[Please excuse the back-to-back book reviews—I’m trying to clear out a bit of a backlog!]
Though it was weeks ago that I completed reading Why Good People Do Bad Things, it is not until today that I’ve been able to write a review. A book like this presents a challenge to me as a reviewer. After all, my worldview, my entire way of thinking, seems fundamentally opposed to that of the author. Because her assumptions vary so vastly from mine, I hardly know where to begin in thinking fairly about it and in critiquing it in a way that might be helpful. So rather than providing an exhaustive review of this title, allow me to point to just two areas that leaped out at me as I read this book.
First, the book is built upon an assumption and one that, at least to me, seems unfair. We see this assumption already in the book’s title: Why Good People Do Bad Things. The author premises the book on her view that people are innately good but that they occasionally do bad things. But why? Would it not be as fair to ask, “Why Bad People Do Good Things?” Why should we accept one option but not the other? If we look at the millennia of evidence left behind by the human race, I’d suggest we could accrue at least as much evidence that we are a group of bad people who occasionally manage to do something that seems good. To suggest that we are inherently good is presumptuous and, I’m convinced, prideful. There is no small difference between these two options. After all, if we are good people we can believe that we are able to fix ourselves (as, indeed, Ford teaches in this book). But if we take the step of faith necessary to believe that we are bad people, we are prepared to look outside of ourselves for a solution to our badness. If goodness is extrinsic rather than intrinsic, it must change the entire focus of our lives. We will seek one who can save us from our badness.
So this is the first area that stood out to me. The second was a question of authority. Conspicuously absent from this book are any footnotes. Footnotes point us towards authority—it is an author’s means of admitting that he or she must look elsewhere for answers. Yet beyond the occasional mention of a “spiritual guru” Ford offers us no authority other than herself. What she teaches, she backs up only with her own life and her own example. Nowhere does she defer to a greater authority. Can we be satisfied with this, as if she has all the answers and we have none? Or should we seek teachers who can point us towards other and greater sources of authority? Where can one look if he has answers that Debbie Ford cannot answer? Where are the answers to life’s deepest questions to be found?
Whether good people do bad things or bad people do good things is not clear from this book. It is a valuable guide to the life and beliefs of Debbie Ford, but beyond that it offers little guidance, little hope. I’d suggest you seek out a source of greater authority, a source of deeper answers to meaningful questions. And here I’d suggest you try the Bible. There you will find a realistic assessment of the human state and an authority that will change your life.
Comments (12) »
1. Lance
June 14, 2008
2:46 PM
If a Christian speaks confidently about something, then claims biblical authority behind such a statement, he is called subjective, at best; intolerant and narrow-minded, at worst; or ignorant, at least.
If an “open-minded” self-help guru speaks confidently about something, based upon his/her experiences, they are called “enlightened.”
Thank you for pointing out the irrationality of such logic in your review.
In the tolerant, self-help world in which we live, experience, not revelation, has become the authority … and footnotes to validate our thoughts are becoming extinct, even in “Christian” literature.
2. kim
June 14, 2008
3:26 PM
On my to be read shelf right now is Lutzer’s book by the similar or same title in prep for a conference I’m doing in November. I have the same thoughts about the title - that is starts with an untruth. But, I’ll see what similarities there are between the two. I’m sure I can gain something from it.
3. CD-Host
June 15, 2008
12:22 AM
Tim —
Just a few quick points. Pelagianism doesn’t require we be actually good but only fully in control of evil, “ He could not claim to possess the good of his own volition, unless he was the kind of creature that could also have possessed evil. Our most excellent creator wished us to be able to do either but actually to do only one, that is, good, which he also commanded, giving us the capacity to do evil only so that we might do His will by exercising our own. That being so, this very capacity to do evil is also good - good, I say, because it makes the good part better by making it voluntary and independent, not bound by necessity but free to decide for itself
But I don’t think Pelagius is the inspiration. Debbie Ford used to be a Landmark trainer, what she is teaching is sort of spiritual version of Werner Erhard. And Erhard is teaching an Americanized version of Heidegger. In some sense Ford is closer to Heidegger’s mysticism than Erhard was. The god of Heidegger (Being) is a product of creation not its cause. So culture both determines the criteria and the Daisen (in this case the human’s) relative level of good and evil. That is a profoundly non biblical view, it turns the gospel on its head. I could go on but to refute Ford and just suggest the bible you really need to address Heidegger.
