Book Review: NKJV Unapologetic Study Bible

Posted on December 6, 2017 by nathanalbright

NKJV Unapologetic Study Bible:  Confidence For Such A Time As This, edited by Emmanuel A. Kampouris

[Note:  This book was provided free of charge by BookLook/Thomas Nelson.  All thoughts and opinions are my own.]

There is a great proliferation of Bibles at present that are targeted to different groups of readers that have the same textual base but which have commentary material of a type that interests some readers more than others [1].  This Bible offers commentary that is focused on a biblical worldview, and there is a lot to commend its approach for the reader who views worldview as important, as this book is unapologetic in its support for a biblical view of culture and politics and science.  The original material in this book takes a tough approach towards both nominal Christians who fail to look at and follow the biblical commands and take a Marcionite approach to scripture as well as to those whose heathen and unbiblical ways misrepresent the biblical position or approach or their reasons for opposing it.  This is definitely a book which lives up to its title of unapologetic, and a reader who appreciates a strong stand against the moral and social evils of this present age will find much to approve of here.

As might be imagined, at its base this Bible is a New King James Version with a large amount of supplementary material.  Aside from this, the Bible is not a study Bible per se, having only very straightforward textual notes, even if it does have a very lengthy index of features for topical study at the back of the Bible that ought to encourage some readers to take some relevant studies of how the Bible applies to society and has been so applied through the ages.  What sets this Bible apart from so many others is the nature of its commentary material, which is divided into eight categories:  church (prophetic voice, glory, in decline, culture and public duty, world religions and worldviews, spiritual disciplines), corruption (bribery, greed, hypocrisy, idolatry, prejudice), economics (systems, poverty and wealth, taxation), education (evolution and intelligent design, manners, teaching and learning), family (adultery and fornication, divorce, homosexuality and trangenderism, marriage and family, parenting), government (church and state, environmentalism, forms of government, peace and war, punishment), sanctity of life (abortion and infanticide, contraception and fertility, biotechnology, euthanasia and suicide), and virtue (compassion, courage, faith, character, justice, repentance, and work ethic).  These eight themes are viewed in four quadrants:  biblical, historical, quotations/writings, and commentary, and manage to find some very thoughtful material about these concerns in nearly every book of the Bible, which is mapped out at the beginning of each book of the Bible in introductions.

To the editors’ credit, the material in this book comes off as an appealing mixture of combative but also moderate and nonpartisan in its town.  The author speaks out clearly about personal and social evils, but puts those in a biblical perspective that also emphasizes personal responsibility and thoughtfully points out the tendency of governments towards oppression and tyranny.  There is a focus on the duties of stewardship for the earth that man has but a criticism of the heathen and antibiblical roots of a great deal of the environmentalist movement and the socialist ends for which it is used.  Rather than viewing either government or the absence of government as some sort of false messianic savior, the commentary material points to the problems of mankind being present in our rebelliousness against God and against His ways, something this book has a lot to say about, much of which it is not pleasant to hear.  The combination of moderate and biblical tone as well as forcefulness of approach is one that is likely to make this Bible greatly appreciated by those who have a high degree of fierceness about the cultural and social and political crisis of our contemporary world without having a highly partisan view of it.

[1] See, for example:

Book Review: The King James Study Bible

Book Review: KJV Word Study Bible

Book Review: The Complete Jewish Study Bible

Book Review: The Illustrated Bible

Book Review: NKJV Word Study Bible

Book Review: NKJV Chronological Study Bible

Book Review: NKJV Prophecy Study Bible

Book Review: NIrV Giant Print Holy Bible

Book Review: KJV Foundation Study Bible

Book Review: The Evangelism Study Bible

Book Review: NIV Once A Day Bible

Book Review: NIV Fast Facts Bible

Posted in Bible, Biblical History, Book Reviews, Christianity, Church of God, History | Tagged , , | 5 Comments

More Tales From The Crypt

Posted on December 5, 2017 by nathanalbright

I had thought that when I previously wrote about bitcoin [1] and about debates over its longevity and legitimacy that it would be the end of it, but as it happens I have more that I want to say about the subject.  As is common, my thoughts spring from a variety of directions and are a bit scattered, but I think that they indicate, together, a picture of the way in which cryptocurrencies have at least started to enter into the public consciousness.  I am not sure the extent to which this is a good thing or a bad thing, but it is something I wish to note because such currencies offer a way for people to avoid many of the gatekeepers and financial pressure that exist in the highly regulated world of finance, and that can be for better or worse.  It is perhaps something to be concerned about that there is so much going on in terms of contemporary economics that wishes to be below the surface and away from the prying eyes of rules and regulations.  Be that as it may, I wish here to comment and not to censure.

