John’s description of the harlot city (Revelation 17:4-5) that he sees in the wilderness is written in four clauses: She is clothed; she is gilded; she holds something in her hand; and she has a name on her forehead. These four clauses describe seven pieces of the harlot’s attire and equipment: She is clothed in (1) purple and (2) scarlet. She is gilded with (3) gold, (4) precious stone and (5) pearls. She has (6) a gold cup in her hand. And on her forehead... Read more
Theories of language, Rosenstock-Huessy comments, focus almost exclusive attention on the speaker or writer, and almost none on the listener: “Our philology is built around the process of talking, speaking, writing.” Listening is emphasized in “military training for obedience, understanding to psychology, listening and learning to acoustics and education.” But all speech is a two-pole process, and the listener’s role is not merely receptive and passive. “Language,” he emphasizes, “is not speech, it is a full circle from word to... Read more
“Eschatology and violence are intrinsically connected,” writer Robert Jenson (Ezekiel, 76). So much the worse for eschatology, one might say. It needs to be purged from Scripture and theology. The problem, Jenson says, is that when we purge the violence, “nothing is left” (76, fn 5). The violence of eschatology is inherent in the Christian and Jewish conviction that there is a plot to history at all, a plot that comes to an end. Aristotle didn’t believe this. He was... Read more
Not surprisingly, Robert Jenson spends a lot of time in his Brazos commentary on Ezekiel talking about Trinity and Christology and other topics that biblical scholars would tell him do not appear in Ezekiel’s prophecy. He knows that his method will offend “the modern exegetical academy’s chief dogma,” namely, the notion that “exegesis of the Old Testament might call up points of Christian doctrine.” the notion that Christian doctrine might shape interpretation is even more offensive (25). Jenson finds these objections... Read more
The verb porneuo and noun porneia are prominent themes in Revelation. Two of the seven churches of Asia are warned about factions that commit acts of immorality (2:14, 20), and the great harlot Babylon fornicates with the kings of the earth (17:2; 18:3, 9). The noun form, porneia, appears seven times, perhaps suggesting a link with the days of creation: the creation has been infected with the evil of porneia. Together, the two words are used a total of 12 times,... Read more
When I published some articles on the German-American philosopher Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy (1888-1973) on the web a decade or more ago, I received an email from Norman Fiering, Director and Librarian Emeritus of the John Carter Brown Library at Brown University. A student of Rosenstock-Huessy’s at Dartmouth College during the 1950s, Fiering has been President of the Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy Fund, which maintains Rosenstock-Huessy’s work in print and promotes the study of his work. Being in Rosenstock-Huessy’s classroom must have been an... Read more
As long as the apostles were alive, writes Robert Jenson, churches could check their understanding of the gospel by asking the living apostles: “Is this the gospel?” Once they died, the church needed something to mediate the apostolic witness: “her self-identity as the church of the apostles would not be an identity mediated through an acknowledged interval of past time, and she would have to live it in the way of such historical self-identity, that is, in the continuity of... Read more
The verb deiknuo, “show,” is used eight times in Revelation. Four of the uses are at the seams of the book, at the beginning of each new in-Spirit vision: 1. Jesus has been given to show John what must shortly take place (1:1). 2. When John sees a door open in heaven, a voice like a trumpet (the Voice that is Jesus) calls him up: “I will show you what must take place after these things” (4:1). He is swept... Read more
“There is a subtle intrigue going on between the generations,” writes Otto Kroesen in Planetary Responsibilities (120). “It is an intrigue of separating from, and inheriting, and convincing, and letting go of each other.” The recurring question is “whether only one generation can be the owner of the truth and put its stamp on the next generation. Or can the truth take a different shape from generation to generation to such an extent that it is both inherited and renewed, because... Read more
Rosenstock-Huessy’s essay “Man Must Teach” begins as an analysis of Augustine’s dialogue with his son Adeodatus, the De Magistro, and then broadens out to a treatment of teaching as a paradigmatic social relation, as well as a treatment of the social construction of time. One of the key moves in Augustine’s dialogue, Rosenstock-Huessy says, is the challenge it poses to dialogue itself, for Augustine insists that the true dialogue cannot be merely dual, but must include a third, the Divine... Read more
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