Yahweh bares His arm so that the nations can see the “salvation of our God” (Isaiah 52:10; Heb. yeshu’at-elohenu). The genitive seems obviously to refer to the salvation that God brings. After all, what sense would it make to speak of God Himself being saved?But then Isaiah twice . . . . Continue Reading »
Zizek (The Monstrosity of Christ: Paradox or Dialectic?) consider’s John Caputo’s On Religionto be the “ultimate formulation of Derridean deconstructive messianism” (256). Caputo reveals that deconstruction is a “Jewish science” at war with idols and even, Caputo . . . . Continue Reading »
“Who are these who fly like a cloud, and like the doves to their windows?” someone asks in Isaiah 60:8. It’s a puzzling question in a context having to do with the assembling of Gentiles at Zion for worship (vv. 6-7, note gold, frankincense, flocks and rams that ascend on . . . . Continue Reading »
When the nations bring their treasures to Zion (Isaiah 60:6), they come with camels. It’s an unusual site. The patriarchs have camels (the word is used 18x in Genesis 24 alone, 25x in Genesis). After that, camels are typically the mounts for Gentile visitors or invaders.Midianites riding . . . . Continue Reading »
When Zion sees her sons and daughters returning home in the arms of the nations, she is stunned (Isaiah 60:5). Her heart trembles (pachad; cf. Deuteronomy 28:66-67) and grows large (rachab; cf. Isaiah 54:2). In short, she has a heart attack, and a flushed face to prove it (“you will see and be . . . . Continue Reading »
Romanticism is often seen as a reaction against the Enlightenment. Louis Dupre thinks that’s too simplistic (The Quest of the Absolute: Birth and Decline of European Romanticism, 4-5). Rather, Romanticism transforms the values of the Enlightenment by turning them into a sublime.Dupre writes, . . . . Continue Reading »
Augustine puzzled over the mysteries of memory and forgetfulness. Where are memories “stored”? Where do they go when we forget something? You forget where you left your phone, or forget what you were going to say, and then it comes back to you. Where was it in the meantime?Forgetfulness . . . . Continue Reading »
In his introduction to Kierkegaard’s Kierkegaard’s Attack Upon “Christendom” 1854-1855, Walter Lowrie suggests that Kierkegaard was “moreevidently andmore fundamentally a Catholicor perhaps it would be better to say,more consciously in revolt against . . . . Continue Reading »
Modernity is marked by the reduction of causes to efficient causes, and the elimination of final causation, of teleology or purpose.Final causes are not so easily eliminated, Hart argues (The Experience of God: Being, Consciousness, Bliss, 78-9).Our experience is not “an immediate perception . . . . Continue Reading »
Naturalistic explanations of nature’s existence are impossible, David Hart contends (The Experience of God: Being, Consciousness, Bliss, 96), because “nature . . . is that which by definition already exists.”Nature’s explanation thus inevitably and “logically” . . . . Continue Reading »
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