This effort by Ron Nash is good and worth reading. There are a number of very good things about this book, but there are also a couple of things about it that in my view, do not warrant a five star rating.

Nash attempts to argue in favor of an exclusivist view of salvation mostly by trying to present negative aspects of both the pluralist and inclusivist views. He therefore devotes the first part of the book to critiquing the pluralism of John Hick, and the second part to critiquing the inclusivism of Pinnock and Sanders.

His critique of Hick's pluralism was easily the best part of the book. Nash methodically analyzes the pluralism of John Hick and by the end of the critique, the reader is left with the impression that Hick's pluralism has been thoroughly discredited not only on intellectual grounds, but on emotional ones as well. As in his other writings, one of Nash's analytical strengths is his insistence on quoting from relevant sources at length. Nash dedicates a significant part of the pluralist section on quoting from John Hick and letting Hick's own words be the basis for Nash's analysis. Nash's conclusions about Hick's philosophy and the ramifications thereof become all the more convincing as a result.

In my own view, I cannot say that Nash had the same level of success in analyzing inclusivism in section 2 as he had with demonstrating the falsity of pluralism in section 1. It's not that this section is bad, because it isn't, there is a lot about his analysis that is good, particularly his analysis of PME and how Pinnock's embrace of it totally contradicts the inclusivist worldview that Pinnock also embraces. But particularly in his analyses of the Scriptural reference that inclusivists often use to support their worldview, I felt that Nash's critique was too summary oriented and not sufficiently detailed to mount a convincing case against inclusivism. To his credit, I thought that Nash did a good job in the very last chapter of rescuing his exclusivism argument a bit, but I still felt that his analysis of inclusivism needed to be more detailed in order for him to effectively demonstrate what he was trying to demonstrate.

The one other negative aspect of the book, in my opinion, is that Nash does not present a positive case for exclusivism. His argument for exclusivism is based almost completely on negatively critiquing pluralism and inclusivism. And while these critiques certainly needed to be done in order to demonstrate that these worldviews run into big intellectual and emotional problems when thoroughly thought through, Nash nonetheless should have put forth a positive defense of exclusivism in order for this book to truly achieve its mission. This absence, coupled with what I believed to be the too top level nature of his Scriptural critique of inclusivism, persuade me to give the book 4 stars instead of 5. Having said that, his critique of pluralism is top grade, and even his critique of inclusivism, while not perfect, still produces lucid arguments and comments that are worthy of being read, in my opinion.

This book is back in print and is readily available from its original publisher, Zondervan Publishing Company in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The book is perhaps the major work that critiques the opinions of pluralists like John Hick and inclusivists such as Clark Pinnock. It defends the claim that Jesus IS the only Savior.

For a person just becoming acquainted with the concept of a worldview this book is probably a reasonable place to start. For example, the definition that Nash gives at the beginning of Chapter 1 is quite a good brief definition. His discussion of the major elements of a worldview and his descriptions of the three worldviews that he considers in any detail, Christian theism, naturalism, and the new age movement, are all reasonable introductions.

I have concerns with Nash's attempts to logically 'prove' points in favor of Christian theism or against the other two worldviews, however. I am a believing Christian but reading a number of the 'proofs' left me shaking my head in wonderment. And, as other reviewers have pointed out, Nash tends to turn to quotes from C. S. Lewis and others in his proofs a bit too much for me.

Try this book as an introduction, but don't stop here. James Sire's book, "The Universe Next Door" has a very similar approach, but it covers more worldviews, presents an excellent exposition of how the worldviews covered evolved in response to previous worldviews, and it covers these topics in a bit more depth. Even so, some of Sire's arguments left me shaking my head also.

It is also informative to search deeper and read presentations of worldviews, such as naturalism, written by proponents of these worldviews. For example I recommend Sigmund Freud's 'The Question of a Weltanschauung' in his "New Introductory Lectures in Psychoanalysis."

Ronald Nash’s "World-Views in Conflict" is a very useful introduction to Christian worldview thought. That said, I have had a rather difficult time deciding how many stars it really deserves.

The author does a very nice job presenting what exactly worldviews are. He comes at his material from a very logic-based western mind-frame. This is not necessarily a bad thing. In its way it is very useful. Chapter nine, in which Nash presents some good arguments for a solid belief in Jesus' physical Incarnation and Resurrection, is so well done that I heartily recommend it to anyone.

My quibble with this book is that it is very, very derivative. I don’t mind people quoting from lots of sources in their work—heck, Brennan Manning does it all the time and he is my favorite author. The specific problem here is Nash’s constant reference to a few authors (the most prominent being C.S. Lewis).

Bearing all this in mind, I am giving "World-Views in Conflict" a solid recommendation, but only three stars. The content deserves a four, but the constant over-referencing to certain authors knocks off a point. Nevertheless, if apologetics or worldview thinking is your thing, you could do a lot worse than this useful book from Professor Nash.