Recently I read a story about Venezuela’s embattled president looking to a cryptocurrency in order to help boost his nation’s tottering economy and to avoid the pressure the United States has put on it.  I myself am not particularly sympathetic to socialist regimes like Venezuela’s, and have an interesting personal relationship with their oil.  Namely, once they sought to give discounts to leftist states in order to reward their support of Kerry in 2004, I stopped buying gas at Citgo, regardless of their prices, a policy I have remained since then.  Most of our oil comes from unpleasant nations with troubled regimes, but if I have to get my car filled by oil from dictatorships, at least I can make sure I’m not rewarding leftist ones.  Suffice it to say that I do not plan on supporting Madero’s efforts at avoiding economic collapse in his sorry excuse for a country, but I do find it interesting all the same that there is an appeal in cryptocurrencies as a way of side-stepping the influence of the United States, and if I had more sympathy for a regime in such a position I would be very willing to help them out, especially if it offered the chance at personal profit.

Needless to say, it is also of interest the extent to which bitcoin and related currencies have become a subject of interest at work.  Most of my department consists of people who have at least some interest in how it works, from futures contracts tied to bitcoin to the logistics and mechanics of bitcoin mining to the volatility of the market.  One of my coworkers even expressed some interest in acquiring sufficient hardware to engage in bitcoin mining, something which may lead to further updates along these lines.  Since I have already begun receiving e-mails and advertisements relating to bitcoin and accounts tied to them, it appears as if the phenomenon is starting to move beyond those who could consider themselves financial insiders–I don’t–and into the wider public, although perhaps not entirely into the public yet.  There is a certain amount of arbitrage in markets like this and especially where rules and regulations are somewhat lacking, the potential for insider trading is extremely high.  The lack of transparency in such operations is an aspect of risk that few people consider when looking at the potential for profit.

It would be easiest to know if one of my former friends was interested in it.  Once upon a time I knew and even worked for a disorganized accounting professor whose tastes in young women mirrored my own despite being my mother’s age, and one of his more interesting and worthwhile quirks was a tendency to be interested in financial investments at the moment they turned from sound investments to bubbles.  In the late 1990’s he began investing in dotcoms.  In the mid 2000’s, he became interested in real estate investment trusts tied to the property values of Central Florida, which were sure to keep going up.  Of course, in both cases it was not long at all before what had seemed like a sure investment went belly up.  If I knew he was interested in bitcoins or anything else, I would short that investment immediately and divest myself of whatever holdings I had in that entire segment.  One has to know the sucker in the room, after all, because if one cannot see the sucker, one is the sucker.

[1] See, for example:

Tales From The Crypt

Posted in Musings | Tagged , , , | 5 Comments

Book Review: Modern Masters

Posted on December 5, 2017 by nathanalbright

Modern Masters:  Contemporary Architecture From Around The World, by Steve Huyton

[Note:  This book was provided free of charge by Edelweiss/Schiffer Publishing.]

The ideal reader of this book is someone who is looking to build the sort of home that will end up in Architectural Digest or some other magazine of that stature and has a plot of land that either has immense scenic vistas or, alternatively, serious design constraints and enough money to afford world-class architecture of a progressive modernist or post-modernist nature.  Alternatively, the next most ideal reader to this is someone who has a taste for quirky architecture that reminds one of the best sort of works by Frank Lloyd Wright or Pierre Koenig or others of that kind [1].  Although I am not possessed of a worthy plot of land and hundreds of thousands of dollars of money, I do have an enjoyment of unusual and striking exterior and interior design and so I appreciate this work even if I am unlikely to enjoy invitations to these buildings or those like them built by the firms discussed in this excellent and gorgeous book as modern masterpieces of residential design.  Readers who share these interests will likely find much to enjoy, even vicariously, about these beautiful houses.

This book consists of slightly more than 200 pages of material that is divided between various residential architects from all over the world that show off some of the housing work that they have done.  There is a wide diversity of places these houses have been built or renovated, from Europe (Spain, Germany, the UK, Turkey, Norway) to Australia, Japan, the United States, Canada, Mexico, and South Africa.  The houses themselves vary from fancy bachelor pads in Istanbul to an unusually angled house on a challenging lot in Japan to a house whose architecture was based on chicken coops to houses with designs inspired by complicated mathematical phenomena like the Mobius strip.  The houses have a wide variety of materials used in their design, from wood to concrete to cloth to brick to steel, along with a large quantity of glass.  Likewise, there are designs here that show the modernist approach, some with a daring curvilinear approach characteristic of post-modernism, and some that are involved in historical renovation of a more old-fashioned way.  There are also some striking similarities, such as a commitment to alternative sources of energy, high concept design, and building forms that work well for the client as well as blending in harmony with the surrounding creation, whether natural or built-up.

There is much to appreciate about a book like this, which reads as a high-class sort of sales prospectus for those interested in high-end residential design.  Even without being in that sort of a market myself, this is certainly a book that one would appreciate reading.  It is a book that one can read for ideas as well as an appreciation of beautiful designs, the sort of book that some people will be able to read practically in search of elite architects in search of worthy projects, and a book that one can leave on one’s coffee table with a high degree of certainty that house guests will be appropriately impressed at one’s taste in architecture.  Everything about this book is demonstrative of good taste, of clean lines, of a sound attention to materials and aesthetic appeal as well as practical concerns and environmental sustainability.  Those who fancy themselves to possess good taste with an interest in residential design would be well-served to give this book an appreciative read, as this is not the sort of book that will disappoint such a demographic.

