Peter Kreeft Bundle (27 vols.)

by Peter Kreeft; Thomas Aquinas

Publisher:

Ignatius

, 1988–2013

Overview

Peter Kreeft is a philosopher, theologian, and apologist. As a philosopher, Kreeft makes understanding philosophy easy via a creative conversational format that let’s us listen in on fictional conversations between Socrates and other philosophical giants. As a theologian, he tackles the tough doctrines of angels, demons, heaven, hell, suffering, prayer and many more, giving the biblical perspective on these issues that are often clouded by popular culture. As an apologist, Kreeft helps answer the skeptic’s questions and equip believers with the tools they need to defend their faith in the world. The Peter Kreeft Bundle contains three collections of the philosopher, theologian, and apologist’s resources rolled into one, at a discounted price.

• Peter Kreeft’s Socratic Dialogues (7 vols.)
• Peter Kreeft Theology Collection (10 vols.)
• Peter Kreeft Philosophy and Apologetics Collection (10 vols.)

Kreeft has written dozens of books explaining and defending the Christian faith and Catholicism. He is frequently praised for his writing that is both clear and logical, as well as delightfully entertaining. In the Logos editions of these texts you can compile and compare Kreeft’s thoughts with other apologists, theologians and philosophers with just a few clicks. See all Scripture references on mouseover, and find everything the Bible says about the beginning and end, life and death, right and wrong, angels, heaven, or prayer in an instant. You can also easily compare Kreeft’s texts with classic primary sources like Discourse on Method, the Critique of Pure Reason, and Plato’s dialogues. Logos saves time and streamlines your study like never before.

Key Features

• Valuable insight for Catholics and Protestants alike
• Tested arguments and analysis on clouded doctrine and the toughest issues confronting Christianity
• Over 5,000 pages of Peter Kreeft’s signature wit and warmth

Product Details

• Title: Peter Kreeft Bundle
• Author: Peter Kreeft
• Publisher: Ignatius
• Volumes: 27
• Pages: 5,836

Philosophy 101 by Socrates: An Introduction to Philosophy

• Series: Socratic Explorations
• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 2002
• Pages: 152

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Kreeft presents this introduction to philosophy to help beginners not only understand philosophy, but fall in love with it. In his forty years of teaching, Kreeft says the most effective way to accomplish this purpose has been reading Plato’s Socratic dialogues.

Philosophy means “the love of wisdom.” In this volume Kreeft uses the dialogues of Plato to help the reader grow in that love of wisdom. No philosopher has ever been more simple, clear, and accessible to beginners as Socrates through Plato. He focuses on the Apology, what Kreeft calls “the Magna Carta of philosophy” and “a portable classroom,” as a model partner for the reader to dialogue with.

If only every introductory course were as engaging as Philosophy 101 by Peter Kreeft! Kreeft offers a marvelous way of using Plato’s Apology both to introduce the whole scope of philosophy and to evoke a personal response.

—Joseph Koterski, professor of philosophy, Fordham University

A terrific introduction to philosophy. It will awaken many a student to the delights of Plato and philosophy. The comparisons of Socrates with Christ are fascinating. This book will go a long way to consoling those who are not privileged to have Socrates or Kreeft as teachers in the flesh.

—Janet Smith, professor of philosophy, University of Dallas

Socrates Meets Descartes: The Father of Philosophy Analyzes the Father of Modern Philosophy’s Discourse on Method

• Series: Socratic Explorations
• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 2007
• Pages: 237

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According to Kreeft, Socrates and Descartes are perhaps the two most important philosophers who have ever lived, because they are the two who made the most difference to all philosophers after them. These two fathers of philosophy stand at the beginning of the two basic philosophical options: the classical and the modern. Through an imagined dialogue between Socrates and Descartes, Kreeft focuses on seven features that unite these two major philosophers and distinguish them from all others.

Socrates Meets Hume: The Father of Philosophy Meets the Father of Modern Skepticism

• Series: Socratic Explorations
• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 2010
• Pages: 240

Peter Kreeft calls Hume the “most formidable, serious, difficult-to-refute skeptic in the history of human thought.” In Socrates Meets Hume, Kreeft challenges Hume’s ideas via a Socratic examination of human understanding in relation to Hume’s skepticism. Kreeft invites you to take part in the process of refuting Hume’s skeptical arguments, with the aid of Socrates. Based on a fictional dialogue between Socrates and Hume that takes place in the afterlife, this profound and witty book makes an entertaining and informative exploration of modern philosophy.

