Leithart
My favorite line from Eudora Welty’s short story, “Why I live at the P.O.”: “Papa-Daddy’s Mama’s papa and sulks.” Read more
My favorite line from Eudora Welty’s short story, “Why I live at the P.O.”: “Papa-Daddy’s Mama’s papa and sulks.” Read more
The London Times Online reported on May 29 on a new proposal regarding gay clergy in the Church of England: “Homosexual priests in the Church of England will be allowed to ‘marry’ their boyfriends under a proposal drawn up by senior bishops, led by Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury. “The decision ensures that gay and lesbian clergy who wish to register relationships under the new ‘civil partnerships’ law ?Egiving them many of the tax and inheritance advantages of married... Read more
Part 2: A Dogmatica Minora Section 1: Trinity Hart ended the previous section emphasizing that Christianity offers a story of the infinite that is also, contrary to all paganism, a story of beauty. To fill out this Christian narrative of infinite beauty, Hart focuses on the Nicene-Constantinopolitan creed as ?the most elementary and binding canon of catholic confession?E(p. 153), examining four specific issues in that creed: Trinity, creation, salvation, and eschatology. He organizes each of these moments by a series... Read more
Now Yhoram son of ‘Achav reigned-as-king over Yisrael in Shimron in the year, the 18th, to Yhoshafat king of Yehudah. And he reigned-as-king two and ten years. And he did the evil in the eyes of Yahweh only not as his father and as his mother. And he caused-to-turn-aside the stele of the Baal which built his father. Only to the sins of Yarav’am son of Nevat which he caused-to-sin Yisrael he clung. He did not turn aside from them.... Read more
In 2 Kings 2, Elisha heals a “barren land,” a land described as “causing miscarriage” or as “abortive” itself. The land is mother, and the new “father” of the prophets sows salt to heal the land and make it fruitful. 2 Kings 3 picks up on this mother-land analogy. Elisha predicts what the three kings will do to the land of Moab. Along with destroying cities, the three kings are going to make war on the land itself, felling trees... Read more
Jehoram goes out into the wilderness with Jehoshaphat, and as soon as he encounters a bit of difficulty, he crumples, blaming his bad fortune on Yahweh’s perfidy: “Yahweh has called these three kings to give them into the hand of Moab.” He had a good teacher: When Ahab received the prophecy in 1 Kings 20, he went home sullen and vexed; when he didn’t get his way with Naboth’s vineyard, he was sullen and vexed once again; and when Micaiah... Read more
Jehoram the son of Ahab wants to suppress the rebellion of Mesha, king of Moab (2 Kings 3). He gains the support of Jehoshaphat and the king of Edom, and then marches into the wilderness. They “go around” seven days and then find there is no water. Jehoshaphat, typically, asks for a prophet, and Elisha gives them counter-military instructions on winning the battle. The account echoes with parallels with the battle of Jericho. Throughout Joshua 6, Joshua instructs Israel to... Read more
In his treatise on the resurrection of the flesh, Tertullian makes an intriguing connection between the phenomenology of baptism and the resurrection of the body. Baptism, he points out, is a corporeal rite, and this washing of the body points ot a resurrection of the body: “unless it were a bodily resurrection, there would be no pledge secured through this process of a corporeal baptism.” The soul, he argues, is not “sanctified by the baptismal bath.” Rather, the sanctification of... Read more
On his web site, David Bayly offers some thoughts on the Reformed baptism debates and 1 Peter. Since he quotes me (without naming me), it might be helpful to put down a couple of responses. First, he claims that those who are advocating what he calls a “new perspective on baptism” and a “return to biblical language” about baptism “are perched precariously on knife?s edge between Roman Catholic and Baptist views of the sacrament.” He suggests that in the end... Read more
2 Kings 2:9: Now it came about when they had crossed over, that Elijah said to Elisha, Ask what I shall do for you before I am taken from you. And Elisha said, Please, let a double portion of your spirit be upon me. The story of Elijah?s departure into heaven follows the sequence of a sacrificial rite. By their journey around the land, Elijah and Elisha become a unit, the ?two of them?Ebecome inseparable. They are washed in the... Read more
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