How do modern world renowned apologists compare to the one’s 100, 250, 500, 1000, 1500 years ago?
Would Jimmy Akin be considered one of the best in the world? Or just region? Scott Hahn? Patrick Madrid?
I really no next to nothing on this subject, so I’m curious on what other people’s thoughts are.
Thanks!
100 years ago, a great Catholic apologist was G.K. Chesterton. One difference between him and modern apologists is that he did not focus so much on biblical arguments or arguments against evangelical Christians. His focus was skeptics who do not care about the Bible, and he tried to show them the beauty of our faith. His main weapon was not the Bible, but the art of language, and he used it to draw people into a better understanding of the faith, because he believed that when a person comes into contact with the authentic faith, it has a power all its own to convince them. One of his most popular works was Orthodoxy. Probably his best apologetic work was The Everlasting Man, which influenced the conversion of the great C.S. Lewis to Christianity.
250 years ago, a great Catholic apologist was John Henry Newman. He focused on answering the critics who say Christianity is merely a natural evolution of religious ideas. He used the Scriptures and Church History to show that Christianity (and Catholicism) is completely new, but a fulfillment of, all high religious ideals, and that everything that is good in other religions, finds its best reflection in Christianity, while everything bad in other religions, is either purified or cast away in Christianity. His greatest apologetic works were Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine, and The Grammar of Assent.
500 years ago, perhaps the best Catholic apologist was St. Robert Bellarmine. He focused on answering the difficulties of the early Protestants, and he has a lot in common with modern Catholics. He originated a lot of the biblical arguments that Catholics still use against Protestants to this day. You won’t find much in Karl Keating or Patrick Madrid that didn’t first come from Robert Bellarmine, who was made a saint and a doctor of the Church for his persuasive and complete refutation of all the Protestant ideas. His great work was the Disputations, also known as the Controversies, a large multi-volume work that addresses at length all the Protestant ideas. It was so popular that the pope had it read aloud to him during his study time. When Francis de Sales went into Geneva, France on a mission to convert the Calvinists, the only books he took with him were the Bible and the Disputations. Unfortunately, it has never been translated into English, but Francis de Sales wrote a work based on it called The Catholic Controversy, which has been translated into English, and you can get a lot of Bellarmine’s information from that book.
1000 years ago, perhaps the best Catholic apologist was St. Bernard of Clairvaux. The Albigensian heresy had deep roots in France in his time, and was so large that the Catholic Church was nearly displaced. He was commissioned to preach against them and try to bring lapsed Catholics back into the fold. He also fought to purify the University of France from its neo-Platonic philosophers, who were teaching the Catholic students to mix pagan philosophy with the Catholic doctrines and ruin the foundations of the faith. He also preached the Second Crusade, which probably involved some instruction about the errors of Islam, against whom the Crusades were launched. However, his most famous book is not an apologetics book, but an exhortation to the pope, and it is called The Considerations.
(Almost) 1500 years ago, the best Catholic apologist was possibly St. John Damascene. He was alive during the Iconoclast heresy, which sought to destroy the use of images in the Church. He does not only write against the Iconoclasts, though. He is the first writer to have a sustained argument against Islam, which is the subject of one chapter in a book he wrote against heresies called The Fount of Wisdom. The first part is about the true faith; it is called An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith. The second part is called Heresies in Epitome: How They Began and Whence They Drew Their Origin. That is the section that contains the arguments against Islam.
I hope that helps. God bless!
