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THE CONTENTS OF OUR TABLE
Bangin’ it out.
Play the Blues
Volume 17, Number 3
Douglas Wilson ponders the blues.
Two poems, both good.
Peter Leithart still won’t stop talking
about baptism.
Thema: A Case of the Blues
Douglas Wilson puts it in the key of G.
“Christians are not to take anything in without careful examination,
prayer, debate and discussion. There is no exception for the blues. I
would submit that the blues contain much of value for us, and we should
receive that which has value gladly and with discrimination. The early
fathers encouraged us to take gold from the Egyptians, which would of
course include gold from their city of Memphis. I simply want to include
our Memphis as well.”
Mencken, Waugh, and Rowling, all
reviewed.
The Supporting Cast:
Nathan Wilson lies to his son about the
butterfly.
Douglas Jones lies about news.
Ben Merkle compares other people’s
mothers to old doughnuts.
Nathan Wilson and Brendan
O’Donnell poke some summer movies
with a long stick.
Taj Mahal profoundly states, “This is
the place to see it from Phyllis.”
Jared Miller, like the Bee Gees, stays
alive.
Sharpening Iron: Letters to the Editor/ You all
The Cretan Times: New News/ Douglas Jones
Flotsam: Butterfly Lies/ Nathan Wilson
Presbyterion: Anonymous Critics/ Douglas Wilson
Husbandry: The Potency of Submission/ Douglas Wilson
Femina: Your Baby Has a Soul/ Nancy Wilson
Ex Libris: Summer Stack/ Brendan O’Donnell and Nathan Wilson
Childer: Giving and Taking/ Douglas Wilson
Liturgia: Baptism is Baptism, IV/ Peter Leithart
Doodlat: Mark Beauchamp
Doctrine 101: Not That Sovereign/ Patch Blakey
Recipio: Day-Old Doughnuts/ Ben Merkle
Stauron: Reading the Lines, Gilded Pages Gelding Pulpits, I/ Gary Hagen
Ex Imagibus: Summer Fillums/ Brendan O’Donnell and Nathan Wilson
Cave of Adullam: Mutterings/ Cletis T. Hambit
Footnotes: Our Wonderful Sources
Tohu: Alive Day/ Jared Miller
Meander: Jesus and the Minimum Wage/ Douglas Wilson
Pooh’s Think: The Women of Israel, V/ Michael Metzler
Counterpoint: Taj Mahal, bluesman/ Interviewed by Ben Merkle
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10
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13
14
15
16
18
19
21
22
23
24
25
28
29
30
32
33
34
Fiction:
Similitudes: Hrethric’s News/ Douglas Wilson
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“Hrethric played thoughtfully with the two golden braids in his
beard. He then turned to two servants standing behind his throne on the
left. ‘Set a place for them at my table. Allow them to prepare themselves.’”
“Things to be done” Volume 17/3
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THEMA
A Case for the Blues
Douglas Wilson
DURING THE HEYDAY of the blues in American black culture,
respectable blacks called the blues “the devil’s music.”1 They
did this because the blues represented blacks to the predominant white culture, and the representation tended to reinforce
a boatload of negative stereotypes. And so of course it was in
the interest of these good folks to overthrow all such impressions. When John Lee Hooker sang about “whiskey and
wimmin” the effect was not really calculated to throw down
the established prejudices. And this is what is behind B. B.
King, a modern ambassador for the blues, performing
consistently in a tuxedo.
The blues probably began in the late nineteenth century,
shortly before the widespread recording of music began. But
by the 1920s, eighty percent of all the records sold in the
United States were blues records. The blues first came into
public view when, in 1903, a bandleader named W. C.
Handy heard a fellow in a railway station in Mississippi
playing the weirdest song he had ever heard. The man was
playing a guitar with a knife pressed on the strings—“Goin’
where the Southern cross the Dog. . . .”
But contrary to popular assumptions, the blues did not
originate in “slavery time”—no slaves sang what we call the
blues. This form of music began (perhaps) as early as 1890,
and perhaps as late as 1902. The blues arose simultaneously,
all across the South, and emerged (kind of, together with jazz)
from the music we call ragtime. For example, the piano blues
called boogie woogie has been described as the “bad little boy
of the rag family who wouldn’t study.”
After his experience at the railway station, Handy saw an
amazing audience response to a local blues band in Cleveland,
and went on to publish the song “Memphis Blues” in 1912.
As the blues emerged from the unpublished shadows, they
divided into two categories performed respectively by city
women and rural men. The “city women” presented the blues
as a polished and sophisticated act. Ma Rainey and Bessie
Smith were good representatives, and they were the first to
make any money at it. Mamie Smith sold an incredible
number of records in 1920 with her Crazy Blues.
The rural men are better known today, and represent
what is thought of as the “authentic blues” that originated in
the Mississippi delta, a region in between the Mississippi river
and the Yazoo River. Early bluesmen were men like Charley
Patton, Leadbelly, Blind Lemon Jefferson and Robert
Johnson. This kind of blues singing is called “country blues,”
or “downhome blues,” or “barrelhouse blues.” The notion of
such blues as the genuine article simply because they are “raw
and unpolished” probably owes more to the philosophy of
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Rousseau and his idea of “primitivism as inherently noble”
than it does to an comparison of the actual forms that the
blues have taken over the years.
After the Second World War, the blues basically worked
their way up the Mississippi river to Chicago, and, having
arrived in the city, they went electric. In 1890, eighty percent
of American blacks lived in the rural South. By 1920, it was
sixty-five percent, and by 1950 it was twenty percent.
Between 1940 and 1950 over a million blacks abandoned the
South, and their music went with them. Of course, other cities
besides Chicago had their blues clubs—Memphis, St. Louis,
Atlanta, and so on—so we must recall that we are flying over
this subject at treetop level. The men who represent this era
were men like Willie Dixon, Muddy Waters, B. B. King,
Elmore James, Howling Wolf, John Lee Hooker, et al.
The most recent phase in the history of the blues has been
an era that might be characterized by an irreverent person as
“white boy blues”—within the last generation (beginning in
the 60’s), the blues have been largely abandoned by blacks, in
favor of hip-hop, and the blues have been adopted and carried
on by whites: John Mayall, Paul Butterfield, Eric Clapton,
Stevie Ray Vaughn, John Hammond, Bonnie Raitt, Johnny
Winter, and many more. And frankly, many of these artists
have gotten really good at it. The music has not really suffered
at all, but there does seem to be more than a little irony in the
fact that the blues are now being performed both by blacks
with a hardscrabble story to sing about, and suburban whites
from the most pampered generation in all history, looking for
a new form of music that will justify all the money their
parents spent on their music lessons.
The blues come in many forms, but the standard skeletal
form of the blues is the straight-forward twelve-bar blues. In
this form, the musical structure begins with the tonic, goes to
the subdominant, heads back to the tonic, and then finishes up
with the dominant, subdominant, tonic—and back to the
dominant. That’s for the people who have had music lessons.
For those looking at a book of chord progressions, with their
tongue out the side of their mouths, it simply means twelve
bars of E, A, E, B7, A, E, B7. But while this is a common
structure, it is by no means the only one. Another common
characteristic of the blues is what is called the shuffle, a
common bass “lick,” which (when done right) sounds like
deep-throated-harmonious thumping. At the end of the
twelve bars of music, the verse ends on the dominant (seventh) chord called the turnaround, which invites one (compels
one) into the next verse. The blues scale typically has a flatted
third and a flatted seventh. Various genres of the blues are
often characterized by the licks, as can be seen in the difference between delta blues and Chicago blues.
THEMA
A poem can have a standard form (as a sonnet does) and
yet display wild divergence. It is the same with the codified
structure of the blues, or even with covers of the same song.
Take the blues standard “Crossroads,” and listen to the
versions of that song played by Robert Johnson (who wrote
it), Cream, Honeyboy Edwards, and Derek and the Dominoes. A similar contrast can be seen in “Sweet Home
Chicago” (also by Robert Johnson) and the cover of that song
by the Blues Brothers.
A great deal of energy has been expended in trying to
figure out where the blues “came from,” and it is admittedly a
very difficult thing to do. How do you trace forms of music in
the eras before music was recorded, and in many places where
the traditions were entirely oral? This difficulty acknowledged, it appears that the only significant feature of the blues
that came from Africa was the talent. Despite exhaustive
research, nothing like the blues can be found in African folk
music. So where did this form of music come from then? The
answer appears to be that the blues are a form that came
directly out of our musical melting pot. In other words,
although particular elements were brought from Africa and
Europe, the combination of them appears to be uniquely
American.
One source was call and response field work—called “cotton
field hollers” or “whooping” or “loudmouthing.” The
practice was to have one sing or yell a long extended musical
shout, which would then be picked up and answered by
another individual, or by a chorus. Those who have been
through boot camp are familiar with this kind of call and
response chanting or singing. One scholar has even argued
that this form is related to the Scottish covenanters, who
would have a song leader sing one line of a psalm which they
would then sing back to him.
Another source was church music. Black culture was held
together at this time by the Church. At the same time, the
blues culture existed alongside the life of the Church, with a
great deal of tension and overlap between them. More than a
few singers got religion, and more than a few preachers began
singing the blues. B. B. King grew to adulthood singing gospel,
and Son House tried to live with the tension between the two.
His music ranged between a desire to get religion and join the
Baptist church (so he wouldn’t have to do no work), to an
understated but profound song about “John the Revelator.”
But despite the tension between church music and the blues,
there was not a great musical chasm between them.
Barrelhouse music provided another source for blues
music. A barrelhouse was a cheap tavern or brothel, named
from the bar which was a simple plank resting between two
barrels. The kind of music played in such settings was
(obviously) rudimentary and very rough.
Another source—no kidding—was Celtic folk music.
Slaves on the plantations had absorbed all kinds of European
folk music—fiddle music, ballads, Wesleyan hymns. These
were brought over into the traveling minstrel shows, and from
here found their way into the blues. But in all this, we are
talking about influences, not causes, and we have to content
ourselves with leaving it at this general level.
How are we to make sense of all this as Christians? The
blues, just like everything else we try to think about, are not
neutral. Nothing is ever neutral. So how are we to evaluate
what we listen to? Should we listen to it? And how should
Christian blues artists (all three of them) take these things into
account as they write and perform?
The subject matter in the blues covers the water front.
The blues can talk about anything. Topics addressed include
natural disasters, hard luck poverty, flooding down in Texas,
nursery rhymes, breaking up somebody’s home, a love
relationship, really hard luck, the Christian faith, trouble in
relationships, burning down a crack house, and delight in
relationships.
One of the most obvious features of the blues is the
stoicism, which is not really the same thing as Christian
courage. The stoic approach to misery is seen in at least two
ways. First, despite the name “blues,” the twelve bar blues are
in a major key. They are not melancholy, in the traditional
sense of a lilting, minor key lament. However bad things are,
the blues exhort one, via the music, to sit there and take it like
a philosopher. Second, the lyrics do not complain, like recent
developments in what might be called the whiney-rock genre.
The lyrics simply observe, “This is the way it is. Sit there and
take it.” A good example of this interesting combination is a
song by B. B. King called “Why I Sing the Blues.” This kind
of stoicism is not a biblical option, and must not be uncritically
embraced by Christian listeners or performers. But portions of
it are biblical, like the endurance and courage. Stoicism should
be thought of as a foundationless attempt at biblical virtue, and
not a rebellious challenge of biblical virtue. But there is a vast
difference between “without Christ this noble thing cannot be
done” and “without Christ we can do as we please.”
The poetry of the blues is thoroughly Hebraic. The form
of poetry in twelve-bar blues consists of three lines, with the
first two repeating the same thought, and the third resolving
or explaining the dilemma set up in the first two. This is not
an exact example of Hebrew parallelism, but it does approximate it, and the poetic effect works in the same way. This is a
very common way to structure the lyrics:
I hate to see de ev’nin sun go down,
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Hate to see de ev’nin sun go down,
Cause ma baby, he done lef this town.
Or from another song:
Well, I went to the mountain, far as my eye could see,
I went to the mountain, far as my eye could see,
Another man got my woman, lonesome blues got me.
Quite apart from what is being said, this is very a biblical
way of saying it.
It must also be remembered that the world of the blues is
a world full of sin. But while it is a sinful place, it is not a
relativistic place. The blues are one place where a man can be
sure to reap what he sows (Gal. 6:7). In this respect, the blues
are like traditional country music (as opposed to contemporary forms of rock, and some contemporary country). In both
rock and country, everyone is a big fat sinner. But in country
music, guilt is part of the picture, along with the consequences
of sin. Not only is sin wrong, but it is also represented
(consistently) the way Scripture represents it—which is to say,
as foolish. The same thing is true of the blues. Sometimes the
foibles of sin are mocked (“your husband is cheating on us”),
and sometimes the understatement can be profoundly chilling.
The inescapability of judgment is never far away, and the
desire to evade it can be seen as lunacy.
houses in the neighborhood, not to mention Christian
repentance and faith. For a good example of the latter, I
would point to a song performed by U2 and B. B. King,
“When Love Comes to Town.” The blues as a musical form
have a broad capacity to address virtually every aspect of life.
For Reformed believers, who insist on the lordship of Christ
being extended into every aspect of life, this should represent
quite an opportunity. “Thank you, thank you. For my next
number, I would like to present a little song I call ‘Federal
Vision Blues.’”
Another element of concern for some Christians is the
sensual aspect. The blues are very physical music, which
means that they are, to a certain inevitable extent, sexual.
Usually the debate at this point revolves around one side
asserting this and the other side denying it. But one other
option needs to be considered—that of agreeing with the
point, but wondering what the problem is. Perhaps we need a
form of music that addresses (in a reasonable way) some of
our residual gnosticism. I think we do.
This relates to another common complaint against rock
music (and a feature which it shares with the blues)—the
famous problem of the backbeat and the fornication some
people believe it causes. This is an enormous subject, but
allow me to touch on it here.With a backbeat in a 4/4 song,
the accent falls on 2 & 4, not 1 & 3:
dadumdadumdadumdadum
If I had possession over judgment day,
If I had possession over judgment day,
All the women I’m loving would have no right to pray.
But, as the singer well knows, we don’t have possession
over judgment day. To this extent, the blues represent the
world God made with a high degree of accuracy. And as Paul
Butterfield put it, “ain’t no one to blame but myself.”
The defined and settled structure of the blues means that
creativity can work within the bounds of an artificial constraint, deliberately set. This is not an example of a boundary
imposed by ignorance, as with much current pop music, but
rather a boundary set in the same way fourteen lines for a
sonnet are fixed and set. This too recognizes how God made
the world. Strict forms in art provide the artist with both
traction and a challenge.
What about the subject matter of the songs? As noted
earlier, the subject matter of blues songs is greatly varied. Of
course, the sexual relationship is a significant theme throughout the blues, but less so than many might imagine. As we saw
earlier, the issues addressed in blues songs include house rent
problems, natural disasters, work, wanderlust, and crack
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Now is this a phonic representation of music with a
backbeat? Yes, it represents virtually every rock and blues
song ever written. Or is this a line of iambic poetry? Perhaps it
is a representation of “Oh, for a thousand tongues to sing.”
Remember the line between music and poetry is not really
that hard and fast. This metrical element of the backbeat is
not only a strong feature of rock and blues, it is also a
constituent feature of some of the greatest Christian poetry
ever written. As a modified version of the old (iambic) Sunday
School song put it, “Be careful what you damn, little men.”
Christians are not to take anything in without careful
examination, prayer, debate and discussion. There is no
exception for the blues. I would submit that the blues contain
much of value for us, and we should receive that which has
value gladly and with discrimination. The early fathers
encouraged us to take gold from the Egyptians, which would
of course include gold from their city of Memphis. I simply
want to include our Memphis as well.
“Things to be done” Volume 17/3
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SHARPENING IRON
8
From Us:
From You:
Just what exactly is our obsession with
the insect world, or at least with the
world of creepidies generally? It doesn’t
seem tasteful. In fact, it seems rather
distasteful. We talk about aesthetics; we
make noises about beauty, and then this,
this little column of text that always
seems to be about bugs, or slugs, or
rodents. Some believe that they have
seen a contradiction, a certain divergence from the orthodox position on
Christian beauty.
We have a similar objection, but
not with ourselves. We have filled out a
complaint and we have sent it straight to
General Assembly. We have a little
trouble with God. Insects, slugs, and
every other thing that may seem larval
or have had a larval state, were God’s
idea. We’re not sure where He got
approval, but apparently He did, and it
must have been pretty open-ended.
