reason our religion will be absurd and ridiculous. . . .There
are two equally dangerous extremes, to shut reason out and
to let nothing else in.'

Since Otto wrote this book thirty-two years ago, and even
since he died twelve years ago, new movements have ap-
peared to deflect and complicate, as well as to enrich, the
current of religious and philosophical thought. In the one
case we need only think of such distinguished names as Barth
and Brunner, Niebuhr, Berdiaiev, and Maritain; in the
latter, of the defiant challenge of Logical Positivism and the
still very esoteric enigma of 'Existentialism'. Those who
knew Rudolf Otto well, who profited themselves from his
eager intellectual sympathy, his penetration of mind, and his
deep reverence for truth, can have no doubt that had he
lived he would have learned much from such movements,
positively or negatively, and that he would himself have had
an important contribution to make to the discussions which
have arisen about them. Nor is there any doubt that he
would have been among those who are striving to re-knit the
torn fabric of Christendom by re-establishing intercourse
among the Christian churches, and a truer understanding by
them all of the significance of the Christian Faith. But I
believe that this book, born during the stress and travail of the
First World War, has a vital message in it that will outlive
the tragic aftermath of the second. His principal legacy to
his own generation, it remains very relevant to the religious
perplexities of to-day.

JOHN W. HARVEY

October 1949

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