In his Atonement: A Guide for the Perplexed, Adam Johnson calls the doctrine of the Trinity the “foundation” of the doctrine of the atonement. The atonement only makes sense in the light of a richly Trinitarian theology proper. Johnson shows how the Trinity is necessary both to explain the coherence of the atonement and to rebut critiques of atonement. He argues, for instance, that the question “Why the God-Man?” isn’t answered by referring to the nature of sin, since “there are... Read more
“Public theology” typically describes “theology that addresses common concerns in an open forum, where no particular creed or confession holds pride of place,” writes Kevin Vanhoozer in his recent The Pastor as Public Theologian. The “public”: in view is “society at large,” and so public theology takes the form of theological reflection on public policy (17). Vanhoozer says that public theology in this form is “first and foremost a reaction against the tendency to privatize the faith, restricting it to the... Read more
Noah Smith notes a gap in the world of Star Trek: The Next Generation: “No one is doing business.” Food is free. Scarcity is a thing of the past. People work if they want to, but they don’t need to work. Could this be our future? Smith thinks so. What happens when the per capita gross domestic product reaches $100,000-$200,000? A small tax on the wealthy would be enough to distribute the fruits of abundance to everyone. Maybe the wealthy would get... Read more
“The standard of living in Athens in classical times was high – and not just in relation to the period, but by comparison with almost any other society until recently,” writes Peter Acton in his recent Poiesis. Economic growth in Greece between 800 and 300 BCE was between 0.6 percent and 0.9 percent a year, twice as fast as in England and Holland before the Industrial Revolution. Health, as measured by bone density, increased rapidly, despite urbanization. . . . Houses,... Read more
Eugene Boring reviews Herman Waetjen’s Letter to the Romans in the Review of Biblical Literature (July 2015). According to Boring, Waetjen sets Paul’s gospel in the context of a biblical story stretching back to Adam and including the promise to Abraham: “Adam (= humanity) was created in God’s image and infused with God’s breath/spirit. Hamartia entered the world by Adam and Eve’s disobedience, representing their lack of trust (as Waetjen consistently translates pistis). Hamartia (which Waetjen refuses to call ‘sin’) is... Read more
Revelation 19:6-9 Then I heard something like the voice of a great multitude and like the sound of many waters and like the sound of mighty peals of thunder, saying, “Hallelujah! For the Lord our God, the Almighty, reigns. Let us rejoice and be glad and give the glory to Him, for the marriage of the Lamb has come and His bride has made herself ready.” It was given to her to clothe herself in fine linen, bright and clean;... Read more
Ted Cohen recounts that he began his research on Jokes by “dividing them into the pure ones and the conditional ones. A conditional joke is one that can work only with certain audiences, and typically is meant only for those audiences. The audience must supply something in order either to get the joke or to be amused by it. That something is the condition on which the success of the joke depends. It is a vital feature of much joking that only... Read more
The introduction to Noel Carroll’s Art in Three Dimensions is as good a summary of the development of the philosophy of art as one is likely to find. Follow Paul Kristellar and others, he notes that Art-with-a-capital-A didn’t exist prior to the eighteenth century. Rather, there were various forms of art; there were arts, plural and with a humble lower-case “a.” The highest arts were the cerebral ones, the ones that were suitable to freemen of leisure – poetry, rhetoric, grammar;... Read more
During the debates over the Chinese Exclusion Act (1882), Western mounted arguments to appeal their Southern colleagues. Southerners in their turn employed the Western arguments against Chinese rights to limit the rights of Southern African Americans. Cozy bedfellows in racial politics. According to Andrew Gyory’s study of the Chinese act (Closing the Gate, 227-8). “westerners pushed the race button at every opportunity, likening the Chinese to ‘rats,’ ‘beasts,’ and ‘swine.’ ‘The Caucasian race has a right,’ said Henry Teller (R-Colo.),... Read more
Aristide Zolberg argues that the US isn’t a nation of immigrants so much as a Nation By Design. President Kennedy to the contrary: Not a nation of immigrants but a nation of some immigrants. American immigration is not a story of laissez-faire yielding to restrictionism. Openness and restriction have existed together from the beginning. Zolberg writes, “From the moment they managed their own affairs, well before political independence, Americans were determined to select who might join them, and they have remained so ever since.... Read more
Leithart
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In