Socrates Meets Kant: The Father of Philosophy Meets His Most Influential Modern Child

• Series: Socratic Explorations
• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 2009
• Pages: 236

In this volume, Kreeft explains how Immanuel Kant was both a philosopher about how we know things (epistemology) and a philosopher of right and wrong (ethics). Kant’s philosophy of knowing truly was a “Copernican revolution in philosophy,” and his ethics were intended to lay a rational foundation for morality. If he had written only on either topic, he would still be among the most important and influential of the modern philosophers. The combination of the two, though, makes for a formidable thinker, one it would take a figure such as the father of philosophy, the relentless Socrates, to confront. The conversation between the two great minds lays out the key issues. Kreeft’s Socrates reflects what the historical philosopher would likely have made of Kant’s ideas, while also recognizing the genius of Kant. The result is a helpful, highly readable, even amusing dialogue that makes the thought of these two giants easily accessible.

Socrates Meets Machiavelli: The Father of Philosophy Cross-Examines the Author of The Prince

• Series: Socratic Explorations
• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 2009
• Pages: 173

In this volume political theory’s foundational thinker has a conversation with the father of philosophy. Peter Kreeft’s reincarnation of the gadfly examines Machiavelli’s virtù, fortuna, and other concepts. The practical power player engages the classical seeker of the ideal in an approachable book on logic, ethics, and politics.

Socrates Meets Marx: The Father of Philosophy Cross-Examines the Founder of Communism

• Series: Socratic Explorations
• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 2003
• Pages: 201

In a unique and compelling take on the philosophies of Marx and Socrates. Kreeft pits the ancient Greek philosopher against the founder of Communism. Among the various topics discussed are private property, the individual, the “three philosophies of man”, individualism, and more. This is a wonderful introduction for the uninitiated, and a joy for the experienced student.

Socrates Meets Sartre: The Father of Philosophy Meets the Founder of Existentialism

• Series: Socratic Explorations
• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 2005
• Pages: 180

In Socrates Meets Sartre, Kreeft takes the reader through the world of existentialist philosophy, posing questions that challenge Sartre’s existentialist concepts. Based on a fictional dialogue between Socrates and Sartre that takes place in the afterlife, this profound and witty book makes an entertaining and informative exploration of modern philosophy.

Angels and Demons: What Do We Really Know about Them?

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 1995
• Pages: 158

Sample Pages: 1 | 2 | 3

In response to actual questions many people have asked him about angels and demons, well-known author and philosopher Peter Kreeft separates fact from fantasy and myth from reality as he answers 100 common questions about these spiritual beings. Based on a very popular college course he teaches on this subject, this book responds to the incredible amount of interest in angelic beings and attempts to clear up some of the misinformation abounding in the numerous books today on what we know about these mysterious spirits.

Drawing on the Bible, traditional Church teaching and St. Thomas Aquinas, Kreeft gives straight, clear answers to the perennial and philosophical questions asked about angels and demons throughout time. Kreeft answers questions like: “What are angels made of? How do angels communicate with God? How do angels communicate with us? Do demons, or devils, or evil spirits really exist?” in his typical lucid, profound, and sometimes humorous style.

Catholic Christianity: A Complete Catechism of Catholic Beliefs

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 2001
• Pages: 425

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For the first time in 400 years the Catholic Church has authorized an official Catechism of the Catholic Church. Using this official Catechism, Peter Kreeft presents a complete compendium of all the major beliefs of Catholicism in his readable, concise style.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church was written for the express purpose of grounding and fostering catechisms based on it for local needs and ordinary readers, and Kreeft does just that. He offers a thorough summary of Catholic doctrine, morality, and worship in a popular format with less technical language. He presents a systematic, organic synthesis of the essential and fundamental Catholic teachings in light of the Second Vatican Council and the whole of the Church’s Tradition. This book is the most thorough, complete, and popular summary of Catholic beliefs as represented in the universal Catechism.

In Catholic Christianity, Peter Kreeft has taken the core of the Catechism’s teaching and has represented it in his pithy and winning style. The result is the best entree to the Catechism yet—and therefore the best entree to the Catholic faith.

—Karl Keating, author, What Catholics Believe

Everything You Ever Wanted to Know about Heaven

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 1990
• Pages: 263

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With the spirit of C. S. Lewis, Kreeft provides an unsurpassed look at the nature of Heaven that offers readers a refreshingly clear, theologically sound, and always fascinating glimpse of the “undiscovered country.” Kreeft’s engaging and informative account thoughtfully answers intriguing questions about heaven, speaking to the mind and heart.

