2 Chronicles 18 is the story of Ahab and Jehoshaphat’s war with the Arameans at Ramoth-gilead. The battle occupies only a brief portion at the end. Most of the chapter is taken up with the kings’ consultation of prophets. After a brief introduction, the bulk of the chapter consists of complexly shifting verbal exchanges between different characters. 1.King to king, vv. 3-4 (Ahab, Jehoshaphat, Jehoshaphat). Ahab asks Jehoshaphat to join his war, Jehoshaphat agrees and then asks to inquire of… Read more

In The Breaking of Nations, Robert Cooper observes that “the spread of the technology of mass destruction represents a potentially massive redistribution of power away from the advanced industrial (and democratic) states towards smaller states that may be less stable and have less of a stake in an orderly world” (viii-ix). More frighteningly, “it may represent a redistribution of power away from the state itself and towards individuals, that is to say terrorists and criminals. If proliferation were to take… Read more

Our entertainment-drenched culture is a reflection of the colonizing power of liberalism. Liberalism is a drive for unlimited freedom, and any inequality or hierarchy stands in the way. Even the distinction between superior and inferior ways of life is anti-liberal. As Ryszard Legutko puts it (Demon in Democracy), liberalism demands a “minimalist anthropology,” one that makes no thick assumptions about human aspirations, values, ends, or purposes. Society exists to facilitate the satisfaction of the most basic needs of human beings…. Read more

“All that exists consists of force and matter,” says atheistic materialism. Very well, replies Vladimir Solovyev (Lectures on Godmanhood, 81-2). Let’s assume that is true and see where it leads. “Force” and “matter,” he points out, are :very general conceptions”: “We speak of physical forces, we speak of spiritual forces. Forces of either kind can be real. In agreeing with materialism further, that forces cannot exist by themselves, but necessarily belong to certain real units or atoms, which represent the… Read more

Few accepted at face value the inflated claim that 1989 brought us to the “end of history” (Fukuyama), where democratic capitalism was left with an ideological monopoly. Still, many operated on the assumption that globalized trade would make the world more peaceful and democratic. It hasn’t happened. History continues despite theorizing to the contrary. In particular, the hope that the world would soon adopt Western or American ways hasn’t come true. John Gray (False Dawn) notes that “A global free… Read more

Materialism is “good news,” according to Stephen Greenblatt, since it shows us the truth of “human insignificance” and dispels enchantment. We’re liberated from sacred boundaries to do what we like. Rusty Reno, who quotes this from Greenblatt (Resurrecting the Idea of a Christian Society, 148) considers this a bit of naively class-based cheeriness: “What Greenblatt fails to see is that this gospel is for the rich and powerful – professors at Harvard, for example. As materialism disenchants, the norms by… Read more

Paul Gottfried (After Liberalism) points out that liberalism doesn’t mean one thing. It “has not been allowed to keep any fixed and specific meaning. It has signified dramatically different and even opposed things at different times and places in the course of this century, from a defense of free-market economics and of government based on distributed powers to a justification of exactly the opposite positions. Self-described liberals in the Western world during the last seventy-five years have been nationalists, internationalists,… Read more

In his Lectures on Godmanhood, Vladimir Solovyev isolated the inner contradiction of 19th-century conceptions of human  nature. On the one hand, “contemporary man is aware that he is internally free, deems himself to be higher than any external principle independent of him, asserts himself as the center of everything.” This is the basis for modern politics: “man is a being with unconditional significance, with unconditional rights and demands.” At the same time, he is convinced by science that he is “only… Read more

Many commentators have noted the similarities between Josiah’s death (2 Chronicles 35) and that of Ahab (2 Chronicles 18). Christine Mitchell argues, however, that commentators often miss the irony of the Chronicler’s account, and some of the other precedents for Josiah’s death. One irony has to do with the location of Josiah’s death. In 2 Kings, Josiah appears to die on the battlefield and his corpse is returned to Jerusalem. In 2 Chronicles, Josiah is still alive when he returns… Read more

Robert Heimburger’s God and the Illegal Alien is a careful, theologically-informed treatment of American immigration law. He provides detailed overviews of the development of immigration law, including the origins of the concept of a legal “alien,” sketches a theology of politics with the help of “Barth’s biblical theology of the peoples,” examines the biblical evidence regarding borders and immigrants with help from Oliver O’Donovan, Luther, and others, and examines specific cases in discriminating detail. He concludes that American immigration law… Read more

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