[1] See, for example:

On The Psychology Of Architecture

Glass Houses

A Horse Is A Horse Of Course Of Course

Book Review: Houses Of Civil War America

Posted in Book Reviews | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Book Review: Heavy Timber Structure`

Posted on December 5, 2017 by nathanalbright

Heavy Timber Structures:  Creating Comfort In Public Spaces, by Anthony F. Zaya and Timothy Diener

[Note:  This book was provided free of charge by Edelweiss/Schiller Publishing.  All thoughts and opinions are my own.]

In reading this book, it is important to know exactly what you are getting.  The authors approach timber construction from a complex point of view that emphasizes many elements and the more of these elements are appreciated the easier it is to enjoy this book as I did.  For one, at least one of the authors is a partner in a firm that is involved in the design and construction of heavy timber roof elements, Lancaster County Timber Frames Inc., and this business interest makes a great deal of importance in determining the form and contents of the book.  If you have an interest in timber construction and design [1] and enjoy the psychology of construction as well as the way that business works as a contractor and subcontractor, you will likely find much to enjoy in this book.  Those without an interest either in the history and psychology of timber design or in the business practices of those who construct timber buildings or building components will likely not find as much of interest here, though.

In terms of its contents, this book is a bit more than 200 pages in the version I read, and is organized around the projects with heavy timber construction that the authors have been personally involved in, which are all on the East Coast and centered around Pennsylvania and nearby states.  After a lengthy discussion about the psychology of building construction and how timber is a material that is not only easy to use and structurally sound but is something that is imitated and is worthwhile for not only structural but also deeply personal reasons, the rest of the book focuses on projects that show the worth of wood.  The authors divide these projects by the type of structures they are:  religious buildings, restaurants/bars, health care buildings, government buildings, clubhouses, historic reconstruction, and retail.  Each of the cases included gives a discussion of the project, some of the design drawings or computer-generated models as well as photos of the construction as well as after it is done that demonstrate the way that the project worked.  The projects themselves are a diverse range that include entrances to churches and box stores, welcome centers for I-70 in South Mountain in Maryland and at Gettysburg, and a covered bridge that had been damaged in a tropical storm.

In reading this book, it is important to remember that the authors are trying to sell the reader something.  In fact, they are trying to sell several things.  The discussion of the desirable qualities of wood is trying to sell heavy timber construction as a construction method for buildings for those who have projects similar to those written about in the book.  The book is also trying to sell the specific expertise of the companies involved in timber construction and design themselves, including matters like efficiency of timber use, willingness to correct mistakes, high standards of achievement in LEED medals, and attention to historical details even outside of the contract.  As far as I’m concerned, this book does a good enough job at presenting worthwhile information as well as beautiful photos and drawings that I am not offended at its being an extended sales pitch.  Not everyone may be so understanding, though, and so it is worth noting that this book has the fingerprints of salesmanship all over it.  As long as you are aware of that and appreciative of that going in, there is a lot to enjoy here.

[1] See for example:

Video Review: Great Courses: Understanding The World’s Greatest Structures: Science And Innovation From Antiquity To Modernity

Book Review: Kon-Tiki

Book Review: Rustic Retreats

Book Review: Houses Of Civil War America

Posted in Book Reviews | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Where You Stand Sometimes Depends On Where You Sit

Posted on December 4, 2017 by nathanalbright

Today two news stories with strongly different levels of significance happened which prompted in me very distinct sets of responses.  In order to illustrate what I mean by this, I would like to talk about the less serious one first.  For some time the Pontiac Silverdome, the longtime former home of the Detroit Lions, has been left abandoned for its replacement, Ford Field.  An attempt made to implode the ruins of this stadium were unsuccessful.  I was of two minds in thinking about this and in its symbolic meaning.  I tend to have a fondness for old buildings, having enjoyed my experiences visiting even the ancient and decrepit ruined stadiums of the Greco-Roman past during my travels to cities in the Middle East like Colosse, Pergamum, Ephesus, and Gerasa.  It is somewhat distressing for me to see buildings only a few decades old viewed as being unworthy of use and preservation, even if they are concrete hulks designed for nothing more sacred than bringing some religious devotees together to honor their tribal gods and local sports deities [1].  Be that as it may, my thoughts on the matter were that either Detroit is so incompetent that they cannot even implode a building correctly, much less anything else, or that the resilience of the stadium and its refusal to go quietly was emblematic of the tenacity of the long-suffering people of the Detroit area.  You view either or both as the case, depending on whether you are a pessimist or an optimist or some combination of the two, respectively.

