I think I will treat the next two chapters together. Chapter Seven of Hitchens’ book is on the nightmare we call the Old Testament, and Chapter Eight informs us why the evil of the New Testament surpasses that of the Old. That which is good in the Old Testament is, according to Hitchens, not unique …
Mucho Macaronic Mirabile Dictu
Chapter Six of Hitchens’ book is all about “Arguments from Design.” I have gone back and forth in my mind about how to approach this one. Should I do a slow inexorable build to the point in my last paragraph where I place the capstone of a fun quotation from this chapter, doing so with …
Fully Accredited
How do we know when someone is competent? How do we know whether they know what they are doing? Why, we ask to see their papers. Whenever we are not content with the word of God on a given subject, we do not have the option of remaining neutral, of doing nothing. The only alternative …
But They Are Adapting
“Muslims have assimilated brilliantly, at least when it comes to mastering the principal discourse of the advanced democratic state—the legalisms, victimology, and entitlement culture” (Mark Steyn, America Alone, p. 82).
Not A Great Man for Bones
“I myself am convinced that the theory of evolution, especially to the extent to which it’s been applied, will be one of the great jokes in the history books in the future. Posterity will marvel that so very flimsy and dubious an hypothesis could be accepted with the incredible credulity that it has. I think …
You Export What You Manufacture
“No virtue is contrary to another, but vices have nothing but contrarities and contradictions in them. Men’s lusts oppose and fight against one another in men’s hearts. No marvel then, when there are such stirs within, that they break forth into quarrels and contentions without. If a man is quarrelsome in his family, no wonder …
The Politics of Dancing
The Lord Jesus Christ is seated at the right hand of God the Father. That should affect things down here. As He exercises His authority, we discover in the Word that this authority is all encompassing. To use Kuyper’s phrase, not one square inch exists concerning which the Lord Jesus does not say, “Mine.” So …
Stuck in the Seventies
“There is no evidence that any Muslim woman anywhere ever wore the jilbab before the disco era, when it was taken up by the Muslim Brotherhood and others in the Arab world. It is no more ancient and traditional than platform shoes, bell bottoms, and cheesecloth shirts” (Mark Steyn, America Alone, p. 74).
Crowns Roll in the Dust
“The world’s way of responding to intimations of decay is to engage equally in idiot hopes and idiot despair . . . In Christian terms, such hopes and fears are equally beside the point. As Christians we know that here we have no continuing city, that crowns roll in the dust and every earthly kingdom …
A Snarling Defense
“Nothing is a man’s own so much as his lusts. Man aims wholly at himself in satisfying his lust. A dog will bark and bite and fly in a man’s face to preserve his own whelps” (Burroughs, Irenicum, p. 152).