The Divine for Critical Minds: Inquiry Into God's Existence

"An important book and a timely one." — Rupert Sheldrake

"Rehan Zaidi's book is authoritative, well informed, and clearly written. He has a sophisticated understanding of modern science and secular philosophies, as well as the theologies of different faiths, combined with the ability to discuss ideas in a calm and informative way. This is an important book and a timely one, as the dogmatic beliefs of materialists are increasingly challenged by the advances of the sciences themselves."
— RUPERT SHELDRAKE , biologist and author of The Science Delusion

"Dr. Rehan Zaidi approached me to read his book to gain an 'atheist's perspective.' He has undertaken the near impossible task of condensing what could literally fill multiple volumes into a single readable work and does so in earnest, and with a genuine passion to seek the truth."
— DAVID ROXBOROUGH , atheist reader

"A detailed journey through the vast waters of science that unveils the logical rigor of theism. For those willing to think outside the narrow box of materialism, Dr. Zaidi's treatise is salient and edifying."
— FARAZ A. KHAN , Lecturer in Islamic Theology, Zaytuna College

"Conducting a balanced investigation demands a careful attention to detail. Rehan takes nothing for granted in his pursuit of objectivity. He asks tough questions but ultimately provides a roadmap that leads us home."
— NAZIM BAKSH , CBC award-winning investigative journalist

Only one animal fits Rumi tells of men in a dark room, each reaching a different part of an elephant, each describing something else. The parable is usually told to mean that nobody has the whole picture. This book takes the harder reading.

The men are not fools. They are specialists. Physics has hold of one part, biochemistry another, philosophy a third — and each is right about exactly what it can reach. The elephant on this cover is assembled from puzzle pieces, and every chapter holds a piece. A puzzle has one solution. Put every specialist's report on the table and only one animal fits.

What is inside Almost twenty years of study, condensed into a single volume. The fine-tuning of the physical constants, and what Martin Rees and John Polkinghorne concluded about them. Complex specified information and the design inference. And the conundrums of life, consciousness and near-death experience — where, as the book puts it, the dominant material paradigm of our times is uncompromisingly assumed to be fact.

The method is stated plainly and applied without exception: take nothing for granted, question every foundational assumption, keep an open mind. Not proof by assertion. One question is asked of every chapter — which explanation is the best one?

Written for the reader who has heard the confident version from both directions and found it thin, and who wants the other side argued at the same level.