The other story I wish to comment on today will take longer to explain, although my feelings about it are also mixed.  It was announced today that the board of directors for Aetna, a health insurance company I have some experience with, accepted a mixed cash & stock deal worth almost $70 billion from pharmacy giant CVS.  In reading about this particular story the nearly uniform response I read, and one of my own thoughts about it, was a sense of puzzlement that CVS had the amount of money it took to buy out Aetna.  The fact that the company either has a good enough financial position to leverage such a deal despite its own aggressive building and pricing programs or has enough cash from selling prescriptions and other items to engage in that sort of buyout suggests that they have not been passing along enough of their savings for buying in bulk to their customers.  There is, of course, an open question as to whether the deal will even be accepted, as there will be the usual reviews in order to determine its antitrust implications.

From the point of view of both CVS and Aetna, the deal makes some kind of sense.  The deal amounts to a vertical integration within the health industry that allows CVS to control in-house a wide variety of functions, ranging from an insurance carrier to a one-stop primary care sort of clinic to a pharmacy to an organization that bargains with government agencies over drug reimbursements.  The move certainly is likely to lead to some sort of imitations by competing companies, as its fellow competitors will be faced with an arms race to acquire their own insurance carriers in house.  Walgreens, for example, might be on the prowl to buy out Humana, or UnitedHealth might look to purchase Rite-Aid as a captive pharmacy for its own insurance plans, to give some potential outcomes of this.  Some companies, of course, are already engaging in this sort of business model, like the way that Kaiser Permanente owns hospitals and clinics in-house that go along with its own insurance plans.  Whether or not all of this is a good thing strongly depends on the behavior of the company itself.  If CVS’ actions spark similar buyouts on the part of competitors in recognition of the threat that vertical integration has to their own viability as businesses, it is possible this could end up being a net draw/slight loss to consumers who would have to pay somewhat higher prices in order for those companies to pay off their debts incurred in order to engage in the buyouts, but without a monopoly threatening the general well-being of consumers.

There are, of course, worse scenarios out there and there are many people who think about our dysfunctional health care system that are inclined to believe the worst.  For one, it should be noted that the move by CVS suggests that it views the real profit center of health care not in economies of scale for retail sales, but rather in seeking to use economies of scale as a way of squeezing more money out of taxpayer funded entitlement programs like Medicare and Medicaid, money which will ultimately come out of customers as employees and taxpayers rather than customers as customers themselves.  Of course, if other competitors are unable to compete with the new behemoth, assuming the buyout deal is approved, then the reduction of competition could allow CVS to use its increased leverage to squeeze customers on the one hand and taxpayers on the other hand, leaving such customers losers twice over.  This does not seem to be an unrealistic fear, as there has not been very many changes that are beneficial to customers and taxpayers in the health industry for some time, Medicare Part D perhaps excepted.

It is perhaps unsurprising that both horizontal and vertical integration are both in play in our health care industry, as the combination of rising costs and the paralyzing fear of uncertainty have led to a great deal of moves that have not been in the benefit of ordinary people, no matter what spinning and political grandstanding has been done.  We are in the sorry state that we can neither trust business to behave in an ethical fashion in the absence of regulation nor can we trust on the efficacy of government regulation in bringing any benefit to the general public as a whole.  In the absence of trust in institutions like companies and government agencies, one can only wait to see which of the more or less neutral to negative outcomes ends up happening, and how other companies will respond to this threat to their own bottom line and their ability to compete with one-stop health related stores.  One can be assured that they will not remain idle, even if what ends up happening is not likely to be greeted with a great deal of enthusiasm.

[1] See, for example:

Sports and Pagan Religion: A Preliminary Investigation

Posted in Musings | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Book Review: Leave It To Psmith

Posted on December 4, 2017 by nathanalbright

Leave It To Psmith, by P.G. Wodehouse

As someone who is quite fond of the works of Wodehouse [1], I must admit that the character of Psmith himself, who changed his name from Smith in school in order to distinguish himself from so many others by that name, was foreign to me.  The character study that Psmith provides is one that is entertaining, troubling, and highly relevant for contemporary society.  Psmith calls people Comrade, showing himself to be a socialist who, ironically enough, is a member of the Senior Conservative Club and who therefore is assumed not to be a thief even though he is, and he believes in the sort of practical socialism that actually steals property from the rich for the benefit of the poor rather than merely talking about it as so many socialists do.  That Wodehouse, whose skill at comic writing is often assumed to have been insensitive to the issue of politics, could use such matters thoughtfully and skillfully in a novel that mixes two of his sagas together is something that other people may not assume him capable of.  This book and the sharpness and cleverness of its wit is a reminder that we should not underestimate writers or assume them to be ignorant of politics simply because they choose not to make it the center of their works.