Stand in your backyard and stare at your
grass. Squint your eyes a bit, and you’ll
realize that your lawn is pretty much
always crawling around.
We had a friend once who spent a
fair amount of time in the jungles of
Maryland. His job was to set out cups
beneath the canopy of leaves, cups that
you might use to measure rainfall. But
he wasn’t measuring rainfall. He told us
that when he held still he could hear the
clatter of what he was measuring—bug
poo. When enough time had passed he
would take the cups off and identify the
population density of the different types
of insects based on how much of their
stool was represented. The government
wanted to know.
That’s the sort of thing we complained about, the sort of thing that
Christians everywhere should declare
inappropriate. But then, in moments of
doubt, we wonder if it might not be
better to cut with the grain. God might
like us better if we were more like bugs.
ARACHNIPHOBIA COULDHAVE-BEEN
“Things to be believed” Volume 17/3
Dear Editor,
It was 1989 or 1990 when the
movie Arachnophobia was filmed. I was 17
and attending Coast Union High school
in Cambria, California. The memory of
this movie is etched in my mind. You
see the movie was filmed in Cambria
and at my high school. I should
remember how cool it was to be an extra
in the locker room scene, or a football
player in the practice scene—emphasis
on “I should.” Everyone knew that a
movie was being filmed in town but no
one knew the casting crew was coming
to campus to look for extras, even a
speaking role. I was the quarterback
that year and that happened to be the
role they were looking for. But football
season had ended and I went back to
my true calling, surfing. Besides, the
role only had one line, six words. Big
deal.
The air was crisp that day, the swell
was up, and school was in session. Bad
combination. I spent the remainder of
2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th, period
classes studying marine biology at an
undisclosed surf spot in Big Sur. The
surf was good, I was glad I had taken
(ditched) the day off of school. But this
was the one time it didn’t matter that I
didn’t get caught, I missed more than
classes.
My friend Nate was a wide receiver
that year. We shared similar physical
features; we might have passed for
brothers. He should have been up in Big
Sur with me that day. Long story short,
he got the speaking role as the quarterback who put on his helmet and was bit
by the spider and died. His one line was
“Like the back of my hand.” The thing
that really hurt wasn’t that he got the
role; it was the $3,500.00 and the trips
down to L.A. to see if he fit other roles.
The spiders had caught me in their net.
I’m pretty much over all of that now, 15
years later. I know “I could of been a
contender, I could of been somebody.”
Well the spiders have come back to
haunt me again. I think the film crew
left a few of the bigger spiders behind.
The other night my wife and I heard
some clickety-clackety on the floor in
the kitchen. Now imagine how big a
spider has to be to be able to hear it
walking across the floor from a room
away. I thought it was a tarantula. And
the next night, the spider’s younger
brother came looking for him. As if that
wasn’t bad enough it was really hard to
learn, at three in the morning, that the
potato bug wasn’t in the wall, it was
between the wall and my pillow. This all
happened in the same month.
Like Nate Wilson, I too have
contemplated the spiders in my shower.
But these are so small, compared to the
mammals I caught in the kitchen, that I
kind of enjoy watching their progress. I
know that the bathroom is the last room
left to remodel. Their days are numbered, and that gives me comfort.
Chuck Anderson
Cambria, CA
LEITHART ON BAPTISM
Dear Editor,
“So, who’s confused, Calvin or
Blomberg?” I’d have to say that I am
further confused. If 1 Cor. 12:13 is
about water baptism, then what is the
baptism of the Spirit? After reading
your article, I’m left with the impression
that water baptism and Spirit baptism
are one in the same. But when I try to
answer certain questions about both
baptisms, I come across different
answers.
For instance, “Who is the one
doing the baptism?” The disciples are
commanded to baptize (presumably
with water) in Matt. 28 but John the
SHARPENING IRON
Baptist says that Jesus is the one who
will baptize with the Spirit in Matt. 3.
“Into what medium are we baptized?”
Acts 8:36 implies water (which of
course is why we are referring to it as
“water baptism”) while the 1 Cor. 12
passage seems to state explicitly that the
medium of baptism with the Spirit is the
Spirit. Water baptism is commanded
while I can find no similar commands
for baptism with the Spirit. In fact, the
aorist tense, passive voice, and indicative mood of the word baptized in 1
Cor 12:13 convinces me that we are
“acted upon” and passive in this
process of “baptism with the Spirit” as
opposed to participating in a sacrament,
“water baptism,” that we are commanded to do.
“When does this baptism take
place?” Water baptism occurs when
wetness has been achieved (smile), but
baptism with the Spirit, which places us
into the body of Christ (and there is
only One body…) must occur at
conversion/regeneration. If it didn’t
occur at conversion/regeneration,
wouldn’t we have to contend with two
bodies (redeemed individuals who are
not in the body of Christ because they
have not experienced this Spirit
baptism, and redeemed individuals who
are)?
If I am correct about these
differences between water baptism and
baptism with the Spirit, then how can 1
Cor. 12:13 mean water baptism?
Very respectfully,
Dan Soltys
Sierra San Pedro
LEITHART AGAIN
Dear Editor,
Leithart's article, “Baptism is
Baptism, III” was muddled, and a bit
negligent.
First, you ignored instances where
baptism in the Holy Spirit occurred
either before or after water baptism
(Acts 10:44–47, 19:2–6). This raises
the question: “Is God’s covenant norm
for baptism in the Holy Spirit (thus
application of saving grace) that of
water baptism?” Catholics and Orthodox would acknowledge God can still
operate outside of the normative. “The
exception does not make the rule,” one
EFC pastor in Pullman used to say
regarding sacred pneumotology. But
that can easily turn around to bite
Anabaptists in the tush.
Calvin’s quote on baptism’s efficacy
puts in question the reformed
soteriology from Eph. 2:8–9, where the
gift of faith is simultaneously the
endued divine salvation. Yet for Calvin,
faith precedes baptism: “Paul, of
course, is speaking about the baptism of
believers. . .” However, if “believers
actually do receive the reality with the
sacrament,” then what they must
receive (by Paul’s pairing) is salvation.
Second, you ignored statements
regarding the “laying on of hands”
(Acts 8:17–20; 10:44–47; 11:15–16;
15:8; 19:2–6), an event either skipped
or not mentioned in Acts 2. It could be
that water baptism is used as the
referent due not only to its clear
covenant symbolism, but also because
the Apostles did not separate into parts
the entire event. Unlike the modern
evangelical practice, upon initial
expression of faith/repentance, a
person was immediately to be baptized
and receive the laying on of hands. The
Apostles kept these together, and
corrected the lack if needed (Acts
19:2–6). So, baptism in the Holy Spirit
can occur before during or after water
baptism. But the Apostolic norm may
involve as the whole baptismal process:
repentance, baptism, laying on of
hands. Scripture does not present a
definitive soteriology of the conversion
event.
It’s a provocative issue, considering
all the baptized infants who later
become fruitless sinners, pagans,
agnostics, or atheists. Biblically, this can
also bring into question the issue of
eternal security on the basis of the
baptized exchanging their faith/
salvation for sin or unbelief ( 1 Cor. 10,
Heb. 6, etc.). Too, it raises the issue of
restoring it with repentance and
ecclesiastical restoration of communion
(Jas. 5:19–20). This depends on how
you choose to view such passages, and
whether you see 1 Jn 2:19 as specific to
those antichrists, all similar antichrists,
or any that leave the faith. Heremeneutic
principles and logic do not always yield
such clean and air-tight doctrine as we
often pretend.
Finally, like all Calvinists, you
reference Calvin for theological back-up
on the orthodoxy of salvific baptism
(Calvin as infallible interpreter). Your
historical theology is severely truncated,
and skipping 1500 years of theological
history. For traditional Christian
churches, baptism is a sacrament (a holy
symbol by which is effected that which it
symbolizes). But then Calvinists don’t
want to start referencing folks who
believed in transubstantiation, traditional
ecclesiology, and the like. You know,
folks like Augustine. To what might that
lead?
Malcom Kirk
Issaquah, WA
Peter Leithart replies: Mr. Soltys’
criticisms assume the very distinction my
article challenged. Nowhere does the
New Testament teach that individuals
experience a “baptism” of the Spirit
separate from water baptism. The
“baptism of the Holy Spirit” is Pentecost,
and by the power of the Spirit water
baptism effects entry into the Spirit-filled
body of Christ. Mr. Kirk hasn’t followed
my argument, but at least he affirms my
Calvinistic bona fides. Not everyone
does, and Mr. Kirk would do me a
service if he would forward his opinion to
Greenville Theological Seminary, Office
of the Inquisition.
“Things to be done” Volume 17/3
9
CRETAN TIMES
Unheeding Mayor Reopens Beach after JAWS 30th
AMITY ISLAND—Mayor Vaughn,
mindful of the lucrative tourist trade of
the upcoming holiday weekend, refused
last week to put the island on a shark
alert, even after Chrissie went swimming and washed up on shore in pieces.
Over the weekend the shark killed
several more swimmers, and on
Monday the mayor ordered local
fishermen to hunt and catch the shark.
Ichythyologist Matt Hooper of the
Oceanographic Institute, a bearded,
bespectacled young man with an intent
look, commented on the deaths, “It
wasn’t an ‘accident,’ it wasn’t a boat
propeller, or a coral reef, or Jack the
Ripper. It was a shark. It was a shark!”
On Tuesday, local fishermen
caught a large shark and hung it by its
tail on the Amity pier. Sheriff Brody was
very happy. Mayor Vaughn was
pleased. Ben Meadows took pictures of
the shark for the press and declared, “I
think we all owe a debt of gratitude to
these men for catching this monster.”
Hooper expressed skepticism
whether this tiger shark was the fish
responsible for the local attacks, given
its limited bite radius. Since shark
digestion is very slow, Hooper recommended that he cut open the shark and
find out if “whatever he’s been eating is
still inside.” Mayor Vaughn strongly
objected: “I am not going to stand here
and watch this fish cut open and see
some kid fall out on the dock.” Soon
afterwards, Mrs. Kintner slapped
Mayor Vaughn.
New Cheetah Cubs at National Zoo Open to Scathing
Reviews
WASHINGTON, D.C.—Washington’s National Zoo proudly displayed
its new, rare litter of endangered
cheetah cubs on Saturday, only to have
to close the exhibit five hours later after
observer heckling grew too intense.
The ten-week-old cubs—three
females and two males—had been
frolicking in the grass with their mother,
Zazi, when a chorus of boos rose from
the second-grade class of Harrison
Elementary School. Other observers
quickly joined in, and zoohandlers had
to urge the cheetah family inside.
Chad Nelson, one of the disgruntled second-graders, explained,
“They just lean on each other and sleep;
I’ve seen that too many times.” Hillary
Jackson complained the cheetah cubs
were “too spotty and earth-toned.”
Others noted that the cubs did not run
as fast as teachers had promised and
none of them made anything bleed.
10
“Things to be believed” Volume 17/3
The bank of news cameras set up to
capture the public debut moved on to
the zebra exhibit after the first hour. The
Washington Post’s reviewer noted, “There
are not enough synonyms for the word
‘bad’ in the English language. This is,
beyond a doubt, the worst cheetah
family I have ever seen.” The Washington
Times said, “Some people tried to tell
me that these cubs were a profound
commentary on American culture, but I
found them squeaky.”
The Deputy Director of the zoo,
Mary Tanner, commented, “We try
our hardest, but some shows just lack
star quality. This happened to the
Kenyan water buffalo, too.” When
asked about plans for the cheetahs,
Tanner said they would probably break
them up and ship them to interested
circuses.
Millions of Mastercard
Customers Still Wandering
Aimlessly in Desert
NEW YORK—Five weeks after
Mastercard International announced a
security breach of personal information
from some 40 million card holders, the
company has yet to complete gathering
some nine million stray customers. “It’s
not as easy as it might seem,” said
Mastercard spokeswoman Sharon
Gamsin. “They no longer come when
they’re called. And we don’t know their
names.”
The compromised data included
“just names, addresses, passwords,
mother’s maiden names, pant sizes, and
Social Security numbers,” said Gamsin.
“But no bank account numbers. Funds
are safe—phew—though the personal
identities are gone.”
Mastercard executive Jack Tenzer
explained Monday in a press conference, “some of these loose customers
have crossed over into protected federal
lands and that allows us to grab them
without introducing ourselves.” Tenzer
noted processing the 32 million
customers already retrieved is a slow
process, but “once we match their
cards, we’ll go back and reduce their
interest rates and minimum payments
during this difficult time. We’ve all lost
good friends in this debacle.”
A flurry of disclosures of breaches
affecting high-profile companies
including Citigroup Inc., Bank of
America Corp and Jake’s Pawn has
prompted federal lawmakers to draw
up legislation designed to better tattoo
credit card customers.
Infants Sick of Mozart, Demand More Schoenberg A13
Court Strikes Down Parental
Notices for Field Trips C7
CRETAN TIMES
Playskool Joins Effort to Make Skyscrapers Terror Proof
PAWTUCKET, R.I.—The National
Institute of Standards and Technology
announced Tuesday that it has asked
Hasbro’s toy division, Playskool, to
contribute to the three-year analysis
probing sweeping changes to skyscraper
safety codes.
“Playskool jumped right in with
recommendations,” said Shyam Sunder,
the lead investigator at the NIST. “In
addition to our existing recommendations such as widening stairwells and
hardening elevator shafts, we will now
also recommend that skyscrapers
remain unplugged when not in use and
that no one should handle skyscrapers
with wet hands.”
Playskool spokesperson Gail
Carvelli said, “Skyscrapers should be of
a sturdy, durable construction, with easy
snap-on handles. No skyscraper should
break into small pieces that might pose
a choking hazard.”
The recommendations are expected to generate a fair amount of
controversy in the building code
community. But for the engineers who
undertook the study, the main concern
is safety and defense. Carvelli explained,
“Skyscrapers should have two nylon
mesh sides and two blue solid plastic
ends. The side rails should collapse into
a ‘V’ that can entrap and strangle a
terrorist.”
The recommendations are not
expected to change the look of the
nation’s urban city design, except to add
a whole series of fun and shiny yellows,
blues, and greens to the skylines.
Deep Throat Just Really, Really Shy
SANTA ROSA, CA—After Mark
Felt’s family ended a thirty-year mystery
by confirming he was “Deep Throat” of
the Washington Post coverage of the
Watergate scandal, Felt has not
stopped giggling. “They did what?” he
said. “Those bad kids. Turn off my
lights.”
“It was never a question of risk,”
said Felt. “I had the whole judiciary on
my side. I just didn’t want to upset
anyone’s schedule.”
When asked why he denied being
Deep Throat for so many years, Felt
said, “No one ever asked nicely. Like
many people, I get flustered easily.”
Though not in the parking garage
Felt made famous during the scandal,
he still lives in an underground facility
with all-night service. “He has just
always felt safer there, away from the
crowds and office windows,” said
daughter Jean. Post reporter Bob
Woodward admits he had suspicions
about Felt’s deep shyness when Felt
kept asking if the trench coat made him
look fat. “That just added to his
mystique,” said Woodward.
Third U.S. Cow Confirmed: Not Mad, Just a Little
Ticked Off
WASHINGTON, D.C.—Tests have
confirmed a U.S. cow falsely suspected
of having mad cow disease is still pretty
testy and perturbed, the Agriculture
Department said Friday.
An internationally recognized
laboratory in Weybridge, England,
confirmed the case after U.S. tests
produced conflicting results, some
showing the animal to be deeply
depressed and others party-whacky.
The cow was a “downer,” meaning
it often complained about its childhood
to other cows. It was unable to walk but
was known to tap-dance at inappropri-
Pentagon Claims Dukes of
Hazzard Remake Not
Terrorist Related
WASHINGTON, D.C.—In a
Pentagon statement Friday, spokesman
Lawrence DiRita denied claims that the
forthcoming film The Dukes of Hazzard,
based on the hit television series (1979–
85), has any connection to terrorist
activity. “This incident is not terrorist
related nor is it related in any way to our
nation’s heightened alert status.”
Rumors began circulating when a
recent al-Quaeda memo surfaced
suggesting that terrorists would attempt
to undermine Americans’ will to live.
