On Dec 14, 2004, at 10:45 AM, Michael Scott Williams wrote: > What makes anyone think Mark Twain has a lock on who God is? I think > much can be said about his approach and personal understanding of God, > but that's all it is -- his personal view. To take his understanding > as something we all need to take on as his own goes against Twain's > own appreciation for being "your own thinker," so it goes -- to > reason things out on your own. ................. Mark Twain comes at God in a personal way: speaking to the person that is God. This is a quality found throughout his creative work relating directly to the subject of God. Yes, he engages with ideas and throws thunderbolts at hypocrisy against God, but in the main he's speaking directly to God /as a Person/. This is my take, not as a scholar (I'm not), but as a literary and creative person, and through reading Mark Twain and engaging with him. "[F]or millions of Christians [...] God is no more real than He is to the non-Christian. They go through life trying to love an ideal and be loyal to a mere principle." -- AW Tozer Susan Dorman