For the most part, this is a story that contains a great deal that is familiar to fans of Wodehouse, in particular his Blandings Castle series.  In many ways, this book marks the end of the Psmith saga, which had featured the hijinks of Mike Jackson and Psmith over the course of several novels, most of them about their experiences in school as well as in the city.  It also is towards the beginning of the Blandings Castle saga and helps to establish some of the themes of deception and imposture that mark so many of those entertaining and glorious novels.  At the center of this novel, and connecting so many of its threads together, is the figure of Psmith himself, a man of uncanny resourcefulness and a strong dislike for fish.  Finding himself impoverished after leaving a family job, he finds himself hired by Freddie to steal Lady Constance Kreeble’s diamond necklace in order to help out Mike and his wife Phyllis.  Meanwhile, he keeps on missing chances to meet the woman of his dreams over and over again, and finds himself invited to Blandings Castle as a poet in disguise, while more thieves find themselves drawn to the castle like moths to the flame.  In the end, true love and a bit of social justice prevail, with comedy all around, at least for the most part.

In many ways, this book is a combination both of familiar elements from Wodehouse’s other novels and some striking alterations that make this novel fresh and original as well as familiar.  This works for the best for the reader, who is left to appreciate the quirks of character as well as the loving descriptions of Blandings that have made his work so appealing to so many.  While the plot of this novel is somewhat madcap, as it generally is in a place filled with so many imposters so often, what stands out as being of enduring value is the characters and the way they are described.  Psmith is someone who claims to be a socialist and shows no qualms about repossessing property for the benefit of his friends and associates, and also someone whose quirks come off as generally appealingly odd.  Freddie Threepwood is dense and inconsequential but also someone of genuine decency and surprising persistence.  Eve is portrayed as conscientious and generally good-natured, a suitable match for the dazzling Psmith.  All of this speaks highly to the capacity of Wodehouse to keep control of his array of characters in all of their complexity.

[1] See, for example:

Book Review: Heavy Weather

Book Review: Summer Lightning

Book Review: Uncle Fred In The Springtime

Book Review: Blandings Castle

Posted in Book Reviews | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

Book Review: Something Fresh

Posted on December 4, 2017 by nathanalbright

Something Fresh, by P.G. Wodehouse

There is something intimate and familiar about this book, which ought not to be a surprise since I am particularly fond of the writings of the author [1].  It is remarkable, though, the extent to which this novel sets up several different sagas of the writer.  The most obvious one, of course, is the Blandings Castle saga, where the absent-mindedness of Lord Emsworth, the general shadiness of the efficient Baxter, the general ne’er-do-well quality of his younger son Freddie Threepwood, and the way that the castle itself attracts impostors of one type or another show themselves here for the first time and definitely not for the last.  In addition to that, though, there are references to Algernon Wooster, and that puts the reader in mind to the Wooster & Jeeves series, which is also a worthwhile series and well worth enjoying.  Wodehouse may not have intended writing a saga when he wrote this novel, but having written such a wonderful story, and having it be such a success, it was good that he returned to this world over and over again with great comic effect, to the extent that it remains an inspiration for readers as well as viewers of various British efforts to put the stories on the screen.

The plot of this story is not too surprising when one looks at the body of work of the author as a whole.  We have absent-minded Lord Emsworth absent-mindedly pocketing a priceless scarab and a massive cast of characters who want to pilfer the scarab back in order to collect the large reward being offered by the unsavory Mr. Peters, whose daughter is engaged to the indolent and not particularly bright Freddie Threepwood, at least until that young woman elopes with another gentleman to his abundant and surprising relief.  The novel itself contains another fortunate couple that spring together through some chance encounters and some remarkable similarities and mutual respect, while the novel itself contains some sparkling discussion of the immense complexities of servant life, which are well-drawn here in a way that demonstrates considerable knowledge of matters that most people would not be aware of, at least not without having watched Below Stairs or something of that nature.  The combination of a crackling plot and some immensely enjoyable characters make this a novel that was well worth starting a famous series.

It is perhaps somewhat ironic, therefore, that this novel would seem like something fresh the less familiar one is with the work of Wodehouse as a whole.  If this is one’s first encounter with Wodehouse, it does come off as something fresh, with the author’s skill with words and a lovable group of rascals and eccentrics at its core, as well as his skill in writing about the lives and ways of servants and the travails of being an underpaid writer, something that is all too easy to relate to for many people.  Yet if this novel is read after having read a great deal of Wodehouse’s work, it is not nearly as fresh, but is rather a book that is still worthy of being enjoyed, not least from the point of view of understanding how the Blandings Saga began.  If you like British comic fiction, this is the sort of novel that bears close study, not only as it makes for enjoyable and somewhat madcap reading, but also because it gives an idea of how one can write good comic fiction by writing about what one knows and having a great deal of wit in one’s dialogue.  Wodehouse would make a career out of writing long series based on compelling and odd characters, and quite a few of them make their debut here to good effect.

[1] See, for example:

Book Review: Blandings Castle

Book Review: Uncle Fred In The Springtime

Book Review: Summer Lightning

Book Review: Heavy Weather

Posted in Book Reviews | Tagged , , | 3 Comments

Nevertheless She Will Be Saved In Childbearing

Posted on December 3, 2017 by nathanalbright

[Note:  This is the prepared text for a message given at the UCG Portland congregation on December 2, 2017.]

