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A review by tim_michiemo
The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self: Cultural Amnesia, Expressive Individualism, and the Road to Sexual Revolution by Carl R. Trueman
5.0
4.9 Stars
Carl Trueman’s "The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self" is a phenomenal work of cultural, philosophical and historical analysis. It is probably the best work of Christian cultural analysis that I have ever read so far (though… I still have plenty more to read). Trueman’s book is essentially an explanation of how modern society has come to a place where a man can say, “I am a woman trapped in a man’s body.” Trueman focuses primarily on expounding the works of Philip Rieff, Charles Taylor, and Alasdair MacIntyre and their understanding of the rise of the “psychological man” and “expression individualism.” Trueman then traces the ideas of these three intellectuals through Western history, showing how the ideas of Rousseau, the Romantics, Marx, Freud, Reich, and Marcuse have psychologized our ideas of self, how our psychologized selves have become sexualized, and then how our sexualized selves have become politicalized.
I cannot stress how great work this is. As Christians we are all swimming in the modern morass of the psychological and sexualized self – this is the water we are all swimming in. Yet, as Christians, we are often shocked when the secularized society around us charges head-long into greater sexual immorality. Yet Trueman masterfully shows us that there are intellectual developments within Western culture that have laid the groundwork for such sexualized ideas of self. And these notions go far further back than the sexual revolution of the 1960s, but back to Enlightenment thinkers like Rousseau, and to Romantics like Percy Blythe Shelly and William Wordsworth. And like a master builder, Trueman walks us through history showing us how the building of modernity has been constructed, and how the furniture of the sexualize self-have been put into place.
I cannot commend this book any more highly. The only critique that I have is that many of the philosophical and historical ideas and terms can be difficult to the casual reader. But I think this book is worth the challenge. It is worth the work of thinking through these ideas because it will better equip you as a Christian to identify where these notions of the sexualized self are coming from. Even though it is brief, Trueman ends his book by stating that the historic age that this modern one is most like is the 2nd century, where Christians were a minority in a prevalently pagan world. Thus, Trueman in this book is equipping us to be the exilic church, a Christian witness that understands the times and looks forward to the hope of heaven!
Carl Trueman’s "The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self" is a phenomenal work of cultural, philosophical and historical analysis. It is probably the best work of Christian cultural analysis that I have ever read so far (though… I still have plenty more to read). Trueman’s book is essentially an explanation of how modern society has come to a place where a man can say, “I am a woman trapped in a man’s body.” Trueman focuses primarily on expounding the works of Philip Rieff, Charles Taylor, and Alasdair MacIntyre and their understanding of the rise of the “psychological man” and “expression individualism.” Trueman then traces the ideas of these three intellectuals through Western history, showing how the ideas of Rousseau, the Romantics, Marx, Freud, Reich, and Marcuse have psychologized our ideas of self, how our psychologized selves have become sexualized, and then how our sexualized selves have become politicalized.
I cannot stress how great work this is. As Christians we are all swimming in the modern morass of the psychological and sexualized self – this is the water we are all swimming in. Yet, as Christians, we are often shocked when the secularized society around us charges head-long into greater sexual immorality. Yet Trueman masterfully shows us that there are intellectual developments within Western culture that have laid the groundwork for such sexualized ideas of self. And these notions go far further back than the sexual revolution of the 1960s, but back to Enlightenment thinkers like Rousseau, and to Romantics like Percy Blythe Shelly and William Wordsworth. And like a master builder, Trueman walks us through history showing us how the building of modernity has been constructed, and how the furniture of the sexualize self-have been put into place.
I cannot commend this book any more highly. The only critique that I have is that many of the philosophical and historical ideas and terms can be difficult to the casual reader. But I think this book is worth the challenge. It is worth the work of thinking through these ideas because it will better equip you as a Christian to identify where these notions of the sexualized self are coming from. Even though it is brief, Trueman ends his book by stating that the historic age that this modern one is most like is the 2nd century, where Christians were a minority in a prevalently pagan world. Thus, Trueman in this book is equipping us to be the exilic church, a Christian witness that understands the times and looks forward to the hope of heaven!