Grasping for Control

Thus [Luke] Bretherton insists that Christians, living in the time between the times, “do not have to establish regimes to control the time so as to determine the outcome of history. Rather, they can live without control because the resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ already inaugurated the fulfillment of history, even as its consummation awaits Christ’s return.… Christians are to cultivate forms of life in this age that bear witness to these eschatological possibilities even as they stand in solidarity with those still suffering.” In doing so, the church looks to Jesus as a model of servant power: “To modern eyes, Jesus’s ministry can look like a refusal of power. But it is better seen as a refusal of the spectacular but vacuous power that Satan offers [at the temptation in the wilderness]. It is also a refusal to exercise the unilateral, coercive power of institutionalized means of command and control (power over). But in refusing power over, Jesus affirms relational power (power with).”— Naming Neoliberalism: Exposing the Spirit of Our Age, 130, citing Bretherton, Christ and the Common Life, 136 and 132

New book coming out on Greek Prepositions

William Ross has the great news. The book from his and Steve Runge's Tyndale Workshop on Greek prepositions is going to be out in November:

Postclassical Greek Prepositions and Conceptual Metaphor: Cognitive Semantic Analysis and Biblical Interpretation.
Edited by: William A. Ross and Steven E. Runge
Volume 12 in the series Fontes et Subsidia ad Bibliam pertinentes

Heres the description:

Traditional semantic description of Ancient Greek prepositions has struggled to synthesize the varied and seemingly arbitrary uses into something other than a disparate, sometimes overlapping list of senses. The Cognitive Linguistic approach of prototype theory holds that the meanings of a preposition are better explained as a semantic network of related senses that radially extend from a primary, spatial sense. These radial extensions arise from contextual factors that affect the metaphorical representation of the spatial scene that is profiled. Building upon the Cognitive Linguistic descriptions of Bortone (2009) and Luraghi (2009), linguists, biblical scholars, and Greek lexicographers apply these developments to offer more in-depth descriptions of select postclassical Greek prepositions and consider the exegetical and lexicographical implications of these findings. This volume will be of interest to those studying or researching the Greek of the New Testament seeking more linguistically-informed description of prepositional semantics, particularly with a focus on the exegetical implications of choice among seemingly similar prepositions in Greek and the challenges of potentially mismatched translation into English.

Uses latest Cognitive Linguistic theory for lexical semantic analysis

Builds upon well-accepted but still underdeveloped language scholarship in Classical Greek Gives attention to practical implications for textual interpretation of the Bible

I admit to being highly biased (I copyedited the volume), but this is a great book! I look forward to getting my copy (hopefully I won't find any errors in it!).

The "sacrifice" of war

Accordingly, we commonly say that in war, we “sacrifice” our sons and daughters. Taken at all seriously, this amounts to child sacrifice—a practice common to some ancient religions but considered outmoded in modern civilization. Discomforting as talk of child sacrifice may be, we do not usually admit another religious aspect of our wars. For no nation sets out to lose a war, to simply sacrifice its children. Wars are fought to be won. The point is not to die but to kill. To that end, our soldiers are commissioned with priestly power: the power to purify the world of our enemies. In short, soldiers are preeminently not to be sacrificed but, like priests, to enact or commit sacrifice—the sacrifice of the enemy other. We thrust upon our soldiers the godlike power to kill, to decide who lives and who dies.— Naming Neoliberalism: Exposing the Spirit of Our Age, 123–24

<idle musing>
And then we wonder why they come home with PTSD…
</idle musing>

The glory of war?

As the early twentieth-century cultural critic Randolph Bourne memorably remarked, “War is the health of the State.” Nothing unites the atomized citizens of liberal and neoliberal states like war. Soldiers give themselves for a higher cause, while citizens back home may forgo some degree of comfort on behalf of the “war effort.” The usually disconnected, competing, and even hostile individuals coalesce against a common enemy.— Naming Neoliberalism: Exposing the Spirit of Our Age, 123

<idle musing>
And we're seeing that right now, aren't we? But how long will it last? It's not built on a solid foundation, so it will slide away.
</idle musing>

Christian nationalism has a history

Nationalism has been entangled with religion—or has served more or less directly as a religion—from its beginnings. Early nationalisms were syncretized with the Bible. In 1719, Isaac Watts translated the Psalms, replacing the word Israel repeatedly with Great Britain. Disillusioned English settlers in America aimed at creating the “true Israel of God” and considered themselves “God’s peculiar people” led into the wilderness to expand and reform “England, God’s Israel.” The earliest known use of the English term nationalism was in the mid-nineteenth century, referring to the divine election of a nation (other than ancient Israel).

