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Dominion

The Making of the Western Mind

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Dominion

By: Nassim Nicholas Taleb, Tom Holland
Narrated by: Tom Holland, Mark Meadows
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About this listen

 Christianity is the most enduring and influential legacy of the ancient world, and its emergence the single most transformative development in Western history. Even the increasing number in the West today who have abandoned the faith of their forebears, and dismiss all religion as pointless superstition, remain recognisably its heirs. Seen close-up, the division between a sceptic and a believer may seem unbridgeable. Widen the focus, though, and Christianity's enduring impact upon the West can be seen in the emergence of much that has traditionally been cast as its nemesis: in science, in secularism, and yes, even in atheism.

That is why Dominion will place the story of how we came to be what we are, and how we think the way that we do, in the broadest historical context. Ranging in time from the Persian invasion of Greece in 480 BC to the on-going migration crisis in Europe today, and from Nebuchadnezzar to the Beatles, it will explore just what it was that made Christianity so revolutionary and disruptive; how completely it came to saturate the mind-set of Latin Christendom; and why, in a West that has become increasingly doubtful of religion's claims, so many of its instincts remain irredeemably Christian. The aim is twofold: to make the reader appreciate just how novel and uncanny were Christian teachings when they first appeared in the world; and to make ourselves, and all that we take for granted, appear similarly strange in consequence. We stand at the end-point of an extraordinary transformation in the understanding of what it is to be human: one that can only be fully appreciated by tracing the arc of its parabola over millennia.©2019 Tom Holland (P)2019 Hachette Audio UK Ancient Christianity Ancient History Thought-Provoking

Critic Reviews

Terrific: bold, ambitious and passionate (Peter Frankopan, author of The Silk Roads)
Tom Holland is fun to read, monstrously erudite, wickedly joyful, and ahead of the established consensus, on average, by four years, three months, and two days (Nassim Nicholas Taleb, author of the Incerto (The Black Swan, Antifragile...))
This extraordinary book is vintage Tom Holland: history boldly and elegantly retold, with fascinating interconnections traced to create a narrative that cannot fail to stimulate, for it leads to a never-ending question (Diarmaid MacCulloch)
Fizzing with insights and challenges, this is one history book that is timely and important, as well as a feast of intellectual entertainment (Christopher Hart)
A rich and compelling history of Christendom . . . A masterpiece of scholarship and storytelling, Dominion surpasses Holland's earlier books in its sweeping ambition and gripping presentation (John Gray)
[Holland encapsulates] so much, so intelligently and entertainingly, in a book that's fizzing with ideas (Andrew Lycett)

Tom Holland's stupendous new book . . . There isn't a page of this magnificent book that does not contain some fascinating detail and the narrative is held together with a novelist's eye for character and theme (Tim Stanley)
A brilliant meditation on how Christianity in its Latin and Protestant forms entirely changed the way humans conceive life and their relationship to each other (Helen Thompson)

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Profile Image for Anonymous User

An Amazing Journey

Having been educated in Christian schools and knowing the Christian story extensively, I have never thought about as such a far reaching phenomenon as Tom Holland as argued in this book.

A great listen or read to anyone who seeks to understand Christianity within the context of our world today and how it got us to where we are, whether a believer or not!

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Profile Image for Joshua Mayne

Profound critical analytical voice is a woke generation

Thank you Tom Holland for providing a work that will stand as a monument for Millenia to the profound stupidity of this current age, and as a light out of it.

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Profile Image for HUMPHREY MORRISON

A MUCH NEEDED REMINDER TO WESTERN MINDS

This book is a work which should be quoted often by social commentators and considered closely by those who lead us. Christianity is the touchstone which must not be strayed from lest the foundations of our successful societies lose direction, crumble and decay.
With great respect to the narrator, I would have preferred to hear Tom Holland read his own work.

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Profile Image for Rodney Wetherell

Imaginative work on Christian history

I very much appreciated this book, firstly describing particular episodes in Christian history, for example the Reformation, and showing how the ideas thrown up by them influenced the Western mind over many centuries. It was an ambitious undertaking, which largely succeeded, in my opinion. I found Holland a fine and entertaining writer, and the main narrator Mark Meadows did very well in putting the material across. I believe this book will be influential itself, in countering the notion that the power of Christianity is all in the past.

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Profile Image for John

Well read and enlihhtening

Very well read for a dialogue free book. Fascinating to see how Christian values utterly permeate the western world and now further afield to those who would never consider themselves such. Even the Woke.

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Profile Image for Doug Tyler

Fascinating

A fascinating view of the history of Christianity, and its influence beyond the church itself, of compellingly told.

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Profile Image for Russell Ayres

A wonderful popular history of Christianity and its persistence

A masterful use of historical scholarship and intellectual discipline to show how much the modern world - especially but not only in the west - is Christian in ethos, mural outlook, teleology and morality, even as the notion of faith in Christ is in retreat in many parts of the first and second worlds.

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Profile Image for Jason P. Green

What was in the corner of my eye I now can see.

Dense, horrific, transcoding but most of all enlightening.
Highlights how the very thing we in the west may scoff at is the very thing that has helped develop of sense of fairness and equality.

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Profile Image for Stephen Annells

well researched and well written

well researched, well written and insightful. will definitely pass this to others to read .

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Profile Image for Allan Murray

Thought provoking and engaging

Tom Holland’s clear and fluid take on the influence and power of Christian ideology and practice through the ages is, well… unsettling. Lots to digest here, including what if it were otherwise. I found myself dipping into different chapters once I had understood the thrust of his overall thesis, without any loss of comprehension. Narration is engaging. Bonus is Holland reads the Preface and the last section (a poignant personal note). Highly recommended.

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