Classic Book of the Month: Orthodoxy

NICK EICHER, HOST: Today is Tuesday, January 3rd.

Thank you for turning to The World and Everything in It to help start your day.

Good morning. I’m Nick Eicher.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard. Coming next: G.K. Chesterton.

Many Christians know the author for his Father Brown mysteries and his profoundly theological quotable quotes.

WORLD book reviewer Emily Whitten recommends one of his nonfiction books for our January Classic Book of the Month.

EMILY WHITTEN, REVIEWER: English author G. K. Chesterton published his apologetic book, Orthodoxy, in 1908. At the time, he was in his 30s, and fairly well-known as a journalist. He hadn’t yet joined the Roman Catholic Church, published his Father Brown books, or begun his popular BBC radio addresses—like this one written just three months before he died in 1936.

CHESTERTON: I myself have even been blamed for defending the spices of life against what was called the simple life.

In contrast to that older, grandfatherly voice, Orthodoxy conveys the thoughts of a vibrant, young man, still settling into his stride. In this audiobook clip read by John Lee, you hear the main idea of the book.

ORTHODOXY: How can we contrive to be at once astonished at the world, and yet at home in it? How can this queer cosmic town with its many-legged citizens, with its monstrous and ancient lamps—how can this world give us at once the fascination of a strange town and the comfort and honor of being our own town? I wish to set forth my faith as particularly answering this double spiritual need.

The word “orthodoxy” comes from the Greek word “ortho”, meaning right, straight, or true. Orthodox Christian beliefs then might be defined as right Christian beliefs. For Chesterton, orthodoxy was both familiar and unfamiliar. Unfamiliar because he hadn’t always embraced Christianity. Like an explorer sailing to find new lands, he went looking for God’s truth. But as the book unfolds, we see that God’s truth was never far away.

Trevin Wax is an author and vice president of the North American Mission Board. He says Chesterton’s book shaped his own journey to find truth.

WAX: And I think the main point of Orthodoxy, and one of the reasons it's still a relevant book, even though it can be difficult and a challenging book to read is, what he's saying is, you actually will never make progress in thought and moving into the world as it actually is, unless you believe in something outside of yourself.

Last year, Wax published a book titled The Thrill of Orthodoxy which tips its hat to Chesterton in several ways. He also published an annotated version of Chesterton’s Orthodoxy, to help new readers engage the classic.

Wax says Chesterton is relevant for our age in many ways. Right off the bat, Chesterton mocks the idea that merely believing in yourself can be the foundation for a good life.

WAX: Chesterton’s right. It leads to cultural insanity. And that's what we're looking at. That's what we're watching happen in real time. We have to believe what anyone says about themselves. And we have to believe in how they identify themselves and we have to believe that sort of self trust is at the foundation of everything.

On his journey, Chesterton often felt the lure of modern heresies, and he helps readers avoid those traps. For instance, many of Chesterton’s contemporaries believed new scientific theories disproved the existence of God. Some saw the fact that the sun repeatedly rises and sets day after day as proof God isn’t involved. But Chesterton challenges that reasoning. Perhaps, he says, God enjoys repetition in the same way a child does, constantly saying, “do it again.” Here’s Wax reading a quote.

WAX: “It is possible that God says every morning, do it again to the sun. And every evening, do it again to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike. It may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that he has the eternal appetite of infancy, for we have sinned and grown old, and our father is younger than we. The repetition in nature may not be a mere recurrence. It may be a theatrical encore.”

Chesterton will be particularly interesting to conservative Christians. He stood firmly against the Marxist and evolutionary views of his day that exalted progress and denigrated the past.

That said, Chesterton isn’t trustworthy on every topic. For instance, he greatly misunderstands the Puritans, he’s overly sympathetic to Roman Catholicism, and his critique of predestination is laughable at times. Wax warns us to read thoughtfully.

WAX: But then also just to know Chesterton is one of these writers that when he's really right, he's really, really right. And when he gets things wrong, he gets them really, really wrong.

Why read Chesterton, then? He may be one of the most influential Christian thinkers of the 20th century. He had a profoundly positive effect on C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, and many other Christian thinkers.

WAX: When you think about Chesterton, you have to think about him as a journalist, not as a theologian. That’s not to say he doesn't deal with theological concepts, he does, but like, I'm not I don't go again and again to Chesterton for theological consultation. I go to Chesterton, because he awakes my wonder at the world around me and at the gospel. That's what he does.

Our Classic Book of the Month, Orthodoxy by G. K. Chesterton can be difficult to read, so I do recommend Wax’s annotated version. But however you engage, I hope Chesterton can strengthen your belief not in yourself, but in God–and His familiar and unfamiliar grandeur.

I’m Emily Whitten.

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