Some Evidence Of Outsiders' Dim View Of Jesus' Origins

Now the birth of Jesus Christ was on this wise: When as his mother Mary was espoused to Joseph, before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Ghost.

Then Joseph her husband, being a just [man], and not willing to make her a publick example, was minded to put her away privily.

-- Mt.1:18-19

I speak that which I have seen with my Father: and ye do that which ye have seen with your father.

They answered and said unto him, Abraham is our father. Jesus saith unto them, If ye were Abraham's children, ye would do the works of Abraham.

But now ye seek to kill me, a man that hath told you the truth, which I have heard of God: this did not Abraham.

Ye do the deeds of your father. Then said they to him, We be not born of fornication; we have one Father, [even] God.

-- Jn.8:38-41

Nora Ephron's Religion: You Can Never Have Too Much Butter

Transcribed remarks here:

WERTHEIMER: You think this movie might bring back butter as some�

Ms. EPHRON: Well, it should, because you can never have too much butter. That is my belief. And I stuck it into the movie. If I have a religion, that's it.

May she rest in grease.

How To Know When You're In The Wrong Church

When the pastor asks for proof texts teaching the doctrine of original sin, you mention Psalm 51:5, "Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me," and everyone laughs.

Philistines At University Of Virginia Oust President Who Wouldn't Axe "Obscure" Academic Departments Like Classics and German

I drew you a map.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The money-grubbing transformation of academia began long ago. First the principle of selectivity in admissions had to go, with the introduction of the GI Bill. Then Latin had to go as a requirement. Then any foreign language at all, or even any core classes. At length college football and basketball became the centerpieces of the public face of universities. Its education graduates who now teach your sixth grader can't spell in their own language, let alone reason in it. The latest development is only the logical conclusion in this process of relegating the central to the periphery, and now to the useless.

Read all about it here in The Washington Post:

The campaign to remove Sullivan began around October, the sources said. The Dragas group coalesced around a consensus that Sullivan was moving too slowly. Besides broad philosophical differences, they had at least one specific quibble: They felt Sullivan lacked the mettle to trim or shut down programs that couldn’t sustain themselves financially, such as obscure academic departments in classics and German.

Ich bin ein Berliner. Sie sind verruckt.

And I Love Not Hearing You

Jeffrey Goldberg Thinks Mormonism's Bad Rap Is Due To Its Proximity To Our Own Times

For Bloomberg.com, here:

In talking to my Mormon friends (some of my best friends are Mormons), the answer is clear. The practices and origin stories of most religions, when viewed by outsiders, all seem fairly strange. But Mormonism seems just a bit stranger than the rest. The great fear is not that Americans will see a Mormon politician as too sinister to lead the country (the way that some Baptist leaders once saw the Catholic John F. Kennedy) but that Americans will see a Mormon as too bizarre to be president.

They point to the issue of “sacred underwear,” the derisive term for undergarments worn by some Mormons to remind themselves of their religious responsibilities. Many find the concept odd, but should they? Is Mormonism really that much stranger than other religions?

I vividly remember learning from a Catholic friend that, each Sunday, his family would attend church to drink the blood of Jesus and eat his body. Freaky. But is it any freakier than the sight of a bunch of Jews gathering around an 8-day-old boy to watch a man with a beard snip off the tip of the baby’s penis, and then to eat blintzes afterward? Religious Jews, of course, also wear a variation of “sacred underwear” -- zizit and tallitot, traditional garments that date back thousands of years, to the ancient Middle East.

The Mormon tradition dates back less than 200 years, to Palmyra, New York. What Mormons suffer from more than any other major religion is proximity. The foundation stories of Mormonism took place in the age of skeptical journalism, and they took place in the U.S.

This seems right to me, except that the lineage factor is missing from the analysis and what significance that has for the progenitors, which cannot be understood apart from an appreciation of doctrinal matters. 

Jews find Christians especially strange because Christianity is an heretical sect of Judaism which crossed the line and made a god of a man.

Christians find Islam strange because it is an heretical sect derived from an heretical sect of Christianity which crossed the line and made a man of a god.

Mormonism is an heretical sect of American Christianity which American Christians historically found objectionable more on moral grounds than theological, so much so that they quite literally drove the Mormons out west to Utah.

In point of fact, the Supreme Court of the United States itself ruled against statehood for Utah until Mormons officially abandoned polygamy because the practise was considered by the Court to be destructive of public (Christian) morals. No state in the union was going to be allowed to be a polygamist enclave.

Imagine such a ruling today, say about same sex relations.

