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Divinity of Doubt: The God Question by Bugliosi, Vincent — book cover

Divinity of Doubt: The God Question

by Bugliosi, Vincent
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Overview

Vincent Bugliosi, whom many view as the nation’s foremost prosecutor, has successfully taken on, in court or on the pages of his books, the most notorious murderers of the last half century—Charles Manson, O.J. Simpson, and Lee Harvey Oswald.

 

Now, in the most controversial book of his celebrated career, he turns his incomparable prosecutorial eye on the greatest target of all: God. In making his case for agnosticism, Bugliosi has very arguably written the most powerful indictment ever of God, organized religion, theism, and atheism. Theists will be left reeling by the commanding nature of Bugliosi’s extraordinary arguments against them. And, with his trademark incisive logic and devastating wit, he exposes the intellectual poverty of atheism and skewers its leading popularizers—Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris, and Richard Dawkins.

 

Joining a 2,000-year-old conversation which no one has contributed anything significant to for years, Bugliosi, in addition to destroying the all-important Christian argument of intelligent design, remarkably—yes, scarily—shakes the very foundations of Christianity by establishing that Jesus was not born of a virgin, and hence was not the son of God, that scripture in reality supports the notion of no free will, and that the immortality of the soul was a pure invention of Plato that Judaism and Christianity were forced to embrace because without it there is no life after death.

 

Destined to be an all-time classic, Bugliosi’s Divinity of Doubt sets a new course amid the explosion of bestselling books on atheism and theism—the middle path of agnosticism. In recognizing the limits of what we know, Bugliosi demonstrates that agnosticism is
 he most intelligent and responsible position to take on the eternal question of God’s existence.

About the Author, Bugliosi, Vincent

Vincent Bugliosi received his law degree in 1964. In his career at the L.A. County District Attorney's office, he successfully prosecuted 105 out of 106 felony jury trials, including 21 murder convictions without a single loss. His most famous trial, the Charles Manson case, became the basis of his classic, Helter Skelter, the biggest selling true-crime book in publishing history. Two of Bugliosi's other books--And the Sea Will Tell and Outrage--also reached #1 on the New York Times hardcover bestseller list. No other American true-crime writer has ever had more than one book that achieved this ranking. The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder was likewise a New York Times bestseller, and Reclaiming History: The Assassination of President John F. Kennedy has been heralded as epic and a book for the ages. HBO, in association with Tom Hanks's PlayTone Productions, will be producing this as a ten-hour mini-series.

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Editorials

From Barnes & Noble

Former prosecutor Vincent Buglioso approaches every question with the vigor of a much younger man. His research on the Kennedy assassination resulted in documentation of more than 2700 pages. His Divinity of Doubt is only a fraction as long (256 pages to be exact), but it does address "the God question" with the same level of commitment. Like his book on the O.J. Simpson case, Buglioso skewers both camps, heaping criticism equally on atheist promoters including Hitchens, Dawkins, and Harris and hell-and-brimstone Old Testament fundamentalists. His call for a healthy agnosticism is certain to generate media attention.

Publishers Weekly

The question of the existence of God has captured the imaginations of pundits and pedants around the world. On one side are the theists, the believers. On the other side are the atheists, the ardent unbelievers. Bugliosi finds himself in a third category -- the agnostic, one who admits that he doesn't know if God exists, and may even insist that it isn't possible to know if there is a God. The author is a well-known attorney as well as a writer, whose best-known book, Helter Skelter, documented the horrific Charles Manson murders. He turns his attention here to a broad and often biting study of the proponents, and opponents, of Godism. He addresses some of the oldest questions in Christendom -- the problem of evil, the sometimes contradictory accounts of sacred events, etc. -- and sees no inevitability of a God in any of the answers proposed by even the best scholars. He ends his thoughts with a simple "God should only be a question." Sometimes pedantic but always eloquent, this is a fascinating read. (Apr.)

Library Journal

Distinguished attorney and true crime author Bugliosi (Helter Skelter; Outrage: The Five Reasons Why O.J. Simpson Got Away with Murder) here takes on the subject of God's existence, making the case for agnosticism. Anyone expecting a gentle and centrist approach may be surprised by the ruthlessness of Bugliosi's scathing attack on both theism and atheism (although he focuses most of his attention on Christianity). Although the book makes quite a number of arguments (e.g., since death is so awful, how can a kind God exist?), they are unfortunately muted by a frequently superficial and sometimes inaccurate understanding of his opponents' views on matters from natural selection to resurrection, all of which significantly dilutes the potency of what could have been a stronger book if better researched. Given the author's background as a seasoned and renowned prosecutor, this major shortcoming is surprising. VERDICT Considering that this book is a systematic attack on the belief or unbelief systems of so many, his readership is unclear. One can only hope for a revised edition that unearths any gems latent within this flawed manuscript.—Brian T. Sullivan, Alfred Univ. Lib., NY

Book Details

Published
April 12, 2011
Publisher
Vanguard Press
Pages
256
Format
Hardcover
ISBN
9781593156299

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