Today I would like to start this message by doing a bit of a thought experiment [1].  I’m going to read a passage of the Bible that is not cited very often in messages, and for the ladies of this audience, I want you to monitor how you feel when I am reading this passage.  The passage in question is 1 Timothy 2:8-15.  1 Timothy 2:8-15 reads:  “I desire therefore that the men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting; in like manner also, that the women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with propriety and moderation, not with braided hair or gold or pearls or costly clothing, but, which is proper for women professing godliness, with good works.  Let a woman learn in silence with all submission.  And I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man, but to be in silence.  For Adam was formed first, then Eve.  And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived, fell into transgression.  Nevertheless she will be saved in childbearing if they continue in faith, love, and holiness, with self-control.”  If I guessed correctly as to how many women feel about this passage, there will be a sense of pushing back at it, and a certain sense of hostility about how passage is interpreted and how it is seen as relevant for believers today.  There may even be a great deal of feeling that Paul himself was somehow sexist and hostile to women.

This passage obviously deals with a larger context than I can cover in the short amount of time alotted to me today, but I wish to defend Paul in a somewhat indirect fashion.  This is a passage which is not a straightforward one, and the least straightforward part is what I would like to discuss as a way of entering into the passage as a whole and what it means and what its relevance is to us.  The last verse of this passage, I believe, offers us the best clue of trying to understand what the passage means as a whole when it says that the woman will be saved in childbearing under certain circumstances.  This verse and the surrounding passage have been subject to a great deal of speculation.  There are some people who view this passage as particularly sexist and misogynistic and as evidence that Paul was a knuckle-dragging troglodyte whose views are irrelevant for believers today.  I do not wish to add to the speculation about this passage that exists, but I would like to point out that an essential part of this passage is the fact that Eve was deceived in the Garden of Eden, while Adam was not.  Adam’s failure was a failure of nerve and a failure of courage to stand up for what he knew to be the truth, while Eve had the wool put over her eyes by the deceptive serpent.  Paul makes a big deal out of the difference between a lack of courage on the one hand and a vulnerability and susceptibility to being deceived and led astray on the other hand.  I would like this to be kept in mind as we look at the whole biblical context of this passage.

There is only one other passage in the New Testament that mentions Eve by name, and unsurprisingly it also deals with the issue of deception, and it was also a passage written by the apostle Paul.  Let us now turn to 2 Corinthians 11:1-5.  In 2 Corinthians 11:1-5 we read the only other passage in the New Testament that names Eve.  It reads:  “Oh, that you would bear with me in a little folly—and indeed you do bear with me.  For I am jealous for you with godly jealousy. For I have betrothed you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.  But I fear, lest somehow, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, so your minds may be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.  For if he who comes preaches another Jesus whom we have not preached, or if you receive a different spirit which you have not received, or a different gospel which you have not accepted—you may well put up with it!”  There are some similarities to the passage we read in 1 Timothy, especially in that Eve is mentioned as being deceived by the serpent.

Yet this passage does not have the same sort of strong language directed at women in particular that leads to such pushback.  After all, here Paul is not directing his language to women in particular, but he is viewing the entire congregation in Corinth as making up collectively a chaste young woman serving as the bride of Christ.  In fact, this passage shows Paul acting towards the congregation as a somewhat jealous parent who is trying to protect a vulnerable young woman from a sexual predator.  Paul speaks about the serpent corrupting an innocent Eve in language that can be uncomfortable to hear.  Those who preach a false gospel are compared to those who prey on the innocent and the simple and the naive, and Paul is clear here that this vulnerability is shared by the believers of his audience and not merely one portion of it.  This passage reminds us, if any reminder was necessary, that innocence is an insufficient defense against the evil that is present in this world, and that Satan is the original model for those who would corrupt that innocence and take advantage of those who are vulnerable, whether we are dealing with the fall of man, the safety of young people, or the well-being of congregations being protected from heretical preaching.

Let us go back, back to the beginning.  We have seen from 2 Corinthians 11:1-5 that Paul did not view women alone as being capable of being deceived.  Does looking at what happened in the Garden of Eden give us a greater understanding of what Paul was saying in 1 Timothy 2:8-15?  I believe it does.  Let us therefore go to the much more familiar passage of Genesis 3:14-17, which discusses the curses that came about as a result of the fall of Adam & Eve.  Genesis 3:14-17 reads:  “So the Lord God said to the serpent:  “Because you have done this, you are cursed more than all cattle, and more than every beast of the field; on your belly you shall go, and you shall eat dust all the days of your life.  And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel.”  To the woman He said:  “I will greatly multiply your sorrow and your conception; in pain you shall bring forth children; your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you.”  Then to Adam He said, “Because you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree of which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it’:  Cursed is the ground for your sake; in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life.””