Fundamentals of the Faith: Essays in Christian Apologetics

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 1988
• Pages: 300

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Kreeft considers the fundamentals of Christianity and Catholicism, explaining, defending, and demonstrating their relevance to our life and the world’s yearnings. Here is a book to help you understand your faith more fully and have a ready defense of your hope for others.

Like every religion, Catholicism has three aspects, corresponding to the three innate needs of the soul. Kreeft uses these three needs as the basic outline for his Christian apologetics. First, every religion has some beliefs, whether expressed in creeds or not, something for the intellect to know. Second, every religion has some duty or deed, some practice of program, some moral or ethical code, something for the will to choose. Finally, every religion has some liturgy, worship, or “church,” something for the body, the concrete imagination, and the aesthetic sense to interact with. Creed, Code and Cult, or Words, Works and Worship, is Kreeft’s useful way of outlining any religious faith, including the Catholic faith.

The God Who Loves You

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 2001
• Pages: 226

God’s love is the subject of Peter Kreeft’s imaginative and thoughtful book. With unusual clarity, Kreeft points out that the man or woman who begins to glimpse the God who is creator, redeemer, and lover of our souls, will never be the same. He describes Scripture as God’s love story and then explains why divine love is the answer to our deepest problems and the fulfillment of our deepest desires.

Posing the hard questions about love that rankle the heart, Peter Kreeft never settles for easy answers. He exposes today’s superficial attitudes about love in order lead people into a deeper understanding of what it means to be loved by God.

There is no subject more important to everyone on earth than God’s love. I know of no writer today who can deal with it more justly and lovingly than Peter Kreeft has done.

—Sheldon Vanauken, author, A Severe Mercy

Heaven, the Heart’s Deepest Longing

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 1989
• Pages: 281

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A major book on the subject of heaven, this expanded edition examines the hunger for heaven that is so strong in all of us. Fascinating and upbeat, Heaven, the Heart's Deepest Longing thoroughly explores the psychological and theological dimensions of this search for total joy and for the ultimate reality that grounds it.

Love is Stronger than Death

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 1992
• Pages: 121

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In one of his most penetrating books, Peter Kreeft ponders the meaning of a terminal illness we all have: death. The three vital questions of life, death, and God are approached through a variety of human experiences. Kreeft’s book is a new statement of the Christian vision: the meaning of our existence, and of death, is the fulfillment of our deepest desire for the infinite joy and love of God.

Prayer for Beginners

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 2000
• Pages: 125

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Peter Kreeft brings his unique insights to this vital and oft’ neglected area of our spiritual lives. He claims he himself is still a beginner in prayer, and this book is for all those, like him, who feel that they are not good at praying but desire to become better at it. Kreeft offers simple-yet-profound advice and practical steps for developing a prayer life based on the time-tested wisdom of the saints and great spiritual writers, drawing especially from principles found in the classic from Brother Lawrence: The Practice of the Presence of God.

In short, straight-forward, and unsentimental chapters, Kreeft covers all the key areas necessary for understanding and developing that intimate form of communication with our creator that we call prayer.

There’s no shortage of good doctrinal material today. But, for the post-Boomer generations, the burning question remains: how do I begin to pray? Peter Kreeft answers that question in a simple, direct way that will reach ordinary unchurched Americans—as well as devout Catholics who have hit a dry spell.

—Michael J. Aquilina

Prayer: The Great Conversation

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 1991
• Pages: 178

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In his typical lucid and original style, Peter Kreeft explores many aspects and questions about prayer, the center of our spiritual lives. In a series of imaginative dialogues, Kreeft shows how prayer can be an exciting adventure, an inexhaustible joy, and a source of wisdom and strength.

Written in a practical, yet inspirational style, this book addresses important areas like finding the time to pray, praying when you don’t feel like it, using the prayer book God wrote, how to overcome sin through contemplation, and how to see God everywhere. Kreeft communicates a vision for prayer that becomes a profound conversation with the God who creates, redeems, and sustains us—the most important conversation in human life.

Written in engaging dialogue form, Prayer: The Great Conversation . . . takes you right along with all your doubts and hesitations into the place of freedom, love, beauty, and fulfillment, even in the midst of suffering, where God has always wanted you to be.

—Ronda Chervin

Good books on prayer magnify God and leave you wanting to pray more than you do. I cannot imagine any Christian failing to find that this book of basic wisdom about prayer is a good book--indeed, a very good book.

