Imposters of God: Inquiries into Favorite Idols

by William Stringfellow

Christian Experience Series, vol. 7
Witness Book #11

Genres: Theology

127 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1969

About the author

Frank William Stringfellow (April 26, 1928 – March 2, 1985) was an American lay theologian. He was active mostly during the 1960s and 1970s.

Reviews

[Mary · Rating 3 out of 5]

I can imagine what a bombshell this book was when it came out in 1969--An elite lawyer turned theologian, rating Stokely Carmichael as less radical than Patrick Henry (Carmichael=a revolutionary Black Panther, for the information of you born-long-after-the-60's subscribers) and condemning the prosecutions of antiway agitators as political maneuvers. The book hasn't aged particularly well and is marred in part by obtuse prose and obscure references. Nevertheless, it still has a provocative thesis that makes it worth the trouble of reading its scant 66 pages: anything, other than God, that is treated as an absolute, and made the basis of a person's sense of worth, is an idol--an imposter of God. Religion, work, money, status, race, patriotism and the Church itself are all examined by the author and exposed and potential objects of idolatry.

[Dillon Lanier · Rating 5 out of 5]

Idolatry is the root of all the worlds problems
Wow this book expanded my mind about the nature of secular vs spiritual thinking. The main premise of the book is about the commandment about how you shouldn’t worship false idols? But what an idol is can be complicated. In this book the examples are
The idol success or “security”
White supremacy and how your country can become an idol

Sometimes people are stuck up because they worship an idol of perfection or class or in our modern times “coolness”. We all do it, we are all subject to idols. Men may think they would be cool if they were sleeping with loads of hot women, that’s the idol of sex.

An idol is something that gives someone “fuel” to confirm they are what they want to be. In a way they are always running away from some kind of death (social death: having no friends, financial death: not having success) so they grab hold of something man made and resident in the physical world (not created by god or virtuous), to make them feel good about themselves. This is why people slave over their work or art, give to charity so they can feel like a good person etc.

This book was cool

[EdnaAnn · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a book that I will refer to again and again, because there is so much truth in it. Stringfellow names many idols such as religion, race, work, patriotism, money, status, and the church. There are many other idols; according to the author, "...idolatry essentially implies grasping after justification by works of one or another variety-obeying certain rules, pursuing certain values, carrying out certain activities and rituals, and so on." Justification, as we know, is totally by faith-not by works of any kind. Giving to the church, religious, or philanthropic organizations can even be an idol.

I was able to identify many idols of my past, confess them for what they were, and ask forgiveness. He provided a framework for identifying idols in the present and future.