The three curses given in poetic form by God in the Garden of Eden have a great deal to say about what Paul was getting at in 1 Timothy 2.  The curse that God gave to the serpent contained the first promise of a Redeemer that would break the curse of sin and evil, and is called the Protoevangelium–that is, the first Gospel–by many theologians.  Paul’s comments about the problem of usurpation of authority by women over men as well as the matter of childbirth are discussed when God says that bearing and raising children will be a matter of great pain and sorrow for many women and that the relationship between men and women will be fraught with a great deal of conflict.  None of us can deny that there is often a great deal of disagreement and discord between husbands and wives, many families that have been broken by abuse and divorce in this world, and certainly even in this room.  Likewise, the labor that we engage in is cursed and full of profitless toil as a result of living as flawed people in a fallen world.  The results of the fall of mankind are present in our lives and in the harshness of our existence.

What lessons can we learn from this?  Paul reminded the Corinthians, and we ought to be reminded ourselves, that we are capable of being deceived by false Gospels and putting up with what we shouldn’t put up with.  Likewise, in speaking to women in 1 Timothy, he pointed to the way that salvation reverses the curse upon mankind and womankind, reminding women to honor their husbands and respect authority rather than to subvert it.  Surely this is a lesson just as relevant in our time as it was in Paul’s time, perhaps even more so.  Even the suffering and pain of childbirth is redeemed ultimately through the birth and death and resurrection of Jesus Christ to crush the serpent on his head.  Even though we live in a world that is deeply broken and wounded by the effects of sin and evil, we who are called by God to serve and obey Him are to have our own lives blessed in such a way that the curse of evil in our world and in our lives can be redeemed and overcome.  May we, like the audience Paul was writing to, continue in faith, love and holiness with self-control, so that instead of a curse, we may bring a blessing in our families and among the lives of those we meet wherever we are.

[1] See, for example:

Pocatardis, Or, The Value Of Thought Experiments

A Pre-Mortem Thought Experiment On The Second American Civil War: Part One

A Pre-Mortem Thought Experiment On The Second American Civil War: Part Two

A Pre-Mortem Thought Experiment On The Second American Civil War: Part Three

To Write Love On Their Arms: A Thought Experiment

Posted in Bible, Christianity, Church of God, Love & Marriage, Musings, Sermonettes | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

Book Review: Samarkand

Posted on December 3, 2017 by nathanalbright

Samarkand:  Recipes & Stories From Central Asia & The Caucasus, by Caroline Eden & Eleanor Ford

My standards for cookbooks are not too demanding.  I enjoy reading about ideas for foods that I already know I like that are unusual and perhaps a bit exotic but above all sound tasty and are somewhat simple.  Like most people, I am not particularly aware of the cuisine of Central Asia although I have some interest in the area [1].  This book definitely made me curious about the cuisine of the area, and any time a book makes me want to eat the cuisine of an area, even a few dishes of that cuisine–and this book certainly does the trick–I consider it time well spent.  I read cookbooks to get ideas for new dishes and to at least expand my interest in trying new dishes and new combinations of food items, being a person of rather plain and perhaps even boring tastes, so this was definitely a pretty exotic set of cuisines to look for.  As Central Asia and the Caucasus have been places with a great many influences from Russia, China, the Middle East, among other places, the food is suitably diverse, which should suit many readers.

This book combines two genres together to good effect.  Most of this book consists of recipes divided into various sections based on the type of food they have as their base or the place where the foods come from:  a shared table (appetizers), soups, roast meats and kebabs, warming food for long winters, plovs and pilafs, side dishes, breads & doughs, drinks, desserts and sweetmeats.  Interspersed with this are various stories about travels or about unusual places and people that the authors met in the course of their exploration of the foods of the region(s).  This included mountain Jews of Azerbaijan, the second largest city of Kyrgystan, and the Pamirs of mountainous Tajikistan.  The stories are fascinating and they help provide a context for the recipes.  At first I thought the recipes were pretty undistinguished with a lot of ingredients I didn’t like.  The book warmed on me, though, and soon I was reading about omelettes with chicken and chestnuts, one-pot dishes with lamb, potato, and vegetables, flatbreads, tasty chicken dishes, and various rice dishes of interest including pumpkins stuffed with rice.  The amount of yummy dishes by the end of the book definitely met my hopes and expectations, which meant that I enjoyed the book far more towards the end than at the beginning when there was too much tomato, cucumber, and eggplant for my tastes.

As the authors note, there is a certain degree of romance in Samarkand as a place.  An entrepot of trade since before the time of Alexander the Great, the surrounding areas around the Black, Caspian, and Aral seas has been fought over by many empires and has accepted a great deal of influences from many areas.  This book did a good job at including a wide variety of ingredients ranging from hazelnuts from the cost of Trebizon to Russian vodkas and cakes to Korean spicy carrot dishes and kimchi.  Reading this book gave me the impression that there was a lot more to Central Asian cuisine than this book included, but also that there was much in this cuisine that would be enjoyable to try even if not all of the ingredients of that cuisine were to my liking.  As a person of fairly broad and somewhat experimental tastes when it comes to food dishes made with ingredients that I happen to like in new combinations and with herbs and spices, there was much that I found appealing and much that I think would be appealing to similarly adventuresome readers and eaters like myself.