—J. I. Packer, professor of theology, Regent College

Three Philosophies of Life

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 1989
• Pages: 141

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“I’ve been a philosopher for all my adult life and the three most profound books of philosophy that I have ever read are Ecclesiastes, Job, and Song of Songs.” With these opening lines, Peter Kreeft begins his exposition of the three philosophies of life and how each one is represented by one of these books of the Bible—life is vanity; life is suffering; life is love.

Kreeft shows how Dante’s great epic, The Divine Comedy, parallels these three books, from hell to purgatory to heaven. But it is also an epic played out in our hearts and lives, here and now. Just as there is movement in Dante’s epic, so there is movement in from Ecclesiastes to Job, from Job to Song of Songs. Love is the final answer to the quest of Ecclesiastes, the alternative to vanity, and the true meaning of life. Kreeft sees in these books the epitome of the theological virtues of faith, hope and love—“an essential summary of the spiritual history of the world.”

Back to Virtue: Traditional Moral Wisdom for Modern Moral Confusion

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 1992
• Pages: 195

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“We have reduced all virtues to one: being nice. And, we measure Jesus by our standard instead of measuring our standard by Him.” For the Christian, explains Peter Kreeft, being virtuous is not a means to the end of pleasure, comfort and happiness. Virtue is a word that means “manly strength.” But how do we know when we are being meek—or just cowardly? When is our anger righteous—and when is it a sin? What is the difference between being virtuous—and merely ethical? Back to Virtue clears up these and countless other questions that beset Christians today. Kreeft summarizes scriptural and theological wisdom on leading a holy life while also contrasting Christian virtue with other ethical systems. He applies traditional moral theology to present-day dilemmas.

Kreeft restores to us what was once common knowledge: the seven deadly sins have an antidote in the Beatitudes. By setting up a close contrast between the two sets of behaviors, Kreeft offers battle-tested guidance in the often bewildering process of discerning right from wrong as we move into the twenty-first century. He provides a road map of virtue, a map for our earthly pilgrimage synthesized from the accumulated wisdom of centuries of Christians, from Paul and the early church fathers to C. S. Lewis.

C. S. Lewis for the Third Millennium: Six Essays on The Abolition of Man

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 1994
• Pages: 193

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Kreeft, one of the foremost students of Lewis’ thought, distills Lewis’ reflections on the collapse of western civilization and the way to renew it. Few writers have more lucidly grasped the meaning of modern times than Lewis. Kreeft’s reflections on Lewis’ thought provide explorations into the questions of our times, providing light and hope in an age of darkness.

Jacob’s Ladder: Ten Steps to Truth

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 2013
• Pages: 160

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In this volume Kreeft lays out ten important questions he says everyone should ask. He tackles each of these questions in a logical step-by-step way, like climbing the rungs of a ladder. Because questions are best answered by dialogue, Kreeft answers these fundamental questions in an imaginary conversation between two very different people who meet at the beach. Kreeft’s characters begin at the bottom of the ladder: the passion for truth. However, when it comes to the most important questions a person can ask, mere interest in philosophy will not do. The passion for truth does not stop there. It carries the reader from one page to the next in this thought-provoking adventure.

Peter Kreeft is our generation’s C.S. Lewis, as this brilliant new book of his further demonstrates. The genius of Jacob’s Ladder lies in Kreeft’s canny ability to capture the imagination with vivid and arresting prose while simultaneously leading the reader, step by step, above and beyond the cramped limitations of the imagination into the spacious and lofty heights of reason, reality, and truth.

—Patrick Madrid, author, Where is That in the Bible?

In Jacob's Ladder, Peter Kreeft offers a wonderful book for someone genuinely interested in asking profound questions and seeking profound answers. With clarity, wit, and insight, the characters of his dialogue consider some the most central questions in human life-including truth, meaning, love, God and Jesus-in a way both entertaining and accessible.

—Christopher Kaczor, author, Five Pillars of the Spiritual Life

Because God is Real: Sixteen Questions, One Answer

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 2008
• Pages: 237

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Kreeft sees Atheistic and agnostic writers aggressively attacking traditional religious beliefs. In this work designed for teens and young adults, Kreeft tackles sixteen crucial issues about the deeper meaning of life. He answers questions like: Is faith reasonable? Can you prove there is a God? Why is Jesus different? Why is sex so confusing? Why is there evil? and Why must we die?

Kreeft provides thoughtful, lucid, and persuasive answers for believers, unbelievers, and seekers to consider. This book is ideal for those exploring faith for the first time, as well as for confirmation and religious education classes.

