Joyous Exchange, Magnificent Duel

Last updated on: January 27, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

Robert Kolb (Martin Luther: Confessor of the Faith) observes that Luther resisted presenting a systematic theology of atonement. Instead, he employed various biblical images and descriptions to meet the pastoral needs of his audience: “When he addressed the guilt or shame of his hearers, Luther presented Christ’s substitutionary sacrifice, which took away the penalty of death which the law lays upon sinners, through a variety of descriptions. When he addressed their fears and terrors, he emphasized Christ’s power and presence... Read more

Apocalypse Sans Apocalypse

Last updated on: January 27, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

In her study of postmodern apocalypticism, Apocalyptic Transformation (xxiii–xxv), Elizabeth Rosen asks what effects secularization has on apocalyptic stories. The most obvious thing is a change in “how the deity is portrayed.” The perfect God of traditional theism is out; “secular deities are often imperfect characters, neither absolutely omniscient and omnipotent, nor absolutely benevolent.” Some writers multiply gods, splitting “traits” of God among characters or conflating deities and devils. The sense of time changes too: “What we find in the... Read more

President Rickles

Last updated on: January 27, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

Like all right-thinking Americans, Emily Nussbaum is suitably horrified by Trump’s election. But she grasps his appeal better than most. He won by being a better stand-up comic and shrugging off criticism by claiming he was just joking: “Trump was a hot comic, a classic Howard Stern guest. He was the insult comic, the stadium act, the ratings-obsessed headliner who shouted down hecklers. His rallies boiled with rage and laughter, which were hard to tell apart. You didn’t have to... Read more

The Wire as Greek Tragedy

Last updated on: January 27, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

The Wire is the best TV series I’ve ever seen. Also among the raunchiest. In an aside in an eccentric piece comparing the Fairie Queene to Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit, Cambridge English scholar Joe Moshenska sketches an even more eccentric comparison of Spencer’s poem to The Wire: The Wire’s co-creator, David Simon, has repeatedly suggested that the show takes its bearings from a canonical literary tradition. Specifically, he has suggested that it was written as a modern equivalent of a... Read more

They Do It On Purpose

Last updated on: January 27, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

The Economist summarizes the notion of “information asymmetry” pioneered by George Akerlof and others. Using a used car lot a setting for a thought experiment, Akerlof showed (in a paper published in 1978) that the information asymmetry between buyers and sellers kills the market. Sellers can tell the good cars from the bad, and know if they’ve covered up flaws. Buyers can’t know if they are getting a lemon or a peach, so they bid low. If they could be... Read more

Yo’ Great-Grandma’s Austen

Last updated on: January 27, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

In her TLS review of new books about Jane Austen, Devoney Looser comments on the irony that we think of Austen as a truthful, i.e., “factual,” novelist, a reporter of life as it was. In fact, “Austen’s writings rarely fetishize facts. Her early foray into history writing famously describes itself as the work of a partial, prejudiced and ignorant historian. Austen humorously boasts to her readers that her history will contain very few dates. That manuscript, ‘The History of England,’... Read more

Trump’s Old Testament

Last updated on: January 27, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

Walter McDougall (Promised Land, Crusader State, 4–5) divides the history of American foreign affairs into two testaments, summarized by the two phrases of the title. “Our Old Testament dominated the rhetoric and, for the most part, the practice of U.S. diplomacy from 1776 to the 1890s, and preached the doctrines of Liberty at home, Unilateralism abroad, an American System of states, and Expansion. These first four traditions were all about Being and Becoming, and were designed by the Founding Fathers... Read more

Anticlericalism and Reformation

Last updated on: January 26, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

Anticlerical agitation was more consequence than cause of the English Reformation, argues David Loades in his contribution to Anticlericalism. Fashions change, including religious ones; monkish religion was not as popular by the beginning of the sixteenth century as it had been, and the energy was with the friars. But changing religious fashions do not amount to anticlericalism. At the local level, he concludes, “the great majority of parochial clergy were doing a decent job according to their lights, and were... Read more

Music in the Middle

Last updated on: January 26, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

The final section of 1 Chronicles is neatly framed by speeches by David. Chapter 22 contains David’s speech of encouragement to Solomon, concluded by a brief exhortation to “all the leaders” (22:17–19). Chapters 28–29 record several public speeches, marked by “David said” and interspersed with descriptions of temple furnishings: 1. Speech #1: David addresses officials, princes, commanders, overseers, 28:1–10 2. David gives to Solomon the tabnit/pattern for the temple and its furnishings, 28:11–19 3. Speech #2: David exhorts Solomon to... Read more

David’s Pharaoh Moment

Last updated on: January 25, 2017 at 12:00 am By Peter Leithart

1 Chronicles doesn’t say anything about David’s sin against Bath-Sheba and Uriah (cf. 2 Samuel 11–12). Bath-Sheba is never mentioned in Chronicles at all, Uriah only once, in a list of David’s warriors (1 Chronicles 11:41). In the Chronicler’s account, David’s great sin is taking a census of Israel (1 Chronicles 21; cf. 2 Samuel 24). It’s inspired by Satan (1 Chronicles 21:1), provokes the Lord’s displeasure (v. 7), and leads to a plague that kills 70,000 (vv. 13–14). Clearly,... Read more

What ailment did Jesus heal with mud made from saliva?