Strange Gods

Starred review from December 14, 2015
Jacoby (The Great Agnostic and Freethinkers) has spent 15 years writing this fine secular inquiry into the history of religious conversion in the West. Beginning with the famous Damascus road conversion of Saul to Paul and then moving on to Augustine of Hippo’s Confessions, Jacoby travels through 14th-century forced conversions in Spain, 20th-century “socially-influenced conversions” resulting from mixed marriages, and today’s headlines about ISIS’s brutal religious persecution. From her atheist viewpoint, she attempts to remove the religious and psychological elements of conversion, leaving only the sociopolitical forces. She writes, “The modern American notion of religion as a purely personal choice, nobody else’s business... could not be further removed from the complicated historical reality of conversion on a large scale.” Missing from Jacoby’s overall argument are the ways that religious belief, practiced in the public square, can contribute to the common good in a democracy. Without this, her tour de force risks marshaling history to serve her own ideological agenda. Her analysis of the dangers of a religious belief beyond personal conviction may be challenging for many readers of faith, but it’s well-argued and illuminating.

February 1, 2016

Starting with the apostle Paul and ending with the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS), Jacoby (The Age of American Unreason) explores the myriad cultural and social aspects of religious conversion throughout the history of the Western world. This approach is in contrast to the many accounts that trace conversion solely to spiritual or supernatural origins. People throughout history have converted for a host of complex and multilayered reasons. Many have been forced, pressured, or coerced. Others have chosen to convert in order to improve their social or economic status, to marry, or to fit in with the majority. Covering a broad swath of contexts such as the Roman Empire, the Spanish Inquisition, and Nazi Germany, and including portraits of individuals such as Augustine, Edith Stein, and Muhammed Ali, Jacoby passionately and thoroughly examines the multiple meanings of conversion. Throughout, she heralds the necessity of freedom of conscience as a human right. VERDICT Jacoby's thoroughly researched narrative is impressively detailed, making this a fine book for a somewhat limited audience. Recommended to those interested enough in the topic to avoid getting bogged down in the specifics. [See Prepub Alert, 8/24/15.]--Brian Sullivan, Alfred Univ. Lib., NY

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 1, 2016
Religious conversions serve as turning points throughout history. Though conversion narratives are popular, the social and cultural situations that surround them often receive less attention than the personal stories. Conversions do not occur in a vacuum, and Jacoby's book traces the religious lives of famous (and some less famous) converts and seeks to firmly anchor their narratives in particular places and times. Beginning with the rise of Christianity and the conversion of Augustine of Hippo, and tracing historic conversions up through the twentieth century, Jacoby highlights historical figures including Edith Stein and Muhammad Ali, painting a parallel portrait of the massive cultural changes surging around them. Jacoby clearly has a point to prove, and she paints a vivid picture of the ways in which conversions happen and the myriad reasons behind their happening.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)

September 15, 2015

Best known for the New York Times best-selling The Age of American Unreason, Jacoby tackles the issue of conversion, often seen as an individual's decision to embrace a fitting spirituality but, as Jacoby argues, just as often a result of complex sociopolitical forces. Sometimes forceful indeed: consider the Spanish Inquisition, the conversion of American slaves to Christianity, and the persecution of presumed infidels in modern Islamic theocracies.

Copyright 2015 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.