DiRita emphasized that “The Dukes of
Hazzard’s featured cousins, Bo and Luke,
with the help of eye-catching Daisy, try
to save the family farm from being
destroyed by Boss Hogg” (Burt
Reynolds) but that “the plot and
character development still require
more active intelligence than MGM’s Be
Cool, starring Travolta and Thurman.”
DiRita confirmed that Be Cool, as well
as Herbie: Fully Loaded and The Adventures
of Sharkboy and Lava Girl, are still under
investigation for terrorist links.
Since the first trailers for The Dukes
of Hazzard were released, the Pentagon
has been inundated with calls from
around the country seeking information
about it and asking whether the
Pentagon has asked Bewitched actress
Nicole Kidman to help in the hunt for
Osama bin Laden. The Pentagon has
repeatedly advised callers to contact the
Department of Homeland Security, but
callers regularly insist they have no
interest in purchasing a ranch.
Memo Reveals Vegetable Oil
Industr y Lobbying for War on
Vegetables B2
TICKED/B1
“Things to be done” Volume 17/3
11
FLOTSAM
Butterfly Lies
Nathan Wilson
SOMEBODY has been cutting hay. The dusk is made of it. The
world is made of it. The hay is made of the air, made by the
sun splitting the C from the two Os. The sun and air made it,
but the hay is not ungrateful. It gives back. It gives this smell.
The smell brings memories, memories of the Casebolts’
barn, of hunting grasshoppers with bows and arrows, falling in
the creek with Joe, the abandoned combine in the hollow hill
across from his house, the two of us caught on the other side
of a “No Trespassing” sign fishing in the bull pasture, and a
border collie’s mouth full of confused infant pheasants carried
past the cat.
But this time, while I pull the scented world into my lungs
and roll its vintage on my tongue, I am surprised. I wait for
the childhood memories. I wait for the remembered sensation
of Mr. Casebolt’s lasso pulling my legs out from beneath me,
the joy of a war we fought against a neighboring birthday
party—our base a network of supported tunnels within a
haystack. But I’ve graduated. I’m no longer simply thinking of
my own childhood; I have begun remembering my son’s, and
he’s still in it. He’s barely even begun. This season’s hay only
takes me back a single year, to a hot day, a stumbling twoyear-old, and a supportive mother.
I am in the park, watching a memory badly filed, nearly
forgotten: my son and the butterfly.
He’s got his socks pulled up and his white tennis shoes
on. The turf is rough for him and even worse on this slight
slope. Every lump here is an obstacle. He’s plenty fast on level
ground, but this is a new difficulty. The wife and then-baby
are following behind, cheering him on. I’ve given him control
of the expedition, the whole park and no guidance. He may
lead as he chooses, and he leads down.
I know the look in his eyes. Dogs get it too, dogs and
boys. The fences are down, the doors are open, the leash is
unclipped. Magellan probably had that look, before the
scurvy. I’ve assumed that we would stop, that there would be
some distraction—grass that needed picking, a rock, a
dandelion—but we plough on. A distraction does come, and
it’s past us almost before we notice. The blond head is
twisting in the wrong direction. I help him.
“Over there, Rory.” I crouch, turn him, and point.
“There’s the butterfly.”
It’s mostly black and almost the size of a monarch, but it
doesn’t move at all like one. This thing is fast. There’s no
flitting; it’s sailing, paddling in time, keeping surprisingly level
altitude, never opening its wings completely. There’s red
involved in there somewhere.
“I want to hold it,” Rory says. This black-dusted flier is
12
“Things to be believed” Volume 17/3
doing loops at the top of the hill thirty yards away. The whole
park has disappeared for my son. The jet-ski butterfly is the
only thing of interest. Simple freedom has lost its attraction.
“Hold it,” he reiterates. I look at his mom and smile.
“Baby,” she says to him, “butterflies don’t like to be
held.” He’s not listening, so I bend my philosophy down
beside him. I am his father. I will explain the world to him.
“Buddy,” I say, for I am wise, “Do you see how fast it is?
It won’t let you touch it. It will be scared of you and fly away
so fast. When you grow up you’ll be faster. We’ll get you a
net and then you can try and catch it.”
His eyes are following the butterfly. It leaves its hill and
crosses the park, passing by us, and then returns to its hilltop.
My son is considering my words.
“I want to touch it,” he says. He remains unconvinced.
And then the butterfly came. It came fast—it had no
other speed— passing right over our heads. But it hesitated.
It had not landed since we had first seen it. It landed now.
Not in front of us, so we could see it and accuse it of being a
large and strange moth, but closer, on a two-year-old chest,
just up by the left shoulder. There it preened.
Rory froze. He did not need me to explain the situation.
He knew how these things were done. His chin dropped and
he stared at it. There were no flowers on his shirt, no bright
colors, but he had been chosen, while a father, a mother, and a
baby all stood around and stared. The divine joke stayed. The
punchline came, rested, and then flew away.
Rory laughed, but quickly grew serious. We, his parents
were both talking, congratulating him, informing him, as if he
did not already know, that this had been a neat thing.
“Again,” he said.
“Rory,” my voice was rather cheerful. “I don’t think the
butterfly is going to come back. But it was right there on your
shirt. Did you see it there?”
“Yeah,” he said. “Touch it again.”
What else did I say? I don’t remember. I laid out the laws
of reality. Butterflies and lightning do not strike twice. And
then God spoke.
“Do you see this man?” He said. “He is your father. Do
not believe a word he says.”
The second time the butterfly landed on his arm.
How many lies have I told him? I and the world both. I
have repented now. I no longer tell him that he can’t touch the
moon from my shoulders. I tell him to stretch, and I offer to
run and jump. There may be a dragon in the mulberries. I
make sure to check. And I look for the fish under the couch.
It hasn’t happened again, at least not with butterflies. But
tomorrow, when the scent of hay has been dew-pressed back
to the earth and small lower-class butterflies are sunning
themselves by the tire swing, then I will ask to hold one.
PRESBYTERION
Anonymous Critics
Douglas Wilson
ON THE SUBJECT of anonymous attacks on ministers, there is
one psalm worth quoting in its entirety:
Hear my voice, O God, in my prayer: preserve my life
from fear of the enemy. Hide me from the secret counsel of
the wicked; from the insurrection of the workers of
iniquity: Who whet their tongue like a sword, and bend
their bows to shoot their arrows, even bitter words: That
they may shoot in secret at the perfect: suddenly do they
shoot at him, and fear not. They encourage themselves
in an evil matter: they commune of laying snares privily;
they say, Who shall see them? They search out iniquities; they accomplish a diligent search: both the inward
thought of every one of them, and the heart, is deep.
But God shall shoot at them with an arrow; suddenly
shall they be wounded. So they shall make their own
tongue to fall upon themselves: all that see them shall
flee away. And all men shall fear, and shall declare the
work of God; for they shall wisely consider of his
doing. The righteous shall be glad in the LORD, and
shall trust in him; and all the upright in heart shall
glory. (Ps. 64:1–10, emphases mine)
Given what Scripture teaches us to expect, it should not
be astonishing that secret attacks are launched against godly
ministers, and that enemies of the gospel air their accusations
in their smear-reviewed journals. The astonishing thing is that
many Christians who ought to know better are swayed and
influenced by such attacks. As long as the writer of an
anonymous assault has the good sense to sign himself as “a
concerned brother,” quite a few Christians will be taken in.
I once received a lengthy anonymous attack on my
character, and the writer of the letter was self-conscious
enough about the anonymous nature of his letter that he at
least attempted to justify it: “The anonymous nature of this
piece is intended to keep the focus on the Scriptures, and not
on the weak points of their collector. I don’t want the
Scriptures to be set aside by my identity, so whether I am a
concerned evangelical, an embrassed member from your own
church or the CREC, or a Presbyterian who just wants to
edify the Reformed world, it should not matter. . . .”
Keep the focus on the Scriptures? I am reminded of St.
Paul’s initial response in front of the Sanhedrin, before he
knew the identity of the high priest. “Then said Paul unto
him, God shall smite thee, thou whited wall: for sittest thou to
judge me after the law, and commandest me to be smitten
contrary to the law?” (Acts 23:3). How can we keep the focus
on the Scriptures through anonymous accusations when the
Scriptures do not permit anonymous accusations? Scripture does
not permit an accusation against an elder except on the
testimony of two or three witnesses (1 Tim. 5:19), witnesses
who are held accountable and on the record for their words.
In addition to the requirement of independent verification, Deuteronomy 19 also establishes the foundational
principle of justice that holds the accuser accountable for false
accusations. This is because we live in a world where false
witnesses actually exist. This ought not to be breaking news to
anyone, but people do lie. The ninth commandment is
dedicated to the problem of dealing with false witnesses:
“And the judges shall make diligent inquisition: and, behold, if
the witness be a false witness, and hath testified falsely against
his brother; then shall ye do unto him, as he had thought to
have done unto his brother: so shalt thou put the evil away
from among you” (Deut. 19:18–19).
My anonymous accuser was quite right that we did not
know who he was. But notice that among all the options he
listed for his possible identity, there were none that would
disqualify him as a false witness. Why did he not suggest
those possible options? Why was that not considered as a
possibility? He was right that we don’t know who he is. But he
limited the options far too drastically, and we need to expand
them a little. We don’t know if he is a concerned evangelical
or a lesbian upset over my stand on homosexual marriage.
Thirty seconds of mature reflection should identify all the
salient reasons why all anonymous accusations should be
immediately round-filed.
The accuser wanted to remain anonymous to avoid
discussion of the “weak points of the collector.” This is a
person who reserved the right to discuss at length the “weak
points” of others, but his weak points must be off the table.
They would only be a distraction from the real point at issue,
which apparently consists of ignoring the beams in his own
eyes. But let us consider for a minute. Is it possible that his
weak points might be such as to disqualify him as a witness
entirely? Do witnesses have to be qualified? Might his weak
point be that he was disciplined by our church for chronic
unfaithfulness to his wife, and he is still bitter about it? Well,
we don’t know, because an anonymous accuser is the one who
insists that everyone else be accountable to Scripture as he
understands it, but refuses to be accountable himself.
Those who understand Scripture know what to do with
anonymous accusations—if they have a shredder. But people
still make anonymous accusations because, at some level, it
still works with some people. In the case mentioned above, I
had to deal with at least one national Christian leader who did
not know that light does not belong under the bushel, and that
one of the main consequences of walking in the light is that
people can see you, and they know what you are doing.
“Things to be done” Volume 17/3
13
HUSBANDRY
The Potency of Submission
Douglas Wilson
HUSBANDS ARE COMMANDED to love, and we are taught that
the kind of love they are to render is the kind that bestows
loveliness. But wives are not encouraged by this to simply be
passive recipients—they are given a command as well. They
are to be subject to their husbands (Eph. 5: 24), and they are
to honor and reverence their own husbands (Eph. 5: 33). We
find the same principle at work—respect bestows respectability. “Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as
unto the Lord. . . . Therefore as the church is subject unto
Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in every
thing. . . This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ
and the church. Nevertheless let every one of you in particular
so love his wife even as himself; and the wife see that she
reverence her husband” (Eph. 5:22–24, 32–33).
In some sense, the relationship between husband and wife
is like the relationship between Christ and the Church.
Consequently, husbands are commanded to model themselves
after the pattern of Jesus Christ. In the reciprocal way, wives
are commanded to model themselves after the Church. They
are in the first place to submit themselves to their own
husbands, as to the Lord (v. 22). Just as the Church is subject
to Christ, so wives are to be this way to their husbands in every
thing (v. 24). There is no great mystery involved at all if men
brow-beat their wives, but Christian marriage is a great
mystery (v. 32). So husbands are to love, and wives are to
reverence their own husbands (v. 33). As we shall see, this
does not reduce women to a state of helplessness, but rather it
leads to a true feminine authority.
With wives, as with husbands, the Christian pattern of
“self-improvement” is death and resurrection. What is true of
the Lord is true of the Church as well. Just as Jesus died for
the Church, so everyone in the Church is called to take up the
cross and follow Him. So wives are equally summoned to
fulfill this pattern, and to mortify their own desires for
autonomy. The pattern is not “husbands die, wives coast.”
Both are summoned to die, so that they might be raised to
their particular calling.
Wives are to “submit” themselves (hupotasso, v. 22). The
word is a Greek military term, and means to subject, submit,
subordinate oneself to a line of authority. The same word is
used in v. 24 (cf. 1 Pet. 3:1). In Titus 2:5, the same word is
rendered as “obedient.” In verse 33, wives are told to
reverence their own husbands (phobeo). In this context, it
carries the sense of “awe, honor, and respect,” and not the
idea of being scared or having a phobia (the same point
should be made in 1 Pet. 3:2).
A few other words from elsewhere in the New Testa14
“Things to be believed” Volume 17/3
ment help fill out the picture. Sarah was subject to her own
husband (hupotasso, 1 Pet. 3:5), and in the next verse it says
that Sarah obeyed her husband (hupakouo, v. 6), calling him
lord (kurios, v. 6 ). Peter tells wives that they are her daughters
if they do what is right, and do not give way to fear. The word
hupakouo comes from the duties of a porter, who was to listen
attentively at the door for an inquiring knock. In 1 Tim. 2:9
the word aidos urges women to a deferential reverence.
This means, along with some other novel ideas, that
Christian wives should obey their husbands. Wives need to
get clear on the actual standard. The fact that your husband is
to love you sacrificially does not alter the content of what this
enables you to do. Of course husbands are prohibited from
bluster, bossing about, selfish grasping, and all the rest of it.
But the Bible nevertheless requires wives to obey their husbands. This obedience is to be cheerful, complete, and
reverent, all the way down, and across the board. Remember
that in our passage St. Paul tells wives to be subject to their
husbands in every thing. Now I am fully aware of the fact that in
our current cultural climate this is a perfectly outrageous thing
to say and teach. It may even be illegal in some states. This is
too bad because the grass withers, the flower fades, but the
Word of the Lord endures forever.
You have heard the qualification about this many times—
no human authority is absolute, and if your husband commands you to break God’s law, then you must (submissively)
decline to do so. But this is almost never where the problem is.
What we considered earlier now comes home in a
striking fashion. In order to do this, a woman must die, and be
raised again. In Gen. 4:6-7, Cain is told that sin lies in wait for
him, and desires to master him, but he must rule over it. This is
a very unusal combination of words in Hebrew, and the only
other place it is found is in the previous chapter, where Eve is
told that her desire will be for her husband, but that he will
rule over her (Gen. 3:16). Part of the fallen order is this
desire that women have to run their husbands in an ungodly
way, in big things and little things. But Jesus came to deal with
this, and He enables Christian women to partake in His
suffering and death, and He raises them up again.
The fear is that this teaching will turn women into
doormats, fit only to be walked over by abusive men. The very
opposite is the case. Remember that we have learned that love
bestows loveliness. If a man sacrifices himself in a Christ-like
way, laying down his life for his wife, in issues great and small,
what is her natural response? Is it “Oh, good, now I can get
really fat”? Not at all—love bestowed bestows loveliness. But
the God who made the reciprocity of the sexes included this
feature in it as well. Respect bestows respectability. Honor
bestows honor. Reverence bestows dignity.
FEMINA
Your Baby Has a Soul
Nancy Wilson
THE APOSTLE John begins his third epistle with a wonderful
greeting and prayer in verse 3: “Beloved, I pray that you may
prosper in all things and be in health, just as your soul
prospers.” John thought in terms of the souls of his loved ones.
And the Old Testament is filled with warnings to “take heed
to your soul.” God wants us to pay attention to the state of our
souls. We are responsible to see that our souls are prospering,
taking root and thriving like vigorous plants, not declining or
drooping like wilted plants in the hot sun.
Not only that, but we are responsible to see that our
children’s souls are prospering as well. Parents are the means
God has established to nurture these little souls, and mothers
share this tremendous privilege and responsibility to see that,
by God’s grace, all the children in their charge are flourishing,
both body and soul.
People in our modern soulless culture deny even the
existence of the soul, much less the state of their own souls or
the souls of their children. But we know better. Wise mothers
should be tuned in to this crucial aspect of their mothering.
Mothering is not just about childbirth options or schedule
feeding. The wise woman understands that children are a
source of joy and blessing entrusted to her by God, and she is
to be a good steward of them, seeing that she takes care to
dedicate her children to God and train them up as God’s own.
When a new baby is in its mother’s arms, we don’t
understand what God is doing to nurture the baby’s wee soul.
