Remembering Beckett

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

Beckett Remembering/Remembering Beckett, edited by James and Elizabeth Knowlson is a compilation of reminiscences by and about Samuel Beckett. The collection covers his entire life, from childhood through years of obscurity, to his later triumphs. It includes recollections from friends, collaborators, students, actors and actresses who performed his plays and whom he directed. There are excerpts from critical essays, mainly by scholars who knew Beckett personally. The Beckett that emerges from this volume is self-aware, self-effacing, a precisionist, a man... Read more

Sabbath Bread

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

When Israel tried to reserve some manna and keep it overnight, it rotted and sprouted worms. Except on the Sabbath: On the eve of the Sabbath, they “rested” (nuach) the baked manna until morning and it was not rotted (Exodus 16:23-24). The manna rested as Yahweh rested (nuach) on the seven day (20:11). An omer of manna was put in a jar and also rested (nuach) before Yahweh (16:33-34), a permanent memorial of the bread of the Sabbath. It too... Read more

Outfitting Overcomers

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

Each of the seven messages to the churches ends with a promised gift to the victors, those who overcome. These are (the numbers refer to the number of the letter): 1. Eating from the wood of life in Paradise. 2a. A crown of life. 2b. Rescue from the second death. 3a. Hidden manna. 3b. White stone with a new name. 4a. Authority and a rod of iron. 4b. The morning star. 5a. White garments. 5b. Not erased from book of... Read more

Death, Sin and the Patriarchs

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

Death, not sin, is the great problem for Israel’s patriarchs. There is remarkable little talk of “sin” in Genesis. Sin waits for Cain (4:7), the sin of Sodom rises up before the Lord (18:20), Abimelech sins against Abrhaham (20:6, 9), Joseph refuses to commit the sin of adultery with Potipher’s wife (39:9), Reuben warns his brothers not to sin against Benjamin (42:22), and the brothers confess their sin to Joseph (50:17). Sin is described in other terms: Noah is rescued... Read more

Sacred Systems

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

Sacred Systems by Eric Kyle is tough going. He covers “systems” of personal transformation and spiritual formation from Philo through the Didache, Bonaventure, Erasmus and de Sales and William Law, to Dallas Willard. Kyle is interested in the “system” that each advocates – their theology and cosmology, their theory of change, their ideals, the specific practices they advocate and emphasize, their modes of assessment and evaluation. It’s a lot to cover, and Kyle’s complex diagrams didn’t do much to help... Read more

Athenian freedom

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

In an essay on sacred law in ancient Athens (The Cambridge Companion to Ancient Greek Law, 67), Robert Parker assesses the scope and limits of freedom of speech and religion. He notes, “If one asks how tolerant of unorthodox teachings (and cults) Athenian society was in practice, the answer will fluctuate depending on how one judges doubtful cases, but nothing would justify talk of systematic repression. If one asks whether the Athenians recognized an ideal of freedom of thought or of religious tolerance, the answer... Read more

Triple Name

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

Jesus promises to make the victors in Philadelphia pillars in His temple, and to inscribe a triple name on them. Fill in the blank: “The name of My God, and the name of the ____________ of My God, which comes down out of heaven from My God, and My new name” (Revelation 3:12). God, BLANK, Jesus. We’ve seen that already, in 1:4-5: God, seven Spirits, Jesus. But the Trinity of 3:12 is different: God, the city of God, Jesus. The... Read more

Spooking Putin

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

Putin is watching Ukraine carefully, writes Julia Ioffe, because he knows that what happens in Kiev could be replicated in Moscow: “Putin and the system he built do sweat the small things because Putin sees dissent as a slippery slope. He knows the cold has never stopped a single Russian revolutionary. One day people are camping out in a snowy fountain in Moscow, the next they’ve set up camp and put up barricades in the center of town, bringing traffic to... Read more

Capitalist Legoland

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

Noah Kristula-Green responds to the politicization of the Lego Movie by, well, trying to score political points: “the film does play lip service to political tropes, but what really makes the film work is that it represents the highest form of capitalist expression: it is a commercial.” The film resists the temptation of toy-inspired movies, the temptation to “to insert products into the real world: the Transformers movie team cooperated with the Department of Defense to integrate U.S. military hardware into... Read more

Hauerwas the Liberal

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

In his wise contribution to the Blackwell Companion to Political Theology, RR Reno concludes that Hauerwas’s theology is “a thoroughgoing Christian liberalism” (314). This isn’t a criticism or a charge of inconsistency. Reno knows that Hauerwas “he rejects the liberal ideal of critical detachment. We can never begin by distancing ourselves from that which gives life. We must seek the density of a properly Christian life; otherwise, our claims to freedom and reason are fantasies. Only as we fall under the... Read more