Theologically Mormonism's problem for Christian America is its divinization of not just one man but of all men. But as far as I can tell, the Mormon in the race for president is probably the last Mormon I'll have to worry will push his ideas on anyone.

I'm not convinced he has any.

Compared with the ideas of his opponent, however, I can live with that. 

"Z", It Seems

 

We that acquaint ourselves with ev'ry zone,

And pass the tropicks, and behold each pole;

When we come home, are to ourselves unknown,

And unacquainted still with our own soul.

-- John Davies

You Feel Better That There Are Some Things You Have Never Seen

"The nakedness of thy father, or the nakedness of thy mother, shalt thou not uncover: she [is] thy mother; thou shalt not uncover her nakedness."

-- Leviticus 18:7

"Y" Plays the Tyrant

 

 

Love is your master, for he masters you:

And he that is so yoked by a fool,

Methinks, should not be chronicled for wise.

-- William Shakespeare

Unexampled "X"

Virtuous and vicious ev'ry man must be,

Few in th' extreme, but all in the degree;

The rogue and fool by fits is fair and wise,

And ev'n the best, by fits, what they despise.

-- Alexander Pope

"W" Makes A Wastrel

Young master next must rise to fill him wine,

And starve himself to see the booby dine.

-- William King

An Intervention of "V"

 

Sad accidents, and a state of affliction, is a school of virtue; it corrects levity, and interrupts the confidence of sinning.

-- Jeremy Taylor

Desire Cannot Be Defeated, Only Displaced

Wise words from an unlikely source:

[T]he crucial skill is the “strategic allocation of attention.” Instead of getting obsessed with the marshmallow — the “hot stimulus” — the patient children distracted themselves by covering their eyes, pretending to play hide-and-seek underneath the desk, or singing songs from Sesame Street. Their desire wasn’t defeated — it was merely displaced. If you’re on a diet, don’t have potato chips in the house.

The Second Marriage Bed

From "An Epitaph Upon Husband and Wife" by Richard Crashaw.

Obama's Monstrous Theology: "Male and Male Created He Them"

From The Washington Post, here:

There is a lot of fawning media coverage of President Obama's new support for gay marriage. There is serious discussion of how he "evolved," and there are serious timelines being prepared by the Obama apologencia that earnestly track his "evolution." The only problem is they don't put "evolution" in quotation marks to highlight the cynical doubts that Obama's conversion deserves.  There is every reason to believe that this decision was made because Obama thinks it serves his current selfish political interests. He characterizes his politically expedient flip-flop as a theological "evolution."  The reality is, his political trajectory has stalled and he "evolved" into a desperate political situation.

Genesis 1.26-28:

And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

So God created man in his [own] image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.

Leviticus 20:13

If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood [shall be] upon them.

Revised Roman Missal

Hardeeharharhar.

Is Jesus Good, or Not?

And, behold, one came and said unto him, Good Master, what good thing shall I do, that I may have eternal life? And he said unto him, Why callest thou me good? [there is] none good but one, [that is], God: but if thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments.

-- Matthew 19:16f.

And when he was gone forth into the way, there came one running, and kneeled to him, and asked him, Good Master, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life? And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good? [there is] none good but one, [that is], God.

-- Mark 10:17f.

And a certain ruler asked him, saying, Good Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good? none [is] good, save one, [that is], God.

-- Luke 18:18f.

For the kingdom of heaven is like unto a man [that is] an householder, which went out early in the morning to hire labourers into his vineyard. And when he had agreed with the labourers for a penny a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And he went out about the third hour, and saw others standing idle in the marketplace, And said unto them; Go ye also into the vineyard, and whatsoever is right I will give you. And they went their way. Again he went out about the sixth and ninth hour, and did likewise. And about the eleventh hour he went out, and found others standing idle, and saith unto them, Why stand ye here all the day idle? They say unto him, Because no man hath hired us. He saith unto them, Go ye also into the vineyard; and whatsoever is right, [that] shall ye receive. So when even was come, the lord of the vineyard saith unto his steward, Call the labourers, and give them [their] hire, beginning from the last unto the first. And when they came that [were hired] about the eleventh hour, they received every man a penny. But when the first came, they supposed that they should have received more; and they likewise received every man a penny. And when they had received [it], they murmured against the goodman of the house, Saying, These last have wrought [but] one hour, and thou hast made them equal unto us, which have borne the burden and heat of the day. But he answered one of them, and said, Friend, I do thee no wrong: didst not thou agree with me for a penny? Take [that] thine [is], and go thy way: I will give unto this last, even as unto thee. Is it not lawful for me to do what I will with mine own? Is thine eye evil, because I am good? So the last shall be first, and the first last: for many be called, but few chosen.