4. CD-Host
June 15, 2008
10:47 AM
Rereading my comment, I think I was a bit too vague. My point was that the higher authority’s for Ford are Erhard and Heidegger.
5. deborah
June 15, 2008
8:32 PM
Who is Debbie Ford and why did you read this book?
6. Jim Vellenga
June 15, 2008
8:51 PM
CD-host, I think you are giving way to much credit to Ford. Based on the review he higher authority is herself. That fits perfectly with the post-modern view that subjective experience is more important than anything else. Personal experience trumps all.
7. CD-Host
June 15, 2008
10:06 PM
Deborah —
Debbie is a well known very popular lifestyle coach. Oprah likes her.
Jim —
Well yeah, but that view is Erhard. “Life is empty and meaningless” in other words things by themselves have no meaning the observer assigns them meaning. Or with Heidegger “language is the house of being”.
8. deborah
June 15, 2008
10:57 PM
Thank you, CD-Host. Never heard of her. By the way, your blog looks interesting.
9. CD-Host
June 16, 2008
6:25 AM
Deborah —
Thank you! Right now we are having some interesting conversations on the Sovereign Grace Ministries threads about abusive processes, and on the Xenos thread about where to draw the line between acts of cliques and informal church discipline. Of course if any of the other topics interest you feel free to jump in.
10. Ben
June 16, 2008
6:44 AM
A side note regarding footnotes: Al Mohler recently interviewed author David Wells about his new book “The Courage To Be Protestant”. Wells explained that he wrote the book in large part to provide a summary of his four other important works which were “too inaccessible” to many people. He said that he had received feedback from many people who had tried to read his other books but found them difficult because they had footnotes. I guess if a book has footnotes it’s just too confusing. Maybe all he needs to do is gain an endorsement from Oprah. Who needs footnotes when Oprah likes you?
11. Jim Vellenga
June 16, 2008
10:17 AM
CD- I don’t disagree that she agrees with them, I was simply saying she probably would not see them as her authorities, assuming she even knows who they are.
12. CD-Host
June 16, 2008
11:04 AM
Jim —
Oh I see your point that she has no “authority” she agrees with him because she happens to agree. In a very real sense Debbie Ford can be seen as sort of a new age minister. New age rejects the notion that “I command you believe X”, “thus sayth the Lord” is a legitimate command. For her Erhard is true because he is effective, that is that which is true that which helps people improve their lives. In which case I see what you and Tim were getting at.
One of the things that bothered me about this review as the use of “good” and “evil”. Tim uses the words in a Christian sense:
good = what is pleasing to God / what is moral
evil = what is not pleasing to God / what is immoral
Debbie uses the words in an Landmark sense:
good = those things that help you live the kind of life you really want to live
evil = those things that undermine your ability to live the kind of life you really want to live
So while it may be reasonable to attack her definitions assertions like, “I’d suggest we could accrue at least as much evidence that we are a group of bad people who occasionally manage to do something that seems good” is obviously false under her definitions. Most acts that people do are consistent with advancing their objectives: they feel hungry they eat successfully, they are tired they sleep successfully, they want to drive the store and they take the correct route and perform well….
Which is why I felt Tim was kind of missing the point. The problem is she is perhaps too informal. He says this in his review, “After all, my worldview, my entire way of thinking, seems fundamentally opposed to that of the author. Because her assumptions vary so vastly from mine, I hardly know where to begin in thinking fairly about it and in critiquing it in a way that might be helpful.” That is under all the “ra-ra pep” frosting he couldn’t see the real cake (Heidegger). Heidegger addresses his two points quite directly.
Anyway, as for knowing who Erhard is, no questions she does. She worked for Landmark (which used to be called Erhard Training Seminars when he owned them) for 3 years. They still use his materials. As for Heidegger, Erhard talks about Heiddeger so I’d assume she is at least aware that Erhard considered him the basis of his ideas. But yeah I have no evidence she has ever read Heiddeger, except maybe the quotes in Landmark training materials.
I think a good analogy is lots of baptist ministers will talk about Luther and the reformation but haven’t actually read much Luther themselves. They absorb it indirectly.