Reciprocity to Cult

Last updated on: July 9, 2012 at 12:50 pm By Peter Leithart

In his Reciprocity and Ritual: Homer and Tragedy in the Developing City-State (Clarendon Paperbacks) , Richard Seaford traces a shift from Homeric interpersonal reciprocity to the impersonal cult of the Greek polis . Seaford believes this transition in the sources of power and legitimacy are reflected in the development of early Greek philosophy. He writes (p. 221-2): “The cosmology of Herakelitos reflects the polis and its economy at a later stage of development [than Anaximander]. Anaximander’s cosmic process driven by... Read more

Quest for Purity

Last updated on: July 9, 2012 at 10:27 am By Peter Leithart

A NYTBR review of White Bread: A Social History of the Store-Bought Loaf highlights the “Pharisaical” motives behind the push for white bread: “At the turn of the 20th century, urbanization outpaced civic infrastructure. Most bread was baked at home, but in dank city bakeries, bakers worked around the clock in squalor, making loaves for a growing labor class. Months after the 1906 release of Upton Sinclair’s book The Jungle , Chicago’s lead health inspector proclaimed sanitary conditions in its... Read more

Finite and Infinite

Last updated on: July 9, 2012 at 8:01 am By Peter Leithart

Several friends have objected to this statement of mine from a recent post on natures and substances: “‘The finite cannot contain the infinite’ was an axiom of Greek philosophy. But the incarnation says the opposite.” My friends have said (nicely) that this statement was at least unguarded and at worst ignorant. They’re right on both counts. It was misleading and, not surprisingly, left the impression that I was abandoning a key idea of Reformed Christology. I was not. On his... Read more

Eucharistic meditation

Last updated on: July 8, 2012 at 7:24 am By Peter Leithart

Exodus 23:14: Three times a year you shall celebrate a feast to Me. Israel’s festival calendar was organized around three feasts. In the spring, Passover celebrated the deliverance from Egypt. In the third month, they kept Pentecost, marking the firstfruits of harvest and the giving of the law. In seventh month, Booths or Ingathering commemorated Israel’s journey in the wilderness and anticipated a final harvest. Each year, Israel retraced her past, her journey from bondage in Egypt to abundant life... Read more

Baptismal meditation

Last updated on: July 8, 2012 at 7:13 am By Peter Leithart

Exodus 23:20: Behold, I am going to send an angel before you to guard you along the way, and to bring you into the place which I have prepared. As Pastor Sumpter has emphasized this morning, Yahweh promises to send His angel ahead of Israel. This Angel is an early appearance of the Last Adam, who comes to guard and lead us to the place where He is. This passage reveals the promise of baptism. By baptism, we are made... Read more

Exhortation

Last updated on: July 8, 2012 at 6:42 am By Peter Leithart

“You are not to boil a kid in the milk of its mother.” This odd commandment is repeated three times in the law. God must think it’s important. But what does it mean? Jews interpret it as a food law that forbids them to eat milk and meat together. But the law is more specific. It doesn’t prohibit cooking meat with milk; it forbids seething a kid in its own mother’s milk. Mother’s milk should nourish her kid goat. It... Read more

High church = Nominalism?

Last updated on: July 7, 2012 at 3:03 pm By Peter Leithart

There’s a widespread instinct that the higher a church’s liturgy, the more apt a church is to be full of lukewarm nominal believers. Mainline liturgical churches like the ELCA, ECUSA, PCUSA are, it is argued, full of people who know nothing of the Bible and little of Jesus, and they have high liturgical traditions. Of course, correlation does not prove causation. And there is plenty of evidence to the contrary. Anyone who thinks only high church traditions are afflicted with... Read more

Nakedness and shame

Last updated on: July 7, 2012 at 8:26 am By Peter Leithart

Originally, Adam and Eve were naked and unashamed. As soon as they ate the fruit, their nakedness became shameful and they tried to cover. After that, nakedness and shame are constantly associated in Scripture. Why? Nakedness is shameful when it is the result of stripping off glory. Before Adam ate from the tree, his eyes were not opened to know good and evil; that is, he was not invested as a “judge.” By eating, he assumed a judicial role, but... Read more

Thaskgiving

Last updated on: July 6, 2012 at 4:05 pm By Peter Leithart

We can pray, says Schaller ( Asking and Thanking (Concilium) , 5-6), only because of the rights of children given us by God: He has “admitted [us] to his presence. It is his will that we should not keep silent before him.” Thus, “where we venture to turn to God with a request, we also always implicitly give thanks. We recognize the degree to which our prayers are undeserved, and therefore know that without claims or merit on our part... Read more

To ask is human

Last updated on: July 6, 2012 at 3:52 pm By Peter Leithart

Hans Schaller has some profound reflections on asking in his contribution to Asking and Thanking (Concilium) , p. 3 . Disputing Seneca, he says that asking is a fundamental human form of communication, for two reasons. First, “The strength of trust, whether between God and human beings or between human beings, is always measured by the amount of room which is made for personal weaknesses, imperfections and needs. It is a special demonstration of trust when we can express our... Read more

Which river did Naaman wash in to be healed of leprosy?