It is a mystery. But He uses every loving word, every silly
song, every kiss and playful hug to nurture and nourish the
souls of our children. This is a work of faith, and we trust God
to do it through us. Laying aside our “own plans” in order to
rock the baby or comfort a child is a soul-prospering work,
not an annoying interruption.
Though a mother’s work can seem monotonous or
repetitive (and it is) when it comes to doing the laundry or
changing the diapers, we have to have the eye of faith as we
go. God blesses all these loving duties to the prospering of the
souls of both mother and children. Reading stories over and
over, stacking the blocks one more time, washing a face,
wiping a nose, changing a wet diaper, or putting fresh sheets
on the bed are all ways that a mother cares for her children
and communicates love and security. And in some mysterious
way, God uses it like sunshine and water on a tender plant. So
we plant and water, but it is He who gives the increase.
All the loving attentiveness a mother gives her children is
food for their souls. When the child is a small baby, all those
smiles and kind words, the laughing and playfulness, the
motherly delight and pride in each new accomplishment, is
used by God to prosper the baby’s soul. And it continues as
the child grows. Even the smallest gesture, if done in love and
kindness, is nourishing. And we want children with fat little
souls, children who are healthy plants, as in Psalm 144:12,
“that our sons may be as plants grown up in their youth.” The
child cannot find the same soul-nourishment from a stranger
or casual acquaintance. That’s why when a child is hurt, he
always turns to his parents for comfort, no matter how nice
the babysitter is. And that is a good sign, not a bad sign.
Children find security in their own parents, and if they don’t,
then they will look elsewhere, even to strangers.
A child growing up in a home filled with selfishness,
criticism, impatience, and bitterness does not flourish. How
can he? His soul is malnourished, stunted, and neglected.
Parents often do not take seriously the tremendous impact
their lives have on their children. They fail to realize how
potent their words and actions are, for good or ill. Mothers
who hand off their babies, who are too busy for their children,
or who grow impatient, cross, or scolding with the many
demands on them are rearing unhealthy children. They are
starving them spiritually. Sticking them in front of the
television for hours can be soul-deadening. Ignoring them
when they ask questions, or telling them that “we are too busy
right now,” is like giving them a crust of bread for dinner.
Nothing we do is neutral; it will either feed and nourish or
starve and impoverish. We cannot think that a prayer at
bedtime and reading a Bible story occasionally will counteract
the damage done day in and day out by the foul air the
children breathe in the home, day after day, all year long. This
kind of mother is tearing her house down with her own hands
(and her own tongue).
The mother is designed by God to be a source of great
blessing to her husband and children, the “very soul of the
house.” And mothers underestimate the power in their hands
to bring their families great good. As Proverbs says, better a
meal with vegetables with peace than feasting with strife. But
by the grace of God, mothers can provide feasts with peace
and joy, which nourishes both body and soul. Listening to your
children, taking them on your lap and talking with them, being
affectionate and loving to them, will of course take time. Just
as preparing and serving good food takes time, so feeding our
children’s souls takes time. Though we cannot see the food
doing the work at the table, we do see our children growing
over time. The same is true of nourishing their souls. We
cannot see how reading this story one more time will be like a
second helping of mashed potatoes. It is. God uses all these
things we do, when we render them unto Him by faith, to
strengthen, nourish, and grow our children up into men and
women with fat souls who will then be able to nourish their
own children and grandchildren.
“Things to be done” Volume 17/3
15
EX LIBRIS
Los Books
Reviewed by Brendan O’Donnell and Nathan Wilson
Happy Days:1880–1892; Newspaper Days:
1899–1906; Heathen Days:1890–1936
by H. L. Mencken
reviewed by Brendan O’Donnell
Henry Louis Mencken, master and unapologetic champion of
the American iteration of the English tongue, employed the
language in all its pugilistic, cocksure glory. His three-volume
autobiography, which he wrote in the years spanning 1936–
1943, displays his two-fisted virtuosity in the American
dialect in nine hundred of the twentieth century’s most
enjoyable pages. While not much of a one for poetry—he
rejected it as “jingly and juicy nonsense”1—the man nevertheless loved words, deeply. Rather than devote his to the
articulation of “the pearls of the imagination,” the newspaperman-by-trade-and-heart trained them to elevate “overt facts”
and anecdotal storytelling into an utterly unpretentious art.
And so anecdotes comprise the bulk of the autobiography; in fact, there is no more overarching narrative structure
than one may glean from the “Note about the Author” closing
out each volume. Born in 1880 in Baltimore, he began writing
for that city’s Morning Herald in 1899, moving on in 1906 to
the Sun, where he remained until a few years shy of his death
in 1956. Along the way, he wrote for and co-edited the Smart
Set, a magazine of literary criticism, and sired a prodigious
litter of eminently readable books and essays. An athletic
wordsmith, he remarks in one place that his career had
coaxed out of him some ten million words, with more sure to
follow.
His childhood memoir Happy Days enjoys a throne of
honor atop that vaunted heap of letters. Mencken delighted in
his nonage, and dare I say, was profoundly grateful for it.
Gleeful, doxological passages on the glories of an uncomplicated young life crowd this first volume; his passage on
stewed blackberries alone ought to fetch the $15.95 that
Johns Hopkins Press levies for the book. Mencken assiduously avoids the psychoanalytic brine in which so many
autobiographers marinate their childhoods, and what he
spares us in self-reflection he makes up for in his lively
recollection of the bygone. He writes of a Baltimore where a
housewife fetching soft crabs for the family supper shilled out
but “two-and-a-twelfth cents apiece,” and where the grammar-school pedagogues took after the boys with yardsticks.
His recollections of things that a lesser writer would bathe in
sucrose, such as the peach ice cream that stapled down the
family desserts, always arrive with some salty change-up—the
Mencken family tired of the fresh peaches, and turned the ice
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“Things to be believed” Volume 17/3
cream over to the conniving, gluttonous family Shetland. He
reports, unsentimentally, that even the stewed blackberries
turned up the occasional grasshopper.
Newspaper Days charts Mencken’s career at the Morning
Herald, which he talked his way into via six winter weeks of
pestering Herald editor Max Ways for a beat. After one of his
regulars did a six-day stint in absentia, Ways gave Mencken his
first crack at journalism. Upon seeing his first hundred words
in print, “there ran such thrills through [Mencken’s] system as
a barrel of brandy and 100,000 volts of electricity could not
have matched.”2 Mencken soon found himself pulling down a
regular paycheck and living the reportorial life—irregular
hours, fried steaks and potatoes, ringside seats at hangings,
drink-addled colleagues, and theater passes, all of it washed
down with copious doses of malted drink. Though he
spectated at many a blow-up, Mencken himself was no lush;
his respect for alcohol was that of a highly amused professional. Mencken the twenty-five-year-old admired drink the
way Mencken the ten-year-old admired blackberries—as part
of a life “very busy and excessively pleasant.”3 That life also
included feasts. Again, no asking price is too steep for the
man’s descriptions of the Herculean repasts that weighed
down the tables of Baltimore and the equally heroic appetites
of those who dispatched them. Only the most pusillanimous
gnostic could turn up his nose at these passages, for they
exude an uncomplicated delight in what grease, flour, and
heat can do to God’s creation.
Volume Three is the most topical of the autobiography;
we now turn to his “random reminiscences” harvested from
the days spanning his adolescence to his early sixties. He
alights upon his topics—journalism, ales, personalities,
politicians, traveling, and others—following a chronology of
yarns assembled mainly to give him opportunity to stretch his
essayist’s legs. In Heathen Days we find all of Mencken’s
strengths present and kicking; we also find ourselves holding
him at an arm’s length. In chapter XVII, “Inquisition,”
Mencken stakes out for himself a generous tract on the wrong
side of the Scopes trial, embodying the Progressive era’s
modernist arrogance, even if he took up with its more
charming scraps. The fundamentalist Tennesseans he
encountered proved ready magnets for his derision and scorn,
however grinningly deployed. He positively tars and feathers
William Jennings Bryan, whom he calls “a quack, pure and
unadulterated” in another chapter. For, sure enough, Bryan
was a Christian, which was sufficient reason for Mencken to
dismiss him.
Mencken was an unapologetic unbeliever; he describes his
own incredulity at the Christian faith with the same glee he
uses for food and beer. His father, he writes, “enjoyed and
EX LIBRIS
deserved the name of an infidel;”4 the phrase “Sunday-school
superintendent” and its variants is one of his chief insults.
Though his irreligion gets into the books like smoke gets into
the furniture, let the caveat stretch no further. For the
Christianity he encountered was, in the main, the pietistic and
simpering variety that, when it finally molted, ordained Gene
Robinson as bishop of New Hampshire. Indeed, whenever he
encountered something vertebrate in the faith, he praised it –
the sturdy singing of hymns in Sunday-school, or the admitted
rhetorical greatness of his much-maligned W.J. Bryan. Such
passages are few and far between; more frequent are his
offhand imprecations which, in their larger doses, become
quite tiring. However, Mencken is worth fighting through, if
only because he seems an enemy worth fighting with. Infidels
these days are hardly a tenth as clever, entertaining, or
worthwhile.
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince
by J. K. Rowling
reviewed by Nathan Wilson
Who is the Half Blood Prince? Tisn’t Potter. Tisn’t
Voldemort. It’s a surprise. The marketers tell us that
someone dies. Does that really boost sales?
Anyhow, the sixth book hit shelves recently, the book in
which Ron finally starts making out with people, and in which
someone dies, someone you know and love. Read it and find
out who. They’re dead. They’re not coming back.
The down sides of Potter should be obvious; a number of
people make a living talking about them. Good and evil aren’t
exactly consistent constructs, though Rowling is usually a little
clearer on the surface. But despite weaknesses in the series,
there are a few things that make me like Rowling the person
despite the craze. Rowling’s writing is pleasant and makes no
attempts to be sophisticated. She is the most successful writer,
well, ever, but still seems to be writing simply to amuse
herself. Because of her lack of pretension, this makes the series
tolerable. Plenty of people are pretentious about the series,
but she doesn’t appear to be one of them. On top of that, her
characters are most crudely drawn when they are whining, as
if she has trouble understanding whiners. I appreciate that
about her.
Plot wise, this volume consisted of occasional bad news
and some back-story on Voldemort’s childhood. Then there
was Harry’s second-hand textbook with brilliant notes in the
margins that teach Harry more than he has learned in a long
while. An inscription claimed the book once belonged to the
Half Blood Prince. A curiousity about the identity of the
prince and a knowledge that someone is going to die both
keep us going. We find out who the prince is and someone
dies. We are then done, ready for the next book with a
distinct game plan for how Harry must tackle Voldemort in
the final volume. Though many people will be surprised, the
story itself is unremarkable and relies heavily on a reader’s
predisposition to care.
The standard criticisms of Potter—moral confusion—
do hold water and aren’t only connected to sorcery. Parents,
Christian and nonChristian alike, have begun realizing that
while it might be unlikely that their children will begin mixing
potions and pursuing the dark arts (hopefully), it is a little
more likely that the occasional lying/cheating/stealing/
disobedient activities of Potter and friends could cause
problems. Not that that concern is having an impact on sales.
Wherein lies the thrill of Potter? Why the enormity of the
fan base? I have recently heard Potter books compared to the
Super Bowl. We like to have events and things that bring us
together, form a temporary community, and feed us chips.
But nobody expects the Super Bowl to be good. If it is, that’s a
bonus, but that’s not what it’s about. It’s a cultural event. We
want another reason for a party. However Potter began its
buzz, it’s a Super Bowl now, and everybody’s happy even with
a twenty-one point spread.
The Loved One; Brideshead Revisited
by Evelyn Waugh
reviewed by Nathan Wilson
Evelyn Waugh was an RC novelist with whom I was terribly
unfamiliar. Recently I was given two of his novels by someone
discontent with my unfamiliarity. The Loved One is a short
satire, almost a novella. It is fantastically scathing in its
treatment of secular America, particularly as we relate to
death. The story swirls into being with a first suicide and ends
with a second. His prose can take some getting used to, but is
extremely effective. Brideshead Revisited is a little different. Full
length and acclaimed, it is believed by many to be Waugh’s
classic. It is a story about Catholic guilt centering around the
nostalgia of a British officer in WWII. When moved with his
men to a wartime base at Brideshead, we the readers are
walked down the memory train wreck that occurs in our
hero’s mind, beginning with his first year at Oxford and
hopping through decades. In this work Waugh is a sort of
Catholic F. Scott Fitzgerald. We wander through all the same
sorts of follies that Fitzgerald gives us, but we have extra
condemnation thrown on top. There is repentance shown;
there is a promise of more. But the story focuses on the
necessity of guilt. Guilt is a wonderful thing and the more
guilty the life, then the closer that life is to God. There is a
sort of truth here, but in a flat, typically Catholic form. Both
books are solid reads nonetheless.
“Things to be done” Volume 17/3
17
CHILDER
Giving and Taking
Douglas Wilson
IN OUR LAST installment, “When Sons Leave,” I emphasized
how, in the formation of new families, sons leave and daughters are given. This pattern is taken from the foundational
paradigm of family formation in Gen. 2:24, coupled with how
it is applied in the New Testament (1 Cor. 6:16; Eph. 5:31).
We found certain other features of Old Testament law to be
consistent with this. Young men were included in the militia at
the age of twenty (Num. 26:2), and the atonement tax for
separate households was reckoned for twenty-year-olds and
up (Ex. 30:14). While the normal pattern is for sons to leave
in order to marry, there are exceptions. Timothy left home as
a very young man to travel as Paul’s assistant, Paul himself was
unmarried, and of course the Lord was not married.
But how are we to respond to those who point out some
other expressions found in Scripture? For example, it is not
just said that daughters are given; it says that wives are taken.
Does this not mean that sons are in some sense under parental
authority in marital issues also? Rebekah was brought to Isaac
while Isaac was still living at home. Jacob (when he was in his
seventies) was commissioned by his father Isaac to find a wife in
the house of Laban (Gen. 28:1–2). Hagar took a wife for
Ishmael (Gen. 21:21). God commands the Israelites not to
“take” Canaanite daughters as wives for their sons, and this
surely assumes that there was a prospect of them doing so (Ex.
34:16; Deut. 7:3).
Following this pattern, it could be argued that a son does
not leave his parents (Gen. 2:24) until those parents take a wife
for him, and the formation of that new family occurs because
they have taken a wife for him.
In my view, there are several problems with this view—
but only if this approach is being offered as the normative
pattern for us today. It is important to note something at the
outset. Whether or not these examples from Genesis are
normative, the presence of these examples of arranged marriages in Scripture certainly means that such practices are
lawful. I once met a gracious Christian couple from India who
were in this circumstance. The parents on both sides were
non-Christians, and their son and daughter each asked their
respective parents to arrange a marriage as they saw fit, but
asked merely that the union be with another Christian. The
parents honored this request, the couple married, and a
number of years later they were here in the States, still happily
married. There is nothing in Scripture to suggest that this sort
of thing is inherently sinful, and there is strong evidence to
show that the patriarchs practiced a form of it.
So why is this pattern not normative? There are several
reasons. The first is that the patriarchal examples prove too
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“Things to be believed” Volume 17/3
much. If the pattern in its entirety is normative, then we
cannot reconcile it with the express words of Genesis 2:24,
where sons leave and establish a household of their own. In the
cases of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the sons did not really
leave. Isaac took Rebekah into his mother’s tent (Gen. 24:67).
This suggests a number of things that would be problematic
if we tried to apply them as a normative example today. This
shows that Sarah’s tent was different than Abraham’s. Must
husband and wife live separately? Later, when Sarah dies,
Abraham traveled from his dwelling place to where she had
lived, and mourned for her (Gen. 23:1–2).
And while Jacob left home to “take” his wife, after he
had worked for his wives (buy one, get one free), he still
returned to Isaac’s house after many years (Gen. 35:27),
when he was at least in his mid-eighties. To treat the example
of the patriarchs as normative is not just to follow a certain
pattern of courtship that requires permission from the
parents of the groom—consistency would require the
formation of a compound, where husbands and wives live in
separate dwellings, and a self-contained agrarian economy.
Such a model would have architectural ramifications.