A Refutation of Moral Relativism: Interviews with an Absolutist

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 1999
• Pages: 177

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In this volume, Peter Kreeft argues that no idea is more fateful for civilization than moral relativism, and that history knows not one example of a successful society which repudiated moral absolutes. Kreeft claims most attacks on relativism have been either pragmatic (looking at its social consequences) or exhorting (preaching rather than proving), and philosophers’ arguments against it have been specialized, technical, and scholarly. In this fun and accessible volume, Kreeft sets up a dialogue between an absolutist and a relativist that fleshes out the major arguments for both sides, ultimately finding the relativist position to be untenable.

We’ve come to expect nothing less than the most readable and engaging books from the great apologist, Peter Kreeft. He has an uncanny knack to take profound truths and get them across in entertaining and exciting conversation, as he has done here. Once again, Kreeft does not disappoint us.

—Chuck Colson, author, Loving God

Three Approaches to Abortion: A Thoughtful and Compassionate Guide to Today’s Most Controversial Issue

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 2002
• Pages: 134

Abortion remains a crucial issue in American politics. Three Approaches to Abortion cuts through the rhetoric of today’s politicians. Kreeft argues that it is illogical to support abortion rights while claiming to be personally opposed to abortion. Set up as a dialogue between two people on opposing sides of the issue, Kreeft’s commonsense approach, lucid arguments, and easy-to-grasp illustrations, make this book an invaluable in understanding abortion in 21st-century culture.

What is left to be said about the abortion debate? First of all, that is it usually not much of a debate. Peter Kreeft points the way to taking deepest disagreements seriously in creating and sustaining honest debate.

—Richard J. Neuhaus, editor, First Things

Yes or No: Straight Answers to Tough Questions about Christianity

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 1991
• Pages: 191

In this volume Kreeft tackles many of the tough questions facing Christianity today. In a series of imaginative dialogues, Sal the Seeker and Chris the Christian deal with the profound mysteries of the Gospel. The result is a book that is both engaging and profound. Kreeft shows how Christianity is God’s marriage proposal to the soul, and the answer must be “yes” or “no.” Kreeft explains how we can evade the claims of Jesus Christ for a while, but death brings evasion to an end. It is wiser to look at Christianity honestly now. Yes or No? shows the truth of Jesus’ promise that those who sincerely seek the truth shall find it. It is a road map for those who are honestly seeking the truth and a source of greater faith for those who have already found God. It presents the full challenge of the gospel in a way modern men and women can understand.

Lots of writers have the gift of irony, or humor, or logic, or common sense. Very few combine all these gifts in one talent and put it at the service of truth. Peter Kreeft is simply the best, the most engaging, Christian apologist at work today, and this book is another example of a master craftsman at his peak.

—Fancis X. Maier, editor, National Catholic Register

A Shorter Summa: The Most Essential Philosophical Passages of St. Thomas Aquinas’ Summa Theologica

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 1993
• Pages: 162

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St. Thomas Aquinas is universally recognized as one of the greatest philosophers who ever lived. His writings are both clear and profound; he is a master of metaphysics and technical terminology, yet full of both theoretical and practical wisdom. The Summa Theologica is timeless, but particularly important today because of his synthesis of faith and reason, revelation and philosophy, and the biblical and the classical Greco-Roman heritages. This little book is designed for beginners, either for classroom use or individually. It contains the most famous and influential passages of St. Thomas’ philosophy with copious aids to understanding them.

A Summa of the Summa: The Essential Philosophical Passages of St. Thomas Aquinas’ Summa Theologica

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 1990
• Pages: 532

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This unique book combines selected essential philosophical passages from Aquinas’ Summa with footnotes and explanations by Peter Kreeft. Kreeft selected those passages from Aquinas that are intrinsically important, non-technical enough to be intelligible to modern readers, and most likely to be used in a class or by an independent reader. Kreeft’s detailed footnotes explain difficult or technical passages and call attention to points of particular significance for the modern reader.

Your Questions, God’s Answers

• Publisher: Ignatius
• Publication Date: 1994
• Pages: 125

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In this book Kreeft provides the Bible’s answer to the most common and important questions young people ask about the deeper meaning of life, their own identity, overcoming failure and temptation, the mystery of God’s love, and much more. Kreeft believes these are important questions for everyone to ask, and that God's answers, as found in the Bible, respond to the deepest needs of every person.

About the Author

Peter Kreeft is a philosopher, theologian, and apologist. His concise, lucid, wit-infused prose draws frequent comparisons to that of C. S. Lewis. He has written dozens of books on understanding philosophy, defending the Christian faith, and encouraging Catholics on difficult doctrine. He is currently professor of philosophy at Boston College.