-- Matthew 20:1-16

Now it came to pass, as they went, that he entered into a certain village: and a certain woman named Martha received him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, which also sat at Jesus' feet, and heard his word. But Martha was cumbered about much serving, and came to him, and said, Lord, dost thou not care that my sister hath left me to serve alone? bid her therefore that she help me. And Jesus answered and said unto her, Martha, Martha, thou art careful and troubled about many things: But one thing is needful: and Mary hath chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her.

-- Luke 10:38-42

And Nathanael said unto him, Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth? Philip saith unto him, Come and see.

-- John 1:46

I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep.

-- John 10:11

I am the good shepherd, and know my [sheep], and am known of mine.

-- John 10:14

h/t Theo

Methodist: Another Way To Spell Pest

 

I'll never forget the reaction of an earnest Methodist when I began what was to be but a brief sojourn among the Methodists some years ago: "You mean you like us?"

In the end I didn't, but not because of the history of Methodism's political advocacy per se, with which I was already intimately familiar. What I found wanting was the theological basis for it: grace so predominating as a doctrinal force that it excludes almost all talk of sin and judgment, a monstrous form of Christianity similar to others in America which end up emphasizing just one feature of themselves in an exaggerated fashion. The latest version of this phenomenon abandons the concept of hell. As we used to say in Greek class, orthodoxy is my doxy. Heterodoxy is another man's doxy.

If theocracies are wrong because in the end they conclude that human beings are essentially evil and need to be ruled, liberal democracies are wrong because they believe that people are essentially good and can be trusted to their own devices. The basis for American style limited government, by contrast, is a moral conclusion derived from long experience on English soil which believes that men are first and foremost always at war in themselves.

"The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together: our virtues would be proud if our faults whipped them not; and our crimes would despair if they were not cherished by our own virtues."

-- William Shakespeare, All's Well That Ends Well, 4.3.84

From William Murchison, here:

From the Methodist standpoint, as it evolved in the late 20th century, the Lord was calling his people to adopt pretty much the social and political programs of the Democratic Party. ...

A poll at the church’s 1996 General Conference found that 60 percent of clergy delegates took the liberal side on social and political questions. The laity lagged only slightly behind, with 51 percent making the same affirmation. ...

Methodists, Episcopalians, Presbyterians - that is how it goes in the old mainline denominations. Leaders tug leftward; the path to the right leads often enough straight out the church door - to bodies with conservative commitments, or just to religious inertia. ...

Americans saw readily enough, as the dark night of Prohibition descended, that the Methodists and their allies had quit preaching and gone to meddling. Something deeper was wanted - an engagement with the high and serious purposes of God, first in creating man and woman, then in saving them.

Finally, Some Fighting Words About Barack Obama, and Other Enemies of Christ

"For 2,000 years the enemies of Christ have certainly tried their best. But think about it. The Church survived and even flourished during centuries of terrible persecution, during the days of the Roman Empire.

"The Church survived barbarian invasions. The Church survived wave after wave of Jihads. The Church survived the age of revolution. The Church survived Nazism and Communism.

"And in the power of the resurrection, the Church will survive the hatred of Hollywood, the malice of the media, and the mendacious wickedness of the abortion industry.

"The Church will survive the entrenched corruption and sheer incompetence of our Illinois state government, and even the calculated disdain of the President of the United States, his appointed bureaucrats in HHS, and of the current majority of the federal Senate.

"May God have mercy on the souls of those politicians who pretend to be Catholic in church, but in their public lives, rather like Judas Iscariot, betray Jesus Christ by how they vote and how they willingly cooperate with intrinsic evil. ...

"Remember that in past history other governments have tried to force Christians to huddle and hide only within the confines of their churches like the first disciples locked up in the Upper Room. ...

"Hitler and Stalin, at their better moments, would just barely tolerate some churches remaining open, but would not tolerate any competition with the state in education, social services, and health care.

"In clear violation of our First Amendment rights, Barack Obama – with his radical, pro abortion and extreme secularist agenda, now seems intent on following a similar path.

"Now things have come to such a pass in America that this is a battle that we could lose, but before the awesome judgement seat of Almighty God this is not a war where any believing Catholic may remain neutral.

"This fall, every practicing Catholic must vote, and must vote their Catholic consciences, or by the following fall our Catholic schools, our Catholic hospitals, our Catholic Newman Centers, all our public ministries -- only excepting our church buildings – could easily be shut down. Because no Catholic institution, under any circumstance, can ever cooperate with the instrinsic evil of killing innocent human life in the womb.

