Peter J. Leithart

An essay of mine on Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy is currently available on the First Things web site, here: http://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/?p=786. . . . . Continue Reading »

The NT uses the Greek word aggelia twice, both in 1 John (1:5; 3:11). The noun comes from the same root as euaggelion , good news, and Raymond Brown suggests that aggelia is the Johannine equivalent - meaning “good news” or “gospel. If this is true, 1 John’s two uses are . . . . Continue Reading »

"Obscure" hardly begins to describe the obscurity of the German-American thinker Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy (1888¯1973). Though never a household name, he was admired during his lifetime by W.H. Auden, who wrote a foreword to one of Rosenstock-Huessy’s books; Lewis Mumford; Harvey . . . . Continue Reading »

In her recent book The Mirror of the Self , Shadi Bartsch argues that ancient notions of introspection and self-examination do not employ the image of the mirror in the way we do in post-Cartesian philosophy. In the words of the TLS reviewer, for the ancients “the mirror was the means by . . . . Continue Reading »

Wilken summarizes Augustine’s social vision of perfection this way: “This peace for which the city of God yearns is a ‘perfectly ordered and harmonious fellowship in the enjoyment of God,’ a peace of ‘enjoying one another in God.’ Notice that Augustine’s . . . . Continue Reading »

When Plato thought about politics, he thought about an ideal city (at least in the Republic ). Not Augustine. Augustine recognized that Plato had portrayed “what kind of city ought there to be.” But Augustine was after something different. He presented an actual human society, a city of . . . . Continue Reading »

Aquinas wrote: “If the teacher determines the question by appeal to authorities only, the student will be convinced that the thing is so, but will have acquired no knowledge or understanding, and he will go away with an empty mind.” . . . . Continue Reading »

In his wonderful book, The Spirit of Early Christian Thought , Robert Louis Wilken criticizes the Formula of Chalcedon as “formulaic and abstract,” which described Jesus as “one person,” but “seemed to divide Christ into a divine nature that, for example, healed the . . . . Continue Reading »

Alcinous, a pagan philosopher of the second century AD claimed that God is “eternal, ineffable, self-sufficient, without need . . . and perfect in every respect.” The only way to know such a God was to ascend from earthly things to higher realities: “First one contemplates the . . . . Continue Reading »

Israel is Egypt. For Israel to become Israel again, she had to go back out to the wilderness, where John ministers, and she’s going to have to cross the Jordan all over again. Wrath is coming on Israel/Egypt, and only those who repent and receive the baptism of repentance will survive the . . . . Continue Reading »