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Writing

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31-03-0213
Hermeneutics

Apocalyptic Eyes

Flying scrolls. Red horses. Beasts coming out of the sea. Winged women. The list goes on. Apocalyptic literature in the Bible is like a cross between science fiction and Marvel comics. And the Bible has a fair bit of this sort of thing. Daniel sees visions in Babylon, Zechariah sees…

by Toby SumpterNovember 4, 2014
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Theopolis News

New Name, New Look

Trinity House Institute has taken a new name, the Theopolis Institute. This striking new name expresses our unique vision and mission and captures the unified purpose behind all our specific programs and activities. We still have Bible, liturgy, and culture in our tagline. We still offer the same courses on…

by TheopolisNovember 4, 2014
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Atonement

Not Fearing the Devil

Adam Kotsko offers a socio-political variation on the Christus Victor atonement theory in his 2010 study, The Politics of Redemption: The Social Logic of Salvation . He does this by explaining "the devil" in terms of the Hegelian concept of "objective spirit," Geist . As Kotsko puts it, Geist "refers…

by Peter LeithartOctober 13, 2014
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Leviticus

The Meaning of Sacrifice

Two factors keep Nahtali Meshel from discussing the meaning of sacrifice until late in his The "Grammar" of Sacrifice . The first has to do with the texts he draws from: "P says little about the meaning of its rituals" (174). The other has to do with the grammatical theory…

by Peter LeithartOctober 8, 2014
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Leviticus

Praxemics

Chapter 5 of Naphtali Meshel's The "Grammar" of Sacrifice focuses on "praxemics," the physical actions of sacrificial ritual. Praxemes are constituted by six elements: an "atomact," an elementary physical act or gesture; an actor; an object that is acted up; a target for the action and often for the object…

by Peter LeithartOctober 6, 2014
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Leviticus

Jugation and Hierarchy

Two chapters of Naphtali Meshel’s The “Grammar” of Sacrifice cover what he calls “jugation” and “hierarchies.” The first involves the addition of other materials to an animal offering. Jugates include wine, cereal, and oil that are added to the animals (zoemes) that are offered in sacrifice. Some jugates are coordinated…

by Peter LeithartOctober 1, 2014

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Literature

Roth’s Everyman

Philip Roth, Everyman . Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2006. 182 pp. Paperback, $13.00. When Death comes to fetch him in the medieval morality play, Everyman is abandoned by Friends, Kin, Beauty, and Goods. At least Good Works, purified through penance, accompanies him and gives access to heaven. Philip Roth’s Everyman, the…

January 12, 2007
Literature

Roth’s Everyman

Philip Roth, Everyman . Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2006. 182 pp. Paperback, $13.00. When Death comes to fetch him in the medieval morality play, Everyman is abandoned by Friends, Kin, Beauty, and Goods. At least Good Works, purified through penance, accompanies him and gives access to heaven. Philip Roth’s Everyman, the…

January 12, 2007
History

End of Christian Europe

When the constitutional treaty for the European Union deleted references to Europe’s Christian heritage, many quite rightly protested this remarkable act of self-induced amnesia. But it was really old news. From the time of the French Revolution, “Europe” was redefined, first in France and then throughout Europe, without reference to…

January 11, 2007

Life and liberty

Jefferson claimed that “The God who gave us life gave us liberty at the same time.” But this “us” is a very narrow slice of the human race. As Rosenstock-Huessy says, “The obvious weakness of the new-born child, of the old man, of the dependent servant, of the ill or…

January 11, 2007

Messianic measurements

Writing in 1821, John Quincy Adams observed the massive difficulty of introducing metric measurements. Measurement so permeats society that an immediate change in standards would “affect the well-being of man, woman and child, in the community.” He noted, “Weights and measures may be ranked among the necessities of life to…

January 11, 2007
History

Lutheran v. Calvinist

Rosenstock-Huessy points out, “For two hundred years the Lutheran patricians in Frankfurt had prevented even their Calvinist competitors from living in the city. Not until 1780, nine years before the conquest of the Bastille, did the Calvinist merchants get permission to build their church in Frankfurt itself instead of in…

January 11, 2007

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