Geoff's Miscellany

The medieval church utilized a four-fold system of Biblical interpretation which they labeled the quadriga. It attempted to interpret the Scripture in four senses:

1. Literal- This is the meaning of the passage in the context of the book that contains it.
2. Allegorical- This would be the significance of the passage as a type or allegory for the gospel or some aspect of the Christian life.
3. Tropological- This is the moral sense of the passage, describing how it might apply to the believer today.
4. Anagogical- This is the sense pertaining to the last day and the glories of the new heavens and the new earth.

1. Literal - This is the meaning of the passage in the context of the book that contains it.
2. Canonical Meaning - This explains the passage in its salvation historical context, how it fits into the gospel story, and whether/how it is fulfilled in the New Testament. This also compares the book to other perspectives in the canon. If the collectors of the canon included Chronicles and Samuel, they certainly knew about the utterly different perspectives on David. Thus, it would seem, that this level of significance might compare the historical utility or the rhetorical place of each perspective in the life of ancient Israel and even for the Christian today.
3. Tropological - This explains how the passage is morally relevant to the person today. Perhaps it is a negative example, such as Abraham's cowardice. It could also be a positive example, such as Paul's custom of working with his hands. I suppose here too, the use of imagination is important. Believers can see themselves in their struggles as somebody whose faith is akin to those listed in Hebrews 11. Thus, such figures, in their flaws and quests that seem irrelevant to us, become types for our own struggles to conform ourselves to Christ. Another example might be preaching Jeremiah's message of repentance and then immediately showing how his message was taken up by John the Baptist and Jesus.
4. Eschatological - This is a further exploration of the text's significance in salvation history, but with a view toward the eschaton. So, you see in stories about God's judgment (even ones that make no sense considering the New Testament picture of God) a picture of a final righting of wrongs on the last day.

Pro 15:14-19 The heart of him who has understanding seeks knowledge, but the mouths of fools feed on folly. (15) All the days of the afflicted are evil, but the cheerful of heart has a continual feast. (16) Better is a little with the fear of the LORD than great treasure and trouble with it. (17) Better is a dinner of herbs where love is than a fattened ox and hatred with it. (18) A hot-tempered man stirs up strife, but he who is slow to anger quiets contention. (19) The way of a sluggard is like a hedge of thorns, but the path of the upright is a level highway.

One of the amazing things about the world is how seemingly disparate things are connected in profound ways. One of these connections is between sodium bicarbonate (household baking soda) and intense physical exertion.

I use Sodium Bicarbonate for my heartburn when it comes up (less common these days thanks to eating less carbs), but I never would have guessed that it functioned as an ergogenic aid.

But. these studies indicate that it does:

Avery and I don't have any children except for a college student who rents from us are folks from the Sunday school class we joke about having adopted. But, many of our peers have children. So, she wrote this article that might be helpful for people in a similar situation. Go read it.

One of my favorite songs is by mewithoutYou.

It's part of a concept album about a train wreck from which several animals escaped. This particular song is about the Elephant, who in a previous song, you discover, caused the crash so her friends could escape. The song has several layers of intertextuality. For instance, the title is reminiscent of "God in the Dock" by C.S. Lewis and the Elephant is a sort of savior figure in the song. In real life, in the 1910s, an Elephant was hanged in Erwin Tennessee. And the chaplain has a brief line during his prayer/address to the people wherein he notes his Berkleyianism.

One of the questions I've always had is this: How does what the Bible teaches relate to the world outside of the text? Obviously, two true descriptions on one topic much coincide in some way. But if the Bible is unclear on a topic, can a field of inquiry into the same topic bring clarity to the topic, and thus to the Biblical text?

This question has an obvious answer to many people. The problem is that it is treated precisely as obvious.

If you want to read the whole list, find it here.

I just wanted to comment on his list because part of blogging is forcing yourself to write and part putting your thoughts upon the internet so that other people can ignore them.

Ephesians by Markus Barth. Barth was an outstanding lecturer in Basel. He was even a greater writer. Just read what he has to say about marriage in Ephesians 5 and see if you don’t agree.

So, I’ve always wanted a garage and due to some Deus Ex Machina in the history of my life, a local microbiologist with whom I am acquainted found work doing coral reef research in a far away land. So, my wife and I were offered the house for rent at a ridiculously low fee, probably lower than anything even remotely this size in town. In fact, apartment prices have been driven up very high since we moved out of the rather modestly sized apartment. If we were to get the next size down from our old apartment, it would be $100 dollars more than our previous place. This might sound cheap to some, but with local economics in mind, it’s exorbitant. I wonder if the oil field has driven up rental prices? Anyhow, back to the post. We live in the house and it has a garage (it also came with my friend’s children’s dog because it couldn’t go with them). The sad thing about this is that it was filled with a great deal of his things. He told me I could use all of it, and that with the exception of a select few items that, if upon inspection something turned out to be worthless, it could be throw away (they had to move suddenly).

I was typing an article in wordpress, which is usually a mistake, but I figured that I had quite a bit of battery life on my laptop. I had saved the draft several times and watched it autosave several times as well. Suddenly, with about 80% power, my laptop just shut off. The batter entirely discharged instantly and it won't turn on even when plugged in. Thankfully I just built a desktop. I bought the parts for the desktop and a new smaller laptop because I'm about to go back to school and needed a more powerful pc and a less heavy and less worn out laptop. The weird thing is that on my desktop the draft for wordpress is not available. It's like my browser was just going through the motions without actually sending any data to the wordpress servers. So the whole post is gone unless by some form of magic it is still in the ram on my apparently defunct laptop that I really hope is still under warranty.

And you, who at one point were, in terms relating to the mind, alienated [from God's people] and enemies [of God] by evil works, but now he has reconciled you in the body of his flesh through the death to present you holy and blameless before him, if indeed you remain in the faith, firmly rooted and steadfast and do not shift away from the hope of the gospel of which you have heard, which was proclaimed to all creation which is under the sky (heaven), of which I myself, Paul, became a representative (servant). Colossians 1:21-23 (my translation)