"No Catholic ministry – and yes, Mr. President, for Catholics our schools and hospitals are ministries – can remain faithful to the Lordship of the Risen Christ and to his glorious Gospel of Life if they are forced to pay for abortions."

-- Bishop Daniel Jenky

Read the whole thing, here.

Roger Ebert Hath Said In His Heart: 'I Exist Only In Other People's Minds. I Will Be Forgotten.'

So Roger Ebert, here:

"We exist in the minds of other people, in thousands of memory clusters, and one by one those clusters fade and disappear. Some years from now, at a funeral with a slide show, only one person will be able to say who we were. Then no one will know."

So even Ecclesiastes 2.16:

"For of the wise man as of the fool there is no enduring remembrance, seeing that in the days to come all will have been long forgotten. How the wise man dies just like the fool!"

But consider this:

"Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, [and] I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations."

-- Jeremiah 1:5

"Remember these things, O Jacob, and Israel, for you are my servant; I formed you, you are my servant; O Israel, you will not be forgotten by me."

-- Isaiah 44:21

"Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should have no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you."

-- Isaiah 49:15

"Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? And not one of them is forgotten before God. Why, even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not; you are of more value than many sparrows."

-- Luke 12:6f.

"One of the criminals who were hanged railed at him, saying, 'Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us!' But the other rebuked him, saying, 'Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? And we indeed justly; for we are receiving the due reward of our deeds; but this man has done nothing wrong.' And he said, 'Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.' And he said to him, 'Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise.'"

-- Luke 23:39ff.

Actually, we exist only in the one mind which matters:

"One necessary, eternal, uncaused, unlimited (=infinite), rational, personal, and moral being exists;


Such a Being is appropriately called 'God' in the theistic sense, because he possesses all the essential characteristics of a theistic God;


Therefore, the theistic God exists."

Really, How Would They Know 'God Speaking', So As To Reproduce It, Hmm?

A new translation of the Bible into English does not contain the name "Jesus Christ" nor the word "angel." It also prefers the word "emissary" over "apostle."

The Voice, a Bible that replaces "Jesus Christ" with terms like "Jesus the Anointed One," had its complete edition released by Thomas Nelson Publishing last month. ...

The scholars and authors who collaborated on the translation say their intention was to help readers "hear God speaking."

Read the whole thing, here.

Looks Like Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention has a Little Problem with Plagiarism

For the extended examples from his radio show remarks, which appear to be cribbed from The Washington Examiner, The Washington Times and Investors Business Daily without attribution, see the posts here and here at The Big Daddy Weave.

True Religion

 

 

 

 

 

And the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner.

-- Luke 18:13

Jesus' teaching against honorific titles

But you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher, and you are all brethren. And call no man your father upon the earth: for one is your Father, which is in heaven. Neither be ye called masters: for one is your Master, even Christ.
-- Matthew 23:8ff.

Jimmy Carter's New Book Gives George Weigel Gas

Here's the money line:

In the hands of a theological illiterate like Jimmy Carter, “fundamentalism” is a “Gotcha!” word that substitutes flatulence for thought.

The smell of napalm in the morning is preferable. 

More Evidence of Subordinationism in the "My God" Sayings

And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? (Mt.27:46)

And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani? which is, being interpreted, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? (Mk.15:34)

Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and [to] my God, and your God. (Jn.20:17)

These things saith he that is holy, he that is true, he that hath the key of David, he that openeth, and no man shutteth; and shutteth, and no man openeth; I know thy works: behold, I have set before thee an open door, and no man can shut it: for thou hast a little strength, and hast kept my word, and hast not denied my name. Behold, I will make them of the synagogue of Satan, which say they are Jews, and are not, but do lie; behold, I will make them to come and worship before thy feet, and to know that I have loved thee. Because thou hast kept the word of my patience, I also will keep thee from the hour of temptation, which shall come upon all the world, to try them that dwell upon the earth. Behold, I come quickly: hold that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown. Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go no more out: and I will write upon him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, [which is] new Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from my God: and [I will write upon him] my new name.(Rev.3:7-12)

Echoes of subordinationism: the God of Jesus

That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him.

 

-- Ephesians 1:17

Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort.

 

-- II Corinthians 1:3

To Whom Does A God Pray?

