Wit & Whim

It has been too long since my last installment. I've been struggling to find time to write with all these grad parties, working until I'm half blind, and so forth. This one came together quick, but I like it. In Dich Hab ich Gehoffet Lord Jesus Christ who bore the cost, Whose blood has ransomed all the lost, A full propitiation; God’s wrath thou staid, And our debt paid, Procuring our salvation. When all the world was dead to sin, Thou sallied forth our souls to win, Were born of virgin mother; The Lord of Light, From Heavenly Might, Descends to be our brother. Thy holy power Thou set aside, As mortal man with sin Thou vied, Alone the victory taking; Though tempted sore, Thou dist endure, In all our woes partaking. From lying lips and wagging tongues, All blasphemies were at Thee flung, The prophets word fulfilling; By men despised, They ‘gainst Thee rise, The paschal victim killing. Not only man upon the tree, But true God from eternity, Breathes out his benediction, And bows ...

We have a nascent Juneteenth tradition, now that it is a federal holiday. We have a cook out. We eat soul food, which happens to be delicious, if comprised largely of sometimes foods. We got so busy talking this year that we forgot to sing the Battle Hymn of the Republic, but we'll fix that next year. We commemorate the effective end of slavery in these United States. I have heard complaint that Juneteenth is a token holiday. That it is only a holiday because of the events of 2020, and never would have been so if the feds did not feel like they needed some way to signal "we totally care about black people." And that is obviously true, if we constrain ourselves to examining why it was made a federal holiday at that particular moment. But the weakness or shallowness of the people who made it a federal holiday should not distract from the solemnity of the occasion. On June 19th, 1865, the brave sons of the union carried the emancipation proclamation to the last official bast...

 We had a book discussion tonight, and we discussed "The Way of Men" by Jack Donovan. He has some interesting things to say and some useful vocabulary to take away, but there are numerous problems with his treatment, and they start from beginning with the wrong first things. The man of Jack Donovan's imagination is all meat. He is interested in his own survival. and reason, spirituality, and brotherhood are things that come later only when one has the luxury to develop them. Religion is a product man creates to order complex hierarchies. Fatherhood is not a part of the virtues of his primal man. He frequently resorts to examples of lower primate behavior to explain human men. The problem with his model of manhood, is that he leaves out the humanity and focuses on the animal. It is so curious that, in dealing with Courage, he engages the Nicomachean Ethics of Aristotle, but borrows only what he likes about Thumos, Spirit, and leaves aside the discussions of telos--the ends...

 I have been reading back through Niccolo Machiavelli's Discourses on Titus Livy. I read it a couple times as a young man, but I am having the extraordinary experience of reading it again with older eyes. Time again I find myself stopping and laughing as he puts his finger on something exactly--so directly that it seems like it should be obvious. There have been many such moments as I've gone through, but I want to talk about the one that stopped me in my tracks just minutes ago. I had to stop and wonder at the headline that I have used as my title. It is how Machiavelli opens book three of the discourses: If One Wishes a Sect or a Republic to Live Log, It Is Necessary to Draw it Back Often to Its Beginning. I wondered that I had read this before, more than once, but that it had gone over my head. You see, in the last two years or so, so probably 3-4 years after my last reading of this work, I have become convinced of, and have made many people listen to, the idea that perpetua...

 The individual is God. All have fallen in the camps of state supported self actualization, or else in the camp that says every involuntary imposition on a man is slavery. Every man bought into the idea that his owing others anything in particular without their consent was unjust. We are born owing nothing to any, but owed a great many things. Different things in each accounting, but still we are owed. It is against the puerile, selfish, and venal attitudes regarding what a person owes and is owed by government--as partly outlined in my previous semi-coherent post--that those standing under the heading of Christian nationalism are reacting. The steelman of christian nationalism is that we have a particular duty to those God has placed immediately in front of us. That the rulers of the earth owe it to their people to endeavor to establish just government and good order, and that a christian ethical framework is, has been, and must be, better for the ordering of a peoples than the al...

  The Lord upon the mountain taught: a versification of the beatitudes Ich Singe Dir The Lord upon the mountain taught  A holy life to lead,  That up with him to heaven caught,  We shall be his indeed. Blessed all those in spirit poor—  Thy kingdom theirs shall be,  Who beggars ever at Thy door  From Thee gain victory. Blessed are all that here must mourn;  What comfort shall be theirs!  For Christ with gladness will adorn  And make them heaven's heirs. Blessed are all the meek in heart,  The earth they shall receive—  A new creation set apart  From sin and pride reprieve. Blessed all that for righteousness  Yearn more than earthly wine;  On Thee, beyond all plenteousness,  Thou grantest them to dine. Blessed all they that mercy show,  For mercy they shall find;  Within Thy wounds and free from woe,  Be at Thy feet reclined. Blessed all those whose hearts are pure,  Who have not evil love...