Borrowed Capital

Last updated on: January 18, 2014 at 7:02 pm By Peter Leithart

Chesterton (The Thing), pre-channeling Alasdair MacIntyre: “the modern world, with its modern movements, is living on its Catholic capital. It is using, and using up, the truths that remain to it out of the old treasury of Christendom; including, of course, many truths known to pagan antiquity but crystallized in Christendom. But it is not really starting new enthusiasms of its own. The novelty is a matter of names and labels, like modern advertisement; in almost every other way the... Read more

Ukraine, Dictatorship

Last updated on: January 18, 2014 at 6:56 pm By Peter Leithart

Timothy Snyder reports on depressing developments in Ukraine: “President Viktor Yanukovych, in having the deputies of his Party of Regions endorse an extraordinary packet of legislation, has arrogated decisive political power to himself. After hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians spent weeks in the cold demonstrating for basic human rights and a stronger association with Europe, the president has responded with a violation of human rights and a rather sad imitation of Russia.In procedure and in content the laws ‘passed’ by... Read more

Static Natural Law

Last updated on: January 18, 2014 at 6:46 pm By Peter Leithart

A debate on natural law is brewing in my little world, and here’s a little contribution. Natural law advocates insist that there are things that We Can’t Not Know, as J.Budziszewski puts it. Paul agrees: “Since the creation of the world God’s invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood by what has been made. . . . they knew God” (Romans 1:20). Not only do all people know God, but “they know the... Read more

Doubts about Brain Death

Last updated on: January 18, 2014 at 6:01 am By Peter Leithart

Gary Greenberg raises doubts about “brain death” as a definition of death. The standard was introduced largely to facilitate organ donation and transplant, and it has become a fixture of bioethics. Greenberg points out that “brain death is not quite as certain as these bioethicists might like. A doctor cant always determine whether the brain is truly dead. The diagnosis is made the old-fashioned way: by careful observation. A doctor checks to see whether the eyes are responsive to light... Read more

Cut for Kingship

Last updated on: January 17, 2014 at 3:02 pm By Peter Leithart

What does God commit Himself to when He makes a covenant with Abraham? Genesis 17 gives a number of specifics: Abraham will be a multitude of nations, his name will become Abraham, Yahweh will be God to Abraham and to his seed and will give them the land. Twice in Genesis 17, the covenant includes the promise of kingship: To Abraham, Yahweh says, “kings shall come from you” (v. 6), and again regarding Sarah: “kingship shall come from her” (v.... Read more

Apocalyptic in Ordinary

Last updated on: January 17, 2014 at 5:21 am By Peter Leithart

Everyone is talking about “apocalyptic” today. I join the chorus and reflect on CS Lewis’s The Great Divorceas an exercise in apocalyptic theology. Read more

End of Dialogue

Last updated on: January 17, 2014 at 5:20 am By Peter Leithart

Rosenstock-Huessy points out in one of the letters collected in Judaism Despite Christianitythat Kant worked out his entire philosophy in conscious dialogue with Rousseau: “While he himself wants to stand metaphysics on its head, just as Kepler and Newton stood physics, yet he compares for his part Rousseau and Newton. Rousseau has brought a comparable order into the theory of man’s mind. That is to say, he collaborates in all his work unconsciously with his opposite number, his spiritual better... Read more

Naive Sophistication

Last updated on: January 17, 2014 at 5:20 am By Peter Leithart

Rosenstock (Judaism Despite Christianity: The 1916 Wartime Correspondence Between Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy and Franz Rosenzweig, 127-8) objects to Rosenzweig’s characterization of church history as a move from the church of the spirit to the church of dogma and tradition. Rosenstock thinks the dualism nonsense: “Every Christian experiences the dogmas of the church as martuus, as his personal experience. Redemption means precisely that one can appropriate a proposition of Nicaea and Constantinople, such as the qui locutus est per prophetas as a... Read more

From A to B

Last updated on: January 17, 2014 at 5:19 am By Peter Leithart

Rosenzweig locates a fundamental similarity between Judaism and Christianity in their mutual affirmation of protology and eschatology, which give form and meaning to the “middle things” that occur between A and B – that is, the middle things of world history. Rosenstock objects that the two are not equal simply “because they both touch the same endpoints.” The shape of the path between A and B is crucial (Judaism Despite Christianity: The 1916 Wartime Correspondence Between Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy and Franz... Read more

Essence of history

Last updated on: January 16, 2014 at 2:36 pm By Peter Leithart

Rosenzweig (Judaism Despite Christianity: The 1916 Wartime Correspondence Between Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy and Franz Rosenzweig, 157) offers this profound rejoinder to the professorial habit of trying to modify the traditional epochs of history: “It is necessary . . . to accept the traditional periods, and to avoid wanting to be ‘original’ like the professors – and like ourselves when we were still professorial. 1789, 1453, (1517), 476, (313) – these are truths, nay the essence of history, just because they are... Read more

What was the first miracle performed by Elisha?