Book Review: Divided By God
I really hoped to learn a lot about the history of the church/state separation and lack thereof from reading this book and I wasn’t disappointed. I was pleasantly surprised at how honest, straightforward and unbiased the writer was. For example, Noah explains why the state allowed religious groups to gain footholds into federal and state arenas instead of simple denying it all together or claiming it was the religious controlling the government.
While the book still gives me more reason to keep the separation intact and even separate it more at this point, it also gave me reasons why they became the way they are without pulling punches for a particular audience. However the claim in the title of “…and what we should do about it” is not done quite as well. From reading the book it seems as though it’s more like “we aren’t really sure what to do about it” than a good idea to fix anything. Overall I’d give it a 7 out of 10 simply because I learned more about why it is the way it is, instead of why we should support the separation
Rating: 3.5 / 5
Author: Noah Feldman