Anti-Intellectualism in the Western World
Anti-intellectualism is a disposition to discount the importance of truth and the life of the mind.
—Os Guinness
We live in what may be the most anti-intellectual period in the history of Western civilization. . . . We must have passion—indeed hearts on fire for the things of God. But that passion must resist with intensity the anti-intellectual spirit of the world.
—R. C. Sproul
The result of all this is that Americans are the best entertained and quite likely the least well-informed people in the Western world.
—Neil Postman
Anti-Intellectualism in Evangelicalism
I must be frank with you: the greatest danger confronting American evangelical Christianity is the danger of anti-intellectualism. The mind in its greatest and deepest reaches is not cared for enough.
—Charles Malik, Former President of the United Nations General Assembly
The scandal of the evangelical mind is that there is not much of an evangelical mind.
—Mark Noll
We speak of “the modern mind” and of “the scientific mind,” using that word mind of a collectively accepted set of notions and attitudes. On the pattern of such usage I have positied a Christian Mind, chiefly for the purpose of showing it does not exist. . . . There is no Christian mind. . . . the Christian Mind has succumbed to the secular drift with a degree of weakness unmatched in Christian History.
—Harry Blamires
The contemporary Christian mind is starved, and as a result we have small, impoverished souls.
—J. P. Moreland
Anti-Intellectualism Is No Virtue
God is no fonder of intellectual slackers than of any other slackers.
—C. S. Lewis
At root, evangelical anti-intellectualism is both a scandal and a sin. It is a scandal in the sense of being an offense and a stumbling block that needlessly hinders serious people from considering the Christian faith and coming to Christ. It is a sin because it is a refusal, contrary to Jesus’ two great commandments, to love the Lord our God with our minds.
Anti-intellectualism is quite simply a sin. Evangelicals must address it as such, beyond all excuses, evasions, or rationalizations of false piety.
—Os Guinness
Anti-Intellectualism Is a Hindrance to the Gospel
False ideas are the greatest obstacles to the reception of the gospel.
—J. Gresham Machen
Towards a Solution to Anti-Intellectualism
The Christian religion flourishes not in the darkness but in the light. Intellectual slothfulness is but a quack remedy for unbelief; the true remedy is consecration of intellectual power to the service of the Lord Jesus Christ.
—J. Gresham Machen
Update: For a bibliography on anti-intellectualism, visit Timmy's blog.
