The full title and subtitle is actually The Secret Gospel of Ireland:The Untold Story of How Science and Democracy Descended from a Remarkable Form of Christianity That Developed in Ancient Ireland. But that is quite long and would not do as a title of this review.
The Behan brothers begin with the early history of the Catholic church. The Romans never made it to Ireland but did rule most of the known world in those days. The Catholic church or at least that a large part of it was centered in Rome and became the official state religion of the Roman Empire in 380 AD.
The really interesting thing is that this is not just a straightforward history of the Church with perhaps a regretful statement about the light of learning going out in Europe but surviving in Ireland and then being revived in Europe by some travelling Irish monks.
No, this is much more. Consider the issues discussed, Why did the Pope send a mission to Ireland? Why was Patrick much more successful than the bishop sent by the Pope. How and why did Irish Christianity differ from the Roman Catholicism of the time. What were the philosophical and theological ideas of each? What were some of the other ideas considered? And how did they develop and influence each other?
The Behans cover a lot of ground in about 200 pages. And do so in an interesting fashion and weave an important explanation of events, relating some Irish influence on Catholicism to our ideas of science and democracy.
A very interesting book. And as a bonus, they added a short chapter at the end with references and suggestions on further reading.
I enjoyed this book quite a bit so this is really a very favorable review but I do have one minor gripe.
The title can be a bit misleading. That is, The Secret Gospel of Ireland might lead you to believe that this is about some long-lost secret scrolls found in Ireland. And that is not what this book is about at all. But that is a bit of a quibble and definitely not as important as the content of this wonderful book.
The subtitle is a much better indicator of what this book is about but it is too long to be a good title. So we have a shorter and less accurate title. Certainly not a major flaw but something I thought I should mention in case any prospective readers are mislead.
But the title does have the sense of the book and a short pithy title does make it easier to refer to the book, to say nothing of looking nice on the cover (very nice cover, by the way). So we have a good book with a title that might be more accurate but I have no suggestions there.
This book is definitely a keeper. I enjoyed it very much and learned a lot in the process. The nice part about having this book on my bookshelf is that when I am feeling a bit philosophical, I can reread parts or turn to that last bonus section to find more reading.
I highly recommend this book to those with an interest philosophy, theology, or the intellectual history of Europe.