And when he had sent the multitudes away, he went up into a mountain apart to pray: and when the evening was come, he was there alone. (Mt.14:23)

Then were there brought unto him little children, that he should put [his] hands on them, and pray: and the disciples rebuked them. (Mt.19:13)

Then cometh Jesus with them unto a place called Gethsemane, and saith unto the disciples, Sit ye here, while I go and pray yonder. (Mt.26:36)

And he went a little further, and fell on his face, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou [wilt]. (Mt.26:39)

He went away again the second time, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if this cup may not pass away from me, except I drink it, thy will be done. (Mt.26:42)

And he left them, and went away again, and prayed the third time, saying the same words. (Mt.26:44)

Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions of angels? (Mt.26:53)

And in the morning, rising up a great while before day, he went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed. (Mk.1:35)

And when he had sent them away, he departed into a mountain to pray. (Mk.6:46)

And they came to a place which was named Gethsemane: and he saith to his disciples, Sit ye here, while I shall pray. (Mk.14:32)

And he went forward a little, and fell on the ground, and prayed that, if it were possible, the hour might pass from him. (Mk.14:35)

And again he went away, and prayed, and spake the same words. (Mk.14:39)

Now when all the people were baptized, it came to pass, that Jesus also being baptized, and praying, the heaven was opened, (Lk.3:21)

And he withdrew himself into the wilderness, and prayed. (Lk.5:16)

And it came to pass in those days, that he went out into a mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to God. (Lk.6:12)

And it came to pass, as he was alone praying, his disciples were with him: and he asked them, saying, Whom say the people that I am? (Lk.9:18)

And it came to pass about an eight days after these sayings, he took Peter and John and James, and went up into a mountain to pray. And as he prayed, the fashion of his countenance was altered, and his raiment [was] white [and] glistering.(Lk.9:28f.)

And it came to pass, that, as he was praying in a certain place, when he ceased, one of his disciples said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples. (Lk.11:1)

But I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not: and when thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren. (Lk.22:32)

And he was withdrawn from them about a stone's cast, and kneeled down, and prayed, (Lk:22:41)

And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly: and his sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground. And when he rose up from prayer, and was come to his disciples, he found them sleeping for sorrow, (Lk.22:44f.)

And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever; (Jn.14:16)

At that day ye shall ask in my name: and I say not unto you, that I will pray the Father for you: (Jn.16:26)

I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine. (Jn.17:9)

I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil. (Jn.17:15)

Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word; (Jn.17:20)

Oh Unqualified "U"!

 

How can the muse her aid impart,

Unskill'd in all the terms of art?

Or in harmonious numbers put

The deal, the shuffle, and the cut?

-- Jonathan Swift

(image source)

Peter Berger Misunderstands Interim Ethics

 

Peter Berger, writing in The American Interest, here:

The British writer Ferdinand Mount described the Sermon of the Mount as perhaps the greatest sermon ever, but that it was written for bachelors—that is, for individuals with no responsibility for the future. Probably Jesus’ message about the Kingdom of God was apocalyptic—a message about a radical shift in the nature of reality (which means that Paul was not far off). We know that many of his followers, and perhaps Jesus himself, expected that the apocalyptic event would happen in their own lifetime. Thus, as some scholars have put it, the moral teachings of Jesus (and possibly Paul’s as well) were an “interim ethic”—how to live in the short time before the coming of the Kingdom. If you expect the world to end next week, you won’t bother to change the oil, though you still want the windshield wipers to work. In that interpretation, the Sermon on the Mount was meant to describe the world after the coming of the Kingdom (though some of Jesus’ followers may want to anticipate this blessed condition in their present lives). Be this as it may, it is very doubtful indeed that Jesus intended these teachings to be a behavioral code for the next two millennia. In any case, any society larger than an Amish village would not survive for very long if it tried to live by such a code.

This is good as far as it goes, and God knows we don't read enough people talking about these issues, but it does seem to miss two things.

One, the Sermon on the Mount isn't just for bachelors. It's also for spinsters.

Apocalyptic ethics overthrow all human conventions because true repentance is impossible without them. There are no more husbands, fathers, wives, mothers and children per se in the kingdom of God, which is coming suddenly with the appearance of the Son of Man in the clouds of heaven. There is no time for funerals, for working at a job, for building bigger barns in your retirement to hold all your increase. "Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does the will of God is my brother, and sister, and mother" (Mark 3:34f.).

Two, the world after the coming of the kingdom is not really describable because it is transformed by divine action.

What is remarkable about it is how few, however, take seriously what this means in terms of justice in the teaching of Jesus. The assumption is usually that there are many human players left in a too-worldly kingdom of God populated by shiny happy people who have received the grace of God, whereas Jesus is at pains to describe God's coming judgment in which evil and evil-doers are swept away. The angels first come at the harvest not to rapture the few into the air to ever be with the Lord, but to gather the many tares and hurl them into the fire. As interim ethics, Jesus' teaching is survival ethics, and temporary because terrestrial, designed to help his hearers escape the wrath that is coming. Beyond that, the future is not really ours to see.

