Reading

Currently reading Is 57, Matt 7, Epist Cic, Wright's New Testament and the People of God, and some Thomas Hardy short stories. There is something truly glorious is the Latin "promise" passages of Isaiah that I've never heard in the English. I've still no idea how it would run in Hebrew, but

quia haec dicit Excelsus et Sublimis habitans aeternitatem et sanctum nomen eius in excelso et in sancto habitans et cum contrito et humili spiritu ut vivificet spiritum humilium et vivificet cor contritorum

For the High and Lofty one says this, dwelling in eternity and whose name is holy, "In the hights and in holiness dwelling and with the contrite and lowly spirit that the lowly spirit might be made lively and the contrite heart made be made lively."

My past few posts have largely centered around the practice of Christian dialectic, partly resulting from a Bible Study passage in Matthew:

ἦλθον γὰρ διχάσαι ἄνθρωπον “κατὰ τοῦ πατρὸς αὐτοῦ καὶ θυγατέρα κατὰ τῆς μητρὸς αὐτῆς καὶ νύμφην κατὰ τῆς πενθερᾶς αὐτῆς, καὶ ἐχθροὶ τοῦ ἀνθρώπου οἱ οἰκιακοὶ αὐτοῦ.

For I am come to turn a man "against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a bride against her mother in law, and a man's enemies [shall be] his own house."

This led to an interesting topic of whether it would be more accurate to regard ἐχθροὶ as what we mean by enemies, or whether the intended meaning would be "those with whom we are at enmity." The possibly mistaken application of "enemy" to the rest of the world has burnt many bridges, and at its worst has resulted in some very dirty warfare. If there's one thing the Christian civilization has insisted upon, we discussed, it was a fair fight when the fighting had to be done. Some principle of chivalrous dialectic ought to be developed in an unscrupulous age, and this has been recently on my mind. This Sunday we'll be traveling to J's home church, my highly-anticipated first week away from Cranford Presbyterian since I took the job. The pastor (a man for whom we have great respect, and not respectful enmity) always closes the Sunday service with an altar call, no matter what the focus of the service. This, to me, is the perfect example of a practice that ought to fall victim to a principle of chivalrous dialectic. Even in the brighter moments of Wesleyanism, the emotional altar-call has always seemed rather a cheap trick. It shows a lack of respect for both the hearer and for the message; for the hearer, because it presumes they lack the rational capacity to come in any state other than humiliation, and for the message, because it reduces the power of the good news to a cheap thrill, easily replicated by any well-timed swell of music. If anyone wishes to differ on this point (for it is a very controversial one, and what I've written here, as usual, seems much more the beginning of a discussion than the end of one) please post in the comments.