This impressive book marks very clearly the revolution that is taking place in Christian thinking about Islam, and at the same time it illustrates an important new trend in scholarly treatment of the Qur’an. In the past, theological hatred of Islam has often been stronger among Oriental Christians than among Latins; the prejudice shared by both has been intensified by the frustrations of subordination in the political and social order. Now this important book comes from a Maronite author, that is, from the Church traditionally most anti-Muslim. It enjoys the blessing of that truly remarkable prelate, H. B. Mgr Meouchi, the Patriarch, who, however, is far from being at one with his church. The book is a little dour; it has all the severity of the thesis form. Even when it was turned into a book, the solid meat was served without sauce. This criticism, which militates against its readability, is the only criticism I can wish to make of a book which greatly promotes understanding of Islam, and clears new paths for scholarship.

It reverses the traditional attitude of Christians and of scholars, in a very simple revolution, which consists in treating the Qur’an as a religious book; in treating it consistently as consistently a religious book; in assuming that religious ideas inspired and informed it and guided the Prophet. From the earliest days of Christian criticism, Islam was supposed to have been contrived out of Christian, Jewish and pagan elements, by a false prophet; hypocritically, it was thought in the old days, and more or less sincerely, or innocently, in a more modern view.

A lecturer at a study week-end on the arts recently caused a mild sensation among his hearers by attributing what he regarded as the negligible contemporary impact of English Catholics on the arts to the fact that the parish clergy (he made it clear that he didn’t altogether hold it against them) were largely drawn from the lower middle classes.

This equation—lower-middle class clergy, ‘people’s’ parishes, sentimentality, vulgarity, lack of taste—has come to be largely accepted, whether defiantly or with a resigned shrug. Like many similar commonplaces, it doesn’t stand up to scrutiny unshaken. Sentimentality, vulgarity and lack of taste were unfortunately part of the climate in which the Church revived and expanded rapidly after emancipation, and all classes and creeds were affected. In casual conversation of the seminary common-room type, one still hears Anglicanism equated with good taste: yet half our English medieval churches are scarred by the fury of the antiquarian wreckers of the last century. These came in two styles: the strippers, who reduced churches to barns, and the titivators who made them look like repository showrooms. On the whole, considering our limited financial and other resources, Catholics come better out of the architectural history of the past 150 years than most other corporations. Admittedly this is not saying much, but at least we were spared all that dreadful watered-down pre-Raphaelite stuff one finds in children’s corners of Anglican cathedrals.

The publication now in progress of the second edition of this standard work of reference, thoroughly revised and refashioned, is an event not only for German-speaking Catholicism but for the entire Catholic world. In its new form the Lexikon can fairly be described as the flowering of a long process of growth within the Church beginning perhaps under Pius IX, in which she began fully to accept the challenge of the modern world. If there have been hesitations in this growth, and sometimes even the apparent rejection of the possibility of growth at all, as in the Modernist crisis, these have been precisely crises of growth, brought about by the unbalanced and uncritical pursuit of novelty on the one side, and an often unfounded suspicion of it on the other. We have not seen the last of these crises; how could we, if, as we must firmly believe, the Church will continue to grow under divine Providence and fed by the Spirit of Christ, until the Coming of the Truth of Christ at the end of time?

Meanwhile we can be grateful for this remarkable manifestation of Catholic maturity. It need hardly be said that the Lexikon maintains the highest standards of German scholarship, wissenschaftlich in the best sense. As far as publications go, Mgr Höfer of Rome is best known for his studies in nineteenth-century German Catholicism and as an editor of Scheeben; Fr Karl Rahner, S.J., is Professor at Innsbruck, editor of the current Denzinger, and undoubtedly the most influential theologian writing in German today.