With the season of Advent and Nativity approaching quickly, I hope that you might consider reading this wonderful story of a young boy entering a dark world carry light and salvation. On October 21, 2022, Michael Martin invited Mike Sauter to join him in interviewing David Bentley Hart on Hart's novel Kenogaia (A Gnostic Tale). … Continue reading Just in Time for Advent: Hart’s Own Summary of Kenogaia with Some Commentary
Author: Jesse
Tips on Reading the New Testament Regarding the Afterlife
In a recent online discussion about how difficult it is to discern what the New Testament authors thought about suffering and salvation after biological death, I shared these four top reasons why people today misunderstand the plain meanings of the New Testament on this topic: 1. They have no concept that for most in Christ’s … Continue reading Tips on Reading the New Testament Regarding the Afterlife
Our Fleshly and Our Spiritual Bodies According to David Bentley Hart
Dear reader, I have transcribed below a good bit that David Bentley Hart had to say recently about spiritual versus fleshly bodies in an interview with Larry Chapp from October 10, 2022. These points by Hart (that he has made many times and in many ways) are extremely confusing to people. Therefore, I’ve put together … Continue reading Our Fleshly and Our Spiritual Bodies According to David Bentley Hart
Slavery in Gregory of Nyssa as a Wound that We Inflict Upon Christ
In 2009, David Bentley Hart made bold claims about Gregory of Nyssa as the first in the ancient world to denounce slavery in utterly uncompromising terms. This was in Atheist Delusions: The Christian Revolution and Its Fashionable Enemies (Yale University Press). While Hart does not provide much by way of footnoting or defense in his … Continue reading Slavery in Gregory of Nyssa as a Wound that We Inflict Upon Christ
What of Hart’s Tradition and Apocalypse is Shared with Wilken’s The Myth of Christian Beginnings?
[Advanced notice: Please see one correction in a comment below from David Bentley Hart.] Robert Louis Wilken Two of Robert Louis Wilken’s wonderful books blessed me a few years ago (The Spirit of Early Christian Thought: Seeking the Face of God and The First Thousand Years: A Global History of Christianity). For another project recently, … Continue reading What of Hart’s Tradition and Apocalypse is Shared with Wilken’s The Myth of Christian Beginnings?
The Terror of Faerie
Of late, I have been dwelling a little upon the fearfulness of fairies. We recently read a book out loud as a family that played a part in these ruminations. The Perilous Gard is a young adult novel by Elizabeth Marie Pope that was awarded the Newbery Honor in 1975. It is set in the … Continue reading The Terror of Faerie
Some Interviews with Jesse on Fairies, the Fall, and the Restoration of All Things…
I was recently invited by Steven HAuse with Love Unrelenting to talk about universalism (5 minutes), interfaith relationships (7.5 minutes), the atemporal fall (13 minutes), and the aliveness of all creation (7 minutes). Around the same time, I was invited to talk about the restoration of all things by Eric Van Evans with Conscious Philosophy … Continue reading Some Interviews with Jesse on Fairies, the Fall, and the Restoration of All Things…
David Bentley Hart’s Questions about Jordan Wood’s Christology
Note: This report was updated for accuracy in several details on August 23, 2022 based on input from a few of those involved. And see also this most recent response by Hart. This is a dispute that I don't really understand. However, I'm trying to follow it, and below is Hart's latest summary of his … Continue reading David Bentley Hart’s Questions about Jordan Wood’s Christology
Maximus, Paul, and Jesus on Annihilation and Apocatastasis
In seventeen minutes on this video from Love Unrelenting, Jordan Wood recently gave a brilliant account of why Maximus the Confessor is best understood as a universalist. Wood goes well beyond the famous Maximus scholar Hans Urs von Balthasar who Wood summarizes by saying: His position was that Maximus was himself a confident universalist but … Continue reading Maximus, Paul, and Jesus on Annihilation and Apocatastasis
A Sermon for the Dormition by David Armstrong (with Brief Commentary)
If you have not yet read "You Did Not Forsake the World: A Sermon for the Dormition" by David Armstrong at A Perennial Digression, please leave this page and do so. With David's permission, I'm reposting much of it here with two brief connections of my own afterward (in hopes that another few readers might … Continue reading A Sermon for the Dormition by David Armstrong (with Brief Commentary)
Jesus and the Ancient Paths 