“Manasseh” is derived from a causative form of the verb “forget” – hence, cause to forget. Manasseh causes Judah to forget by liturgical change – rebuilding high places, erecting altars and Asherahs, and so on. Memory is nourished by liturgy; forgetfulness by liturgical perversion. Read more
Stephen Charnock argues that salvation must be supernatural because nature is insufficient for the task: “A change from acts of sin to moral duties may be done by a natural strength and the power of natural conscience: for the very same motives which led to sin, as education, interest, profit, may, upon a change of circumstances, guide men to an outward morality; but a change to the contrary grace is supernatural.” (more…) Read more
Roger Haight offers this summary of the notion of “supernatural”: “God is not supernatural in himself; he is simply the infinite and transcendent being; he is God. But viewed in relation to the human he is supernatural; that is to say, spiritual union with God transcends human nature and all its dynamisms absolutely. The first meaning of ‘supernatural,’ then, is ‘utterly transcendent to the human and everything finite.’ But the end of human existence as known through revelation is personal... Read more
Peter Lombard argued (Book 1, distinction 17 of the Sentences ) that the Spirit is both the love by which God loves us and the origin of the love by which we love Him: “the Holy Spirit is the Love [amor] of the Father and the Son, by which They love [amant] one another and us. Moreover, it must be added to these, that the very same Holy Spirit is the Love or Charity, by which we love [diligimus] God... Read more
In another chapter of the same book, Larsen argues that British secularization promoted by Dissenters within England, and on specifically theological grounds. According to the “Protestant Dissenters’ Catechism” (published 1772, by Samuel Palmer), a church is “a congregation, or voluntary soceity of Christians, who meet together to attend gospel ordinances in the same place. And they think every such society has a right to transact its own affairs according to the judgment and conscience of the members thereof, independently of... Read more
In his book Contested Christianity (Baylor, 2004), Wheaton historian Timothy Larsen examines the reception of DF Strauss’s Life of Jesus in England. He suggests that only Darwin’s Origin of Species rivals Strauss’s book as a challenge to orthodoxy in Victorian England. Yet, the book’s impact had less to do with its radicalism than its piety. Charles Hennell, friend to Strauss’s English translator George Eliot and author of his own non-miraculous account of Christianity, suggested that Strauss’s abandonment of miracles was... Read more
In response to my comments about the “road to Rome” charge, Eric Enlow of Handong International Law School writes: “I would connect sacramentalism with the road to Rome for an empirical reason. The individuals that I have known who have been most interested in sacramentalism have converted to Roman Catholicism. They might have become Lutherans if sacramentalism alone motivated them — but I believe they were attracted by the general romantic atmosphere of Roman Catholic religion,” a romanticized picture of... Read more
INTRODUCTION Manasseh undergoes a demonic “repentance”: Verse 3 says “he turned, he built,” using the Hebrew verb that normally designates repentance (“turn”). He “repents” of Hezekiah’s reforms. Because of this, the Lord determines to repeat in Jerusalem what he did in Shiloh (v. 12; cf. 1 Samuel 3:11; Jeremiah 19:3). He will bring a judgment that will reverberate throughout the world. THE TEXT “Manasseh was twelve years old when he became king, and he reigned fifty-five years in Jerusalem. His... Read more
2 Kings 20:8-11: Now Hezekiah said to Isaiah, What will be the sign that the Lord will heal me, and that I shall go up to the house of the Lord the third day? And Isaiah said, This shall be the sign to you from the Lord, that the Lord will do the thing that He has spoken: shall the shadow go forward ten steps or back ten steps? So Hezekiah answered, It is easy for the shadow to decline... Read more
2 Kings 20:7: The Isaiah said, Take a cake of figs. And they took and laid it on the boil, and he recovered. Hezekiah is on his deathbed, and it’s something of a surprise that he is suffering from nothing more serious than a boil. And then we’re surprised again when the treatment is to lay a cake of figs on the boil so that he recovers. What is going on here? I’ll leave the medical side of this to... Read more
Leithart
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