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Revision as of 16:30, 20 February 2006 by King aardvark (talk | contribs) (→Bibliography: added new book)(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)Lee Strobel, a former legal editor for the Chicago Tribune, is a Christian apologist and former teaching pastor of Willow Creek Community Church. He is best known for writing the semi-autobiographical bestsellers The Case for Christ, The Case for Faith, and The Case for a Creator. Strobel also hosted a television program called Faith Under Fire on PAX TV.
Biography
Strobel earned a journalism degree from the University of Missouri and a Master of Studies in Law degree from Yale Law School. A journalist for fourteen years, he was awarded Illinois' highest honors from United Press International for both investigative reporting (shared with a team he led at the Chicago Tribune) and for public service journalism.
It was during his years as a journalist that Strobel was an avowed atheist. That period of his life ended in 1981 with his conversion to Christianity, which was influenced by his wife's conversion two years earlier and Strobel's subsequent personal investigation into the historical, scientific, and philosophical evidence for Christianity, which is the subject of many of his books.
Criticism
Strobel's books are often marketed with the suggestion that his journalistic and legal background enables him to evaluate claims by contemporary theological authorities and biblical scholars. Because of this, some critics have accused Strobel of having sacrificed journalistic objectivity, by considering the opinions of academic Christian theists while paying insufficient attention to the rebuttals of academic atheists.
However, some apologists for Strobel have defended his methodology by pointing out that Strobel's books are clearly written in an op-ed style, are intended as introductory works in Christian apologetics, and are not marketed or portrayed as "hard journalism". The names of Strobel's books imply that the reader will get "The Case for Christ" for example, and not the case for and against Christ. However, Strobel does in fact cite the most popular objections raised by prominent atheist and skeptical scholarship and generally, the scholars whom Strobel interviews are authorities in their respective fields who themselves often appeal to the consensus of mainstream scholarship in the related disciplines discussed.
Strobel's apologetic style fits in with a school of thought known as legal apologetics or juridical apologetics. His work has been classified and discussed in the history of legal apologetics (see below the items by Clifford and Johnson).
Bibliography
- Reckless Homicide? Ford's Pinto Trial (1980)
- Inside the Mind of Unchurched Harry and Mary (1993)
- What Jesus Would Say (1994)
- God's Outrageous Claims (1998)
- The Case for Christ (1998)
- The Case for Faith (2000)
- Surviving a Spiritual Mismatch in Marriage (2002)
- The Case for a Creator (2004)
- The Case for Easter (2004)
- Experiencing the Passion of Jesus (2004)
- The Case for Christmas (2005)
- Discussing the Da Vinci Code : Exploring the Issues Raised by the Book and Movie (2006)
Strobel as Legal Apologist
- Ross Clifford, John Warwick Montgomery's Legal Apologetic: An Apologetic for all Seasons (Verlag für Kultur und Wissenschaft/Culture and Science Publishers, Bonn, Germany, 2004).
- Philip S. Johnson, "Juridical Apologists 1600-2000 AD: A Bio-Bibliographical Essay," Global Journal of Classical Theology, 3/1 (2002)
External links
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