God: A Human History of Religion by Reza Aslan

I picked up this book because I am interested in the history of religion, how it evolved and came to be what we know it as today. I really enjoyed the first two parts of the book because it contained a lot of interesting material such as the Gobelki Tepe, which is the oldest temple on earth. It predates the Stonehenge by 6,000 years! I found the historical part of the book super interesting. The book is divided into 3 parts: The Embodied Soul, The Humanised God and What is God? The first two I found very enjoyable as they were factual and laid out some new and interesting information.

However, the third part was not enjoyable for me because it slowly felt as though Aslan was trying to convince me that a God surely exists (I am an atheist). It spoke about the three Abrahamic religions: Judaism, Christianity and Islam – in that order – and his agenda subsequently progressed through the chapters. I personally am not a huge fan of religious propaganda, most likely because I do not believe in it. In any case, the worst chapter was by far the ‘conclusion’. According to Aslan the logical conclusion to this long history of humans and religion is Islam. All of the facts that he had laid out before clearly, according to him, points to the only truth: Islam. Now what really bothered me was the very last sentence “you are god”. This bothered me for a number of reasons but the principal issue I had with it was the audacity to place his religion onto us, the readers, whilst we had been reading this book under the assumption that it was not going to try to persuade us in any direction. Just as much as I wouldn’t like to read a book directly trying to persuade others to be atheists, I equally do not appreciate when religious people do the same. If this book had been outwardly Christian, Muslim, Jewish, etc. I probably would not have chosen it, or at the very least I would have expected the attempted conversion. It is precisely the fact that this book is supposed to be a history of religion not a history that supposedly logically leads us close to God, namely the Islamic god.

I would like to clarify that I have no issues with reading a religious book, that is perhaps trying to sway me, because I would actually find that interesting and insightful to read. What I dislike is selling a book under the false promise that it is unbiased and factual. Up until the third part of the book I enjoyed reading the book and even recommended it to friends who are interested in this kind of topic. However, upon reaching the third part I started to realise that this book had two goals: to educate people in the history of religion and to persuade them into at least believing in a god – ideally the Islamic one.

Therefore, I would recommend the first two parts of the book because they were truly very interesting and enlightening. I enjoyed learning about the prehistoric forms of religion and how the religions evolved into monotheistic religions. However, when reading the last part and conclusion be aware that it is not totally unbiased.

If you have read the book and think I have been unfair please let me know! I would be really interested to see other viewpoints! Either send me a message here, comment on my website or on my Instagram and Facebook! There are plenty of ways to get in touch!