Perhaps more than anything else, it is the failure of this vision to materialize historically which has been lurking in the background in the mind of modernity and fueling the conviction that God is dead. 

"T" Tells a Tale

 

The bookful blockhead, ignorantly read,

With loads of learned lumber in his head,

With his own tongue still edifies his ears,

And always list'ning to himself appears.

-- Alexander Pope

"S" is for Seed Plot

 

The pestilent seminaries, according to their grossness or subtility, activity, or hebetude, cause more or less truculent plagues.

-- Gideon Harvey, A Discourse of the Plague

(image source)

The Restraint of "R"

 

 

 

Rhyme is a crutch that lifts the weak along,

Supports the feeble, but retards the strong.

-- Edmund Smith (1672-1710)

Piquant "Q"

 

 

What, are you dumb?

Quick, with your answer, quick,

Before my foot salutes you with a kick.

-- John Dryden

The Sickness at the Highest Levels of United Methodism

The sickness at the highest levels of United Methodism is most lately demonstrated by this statement from an emeritus professor of theology at Perkins School of Theology:

The church should be concerned with being biblical in the deepest sense. What might that look like? The ranking of a few statements by Paul above all the persuasive and powerful texts related to God’s radical love through Jesus Christ can hardly qualify as serious biblical inquiry and authority. Paul and his generation had no knowledge or awareness of long-term consensual same-gender loving relationships so prevalent today.

At this late date in the study of the New Testament one would think that there would be other matters over which to argue when it comes to the differences between Jesus and Paul than the categories of their moral universe.

It is only a measure of contemporary decadence that a person who should know better would seek to divide them over an issue which would have been non-existent at the time, not just for Paul but for Jesus himself. No one can say with a straight face that Jesus and his generation knew of "long-term consensual same-gender loving relationships." The reason for this is that in Judaism they were stoned to death when they were found out, not unlike other malefactors.

Like the Christians, for example. Just ask Saul. He stood by holding the coats while Stephen was dispatched to the next world. I suppose it won't be long before some enterprising New Testament scholar tries to make a name for himself by claiming homosexuality was a chief tenet of Stephen's Hellenistic circle in Jerusalem. We already have one claiming there was advocacy for suicide in early Christianity, so why not Greek homosexuality, too?

No, the law of God is wise because it demands that evil be stamped out when it is discovered before the people can become inured to it. But, of course, inuring the people is the modus operandi of Fabian socialism.

The problem with the preachers of the radical love of Jesus is that to them, radical is measured on a meter whose needle only goes into the red zone when fellow Christians are outraged, not the world. What they intend is anarchism, not radicalism. It drinks from the same well as the revolution of the 1960s. A new order is not its object, merely overthrow of the existing order. These would give us license, not liberation.

These people don't know the first thing about radicalism, otherwise they'd be out of a job. The sorry truth about the church since the dawn of the twentieth century is the way it has made peace with the liberal Jesus of the nineteenth. Jesus is nothing more than a moralist who taught forgiveness and love, reigning interminably in heaven while ceaseless ages here below roll on and on and on, to be improved year upon year by the presence of God's holy people. This Jesus was a sitting duck for the Progressive Movement, the Social Gospel, liberation theology, the civil rights movement, and all the other forms of Marxism which now plague the world, and the United Methodist Church now in particular. Rick Santorum was more right than he knows.

If the church were "biblical in the deepest sense," the church as we know it wouldn't exist. The cost of discipleship rules that out, but, of course, recovering what that means is almost impossible for the church because it has been trimming and compromising Jesus since the beginning. Jesus asked his followers to turn their backs on their jobs, their money, and their wives and children because the form of this world was passing away in an instant. So urgent was his message of the kingdom and the coming judgment that there was no time even to bury the dead. The judgment would come even before the disciples had finished preaching in Israel.

Yes, judgment. And Jesus' vision of it is horrific. Many are called, but few are chosen. Homosexuals will make up only a small few of us who don't make it.

Radical.

Few Are The Worthy Disciples of Philosophy According to Socrates

The worthy disciples of philosophy are few in number.

Some are well-educated nobles who live afar off because they were exiled.

Some are lofty souls who condemn and neglect politics but live undetected because of the madness of the multitude.

Some are gifted but renounce their arts and despise those very arts for philosophy's sake.

Some pursue philosophy because ill-health checks them and keeps them away from politics.

They know that no politician is honest.

They know there is no champion of justice at whose side they may fight and be saved.