Second, when the paradigm from Genesis is quoted in
the New Testament, it is quoted in the midst of a pagan
society that was not nomadic. And yet the pattern of leaving
and cleaving is still regarded as functionally normative for
these Gentiles who were just hearing about the Scriptures for
the first time. St. Paul quotes Genesis 2:24 to the Ephesian
church and applies the terms of it straight across. The point
is not that the other portions of Genesis are not authoritative
for the Gentiles also—it is simply to say that we have Paul’s
interpretation of Genesis 2:24 in hand. We do not have his
view on Esau taking another wife because he realized the first
one was distressing to his parents (Gen. 28:8–9). The New
Testament tells us that Genesis 2:24 is normative in a
straightforward way. The narrative portions of Genesis are
authoritative also, but because they are narrative, we have to
be careful in how we derive general doctrine from that
narrative. It must be done, but given the nature of the case, it
must be done carefully.
And third, as we look at the development of culture
throughout the course of the Old Testament, we see God
changing “the constitution” of Israel on several significant
occasions. The climax of this was of course with the coming
of the Messiah, where it happened in an ultimate way. In all
these transformations, certain features stayed constant. But
other elements of that culture faded away. As we consider
various details from our covenant history, we need to make
sure that we are not resurrecting something that God
deliberately retired.
LITURGIA
Baptism is Baptism, IV
Peter Leithart
MY THESIS IN THESE several articles has been simple: When
Paul uses the word “baptism,” he means baptism—the water
rite of Christian initiation. Here, I examine 1 Corinthians
15:29, where Paul argues for the reality of resurrection with
two disorienting rhetorical questions: “Otherwise, what will
those do who are baptized for the dead? If the dead are not
raised at all, why then are they baptized for them?”
What does Paul mean by “baptize” in this passage?
There is little dispute about this, though Jerome MurphyO’Connor suggests that it is a metaphor for “being destroyed.” On his view, Paul is asking rhetorically why
preachers (“they”) are being destroyed (“baptized”) for the
sake of those who lack wisdom (“the dead”). Though this
interpretation makes some sense of the connection between
verse 29 and the following verses, it hardly fits the language of
verse 29 itself. Any interpretation that requires inverted
commas for all the key words is, well, suspect. Apart from the
idiosyncratic Murphy-O’Connor, no one seems to doubt that
here “baptize” means baptize.
The interesting question in 1 Corinthians 15:29 is not
what “baptize” means but what “for the dead” means. Many,
not only Mormons, have taken this passage as evidence that
some in the early church baptized living people as surrogates
for the unbaptized dead, a practice that continued in some
heretical groups into the patristic period. Didymus the Blind,
for instance, claimed that “The Marcionites baptize the living
on behalf of dead unbelievers, not knowing that baptism saves
only the person who receives it.” Chrysostom offers a more
colorful description in his fortieth homily on 1 Corinthians:
“When any Catechumen departs among them [Marcionites],
having concealed the living man under the couch of the dead,
they approach the corpse and talk with him, and ask him if he
wishes to receive baptism; then when he makes no answer, he
that is concealed underneath saith in his stead that of course
he should wish to be baptized; and so they baptize him instead
of the departed, like men jesting upon the stage”—the stage
being, for Chrysostom, that than which nothing worse can be
imagined.
Other early documents show that baptism was not only
performed for the dead, but sometimes on them. (The era of
baptizing house pets and farm animals was still some centuries
away.) Baptism of corpses was apparently widespread enough
at least in North Africa that the Code of the African
Churches, compiled from various councils and approved in
419, included a canon condemning the practice: “Neither the
Eucharist nor Baptism should be given to the bodies of the
dead.” In a Greek version of the canon, this explanation is
added: “For it is written: ‘Take, eat,’ but the bodies of the
dead can neither ‘take’ nor ‘eat.’” That’s hard to argue with.
Calvin challenged this line of interpretation, pointing out
that “it is hard to believe that people who were denying the
resurrection were at one and the same time making use of a
rite like this,” since the rite makes no sense unless it is done
with a view to resurrection. If the Corinthians denying the
resurrection were not the same Corinthians who were
baptizing the dead, they could respond to Paul’s criticism
with “Why do you put pressure on us with this old wives’
superstition, when in fact you do not approve of it yourself?”
And if Paul disapproved of the practice, why didn’t he say so?
He was not one to shrink from confrontation, particularly with
the Corinthians.
If his argument is to work, Paul must be appealing to a
practice that both he and the Corinthians accepted. If the
Corinthians do not “baptize for the dead,” then Paul’s appeal
to this practice is useless. If Paul doesn’t think that the dead
should be baptized, then his Corinthian opponents have a
ready-made, and decisive, rejoinder.
So, what is “baptism for the dead”? Calvin suggests that
“for the dead” means “those regarded as dead already,” in
other words, the mortally ill. Paul’s argument is, “What’s the
use of death-bed baptisms if there is no resurrection?”
Perhaps. But Chrysostom has the better of the argument. The
baptismal rite of his time included a confession of faith in the
resurrection: “I believe in the resurrection of the dead.” Thus,
“with a view to this art thou baptized, the resurrection of thy
dead body, believing that it no longer remains dead.” Baptism
is added to the creed as a sign to assure the baptized. Citing
Romans 6, Chrysostom says that entering the water and
emerging from it “is a symbol of the descent into Hades and
return thence” (Homily 40 on 1 Corinthians). Baptism for the
dead is not a bizarre perversion of baptism. All Christian
baptisms are baptisms for the dead, for everyone comes to the
font dead in trespasses and sins. This also fits with the
following verses, which show that Paul, having been baptized
in hope of resurrection, faces danger, strives with beasts, and
sacrifices himself for the church.
This almost satisfies. But not quite. Paul uses a distancing
third person— “they” baptize for the dead; why not “we”?
Paul might well be referring to Jewish practices. Under the
ceremonial laws of Torah, every washing was a washing “for
the dead.” Uncleanness was a ceremonial form of death, and
through washings of various sorts the unclean dead were
restored to life in fellowship with Yahweh.
Whatever the particulars of Paul’s argument, one thing is
clear from 1 Corinthians 15:29: “Baptism” means baptism.
“Things to be done” Volume 17/3
19
SIMILITUDES
Hrethric’s News
Douglas Wilson
THE SOLITARY VIKING stood silent for a moment, looking
first at Beow and then at Andrew. When he was done, he
spun on his heel, and said, “Come.” Well, he actually said,
“Cume,” but they knew what he meant.
“We are not at war,” Beow whispered to Andrew,
“but look lively just the same.” With that, the two
followed after the chieftain. The path wound down toward
the coast, with just occasional glimpses of the sea. The
chieftain appeared to have no interest in waiting for them,
or conversing with them, and so Andrew had to step
quickly, and Beow was at a slight canter.
After a bit of brisk walking, the path emptied out into
a stretch of grassy dunes. The sea was invisible, but
Andrew could see the columns of smoke rising, and the
very tops of the masts. When they crested the last dune
before the beach, a few moments passed while they were
making their way down the slope before a shout went up.
The chieftain strode into the encampment, and signaled
several of his men, commanding them to escort Andrew
and Beow to the center of the camp. The order did not
include a command to seize their weapons (which in
Beow’s case was impossible anyway) and so Andrew
walked slowly alongside Beow, holding his spear carefully.
They came into the central enclosure of the settlement, where there was a large fire, over which was a large
hog on a spit, being turned slowly by several slaves. On the
far side of the fire was a large carved wooden throne,
which the chieftain approached purposefully, turned, and
sat down in. “Come,” he said again.
Andrew and Beow walked around the fire and stood
quietly in front of the throne. Andrew was still looking
around curiously. “What are your names, and where are
you from?”
“My name is Beow, and I come from the mystic
mountain. I am a servant of the Lady Margaret.”
The chieftain’s gray eyes turned to Andrew. “My
name is Andrew,” Andrew said. He did not know how to
say where he was from, and was still not sure himself, so
he just said, “I am from the mother world.”
This did not appear to surprise anyone. By this time a
large number of the Vikings had gathered around, and
they just stood, watching silently.
The chieftain nodded. “And my name is Hrethric.
And these are my people, of the tribe Rohan.” Andrew
blinked, startled, and looked around for horses. A moment
later he wondered why he had thought there would be
horses.
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“Things to be believed” Volume 17/3
“A day before,” Hrethric said, “you could have
passed here without questions or delay. But now that we
have landed, this realm is ours as long as we are here. And
so you must seek our leave to pass through it. What is
your purpose? Where are you going?”
Andrew lifted up his chin, somewhat defiantly. “We
are going to meet the dragon.”
At this, a great roar of laughter came from all the
surrounding men. Even Hrethric smiled, and when the
laughter had passed, he said, “A dragonslayer. They are
growing dragonslayers from your mountain younger and
smaller every year. Do you confess it, Beow?”
“I confess it,” he replied. “But older and larger is not
always wiser. And this one has many in his line who have
slain a worm. The gift is upon him. And he has been sent
to us.”
Hrethric played thoughtfully with the two golden
braids in his beard. He then turned to two servants
standing behind his throne on the left. “Set a place for
them at my table. Allow them to prepare themselves.”
Andrew was curious how they would set a place for
Beow at a table, but he need not have worried. When they
were escorted there just a short time later, they found that
Andrew was seated at the king’s left hand, and Beow found
a trough full of oats at the king’s right. Andrew had a
wooden trench in front of him that had hot potatoes on the
one side, a slab of ham on the right, and a tumbler full of
ale.
“Eat,” said Hrethric. “And then I will give you such
news as I have.” Andrew soon discovered that these
Vikings did not converse when food was before them. The
object was to eat it all, and then speak later while they
were drinking. When the food was gone, Hrethric cleared
his throat, finished his ale, and motioned for another cup.
With that, he turned and spoke straight to Andrew, but in
a way that Beow could hear.
“As I have heard, the dragon has taken a maiden. I
presume you knew this much?”
Andrew nodded.
“If I tell you what I know, then will you remember us
if it comes to the treasure?”
Andrew shook his head, remembering the second part
of his instructions. “That is not mine to promise,” he said.
Hrethric smiled, a little grimly this time. “I understand. And I will tell you anyway. “The maiden is not a
princess. But a line of princes will come from her. And
when you see her, you will understand your time on the
mountain.”
DOODL AT
By Mark Beauchamp
“Things to be done” Volume 17/3
21
DOCTRINE 101
Not That Sovereign
Patch Blakey
MANY CHRISTIANS believe that God is sovereign. They
believe that God can control the weather, heal disease, provide
safety for folks when they are on long trips, grant healthy
deliveries of babies, give doctors wisdom to treat ailments,
provide food, work, and rest, mend broken relationships, give
courage and protection to those in danger, change hearts,
bring disaster on the wicked, exalt the righteous, lead single
people to the person they will ultimately marry, limit the
actions of the devil and his demons, lead people to a saving
knowledge of Christ, and much, much more. Yes, they believe
that God has authority over all things that come to pass—
almost.
We know that these dear Christians believe that God can
do all these things because we hear them pray for Him to do
them. It would be ludicrous to ask someone to do something
that they are incapable of doing, even if that someone is God.
But the one thing that these same Christians believe that God
cannot touch—that it is inviolable for Him to tamper with,
that He has foresworn not to invade—is man’s free will. This
is apparently the big “King’s X” in the universe which God
has strictly bound and forbidden Himself to violate. Man’s
free will is like the Garden of Eden to God; He has placed a
guard against entering man’s free will just as the cherubim
kept man from entering the sacred spot of the Garden after
the Fall. Yes, these Christians believe that God is sovereign,
but not that sovereign.
So, what is the point then of praying to God, asking Him
to intercede in people’s affairs, if He cannot transgress man’s
free will? Why ask God to fatten an anorexic young girl since
He would have to violate her free will to do so? Why pray for
a young teenager who is pregnant out of wedlock to be
deterred from getting an abortion if that is what she has set
her mind to do? Why pray for a missionary’s safety while he’s
ministering to bring the gospel to violent tribesmen if this
would violate their free will? Why ask God to have Congress
pass a bill that would protect heterosexual marriage if this
would require Him to tamper with their politically correct
thinking? Why pray for God to save a homosexual knowing
that He isn’t about to change that person’s heart against his
own free will?
It seems that many Christians are willing to allow God
the latitude to give doctors greater skill than they naturally
possess in order to perform some serious surgery or treatment that will result in the restoration to health of some
beloved family member or friend. But isn’t this also a violation
of God’s self-imposed restraint into the free will of men? But
someone may say that the doctor would like to have this
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increased ability. Did they ever ask the doctor before they
prayed for God to act in this way? Most likely not.
Did God tamper with man’s free will when He kicked
Adam and Eve out of the garden after the fall, and placed the
cherubim as priests at the entrance back into the garden? The
garden was a pretty cozy spot that didn’t require much labor
to obtain food, other than picking it. But God forced Adam to
work by the sweat of his brow by physically removing him
from the Garden. Maybe Adam should have filed a complaint
with the free-will police.
Didn’t God bring the Flood on the entire world, killing
all of mankind and sparing only eight? “For this they willingly
are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of
old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water:
whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with
water, perished” (2 Pet. 3:5–6). God took the lives of all but
eight people in the Flood. Did all these people want to drown?
Was this action by God against their free will?
Didn’t God bring plagues on the nation of Egypt,
ultimately killing all of their firstborn, both of man and beast?
“And it came to pass, that at midnight the Lord smote all the
firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh
that sat on his throne unto the firstborn of the captive that was
in the dungeon; and all the firstborn of cattle” (Ex. 12:29).
Was this in accordance with the free will of the Egyptian
people? Did they all want their firstborn children and cattle to
die?
Wasn’t the land of Canaan previously occupied by seven
nations, and didn’t God give the land of Canaan to the
Israelites? “Get thee up into this mountain Abarim, unto
mount Nebo, which is in the land of Moab, that is over against
Jericho; and behold the land of Canaan, which I give unto the
children of Israel for a possession” (Deut. 32:49). Did God
ask the Canaanites if they wanted to be cast out of the land of
their heritage? Was this action on the part of God a violation
of the Canaanites’ free will?
But perhaps some will concede that a sovereign God
certainly may and can take life and land against the free will of
their possessors; however, He still can’t save them contrary to
their free will. Yet Scripture testifies even here, “For if, when
we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of
his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his
life” (Rom. 5:10). Fortunately for those Christians who
believe that God is sovereign, but not that sovereign, He is far
more sovereign than they are willing to believe, even in saving
them contrary to their own free will.
RECIPIO
Day-Old Doughnuts
Ben Merkle
MOSCOW, Idaho is a unique place. We have two major
universities crammed into a few miles of country bumpkin
farmland. It’s an interesting contrast, which highlights some
odd quirks that might have elsewhere gone unnoticed. Fourwheel drives and cowboy hats blend in in most farm towns.
But it is a little odd to sit in your organic chemistry class next
to someone dressed up as Clint Eastwood: boots, hat, duster
and all.
But things stand out going the other way as well. Mom’s
Weekend is notorious. In a big city these women would be
ubiquitous. But in Moscow, we don’t have enough size to
dilute the influx of early forty-something women trying to
relive their youth. Hundreds of moms descend on the town
looking for action. A sea of siliconed, botoxed, lypo-suctioned,
lifted, tucked, injected, tanning bedded, desperate housewives, and all of them, like Gretchen Wilson, are here for the
party. My wife came up with the perfect expression to
describe them: the day-old-doughnuts.
Perhaps the metaphor needs a little explanation. Of all
the pastries on earth, the doughnut is generally the cheapest.
Nothing against doughnuts. I like the ones with chocolate
icing and chopped up peanuts. But we need to admit that the
real virtue of the doughnut is the cheapness. It is cheap and
sugary, requiring no refinement of taste. These are great
attributes in a Saturday morning snack. But these attributes
are not exactly descriptive of the Proverbs 31 woman. And
the only thing cheaper than a doughnut is a doughnut that has
been left over and marked down: the day-old-doughnut.
And so we have a flock of women swarming to our town
all looking to make an impression. But what look will they go
for? How about driving up to campus in the station wagon
with simulated wood-grain stickers on the side, wearing the
hair in a bun and a t-shirt with iron-on pictures of the kids
back at home? No. That isn’t the usual approach. They want
to be seductive. They want the boys to stare. They want to be
the most popular mom at the frat party. (I’m not making this
up. The center of Mom’s Weekend is the flurry of frat parties
where frat boys hit on visiting moms.) And so we have
hundreds of forty-something women trying to look like
Britney Spears, jiggly midriff and all.
This is where the day-old-doughnut expression comes in.
Of all the looks that they could go for, they pick the cheapest.