This book is good for those starting out in understanding worldviews. Nash does his best at trying to help the novice understand the basics of worldview thinking explaining as much as he can in layman's terms. Resources for further study are endorsed in the footnotes.

I just finished this book and it was my first exposure to Dr. Gills. It is an easy read and presents a good argument for the morality of capitalism. I especially appreciated Dr. Gills' characterisation of the American economy as interventionist...as opposed to capitalistic.

Worth the read!

Nash (presently a prof. at RTS) has used his great powers of simplification to make this book easily understandable to even the most casual reader. The questions dealt with (and most importantly the general approach) in the book is that of the old-fashioned logocentric sort.

Nash does have some good explanations of Plato's and Aristotle's philosophy that I found helpful. But, every subject is dealt with only very shortly. Perhaps Nash puts the most effort and time into logic and logically possible worlds. Though that is interesting, I find it somewhat disappointing, too. This book has basically nothing about 20'th century philosophy, except for a tiny bit about decontructionists. One of my main problems with this is that Nash is a Clarkian in his epistemology. Beware of that when you read it. For those of you who are used to reading more open-ended up-to-date stuff, this will definately strike you as ...-retentive.

But, I would recommend this to any Christian who is interested in a general introduction to Christian thought. And, Nash has a good, though brief, introduction to the latest in anti-evolutionary thought. I found this book helpful, though not necessarily "nice".

I have had not only the pleasure to read this book but to also have had it as a textbook. On top of this, I had Ron Nash himself as a professor teaching out of it.
The positives of this book are that it is truly easy to grasp. Philosophy is never an easy subject and intro texts tend to be boring or stereotypical. Nash's text is quite exceptional. He brings complex ideas down to understandable terms.
The downfall of this book is the flip-side of its strength. Because of its easy understandability it also at times is overly simplistic. Also it does not deal with very many modern and post-modern problems in philosophy. But overall this is an excellent text. I personally prefer Ed. Miller's "Questions That Matter."

Nash has produced a pretty good intro text to the study of philosophy. The book itself contains two major sections and an introduction. One of the more positive features of the text is the fact that Nash stresses the importance of a worldview and worldview evaluation. This angle is missing in all other intro texts that I have read, and seems to work as a nice addition to this particular text. The first part of the text is aptly titled "Six Conceptual Systems." In this pat Nash covers Naturalism, Plato, Aristotle, Plotinus, Augustine, and Aquinas. This section is simply an introduction into the thinking of these men and Naturalism (and their worldviews). Actually, Nash has a nice way of making all these philosophers easy to grasp. The second part consists of Problems in Philosophy. Here Nash covers logic, epistemology, metaphysics, God's existence, ethics, and human nature. In part two Nash covers Reformed epistemology (which he makes known that he is in favor of this system) and he also covers Open Theism (which he makes known that he is opposed to this type of theology). Nash is a moderate rationalist and this come out in the text. The redeeming qualities of this work are: 1) It's simplicity, 2) It's overall thematic style that is geared around worldviews and, 3) Nash's inclusion of medieval philosophers (especially Aquinas). I mention #3 since many if not most intro text do not include Aquinas which is a real pity since he was the greatest of the medieval philosophers. The one major vice, it seems of this text, is the fact that Nash comes across a little haughty and pugnacious at times. He asserts certain opinions in the text that might have been left out if all he is trying to do is simply give an exposition of the information. However, if Nash is attempting to serve an opinion in this work, then he has done so quite readily with Open Theism as well as postmodernism. That being the case, perhaps Nash meant this book to have some apologetic qualities about it. Nonetheless, if what he was aiming for was simply an intro to philosophy (which is what is declared on the back cover description) then these opinions might have been best saved for other works. However, this text is distinctly Christian, and perhaps Nash wanted to evaluate these systems for the purpose of the Christian reader. Overall, I would recommend this text to beginning students to help them gain a better understanding of the issues of philosophy.

This book contains no-holds barred debate among advocates of 3 answers to the question, "Is Jesus the Only Savior?" John Sanders defends the inclusivist belief that conscious belief in Jesus is not necessary for salvation while another author claims that salvation is possible after physical death. Ronald Nash defends the belief that Jesus is the only Savior, a position he defends in greater detail in his book titled "Is Jesus the Only Savior?" also available from amazon.

Three differing views of the fate of those who experience physical death without hearing the Gospel of Jesus Christ is fascinating, but limited. Again, as it seems to be, not all Christian views are presented.

Certainly, we who hold the Lutheran confession would side with Nash, who easily out of the three represented does the most exemplary job of using God's Word correctly. Nash is correct in his chastisement of his two opponents for not lack of good exegesis of the Bible. It is truly sad but commonplace to find such poor, hurried exegeis as exemplified by Sanders and Fackre.

It would have been good to have one argue: univesal grace, grace alone, the means of grace, and the mystery of why some saved and others not? This would have given the complete Biblical picture. This is not demonstrated by any of the three in this book.

