If anyone could prove to me that Christ was outside the truth, I would prefer to remain with Christ than with the truth. (p. 141)
The genuine realist, if he is an unbeliever, will always find strength and ability to disbelieve in the miraculous, and if he is confronted with a miracle as an irrefutable fact he would rather disbelieve his own senses than admit the fact. Faith does not... spring from the miracle, but the miracle from faith. (p. 163)
[Concentrating on the Sermon on the Mount, Leo Tolstoy says,] The test of observance of Christ's teaching is our consciousness of our failure to attain an ideal perfection. The degree to which we draw near this perfection cannot be seen; all we can see is the extent of our deviation. (p. 126)
And this is from an introduction to an interview with Cambridge professor (actually, "associate principle at Ridley Hall at Cambridge") and musician and conductor Jeremy Begbie.
Cultural forms [as in, art forms imbued within the culture] are not simply utilitarian or ornamental, but are expressions of an understanding of the nature of creation, specifically of human nature and human well-being. Cultural conventions usually take form at specific times and places because they’re compatible with a set of dominant assumptions about things. They are concrete crystallizations of abstract hopes, desires, and theories.
they're both funny though. President W's spanish is very stereotypic anglo-mangle.
ReplyDeleteJesus and Joshua both come from the same word, though, right?
seeing that you know something of linguistics and i'm generally interested but proficiently stupid, are the semitic languages related to the indo-european languages? i know persian is, if i recall.
thanks for dropping by.
wow,
ReplyDeletei do think the study of general - superstructural - linguistics is fascinating. maybe for me, in my mind it points to the post-deluge and the scattering of tongues to the four corners in babbel in early Genesis.
and you say 'imperfect analogy' partially, i take it, because english is an indo-european language through all of its feeder languages. gaelic-briton (i forget the name for it), norman-franco (i just don't know the proper name for it), and germanic tongues are all indo-europian.
so, is this a hobby for you? just an interest? or more in tune with your proffession?
i tend to think in terms of concepts. i'd say i'm a conceptual thinker, but that's usually associated with engineers and inventors, furthermore, with mathematical skills nonetheless.
ReplyDeletedetails don't so much bother me as elude me. if the devil's in the details, than God wired me to deliver me from the evil one.
now, as to your last paragraph, picture being partially puerto rican, in a largely puerto rican neighborhood and a largely puerto rican church. we associate language with identity, especially self-identity, right?
latinos are no different. they become frustrated with me because i don't know spanish. yeah, i've tried and still try to keep up. but i've resigned myself to trying to learn the intracacies and nuances of the english language, which is beautiful and lovely, much as are the romantic languages. i didn't learn spanish growing up. my mother didn't really learn spanish, and certainly not at home (long story, although i think she could have picked up on some mean cusses). and any formal training, or even informal training, didn't begin til college. and, blah, blah, blah. i don't have a working knowledge of spanish.
course, nobody asks if i know dutch or luxembourghe or gaelic.