One was the mind behind communism and much of modern socialist thought. The other was a famous traveling evangelist who founded schools and charities that still exist today. Erwin Lutzer, the 85-year-old author and former longtime senior pastor of The Moody Church in Chicago, Illinois, has co-authored a book contrasting the lives, legacies, and worldviews of 19th-century contemporaries Karl Marx and Dwight L. Moody. Titled Marx and Moody: Two Contemporaries. Two Gospels. Two Tombstones.
One Choice and co-authored with Gregg Quiggle, former D.L. Moody professor of historical theology at Moody Bible Institute, the book was released last month by Moody Publishers. Lutzer wrote the sections on Marx, while Quiggle, who had previously written Bread and Bibles: D.L. Moody's Evangelism and Social Action(2024), wrote the sections on Moody.
In an interview with The Christian Post, Lutzer said the book's inspiration came when he visited Marx's final resting place in Highgate Cemetery in London, England. As he prepared to film a lecture at Marx's grave site, Lutzer recounted that “it suddenly struck me that” Marx and Moody “were contemporaries,” with Marx's collaborator, Friedrich Engels, once visiting a Moody revival service in England.
“That began an interest, and I said, ‘What we need is a book that actually highlights these two individuals,’” Lutzer said. “Here are two towering figures in the 1800s.” In his section on Marx, Lutzer was critical of the 19th-century writer's legacy, both regarding the fundamental assumptions of socialism and how it has been implemented worldwide.
Lutzer also acknowledged in his book that capitalism has had a history of corruption and poor implementation, but maintained that, fundamentally, capitalism was superior to socialism. According to Lutzer, capitalism was “fundamentally” better because “it appeals to our initiative to want to better our position” and that “it has competition” that creates certain incentives.