“Radical Idealism and Empirical Metaphysics in the Work of Mary Baker Eddy”

Sheldon, Nicholas David, “Radical Idealism and Empirical Metaphysics in the Work of Mary Baker Eddy,” PhD dissertation, University of Keele, June, 2022. 

Sheldon makes the case that Mary Baker Eddy was a philosopher of “daringly ambitious radical idealism” (ii) whose writings should have recognition in the field of philosophy. Eddy’s central thesis, Sheldon claims, is that the physical senses are unreliable and create a system of false beliefs about reality. He associates Eddy’s work with philosophical writings from many ages, but through rather short examples. One comparison is a claim that American Transcendentalism was foundational to preparing Eddy’s thought before her writing about Christian Science. The dissertation also contains a brief history of Eddy’s movement and critical reception as a religion. In this assessment he includes thinkers from within the Christian Science community such as the writings of Stephen Gotttschalk, and the philosophical nature of Amy Voorhees’s work. The dissertation includes the entire glossary from Eddy’s textbook Science and Health and fifty pages of individual healings from its chapter on Fruitage. Despite contemporary challenges to the contrary, Sheldon includes some myths regarding early Christian Science history, such as a supposed 1943 official endorsement of Eddy as equivalent to the woman in Revelation chapter 12, and notions that Albert Einstein praised Christian Science. Sheldon has now published a book based on his dissertation.

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See also annotations:

“Theodicy after Auschwitz and the Reality of God” by Stephen Gottschalk

A New Christian Identity: Christian Science Origins and Experience in American Culture by Amy Voorhees