Book Review
Polytheism: A Platonic Approach
by Steven Dillon
Publisher: Moon Book
Publication Date: March 22, 2022
144 pages

 

 

Polytheism is the belief in multiple gods. When I got this book to review, I was expecting a completely different book than what I got. I am polytheistic so I was quite excited by the title. I thought this sounded like an interesting approach and possibly a book I could give to any of my monotheistic friends so that they could maybe get a better understanding of what polytheism was.

Sadly, that was not what I got. Instead of a book easy for anyone to read and
understand, this book was a bunch of long, difficult words that even I, someone with an above average IQ, had problems with and had to constantly look up.

When I read a book, even one for research when writing my own books, I should not have to continuously look words up. And I don’t mean every now and again. I mean every paragraph or every other paragraph.

I have read a lot of academic articles and I own quite a few philosophical books but none of them were ever difficult to get through. Not only did this author use a lot of difficult words, but also used some words over and over, i.e. ineffable, tout court, intelligible. I had to look up the first two words, sometimes multiple times, because many of his sentences didn’t make sense.

Ineffable as defined by dictionary.com:

adjective

incapable of being expressed or described in words; inexpressible:
ineffable joy.
not to be spoken because of its sacredness; unutterable:
the ineffable name of the deity.

Here is a part where the other uses ineffable twice and it only makes sense in the first sentence:

“…whatever else may be said of Nature it is at least sensible and intelligible, so that according to theism reality it is not just sensible and intelligible, but also ineffable. However, to be ineffable is for one to be so utterly individual that there is nothing more to her than herself to be described as: she has no properties, features or characteristics that are not just herself.”

Now, according to the above definition, the first half of that makes complete sense. But, to me, I don’t see how the next half does?

The above example is just one of many paragraphs that makes one pause and go ‘huh?’. Another example:

“Conversely, as subjects are indescribable apart from predicates, so too are individuals qua individuals ineffable.”

Above this sentence, the author was explaining that “propositions are comprised of a subject and a predicate” and that you cannot look at a subject without any predicates. I have had to read the entire paragraph and a half multiple times and still have no idea how it ties in with my example. Also, what the heck is qua you ask? Glad you asked! Qua, as defined by dictionary.com:

adverb
as; as being; in the character or capacity of:
The work of art qua art can be judged by aesthetic criteria only.

Even Google docs doesn’t think the above sentence is right! So how are lay persons supposed to understand what the author said?

To say the least, I was not impressed with this book and I definitely will not be recommending it to any of my friends.

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Steven Dillon has been a practicing polytheist and a pagan author and philosopher for over 10 years.

 

Pagan Portals: Polytheism: A Platonic Approach on Amazon

 

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About the Author:

Cyndi Snow-Pilcher is an urban faery just trying to make it in this insane world. English was her favorite subject and spent hours writing short stories and poems. She gave up writing when life got in the way with the military and family duties. Then, after meeting the love of her life in 2000 and the support of friends, she started writing again.

She co-owns Fae Corps Publishing, LLC, an indie author publishing company that she started with her best friend and partner Patti Harris. They published quite a few anthologies and single author books since they started in July of 2019.

She has been in a few of the anthologies: Through the Sunshine, Faery Footprints, Nightmare Whispers Vol I, and will be penning something for Fae Corps Halloween anthology, Fae Shivers which comes out around the middle to end of October, 2021.

Her first book was The Woodland Adventures: Nita and the Honeybees, published in 2015. Soon after, she published Keko and the Lost Bananas. Neither are available at the moment as she will be republishing them under Fae Corps Publishing, LLC sometime in 2022.

She is currently working on a mystery novel and her Faery world of Cassari.

You can find her on her blog at: RedBird’s Storytime

Or follow her on Instagram at: https://www.instagram.com/redsstorytime/