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Potter Politics

Last updated on: August 22, 2014 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

Anthony Gierzynski reports on his research supporting “the idea that the Harry Potter series influenced the political values and perspectives of the generation that came of age with these books. Reading the books correlated with greater levels of acceptance for out-groups, higher political tolerance, less predisposition to authoritarianism, greater support for equality, and greater opposition to the use of violence and torture. As Harry Potter fans will have noted, these are major themes repeated throughout the series. These correlations remained significant... Read more

Universal Truth

Last updated on: August 22, 2014 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

It’s often suggested today that any argument or claim drawn from revelation is “sectarian.” In order to make a “universal” claim, we need to ground it in something more general than a particular revelation. Christians assume this as much as secularists. Many think we have to move from revelation to something more universal like “nature” to make truth claims that apply outside the church. But we shouldn’t. It’s a concession to modern conceptions of religion and revelation that we should... Read more

Eternal Matter Matters

Last updated on: August 22, 2014 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

Most ancient myths and philosophies, and not a few modern scientific and philosophical theories, posit or assume that matter is eternal. Does that matter? Yes. If matter is eternal, then creation can only be control, limitation, ordering. If matter is eternal, creativity can only be negative. If matter is eternal, creation cannot be gift. If matter is eternal, creation cannot be bestowal of existence, a grant of being. If matter is eternal, creation cannot be a free act of love.... Read more

Agents of New Creation

Last updated on: August 21, 2014 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

There are, James Jordan has argues, three “problems” to solve in Genesis 1:1-2: Formlessness, emptiness, and darkness. Yahweh forms the earth with light, by giving form, and by filling. This is also the pattern of new creation. Jesus comes as the light of the world to dispel the darkness. He comes as the Word to give form to the world. He is exalted to fill all things. He is the Creator who comes to make new creation. When He sends... Read more

Plato and Moses

Last updated on: August 21, 2014 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

In his four-volume Court of the Gentiles, published in the mid-seventeenth century, Theophilus Gale aimed to “confirm thee Authoritie, and demonstrate the Perfection, of Sacred Scriptures.” His other aim was to refute the Deist idea of natural theology, the notion that theology outside Israel and Christianity took its rise purely from nature: “A farther Designe I have in promoting this hypothesis is to beat down that fond persuasion which has of late crept in among , and been openly avowed... Read more

Plato and Moses

Last updated on: August 21, 2014 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

In his four-volume Court of the Gentiles, published in the mid-seventeenth century, Theophilus Gale aimed to “confirm thee Authoritie, and demonstrate the Perfection, of Sacred Scriptures.” His other aim was to refute the Deist idea of natural theology, the notion that theology outside Israel and Christianity took its rise purely from nature: “A farther Designe I have in promoting this hypothesis is to beat down that fond persuasion which has of late crept in among , and been openly avowed... Read more

Wisdom of Death

Last updated on: August 21, 2014 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

When the gods determine that Gilgamesh’s rival-turned-buddy Enkidu must die, he goes through some soul-searching. He not only regrets the battle with the bull of heaven, but begins to regret the storming of the cedar forest that that led to the destruction of Humbaba and the ambition that drove him to it, and the lust that led to the seduction by Shamhat. “Enkidu began to speak to Gilgamesh: ‘My brother, this night what a dream [I dreamed!] The gods Anu, Enlil,... Read more

Reconciled to the Spirit

Last updated on: August 21, 2014 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

As one would expect, Jenson’s brief sketch of a positive account of atonement (Theology as Revisionary Metaphysics, 133-5) is a Trinitarian account. Atonement means at-one-ment, and we cannot know what that reunion is or how it happens without knowing the One with whom are are made One. Atonement cannot be like gluing one coin to another. Rather, “the relation of creatures to this God is always a function of their involvement with the three who are God – or, in... Read more

The Costs of C-Sections

Last updated on: August 20, 2014 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

Cesarean sections have gotten a lot safer over the past century plus. And as they’ve gotten safer, they’ve gotten a lot commoner. But Sarah Yager reports that there are costs attached to the increase: “unnecessary C-sections cost insurers an estimated $5 billion a year.” And the cost of the procedure isn’t the end of the cost. Studies are showing that “C-section babies go on to have a 22 percent higher risk of obesity, nearly double the risk of celiac disease, a... Read more

AdWorld Wide Web

Last updated on: August 20, 2014 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

The first thing that came on my computer screen when I clicked the link to look over Ethan Zuckerman’s Atlantic essay on the ad-based web was a pop-up. Oh, the irony! as my kids like to say. Zuckerman has been in the web industry for a couple of decades, and in his essay he looks back to the early days, when he and his associates at Tripod.com were trying to come up with a business model: “At the end of the... Read more

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