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Morality
Restoring the Common Good in Divided Times

Publication date: 16 March 2020

With liberal democracy embattled, public discourse grown toxic, family life breaking down, and drug abuse and depression on the rise, many fear what the future holds.

In Morality, respected faith leader and public intellectual Jonathan Sacks traces today’s crisis to our loss of a strong, shared moral code and our elevation of self-interest over the common good. We have outsourced morality to the market and the state, but neither is capable of showing us how to live. Sacks leads readers from ancient Greece to the Enlightenment to the present day to show that there is no liberty without morality and no freedom without responsibility, arguing that we must all must play our part in rebuilding a common moral foundation.

A major work of moral philosophy, Morality is an inspiring vision of a world in which we can all find our place and face the future without fear.

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Awards

  • Sunday Times Top Ten Bestseller
  • 2020 Book of the Year, Jewish Book Council (USA)

Also available in

Formats

  • Audiobook
  • Hardcover
  • Kindle
  • Paperback

quotemarks
Jonathan Sacks has produced a work of extraordinary depth, beauty, urgency, and erudition. If the prophets of the Hebrew Bible came back to guide liberal democracies and anxious citizens through this difficult time, but first they studied modern history and social science, this is the book they would write for us.
Jonathan Haidt, author of 'The Righteous Mind' and co-author of 'The Coddling of the American Mind'
Jonathan Sacks is one of the great moral thinkers of our time. His latest book, 'Morality', applies his powerful approach to the unprecedented challenges of our time - social, political, economic, and above all, cultural. May his words be heeded throughout the land.
Robert D. Putnam, author of 'Bowling Alone' and 'The Upswing'
A masterpiece... One leaves with a deep sense of gain in reading and of loss for the future. This is a life for which we should all be deeply thankful.
Justin Welby, Archbishop of Canterbury, writing in the foreword to the paperback edition
Morality is not an argument or a compilation of thoughts - it is a wake-up call to a world that has become self-obsessed, self-centered and lonely, and whose moral standards have withered as a result."—Jerusalem Post “This book once again confirms his reputation as one of the great religious sages of the Abrahamic faiths and as an outstanding philosopher of our times.
Amb. Prof. Akbar Ahmed, Ibn Khaldun Chair of Islamic Studies, American University
I highly recommended people check out [the new book, Morality]… I can think of nothing more important right now in embracing this and shifting from ‘I’ to ‘We’…
Tim Ferriss, #1 bestselling author and host of The Tim Ferriss Show podcast
This major work in moral philosophy and theology should engage all readers, but particularly scholars, undergraduates, and graduate students.
Library Journal
An impressive tour d'horizon of the state of the western world - the US and the UK in particular - at the end of the second decade of the 21st century.
Times of Israel
If you are looking for a book to read during these strange and stressful days, look no further than Jonathan Sacks' magnificent Morality.
Matthew D'Ancona, Evening Standard
In his new book, Morality, the former Chief Rabbi, Jonathan Sacks, makes a very basic and crucial point about the nature of morality: it is based on 'we' and not 'I'.
Giles Fraser, Daily Telegraph
One of the great public intellectuals of the age
The Times