They pick Brittany Spears. They pick the doughnut. But being
forty-something, they are not quite able to pull off the
doughnut. They have to have thousands of dollars of surgical
alterations before they can pull up to the frat party in their
midlife-crisis sports cars and step out in all their day-old-
doughnut splendor. They show up as an even cheaper knockoff of the cheapest thing out there.
How odd that our society has completely inverted the
biblical teaching. Paul urges Titus to have the older women
lead the younger women (Titus 2), and we have flipped
things. Our older women chase after the younger women,
looking to ape them in every way possible, even if it means
some expensive augmentation.
Scripture points the attention of young women towards
the older women in the congregation. It instructs the younger
women to model themselves after the older women who have
given years of service to husbands, children, and the broader
church body. Paul describes the women who should be
counted as true widows as those who have brought up
children, lodged strangers, washed the feet of the saints,
relieved the afflicted, and performed other works of service (1
Tim. 5). How different is the list of desirable attributes that
Paul gives from the list that seems to be used for Mom’s
Weekend?
That our culture worships youth is not all that surprising
of an observation. But it is sad to see what this misplaced
worship has cost us. Because we have defined ideal womanhood as a giggling twit of a doughnut, women have begun to
consider the very thing that Scripture identifies as their glory
as a handicap. Rather than honoring their years, we have
taught women to be embarrassed by them. Rather than
directing the younger women to learn from the wisdom of the
older women, we have convinced our older women to chase
after the younger.
And what have we gotten out of the bargain? No glory
and a pile of day-old-doughnuts. It’s as if we had some
glorious palace, sculpted out of the finest marble, at which we
turned our noses up and asked if someone could make it look
a little more like one of those double-wide mobile homes with
a hot tub and a redwood deck. It would be funny if it weren’t
so tragic.
Fred’s Word Study
The word hymn (Greek humnos) has familiar usage
as a noun. For example, Col. 3:16 reads: “Let the word
of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and
admonishing one another in psalms and humnois
(hymns) and spiritual songs.” We find it unusual to see
hymn used as a verb or participle. However, in the
Philippian jailer incident (Acts 16:25) we read, “About
midnight Paul and Silas were praying humnoun
(hymning) to God and the prisoners were listening to
them.” (In the Greek text there is no “and” between
praying and hymning.) Then in Matthew 26, following
Jesus’ institution of the last supper, we read, “And
hymnesantes (having sung hymns) they went out to the
Mount of Olives.”
“Things to be done” Volume 17/3
23
STAURON
Reading the Lines: Gilded Pages,
Gelded Pulpits, I
Gary Hagen
C. S. LEWIS once wrote, “We make men without chests and
expect of them virtue and enterprise. We castrate and bid the
geldings be fruitful.”
We certainly live in the age of a gelded church. Of
course, the eschatology that a church holds to often makes all
the difference between a confident masculine approach that
engages the surrounding culture, and one that is diffident—
even retiring—in disposition. But beyond this, a primary
reason that relatively few study what the Scriptures truly teach
in this area is that it is widely assumed to be a theological
topic quite detached from core Christian doctrines, and
chiefly from those that affect daily living. But is this really the
case?
If you have ever listened to an pop-evangelical sermon
preached on the final chapters of Ezekiel, what you may have
heard was an extended proclamation and description of the
rebuilding of a millennial or tribulation temple, complete with
a reinstatement of Old Testament animal sacrifices despite
the return of Christ.
But upon hearing this, many reformed minds turn
immediately to the eighth, ninth, and tenth chapters of
Hebrews. “How can evangelical pastors preach a final return
to the system and trappings of the first covenant when the
Scripture so clearly opposes this?” we ask. We think it is
because they lack—among other things—the virtue of Berean
nobility, or a simple modicum of Bible study enterprise. They
just imbibe and re-echo an error that has enjoyed increasing
popularity in various seminaries ever since the time of
Scofield. “But haven’t they read Hebrews 8–10?” And yet
aren’t those in the Reformed camp who use this rebuttal just
as lacking?
Of course the writer of Hebrews is admonishing against
returning to Old Covenant animal sacrifices, but not per se.
And this is where Reformed churches often get their argument wrong, and for much the same reasons. We, too, simply
regurgitate the counterarguments that have also been around
for a long, long time. And we, too, fail to read the lines of
Scripture to see what is really being said.
Let us quickly review what the writer of Hebrews affirms
on this. In 8:13, a declaration is made that sets the stage for
the discussion of the next two chapters: Christ has made the
former covenant obsolete by his death, resurrection and
ascension.
Chapter 9 develops the case that even under the Mosaic
system, the Holy Spirit was teaching that this was only
symbolically preliminary to true redemption (vv. 8, 9 cf. 12,
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15). He goes on to spell out clearly that neither blood of bulls
and goats nor ashes of red heifers could put away sin (vv. 13,
26). Not then, not now, not ever. The Law of Moses and its
attendant sacrificial system were only shadows and dust
(10:1). It was impossible for the blood of animals to take
away sins (10:4, 11). Yet God gave these to teach the coming
Messiah (10:1). Finally, the writer warns that if his readers
reject Christ’s atonement and return to the Jewish temple
system of sacrifice they will have insulted the Spirit of grace
and will be numbered among those that draw back to
judgment and perdition (10:26–29 cf. 27, 39).
At first glance, this would seem like a slam-dunk and
custom-made rebuttal against the doctrine of millennial
temple sacrifices. But there are several fatal flaws with using
such an answer.
For one thing, the leading dispensational premillennial
theologians, including both C. I. Scofield and the late Dr. John
F. Walvoord, have always acknowledged the message of
Hebrews. They readily concede that millennial sacrifices will
not be salvific. They hold them to be only memorial in nature,
“looking back to the cross,”1 in much the same way that the
bread and wine of a communion service makes no atonement
in and of itself. They admit that the Mosaic Law served only
as a schoolmaster to teach of a redeeming Messiah. And
therefore they simply look upon their millennial sacrifices as a
future recovery of the former tools of learning that they say
will be employed once again to teach the nations the gospel
upon Christ’s return.
But this rubs our Reformed fur the wrong way and we
wonder how supposedly sane people can close their eyes to
the pointless slaughter of thousands of animals for something
so clearly impotent. But these “crazies” will simply point out
that God already imposed the death of hundreds of thousands
of animals that were killed for an equally impotent purpose up
until the time of reformation under the old covenant (9:10).
And while they would admit that their proof texts in Ezekiel
clearly speak in the robust language of sacrifices atoning for
sin, they would also point out that the Old Testament
passages for Levitical animal sacrifice speak identically, even
though the writer of Hebrews proves these were impotent as
well. Of course, on this last point at least, they would be
correct. And our problem is that we don’t know the Scriptures nearly as well as we think.
In our next issue, we will finish our look at the shortfalls
of the typical Reformed rebuttal to this dispensational
doctrine, and continue our look at Ezekiel’s temple and its
relationship to the atonement of Christ.
EX IMAGIBUS
Motion Pics: Bring Your Own Class
Reviewed by Brendan O’Donnell and Nathan Wilson
In Theaters (pretty much):
Cinderella Man
directed by Ron Howard
reviewed by Brendan O’Donnell
Freckle-faced director Ron Howard has produced enough
cinematic feel-goodery that one should feel justified in
approaching Cinderella Man with trepidation. The maudlin
“Seabiscuit, but with a boxer” previews didn’t help, and the
breadline backdrop of the Great Depression promises waves
of hungry-kid pathos. But most of the baloney in this movie is
the kind you eat; that’s all that Jim and Mae Braddock have to
feed their children. We first meet the Braddocks in better
times. After champion fighter Jim wins the movie’s introductory bout, he goes home to the family, despite the availability
of lascivious alternatives. He’s hot-to-trot for his wife and a
doting father to his children; they live in a fine house with lots
of nice things on their bedside tables—jewelry, watches, a
frame for the wedding picture. Cut to another bedside table a
few years later, with the jewels all pawned off, and the picture
sitting battered and frameless. It’s an elegant and eloquent
transition, especially knowing that Howard could have really
cranked the blarney in a “we’ve-lost-everything” scene;
instead, he lets the pictures tell the story.
Psychologically, Jim, the washed-up boxer who can barely
keep the house lit, the wife warm, and the children fed, has
the worst of the Braddocks’ lean times. One day, his old
manager Joe Gould reappears, looking for a warm body to
show up to a match with a contender, waving $250 at the
desperate father. Jim wins an against-all-odds victory in the
fight, catapulting him back into the roles of champion boxer
and solvent breadwinner. Before long he has a shot at the title,
held by one Max Baer, who has killed men in the ring. And so
the movie’s great conflict takes its final shape: Jim, who’s
“fighting for milk,” and Max’s more traditional movie-boxer
pursuit of pugilistic glory, with all the blonde-and-brunette
trimmings. As to the winner —well, this is a Ron Howard
movie.
Nevertheless, it’s convincing. Russell Crowe remains
today’s most compelling actor, and the boxing scenes make
every punch count—a rare achievement. And, even though
Howard works from a script which includes phrases like
“champion of my heart,” he pulls off an enjoyable, sturdy,
altogether manly movie about what a husband and father
ought to do for his family. Yes, you may occasionally feel
manipulated, but at least you won’t feel lied to.
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
directed by Tim Burton
reviewed by Nathan Wilson
Tim Burton doesn’t always seem well. In fact, he can frequently seem rather unwell. He has been behind several of
what I would call dark-eye-makeup-on-men films, and behind
the morbid death humor of things like The Nightmare Before
Christmas. He tried to appreciate fairy tale in Big Fish but
simply ended up struggling with the concepts of true and false
(they are rather tricky after all). At the beginning of Charlie and
the Chocolate Factory we were all treated to a special trailer for
another of his future masterpieces, The Corpse Bride, a touchingly animated (or claymated) story of a man who, fleeing an
arranged marriage, accidentally marries a corpse. It looks to
be the sort of lovely exploration of zombies and necrophilia
that could capture Burton’s imagination.
Burton’s imagination being what it is, I was a trifle leery
of the new Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Rumor has it that
Burton battled with the studio over the role of Willie Wonka.
Burton wanted Marilyn Manson. The studio actually wanted
to make money, not news, and so Burton’s friend Johnny
Depp ended up as Willie. Whether that initial defeat drove
Burton into his shell, or he was simply sleeping more regularly
than normal, this film is Burton at his sanest. Yes Willie
Wonka is weird. Yes, he seems more than a trifle effeminate
(as did Gene Wilder), but the imagination in the film is
generally healthy and Burton even shifts away from the final
conflict of the original’s (Charlie’s failure to obey instruction)
and moves towards a disagreement between Charlie and
Wonka over the importance of family. Wonka learns to stop
hating his father (watching Marilyn Manson have to even
pretend to do that would have been the upside of Burton’s
casting choice), and learns that, though his dad was a wackocandy-hating dentist, he only oppressed his future chocolateer
son out of love and a desire to protect.
Though the humor surrounding Depp’s oompa assistants
was occasionally tired, they worked in general and their
musical numbers were good fun. Overall, the effect was better
than I was expecting and preserved many of the strengths of
the original.
Batman Begins
directed by Christopher Nolan
reviewed by Brendan O’Donnell
This summer’s second movie about how a scary guy in a black
mask got that way beats the tar out of the first one (Episode
III). Batman Begins director Christopher Nolan, of indie hit
Memento fame, understands what the last two Batman movies
“Things to be done” Volume 17/3
25
EX IMAGIBUS
forgot: we will only consider taking a man dressed as a bat
seriously if he comes across as scary. Otherwise, he’s nothing
more than a prancing, flapping laughingstock, and so is
whatever movie you put him in.
So, we get the story of how young Bruce Wayne acquired
a fear of bats, lost his parents to a mugging, and made his fear
fearsome in order to avenge them. He does so by starting a
fight in a Chinese prison and getting bailed out by the monomonikered Ducard, who calls him to a fighting monastic life
atop of a Tibetan mountain. Once there, he acquires all sorts
of sweet moves, and the vigilante gang wants him to join
because of his skills with their giant ninja daggers. When
Wayne turns them down, everything blows up, thus setting up
Ducard’s unsurprising metamorphosis into a super-villain.
Wayne returns to his Gotham hometown to begin his
criminal-spooking career and helps himself to the unappreciated fruits of Wayne Enterprises’ R&D department. Besides
the black tights, body armor, and assorted costume geewhizzery, he gets a hold of the new Batmobile, which, unlike
previous models, roars and handles more like a tank than a
jet-fuel Cadillac. Armed with this stuff, motivated by a mild
love interest with Tom Cruise’s main squeeze and a dislike for
crime, bad guys, and super-villains, Batman saves the night.
Concerning super-villains and secondary characters, the
movie at times gets so caught up in setting up its sequels that
it nearly topples under the weight of its top-shelf cast.
Nevertheless, the franchise is resurrected, and looks fit to
wash away any memory of the neon-goo stuff that sank the
last series.
War of the Worlds
directed by Steven Spielberg
reviewed by Brendan O’Donnell
In this movie, Martians invade planet Earth and trample the
place. They do this by shooting ice-encrusted Martian pilots
into gigantic tripod killing-machines, buried perhaps millions
of years ago beneath the ground. In a remarkable show of
prescience, the Martians buried each of these machines
beneath what would become, over the course of the next
million years, a major American city. Furthermore, the
Martians anticipated all of our electronic technology and how
to disable it. On top of that, they knew that humans would
evolve out of whatever was slurping around in the primordial
muck, and that humans would fight back with grenades and
bombs. Therefore, the tripods have force-fields. So, having
perfectly anticipated our every move, the Martians stomp all
over us until they catch the common cold and die. Apparently,
in their detailed study of planet Earth, they missed the wee
beasties and consequently left all the vaccines in the medicine
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cabinet. That, by the way, is how the movie ends, so no need
to go see it or even rent it now. The human plot, what little
exists of it, consists of dock-worker Tom Cruise protecting
the stock wise-beyond-her-years 10-year-old Dakota Fanning
from the astonishingly malevolent Martians. Character
development explores the dilemma Tom faces between
fleeing and fighting. The Greatest Generation shows up at the
end, when Tom gets to Boston to drop the kids off with
Grandma and Grandpa. In its favor, the CG effects are far
more convincing than in just about any other movie of recent
memory, and Spielberg, as sentimental and boring has he has
become, still knows what the widescreen is for. All in all,
though, what a spirit-crushing two hours. Spielberg’s
Martians may die of allergies at the end, but then that leaves
the human race alone with itself, a nasty, scrambling lot whose
only hope is in traditional values that have gone the way of
World War II.
Howl’s Moving Castle
directed by Hayao Miyazaki
reviewed by Brendan O’Donnell
Hayao Miyazaki, unfairly saddled with the title of “Japanese
Walt Disney,” boasts what few other animators or storytellers may lay claim to nowadays: a Tolkienesque belief that
the movies he makes describe events that are actually occuring
somewhere. His movies come across as fantastic yet strangely
plausible; what’s more, these two traits both originate in the
same place—his unwillingness to explain every last detail and
nuance of the world he depicts. Western audiences must
come to his movies with a cautious willingness to get sucked in
and just accept the way things are.
Howl’s Moving Castle, presently in limited release, is not as
fine a movie as Miyazaki’s last American offering, 2001’s
beautiful Spirited Away, but it still displays more imagination
and playfulness than anything else currently prowling the
American movie theater. Summaries don’t come easy; loosely,
it concerns one Sofi, a plain, young girl who sews ribbons onto
hats at the hatshop. One night, the Witch of the West
appears at the shop door and curses her—young Sofi is
transformed into a 90-year-old woman. Unrecognizable to
her family, she sets out for the wastelands, a rocky place
outside of town prowled by the eponymous Moving Castle, a
glorious cobble of pots and pans, timbers and smokestacks,
bolts and bricks clanking about the land somewhat in the form
of a lizard. A turnip-headed scarecrow leads her to it; perhaps
Howl, the handsome and intemperate magician of the castle,
can lift the curse. Meanwhile, the nation plunges itself into a
fiery war over a missing prince; Howl must resist the self-
EX IMAGIBUS
destructive call the King of the land sends out to the wizards
and magicians to join the pointless fight. Suffice it to say that
Howl and Sofi grow quite fond of each other, and the story
moves towards the reversal of more than just Sofi’s curse.
