Reviews for Spirituality Of Resistance

The average rating for Spirituality Of Resistance based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2011-10-03 00:00:00 Josslin Smith I had been impressed by Gottlieb's description of the varied response to oppression (four classes of resistance/non-resistance) in an academic paper, and picked up this book as something that might give me a deeper insight into his system. He deals with the class of "self-deluded non-resistance," when he discusses our dysfunctional attachment to the work that alienates us. This is the engineer (in the old joke) "fixing" the guillotine, which will soon lop off his own head. He didn't get specifically into the "neurotic" response to oppression, which I found most interesting'and which I began seeing all around me'but this book is mostly about making resistance (particularly, resistance to ecocide) effective, so I really wasn't expecting anything with this category (I guess the neurotic response would be to stop reading). At times the prose descends a little too close to rant (he is a Marxist) but I agree that quietude is not an end in itself'we seek quietude to achieve clarity, and to focus our actions. This is the Latin (as opposed to the Greek) approach to stoicism.

Review # 2 was written on 2010-07-22 00:00:00 Norbert Saerberg This was a great book for thinking about spirituality in a different way. Gottlieb challenges us to connect our spirituality with the real world challenges of global climate change. He is critical of the emphasis on spirituality as a mean for finding personal peace in the midst of this crisis. He would rather we find that peace as we engage the major issues of poverty, injustice and ecological disaster. While at times he gets a little wordy, and his long chapters could have used some sub-headings to help the reader follow his thought, these minor problems do not take away from this deeply insightful and engaging book. For further reflections on the insights he provides see my blog at