In our time, a powerful distillation of this nationalism is found in Peter Marshall and David Manuel’s The Light and the Glory, first published in 1977 and most recently in a revised and expanded edition in 2009. More than a million copies of the book have been sold, and it has been widely used in private Christian schools and Christian home schools.— Naming Neoliberalism: Exposing the Spirit of Our Age, 117

<idle musing>
I tried to read The Light and the Glory back in 1977. I couldn't get past the secodn chapter, it was so flawed. I pointed out the errors to the person that loaned the book to me, but they seemed uninterested in the errors, claiming that the "truth" of the book was greater than the facts. Huh? How can that be?

That was my first exposure to "Christian" nationalism. And I've been running from it ever since!
</idle musing>

Your vision is too small

New creation has arrived [Galatians], though it is not yet fully manifested. In it, the capacious economy of God has been revealed. Beside it, the neo-liberal economy is puny and constricted. The market as a gigantic information processor cannot and does not contain or process care for the weak and the “loser”—in a word, mercy—or care for creation or nature as a good in itself. It does not embrace community, covenant love, grace, or miracle. In the economy of God, all of these realities live. And they can thrive.— Naming Neoliberalism: Exposing the Spirit of Our Age, 113–14

The lust of the eyes

In light of the apocalypse, the church can at least be honest about the shortcomings of neoliberal capitalism. As Hart writes, “It eventuates in a culture of consumerism, because it must cultivate a social habit of consumption extravagantly in excess of mere natural need or even (arguably) natural want. It is not enough to satisfy natural desires; a capitalist culture must ceaselessly seek to fabricate new desires, through appeals to what 1 John calls ‘the lust of the eyes.”’ Furthermore, “A capitalist society not only tolerates, but positively requires, the existence of a pauper class, not only as a reserve of labor value, but also because capitalism relies on a stable credit economy, and a credit economy requires a certain perennial supply of perennial debtors. . . . The perpetual insolvency of the working poor and lower middle class is an inexhaustible font of profits for the institutions upon which the investment class depends.”— Naming Neoliberalism: Exposing the Spirit of Our Age, 111

<idle musing>
I recall hearing the story of a US company opening a factory in Sub-Saharan Africa. At the end of the first month, the workers received their check and didn't come back to work. When asked why not, they replied they had earned more than enough for the rest of the year. At a loss, the company brainstormed how to get them to work. One brilliant person suggested giving them a Sears catalog. After looking at all the bobbles and bits in the catalog, the workers not only came back, but asked for overtime in order to obtain what a few months before they didn't even know existed.

Basically, they ruined their lives. I don't know if the story is true, but it rings true. The first time I heard it, I wept inside and asked God's forgiveness on behalf of the US's blatant sin toward those people.
</idle musing>

What are you afraid of? That your theology might be defective?

“Simply said, ” David Bentley Hart observes, “the earliest Christians were communists . . . , not as an accident of history but as an imperative of faith.” And if time and circumstances meant that not all subsequent Christians evinced communism as fully and intensely as the earliest, a call toward a vision of service to the common good echoed through the patristic period, founded on a truth taught by Basil the Great, Gregory of Nyssa, Ambrose of Milan, and John Chrysostom: “The goods of creation belong equally to all, and that immense private wealth is theft—bread stolen from the hungry, clothing stolen from the naked, money stolen from the destitute.”

Nor did such hopes, dreams, and practices cease with the patristic age. We can think of monasticism and mendicancy as well as such present-day movements as the Catholic Workers, the Bruderhof and the (usually Protestant) New Monastics. Such “purist” movements have great value and pertinence, as does the less “purist” yet still significant giving in face of need—serving at soup kitchens and homeless shelters, donating cars and groceries—that happens day to day and week to week in ordinary urban, suburban, and rural churches.— Naming Neoliberalism: Exposing the Spirit of Our Age, 109–10

<idle musing>
I recall when I was (much) younger and the threat of world Marxism (called Communism, with an upper case C) was a very real threat. The attempts by the Western church to rewrite the early chapters of Acts was almost comical. What were they afraid of? That they might be required to share their wealth?

