Disappearance Of God: A Divine Mystery - Hardcover

This work, by the author of "Who Wrote the Bible?" probes a chain of mysteries that concern the presence or absence of God. It begins with a reading of the Hebrew Bible, revealing the mystery and significance of the disappearance of God there. Why does the God who is known through miracles and direct interaction at the beginning of the Bible gradually become hidden, leaving humans on their own by the Bible's end? The book then investigates this phenomenon's place in the formation of Judaism and Christianity. It goes on to explore the forms this feeling of the disappearance of God has taken in recent times, focusing on a connection between Nietzsche and Dostoevsky, who each independantly developed the idea of the death of God. The author then relates all of this to a contemporary spiritual and moral ambivalence. He notes the current interest in linking discoveries in modern physics and astronomy to God and creation, and explores the connection between the mysticism of the Kabbalah and "Big Bang" cosmology, relating the findings to the age-old quest for a hidden God.

In this bold and illuminating new work, Richard Elliott Friedman probes a chain of mysteries that concern the presence or absence of God. He begins with a fresh, insightful reading of the Hebrew Bible, revealing the profound mystery and significance of the disappearance of God there. Why does the God who is known through miracles and direct interaction at the beginning of the Bible gradually become hidden, leaving humans on their own by the Bible's end? How is it possible that the Bible, written over so many centuries by so many authors, depicts this diminishing visible presence of God - and the growing up of humankind - so consistently? Why has this not been common knowledge? Friedman then investigates this phenomenon's place in the formation of Judaism and Christianity.