Unthought Axiomatics

Last updated on: October 14, 2015 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

Derrida is old hat these days, but he’s still a thinker worth wrestling with, worthy of better than the dismissal he often gets from some writers. His deconstructive techniques can be put into the service of theology. In his crucial essay, “Plato’s Pharmacy” he offers what he describes as a “close reading” of a philosophical and literary texts. What is he after are the the “unthought axiomatics” that underlie the text. In this, Derrida is something of a “presuppositionalist” who wants... Read more

Ritual and Spontaneity

Last updated on: October 13, 2015 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

For the first 1500 years of its existence, Christianity was a liturgical faith. That began to change with Wyclif and the Hussites, and the Reformation produced permanent forms of un- and even anti-liturgical Christianity. Ceremony took on negative connotations, synonymous with hollowness and superstition. Ritual was no longer seen as an instrument of grace; at best, rituals signified salvation. Salvation came by faith, and the evidence of faith came to be seen not as participation in a liturgical community but... Read more

Hope Springs Eternal

Last updated on: October 13, 2015 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

In the introduction to What Hath God Wrought, his contribution to the Oxford History of the United States, Daniel Walker Howe quotes an 1850 Methodist women’s magazine’s ecstasies over the telegraph: “This noble invention is to be the means of extending civilization, republicanism, and Christianity over the earth. It must and will be extended to nations half-civilized, and thence to those now savage and barbarous. Our government will be the grand center of this might influence. . . .” The magazine... Read more

Baptismal Imagery in James

Last updated on: October 13, 2015 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

James hooks the different sections of his epistle together by using the same or a similar word at the close of one section and the opening of the following section. James 1:1 ends with the word “greetings” (Greek, chairein), and his first exhortation is to “consider it all joy” (charan); 1:4 ends with the phrase “lacking in nothing” (en medeni leipomenoi) and the next section begins with “if any of you lacks wisdom (ei de tis humon leipetai); in the... Read more

Isianic Passover

Last updated on: October 13, 2015 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

The consensus of modern critical scholarship is that the book assigned to Isaiah was in fact composed by several different hands. “Deutero-Isaiah” supposedly begins with Isaiah 40:1. There are many good reasons for rejecting this conclusion. Among these, the narrative pattern of chapters 36-39 is a neglected piece of evidence. All commentators on Isaiah recognize that the chapters after Isaiah 40 hold out the promise of a new exodus (cf. 43:14-21; 44:27; 50:2; 51:9-11). Just as the Lord delivered Israel... Read more

Irritability and Intellect

Last updated on: October 12, 2015 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

We like to pretend our notions are the product of careful study and rational analysis. We like to pretend our likes and dislikes are deeply rooted in principle. Montaigne thought otherwise. In “An Apology for Raymond Sebond,” he wrote, “I have seen some, who without infringing their patience, could not well hear a bone gnawed under their table: and we see few men, but are much troubled at that sharp, hard, and teeth-edging noise that Smiths make in filing of... Read more

Eucharistic Modalism

Last updated on: October 12, 2015 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

One of the earliest Trinitarian heresies is called “modalism.” It taught that the “persons” of the Trinity are not distinct persons, but only the masks or roles that the one Person of God adopts at various times. The fundamental problem with modalism is that it stretches out a veil, or digs a chasm, between God as He reveals Himself and God as He is. God shows Himself as loving, kind, gentle Jesus, but can we know that’s really who He... Read more

Showing the Lord’s Death

Last updated on: October 12, 2015 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

How does the Lord’s Supper proclaim the death of Jesus until He comes? (1 Corinthians 11:26). Historically, liturgists have attempted to locate some act in the rite of the Supper that corresponds to the death of Jesus: the fraction (breaking of bread), or the fact that bread and wine are separated, have been suggested. I find these efforts strained. It is impossible to make a meal look like a death by crucifixion. More seriously, these efforts assume, as Paul H.... Read more

Locusts and Honey

Last updated on: October 12, 2015 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

John the Baptist is presented in the gospels as the fulfillment of the Old Testament promise that God would send His messenger to prepare the way for the coming of the glory of the Lord (Isaiah 40), and the promise to send Elijah before Him to turn the people to repentance (Malachi 4). Thus, Matthew’s gospel tells us that John wore a leather belt, just as Elijah did (cf. 2 Kings 1:8), and that John wore a garment of camel’s... Read more

Sex and Peace

Last updated on: October 9, 2015 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

Sex is supposed to keep everyone so busy that they don’t have time to fight. Make love not war has been the implicit slogan of nearly every utopian project in the modern age. Augusto del Noce (Crisis of Modernity, 182-4) shows why this is not the case: “One common feature [of the sexual revolution] is psycho-erotic-Freudian-Marxist de-Christianization. Another is stopping at negativity and believing in the magic power of the idea of negativity. It must be followed by the quest... Read more