Just an
</idle musing>

and that's guidance?!

At a basic level, the market qua market exhibits moral idiocy This can be confirmed by a walk through the common drugstore. Cigarettes are stocked adjacent to smoking-cessation aids. Diet and weight-loss concoctions sit next to high-calorie snacks and sugar-loaded beverages. Fertility pills are down the aisle from contraceptives. In actual practice, no sane consumer can be or is guided simply and solely by the market.

Speaking at an equally basic level, every minimally working human economy has a strong, underlying communistic dimension. At first blush, this may sound shocking and revolting. But think not of state-directed and state-compulsory communism, as in the Soviet Union and China, which are indeed revolting. Think instead of consanguineous family, where all goods are shared in common. Think of close friendships or tightly knit neighborhoods, where snowblowers and mowers and tools are freely passed back and forth, or a hand is lent with moving house or barn building. Think of bystanders rushing to help a child who has fallen onto subway tracks. Think of the aftermath of natural disasters such as storms, fires, blackouts, or an economic collapse, where each gives of their ability to each according to their needs. Then, often if not always, people resort to a “rough-and-ready communism.”— Naming Neoliberalism: Exposing the Spirit of Our Age, 108

Character Styles in Word for Mac 2019

This post is mainly for my own benefit, as I will likely forget this. If you find it helpful, great.

As a copyeditor, I am sometimes asked to apply styles to a document I'm editing. And, I have to admit that there are two things that Word for Mac 2019 does fairly well: R-to-L Hebrew (finally!) and the Styles pane.

But, character styles are a different matter. There is no good tutorial that I could find out there, which is why I'm writing this: to attempt to fill in the gaping hole.

The impetus for this comes from my most recent job, which requires character styles on all the Greek for typesetting purposes. Different presses handle this differently. For example, SBL Press asks you to set all Greek to SBL Greek and all Hebrew to SBL Hebrew. They then use macros to transform that in their typesetting process. The press I'm doing the current book for uses character styles. I've used character styles in Word for Mac before, but recently was forced to migrate to Word for Mac 2019 because the older version was only 32-bit. Things aren't as obvious as I would wish. So, let's begin…

Select the word/character you want to create a style for. In my case it was a Greek word, set in GraecaU, 11 point. Then, click on Format on the top and select Styles (see graphic below)

Click on New, and type in the name you want to call the style. I used Greek for obvious reasons. Change the Style type to Character, basing the style on the Default Paragraph Font. Note the "a" with an underline; that means it is a character style. You can see all the characteristics it inherits in the box. If you want to change the font size and style, you can do so, but I find it easiest to change them before I create the style, that way you can just accept it.

I click both Add to template and Add to Quick Style List, just to keep it handy. Then click OK and Apply. On the right-hand side of Word's Home ribbon, there's a Styles Pane button. Click it and the styles will appear on the right hand column of your document; adjust the size of your document so you can see the Style pane as your document easily.

Now, highlight the next word(s) you want to apply the style to, click on Greek, and, "Voilà!" it's in the correct font and the style will be there for the typesetter. See below, before:

And after:

And that's it! Of course, if you don't want to have the style pane open, or don't have room for it on your screen, you can create a keyboard shortcut for it, but that's another story. I have multiples of those for various fonts, formatting, etc. Maybe someday I'll go into that, but this has already eaten up too much of my time today—hopefully it will save you (and me in the future when I forget) a great deal of time!

Here's a list of all copyediting posts.