However, as exemplary as Nash is with his defense of restrictivism by not only showing the proper exegesis and hermeneutic of the other two sides, he has some glaring weaknesses himself. As those of the Reformed are bent to do, they always want to let logic and reason dominate, rather than letting God's Word suffice.

Or as Luther would say, "What is not spoken of in God's Word must be left to the heavenly academy for resolution." We do not have all the answers to all mysteries in God's Word!" As Moses said so profoundly on his deathbed, "The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our sons forever." (Deut. 29:29)

Nash suffers, as Sanders catches him, on Double Predestination. Calvinists cannot say that Christ died for all, but only for the elect. This is the classic error of Calvin. As well, they hedge the truth of God's Scriptures of the Real Presence in the Sacrament. Sanders does not confess the B.C. Means of Grace as St. Paul does in 1 Cor. 10:1-11, that Christ was present with them, but most did not have faith and were disallowed into Promised Land. This typology extends throughout OT, allowing OT saints the same (Romans 4) as we NT saints, faith in Promised Messiah (Christ).

However, to deny infant sin (Age of Accountability) that Nash puts forth is unbiblical (Ps. 51:5) Furthermore, Nash is wise to attack inclusivism on premise that grace is with all until rejection of Christ and Gospel, and he shows forth Biblical attack to destory this false teaching.

Nash certainly is far and away the more faithful Biblical presenter, aside from the errors already identified. Further, he does not profess Christ's descent into hell as for what it was: Christ's victorious announcement of victory over the demon angels, nor is he correct is declaring Luke 16:19ff as being a parable. It does not necessarily have to be interpreted as parabolic, see Art Just's Commentary, Volume II, pg. 630ff.

Cudos to Nash for calling the other two's hand for not showing the Biblical evidence for their positions, while discounting his opponents Biblical proofs and offering restrictivist passages, Nash has provided the debate with the sure foundation of what God says about this controversial topic.

Contrary to Sanders and Fackre, Nash did an excellent job refuting both inclusivism and PME, and presented his case for restrictivism well. Though I don't agree totally with Nash's restrictivism (since I hold to unlimited atonement), he does a good job presenting a very persuasive case for the traditional evangelical understanding of the destinies of the unevangelized. Sanders' inclusivism leads to the heresy of works-salvation (unbelievers who positively respond to God's light and walk in His ways will be saved even without knowledge of Christ). Such heresy leads to another heresy: that Christians also must do good works to earn or maintain their salvation. His interpretation of Romans 2 on pp. 46-7 is horrible (he follows the interpretation of the "new perspective" that Paul was not opposing Jewish works-salvation but Jewish nationalism). ... Overall, a good book for those who want to be convinced of the truthfulness of restrictivism.

A "Christian" book that doesn't quote the Bible? Nash simply trashes authors he disagrees with, offering no scriptural basis for his attacks and instead quoting extensively from a few writers that he admits are "out of the mainstream." I'm interested in learning how the religious right scripturally defends their position, but this is a hate-filled, name-calling diatribe.

If you want analysis based on almost zero research or a few quotes mostly taken out of context, you've come to the right place. Ronnie trashes the life and work of people he obviously knows and cares very little about. This book is so biased - as is his work in Liberation Theology - it is not worth reading. Pick up the book long enough to learn the names of the people he detests, and go read them for your self; they are all well published (and respected).

No one, it seems, ever talks about the Religious Left in America. Well, this book does. In fact, it is probably still the only detailed examination of the movement. Thoroughly researched, the book offers important information about the political left's attempt to gain control of evangelical Christian institutions.

Someone gave my husband and I this book after the full term loss of our second baby. Fortunately, I had read other much more comforting books on the subject of pregnancy/infant loss before opening this one. I never completely got through this book, it was a theological discussion and not comforting. I needed to read books written by people who had gone through loss, who were offering comfort and support.

If you are reviewing this book because you have lost a precious baby. First, my heart goes out to you. It is a devastating and soul-wrenching loss. Secondly, I would recommend my two favorite books on the subject: Silent Cradle and A Deeper Shade of Grace. In both these books the authors share their personal stories of loss, healing and hope.

I bought this book thinking it would help me to find some answers, maybe just maybe give me some hope that my daughter is safe and in heaven. Instead it just confused me. I tried reading it in the early months after my daughter's death and again about a year later and I still found it to be way too involved for me to read and/or understand. This book is probably best used by people who want to figure out their theology on what happens when a baby dies, ie. if they go to heaven or not and why or why not.

Again I would say this book is NOT recommended for bereaved parents, the title makes the book sound helpful but the truth is the content of this book will probably leave you more frustrated and discouraged than you were when you started to read the book and wondering why you wasted your money. There is nothing comforting or uplifting about this book, it is just this man's platform for his own personal views on whether babies who die go to heaven or not.

This book means so much to me. Someone gave me a copy of this book when my three-year-old daughter died in a car accident. This book gave me the comfort that I needed. I recommend it for any parent who is grieving because of a lost child. I know how it feels to lose a child, and this book will comfort you. It will answer all the questions you may have.