Reinhold Niebuhr and Paul Ramsey were towering figures of twentieth century religious thought whose influences remain widely felt?if not also contested?well into the next century. This book makes an invaluable contribution to the recent renaissance in Christian realism. Indeed, Kevin Carnahan perspicuously shows us how much we have yet to learn about Reinhold Niebuhr and Paul Ramsey's complex theological frameworks and ethical outlooks. This book fills the gaps by examining the intellectual and personal relationship between these two men. With a masterful command of their formidable thought?supplemented by painstaking review of their letters, lecture notes, and private papers?Carnahan probes the pragmatic Jamesian and idealist Hegelian foundations of Niebuhr and Ramsey's respective intellectual outlooks. He expertly reveals as well how the insights and limits of one are offset by the other, particularly when it comes to their views of war and the use of force. This is exactly the right time to revisit Niebuhr and Ramsey's work in the comprehensive way that Carnahan's cogent study provides. He offers a sorely needed approach often overlooked by other scholars who choose sides between Niebuhr and Ramsey. Undertaking a deep retrieval of the early contexts an
