Thoreau's God - by Richard Higgins (Hardcover)

About the Book

"Thoreau's deep religious sensibility was a central thread in his life and thought. Despite his scathing criticism of organized religion, Thoreau had a profound sense of the holy. In neglecting this deep vein in Thoreau, we miss an essential part of who he was. Thoreau's God approaches Thoreau's religion as a riddle rather than as an oxymoron, as it is sometimes assumed to be. His religious sensibility, Richard Higgins shows, was not a compilation of beliefs but a set of internal possibilities and choices about how to live, what to notice, and what to love. This book explores the paradox of Thoreau's love for this world and his yearning for the unseen and unheard. Although his views were iconoclastic, Thoreau's experience of the divine in nature was often rapturous. He disavowed discursive theology, but he wrote about and sought communion with a mystery at the heart of the universe that was at once present in nature and yet transcendent. He called this illimitable presence many names, but he often called it God. Rather than a fixed belief, however, Thoreau's theism was contingent, never final, more of a moving toward than an arriving at. Thoreau's God was an infinite, wild, life-giving presence manifest in the natural world. Only by understanding Thoreau's particular conception of the divine and his relationship to it will we be able to understand the Thoreau of Walden as well as his profound influence on the American religious landscape"--

Book Synopsis

Meditative reflections on the great spiritual seeker's deeply felt experience of the divine.

Henry David Thoreau's spiritual life is a riddle. Thoreau's passionate critique of formal religion is matched only by his rapturous descriptions of encounters with the divine in nature. He fled the church only to pursue a deeper communion with a presence he felt at the heart of the universe. He called this illimitable presence many names, but he often called it God.

In Thoreau's God, Richard Higgins invites seekers--religious or otherwise--to walk with the great Transcendentalist through a series of meditations on his spiritual life. Thoreau offers us no creed, but his writings encourage reflection on how to live, what to notice, and what to love. Though his quest was deeply personal, Thoreau devoted his life to communicating his experience of an infinite, wild, life-giving God. By recovering this vital thread in Thoreau's life and work, Thoreau's God opens the door to a new understanding of an original voice in American religion that speaks to spiritual seekers today.

Review Quotes

"When so many politically progressive books feel didactic, it is refreshing to read one that doesn't. . . . [Thoreau's God] offers insight into Thoreau not as a naturalist or a secular ascetic but as someone who believed strongly in God as love. Regardless of your religious beliefs, this book is worth reading for anyone interested in American religious experience."-- "America Magazine"

"Thoreau's God is impressive in scope. Through extensive research and review of Thoreau's voluminous writing, Higgins chronicles the lifelong evolution of his belief, from his early disparaging of Christianity and the church to his 'eclectic, experiential, noninstitutional spirituality' which is so popular today."-- "The Christian Century"

"Higgins persuasively leads his readers on something of a pilgrim's progress through the complexities of Thoreau's religious thinking . . . Thoreau's God is an excellent exposition of Thoreau's complicated and ever-developing religious ideas. It is especially helpful in locating the place in his thinking of concepts such as nature, soul, church (dismissed by Thoreau), divinity, and redemption. Thoreau's God is a work of learning and true sensitivity."-- "Modern Philology"

"Higgins shows how Thoreau's spiritual quest was suffused throughout his writings--often laced with paradox and references to the Bible, sacred Hindu texts, and Confucianism--as he strove to live in right relation to God, nature, and humankind."-- "Choice"

""Thoreau's God" focuses not only on Thoreau's brilliance, wit and authorship, but also cites many of his major influences and supporters with references to and quoted material from such spiritualists and naturalists . . . "--Thomas Crowe "Smoky Mountain News"

"[No] book captures the breadth and evolution of Thoreau's religious understanding as well as Richard Higgins' Thoreau's God."-- "Notre Dame Magazine"

"Higgins reveals in seventeen chapters how his subject was a spiritual seeker with a religious imagination from beginning to end."--Jon M. Sweeney "Spirituality and Practice"

"Thoreau's God is an invitation to join hands with the transcendentalist, explore nature, find out who or what God is to you, and develop (or refine) your personal spiritual practices to honor that divine mystery."-- "Washington Independent Review of Books"

"[Higgins] takes on the task of perusing through the great timberland of Thoreau's writing, less to make the case for a definitive angle of identity but to fashion compelling Thoreauvian perspectives, even meditations, on the question."-- "Chicago Review of Books"

"[Readers] will come away with a nuanced understanding of Thoreau's religious thought, thanks to the author's fine-grained and surprisingly poetic analysis. It's a worthy reconsideration of an important American philosopher."-- "Publishers Weekly"

"Thoreau's God is the most subtle and probing assessment yet of the many senses in which this emphatic but elusive thinker must be understood as a deeply religious person."--Lawrence Buell, author of 'Henry David Thoreau: Thinking Disobediently'

"If you have ever felt lost in this world of fractured faith, then pick up this book and let Higgins take you on a walk with one of America's most profound and thoughtful religious writers: Henry David Thoreau. It won't be an easy path, for Thoreau's God lives in no church but out in a world of paradoxes. And Thoreau insisted that even the best of books can only point the way, through words poetic enough to say what cannot be said: that true religion lies not in what you profess, but in how you live. Higgins shows us a mind and heart at work during a troubled time, a fellow human being knocking at the door of God and hearing an answer that guided him for life."--Laura Dassow Walls, author of 'Henry David Thoreau: A Life'

"Thoreau was a practical man, but he was also in some sense a mystic--no one has ever been more open to the world around him. This fascinating book tries to understand Thoreau's sense of the divine, which in some ways very much prefigures the unorthodox syncretism of our day."--Bill McKibben, author of 'The End of Nature'

About the Author

Richard Higgins is a former staff writer at the Boston Globe and the author or editor of four books, including Thoreau and the Language of Trees. His articles, essays, and reviews have appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, Christian Century, and American Scholar.