Peter Kreeft's Handbook of Apologetics

[Rmac81]

I’m wanting to get a gift for someone, and heard on the radio that Peter Kreeft’s Handbook of Christian Apologetics was a wonderful source to have on hand.

When I looked it up on Amazon, I found two books with similar titles. One titled Handbook of Christian Apologetics and the other titled Handbook of Catholic Apologetics.

Does anyone know which one would be the better book? Or are they the same, but one is a newer edition?

I’m buying for friends who will be brought into the Church next week (they’re coming from a Baptist background).

 

[Scottgun]

The Handbook. It’s been years since I’ve read it, so I can’t provide a rationale other than I recall it was excellent.

 

[katy]

From Amazon review regarding Handbook of Catholic Apologetics
:
This “new” volume is that exact text (as far as I can tell, it is entirely unaltered from the last edition of the HBCA) with the exception of a new chapter - just under forty pages - of very short essays, ranging from a half a page to two pages in length, on various Catholic topics.

 

[commenter]

Handbook of Catholic Apologetics - now published by a Catholic publisher - is an expanded version of the Handbook of Christian Apologetics, which was published by Intervarsity, an evangelical publisher. The original Handbook was valuable, because it was written by a Catholic priest and layman (Kreeft) but circulated through Evangelicals. It helped show many of them that Catholicism is fully compatible with defending Christianity as a whole, which is what C. S. Lewis did, especially in Mere Christianity. I hope it is still being published. Most apologetic works are either kind of hard to read, or else they use very little logic. This one is logical and easy to read.

The later, Catholic version simply expands to show that not only is Christianity itself logical, but within Christianity, Catholicism is the better choice. For people who are already thinking of becoming Catholic, I would suggest it. But the earlier version is valuable too. Sometimes it’s all you can do just to demonstrate the logic of Christianity itself, for now.

 

[Joe_5859]

Handbook of Catholic Apologetics - now published by a Catholic publisher - is an expanded version of the Handbook of Christian Apologetics, which was published by Intervarsity, an evangelical publisher. The original Handbook was valuable, because it was written by a Catholic priest and layman (Kreeft) but circulated through Evangelicals. It helped show many of them that Catholicism is fully compatible with defending Christianity as a whole, which is what C. S. Lewis did, especially in Mere Christianity. I hope it is still being published. Most apologetic works are either kind of hard to read, or else they use very little logic. This one is logical and easy to read.

The later, Catholic version simply expands to show that not only is Christianity itself logical, but within Christianity, Catholicism is the better choice. For people who are already thinking of becoming Catholic, I would suggest it. But the earlier version is valuable too. Sometimes it’s all you can do just to demonstrate the logic of Christianity itself, for now.

If you utilize the “Look Inside” feature on Amazon for the Handbook on Christian Apologetics and the Handbook on Catholic Apologetics, you can see that the Table of Contents is identical for both with the exception of an additional “Chapter 17: Twenty Catholic Capstones to Christian Apologetics” in the latter book.

I haven’t done a side-by-side comparison of the two books to see if the rest of the content is identical or not, but that additional chapter appears to be the main difference. I agree that it would depend on the person. If it is someone being brought into the Church, it would seem appropriate to get them the Catholic version.

 

[pnewton]

Great book (s)! I had the first and got the second as a gift. I am still waiting for the opportunity to ditch the first when I find the right person. This book should be the part of any library of the avid apologist.