Some cautions: Disney distributed Howl’s in the U.S., and
dubbed English and American voices into the mouths of the
characters. One suspects that they also tampered with the
dialogue in places, but the cardboard pacifism that rears its
head in spots may well be original. Further, the movie suffers
from its Eastern origins as far as its storytelling goes, and its
comfort with demons and sorcery should arch the eyebrow—
this, after all, isn’t the Wiccan paganism you can buy at Hot
Topic, but the largely unevangelized (but unagressive) Zen
variety. Nevertheless, Miyazaki’s imagination is well worth the
trip, and his ease at creating images at once startling and
humorous, unsettling and delightful, ought to be appreciated
by good Trinitarian imaginations.
On Video:
Bride and Prejudice: A Bollywood Musical
directed by Gurinder Chadha
reviewed by Nathan Wilson
We’ve got Hollywood (and aren’t we proud) and India’s got
Bollywood. This time Bollywood got its teeth into Jane
Austen. It seems natural enough. When I think of Jane
Austen, pretty soon after I find myself thinking about Indian
villages, large dance numbers on sound stages and the tension
that must exist between Indians that stay in their country, the
wealthy Indians of Britain, and those that choose to pull stakes
and move on to a better land (California) where they can fully
embrace American suburbia.
Of course I knew Jane Austen’s version, but despite that
advantage, I never quite knew what was going to happen in
this one. I laughed an enjoyable but nervous laughter as I
discovered Darcy’s character banging away on native drums,
when the full black choir appeared singing behind Eliza and
Darcy while they walked on the beach (two lifeguards joined
in), and at Mr. Kholi’s Americanisms. All in all, I thoroughly
enjoyed myself. Jane Austen was of course murdered
thoroughly, as was common sense, but people in bright
clothing sang and danced in ways socially embarrassing to
most people on this continent.
In this film Bollywood offers us a large container of pump
cheese nachos and a fried elephant ear on the side. Are you
willing to go to the county fair? I was surprised that I was and
just as surprised that I enjoyed the spectacle. It only took a
couple hours and my comfort zone was a little stretchier
afterward.
Dear Frankie
directed by Shona Auerbach
reviewed by Nathan Wilson
Well-intentioned deception can be a real kick in the head.
Frankie, a young deaf boy, and his mother are always on the
move. But dad is still very much in the picture. At least Frankie
thinks he is. He faithfully writes letters to his father, allegedly a
sailor, who writes him back from ports all around the globe. But
that’s not what’s actually going on. Frankie’s mom collects all of
his letters and then writes her son back, posing as a loving father
and sending him stamps. Frankie even keeps a world map with
little flags marking all of his father’s travels.
Of course deception gets everyone in trouble eventually. A
pillish boy at school notifies Frankie that his father’s boat is
scheduled for arrival in Frankie’s very own coastal town. This
boy then bets Frankie that his father won’t come to see him, and
of course Frankie mentions his bet in a letter to his dad.
Mum panics (she didn’t even know that the ship existed)
and all the deception comes to a head in our little pathos-soaked
story.
The Scottish accents make everything more enjoyable and
(for an American) more believably acted. Mum sets out to find
a man to play the role of her son’s father for a day and the owner
of the local Chip Shop helps her out. A man is found, hired, and
the final deception begins.
The story spends most of its time building up the sob side
of things, the horribly sad situation of the little boy Frankie,
deaf, fatherless, and lied to by his mother. A great many
predictable things happen in the brief contact that Frankie has
with his pretend father, but nothing that really pulls us out of all
the deception, that really redeems. The film’s problems seem to
descend further and further past resolvable, and then, at the
end, only a half-hearted attempt is made to pull out of the
mess. The answers to the problem are given, but they aren’t
emotionally convincing or satisfying. Watch it, if you do, for
accents that seem more fun than your own.
Finding Neverland
directed by Marc Foster
reviewed by Nathan Wilson
Out for a good while now, this is the vaguely true story of J. M.
Barrie’s inspiration to write Peter Pan. I avoided the film initially
because of what appeared to be an emphasis on Barrie’s
infidelity. However, I think Barrie’s folly was portrayed
tastefully, and his genius beautifully. The imagination gospel
rings hollow in the face of true sorrow, but the film, on the
whole, is surprisingly effective.
“Things to be done” Volume 17/3
27
CAVE OF ADULLAM
Mutterings on Regnant Follies
Cletis T. Hambit
But if they both sink, that would turn the water purple, thereby
offending me.
National Sunday Law
Recently got a book in the mail (along with every other
resident of our town, I think) entitled National Sunday Law, but
it appears to have been written by a Seventh Day Adventist
with a lurid view of Sunday. Not sure what the thesis is,
exactly, but it appears to run along the same lines as John
Fogerty’s Bad Moon Rising. Anyhow, the pope enters into it,
thusly: on the pope’s hat, we find the words Vicarius Filii Dei,
which means Vicar of the Son of God. Now if you go through
this phrase and pull out all the Roman numerals (v, i, c, i, u
which is a v, another i, l, i, i, d, and i), and then add them all
up, you find that the number is 666.
But if you hold it upside down, the only numerals that count anymore
are the i’s and the l, and that only adds up to 56. There is always a hitch
somewhere.
Unleashing Primal Forces
This last May, Trinity Church (Wall Street) decided to have
a special “Clown Eucharist.” The clown is a symbol,
dontchasee, of the “divine foolishness,” and clowns “represent
the underdog, the lowly, the remant people.”
No sense getting worked up about things like this. We just think of it
as unleashing the inner Anglican.
Fries With That?
A theological genius associated with the Metropolitan Church
of the Quad Cities (where’s that? lots of places have Quad
Cities) came up with a great idea for a church service. The
entire service takes 5 minutes, and nope, you don’t even have
to get out of the car. It’s a drive-through.
But when the people in the back of the line start honking, it gets folks
out of fellowship.
And Why Not?
National Review reports that we are coming up on the 200th
anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar. At this epic battle the
British hero Nelson carried the day with twenty-seven ships,
against a combined French and Spanish fleet of thirty-three
ships. This October, in honor of said anniversary, the British
are holding a reenactment in the Channel off Portsmouth.
However, in this reenactment, for fear of offending against
certain PC sensitivities, the fleets will be identified merely as
Red and Blue. A spokesman for the Royal Navy said, “This
should not be a French-bashing opportunity.”
28
“Things to be believed” Volume 17/3
Mainstreaming Like Crazy
A group of progressive churches in the Raleigh area have
banded together to take a stand against the Religious Right.
The coalition of churches has so far identified three common
issues that hold them together—inclusion of gays and
lesbians, environmentalism, and the need for us to be more
responsible global citizens. The “Rev. on His Good Days”
Doug Long said, “We feel the primary understanding of
Christianity in mainstream America is that of the evangelical
right.”
Now here’s a lid worthy of such a kettle. A representative of one of the
mainstream denominations had to band together with representatives from
other mainstream denominations, in order to fight the perceptions of
mainstream Americans that Christianity is what the “out of the mainstream” evangelical right says it is. A couple of turns of the river back it
appears that the mainstream denominations found their “stream that used to
be main” is now just standing water in a bayou somewhere.
Jumpstarting Promise Keepers
From its heyday in the nineties, Promise Keepers has
undergone a significant decline in attendance. It is a lot harder
to fill a stadium today than it used to be. But continuing the
long evangelical tradition of getting revivals penciled in
beforehand, Promise Keepers has scheduled twenty revivals
this coming year.
The Holy Spirit must have changed booking agents.
A New Skinist Movement
Actually, they call it the kinist movement. Harry Seabrook (at
a place called littlegeneva.com) thinks that he is not a white
supremacist because he believes heaven will not be populated
exclusively by whites. Their web site is characterized by a row
of pictures of honorable dead men who are in no position to
demand that their images not be used to glorify the running
patter of race-baiting.
So here is a little question for the skinists. Are blacks in heaven
culturally superior to whites in hell?
FOOTNOTES
In Order of Appearance
Spanish Leaves
Thema:
It’s their concert,
the fall performance,
the one they’ve practiced
all year.
1. For a number of the historical details, I am indebted to Giles
Oakley, The Devil’s Music (New York, Da Capo Press, 1997).
Ex Libris:
1. H. L. Mencken, Happy Days (Johns Hopkins Press, 1996), pg.
161.
2. H. L. Mencken, Newspapger Days (Johns Hopkins Press, 1996),
pg. 8.
3. H. L. Mencken, Happy Days (Johns Hopkins Press, 1996), pg. xi.
4. Ibid. pg. 27.
High on the stage
in the spotlight of the sun
they wait
until the instruments of wood and wind
orchestrate the prelude.
Stauron:
1. The Scofield Study Bible remarks on Ezekiel 43:19: “Doubtless
these offerings will be memorial, looking back to the cross, as
the offerings under the old covenant were anticipatory, looking
forward to the cross. In neither case have animal sacrifices
power to put away sin.”
They do the Zambra, dipping, turning,
each on a long, slender leg of stem,
then glide from their place
in scallop-edged gownsheavy wine-red,
ginger-pinch orange,
butter-fluted brownand it’s all twirl
twist
spin
then the rustle
of the cloth settling about them
as they conclude their piece.
Their fifteen seconds of glory—
freedom, admiration, appeal—
all they slept
and ate and drank
stare down at them,
lying there on their backs on the outspread
skirts of fading gold.
Out of their reach
is the tumbling sun,
the wrinkled clouds bantering,
and nights black and sweet as plums
fold about them like dark grave clothes.
Roberta Dahlin
A Little Help For Our Friends:
First Orthodox Presbyterian Church in San Francisco (Charles
McIlhenny, pastor) is currently looking for a full time pastor for a
mission work they began several years ago. If you itch for the
frontlines contact Deacon David Gregg, Providence Orthodox
Presbyterian Chapel. Phone: (925)960-1154.
“Things to be done” Volume 17/3
29
TOHU
Alive Day
Jared Miller
I WOKE UP TO A ROOM FULL OF HAZE. Blinking to clear it, I
looked at the clock out of habit: 1:45 A.M. Then I smelled it.
They say that smell is the sense closest to memory. You grow
up thinking of the sharp, good smell of burning wood, and it
reminds you of fall bonfires, camping, the fireplace in winter,
and songs against the darkness. This was different. It was the
gagging stench of burning paint. Burning carpet. Burning
insulation. Burning plastic as the flames licked and peeled the
coverings off copper wire, dropping it shrunk and shriveled
from the blackened skeleton. For months afterward, when I
opened one of my books, or took an old sweater out of a
drawer, I would get a hint of that smell, and it would turn my
stomach.
I didn’t expect the first emotion to be something as petty
as annoyance. The semester was almost over, and I had two
final papers due. I was getting married in less than a month.
My fiancée and I had just spent Thanksgiving break cleaning
up the place for a waiver of the security deposit. We had
painted every room; the kitchen cupboards had gone from
institutional white to a Mediterranean red, and the bathroom
had taken on a shade of spring green. We had scrubbed,
mopped, dusted, and sweated to a medley of Beatles albums,
and with our own hands we had transformed a trashed
vacancy into our own clean, well-lighted place. Now it was all
going to count for nothing. It was that quick, that easy.
I stumbled into the living room where the vintage wall
furnace was still blowing. Something glowed orange behind
the grate. On the other side of the wall, in the kitchen, flames
sprouted from a small hole near the floor. I must have been
expecting something different, something from a movie, the
liquid billowing of flame in slow motion. These flames were
quick, jumping, crackling, in real time, those same bonfire
flames that remind you of toasting marshmallows and singing
and the sweet, nutty smell that lingers in your hair and clothes.
They were out of place, an absurdity, like a spinning child at a
funeral.
Choking, I grabbed a glass off the counter and began
throwing water a pint at a time on the wall, down the hole,
into the heater grate. The fire was bigger than I thought; the
wall was saturated with it, firelogged, burning from the inside
out. I turned and opened the utility closet where the hot water
heater was. The wall and part of the floor were decked in fire:
small, sharply-cut flames fluttering from shreds of old
wallpaper. I saw them in my mind, quite clearly for an instant,
immersing the gas pipes, turning them red hot and then
white.
I dialed 911, almost apologizing for the melodrama of
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“Things to be believed” Volume 17/3
the situation, and banged out the door. I stopped suddenly,
unaccountably, and turned to go back in. The door had
locked. A sign, apparently. I turned again and stumbled down
the stairs. You always hear about those who go back, whether
for a book, a photograph, or some useless souvenir. It’s
sentiment and not greed that kills them. It’s a defense against
forgetting. They’ve spent a lifetime piecing together a scaffold
for the self, a cast to keep the molten stuff of their everyday
experience from running down the path of least resistance and
dissipating into some shapeless non-identity. If you cannot
step into the same river twice, you can at least dam it and
swim in the reservoir. We moderns are all recovering
amnesiacs. Blame writing, like Plato. Blame the camera and
the camcorder. It’s too easy to get yourself embedded in
things and accept a simulacrum of your past. Then to keep
your sanity you’ve got to shore it up against the flame, the
worm, the dark. And you’ll go back to save it. Because when
your muscles have atrophied, and the scaffolding folds, you
know you’ll fall with it.
It took some time to rouse the other tenants. I actually
had to overcome a reluctance to disturb them. The hippie
couple downstairs was still awake—at least their lights were
on. They didn’t go back, not even for their shelf of LPs or the
Hendrix banner on their living room wall. The old man in the
basement kept shooting me black looks, but he didn’t go back
either. Conversation was difficult, standing there on the
sidewalk under the streetlights, in a cold, starry December
morning. There had been a frost and the grass was stiff. I
looked down at my feet. They were bare. I was wearing
khakis and a T-shirt. My pockets were empty. I’d forgotten
my glasses. For all I knew, most of the artifacts of my past had
just been destroyed. I began to suppress a nagging wish that
the door hadn’t locked.
When Anne Bradstreet saw all her “pleasant things in
ashes,” she remembered the good times she had spent
surrounded by them in the company of family and friends.
The deep attachment to physical comforts shines through
every line of her great poem. When she finally lets them go,
trying to commit to purely heavenly treasures, she can’t be
entirely sincere. She knows that she’s losing something when
she professes disillusionment with God’s good creation,
denying attachment in order to mitigate suffering. The result
rings a little hollow, but the hollowness only adds a sad
resonance. “Adieu, Adeiu; All’s vanity”; “The world no
longer let me Love”—the language is biblical, certainly, but
the warnings of Solomon and Paul do not condemn the things
Bradstreet mourns: the guest-loud table, bursting stores of
food and wine, pleasant tales retold, the bridegroom’s voice.
Their loss should sharpen the appetite, not dull it. She should
TOHU
have quoted Job. Things are destroyed to make room for
more and better ones. Like the ancient sacrifice, they are
burned so that they may ascend, transformed, a pleasing
aroma and not the stench of death.
When the fire trucks arrived, it was almost a disappointment. The fire hadn’t grown much; I could see it glowing
weakly through a window. This couldn’t be all there is. I had
to lose everything now. Like a kid playing at orphans. It’s
strange and catching, that exhiliration of uprooting, of going
bankrupt and following some desert prophet. I was silently
cheering the fire on now, willing it to grow and consume
everything, the house, the trees, the block, the whole town,
while we danced in the streets. I’ll bet it shone in my eyes. Let
it all burn, and we can start from scratch. Everything must be
made new, nothing holding us back. To plant instead of
water. To break everyone’s casts, take them out of traction,
and see if they can hold up their heads again. I’d like to think
this feeling is universal. Maybe everyone’s a secret arsonist.
The gray morning drained any remaining drama from
the scene. The house still stood; it hadn’t had the aesthetic
sense to collapse in a tornado of sparks. Our living room had
taken the brunt. Many of my things had survived, but I found
myself wishing they hadn’t. What wasn’t stained or waterlogged carried in it that invisible, sickening smoke.
Later that day we talked with the fire chief. I handed in a
written statement and he chastened me, quite rightly, about
safety and luck. When we had first seen the apartment a week
before, I had noticed a broken smoke detector above the front
door, its cover and viscera dangling from red and green wires
like some infernal Christmas wreath. The others had no
batteries; possibly the cigarette burns on the carpet had
something to do with it. You need alarms because fires try to
drowse you down with carbon monoxide. Most people just
never wake up, asphyxiated and oblivious in their beds while
the flames cover them like falling leaves, peeling them to black
wire bones. But a few wake up. Some of them go back, if a
lock lets them, and some of them are lulled to bed again,
dizzied to the floor, as their scaffolding tumbles down around
them.