They will not join in the wickedness of their fellows, who act like animals and beasts.

They know they cannot resist all these single-handedly, so they hold their peace, and go their own way.

The worthy disciple of philosophy is like one who, in the storm of dust and sleet which the driving wind hurries along, retires under the shelter of a wall.

He is content, if only he can live his own life and be pure from evil or unrighteousness, and depart in peace and good-will, with bright hopes.

For many are called, but few are chosen

"[T]he worthy disciples of philosophy will be but a small remnant."

-- Socrates, Plato's Republic, Book 6

πάνσμικρον δή τι, ἔφην ἐγώ, ὦ Ἀδείμαντε, λείπεται τῶν κατ᾽ ἀξίαν ὁμιλούντων φιλοσοφίᾳ

"Because strait [is] the gate, and narrow [is] the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it."

-- Matthew 7:14

 ὅτί στενὴ ἡ πύλη καὶ τεθλιμμένη ἡ ὁδὸς ἡ ἀπάγουσα εἰς τὴν ζωήν, καὶ ὀλίγοι εἰσὶν οἱ εὑρίσκοντες αὐτήν

Socrates on Obama

"[W]eak natures are scarcely capable of any very great good or very great evil."

-- Socrates, Republic, Book 6 

Socrates on Democracy

"[T]he corruption of the majority is also unavoidable."

-- Socrates, Republic, Book 6

Socrates on Election Campaigns

"The ruler who is good for anything ought not to beg his subjects to be ruled by him."

-- Socrates, Republic, Book 6

Socrates on Pleasure

"A true philosopher . . . will hardly feel bodily pleasure."

-- Socrates, Republic, Book 6

A prophet is not without honour, but in his own country

[P]hilosophers have no honour in their cities . . . their having honour would be far more extraordinary. ... [T]he best votaries of philosophy [are] useless to the rest of the world.

-- Socrates, Plato's Republic, Book 6

The Philosophical Observer

"[H]e who has magnificence of mind and is the spectator of all time and all existence, [cannot] think much of human life."

-- Socrates, Republic, Book 6

Philosophical Minds Always Love Knowledge Which Shows Them The Eternal Nature

He whose nature is amorous of anything cannot help loving all that belongs or is akin to the object of his affections.

-- Socrates, Republic, Book 6

Antonyms To Ponder This Day

". . . the great conflict between the ironic mind and the literal mind, the experimental and the dogmatic, the tolerant and the fanatical . . .."

Seen here.

Garry Wills: Public Intellectual, Ideologue, Leftist, Utopian, But Above All, Anachronist

Mr. James Bowman strikes a blow for historicism, here:

In short, “Shakespeare looks below and behind the poses of honor with which this play is filled. The vices of Rome poison even the traces of nobility left in friendship.” This is a familiar point of view to us, but it would not have been to Shakespeare’s contemporaries, who took the ancient idea of honor very seriously. It is possible, of course, that Shakespeare anticipated a point of view that was not common until three centuries after his death, but I don’t think Mr. Wills is well-advised simply to take that for granted.

Yet taking such things for granted is more or less the stock in trade of the public intellectual. The scholar tells us how people of the past thought; the intellectual takes that thought and attempts to fit it anachronistically into an ideological system very much of the present day.

I Didn't Leave Catholicism. Catholicism Left Me.

Spengler on 'Womanish Love of One's Neighbour'

From The Hour of Decision, 1933:

"There is one other thing that belongs of necessity to a ripe Culture. That is property, the thought of which causes delirious outbursts of envy and hatred from the vulgar-minded. Property, that is, in the original sense: old and permanent possession, inherited from forefathers or acquired over long years by the heavy and devoted work of the owner and cherished and increased for his sons and grandsons. Wealth is not the mere background of superiority, but, above all, the result and expression of it, a function not only of the way in which it has been acquired, but also of the ability needed to shape and use it as a true cultural element. Let it for once be said outright, though it is a slap in the face for the vulgarity of the age: property is not a vice, but a gift, and a gift such as few possess. For it, too, is the product of long training through generations of distinction; occasionally it is acquired in families that have worked their way upward - by self-education on a groundwork of sound and strong race-character, but practically never by original talent alone, without some precondition of educated environment and past example. It is not a question of how much one has, but of what one has and the way in which one has it. Mere quantity as an end in itself is vulgar.

