief in God. One argument might be called the existensial - personal decision argument , in which the individual out of his own need and will decides for belief in God. This decision can be a rational calculation as Pascal suggests that we should make in order to give our own immortality a chance, or it can be a profound deeply moving conviction something that grows out of our own deepest being and need. Another path to belief in God is through the kinds of mystical experience that thousands of human beings from all cultures have had. William James collects some of these testimonies in 'The Variety of Religious Experience'. Another path is through the path of accepting the Tradition given us by our ancestors.
Now it might be said that these alternative paths to belief in God do not deal with the kind of ' proofs ' Hume is talking about. Hume is really talking about the ' rational way' to God through mind and reason. But I believe that every reader should have these other ways to God in mind , if only not to be devastingly shattered by Hume 's demolition job of the Design Argument.
It is well to remember that there are other ways to God aside from the ones spoken of and questioned here.
I write this as a believer in God who also believes that a very great share of Mankind needs God, needs the belief in God to make their own lives ultimately meaningful. And this when I would also keep in mind the following idea. If the Proof of God were certain and absolute , then there would be no test/ trial / challenge for humanity in its belief in God.
And here I add the idea central in the Jewish tradition, and probably important in others, that God wants our decision for God, our free choice of God, and not a slavish obedience even to an airtight logical principle.