The cheapening of marriage

Neoliberal capitalism inhibits the Christian practice of marriage and family because the market has overrun its boundaries. We face a belligerent bottom line that invades all aspects or spheres of our existence. We are coached to see not just the bartering of bread and soap but the whole of our lives in the ways of the market. We too easily fall into neoliberal economistic language that reconceives family practices and relationships. We speak of children presenting “time demands.” Spouses should “invest” in one another to “promote” intimacy, or their marriage may become unproductive.— Naming Neoliberalism: Exposing the Spirit of Our Age, 102

Contract versus covenant

Neoliberal contractualism is hemmed about by qualifications; its form of marriage is enamored of contractual arrangements such as no-fault divorce and prenuptial agreements. Whereas covenantal marriage aims at a union of selves, contractualism aims only at a union of interests. It promises faithfulness only so long as one (or both) parties do not find a “better” option. It hedges its bets and is based on careful and ongoing calculation. For neoliberalism, with contractualism and competition at its roots, enduring trust is decidedly not a premium. And what is true here of neoliberal marriage is true of its wider economy: the “suzerains” that are neoliberal employers owe no fidelity to their workers or “vassals,” who are fungible and disposable.— Naming Neoliberalism: Exposing the Spirit of Our Age, 103

<idle musing>
Almost diametrically opposed ot the biblical view, isn't it? The Bible says we are made in the image of God and have inherent value. Neoliberalism says we are merely an "asset" to be exploited and then disposed of.

Let's call it what it is: Sin!
</idle musing>

What kind of god?

Note well that this covenant fidelity of Yahweh represents a particular kind of divinity. The Greek gods, after all, put no premium on fidelity to their people. Pagan divinity in general is not so much to be trusted as outwitted and manipulated. But fidelity is a key mark of the God revealed to Israel and the church—the God who chose, finally, to answer human betrayal with the cross rather than a flood of destruction. And so if we are to live in the light of this, the true divinity, we must strive to become the kind of people who practice at least enough covenant faithfulness to know what it looks like. Christians live lives of fidelity in order to become people who can learn to recognize the God of enduring faithfulness, the God of Israel and Jesus Christ.— Naming Neoliberalism: Exposing the Spirit of Our Age, 101

This is evil!!

The Maryland court blocked the library ebooks law from going into effect, claiming that it violated copyright protection.

Now, that might be, and by itself wouldn't have riled me. But, the very next sentence in the Publishers Weekly Daily eletter says this: "Hachette Book Group parent company Lagardère saw record gains last year, with HBG up as well even discounting its purchase of Workman Publishing."

And they aren't the only publishing company setting records for profit and sales!

But, they won't let the libraries have ebooks at a fair price (the pricing to libraries is definitely ridiculous and gouging) or in a timely manner. Why? Because it might damage their record profits. It would be different if they weren't making tons of cash and paying their executives sinfully extravagent salaries and bonuses (all the while paying their rank and file workers scandalously low wages and exploiting them). But they aren't.

Copyright is to protect the rights to make a fair profit for authors and publishers. It is an attempt to balance the rights of producers and consumers. But, the balance of late is far too much in favor of the corporate producer (not most authors, mind you) at the expense of the consumer.

Just an
</idle musing>

Contract or Covenant? It matters

Contract is the fundamental basis of the neoliberal economy (and of a liberal economy more generally). A contract is a punctual agreement enacted between two parties, for a set period, and under specified conditions. Contracts, and contracting parties, are calculating and careful. Their trust and fidelity, such as they are, intend to serve the immediate interests of the contracting parties—and do not extend beyond the terms of the contract. In other words, the relationships they establish are limited and completely conditional.

Though Christians certainly participate in this contractual economy, it is not their ultimate economy. The church as first family is the oikos grounded in God’s encompassing economy. It works most fundamentally by way of covenant rather than contract. It is about establishing and maintaining deep, full, thoroughly faithful, long-term, and open-ended relationships.— Naming Neoliberalism: Exposing the Spirit of Our Age, 100–101

Scapegoating again

There's an article on Bicycling Magazine's website, entitled "Cars Kill. Bike Helmets Don’t Change That." It's really about more than that, though. It's about how we assign blame so we don't have to change anything. Read the whole thing for more, but here's a good takeaway paragraph:

Studies show that the simple act of finding someone to blame in an accident makes people less likely to see systemic problems or seek systemic changes. One [study] prompted subjects with news stories about a wide variety of accidents: financial mistakes, plane crashes, industrial disasters. When the story blamed human error, subjects were more intent on punishment and less likely to question the built environment or seek investigation of organizations behind the accident. No matter the accident, blame took the place of prevention.

<idle musing>
As a pedestrian and bicyclist, I know that the odds are that if I get hit, I'm in serious trouble. I've already experienced that once and don't want it to happen again. But, why is it always the victim that is blamed?