[1] See, for example:

Book Review: The Empire of the Steppes: A History of Central Asia

Book Review: Mongols, Huns & Vikings

Non-Book Review: Lost World Of The Golden King

Uzbekistan And The War On Children

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Book Review: The Mac & Cheese Cookbook

Posted on December 3, 2017 by nathanalbright

The Mac & Cheese Cookbook:  50 Simple Recipes From Homeroom, America’s Favorite Mac And Cheese Restaurant, by Allison Arevalo & Erin Wade

A friend of mine has to cook mac & cheese for her father all the time, and so I have gotten in the habit of making jokes about all the ways that one can cook this familiar dish.  As a result of that joke, I wanted to see if there were cookbooks devoted to this particular dish available in my local library system and lo and behold, there was one.  As someone who is both generally fond of macaroni and cheese as well as well as reading cookbooks [1], I found this book to be highly enjoyable.  My general rule of thumb for appreciating cookbooks is if there are even a few dishes that are shown here that I want to try and might even be willing to cook, the book is a success, and by those somewhat modest standards this book definitely excels.  Can a restaurant make variations on one dish that are stellar and fill and entire book (albeit a short one) with different variations of mac & cheese and be successful and worthwhile?  Absolutely.

The book is organized in a very effective way to show off the wide variety of dishes that one can make with or around a base of mac & cheese.  The book starts with a discussion of the dream of the authors to start a restaurant based around mac & cheese that led them to leave lucrative careers as a marketer and a lawyer, respectively, in order to become restaurant entrepreneurs.  Beginning with a recipe of the essential mac sauce (also known as bèchamel sauce), the authors discuss the wide variety of cheeses as well as toppings that can be used for the dish and the importance of choosing the right salt, and even discuss their wine & beer pairings, which are given for all of the main dish recipes included here.  The first chapter of recipes includes American classics, which range from the classic mac to the spicy mac, an interesting variant featuring hot dogs and potato chips that is called trailer mac, a tuna mac, a chili mac, a breakfast mac with fried eggs and a few others, some including Vermont white cheddar and others featuring garlic.  The next chapter includes international varieties including Shepherd’s mac, a Mexican mac, a Cacio e Pepe that looks fantastic, a mac featuring a mix of gouda cheeses, and a patatas bravas mac with paprika that I would like to try for myself, among other dishes.  A chapter on experimenting with unusual ingredients includes a cold pesto mac, a classy truffle mac, a surprising vegan mac as well as some tasty looking dishes like four cheese mac, mac-cakes, and a mac & cheese dish with feta cheese called Mac the goat.  After this comes a chapter on side dishes including some really good looking dishes like roasted carrots with citrus vinaigrette, crispy blanched string beans, a brussels sprouts dish that I would use with turkey bacon and apple cider vinaigrette, a winter citrus salad, and minty, buttery peas.  The book closes with some desserts, some of which (like the dessert mac, seem rather striking continuations of the book’s theme) and others just sound delicious, like the carrot cake with cream cheese frosting, the peanut butter pie, or the strawberry crisp dish.  If you don’t find at least a dozen dishes here that sound absolutely amazing to try, you could probably stand to have a bit more adventuresome tastes and a bit more appreciation of the humble macaroni and cheese.

This book manages to combine two tendencies that are usually at odds with each other when it comes to contemporary cooking.  One of those is an appreciation of dishes that are humble and modest.  I grew up eating variations of these dishes largely because pasta is inexpensive and I grew up rather poor, and because these dishes are inexpensive to make and generally fairly quick to make, they are a familiar food for a great many people.  What these authors do in their book, and likely in their restaurant as well, is to combine a humble but versatile food with a great deal of class and variety to turn it into something that can be appreciated by the hipster gourmands that this book is aimed at.  The combination of humble and flexible foods that are not terribly expensive with classy presentation and inventive ingredients and combinations of dishes makes for a book that appeals both to modest and ordinary people as well as hipsters who are always looking for something different and odd.  This book manages to appeal to both audiences while presenting some foods that look amazing to try.  If their restaurant delivers even half of the promise that these dishes inspire through the excellent writing of its authors, it would be a must-try place in Oakland if I am ever in the area.

[1] See, for example:

Book Review: The Gourmet Jewish Cookbook

Book Review: The Oregonian Cookbook

Book Review: The Lost Art Of Real Cooking

Book Review: The Southern Cook Book Of Fine Old Recipes

Book Review: Colorado Cook Book

Book Review: Salads: Beyond The Bowl

Book Review: Salads

Book Review: The Artisan Jewish Deli At Home

Book Review: The North African Kitchen

Book Review: Jane Butel’s Simply Southwestern

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