The Atheist: Madalyn Murray O'Hair. By Bryan F. Le Beau. (New York: New York University Press, 2003. x, 387 pp. $29.95, isbn 0-8147-5171-7.)

Abstract

In this judicious work, Bryan F. Le Beau examines the atheist philosophy and tumultuous life of Madalyn Murray O'Hair (1919–1995), “an American original” (p. 17) who was once stigmatized as “The Most Hated Woman in America” (pp. 118–19). While Le Beau's book is largely biographical, it also explores the history of freethinking, Cold War American culture, the issue of church and state, and gender relations. O'Hair became notorious after filing a 1960 lawsuit (Murray v. Curlett) against the Baltimore public schools, which had required her older son, William, to recite the Lord's Prayer. Subsequently, she crusaded for decades to advance the cause that animated her most—atheism. O'Hair's zealotry, combined with a law degree and savvy media instincts, helped non-theists gain a measure of respectability that was often outweighed by her notoriety. Exactly why O'Hair, who was raised Presbyterian, became antireligious remains ambiguous. Perhaps she was bitter against the Roman Catholic Church for denying her married lover a divorce; perhaps, as a feminist, she hated a male god. She did think that religion was a dangerous delusion that created a repressive society. Whatever her motivation, she attacked religion caustically. Only irrational people, she wrote, would follow a bible that was “‘replete with the ravings of madmen’” and a god who was “‘sadistic’” (p. 85). An atheist, by contrast, “‘loves his fellow man instead of god’” and “‘believes that a hospital should be built instead of a church’” (p. 172).