Structure of Philippians

Last updated on: July 20, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

What follows is a rough structural analysis of Philippians. Rough, but perhaps it illuminates: A. Joy in imprisonment, 1:1–16 B. Live like citizens of the gospel, 1:27–30 C. Have the mind of Christ, 2:1–11 D. Shared joy, 2:12–18 E. Timothy and Epaphroditus, 2:19–30 D’. Rejoice in the Lord, 3:1 C’. Paul’s kenosis, 3:2–16 B’. Citizenship in heaven, 3:17–21 A’. Joy and contentment in all circumstances, 4:1–23 As I say, rough. But there are some striking parallels, especially as we move to... Read more

Conservatism’s Putin Dilemma

Last updated on: July 20, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

Writing in The American Conservative, Paul Gottfried pinpoints the conservative quandary regarding Putin. On the one hand: “Putin makes no secret about his associations with the Right, whether he is speaking out against the power of LGBT activists in the West, praising the cultural influence of the Russian Orthodox Church, or cultivating the friendship of Viktor Orban, Marine Le Pen, or other figures of the European Right.” Many American conservatives have “a soft, and sometimes even a squishy soft, spot... Read more

Whose Fool?

Last updated on: July 19, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

Paul can sound like the Solomon of Proverbs: “Be careful how you walk, not as unwise men but as wise, making the most of your time, because the days are evil. So then do not be foolish but understand what the will of the Lord is” (Ephesians 5:15–17). Wisdom and folly are stark opposites. Choose one and you live; choose the other and you die. But the cross has disturbed Paul’s Solomonic wisdom. Sometimes, it’s not “Be wise, don’t be a fool.” Rather:... Read more

Locke, Wesley, Romanticism

Last updated on: July 18, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

Richard Brantley states the thesis of his 1984 Locke, Wesley, and the Method of English Romanticism early in his book: First, Locke’s theory of knowledge grounds the intellectual method of Wesley’s Methodism. And second, Wesley’s Lockean thought (i.e., his reciprocating notions that religious truth is concerned with experiential presuppositions, and that experience itself need not be non-religious) provides a ready means of understanding the ‘religious’ empiricism and the English ‘transcendentalism’ of British Romantic poetry. As this summary indicates, Locke’s empiricist epistemology translated... Read more

The Allegory of Troilus

Last updated on: July 18, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

Troilus appears in the Iliad and Aeneid, but only in death scenes. Ancient epics don’t tell the story of his tragic love for Criseyde or Cressida. Characteristically enough, the love story became the main Troilus legend during the middle ages, first recounted by Benoit’s Roman of Troie, who tells of Troilus’s love for Briseis, Achilles’s war bride. Boccaccio changed Briseis to Cressida, and Chaucer and Shakespeare followed his lead. In Chaucer’s telling, Troilus renounces and mocks love at the beginning of... Read more

David the Anti-Saul

Last updated on: July 17, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

Why does the Chronicler begin his narrative with Saul, and why with Saul’s death? As William Riley argues in his King and Cultus in Chronicles, the Saul narrative introduces topics that shadow the account of the Davidic kings. Specifically, the account of Saul’s death raises the question of the persistence of dynasties. Saul’s “whole house” falls at Mount Gilboa—not because every last descendant of Saul dies but because the death of the king and his three sons marks the end of... Read more

God’s Purpose and the Church

Last updated on: July 14, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

In his Christian Ethics and the Church (67), Philip Turner provides a masterful summary of “the link Ephesians makes between the fulfillment of God’s purpose, the perception of God’s glory, and the common life of the assembly”: The members of God’s assembly have been chosen ‘before the foundation of the world’ to be ‘holy and blameless’ before God ‘in love’ . . . . The grace bestowed in Christ engenders love, and love in turn elicits praise. Indeed, the destiny of... Read more

Fanny Price

Last updated on: July 14, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

Few readers love Fanny Price. Some hate her as deeply as Mark Twain professed to hate her creator. CS Lewis had Screwtape call her “not only a Christian, but such a Christian—a vile, sneaking, simpering, demure, monosyllabic, mouselike, watery, insignificant, virginal, bread-and-butter miss . . . A two-faced little cheat (I know the sort) who looks as if she’d faint at the sight of blood, and then dies with a smile . . . Filthy, insipid little prude!” Perhaps it’s a commendation... Read more

Big Philosophy

Last updated on: July 14, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

Robert Solomon’s The Joy of Philosophy is a defense of philosophy as a joyful wisdom, a la Solomon’s philosophical hero, Nietzsche. Solomon knows that Nietzsche isn’t even considered a philosopher by many: “His prose is too shimmering, too full of sarcasm and wise-cracks, too personal. He has too much fun. (Too many exclamation points!).” In Solomon’s mind, that’s just to say that Nietzsche’s work is full of life: “He is a dancer, a philosophical prankster, an ironist in the grand tradition... Read more

In Defense of Vengeance

Last updated on: July 14, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

Robert Solomon argues (The Joy of Philosophy) that “Vengeance is the original passion for justice. The word ‘justice’ in the Old Testament virtually always refers to revenge.” This isn’t isolated or primitive: “throughout most of history the concept of justice has been far more concerned with the punishment of crimes and the balancing of wrongs than with the fair distribution of goods and services.” Of course, vengeance is not always and everywhere right. Vengeance must be controlled, limited, institutionalized. Like... Read more