"One can have, and will to have, property as a means to power - this is a subordinating of economic successes to political aims, and it affirms the ancient experience that money belongs with leadership in war and State. This was Caesar's conception when he conquered and plundered Gaul, and that of Cecil Rhodes when he got the mines of South Africa into his hands in order there to found an empire after his own heart. No poor nation can have great political successes, and so long as it regards poverty as virtue, and riches as sin, it does not deserve any. This was the fundamental though only half-conscious meaning of the old Germanic expeditions by sea and land, for with the booty acquired, ships were built and followers enlisted. This type of will-to-power is hallmarked by a royal generosity. It is the opposite of greed and miserliness and equally remote from parvenu prodigality and womanish love of one's neighbour.

"But this is beside the point. I am speaking of property-owning in so far as it implies the tradition of a Culture. It signifies inward superiority, it marks a distinction from whole classes of people. Not much is needed: a small well-preserved homestead, a worthy craft reputably practised, a tiny garden bearing evidence of cultivation by loving hands, a miner's spotless home, a few books or reproductions of classical art. The point is that these objects should be transformed into a personal world, should bear the stamp of the owner's personality. True possessions are soul, and only through that soul Culture. To estimate them by their money value is, however you look at it, either an incomprehension or a desecration. To divide them after the owner's death is a sort of murder."

Christian Morality is Renunciation and Nothing Else

 

Oswald Spengler, 1933:

What are, actually, Christian trade unions? Christian Bolshevism, neither more nor less. Since the beginning of the Rationalist age - that is, since 1750 - there is materialism both with and without Christian terminology. As soon as one mixes up the concepts of poverty, hunger, distress, work, and wages (with the moral undertone of rich and poor, right and wrong) and is led thereby to join in the social and economic demands of the proletarian sort - that is, money demands - one is a materialist. And then the pressing inward need for a high altar is supplied by the party secretariat, for a poor-box by election funds - and the trade-union official becomes the successor to St. Francis.

This materialism of the Late megalopolis is a practical cast of thought and action, whatever the "faith" may be that accompanies it. It is the mode of regarding history and public and personal life "economically" and of looking upon economics, not as a thing of vocations and the content of lives, but as the method by which with the least exertion the most money and pleasure can be secured: panem et circenses. Most people nowadays do not realize at all how materialistic they are in themselves and their thought. They may be zealous in prayer and confession and have the word "God" for ever on their lips, they may even be priests by calling and conviction, and yet be materialists. Christian morality is, like every morality, renunciation and nothing else. Those who do not feel it to be so are materialists. "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread" means: do not regard this hard meaning of life as misery and seek to circumvent it by party politics. But for proletarian election propaganda the precept is certainly not suitable. The materialist prefers to eat the bread that others have earned in the sweat of their face, the peasant, the craftsman, the inventor, the captain of industry. But the famous "eye of a needle," through which many a camel passes, is not too narrow for the "rich man" only; it is equally narrow for the man who extorts bigger wages and shorter working hours by means of strikes, sabotage, and elections - and for him, too, who engineers these for the sake of his own power. It is the utility-moral of the slave-souls: slaves, not because of their situation in life - for that we are all without exception, from the destiny of being born at a particular time and place - but because to regard the world from below is mean. Does one regard the state of being rich with envy or with contempt? Does one acknowledge the man who has by personal superiority worked his way up to the rank of a leader - from locksmith's apprentice, say, to founder and owner of a factory - or hate him and try to pull him down? That is the test. But this materialism, to which renunciation is incomprehensible and absurd, is nothing but egoism of individuals and classes, the parasitic egoism of inferior minds, who regard the economic life of other people, and that of the whole, as an object from which to squeeze with the least possible exertion the greatest possible enjoyment: panem et circenses. Such people look upon personal distinction, industry, success, joy in achievement as wickedness, sin, and treason. It is the moral of class war, which lumps all this together under the name Capitalism (which had from the first a moral significance) and sets it up as a target for proletarian hate, while on the other side it aims at welding the wage-earners into one political front with the underworld of the great cities.

A Production from "P"

 

 

 

 

Here gathering Chroniclers, and by them stand

Giddie fantastique Poets of each land.

-- John Donne

John Lennon's biggest hit 'Imagine' is tosh

So says Paul Handley for the UK Guardian here, in defense of a New Year's Eve performance of the song which has outraged many who heard it because the performer altered the lyrics.

He's right. The song is a gooey mess, the sentimentality of which mocks the lyrics. But hasn't nonsense been the whole point of rock 'n roll from the beginning? 

That many people take this music too seriously isn't just evidence of a new belief which has taken the place of an old one. The new one is now an orthodoxy whose reactionaries can't abide messing with its sacred, atheocratic text.

Give Yoko Ono some of the credit for this. After all it was she who called Paul McCartney's songs all June, spoon and moon.

She ought to know.