A Nation Wrestles with God
Featured writers: Reza Aslan, Ilan Stavans and Emily D. Crews
Religion scholars Reza Aslan and Ilan Stavans sit down with Emily D. Crews to discuss the new anthology A Nation Wrestles with God: American Prophets, Philosophers, and Firebrands, a landmark collection of the philosophers and firebrands that sparked a country’s journey through divinity—praising, challenging, and redefining the sacred.
This book and program are presented in conjunction with the American Writers Museum’s special exhibit American Prophets: Writers, Religion, and Culture, of which Stavans and Crews were curatorial advisors. American Prophets is now on display at the AWM. American Prophets is supported by a grant from Lilly Endowment Inc. through its Religion and Cultural Institutions Initiative.
Book signing times (all signings take place in the First Floor Lobby of the library)
🖊️Reza Aslan: 12:00 – 12:20
🖊️Ilan Stavans: 12:00 – 12:20
About the writers:
REZA ASLAN is a renowned writer, commentator, professor, Emmy- and Peabody-nominated producer, and scholar of religions. He is the author of numerous internationally bestselling books, including the #1 New York Times Bestseller Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth, currently in development at Fremantle Media with Pablo Larrain attached to direct. A former Truman Capote Fellow in Fiction at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and recipient of the prestigious James Joyce Award, Aslan has helped craft the mythologies for Hollywood’s most acclaimed franchises, including Dune, Game of Thrones, and The Leftovers. In addition to his writing and production work, he has served as host and executive producer of CNN’s Believer and Rough Draft with Reza Aslan, and co-hosts the podcast Metaphysical Milkshake alongside Rainn Wilson. His latest book, An American Martyr in Persia, was nominated for the PEN/Jacqueline Beograd Weld Award. Born in Iran, he lives in Los Angeles with his wife and their four children.
EMILY D. CREWS is the Executive Director of the Martin Marty Center at the University of Chicago Divinity School. In collaboration with its staff and faculty co-directors, she sets the research and programming agenda of the Marty Center. She also acts as its public representative and leads its partnerships with collaborators across the University, the city of Chicago, and beyond. A graduate of the University of Chicago Divinity School’s PhD program in the History of Religions, Emily is a scholar of Christianities in Africa and the United States. Emily is the co-editor of Remembering Jonathan Z. Smith: A Career and Its Consequence (with Russell McCutcheon, 2020) and African Diaspora Religions in 5 Minutes (with Curtis J. Evans, 2024). She has published scholarly articles in Method and Theory in the Study of Religion, Religion and Theology, and numerous edited volumes, as well as articles for the public in Sightings and The Local Palate. She was recently a scholar-consultant on the Court Theatre’s production of The Gospel at Colonus.
ILAN STAVANS is Lewis-Sebring Professor of Humanities, Latin American and Latino Cultures at Amherst College, and publisher of Restless Books, devoted to world literature in translation. He has written and edited multiple books.
A Nation Wrestles with God: American Prophets, Philosophers, and Firebrands
edited by Ilan Stavans
Spanning more than 400 years of spiritual transformation and imagination, A Nation Wrestles With God collects diverse writers—poets, novelists, theologians, scientists, musicians, politicians, comedians, artists, mavericks, naturalists, futurists, and more—whose daring texts incited change and continue to influence a growing nation. In this anthology, you will find the stories, poems, letters, speeches, sermons, essays, song lyrics, comic strips, newspaper columns, and commentaries that awoke new generations to free religious thought, from the pre-colonial to the present day.
God: A Human History
by Reza Aslan
With thoughtful, accessible scholarship, Aslan narrates the history of religion as one long and remarkably cohesive attempt to know the divine by giving it human traits and emotions. According to Aslan, this innate desire to humanize God is hardwired in our brains, making it a central feature of nearly every religious tradition. As a result, we bestow upon God not just all that is good in human nature—our compassion, our thirst for justice—but all that is bad in it: our greed, our bigotry, our penchant for violence.