When a child burned, Dylan Thomas refused to mourn
her, to “murder / the mankind of her going with a grave truth
/ . . . with any further / elegy of innocence and youth.”
Words would blaspheme the “majesty” of her death. The
living cannot comprehend the dead until they themselves die,
when comprehension is gone and only darkness and silence
are left. Death is too momentous, or too petty, for wordshrines; it doesn’t fit. The simple, real thing confronts the
poet, stripped to its black bones. It’s enough to make us all
stammer, trying to bury it in words. We can’t, but we have to
anyway. Not works, but grace. But doubting Thomas settles
for the agnostic’s knowledge: “After the first death there is no
other.” No death, but no life either. What then—sleep?
My wife and I celebrate Alive Day every December third.
It’s a day to burn your bare skin in the snow, stare out the
window for an hour, climb the tree in the front yard you’ve
never touched, and throw away all your old papers and
everything you haven’t used since last year. It’s a day for
remembering. The only fixed ritual is that I drink wine from a
certain goblet—one of a pair that was on the kitchen table and
somehow survived while the other was smashed by part of a
falling rafter. It’s all very profound, fitting, and symbolic. But
maybe it’s a way of forgetting, really, a way to hush it up. Do
we talk in code, like children, because we really don’t have
anything to say? Do we act out fictions to avoid living? Do we
write to avoid remembering? Maybe we grow up cheated by
scripted, ritual deaths, never expecting the awkward void of
the raw, real thing. The dramatic climax is over in a second,
and no one noticed. Maybe we think too highly of ourselves,
think the world should stop and watch as we die, that time
should slow and bend backwards, and perspectives pan and
multiply, so that everyone, including ourselves, may savor the
spectacle of our going.
The real thing is too unnatural, too simple. The real
experience never gives you anything. I felt no majesty or
tragedy of death; my stomach only turned at its ease, ignominy, and pettiness. You never expect to die in this room, in
these clothes, with your dirty laundry piled in the corner. Not
on this day, with these appointments, with bits of that lunch
still in your teeth. You never think of it as leaving a mess that
others have to clean up. We can’t wrap our heads around it;
we turn and gag. We call in symbol and ritual to tame it. You
can tell me that they aren’t the true reality, but I know they’re
the better one. The secret things belong to God—He’s the
only one who can take them on, smiling deviously at some injoke with the universe, plunging His hands into the mess, outrawing the raw. We can only stand by and recite our rhymes,
shouting over the din. Ashes, ashes, we all fall down. It’s really the
only thing for mortals to do. Otherwise there’s nothing, no
mankind in your going. You might as well start the fire
yourself and go to bed.
It’s difficult to remember even yearly how to live like
Damocles, how to love and hate our pleasant things, how to
say the truth without saying a grave truth. It’s hard to
remember to wake up, resisting the dizzying drowse. It’s hard
to reenact the raw real things you’ve seen, self-conscious of the
fakery but still afraid. Above all, maybe, it’s hard to face those
quick, cheerful flames, throw back your head, and spin along
with them.
“Things to be done” Volume 17/3
31
MEANDER
Jesus and the Minimum Wage
Douglas Wilson
IF ANYONE WANTS to read something by N. T. Wright that
would indicate why I find him such an edifying writer, I would
recommend Bringing the Church to the World, put out by Wipf
and Stock. I am edified by him as much as I am because few
contemporary writers make the case against false and pietistic
dualism as effectively as Wright does, and this book provides
numerous examples of this. For Wright, the Lordship of
Christ is no airy-fairy thing, but translates into every aspect of
life, and Wright powerfully shows how this assumption is a
characteristic feature of the apostolic mindset. Further,
Wright’s core orthodoxy in this book is plain: on the Deity of
Christ, the Trinity, the historicity of the resurrection, and
what God was actually up to in the Incarnation, Wright
shines. It would be hard to describe how great a blessing this
book was.
But being blessed by a writer is not the same thing as
slavishly following him. As I wrote in our issue of Credenda on
the New Perspective, I find that Wright is the kind of writer
who can edify me even in the midst of appalling me. That
happens in this book. For example, Wright does outstanding
work in showing how the New Testament does not permit us
to divide “preaching the gospel” from “social action.” Amen,
and amen again. The problem is that some of his suggested
solutions for applying the gospel of Christ to pressing social
issues (e.g., simply forgiving Third World debt) demonstrate
exactly the kind of naivete that makes people want to banish
clerics from all public policy discussions. He wants to kill
mosquitoes without draining the swamp, which would simply
be exasperating if a president or prime minister had a cabinetlevel official wanting to do that. But what if the cabinet-level
official was maintaining that this was what Jesus wanted? Bad
policy backed up with the trump card of Christ’s authority
over all things in heaven and earth is calculated to create a
backlash against that kind of thinking. If anything is capable of
provoking political and religious leaders back into a rigorously
defended dualism, it is this.
Don’t get me wrong. The lordship of Christ does extend
into everything. Wright is exactly right about this. And he is
exactly right that we need to pull up our socks and do the
tough work of making these applications. My problem is that
before learning to apply the “logic of the gospel” to the
current events around us, we need to learn how to detach
ourselves (as much as possible) from the winds of erroneous
doctrine in our own age. It is perilously easy for all of us to
simply equate “a biblical worldview” with whatever it was we
were all thinking already. Turns out that Jesus supports the
war in Iraq when Jesus is from Oklahoma but is deeply
32
“Things to be believed” Volume 17/3
troubled by it in Connecticut. Of course, it is easier to see this
pattern of “my appeal to the divine trumps yours” in other
people, and I do see a number of ways that Wright appears to
be affected by the soft socialism of his UK surroundings. No
doubt he could return the favor and identify ways in which my
American conservatism has affected my exegesis. Exactly so,
which is why we all need to work through multiple generations of careful exegetical and theological study and application before taking this show on the road.
The difficulty is this: before we get around to telling the
world what Jesus thinks of the minimum wage laws, we have
to get past the sound bytes of this particular secular party or
that one. Does Jesus want “everyone to have a decent wage”?
Or maybe Jesus is opposed to this practice of pricing the
marginally employable out of a job. At the same time,
although we don’t want our “applications of the gospel” to
become something that special interests can manipulate (and
they will cluster round, about ten minutes after the word about
what we are trying to do gets out), we still have to “come
down” somehow, somewhere. Continuing with the minimum
wage illustration, there are only a certain number of logical
possibilities. Jesus can either want us to abolish it, raise it,
lower it, or keep it the same. And whichever one we do, after
the requisite Bible study, we are going to please at least one
secular group and anger others. This will be unavoidable, but
shouldn’t we take care not to anger the one secular group that
(by common grace) understood the matter?
And of course, the ecclesiastical world being the kind of
place it is, these applications will simply give Christians
additional fodder for our shameful divisions. Wright is
correct that simply side-stepping these difficulties by
resorting to dualism is a form of faithlessness. But to rush in
and get it all wrong in the name of Christ would be disastrous.
Many of Wright’s applications (or the drift of them that
could be identified from this book) seem to rest on the back of
certain assumptions, assumptions that fall into the category of
“what everybody knows.” But we must guard against the error
of simply identifying what “everybody knows” with what
“everybody in my limited and in-grown circle knows.”
Everybody knows the sun rises in the east. Everybody in
Wright’s circle of friends appears to know what causes acid
rain. Wright does a good job identifying the idolatrous
assumptions that go into the suggested solutions that come
from the pantheistic environmentalists. But he does a fairly
poor job of seeing how idolatrous assumptions can generate
the data that he appears to simply take as “common knowledge.”
And that is how I would characterize this book—great
wisdom in a number of crucial areas. And unfortunately, there
is also a good bit of folly that will undo the value of the book.
POOH’S THINK
The Women of Israel, V
Michael Metzler
THE HOT dry air blew up smoky dust clouds all around the
woman and her child. The woman walked slowly with her
crying child in her arms. A cloth vainly draped over the child’s
face to shield off the sand and sun. Without any more water,
there was nothing else to do for the child. The woman’s hope
to make it back to her homeland in Egypt waned more with
every fatigued step. Bitterness and sorrow welled up inside
her, interrupted with brief relieving moments of numbness to
any feeling at all. The remembrance of her first flight from
her mistress throbbed in her head; she could have gotten back
to Egypt then. She could have done it; her son was only a
small child then. But the angel of her master’s God stopped
her and made her go back to submit to the mistreatment of
her master’s wife. She was promised a wild and free nation
from the boy. Instead, she was still a female slave, despised
and sent off by her master; and her son was now as good as
dead.
Finally, she stopped, laid her child under a bush to die,
walked a hundred yards away, fell to the ground and started
weeping. “Do not let me see the boy die,” she wailed. In the
midst of the barren desert, the crying of the woman and the
boy went out to diffuse with the hot wind and sand.
But there was a God who heard the crying of the child; it
was the God who sees, the God who saw the woman during
her first flight from her mistress. This was a God who took
note and saw the woman in her distress, and now He had
heard the crying of her dying child. And so the angel called
out from heaven with the same promise: “I will make a great
nation of him.” And God opened her eyes so that she could
see the well of water by her.
This second Hagar story is told just before the berith
encounter between Abraham and Abimelech, just as the first
Graffiti
It's like that unexplainable desire
to draw your finger through the frosting
on your mother's chocolate cake,
this reasoning that left a chapstick 'E'
emblazoned on the yellow bedroom wall.
It stayed with you. Your brother joined the club,
etching his name with gravel on the car,
or the window blue with frost,
the skin-like smooth of beech tree bark,
or sand left clean and firm when the tide is out,
a space unscarred, reserved.
Emma Watson
story of Hagar is told right in between the berith encounters
between Abraham and the Lord (chapters 15 and17). The
women of Israel did not cut covenant and so neither did the
Lord with them. The blood of berith did not concern them as
did the blood from their womb. We see this again with Leah:
“Now the Lord saw that Leah was unloved, and He opened
her womb” and she said, “‘Because the Lord has seen [lit. looked
upon] my affliction; surely now my husband will love me”
(29:31). Likewise with Rachel: “Then God remembered
Rachel, and God gave heed to her and opened her womb”
(30:22), and she said, “God has taken away my reproach.”
This gives us necessary context for understanding the
Lord’s relationship with Sarah. After persevering with her
laughter (18:12–15), “The Lord took note of Sarah as He had
said, and the Lord did for Sarah as He had promised” (Gen.
21:1). New laughter was given to her (21:6).
The next time we see the Lord dealing with a woman, she
is also an afflicted servant girl, out in the wilderness. “So God
heard their groaning and God remembered His covenant with
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And God saw the sons of Israel,
and God took notice of them” (Ex. 2:23–24). The Lord takes
note of the abandoned slave girl Israel; He sees her in her
distress and cannot refuse His intimate care, tutelage, and reestablishment. Before we come to the terrifying sign of the
Treaty berith, the worship at Mount Horeb, the berith cut with
Abraham and the berith given to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are
realized only after the Lord sees His abandoned slave girl, and
hears the crying of His despised people from the midst of the
desert.
And in the end, this intimate love overwhelms a poetic
use of manly berith. When Zacharias, as a new Abraham,
asked, “How shall I know this for certain?” the Lord gave no
berith assurance but rather rebuked his unbelief with dumbness.
But his wife became pregnant and she knew that the Lord was
looking with favor upon her, to take away her disgrace (Matt. 1:25).
And Mary, the female slave of the Lord, likewise found favor
with God. The Lord blessed the fruit of her womb (42).
Mary sang to the Lord, “He has had regard for the humble
state of His female slave … for the Mighty One has done great
things for me” (48–49). And Elizabeth gave birth to a son,
for the “Lord had displayed His great mercy toward her”
(58). When the Messiah finally comes to us, He comes from
the blood of the womb; He comes from the slave girl in
distress. The man looking for berith confirmation is struck
dumb. The women crying out in the desert are visited with
God in their womb. After Zacharias regained his voice, he
sang, “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for He has visited
us and accomplished redemption for his people … to show
mercy toward our fathers, and to remember His holy covenant,
the oath which He swore to Abraham” (72–73).
“Things to be done” Volume 17/3
33
COUNTERPOINT
Taj Mahal, bluesman
Interviewed by Ben Merkle
C/A: This is kind of an open-ended question. What do
you think beauty is?
TM: What do I think beauty is? Okay. It’s a sunrise. You
know, a beautiful woman walking down the street. Life
coming into the world. Catchin’ a wonderful breeze in the
morning when you wake up and you’re standing in the trees or
out on the water. I like to fish a lot, so I get up so that I can
really catch the world coming up early in the morning. Flying
over a tropical rain forest. On and on and on and on and on. A
painting. Music. Mostly music though. Everytime I see
something like that, what happens to me personally, is that I
hear music. Whatever it is. If something’s really beautiful,
then all of the sudden the music starts coming.
C/A: Do you think you know why its music?
TM: Because I think it’s the language of the people of
planet Earth.
C/A: Do you think there is a difference, or what is the
difference between pop and folk?
TM: Well, folk is the music that the grassroots
people— you know—take their instruments and make.
They’re not looking for anything more than entertaining
themselves or one another, or creative dancing. Pop music is
usually crafted by people who are directly in there to connect
with your youth, or your adulthood—to get the money out of
you. It really doesn’t have any value past once it’s been played.
Folk music will be around forever; as long as there are people.
C/A: Given what you just said, when you look at what
this country is listening to today, what does that tell you about
the state of America?
TM: Hmmm. It tells you that the bean-counters and the
lawyers are running the record companies.
C/A: Great. And then. . .
TM: And, that we as a people, in a country where we
pride ourselves on being independent in what we think, you
know, have gotten kind of candy-assed.
C/A: Just a little bit. What do we have to do to bring
back real music with soul?
TM: Well, think about it this way. The music will not
come to you. When the music comes to you that easy, always
be suspect. You know, it may not be in every case, but always
be suspect. Usually, if its good music you’re gonna have to go
somewhere to get to it.
C/A: You distinguish between pop and folk. Do you
think there’s a distinction between folk and then what
somebody might consider classical or high, artsy music?
Symphony, opera?
TM: Well, you could have symphonies based on folk
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“Things to be believed” Volume 17/3
melodies. Like, I’m trying to think, what’s this guy . . . a
classical musician, composer, spent a lot of time picking the
folk melodies up and bringing them into a classical, you know
a structured musical context?
C/A: Ralph Vaughn Williams?
TM: Yeah, but older than that. I’m feeling like Hungary,
Romania, in and around that area. You see a lot of the old
European melodies from the peasantry put in his music. And
there was a time when a lot of musicians did that. I think that
has to happen again. But the difference between them is that
with the folk music, there is a living tradition. So it’s alive, it’s
moving down the road. With the classical tradition, because
it’s not passed by word of mouth, but it’s written on a piece of
paper, you don’t know what the original person sounded like
when they played that piece of music. Whereas with the folk
music, it’s a possibility that some of whatever the original song
was, is in the next person that carries it on. It’s not carried on
by paper, it’s carried on by experience from one to another.
We have kind of fallen out of that cycle. But at the same time,
I was very happy to find out that there are a lot of people out
there who are using the internet to find the music that they
want. And not only do they find the music that they want, they
don’t want to be told what to listen to. And I love that about
them, because that’s where I was at. You weren’t going to tell
me what to listen to. You know, and that’s it. I’ve just watched
so many different things where people have said, “Oh, this is
the place to see it from Phyllis!” You know. Excuse me. I have
my eyes, and this is what I’m liking. So, I think that particularly I’m not gonna try to figure out what generation they’re
gonna try to call. You know, because I think all that’s a bunch
of horse-puckey too. I’m out here playing. I’ve been out here
forty years playing music, and I’ve seen every kind of body
come by me and listen to the music. And come back around,
and their kids come around too. I mean, you should have been
here a little while ago. There was a kid, he must been nine or
ten, maybe eleven or twelve years old. He played harmonica;
whipped the harmonica out, played a little bit, then asked to
play with me. And I took my guitar out, and the kid was
blowin’ harp right here. The youngster, he was really good,
you know. He was really sharp; he was so excited. That’s nice
to see. You know, its nice to go out in this country and play
and see people that really like the music. It’s really exciting.
C/A: Do you see how the book of Psalms relates to the
blues at all?
TM: Right at the moment I wouldn’t … if you spoke
more about gospel music, yes. But . . . the blues is in there in
that way, because it has a lot of things to say like that. But I’ll
think about that, and the next time you see me, you can ask,
you can ring my chime again and see if I got the answer yet.