And I don't mean just in auto-pedestrian and auto-bicyclist accidents. What about sexual misconduct cases? There's a lot of victim-blaming going on there, too.

Why?

Because it's a whole lot easier and cleaner to blame somebody than to face the fact that the system is broken.

But it is! Culture is broken. It's worshiping the wrong gods: Money, sex, and power.

It's the same gods that have always been worshiped, just wearing different clothes now.

Just an
</idle musing>

Yes, unconditional, but…

Compare again human parents and children. Parents can love unconditionally, never withdrawing their final and ongoing commitment to their children. But especially in relation to younger children, parents do know what is best mediately and in the long term, and not just immediately. Thus loving parents, not least unconditionally loving parents, do harbor moral expectations and make stipulations—and yes, on occasion, even commands—to their children. At their best and in all circumstances, what such parents hope for is the eventual and enduring flourishing, if not the immediate appeasement, of their children.

Similarly, God’s covenant love is unconditional. But it aims to sustain a substantial and long-term relationship, so it includes what might be considered “conditional” elements. As Levenson says, “It is unconditional in that the love comes into, and remains, in force even when nothing has been done to deserve it. . . . But the relationship is also conditional in that it involves expectations and stipulations, and suffers and turns sour if they are not met.” (Levinson, Love of God, 62)— Naming Neoliberalism: Exposing the Spirit of Our Age, 100

What's the foundation?

Accordingly, in the biblical world, covenant was not made just or primarily on the basis of blood. To be a son or daughter was first of all, in Hebrew thought, to be obedient, not to indicate biological descent. Israel’s election as the “children of God” entailed obedience (Deut l3:17–l4:2). If Israel disobeyed, God might spurn “his sons and daughters” (Deut 32:l9—20), sell them into slavery (Isa 50:l), and declare them no longer God’s people (Hos 1:9). It is likely in this spirit, a covenant spirit, that Jesus turned away from his consanguineous mother and siblings and declared instead, “Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother” (Mark 3:31-35). Jesus’s primary family, in this sense, is composed not of those who share his genetic makeup but of those who share his obedient spirit.

At the same time, such remarks must be kept in tension with an underlying unconditional quality about covenant. Though Israel (and later the church) repeatedly fails and betrays its Lord in what the prophets portray as adulterous liaisons with other gods, Yahweh shows a determination to never give up or turn God’s back on his people. The romance between God and his people is stormy and too often ruptures.— Naming Neoliberalism: Exposing the Spirit of Our Age, 98–99

That's a different take on hospitality

Meanwhile, married Christians bear children to witness to the church’s conviction that God has not given up and will not give up on God’s creation. Christians have children because they believe the world has a future. And they have children to witness to and practice hospitality, for no strangers can challenge us so much as the intimate strangers we call children.— Naming Neoliberalism: Exposing the Spirit of Our Age, 97

<idle musing>
While I can't say I disagree with what he says about children being strangers, I'm not sure I would have put it that way! But he is definitely correct that given the state of the world and its future, it takes faith to bring children into it.
</idle musing>

Freedom? Or bondage masquerading as freedom?

Finally, as regards positive freedom, a word about capacitation or enablement. In the thrall of sin and death, we are not free to love God, to love creation, to love others, or even to love ourselves rightly. We are dead in the condition of sin, and only God’g Word and God’s Spirit can raise us to life and fulsome agency. Resurrection, I have said, is exclusively God’s business, so it is only in the Spirit that we are freed for love in all its forms and directions. Through Word and Spirit, we are enabled and given the capacity to love.

Consider an alcoholic turned loose in a liquor store and given free rein to drink whatever and as much as he would like. He has full, but only negative, freedom, in that he is not forbidden any bottle in the store. But he is a slave to his impulses or compulsion. As Alcoholics Anonymous would have it, he needs a “higher power” for true freedom, the freedom not to drink but to live free of bondage and addiction.

Likewise, we are all addicted to sin. It is the Holy Spirit that can give us the capacity not to sin. Our final and fullest freedom, as Augustine would have it, is the freedom not even to be able to sin, but only to love. This is freedom for—freedom for love of God, of creation, of others, and truly of ourselves. Such freedom is what the apocalyptic gospel promises.— Naming Neoliberalism: Exposing the Spirit of Our Age, 85